Dec. 1

All the best intentions, I bought the girls advent calendars and told Lili and Fei that they could alternate eating Jia's chocolate.  This morning there was excitement about opening the first windows and Jia got in on the joy and ate her own chocolate.  She LOVED it.  What are the odds of her forgetting there is chocolate in those calendars?! 

I'm not the biggest fan of the Christmas hustle and bustle.  There is just too much crammed into one month.  Too much excitement for the kids all at once.  There are parts that I enjoy but it's a constant battle to try and downplay all the festivities.  So, right now we're all about the piano recital and the school play.  There is a dance recital/party too but I haven't told the girls yet.  The recital is way too much stress for Fei and we're seeing the decline in behaviour already.  She flat our refuses to even discuss the idea of her introducing herself so Lili will be doing it for her this year.  They are also playing two duets so that Fei will have Lili with her on the stage.  I wish there was a way to make this easier for her.  There is the option of letting her stop performing but their teacher is really against that idea and we hesitate to start letting her off the hook.  She doesn't seem as concerned about the school play yet.  Likely because the whole class will be together and she is fairly comfortable at the school and it's not for another two weeks.    Needless to say, we're all anxious for the performances to be over with. 

Keeping Jia busy while the girls are in dance and piano lessons is quite the chore.  Jia had fun making a big mess all by herself during the last piano lesson!  Then she stood at the door, hitting the glass, clearly wanting to go, GO NOW. 

Jia went on her first play date last Saturday with May who just came home from Vietnam.  The babies were so sweet together.  They were quite aware of each other and actually played a bit.  At one point May skooched to Jia and put her head in her lap.  Baby cuteness.  I didn't get that picture.  Turned out our friends back yard backs onto our social workers back yard.  We only know two families that live in their city and their yards are connected.  How strange is that?! 

We managed a short shopping trip to the mall before the play date and Jia still loves to shop.  I'm not sure what she loves about it but she is so happy to sit in a cart.  She says 'Ha' (hi) to everyone and waves goodbye when we leave.  With her legs kicking the whole time.  Go figure.

On Sat. night we dropped the girls at Penny's house and they had their first sleepover away from Mom that wasn't at Gramma's.  They had a great time with Haley and Hanna.  The beginning of a whole new phase.  On Sunday Penny met us at the pool with all of them and we swam for three hours.  Yes, that's right, Jia swam for three hours!  She didn't turn blue and she didn't fuss for even a moment.  Our baby clearly loves the water.  I had warned Lili and Fei that she likely wouldn't swim for long and we had an extra token for our locker in case I needed to take her out ahead of everyone else.  In the end, she would have happily stayed in the water longer!  Again, go figure.  After our swim Penny and I took the big girls to see Tangled.  Good Disney movie.  Funny.  Eric took Jia home, she guzzled her bottle and passed out, too tired for lunch.

Isabel is 9mo. already!  Jia is 11mo. already!!  It's time to start planning Jia's 1st Birthday party.  No clue what we'll do yet.  I'm thinking now that a swimming party would be something she would enjoy :)  We're busy all weekend but the girls and I were plotting this morning about when to take Jia to meet Santa.  Both Lili and Fei hated the big guy when they were babies but we're guessing Jia will take meeting Santa in stride too.