Easter - April 4, 2010

Καλό Πάσχα! 

Disney March 2010 - The Big Meet Up

 We traveled to Orlando by auto-train to meet up with Grandma, Uncle John, and Aunt Sue.  This would be the first time they met Sophia.  Instant family; it was as if she'd been a part of us for years.  I can't imagine what a culture shock it was for her being at Disney World.  

We had a wonderful time; it's almost hard to have a bad time in Disney World.  Sophia posed with every princess character she could find and wanted to try every ride she saw.  

We met up with Grace Shirley, who was in the same orphanage as Katerina and also adopted in March of 2006.  She is doing very well, although her mother says she frequently has night terrors.

Lunar New Year Feb. 14, 2010

 Families with Children from China (FCC), along with the Organization of Chinese Americans (OCA) and Westchester Association of Chinese Americans (WACA) held a celebration of the Lunar New Year at New Rochelle High School on February 6th, 2010.   

Included:  Dinner, Traditional Dance Performances, Dumpling Making, Children’s Activities -  Arts & Crafts Room, Young Kids Fun Room,  Concurrent Workshops Ribbon Dancing, Lion Dancing, Paper Cutting, Dumpling Making, Erhu Demonstration/ Play-along, and Calligraphy. 

Sophia looked stunning in her QiPao.  I don't know what she thought of the Chinese American way of celebrating  She palled around with Molly and Lia

Christmas Excitement

Sensory Overload!  It was a whirlwind of Christmas celebrations; home, George & Deb's, and Uncle Bobby & Aunt Suzie. Although she had never experienced anything like this she had no trouble getting into the Christmas spirit. We did not, at this time, emphasize the religious meaning of the holiday since she was brought up as an atheist in China.  Time for that later.

Sophia loved all the gifts under the tree and had so much fun opening gift after gift.  Most of all she loved the joy of being together and celebrating with friends and family.  On New Years Day we met up with the Dan Lewis and Mary O'Neill families which had become somewhat of a tradition the last couple of years. 

The Westchester Mall with Cousin Kara

 We met Gail and Kara at the Westchester mall so that they could meet Sophia.  Kara is a BIG fan of Build-A-Bear and has an obscene number of stuffed bears from there.  Sophia & Kara built matching Hello Kittys.  Katerina's floppy-eared bear is not pictured.

Moved pictures from one post to this one.

Katerina's holiday concert (Kindergarten and First Grades) was Tuesday morning at school. She was so excited that she wasn't sick for it. The kids have been rehearsing for months and it would have been such a shame if she missed it. After the concert, the parents were invited back to the classrooms for refreshments. I was in charge of preparing the edible snowman craft so the night before we created prototypes so that the kids would have an example to follow.

The Holiday Concert

Sophia Update

Today is Sophia's 12th day in school. She is adjusting well and enjoys her ESL, Math, Music and PE classes. She is not fond of her Home and Careers class because she's totally bored. She's eating American food in the cafeteria with "her students" as she calls them. Yesterday she had a hamburger. I thought she might want to bring her own food but she's determined to fit in. She's diligent about homework and is actually putting a tremendous amount of effort into it. We have worked out an arrangement where I will type any text she has into Babel Fish and translate it so she can understand what she is supposed to read or what the questions are. She will then type her answers or narratives into Babel Fish in Chinese, translate it into English and then copy the English onto whatever documents she is working with. She's meticulous with her work and so proud when a teacher tells her she did a good job on something.

She's picking up English more and more and we are actually having conversations in English; not very complicated ones of course, but several back and forth sentences with no need to run for the translator. But there are so many things I want to talk to her about or ask her about that will just have to wait. I want to know what's going on in her head. Is she lonely, homesick, scared, happy, optimistic for the future, etc. etc. She is probably feeling all those things; but even if she confirmed her feelings, then what? Where can we go from there? We will just have to be patient and for now, focus on building trust and helping her feel secure.

A New Week

Saturday was the first day everyone started feeling a little better so we decided to cautiously have an outing to get a Christmas tree. Most years we make a day of it and go up north to cut down a tree but this year we thought 10 minutes in the cold weather would be about all we could handle. We found our tree in record time.

Deck the Halls

Sophia has never decorated a Christmas tree and exclaimed over every ornament. "ohhh cuuute"

Sophia had the honor of putting the Angel on top

The Happy Decorators

The week before, Constantin had set up the Dickens Village which she also exclaimed over.

Just Shoot Me

I'm living in a Petri dish. Since the Tuesday before Thanksgiving (11/24), we have been under seige from viruses. First it was Katerina with H1N1 which cleared up the day after Thanksgiving. That weekend, Sophia and Constantin came down with something; fever, sore throats, etc. On Wednesday everyone was back at school/work; I was free and had a delightful lunch with a friend. Thursday was ok, but it was too good to last. Friday Katerina was sick again and continues to have a fever and cough. She's been in the house since then except for a trip to the doctor; thankfully no pneumonia. I came down with something Monday night which seems to be on its way out and Constantin was in bed all day today with fever. Other than that, things are great! :)

Sophia has had 5 days of school so far. She started the day before Thanksgiving, but with the holiday break, her illness and a snow day today, it's only been 5 days. She likes going to school and is comfortable in most of her classes. She does her homework every night, does an hour of Rosetta Stone English learning and takes Taekwondo 2 nights a week. She would also like to take piano lessons.

Some images over the last week:

Coming home from school - "Aw Mah, would you stop with pictures?"

Katerina playing Wii - that's as much as activity as she has had all week.

FCC Winter Holiday Party

Everyone's favorite Panda was there with a few of the party attendees

Sophia had a great time with the older girls who attended the party. She really seemed to connect and was disappointed when the party was over.

Let It Snow

And to make the day even more special, she saw snow for the first time!! I explained to her as we drove to the party in the rain that if the temperature dropped to 32 degrees or below it would change to snow. I don't think she ever connected snow with rain. She kept a look out all day at the party, out the big windows as snow began to fall. On the way home, she pointed to the temperature gauge in the car that said 34 degrees and said "Mah, why?" It wasn't the time for a lesson in meteorology so we just listened to Christmas songs and drove home as it snowed. I was surprised that Sophia knew "We Wish You a Merry Christmas" in English, and "Jingle Bells" in Mandarin.

Daddy met us as we drove up and a mini snowball fight ensued.



Katerina was so disappointed to miss the party, but very happy the Panda did not forget her when he handed out presents.

The next morning; more fun in the snow. Wait till we get one of our big ones. She has no idea!!