Heritage Camp 2014

Fei is officially in the Beijing Cultural Exchange Heritage Camp 2014.  Yay.  Just got notified a couple days ago to go ahead and book our flights and get our travel visas.  I've put a call into the visa office we used for Luk's trip to ask if we can get them this far in advance.  I'm a little more used to doing everything at the last minute :)  Flights are going to be around $1400 which is quite a bit less than the $2000 Lili and I had to pay. Today we got news that we'll be in the same hotel as when I was with Lili.  http://www.newcenturyhotel.com.cn/en/hotel.html  So, that was great news.  The hotel is lovely, the breakfast was wonderful, there is a grocery store across the street and dumplings and ice cream shops right by.  Most importantly, the air conditioning worked.  Getting excited about getting to do this trip with Fei.  We're planning to add a couple days on the end so we can shop and go to Mutainyu.  Hoping we can get Mr. Yang to accompany us.  I can't wait to see what our itinerary will be.

Our friend James is going to come to stay for part of Spring Break.

Our older chicks are moving out to the new coop today.

Jia has slept in her own bed for four nights in a row.

Luk is still full on walking without his walker.

Goldie

The most treasured chick in the world ;)  Man, I sure hope Goldie turns out to be a hen!

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Happy Birthday Fei Fei!!

Our Fei is 11.  Two 11 year Olds in the house.  The biggest part of the day....she is on Facebook now.  She set herself up.  Love this kid!

Saturday Birthdays are the best.  Gramma and Grampa came over.   Then manicures and Menchies with friends.  Home for dinner of her choice, spring rolls and rice.  Cupcake decorating and a sleep over with Hanna.

Jia is getting sick, she is having a rough night.  We've both been up with her and there is a wicked bad storm tonight so Eric and I aren't getting much sleep.  Will be a long day tomorrow. 

In the picture of Fei and Jia, Jia says she is dressed like Fei except she's a rainbow.  Awww.

Gramma bought Fei a fancy dancy hair curler.  It works great but Fei's hair just doesn't hold a curl for long.  Jia insisted on curls too hense the curlers on her.

Luk had a great time decorating and eating his cupcake ;)  He put his sprinkles on one at a time.  Awww.

Fei and Hanna weren't too interested in having Jia in their room for a sleepover so Eric told Jia she could have a sleep over with Luk.  It didn't work of course but they had a fabulous time playing in the crib for a while. 

Luk walking

Here is a youtube of Luk walking.  He's on day two of walking and doing fabulously.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VE4H373VzwQ&feature=youtube_gdata_player

Luk's exciting news.

Luk did some fabulous walking today and tonight while the girls and I were playing with the rats in the super-yard-xt he was practicing standing up.  He fell on his butt a few times but he figured it out on his own and immediately started walking.  There was lots of hooting and hand clapping.  He was super excited.  He then went on to show us over and over again that he can stand up on his own and start walking!   He still propels forward and would land on his face if we weren't there to catch him ;)  Eric has been working on getting him to slow down and it's finally working.  Amazing progress and so much more than we could have dreamed possible.  Exciting times.

Action shot.

Eric just texted a picture of Luk to me at work. 

Still on about baby chicks.

Quiet weekend at home.  Enjoying our new 'family day' holiday here. Playing with chicks.  Jia is ALL about her babies right now.  Still serious cuteness.  Shocking how fast they are growing.  Feathers appearing to grow each time we look at them.  We've set up the super-yard-xt in the kitchen so we can play with the chicks in there.  Amazing how many uses the super-yard-xt has had through the years ;) 

We finally got to the kids goodies from cny.  Sat down and did Valentines for school and Fei got her gift bags done for her Birthday on Sat.  Feeling semi organized for the week.

Baby Chicks!

Serious cuteness.

We went to Fanny Bay today to pick up our flock.  Dealt with Gavin, he really likes his hobby and was happy to show us around and discuss which chickens would be best for us. 

We chose 5 Red Rocks which are all hens.  1 mystery yellow chick.  4 Rhode Island Reds and 5 Americanas.   Gavin threw in two extra Americanas in case we end up with too many roosters.  They range in age from one day to one week.  The Americanas lay blue and green eggs and they are starting to grow feathers.  Eric and I can see how pretty they are going to be but the girls don't care for their wing flapping. 

The box is in between Luk and Jia for the drive home.  Luk has been leaning over in his seat and peering into the box the whole way.  Too cute.

For all our local friends, bring your kids to play with the chicks and get some photos.  

Piano results

Lili scored 90 and Fei got 85.  We're all so proud of them.  What a great start to their piano testing.

Such a relief for Lili who thought she'd tanked it :)

Range of Marks	70 - 79	80 - 89	90 - 100
Practical
Grade 1	28%	63%	5%
Grade 2	38%	52%	4%
Grade 3	47%	38%	2%
Grade 4	46%	38%	2%
Grade 5	48%	33%	1%
Grade 6	48%	32%	2%
Grade 7	48%	31%	2%
Grade 8	44%	28%	2%

For Grades 1 - 10
Classification	Range of Marks
First Class Honors with Distinction	90 - 100
First Class Honors	80 - 89
Honors	70 - 79
Pass	60 - 69

Little found picture of Luk

Any little part of our children's history is so important.  We/they have so little of their past.  I'm at work right now doing Luk's Canadian Citizenship application and making copies of everything and I found this little picture attached to one of the notarial forms that I've never seen before.  He is so adorable and he looks totally petrified in the picture.  He is so thin in his face.  Not at all what he looks like now and yet still so clearly him.  We had photos taken of him in Nanchang and that picture shows up on most of the paperwork so it was a pleasant surprise to find this one, dressed in the same jacket as in the original referral paperwork.

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Another Birthday done.

Work day and quiet evening at home.   Eric made me stuffed manicotti and chocolate cake, mmm.   My parents joined us for dessert.