Month: January 2011

Mixed Photos – November 2010

We went to the San Bruno Park and Leilani climbed the “big” boulder really well


For her Birthday she got to go to the Cavalia horse show



Short walk at Purissima Creek Open Space


That one is older, just found it

We found Flower-Ray at a thriftstore. Grandma had her made into a soft-bodied toy.

riding on Cherokee

Climbing the web in Junipero Serra Playground, which Leilani and I hiked to during the week. Getting back was an adventure, we tried a shortcut, but ended at fences, and had to go all the way back…

Andy took Leilani biking in an industrial SSF neighborhood and found the cool Windharp there

Andy still gets his haircuts at the worst possible place… so that Leilani can play there I suppose.

Kelby and Belen’s visit

November 21st:



Leilani send a Thank-You note for the nice game she received from Kelby and Belen


Dear Cats,

Nov. 23rd: Another unprompted letter:

Dear Cats I’m sorry
because we [won’t] be home
meow

The other side is even more interesting:

Cat
likes to stop
oil company

For (on the right, then continued on the left)
Millbrae
Nursery
School

Love From
Leilani K

Sign on the right says “save the earth”
Sign on the left: “Stop oil company”

Also note worthy: Check out what’s in the center of the earth, we do not have a map or drawing with a Hawaii centered view of the world anywhere, that was her idea (the mainland inadvertently switched sides, what’s drawn of it is the Golden Gate with the bridge)

Dear Mom

November 20th:

Leilani had a bad streak that ended about a month ago. She was moody, demanding, and pouting a lot. She was also sick, which probably had something to do with it. She was much better behaved this past month, but this week again she was whiny and showing signs of the old behavior.

Several times today, she couldn’t handle being told (rather nicely) that she needed to do something, and stormed off when we told her that wasn’t a good way to behave. She goes to her room, closes the door (or slams it, depending on how upset she is), and gets over it by herself. We find her playing or drawing nicely 5 or 10 minutes later, or she comes back out, and she usually apologizes, prompted or unpromted, now that she knows.

One time today, she came back 10 minutes later and showed this to Sonja:

We couldn’t read all of it, so we had Leilani read it to us:

Dear Mom
I’m sorry
that (looks like “about” to me) I was so schlimm (German for naughty)
I hope that I can
find a way to make [it]

better Love
Leilani

Although a lot of words are absolutely not recognizable some of them are, I’m pretty proud of her. She’s been practicing a lot of writing recently, dictating for us so we can write it down, then she can copy the letters. She wrote to two friends recently like this, to invite them for play-dates. She also copies the words on the covers of her favorite books, and sometimes tries to write words on her own like this.

But this is the first time she’s tried to write whole sentences and a whole letter all by herself. Now I just wish she didn’t have so many reasons to apologize and have to write letters like that :-)