Best Christmas gift ever.

One year ago we had just arrived in Zanzibar. I checked my email to find out that Fiori was going to be our daughter.

For those of you who don't know, we had a honeymoon in Africa during Christmas 2007. I went a bit early and took a side trip to Ethiopia where I met Fiori for the first time. I fell in love instantly but I wouldn't even hold her. You see, there were several people from our agency waiting for infants at the same time and I didn't want to get attached as I had no idea who would be selected by our agency to be our child. Luckily, they chose her for us and the rest is happy history.

Merry Christmas. Look what I can do!

We put this up just before Christmas and look what she can already do by herself.

When it rains it pours

Fiori is going to daycare today for the first time for a whole day. Up until now, she has been doing 5 hours per day, 4 days a week. But today and tomorrow, she is going for the full day and it may need to become a permanent thing.

You see...for those of you that don't know, I am a real estate appraiser and my work has been dead, dead, dead for months now. Which was nice as I could spend a bunch of time with Fiori when she got home. But it got old really quick with so little income; and we live in the SF Bay Area so I can't afford to be a SAHM. So I have been doing a bunch of marketing and have obtained some new clients. It was just starting to get a little busy when the mortgage rates plummeted. So now everyone and their mother (at least everyone who isn't upside down on their house) wants to refinance and I have gone from having 3-5 appraisals per month to 2-3 per day. Yikes.

To boot, I have been looking at going back to my old life as a product manager in high tech due to the deadness in the real estate market (and I admit because I miss the stimulation). So I had been sending out applications and last week I got an interview with a startup in Berkleley right at the time when my current work went crazy. I did well in the interview and they want me to come in for a second round. So *if* I get offered the job, I am in a total quandary.

Do I stay where I am since things are (currently) busy, I get to work from home and the work is fairly easy?

Do I go back to high tech because I miss it, the longer I am out the harder it is to get back in and because my current level of work may be only short term?

Hmmmmm.

Me too!

Fiori's always wanted to do exactly what we do. If I'm wearing a baseball cap, she wants it so she can wear it. If we're using the remote to change the TV channels, she wants the remote, too. Well, Saturday morning, she apparently wanted to eat pancakes like we were - and she wasn't having any of the small plastic baby fork we gave her. She wanted a real fork.

She did quite well. While she needed some help putting enough pressure on the fork the spear a piece of pancake, she handled all the rest by herself. (And was quite proud of it.)

Next up: We teach her how to do her own laundry and wash dishes.

This is the reaction we're hoping for.

Fiori's first holiday season is here and this is the reaction we're hoping for on Christmas morning.

Seriously though, we've managed not to go crazy with presents. We're just planning on a nice family Xmas with my parents, Nikko's mom and sister, our two nephews, and potentially Nikko's aunt and uncle.

I'm sure we'll post pictures of the big day, but if you don't hear from us before then, Fiori, Nikko and I would like to wish you all the happiest of holidays. 

All she needs for Christmas is a paper bag

Really this was not done just to amuse us. She loved it and kept bringing the bag back to us. I swear!

And, no, I still haven't found the Mino. I used my regular camera for this. Oh Mino, where for art thou?

Doin the do

Fiori's hair is growing. And I have been kindly reminded (usually by my black friends) on several occasions that I will need to learn how to do her hair. This is true. I am particularly lazy with my hair - basically wash, spritz with gel, drag a brush through it and then I am done. I know this will not be the case for Fiori and now that her hair is getting longer, it is prone to get nappy. Argh.

I have all the hair products so no worries there but try to do her hair and that girl will scream - even if I KNOW it doesn't hurt her. I put her hair in puffs this weekend but we were in a hurry to get out the door and I was really embarrassed that my parts weren't straight. Later on, I stuck her in front of Sesame Street (which she loves) and tried to redo the parts. I put lots of conditioner in, used the soft brush and a chopstick to part. Yep, she screamed bloody murder. But I got it done (although my mom pointed out that my last part wasn't all that straight - thanks mom!).

Hopefully her hair will grow long enough so that I can do braids and not have to brush it out every day.