Our Huazhou Wonders

Mom called me at work on Friday to let me know that she and Grumpy had dropped off a swing set to kick off spring break! We'd hope to get it together in time for the girls to see it Friday evening but it took a little longer than expected (the slide was put together by shop light around 10:00 pm). Mom wanted to see the girls faces when they saw it for the first time so she came by on her way to work and had the first swing.
They really did swing sun up to sundown -you can see the sun coming up behind them in the first few pictures and the sun setting on their faces in the last few. They LOVE this thing!

Mary Clare is about to fall asleep right in the seat here. She did agree to come in and eat some macaroni cheese before collapsing into the top bunk with Margaret Rose. I didn't hear one single giggle after they got into bed!

They wanted to swing before leaving for the Palm Sunday Mass but finally agreed to wait until they got home.

THANK YOU POPO & GRUMPY!!!

Well once again it's been a while since I've been here. I am an awful blogger and am just in awe of all those folks who manage to post regularly. Anyway here is a review of the last month or so.

These pictures are from Sunday morning. Mary Clare loved this blue ballerina dress and just had to twirl it to church. I think she's been taking modeling lessons from her big sister.

Kid-tested. Mother-approved. And a way to teach geometry. Mary Clare enjoys making shapes on her spoon with Kix before eating them. This one's a flower. She also made a triangle, rectangle and a square.

St. Patrick's day 2009

Margaret Rose came home from school on the 16th telling us she needed some leprechaun clothes or the leprechauns would bite her!? We're a little confused over the biting thing. Maybe she got the words pinch and bite confused or maybe there's a new St. Paddy's day tradition that we don't know about. Anyway, thanks to the lesson learned from the groundhog day

debacle :-), Margaret Rose had the perfect ensemble and was a happy, happy girl. Mary Clare kept insisting that leprechauns were just fiction but changed her mind when she woke up to find a glittery green leprechaun trail that led to a shamrock colored bag of goodies. She and Margaret Rose were sitting on the floor in the kitchen looking through their treats when Mary Clare announced , "Well Margaret Rose, I guess you were right. There really are leprechauns!"

She's happier than she looks here- I promise! The flash just kept making her blink.

At school I read Jamie O'Rourk and the Irish Potato for story time and Mary Clare filled everyone in on who St. Patrick was. Remember that MC likes to share the Bible story from the night before with her class each morning so she was all too happy to extend that and tell them that St. Patrick was a good man of the church who was a priest just like her Father Lyon. Since Mary Clare has to wear a uniform at my school (she loves it) we got her some festive head gear to sport in the car on the way to and from school. Since the shamrocks blinked she christened them "glowinators".

Once home the girls did some posing and playing in the yard.

Margaret Rose's after school program is wonderful. They keep the children active and do some creative things with them. They had a talent show on Friday afternoon and taught the children who didn't want to perform an individual talent several songs and dances so that everyone could take part. Mary Clare and I had to fly up the road to get there on time but we were so glad we did. Margaret Rose's group performed the Tootie-Tot and a really funny song about peanut butter and then Margaret Rose joined the bigger kids in a line dance. She was precious!! We were all so proud especially little sister. MC kept saying, "That's my sister! Go Margaret Rose!"

Miss Margaret is hardly going to have any teeth left. She lost 2 in one week!

Here's Princess Fluffypuff the Princess of Puffs making her throne. Actually I think she's dressed her horse Lucky up as a princess too and is preparing for a coronation.

Our local Adoptive Families Group went ice skating one Sunday afternoon. The girls, who have never been before, insisted that they knew how. MC said, "I can do it! I watched Max & Ruby." Okay. I fully expected them to try for 10 minutes or so and then give up in frustration but my girls persevered and had a fabulous time. By the end they both could skate a little by themselves and had to be dragged off the ice. Margaret Rose got lots of compliments from some of the bigger girl skaters there. They said she did a wonderful job and skated better than they did their first times. They made 2 new "China girl" friends too!

We had another no-snow snow day on March 2. All weekend the forecasters predicted 3-6 inches for our area. Most districts had cancelled school by 5:00 Sunday afternoon. Around 9:00 pm dry air pushed into the area and the snow event fizzled. Luckily we'd kept the girls from hearing anything about the possibility of the white stuff so they ended up being happy just to have an extra day to play. We spent most of the snowday cooking. We made pico de gallo and guacamole and then put them in a 7 layer dip. Then we cooked onions, peppers and mushrooms and made quesadillas. The girls LOVE to cook so they had a blast. Now I have to preface the following pictures with the note that we seldom drink. Nothing against it- we just don't. We might buy a few bottles of beaujolais nouveau each year to have during the Christmas season but that's basically it and the girls rarely watch TV. So I was more than just a little surprised to come into the kitchen and find my baby girl sucking a lime and licking salt off her hand. Now unless Max & Ruby or Caillou have taken to doing tequila shots I have no idea where she got the idea but she was quick to assert , "This is sooooo GOOD!" with a huge grin. I keep imagining my wild child in college and it's a little scary :-)

My party girl looks like she's been in a brawl thanks to fall into the guinea pig cage.

Margaret Rose's class made hats to celebrate Read Across America day. I think she likes her new knot dress better. She sure got a ton of compliments on it. When we went for her IEP meeting, the school secretary just went on and on about the dress. She thought it made MR look like Heidi!

The girls are interested in so many things! Tonight they wanted to learn how to write music notes.

Even though it was still February we had some gorgeous spring-like weather and used one afternoon of it for an inaugural playground visit. The new play structure is really wonderful and the girls enjoyed themselves.

After doing some research we knew that our friend Moose the guinea pig needed a much larger cage. Lee brought home the materials and the girls and I spent a little over an hour one Sunday afternoon building the cube and coroplast cage. They worked hard and did a lot of the measuring, cutting and taping themselves. I was proud of them and Moose showed his appreciation for all the new space by entertaining them with an evening of squeals and popcorn jumps.