These are a few of my favorite things

I felt like I was in the movie "The Jerk" where Steve Martin was saying, "all I need is this . . ." and he kept adding more and more things to his hands. If you don't remember the movie then this won't make any sense. Aminah has to have things just so. She has to have her blanky and bottle (at least in December it was her bottle, now it is her sippy cup). This picture was taken early in the morning one day before going to school. She wanted her blanky and bottle and then she added her baby. She is sitting on the box of wipes which was a perfect size for her at the time.

Merry Christmas!

This was the picture we sent out as our Christmas Cards. I went to have the pictures taken at a studio but Aminah cried and threw a fit. She seems to not enjoy having someone else take the pictures so I had my friend come across the street to take the pictures.

Look what my Mommy did this time!

Look what my Mommy did this time! She is a funny lady. She brought a tree into our front room while I was asleep. She put these strange things all over it with some lights and then told me "No-no" anytime I got close to it. Aminah woke up the day after Thanksgiving to a Christmas tree. Aminah got in trouble once at the sitters and the sitter had to tell her "No-no" and shook her finger at her and from then on whenever I told Aminah "No-no" then she would shake her finger at me and say "No-no." We had a lot of finger shaking during the month of December.

I love going to church!

Aminah loves to go to church. At this point (November 2005) she was just learning to smile for the camera. She didn't like having Mommy too far away. One thing she has always enjoyed was "people watching" so going to church gave her a great opprotunity to do just that.

Do all Mommies allow slides in the house?

Do all Mommies allow slides in the house? Aminah was just learning to slide and so I brought the slide into the front room so that she could practice.

Aminah LOVES music. Especially live music. We went to a benefit concert with Christian artist Clay Crosse in November (2005). My friends in Tehachapi, CA were fundraising for their adoption of their second child from China and Clay Crosse and his wife were also adopting from China. They were able to raise about $5,000 and now both families have their children home from China.

Aminah had a great fall. She was able to spend time at home with Mommy before she had to go back to work. We went to the pumpkin patch that was at Mommy's school and then on Halloween we went to school for the parade. That evening we went to visit friends. One of Aminah's favorite things at the time was bananas so it was only fitting that she dressed up as a monkey. She was even able to say "oohh, oohh, oohh" just like a monkey. It was