Working Hard and Saiya's Birthday

I was away working in Massachusetts for the weekend.  There was a problem with the treatment machine, so I was able to come home a day early.  I had been gone for four days.  Poor Chris was doing a great job with Saiya while I was gone.  She still wont let him rock her at night or read her a story (apparently, thats a Mama job).  Everynight she would crawl into bed and make sure he knew that "as soon as mama comes home, chee chee (kiss), rock me, read me".  Then thunk!  Out like a light.  Poor thing.  So when I got home one day early, we were running around town to get some more wood and stuff for the little fort I was building for her.  The whole entire car trip she was singing "Happy!  Happy!  Happy!  i'm so HAPPY!!"  I said, "why are you happy?"  She replied "Cause I love the mama!!  And the Baba!  And it's Mama, Baba, and Saiya!".  AWWWW!!!  Its hard to work and be away, and feels so good to some home to a happy little girl!!  (above is the fort I built for her out of left over fence pieces, it came out GREAT and the kids LOVE it!)

On another note, today is Saiya's birthday!  Happy birthday baby!  We are planning a party at the same ranch where she went for her Christmas Pony Ride.  We did not invite that many kids, but I know she will have fun.

As a follow-up to my last post, I found a purple Violin on EBay for real cheap (who knew they even came in that color!?), so I bought one for her birthday!  :)  I hope she likes it and that having something that she loves will help foster her love of music.

First Violin Lesson

We signed Saiya up for Violin lessons last week.  Monday was her first lesson.  Her teacher is very nice and has a daughter who started on the violin when she was 3!  Saiya was a little grumpy at the music lesson because she had been running around with her cousin, playing hard all day (there was no school).  She was being somewhat cooperative when Ms. Dana, her teacher, was going over the parts of the violin.  After about 20 minutes she was pretty much done listening and became really cranky.  The 1/4 violin that I rented was entirely too big for her.  We had to measure her and get a much smaller one (a 1/10).  Who knew they come that small!!  I hope she likes it!  I promised her that if she practices really hard and really likes it, I will buy her a purple violin- which she specifically requested about a hundred times (can you guess what her favorite color is??).  Next week she should be more cooperative since she wont be playing with her cousin all day and be so tired.  :)  Here's hoping!

Our Visit with Wei Ying (aka Annie)

When we were getting ready to travel to China, we thought we would have the opportunity to travel with two other families. As it turned out, we ended up traveling to China alone and two of the other children in the SWI where Saiya is from left before we traveled to pick her up. One of those little girls was Wen Wen, who we saw over Christmas break in Indiana, the other was Wei Ying, who we saw this past week while her family was visiting Florida.

Wednesday night, we invited her family over for dinner. We had a nice relaxing time with Jeanne and Andy while the girls played. As soon as Annie (Wei Ying) walked into the house, she looked at Saiya and said “You Ai!!”. She recognized her immediately. It was so cute that she remembered who she was!

The girls played for a couple of hours and then the next day, we all went to the zoo. The zoo was awesome! It was the second time we have taken Saiya to the zoo.  She LOVES it!  It was too bad the giraffes were not out so that we could feed them.  The rhinos were very cooperative though!

The girls had a great time! I am so glad that Saiya got to spend a little bit of time with her friend from the orphanage. Many thanks to her family for taking the time out of their vacation to come and visit with us!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Saiya had a Valentine's Day dance today at school.  All of the kids were supposed to dress up in fancy clothes for the party.  It was SO cute!  Here are a few pictures I thought I would share.

Happy Valentine's Day everyone!

6 Month Home Study Visit

Friday, we had our 6 month home study visit.  We had not seen the social worker for over a year and a half, although it didn’t seem like it has been that long!  She was really impressed with the progress we have made with Saiya and how well she is adjusting.  As soon as Saiya realized that the social worker was there to see her, she was all about the attention.  She kept wanting to show her all her toys and her room and then insisted on sitting down and reading to her.  We talked about how well she is doing in school and where we are with attachment and bonding.  We are really very lucky, (and happy) that we have no issues in either of those areas.  I think that the social worker was a little surprised at how outgoing Saiya is.  We had a nice lunch of simple sandwiches, showed the social worker pictures of our family with Saiya (to be sent to China with the home study report) and then the visit was over.  Saiya even gave the social worker a hug before she left.  I know that she left knowing that Saiya was a treasured part of a good family!  I can’t wait until the 1 year home study visit and see how much she has grown and adapted to our family!

Fun Filled Weekend!

This weekend, we had a great time!  On Saturday, Saiya had dance class.  Saiya still LOVES her dance class!  Her recital is May 22 and she is so excited!  They are doing a little tap dance to a medly of Elvis songs.  It is too CUTE!!

After dance class, we went to Umma’s and Umpa’s house for the day.  Saiya got to go to Rockledge Gardens’ little bug club.  They made mini worm compost buckets.  Saiya loved making the garden sign, she even wrote her own name!  She wasn’t too happy about picking out the worms, and wouldn’t hold them in her hand.  She would, however, poke at them with the little shovel that came with the bucket.  Poor wormies.  After we made the buckets, Umma bought her a flower to put in her garden and then took us out to ice cream.

After we got back to Umma’s house, Saiya played with a puzzle with Umpa.  She had a blast!  I’m still amazed at how long of an attention span she has.  Umpa said she will be working on her Ph.D. By the time she is 20.  Hahaha!!

Saiya had a great day!

Birthday Party at the Ice Rink

Sunday we had Sebastian’s birthday party at the ice skating rink.  Saiya has never been on skates before, but she had a blast!  Most of the time, I was holding her hand, but she can skate pretty well on her own without needing to hold both hands.  She’s a natural!  Its too bad that we don’t have a skating rink closer to our house.  This one is about 35-40 minutes away.  She had fun though!