New Year's at the Cabin

For many years, I have gone to a cabin with a group of close friends to celebrate New Year's together.  This is the 12 or 13th year in a row we have been together.  Since the beginning, there have been marriages and births and/or adoptions of children.  Up until this year, I was the only one who had not yet become a parent.

So I was looking forward to celebrating with Molly this year!  We went to a lodge in Port Alberni for a week, and had a great holiday.  There were just 3 families for the first couple of days, then the rest of the gang joined us in time to ring in the new year.  Molly has never had such a sustained social life since she left the orphanage.  The older kids played with her, dressed her up, pulled her around in her wagon, taught her to run, and I also noticed that her speech development took great leaps forward during the week. 

Quiet time

Playing with the big boys

Group coloring project

Lots of cuddling

Flying paper airplanes

A couple of cuties!

the girls

Dressing up Molly like a doll

Party girl on New Year's Eve

Lighting sparklers outside

A quiet New Year's Day afternoon

Eating noodles

Our First Christmas

The next morning, when Molly woke up, I jumped out of bed and ran to turn on the lights on our Christmas tree.   I went back to Molly and told her that Santa had visited during the night, and he left her some presents.  She sleepily walked out to the living room, and the first thing she saw was her new trike.

And she knew exactly what to do with it too:

After a while, I took her stocking down from the fireplace, and she 'oohed and ahhed' at the treats inside.

She found a set of five hair bands, which she just HAD to wear all at once.  She's pretty good at putting them in her hair by herself!

Then she helped herself to opening the presents under the tree.  She had learned how much fun it is when we were in Kelowna, so didn't hesitate.

I interrupted her by getting her dressed, as our friend Hilary was coming over, and I wanted to hold off with the gift opening until she arrived.  Hilary was soon there, and helped Molly open gifts while I prepared breakfast.

We had a really nice morning, visiting with Hilary, opening gifts, and eating breakfast together.  Hilary soon carried on to her next commitment, so Molly and I had a few hours in the afternoon to visit with our friend Lori and her family.  As they have a family of two teenage boys, we got there just in time for the boys to get out of bed and start opening their gifts!

Lori and Molly played and sang some Christmas carols together.

Eventually, we had to get home to put the turkey in the oven and get Molly down for a nap, because Uncle Ron was coming over for Christmas dinner.

Molly played for a while with her new toys, then we popped some Christmas crackers and dug into our turkey dinner.

I had many reasons to pause throughout the day and just feel happiness for all I have, and for the love of my daughter, family and friends.  I felt lucky, grateful, and joyful this Christmas.

Later That Night...

1:00 am

1:45 am

2:00 am

Christmas Eve with Susan and Quan

Susan and I started a Christmas 'tradition' last year, when we were both on edge waiting to get "THE CALL" to travel to Vietnam and get our children.  We had hopes of being with them for Christmas 2009, but ended up still waiting.  So on Christmas Eve, she invited me over for tea.  We read a couple of Christmas stories to our babies on the other side of the world and exchanged gifts for them from each other.  This is the picture she took to remember our visit:



This year, Molly and I went over again, and had a touching, emotional evening with them.  We were able to read the stories to the kids in person.  They were able to exchange gifts and open them in person.  We were finally having our first Christmas together as family.  Yes, I cried, of course.

Quan played some Christmas carols on his ukelele for us, and Molly showed him how she plays it too.

Susan and I reminisced about the past year, drank tea and watched the kids play together

Then we said our goodbyes, as I needed to get home to put Molly to bed.  I still had a lot of gift wrapping to do on behalf of Santa Claus!

A Molly Christmas in Kelowna (Dec 17 - 21)

Molly and I went to Kelowna the weekend before Christmas to celebrate with our family there.  We had a wonderful time!  Molly got so much attention, and the whole family spoiled her rotten. 

This was 'Christmas Day', celebrated about a week early, at my nephew's place.  A big thanks to Jonathan and Debra for hosting the whole family.  xoxo

Making a gingerbread house with her cousins and Uncle Rob

The tree!

16 Stockings hand-made by Janel

Molly learned how to open presents, and started to really enjoy it 

Look at all the presents surrounding her!  While the rest of us draw names and get one present each, EVERYBODY bought Molly something.  We were opening presents for a long time.

Then there were more!  My father hand-built a toy box for Molly, and inside was a 1/8 size violin for her.  It made me cry...

Plus, she also got a white baby grand piano, just her size

The aftermath of gift opening

Bowling with Dora the Explorer. I think the guys enjoyed it more than Molly?

The next day, it was business as usual for most of the family.  My sister went back to work, but when she came home at the end of the day, she sat down on the kitchen floor with Molly and had a picnic dinner of leftovers from the fridge

Then they played a few Christmas carols on the piano

And Molly let Grandpa feed her a bottle before bedtime.

It was wonderful for Molly to have the time to get to know her family better.  We had 5 whole days to visit and celebrate.  Then we flew home to prepare for another first Christmas in our own home.