A Visit to Santa Claus 2009

Today we headed out to the mall to have Lizzie's Christmas Photo taken and to visit Santa Claus. The Christmas Photos will be posted later. Santa Claus was so fun. My sister stood in line with Lizzie and Guy and I met them at the end of the line. Lizzie walked right up to Santa with her list ... which she wrote with her peppermint scented candy cane pen .... and as soon as he asked her what she wanted, she showed him the list and they read it together. When she was finished, she sang Jingle Bells for Santa. Then she put her list in the Santa Mail Box. She is so sweet and just loved her visit to Santa.

School Picture 2009

Here is Lizzie's first school picture! She is getting so big and looks so grown up!

Four Years Ago Today.....

It is hard to believe that four years ago today, our lives changed forever. We were in Nanchung, China and Lizzie came into our lives. It is so hard to remember what it was like before we got her. We had a clean and tidy house, would go out to eat all the time and took little trips at the drop of a hat. No more! Everything takes planning....but life is so much better.

Lizzie is an amazing little girl and we would not change a thing in our lives! Click here to see the entry we made on "Gotcha Day"!

God Bless our Lizzie!

Halloween 2009

This year Lizzie wanted to be Snow White for her school pagent and Tinkerbelle for Trick or Treating and we aim to please. I could not get her to smile in the pictures. She was too anxious to go out and get candy! She had a great time trick or treating with Aunt Lisa and was completely wired afterward!

Lizzie's 5th Birthday!

I am still in shock as I write this. Our baby is 5 years old, or as she puts it, "One Whole Hand"! We can't believe it. Where did the time go? Her birthday is 9/20 so Aunt Lisa came over with a cake and we had a small celebration. We gave Lizzie her gifts: A Zaboo stuff animal (from Zaboomafoo) and a really cute little interactive kitten that purrs and coos when you feed it. As you can see from the pictures, she is very motherly towards it!

We had Lizzie's "Official Birthday Party" on October 10 at a place called "The Little Red Schoolhouse". It is a beautiful little hall. This year Lizzie wanted Princess Belle to come to her party and we didn't want to have two parties again, one for family and one for her friends. We were supposed to have three boys at the party, but two couldn't come, the rest were all girls. Princess Belle was quite the hit of the party. She sang, danced and did face painting. She was really wonderful. The kids all had a great time.

Lizzie As Tinkerbell

Ok, for a couple of weeks now, Lizzie has managed to squeeze herself into her size 2T Tinkerbell costume that she wore when she was 2 years old! She added her fairy wings and then asked me to make her hair like Tinkerbell! Of course, we needed to add some makeup! She looks so darn cute!

So, How Did Lizzie Like Her First Day????

In her own words, "Loved It"! She cannot wait to go back tomorrow. We picked her up at noon and Guy went up to the door to get her, as she was coming out, she gave one of the nuns a high-five! We wanted to celebrate so we went out to lunch and then to her favorite spot in the whole world... Coldstone Creamery! She loves the cotton candy ice cream! We are going to make it a tradition on her first day of school to have lunch and ice cream!

The school she goes to is wonderful! The sent home a communication folder with her first little bit of home work, which we did, of course more forms and a Kindergarten Handbook! Oh, and before I forget, her first fundraising packet for the year -- Yankee Candles! Picture of Lizzie at Stone Cold Creamery!

First Day of Kindergarten!

Well, the first day of kindergarten has arrived! Lizzie was beyond excited last night... seriously, Christmas Eve, Santa is coming excited. It carried over to this morning too. She was singing "I'm going to kindergarten," "I'm going to kindergarten" all the way to school. She could not wait to get out of the house!

Once we got to school, she became a little quiet, but you could tell she was still excited. Once her friends, Nicky, Anthony and Maddie arrived, she was all smiles again. When it came time for the kids to go into class, the teacher had them all line up. Lizzie came over and gave us a quick (I mean quick) kiss and hug and got into line! She waved as they walked into the classroom. No tears from our girl! :)

Guy and I held it together until we got back to the car. I started crying .. I just can't believe our baby is in kindergarten and will be 5 in about three weeks! Oh well, here are some pictures!

First Pictures in Uniform

We took these today to see how the whole outfit looks....OMG, she looks so cute! More on the first day of school.

Final Pre-K Photos!

Well, we are in the final week of Lizzie going to Pre-K. They had pictures taken about 2 weeks ago...needless to say, they are adorable!

Kindergarten next week....unbelievable!

July Update!

July was a nice quiet month for us. We decided we were going to have a stay at home 4th of July, just the three of us. Well, it tuned out that Guy's mom was home by herself, so on Friday night, Guy drove over to pick her up to stay with us for the weekend. Then, we wound up having my parents over for 4th of July for an impromptu barbeque! It was actually very nice. Lizzie of course decided to visit the neighbors at their barbeque .. she went right up on their deck, ate their food and played with their grandkids. It was close to 9:00 before we could get her in the house! She was running around having a great time - which is all that counts!

Then on July 6, I started my new/old job back at my old company. I had worked there for almost 20 years and left when the travel became too much after Lizzie came into our lives. I am working out of the Atlantic City office and loving it! It is so great to be back with my friends! The only downside is Guy is the primary person who drops Lizzie off at school and picks her up. We are all adjusting to the new schedule.

Let's see, we had my father's and my birthday this month too and started to get Lizzie ready for kindergarten! We simply cannot believe that our baby is going to be 5 years old in September and will be going to kindergarten.... where does the time go. More about school later!

Not too many pictures this month, but enjoy!

Fourth of July:

That's it for now...more at the end of this month... wait until you see Lizzie in her school uniform! Needless to say, the tears were flowing!

Finally A Beautiful Day in South Jersey!

Finally after weeks of rain and miserable weather we had a beautiful Sunday. We got the pool out early and Lizzie, with all of her toys was in there for a while! Here are some photos with our new camera. It is a Kodak Z980 12MP, 24X Zoom, Wide Angle Camera w/Smart Capture. We are just learning how to use it, but so far, the pictures have been amazing! These were the first outside shots. The one picture looks like Lizzie has water reflecting on her face is actually the sun reflecting off of our table!



My previous post had some random inside shots!