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One week more

Amelie has now been a member of our family 1 week more than she was an orphan.  Her adoption trip was an adventure and it took a while for her to learn to trust us and be a part of a family. But now we have a 3 year old joker on our hands who wants to do every.single.thing. her big sister does – whether she is allowed to or not! She loves to color, read books and do everything barefoot. It’s been so sweet to see her change so much in the last 20 months.

We love you Amelie!

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Christmas Eve 2010 – the last photo we received of Amelie before we traveled.

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Amelie in China on the day she was sworn in as a US Citizen.

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Amelie’s 2nd birthday – home 4 months.

Amelie's 3rd Birthday Party

Amelie’s 3rd birthday – home 16 months.

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On vacation at the beach in September 2012.

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Happy 6th Birthday Nadia!

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Oh sweet Nadia we are so blessed to have you for our daughter! Here are just a few observations about you today.

  • You are a silly girl and your laugh is contagious.
  • You learned to read in the last year and it’s exciting to see you reading all kinds of things now.
  • You love to use the camera you got for Christmas to make videos.
  • You are doing great in gymnastics and loving it.
  • You are such a great big sister to Amelie.
  • You love to help in the kitchen.
  • You are so curious about the world around you and how things work.
  • You are so creative and always making little crafts and gifts for others.
  • You are so compassionate when people are hurting.

We love you Nadia!  – Daddy, Mommy and Amelie

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Alice in Wonderland Unit Study

I was very excited to do our first Classic Literature Unit study from Erica over at Confessions of a Homeschooler and we decided to do “Alice in Wonderland.” Nadia is doing a great job strengthening her reading skills, but she still loves for us to read to her so this was a great way to build on our regular daily reading.

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The basic layout of this unit is to do a beginning worksheet where the child answers questions and then start reading the book. After each chapter we went to see what the activity was for the lapbook.

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Nadia showing Amelie her completed lapbook.

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Nadia really enjoyed this and by the end I knew that she was going to remember this book for a long time. Stopping after each chapter to complete the lapbook activity really reinforced the story for her. It also opened up some good discussions about how wild and sometimes confusing this book can be.

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I am looking forward to the next classic book unit study on our list!

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Flower arranging/wreath making

Wreath Making 2012

Before we went on our vacation Michael’s had a really big sale on all their fall decorating items. Nadia had been asking me for quite a while to teach her how to make a “fancy wreath”, so we bought everything and I told her that after our trip we would do it. I also picked out flowers and rocks so she could do a basic flower arrangement for the kitchen table with the really cool vase Mike got me for Mother’s Day.

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Everyone should make wreaths in pirate shirts.
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And wear their hair in 1980's ponies.

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I explained to her that you should mix up the colors and textures. I also had her place everything before we started to attach the items permanently.

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After the placement came Nadia’s favorite part of the whole lesson – she got to use the GLUE GUN!!!

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My little cutie with her finished work on the door.
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