Day 32, 02/01/2009, Xiao Min, No Training Wheels!

Today, Xiao Min rode her bike without training wheels! It was so exciting. the day before we took the pedals off of her sister's old bike. Then she practiced scooting around practicing her balance. She caught on quickly and when she got her bike (minus training wheels), she just took off. She did it!

Day 31, 01/31/2009 Birthday celebration

February 1st is Meng Jiao's birthday. This year we celebrated on January 31st so that her aunt and uncle could join the celebration. She turns 8 tomorrow. You may notice her hair amongst the candles. Yes, we had a scare and her hair was singed. Luckily it wasn't a worse situation. Hard to believe our Meng Jiao is 8! She got a new bicycle for her birthday had a blast with it.

Day 28, 01/10/2009, Mario Kart!

Today I found Mario Kart for the Wii!!! I have been looking for this since November and just stumbled upon it at Target. This is the cutest game. The girls love this game and had a blast playing. It is a game that they can play together and it fits their skill level.

Day 27, 01/27/2009, Visit with Oral Surgeon

Today Xiao Min had her first appointment with the oral surgeon that will close the alveolar cleft (split in her gum-line) in her mouth. The surgeon is the head of a the department at a large university based medical facility, so I have great comfort that the best surgeon will be doing the surgery. I was afraid that we had messed up in the timing of getting hooked up with this surgeon, but it turned out it is fine. We will return in June to be evaluated then. They need to time the surgery after her front baby teeth come out. We are hoping the surgery can be done this summer while she is out of school. They will take a piece of bone from her hip and graft it into the split. She will spend a night in the hospital and be out of school two weeks. It will be the most painful surgery she will have.
In the picture she is showing off the goodies they gave her (see the ring and the glasses). Kids are suckers for this stuff.

Day 26, 1/26/2009, Meng Jiao at 100 Years Old

Today was the 100th day of school and Meng Jiao's class was asked to dress what they thought they might look like at age 100. The famous white wig came in handy. She wasn't thrilled about this activity as she thought no one else would do it, but they did. She said she didn't think the white hair looked right with her tan skin. I told her Chinese people get gray hair too. I guess she had never noticed that.

Day 25, 01/25/2009, Chinese New Year

Today, we participated in a FCC Chinese New Year celebration. I love the girls in the silks. We had a good time until they did the firecrackers. The adult that was in charge of this part, decided to light them about a foot from Xiao Min. He gave no warning. She tried to get away, and stepped over the fireworks as the first ones started to fire. I was so upset at the lack of safety. She was hysterical and I think will never forget this. This person was an idiot.

Day 24, 01/24/2009, DS Concentration

Both girls now have a DS game and it is great for trips in the car. This is Xiao Min playing with hers while we drove to a nearby town for a trip to Costco and a movie (Mall Cop).