Wow, is it really the middle of July already? Where has the time gone? It doesn’t seem possible that it has already been 3 months since we came home as a family. We’ve watched Victoria make such leaps and bounds in her development…becoming part of a loving family, adapting to and learning a new language, etc. She now greets people with a direct “hi” and is certain to say a nice “bye” when they depart. She is so much more engaging and conversational with family/friends that we meet. We know that this has been a continual story over the past few weeks, but it’s really mind boggling how far this amazing little girl has come in such a short time.
Since Mommy has to return to work next month and Victoria is starting school in September, this week we decided to have Victoria start attending a day camp. She’ll attend a few days a week over the next few weeks until Mommy returns to work. At that point, she’ll attend full time until school starts. We were a little anxious about how she would do on day one, so Mommy brought her by for an hour on the day before to hang out with the teacher and to meet the other kids. This seemed to work quite well. While, as expected, Victoria was a little shy at first, she had a great day and was looking forward to going back. The teacher even commented that Victoria was excellent with her use of “please” and “thank you”, stating that she wished all of the other kids could be as good as she is. What an awesome thing for a parent to hear, huh?
This weekend was a very important one for Victoria and was cause for celebration, as she was baptized in a very nice ceremony at our church. Since Victoria has been more actively taking part in things like our pre-meal prayers, we felt this would be a very good time for her to take part in this Sacrament. We were on a tight schedule, though, since it’s tough to get everyone together and our Pastor goes on vacation soon. Also, since we wanted a Saturday service, we needed to set up on very short notice (a week or so).
In preparation for the ceremony, we practiced the night before (placing water on Victoria’s head and asking her to do the same with us). She enjoyed this and was excited for the real thing. The ceremony was excellent. Afterwards, our Pastor showed the kids the beautiful organ at our church and played some tunes (he really is an excellent player).
The gathering at our house for lunch was great, while it stretched the limits of how many people we could sit. We had a seat adorned with balloons for Victoria. The cake was as delicious as it was beautiful. When we brought out the cake, Victoria’s cousin even led us in a song of “Happy Baptism to You” (sung to the tune of Happy Birthday). As usual, Victoria had a great time playing with her cousins….she also had a great time with her grandparents, aunts, uncles, Pastor, and her proud new Godmother and Godfather. Victoria even had a chance to say “Happy Birthday” and to give birthday presents to her Grandfather and Godfather. So, as you can tell, this could only be described as a fantastic day and a fitting end to yet another great week.
Here are some pictures from this week…
Showing off her new lunch bag before heading to camp:
Victoria with Mommy, Daddy and her proud Godparents:
A nice photo with our Pastor:
Victoria was all smiles after her Baptism:
Our little Victoria Ann, very excited about her cake!
A better view of Victoria’s decked out chair:
Having a blast with two of her cousins…
…While it may have been a little too much excitement for her younger cousin...haha:
Relaxing on Sunday and getting ready to paint:
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