Just Because

I was just playing with the camera, taking pictures of the princess. She was building with blocks and I was snapping away. Sometimes I could even get her to pose.

 Here, I asked her to give me a fancy look, this is the expression I got...funny kid!!!!

                                                                           Her tower

colouring.....

This morning Miss Diva and I will working on some A B C recognition and secondary colours. At the end of the first few pages, there was this page. She got down to work and did her best colouring it. She loves to colour and thinks it very neat that she is almost able to print her name on her artwork.

Gift from her Mongolian/travel group friend

 The family that travelled with us to Hohhot, sent the princess a gift. She was super excited when I told her it was from her friend Eloise. Look at that smile!

Isn't the dress just adorable? She wanted to try it on right away and take pictures to send to Eloise. Look at the smile on her face, she loves this dress and asked if she could wear it tomorrow. Thank- you to our friends.

Game On!

All day Sunday we stayed @ home. I did some much needed cleaning and a little baking. Then in the evening, we played games with the princess. She loves games and we love playing games with her.

Our first game was Candyland. She beat me and baba with no help and keep saying" nana nana boo boo, you can't catch me." Funny kid!

 Our second game of choice was trouble. She had a hard time pushing the pop-o-matic but with lots of coaching and telling her to use her strong muscles, she figured it out!

                                              We had a fun and can't wait to do it again.

1st Chinese New Year Celebration 2013

We arrived a little late and they were already in the mist of doing the dragon dance. Miss Diva heard the loud music and completely freaked out. I removed her the room and we chatted about the dragons and how they were just people dressed in costumes and I would never allow anyone or thing hurt her. She was okay to return to the celebration as long as she could sit on my lap. Then she enjoyed the rest of the performances.

The traditional dragon dance

 The people doing the dragon was standing on the red bench to left. They jumped of the bench and landed like this at exactly the same time. Just amazing!

 

This young guy was amazing to watch with this sword! Good Lord, I think I would have be missing a few body parts if I even try to attempt the things he did. Amazing to watch! 

Jason and the princess

                                These young ladies were doing a traditional Mongolian dance

 I loved the detail in their outfits. They were very beautiful to look at and lots of detail!

 This young man has been competing all around the world playing this traditional Chinese instrument. It was a very beautiful sound.

                                                     These girls were very cute to watch.

                                                    Look at that shape. Simply amazing!

                                                                        Miss Diva

 This group of people was singing happy new year to the audience in mandarin..very nice

 just a small sample of the yummy food that was there. they also had a table set up with all kinds of different teas. I know Jason tried the date tea and the jasmine tea.

                 The princess watching all the action very closely while eating her dumplings!

 Another traditional Chinese instrument... I wish I remember what they were called but I don't. This was a very different sounding instrument but a common sound I have heard in Chinese music.

 This little girl blew my socks off! She has a FANTASTIC voice....It's powerful and almost hard to believe that such a big voice could come from such a little person. She sang a song about Chinese new year and sang it very well.

                                              These little dancers were very cute.

                                                                     Great pose!

 Another traditional Chinese instrument. The detail in the craving on this thing was wild. I remember thinking while in China in the Forbidden city about how much detail China puts into their world. It's wonderful to see!

                                                            Look at the detail

 Thia Chi dancers. Again, we saw this a lot while in China. In the local parks, in the front of churches and in the Summer Palace!

 Jason and I bought some Chinese lanterns to bring home. Well, when we got them out of the bag, there were like a zillion pieces to put these things together. Thanks goodness we took a picture of them there.

The finished lanterns that weren't so bad after all. I kind of like them. Miss diva keeps saying"there so beautifu!" Happy Chinese New Year to the chinese world!

Visiting Grandpa Brook

We went to visit grandpa Brook, he was feeling good, so we stayed for dinner. He always has smarties for the princess. They sat on the steps and shared the smarties and played with Zoe for a while. It's always good to see her interacting with grandpa Brook.

                                                 sharing smarties on the stairs together

 she takes a while to warm up to animals, now she seems to be okay with Zoe and loves playing with her. She rolls around on the floor and likes to rub her belly. Silly Yan Yan

                             I truly love this picture of them together....a picture to cherish

                                                  hangin' out on the floor playing with Zoe

                                     grandpa Brook, Jason's mom, jason, miss diva and Zoe

                                  grandpa and Yan Yan playing with her Innotab together

1st snowman

It was a day that I had to kind of bribe her to come outside to play with me and her daycare friends. She wanted to stay inside with her daddy and hang out with her toys downstairs. When I asked if she wanted to make a snowman, she was excited and happy to come outside.

I am trying to explain to her how a snowman is created. She wanted me to start the snowball for her and then she wanted to push it around the backyard and watch it get bigger and bigger. She thought it was the neatest thing ever.

                            Our first ball to create the base of the snowman....she was excited to see this snowman finally taking some type of shape.

                                             pattin' in down so all the snow is nice and firm

                                                          second snowball

 the last snowball was in place and we just needed to patch it with snow so it sticks together.

                                           we used play hamburgers that she had in her play house for the eyes, carrot for the nose and sticks for the arms and mouth. Baba took the stuff of the cedar trees to make like hair for the snowman

                                      and we had the magic black hat....our 1st snowman