Hey everyone. I'm sorry I have been MIA on here since the middle of November. The Thanksgiving and Christmas seasons kept me super busy. I got a short cold in the middle of December, so that didn't help things.
I wish I could do some long picture-filled amazing recap of 2022, but I just don't have the time right now. I do plan on catching up on November and December here soon.
I am finding it harder and harder to get to my blog to write, but I'm not ready to give it up yet. It is still my hobby and something I love to do, so it's not going completely away.
2022 was filled with ups and downs - just like every other year.
I started the year with bronchitis, got Covid on Mother's Day and had a bad cold at Christmas. I had heart testing done in the summertime which was stressful, but the good news is that everything looked good in that department.
Sadly, my uncle passed away in February, a friend from middle school passed in March at just 48 years old from cancer and Doug's dad passed from cancer as well in June. Definitely some very sad losses.
Happy and positive news from 2022 was Briana turning sweet 16, getting her driver's license and doing great in school. Doug and I celebrated our 25th wedding anniversary in May. Doug, Bri and I traveled to Denver in April and New York City in September. We also visited Savannah, Georgia so Briana could attend a college camp at SCAD.
We saw three musicals in 2022 (Mean Girls, Beetlejuice and Anastasia), and Doug and I attended the Elton John concert in September.
Our family has a lot to look forward to in 2023 including a trip to Walt Disney World in February, a trip to Savannah in the summer so Bri can attend the SCAD camp again, Bri's senior year and both Doug and I will turn the big 5-0 in 2023.
So, I will start blogging and catching up again in a few days. Thanks again to everyone who continues to follow our journey on this blog. I am seriously one of the last China adoption bloggers left in blogland, so thanks for sticking around.
Now that I've wrapped up Halloween on the blog, I can give you a high school update. I honestly cannot believe Bri is just a couple of weeks away from being done with her first semester of junior year. Junior year is no joke, but she is doing very well.
Her grades are good and she had some social drama earlier in the school year, but she's on the other side of that now and things are really good.
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She's been taking an online SAT course to help her make a strong score when she takes the test on December 3rd...
I'm nervous for her, but I know she will do well. And if her score doesn't end up as high as she is hoping, she can always study and take it again. I swear - it doesn't feel that long ago since I took the SAT. Time goes so quickly.
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Briana was invited to be in NAHS - the National Art Honor Society. She was very honored and excited! There was a small induction ceremony that took place in October...
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About a week after Briana started this school year, she decided to do her own challenge. She owns so many graphic t-shirts and she wanted to wear a different shirt each day until she went through them all (not including school, club or volunteer shirts or Doug's business t-shirts).
So for 40 school days (excluding her deca club field trip and school picture day), she wore a different t-shirt (and I documented it). It was pretty fun to see in all her shirts (TV shows and movies, cartoon characters, Broadway shows, places we've visited, concerts we've attended, etc)...
Bri's
friend Mary went to her homecoming dance (at a different school) later in the month. And Bri's
friend Imerie went to her homecoming dance same day as Bri (same school as Bri), but attended
the earlier dance (freshman/sophomores and junior/seniors had separate
dances due to overcrowding). I got all nostalgic the night Mary went to
her dance because I remember when all three girls were so dang little.
And now, they are beautiful young women. Where did the time go?
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As you know, Briana is a member of beta club. And for beta club, she has to volunteer for several hours for an outside organization. She volunteers for a local art museum and she really enjoys it. In October, she volunteered for the "Cowboy Festival" event. She was at one of the craft booths helping kids make crafts...
Here is Bri with the volunteer coordinator Tiffany...
It was the most beautiful day, so Doug and I decided to hang out there while Bri worked and enjoy some of the festivities.
There were several really neat acts - Mexican rodeo horseback riders (CharrerÃa), actors who reenacted the Gunbattle at the OK Corral and a Native American dance troupe...
This gentleman (below) is an expert on the OK Corral and was a consultant on the film "Tombstone"...
It was a really entertaining afternoon and I wish Bri could have enjoyed the acts and not had to work it!
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And lastly, Briana worked really hard the last several weeks in her theater class on sets for the school musical "Little Shop of Horrors."
There were performances on two different weekends with two different casts. Bri wanted to check out both casts, so she went the first weekend with her friends Mary and Meredith...
Then Doug and I went with her the second weekend to check out the musical (and see Bri's hard work).
The sets turned out amazing! Bri and her theater classmate drew, sawed, cut, painted and nailed the set together. Bri drew the arch over the window freehand (and someone else cut it out). She even had the idea to use the wrong word "flour instead of flower" and cross it out on Seymour's counter in the flower shop.
The Audrey II puppets were rented (they would have been too difficult to make!) and it really added to the show. The kids were so amazingly talented and the show was so entertaining...
Her class even got a thank you shout out in the playbill...
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I'm going to step on a soapbox for just a minute.
I will say, I wish the auditorium had been completely full the day we went. But it wasn't. And Bri said the weekend before, it was even less crowded. These kids worked SO hard and it showed. When musicals were presented when I was in high school, they were a big deal and the seats were filled. I wish our school/students/parents cared as much about non-athletic events as the athletic ones. Sports, mainly football, are seriously life at B's school (football gets most of the school's funding to prove it). Honestly, there is a lot more to life than football.
Stepping off my soapbox now.
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So that is the update. It's all good! Just a few more weeks of Pre-Calculus, American History and Spanish II for B. Next semester she'll be taking World Lit, Physics and Painting. And she gets to take theater again - which makes her happy!
A few weeks before Halloween, Bri started talking/texting with her friends Mary and Meredith about possibly trick or treating for Halloween. They thought about what/who to go as and they decided on The Plastics from the "Mean Girls" movie. I thought it was an amazing and super fun idea!
They wanted to decorate their trick or treat bags, so about a week before, Bri invited the girls over to work on them...
They turned out so great!
I helped Bri out picking/ordering pieces for her outfit - she was going as "Regina George."
Once we put her outfit together (including the designer sneakers and purse we bought in NYC), I of course had to do an early photo shoot of Bri...
We had so much fun doing this little photo shoot. She was working the character! LOL!
Then Mary and Meredith arrived on Halloween and they looked absolutely amazing too! So another photo shoot was a must with all three of them (I love how they were working their characters!)...
They had a "mocktail" before leaving for trick or treating...
And Bri snapped a photo for me while they were out and about...
I'm so glad they had such a good time. These girls couldn't be further from being true mean girls, but even at 15 and 16 years old, it is still fun to dress up and pretend!
