A Little Butterfly...of the Social Variety!!

Warm greetings to everyone!! At the beginning of each week, we always think “this is going to be a boring week”, but, surprise, that has not happened yet! hahahaha…. Little Miss has recovered very nicely and bounced back from her surgery last week. So, we are very happy about that. We were unusually light on doctor appointments this past week, which was nice. We continue to get good feedback from the doctors which, of course, continues to make us so very happy.

One of the doctors that we went to see was one that Victoria typically does not enjoy. Much to our delight, she handled it like a charm! So, after the appointment, we decided to take her to a Rotary Fair that was being held in our town this week. Since the weather was calling for rain all week, we were not sure we’d be able to get her there. But, we lucked out and she was in a mood ripe for fun. She had no idea where we were taking her; we simply told her that we had a “surprise” for her. She’s never been to a fair before, so the best way to explain it to her was to actually take her.

When she saw the fair from a distance, she began to squeal with delight. As soon as we entered the fair grounds, she recognized a boy from her day camp class. This was our first realization that we may have a budding social butterfly on our hands! She walked right up to him, tapped him on the shoulder and said “hi!” We were stunned (not the act of the shy little girl she once was) and excited (great to see her coming out of her shell) at the same time. Her first ride was on a kid’s roller coaster. As she waited to go on a dinosaur ride, another child caught her eye. As it turns out, he was another boy from her day camp class. Once he got off the ride, she strode right up to him and gave the same smile and “hi” that she gave the other child….amazing.

After this ride, she showed no fear and went down a high potato-sack slide (3 times!)...even joining a few other girls in a friendly race for one. We enjoyed a few more rides before we called it a night. Needless to say, she had an absolute blast!! The next day when Mommy picked her up from day camp, Victoria asked if she had another “surprise”. Mommy laughed and had to let her know that, unfortunately, we can’t have such a big surprise every day.

At day camp this week, Victoria has enjoyed playing with a number of the girls. Also, a magician came in and put on a magic show for the kids. When the magician asked for the help of some assistants, Victoria raised her hand and offered her help (again, not the shy little one she once was). She helped the magician with saying the magic words (“abracadabra”…which she continued to say all night) and pull a rabbit out of his hat. In the end, she was even able to pet the rabbit and a dove that was used as part of the show. She was very surprised at how soft the rabbit’s fur was.

One random funny story from this week….while listening to the end of a Yankees radio broadcast, Victoria had her first experience of John Sterling’s trademark “Yankees Win…Tha-a-a-a-a-a-a Yankees Win!” She proceeded to imitate what she heard, however her take was “Yayayaya Yankees Win!” She was so proud and it was very cute.

Over the weekend, we all went to a BBQ where Victoria finally got to meet some of Mommy’s best childhood friends. Victoria had a blast running around in the sprinkler (“fountain” as she calls it), playing ball and eating. On the drive home, we were listening to the radio. When “Don’t You Want Me” (by The Human League) came on, Victoria mentioned that she had heard this song when she was in the orphanage. At first, we were not sure what to make of this, but she definitely knew the tune because she kept correctly humming along. Close to home, we stopped when we saw some deer crossing the road (a doe and a fawn). The fawn (which we called “Bambi”) stopped and looked right at us before crossing the road. We tried to make this into a lesson for Victoria (noting that the doe had not crossed, we told Victoria that “Bambi should wait for his mommy to cross”). Victoria’s response was priceless…she said that Bambi should be in a zoo (can you believe that?). We assured her that Bambi was far happier being free like us. So, she was OK with that. We did have a good laugh.

Here are some pictures from this week…

On her first roller coaster ride:

Riding solo on the caterpillar:
Weeee….mid-ride and turning the dragon’s head:
Don’t think that she really like the sack-slide, huh?
Flashing her beautiful smile while waiting for the train ride to start:
Not camera shy…can this kid pose, or what?
Who knew that sprinklers could be so much fun?
Still showing great soccer kicking form:
Sporting her new Mickey and Ariel (“Princess of the Sea”) sunglasses: