A Big Day for Anna

Today was almost like Christmas for Anna.  It was a day she had been anticipating for quite some time.  Her braces came off!

Here is Anna before:

And here she is after:

Both of my kids were teased about their teeth.  I am thankful that we are able to afford braces for them.

Anna doesn't like to see pictures of herself "before".  All she can see is her teeth.  I think there are some painful memories tied up in that for her.  It's too bad, because I have so many adorable pictures of her.  I hope some day she will be able to look at the pictures of her young years and remember the happy times.  I am sure pictures going forward will be much happier for her.

Sea Glass

When we were in the Bahamas we enjoyed one day at a beautiful private beach.  While there, we  found several pieces of sea glass.  I prefer looking for the glass rather than for shells.  Usually it is more difficult to find and I enjoy the challenge of that.  This day, however, we found it in abundance.

There is one piece in the picture which I particularly prize: the light blue which is resting in a shell near the center of the picture.  I absolutely love that color.

Hummingbird

I just ran across this photo which I had wanted to share months ago. I managed to catch one hummingbird outside our window. There had been 2 fighting, but one flew off before I could get my camera (phone) ready.

News!

I am happy to share the news that we have purchased a home. This will be our back yard. The details worked out very well. We will close in two months and then the sellers will rent it back from us for two months. Since we still have 6 months until the end of our lease, this is perfect.

 The house has all of the space we wanted, including a small guest suite. My Dad spends Christmas Eve with us (he lives very close by, but since my Mom passed away he doesn't like to go to an empty house on Christmas.) My MIL stays occasionally; eventually she will stay with us for longer periods of time. We also have other visitors from time to time. They will now have a nice bedroom and full bath to use comfortably.

 We call the area the house is located in Yangmingshan. That is the name of the area where we lived in Taiwan and this vaguely reminds us of our Taiwan location. "Shan" means mountain; we lived on Yang Ming Mountain and the road to our house was steep and curvy. It is the same here. Though technically we are in the foothills rather than on a mountain, the drive is at least as steep as it was in Taiwan and the initial curves are very similar. So it feels familiar and good when we drive up the hill.

Soon I will need to begin preparing for another move. I am hoping the frequency of moves slows down now. We recently celebrated our 17th wedding anniversary. In those 17 years we have lived in 11 places. The new house will make it 12. So I think some settling might be in order. Unless, of course, the company wanted us to move to Italy...!