Life At Home and Merry Christmas!

I was reading through the blog from the beginning and it was a wonderful walk down memory lane. I'm so glad I decided to keep this blog going. Glad for several reasons: I can read through and remember the beautiful and amazing stages of life with Jia; this will be a priceless catalog for Jia to view her journey; it serves as a reminder to me of how important it is not to rush through a single day of my journey with Jia.

The holidays are in full swing and Jia is oh so excited about Santa. She also loves, loves, loves her new school and tells me that regularly. She has lots of good friends there and she's getting old enough to really enjoy her friends. Carter is her BFF at the moment with Jenna a close second to the coveted title. Jia loves all things kitty cat now. She has at least 8 and there are tea parties and stroller rides for her little guys and girls. Sidney Gomez, our live cat, gets quite a ruffing up occasionally but Jia is learning. Santa brought her a robotic cat she named Miss Pettybones and she goes EVERY where with her!

Jia also now has the best bouncy ball in the WHOLE world, also brought by Santa. We no longer walk around the house, we bounce, bounce, bounce.

All things here are great. We love family time and each other. Truly blessed, I am.

Our Little Girl is Getting Big

It is wonderful as long as she doesn't keep getting big so fast! It's hard to believe Jia has one more year before she starts Kindergarten. Ohhhh, it's hard to imagine! But she is growing and learning and knows so much already! She loves her computer games and is now getting big enough to do them by herself. These are just Mickey Mouse games and such - no crazy xbox yet (maybe never!) but she is great with navigating through the site and using the wireless mouse. It's pretty spectacular - I mean c'mon, she's just barely 4, right? (well, almost 4.5 now, sigh.) Here are some shots playing computer games and playing with Cindy Gomez. Isn't she a big girl?

Summer Fun, A New School and More!

Adding a few pictures of what we've been up to over the last couple of months. Jia started at her new school which has been wonderful. The other kids treat her like a rock-star - really. She's had to tell them (as have the teachers) not to hug her so much. She seems to be adjusting well. We got a cat! Jia has named her Cindy Gomez. I know, I know. Too wonderfully funny. Let's see - what else? Her dad had a birthday as did I. We are in the middle of Halloween and she is the most beautiful bumble bee ever. I will put up a few posts of catch up pictures! We are looking forward to the holidays, Jia has already begun to circle the things she'd like Santa to bring! Hope you are all well!

More Pictures!

More photos of recent good times.

Lots of Stuff Going On

This summer has been hot, exhausting, filled with work and worry, hot, fun, and well, hot. Heh. For the third summer in a row we've put our vacation off until after labor day to take advantage of fewer crowds, nicer weather (less hot (see a common thread here?) and better beach bargains. But by doing so we are generally darned tired by the time we finally take a break Work for the mom has been not great, at best, and for the dad, very busy. T got a fantastic promotion which entails more hours and travel as most promotions do. Jia has had to slug off to school every day of the week during the time many kids get a well deserved and wonderful break in schedule. Again, woes of the two working parent household. However, at this age she seems to prefer a routine and she does generally like her school so that is some consolation.

Some great news - we've secured a spot at a fantastic new school for Jia for JK! At least I think we have. We go tomorrow to sign up and settle everything for the Fall. It was touch and go in terms of availability. This school always has a waiting list and I was a bit behind the eight ball in trying to get in. In an incredible stroke of luck, one of the families in the JK program decided to take their child half days which opened a spot for us. She will be in the same room as a wonderful friend from her present school who transferred there at the beginning of summer. I'm hoping this will help with the transition. Amazingly this school is on 5 acres and has the most incredible garden I've ever seen. They actually cook with the food grown in the garden. In addition to basic ABCs, Jia will have classes in cooking, drama, art, science labs, art and photography. They have an incredible library, ballet classes and even rock wall climbing! Needless to say, WOW.

We also had Jia's medical procedure to correct a slight misalignment of her eyes. None of us even recognized this and it took a trip to a pediatric ophthalmologist last February, for what we thought was a routine vision screening, to tell us about it. We had a couple of choices to address it, none of which made me a happy camper but we knew we had to do everything possible to get her to binoculor vision. So - after much research and visits to 3 different POs (Johns Hopkins included even though this is a fairly common issue and nothing for those reading this to be scared about) we chose a treatment course. We are now smack in the middle of results to see if this will work and avoid surgery on her eyes. The surgery option is considered standard and "no big deal" but for the mom, any surgery is a REAL BIG DEAL. So we went with a less invasive option that even Hopkins said should bring similar results to surgery and ....we wait. If this doesn't work we will go with surgery but everyone keep their fingers, etc. crossed.

Our beautiful girl is just as energetic, smart, fun and delightful as ever and we are counting down the days to our much anticipated September beach vacation that each of us needs very, very badly! :)

Love to all.

A Birthday! And Lots of Summer Fun!

Whew. It's been a whirlwind couple of months! Summer is chugging along. We've had a great time so far! Jia turned 4 (FOUR!) on June 9th and she had a wonderful week long celebration. We celebrated the day itself here at home with a homemade lop-sided birthday cake then 2 days later her fabulous, cool, amazing play set arrived! On Saturday following her birthday we had a big bash at Young Chef's Academy with 15 of her school friends and cousins Melissa and Rachel. Again, whew. That was just the second the week of June! Since then we've enjoyed fun outdoors on the play set, frolicking in the backyard blow up pool and running through sprinklers - all amidst her daddy's amazing flower garden. I only wish I didn't have to work so much so that we could spend more time together. Sigh - trials of the working mom. We make the most of every weekend though. We haven't spent much time on the boat but we never do this time of year as it is very hot.

Jia loves to pull out her piano occasionally and a couple of weeks ago we were pleasantly surprised by an unexpected concert. She twinkled the ivories and serenaded us with Twinkle Twinkle Little Star and she was amazing! I can't wait until she is old enough for piano lessons. Jia loves music and has an incredible sense of rhythm. She is one all around amazing kid! But you all know that by now!

Hope you are all well. We have beach plans in a couple of months and until then it's just getting through the dog days.

3 Years............Wow

It's hard to believe that 3 years ago tomorrow we became a family. There are many emotions that go along with this day however as the years go by the impact that May 7th has had on our lives changes. Gone are the days where I was shell shocked by the sheer magnitude of being a mom and they are replaced by the joy and sheer responsibility that is associated with being a mom. It feels like Jia has been with me forever. Like I never had a day without her. Yes, I remember the carefree days of not being a mom. But they have been replaced by the day to day responsibilities of being a mom and that includes mostly extraordinary delight with the occasional frustrations of parenting a preschooler. Her laugh, her curiosity, her ability to make my heart sing, her unending energy that often beats even my almost unending amount of energy, her humor, her need to know how EVERYTHING works, her limitless love for us and we her, her beauty and lastly, her affect on my soul, has made her entry into my life the most amazing event of my life. That the anniversary of our family day in China coincides with Mother's Day makes all of this that much sweeter.

I love you dear Jia. More than I can describe. You will only understand the depth of this love once you too become a mom. It is all encompassing.

Really, April?

I think about updating our blog alot but where does time go? At the moment I'm avoiding the last few minutes of the VCU Final Four game because I get too darned nervous when it's this close. And, and this is a big and, Jia actually went to bed before me! Jia is bursting with energy and intelligence these days and simply doesn't want to sleep! She talks in her beautiful little voice from waking until reluctantly falling to sleep. She loves school and knows all of her letters, how to spell her name, how old she is, exactly when her birthday will come and just about everything else you can imagine. Her sense of humor is amazing. She loves to sing and dance. We just got her a new big girl bike and she rides it like a wild child! When we visited the bike store it was only to buy a second helmet since her one helmet never seemed to be where we needed it to be (either home or school). While at the store she picked out a smokin' cool red mountain bike and JUST HAD TO HAVE IT! So now she is officially a bike riding (with training wheels of course) "big girl"!

We are all just great. Sadly, Cousin Duncan has decided to move out and back to IL. Sad for us but happy for him. He misses friends and family and has decided to return home to school which I think is a great plan.

Spring is here and we've started our tomato seeds and they've just begun to sprout! All of our outdoor flowers are starting to reach out of their winter homes soon to bloom and give us all what we need - a lot of color and beauty to go with warmer weather!

As Promised

A few pictures from the holidays! Jia has started her new Pre-School class and is now with the "big" kids! She was a bit apprehensive at first but now seems to be in the groove and adjusting wonderfully! Winter is plodding along and this week-end we're going out to get all kinds of pretty things to decorate for Valentine's Day! Hope you all are doing well. Terrell and I are working hard and Jia is thriving under much love and learning!

All is Wonderful - I'm Just Busy!

Sorry for lack of posts. I'll try my best to get some up this weekend along with some pictures of our wonderful Christmas! Don't want anyone to worry - we're all good, I'm just busy! Hope all is well. Check back soon!