Leah week by week

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Practicing for the DANCE PARTY!

Leah dancing!

Hannah dancing!

Leah is 11 months old today!

One month left of formula, bottles, rear-facing carseat and calling Leah a baby! Leah is 11 months old today and is happier now more than ever before.

Pumpkin Patch Pictures

Hannah's favorite part of today...the Pumpkin Patch!

We needed to get out of the house tonight to let Daddy rest as he hasn't been feeling good today. So the girls went to the Pumpkin Patch...of course we forgot to wear our pumpkin shirts, oh yes, they have them but we'll have to go back and do it again!

This is Leah's first time at the pumpkin patch! She had no idea what to think or do!

Hannah, the pumpkin expert, had a great time!

Hannah really wanted to pull Leah around! Such a good big sister!

One day, three events, two very tired parents!

Yesterday we overbooked ourselves but had a very, fun day! We started our day by walking a two-mile path through Carlin Park in Jupiter for The Place of Hope Walk.

Team Thomas! Our friend Christi helped us all get together and we all raised about $1500 for Place of Hope! The Team that won raised over $4,700!

They had many signs throughout the walk to help educate us about foster care. It was definitely moving to read them as we realized how blessed we really are just by growing up in a family...which many children don't have. For more info on Place of Hope, visit www.placeofhope.com After already spending two hours in the humid, September heat we had a birthday party at another park for a girl in Hannah's class, Olivia. You're thinking oh a simple party at a park...wrong! After another two full hours in the heat at this park we had to go but Hannah certainly enjoyed playing on the playground, the balloon man, face painting, eating candy, popcorn, hot dogs, snow cones, and cotton candy, playing games and actually meeting Snow White, Grumpy and Dopey!

This is the first time Hannah has ever wanted to get her face painted! She surprised us as she really wanted to do it and "be like my friends." It's good that she's trying new things but it's hard to see her do things only because her friends are doing them. I guess that is how she learns what she likes to do and not do.

It' was Olivia's 5th birthday party. Olivia's the girl in the white dress in the middle. The girl next to Hannah and the boy on the far right are in class with Olivia and Hannah.

Then straight from the party we went to church as they have dinner there and we knew we needed to eat and listen to the service. We love going to church on Saturday nights and usually spend several hours just hanging out before and afterwards. Here are some pictures of the new God's Town area just for kids. Hannah will be going to her new classroom next weekend. The section in the video is for children in K-5th grade!

A music/worship room just for 4th and 5th graders!
Hannah's classroom!

Another room...for Kindergarteners, Hannah will have to wait a few years. The other Kindergarten room is the Art room in the video.

The God's Town Store!

Instead of cashing in their earned dollars for bouncy balls or yo-yos for themselves kids will be able to purchase goods for other kids in other countries. For instance $185 God Town's dollars = a goat for a family in India. $15 = a plate and a cup for a child in India. There were several other similar purchases available.

It won't be long now!

Leah has been practicing! Watch these two videos to see how she's trying to walk already!

If you get this message in an email please visit the website, www.hannahandleah.blogspot.com, directly as the video will not show through the email. Thanks!

Leah is 10 months old today!

Hi! This is Leah and I wanted to tell you that I'm 10 months old today! I'm having a tough week as I may be getting some teeth. I've had a fever, am not sleeping or eating well, and I'm cranky a lot. Mommy and Daddy are so happy that I am trying to take steps when they hold my hands. They think it's cute when I wave too! Oh what else can I do that they'll just love!?! We'll see...until then, love you all! Hope to see you soon! You know my birthday is coming up! It's my first one! I'm so excited at least that's what they say!


Oh yeah, and I love to wash my hands now! I just love crawling up the step stool and looking over. I love the water but not the yucky bubbly stuff, it doesn't taste good!

School time and Play time

Hannah has been going to school for not even 2 weeks now and we can tell already how much she has learned! Here are some examples and stories...

• Hannah is learning her days of the weeks...she has a song and has been trying to sing it to Mommy. Hannah keeps telling Mommy to just ask the teacher...she'll teach you!
• She loves to cut! Don't be alarmed if you open an envelope full of cuttings some day! She's very proud of her work!
• Hannah can recognize and LOVES to point out the American flag! She keeps saying "Mommy, there's your favorite flag!"
• She told us that her teachers taught her if she has to cough to cough into her elbow.
• She said if you know the answer you have to raise your hand and put your finger over your mouth!
• Hannah has made several friends. The ones she talks about the most are Olivia and Helena. She also tells Mommy ever day that Matthew keeps making those dinosaur noises again! Boys...
• She'll tell us that she misses Leah but she doesn't miss Mommy during the day.
• She really likes her teachers Ms. Julie and Ms. Lisa. She talks about them every day and pretended to call Ms. Lisa over the weekend to see how she was doing.
• Hannah has become more comfortable talking to others. We've seen her answer when asked "what's your name," or "how old are you?" Usually she just stares at the person. We've told her in the past that you can answer them if Mommy and Daddy are talking to them...but before school she never talked to anyone if she didn't really know them.

Leah has been adjusting to having Mommy all to herself. She really doesn't take a morning nap well anymore. She's a little young to give it up but we think she just likes being with Mommy and doesn't want to sleep. We are trying to get her use to playing by herself too as she hasn't since the day she was born. She's getting more use to having others watch her too as Mommy's been taking her to the gym a couple of mornings a week, and to church for different events. She's been doing good and we don't get paged anymore to have to go get her!

Playing at Daddy's work

We brought lunch today and ate it in Daddy's office. Then we played in the fitness room while Daddy taught class. Here is a cute video of Hannah and some pictures. Make sure to go to the web page, http://www.hannahandleah.blogspot.com/ as the videos do not work through the email. two seconds before she fell off the treadmill bumping her head then screaming!

Hannah could pick up this 6 lb ball! She looked like she was in the "strongest girl" contest!

Leah is 9 months old today!

Leah is 9 months old today and very active! Comparitively speaking...Hannah wasn't crawling until 9 1/2 months. Leah can crawl, climb up the stairs, and stand up when holding onto something! She's trying to catch up to her sister, who is also very active. Leah goes to the Doctor on Thursday for a check-up and shots. We will let you know her measurements and how she did then. Also, the countdown until her birthday has started...we are having her party on her 1st birthday, November 15th, so be thinking about your plans as we are thinking about it already!!

Visiting Friends and Family in Ormond Beach

We spent a week in Ormond Beach at Renee's parents' house as her family from TN was in town. Renee's parents were out of the country so we had the whole house to ourselves, which worked for all the stuff we needed for the girls! It had been over a year since Renee's cousins had gotten together so we thought it would be a good chance for them to play together and for everyone to meet Leah. The week went by fast but we had a lot of fun seeing friends and family. Here are some pictures and a video of us at the beach. The video isn't the best but it's all we could get with all the kids everywhere.

Ava Mantegna loved the pool but doesn't want to get in a float anymore. She's growing up so fast and now lives in Orlando with her parents, Julie and Chris.

Erin, Alli, Hannah, Emily and Leah- they are 2nd cousins?? Jennifer and Renee are cousins so what does that make them? Either way we all call each other cousins.

Aunt Jennie had fun with all the girls.

Andrea is a old family friend who's family was vacationing in Florida from TN as well. We finally got to introduce our girls as they were born on the same day, 6/16/06!

We had Jennifer (old friend of Renee's) and her family over and had the girls play together. Hannah and Saige are 2 days apart and became instant friends!

We went to see Uncle Jon's new apartment. Very nice! Hannah loved the fish and his roommates kitty until it hissed at her.


Uncle Jon was excited to play dress up, princesses, and watch movies with the girls! But I think he liked swimming with them the best!

The princesses had a great time at the Aunt Jennie's birthday party!

The famous "everyone to the slide" picture!

Renee's friends, Amy and Dorene, from 5th/6th grade- still friends, these girls where in our wedding too!

We are Disney crazy!

We spent two nights at Saratoga Springs Resort- a Disney Vacation Club to see how we liked the DVC resorts. We took a tour of their model rooms and of their new resort, Bay Lake Towers. We ended our quick trip with a DVC event where we got to meet Mickey and have a dance party with the Chipmunks! We all had a great time and love Disney even more!

Make sure you go to our blog to access the videos as you cannot see them through the email.

We're packed- at least Hannah and Leah are ready!

Fun together and fun altogether!

PGA National's Waters of the World

Thanks to Aunt Ann for watching Hannah and Leah for us...we had a half day date! We went to the gym for a run together, had breakfast, swam in the pools at The Waters of the World, and then had lunch at J. Alexander's! The pools were amazing! We could've stayed there all day. They have two hot tubs, one ice cold tub, a regular pool (this picture), a pool with water from France and a pool with water from Turkey (I believe...) Very relaxing!


Hannah has been wanting to go to "the park with the blue top." She can see this park from the highway. We loved it! The whole park is shaded by a big blue tarp. As you can see Hannah loved it! Leah had fun too but it's getting harder to keep track of what she touches as she's crawling everywhere now.

Picture of the WEEK!

The girls got a Princess playhut but it doesn't work quite right. We got it from a consignment shop so after calling them they said to keep it and they'd credit our account. Since it's free and the girls don't know it's broken they've had so much fun in it. Just look at their faces!