Chinese New Year Party!

Welcome to our home and our Chinese New Year celebration!  We decorated...

 

 

 And cooked....

 

And the party was ready!

We were excited that another child adopted from Jen and Abigail's orphanage was going to join us this day, but he unfortunately began running a fever the night before the party.  We missed you so much, Bobby!

One other family joined in our festivities.

 

 Traditionally, the children receive red envelopes called hung bao for Chinese New Year. Inside is "lucky money."  The way I figured it, with adoption travel expenses on the near horizon, they were "lucky" to get it!  (smile)  Asian candy was also a huge hit with the Little Princesses, though it wasn't what the rest of us were used to!  Some was made of sesame, some with chia seeds,  or candied ginger, and not very sweet as one might expect with candy.

 Following dinner we had several activities for the kids.  Chinese New Year is a festival that is celebrated for fifteen days, but we attempted to condense it into one big day!  First we read a book about Chinese New Year.

Then the kids got to choose what they wanted to do.  We had a coloring page, word search, paper lanterns, and since it is the "year of the horse" a horse mask.  Only one little girl wanted to make the mask, but she was a VERY cute, little horse, indeed!

  

 

 Then we made a type of Chinese drum called "Boland Gu."

Our final craft was to figure out how to put battery operated lights in paper Chinese lanterns since there was no way in the world I was going to put FIRE in them!  

 

 

 

We suggested to the children that day fifteen of Chinese New Year would be appropriate for a parade with their lanterns, but they just couldn't wait.  By this time a couple of the neighborhood children even joined in!

We ended our evening with poppers (NOISE!) and sparklers.

The Little Princesses were VERY excited to celebrate Chinese New Year, and it was our very first time!  I'm certain we didn't get everything "right," but it gave them a taste of their native country and culture, and we had a blast doing it!  We cannot wait for Isaac to join our family picture next time!

The Lanz family wishes you a Happy Chinese New Year!

Chinese New Year - Friday, January 31

Our first day of CNY was pretty relaxed, with just our immediate household.  We ate simple noodles and steamed buns for dinner.

 It is the year of the horse, and this year's element is wood, so the girls colored wooden horses with markers to use for decorations at the big party planned for Saturday.

There were a couple little gifts - a tiny play horse, and the best surprise of all - Chinese Barbies!

 Happy Chinese New Year, everyone!

I800 Approval and Final Steps!

We are getting down to the last steps before travel!  Our I800 immigrations form was approved yesterday, January 28.  In legal-eze what this does, from the USCIS website;  "USCIS will provisionally approve the Form I-800 if the child qualifies for classification as a Convention adoptee and the proposed adoption or grant of custody will meet Convention requirements."

Next up is the Article 5 from the National Visa Center.  Again, from the website, " submit a visa application to a Consular Officer at the appropriate U.S. embassy or consulate in the Convention country. The Consular Officer will review the Form I-800 and the visa application for possible visa ineligibilities and will advise you if there are options to waive any noted grounds of inadmissibility.  If the Consular Officer determines that the child appears eligible to immigrate to the United States and that the information provided indicates that the adoption process thus far has complied with the Convention and IAA, he or she will notify the Convention country's central authority by issuing an Article 5/17 letter. The Article 5/17 letter will inform the foreign central authority that U.S. competent authorities have determined the prospective adoptive parents are eligible and suited to adopt, that the child may enter and reside permanently in the United States, and that the U.S. Central Authority agrees that the adoption may proceed."  

The NVC should have our paperwork by this time next week, and they are generally quick to issue the Article 5.  Due to the Chinese Consulate being closed for Chinese New Year our Article 5 will not be able to be submitted to them until February 10.  Typically the Article 5 approval takes two weeks then we wait on our invitation to travel!!!

So there you have it!  Article 5 and Travel Approval.  We are that close!

We completed our applications last night for Chinese Visas so we will be ready when our travel invitation arrives.  It is looking like traveling at the end of March is a real possibility!

How much fun?

How much fun can three little girls have with an after Christmas clearance sale?

We found these giant gingerbreads at the grocery store DEEPLY discounted.  The girls had a LOT of fun decorating them.  Believe it or not, Abigail (the littlest one) was the only one who actually ate her entire cookie!  She happily munched it down over several days. 

Our New Organizing Wall

One of the best things I ever had in my home was an oversize bulletin board.  I'm talking a MAJOR bulletin board that we'd gotten at a school auction.  It was maybe six feet across and four feet tall.  It held four of those poster board size dry erase calendars that are used in a classroom.  I really miss it!  We left it behind when we moved because we just don't have room for it here.

After some major scares whereby I lost some important adoption paperwork, I decided organization HAD to be given priority around here.  We live in an average home that doesn't have a lot of extra wall space, so I have to take advantage of smaller spaces, using them to their best advantage. 

I already knew the back of the door leading into the laundry room was a haven for the Little Princesses' hair stuff.  It has saved me thousands of steps and hours of looking for brushes and bands.

So why not utilize the other side of that door?  Sure it faces the family room, but why not?

 

I haven't totally used these pockets to their full advantage yet, but there is a lot of potential, and it has helped a bunch already.  I love having file pockets to drop important papers into.  It is so much better than putting them down in a random spot until I get them into a file cabinet!

Since the pockets were a success I decided to take it one step further to organize the family calendar and the children's chore charts.  I used a small wall that is slightly inset which allowed for hanging clipboards without disturbing the normal traffic flow through the hallway.

I painted with magnetic primer first.  Hint number one: it is an awful, oil based substance (translated a nightmare to clean up) that my husband stirred for an hour before it was of a useable consistency.  I finished with a chalkboard paint. 

 

  Hint number two:  My magnetic boxes, etc. will not stick.  Magnets with NOTHING under them stick, but that is about it.  If I were to do this again I would skip the magnetic primer.

This wall has been so handy!  The dry erase calendar allows for easily adding - and in these bad weather days moving - activities.  The dry erase board serves as a great place to highlight reminders.  The Little Princesses have their "chores" on magnet boards.  They move the squares to the bottom when they have completed the tasks - and I will add that they LOVE having little things to do.  They really enjoy helping.

When I added Isaac's chart, Tikvah wondered out loud why I had given him a pink one, then she looked  a little closer.  We don't have a LOT of photos of Isaac, but in three of the photos (obviously taken on different days) he is eating ice cream.  His chart has a scoop of green and a scoop of pink ice cream!

Tikvah and Isaac have laminated charts so I can easily add things with a dry erase marker.  Hmmmmmm.... do you suppose if I put "Come home soon" on Isaac's chart that it would help?

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