Xīn Nián Kuài Lè-新年快乐

Happy Chinese New Year-4706-Year of the Ox

We had a GREAT time at our Families with Children From China New Year party this past weekend. The first two pictures were done by a professional photographer at the party.

To say M enjoyed herself would be a gross understatement of the evening. That girl was having crazy good fun! Chinese pop music was playing and the children were allowed to dance on a big dance floor and up on stage. Can you guess where M was? If you guessed the stage-BINGO! All she talked about was dancing on stage. After we ate a huge dinner, during which dishes kept coming and coming, M wanted to get right back to grooving. She had a meltdown in the bathroom as I tried to explain that a dragon and other children would be doing special Chinese dances on the dance floor and stage and that she was probably done dancing for the evening.

The girl's got moves!


The children were all given hong bao(red envelopes) with a golden coin inside. As the dragon danced around the room each child "fed" the dragon his/her hong bao. When it was M's turn, she didn't hesitate to put the hong bao right into the dragon's mouth.

After the dragon dance, some local Chinese dance schools performed several numbers. M sat with all the other children on the floor watching with rapt attention. For the final few performances she stood on her chair at our table to peer over the heads at the tables in front of us. Did this stop her from getting her groove on? No way! She was swaying her hips and waving her free hand as I held fast to the other to keep her from falling off the chair. Did I mention she can keep a beat?

The evening ended with an extra thrill when M won an An*gelina Ballerina game and an Asian doll from the raffle! That girl was on cloud 9. Needless to say she fell fast asleep on the way home.

Jenny