The one with lots of Christmas pictures.

Santa brought a kitten for G!

Christmas morning. from Ksenia on Vimeo.

G was pretty overwhelmed with the gift.  He didn't want to open any other gifts for a while until the excitement wore off.  

You might not see it well, but he has tears in his eyes!  He was SO happy!!!

G named him Figaro!

It was time to unwrap presents now.

G doesn't like remote controlled cars for some reason, but he is in love with the remote controlled rover that he built himself.  

G got a microscope from his granddad and his family.

A dress with leggings and a hair clip from granddad and family.

Princess tent from grandmom.

Playing with Figaro and G's new car that he wanted.

Later that day, we had a pretty large gathering at our house.  We had salad, brown sugar roasted ham, mashed potatoes, gravy, roasted cauliflower with saffron, and spiced apple cider with rum.  We also had plenty of wine, Tres leches cake and Tiramisu, and lots more food and snacks.

At the end of the day, the kids opened Christmas crackers with prizes and paper hats inside.  I will only post one picture, because I don't want to post pictures of other people's kids.

I'm helping M to crack her cracker.

We got more presents from our friends, but I was too tired to take pictures...  It was a great Christmas this year!  

Wearing her fairy dress from Santa.

Religion & Santa & Christmas Eve

Listening to Santa. The kids didn't think he was real, though.

A couple of months ago:

Annika is roller skating in the living room.  G starts throwing his stuffed Angry Birds at her and she starts screaming.

Me: "G stop!  G stop!  G! STOP! IT!"

G: "I'm doing this because I want her to fall!"

Annika starts screaming even louder: "G WANTS ME TO FALL!"

Me: "WHY would you want to be SO mean to your sister?"

G stops, thinks for a minute then gives me this little gem:

"You know, I can't wait to grow up and leave you, because you are ALWAYS a mean mama.  Well, not always, and I always forgive you, and don't worry, I won't leave you for a long time."

I just couldn't help but laugh and laugh.

Then last night he said: "Mama, even when you are disappointed, you are still nice!  Thank you for EVERYTHING!"

He is unbelievably sweet!

This Fall, G had his soccer practice and Annika was playing with a ball on the sidelines.  She fell and scraped her knee.  She saw that she was bleeding and freaked out, screaming as loud as she could.  I grabbed her and took her to the car to get a band-aid.  G kept playing soccer.
After soccer practice, we all went to the car, and, as he was buckling, G said: "I saw Annika fell down and I prayed to God".
Me: "Um, you prayed to God?"
G: "Yes, I did."
Me: "What did you say?"
G: "I said: Dear God, please make Annika's ouchie feel better.  Thank you."
Me: "Did you say it out loud or did you say it in your head?"
G: "I said it in my head"
Me: "That was very nice of you, G."

Today:

Annika: I am four!

G: And I am six.

A: You are not six!

G: Yes, I am!

A:  No, you are googol!

G: You can't be googol because that's when you die.

A: I don't want to die.

G: But that is when you become an angel.  An angel is like a fairy because they have wings.  And you go to heaven where God lives.

A: I want to be a fairy!

G is very, very interested in religion right now.  We really need to find time to visit local Catholic churches. 

A few weekends ago, we were at a store shopping and G started quietly crying. Tears were just flowing down his cheeks.  
We asked him what was wrong and he asked us: "Why did Prince have to go?  I miss him."
It was heartbreaking.  I said that maybe he should ask Santa to bring him a kitten.  G replied that Santa only brings toys that elves make and he can't bring cats.
So, we told him that it doesn't hurt to ask and Santa can sometimes do magic.
G was ECSTATIC at the possibly and he was now convinced that he was getting a cat from Santa.

-Scanned photo- Visiting Santa at Santa's Village.  Summer 2013.

On Christmas Eve we went to church for the children's service, where Annika was an angel and G was a sheep.  When we were singing about sheep, G would say "That's ME!" (seen in the video) and when the pastor would mention Joseph (and Mary), G would say to Joseph: "That's YOU!"  

He is too cute! 

Then we came home, ate dinner and left some food for reindeers and Santa himself.

REINDEERS, STOP HERE!

Everyone is tired and ready for bed.

Losing it!

G lost his tooth.  Of course, we had some drama involved with this, because he lost it in the "Target" parking lot, around 7pm, when it was dark outside and it took us close to 30 minutes to find it, using the flashlights on our iPhones, while G was crying his eyes out.
At first, the Target employees were eager to help, but upon finding out that we were looking for a biohazard, they backed away slowly.
But, Joseph found it!  He found it the second we decided it was gone and we needed to move on with our lives.
Happy Boy!  Happy everyone!
It looks like a new tooth is already popping out, too.  It all happened so fast!

The next day, a fairy door appeared in G's room, and the Tooth Fairy brought him a tiny letter, coins and two magnifying glasses.

Opening a package from the Tooth Fairy.

He got a tiny magnifying glass.

And a letter (address blacked out).

Inside was a letter and fairy dust.

1oz silver coin.

Letter next to a dime.

Santa 2013

Today the kids went to see Santa.  They already saw a Santa last week, but they questioned his authenticity.  They thought he looked silly.
This Santa, on the other hand, was REAL!  G was so HAPPY!
Santa took his time talking to the kids and asking them all kinds of questions.
G asked for a specific car and a cat.
Annika asked for a fairy doll.

-scanned photo-

G has a lose tooth!  I don't know how long it will take for it to fall out, but it makes me sad.  Wasn't it just yesterday his teeth were coming in?

Time just flies!

National 9/11 Pentagon Memorial

This is a beautiful and peaceful place.  There is a reflecting pool under each bench and the sound of the water running is very calming.  I remember it smelled like chlorine mixed with fresh air.

It looked so lovely at night!

Each bench represents one person who died in the building and on flight AA77.

There are 184 benches.

Pentagon.  South facade.

Dana Falkenberg's bench.  She was 3.

Benches facing this way represent people who died on AA Flight 77.

Benches facing the other way represent people who died in the Pentagon.

Annika is three in this picture.

Visit the virtual memorial here: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/nation/interactives/pentagonmemorial/victims/

Добро.

Люди часто бывают глупы и упрямы, эгоцентричны и нелогичны.
Все равно прощай их.

Если ты добр, люди будут обвинять тебя в том, что под маской доброты ты скрываешь корысть.
Все равно оставайся добрым.

Если ты честен и прям, люди будут обманывать тебя.
Все равно будь честным и прямым.

Если ты спокоен и счастлив, тебе будут завидовать.
Все равно оставайся счастливым.

То добро, которое ты делаешь сегодня, завтра люди забудут.
Все равно делай добро.

-Мать Тереза

А принц Белоснежку полюбит. 

А жадность Кащея погубит... 

А Золушку выручит фея, 

Не станет Горыныча Змея... 

А месяц засветится ясный, 

В глазах Василисы Прекрасной... 

Пусть Зло на проделки хитро,

Но все ж побеждает Добро!

G's first piano performance & parent-teacher meeting.

Today the teacher asked if anyone wanted to volunteer to play a song in front of the class and G immediately raised his hand.
Here is his short performance.
In two months he will start private piano lessons, as well as continue attending the Yamaha School of Music.
I don't know how to play piano, so I am incredibly proud of my little monkey, who just turned 6!

 The video is shaky. Joseph was filming him with his phone.

This week I volunteered at G's classroom.  I was doing a rotation, playing a cooperative game with kids (4 groups of 5 kids) for about 2 hours.  Honestly, it was hard work!  I could never be a teacher.

Then I ran home for our play group and Joseph went to a parent-teacher meeting.  I actually didn't want to go there, because I have bad memories of parent-teacher meetings in Russia.

So, I told Joseph I didn't want to go.  He sent me a text at 2:00 saying that the meeting went well.  I was so busy that I wasn't able to call him back until 6:00.

The teachers said only nice things about G.  He is sweet and a joy to be around and this and that and brag, brag, brag!  Everything is perfect-perfect with a cherry on top.

He scored highest in every section of the Kindergarten assessment test.

His handwriting is great!  So, he will soon stop receiving occupational therapy (not sure how I feel about this, as I want him to continue receiving it).

He reads and can solve basic algebra problems (find x).  He knows his 2D and 3D shapes.

He's been making huge progress with his social development.

So, that was that.

When I went to volunteer in the morning, I came during snack time.  He saw me, screamed with joy, ran to me and started hugging me.  He buried his head in my neck and I saw that his eyes were full of tears.  Of course, that made me cry, too.  I couldn't believe how much he loved me to have SO many emotions!  All the teachers (4 teachers in his class) started saying how sweet he is and how much he loves me!  That made me cry even more!

Later that day, I told him: "You were so surprised to see me at school that you even started to cry!"

He replied: "Yes, I thought you came to take me home and I started to cry because I didn't want to miss recess."

Mommy 0  Recess 1

My feelings are kind of crushed right now.