Gung Hey Fat Choy!

We decided to celebrate Josie's birthday a few weeks early this year for two reasons: 1) she has a follow-up medical appointment out of state the weekend of her birthday and 2) she's five so she gets to invite friends this year. What better day to celebrate than the Chinese New Year! She was super excited and decided to ask her friends to not bring gifts.  Instead, if they wanted to, they could donate to CCAI's Charity Fund. We have $225 ready to send tomorrow! (I think her little friends gave a bit more than they would have spent on a gift!) She has no idea how much money that is, but Chris and I are excited her decision will result in some good half way around the world. We continue to be thankful for the work CCAI does, both in adoptions and in caring for the orphans who remain. We're also pretty proud of our Josie. Not just for this, but for who she is becoming. We're finding she's artistically talented, loves to cuddle, gets frustrated when she cannot communicate what she wants to us, does not want to wait until kindergarten to learn to read and write, and loves to pray. I can't wait to see the young lady she will be at ten and 15 (the other years she gets to invite friends)! Now for the birthday pics:

I gave her several pictures of birthday cake suggestions.  But she looked them all over and started combining them!!!  She came up with red cupcakes with yellow icing Chinese characters (they say "5," "love," "happy birthday," and  "An Hong") on a tiered, ribbon wrapped pedestal.  Phew!  The girl knows what she likes! 

Here she is with a cupcake which says, "love."

Here is Daddy serving the "Chinese red drink" (Cherry 7-UP) to all the little empresses.  Too bad you cannot see the gold stars dangling from the black swirlies dangling from the ceiling.  They were cool!

Some of the fun: Chinese lantern invitations, chop sticks (no, I didn't make English four-year-olds eat their red velvet cupcakes with chopsticks, I thought their parents may like them to wear those clothes again), a panda craft/photo frame (the girls each had their picture taken with Josie), some gold coins with dragons (thank you, Oriental Trading Co.) and the fans, which I hope say something good : )

The hats say "happy birthday" in Mandrin and have "love" stamped around the edges in red.

Happy birthday, Josie An Hong!!!!!! 

PS: Today is also our 3rd anniversary of receiving Josie's referral.  I still remember: "We think we may have a Valentine for you, but we're not sure because she has two arms."  One of the most bizarre and wonderful conversations ever!