Gong Xi Fa Cai!

Happy Chinese New Year! The lunar new year began this week -- it is now the Year of the Ox!

We attended a Chinese New Year party over the weekend with the "Bamboo Bunch" a local group of families with children adopted from various Asian countries. W and R dressed up in dresses that we bought for them in China -- we purchased dresses in many sizes so they can wear one each year for Chinese New Year.

R left, W right.

R left, W right.

The twins really enjoyed the party. They ate their weight in noodles and ran around and danced with dozens of other little girls. They also ate cake, which they never usually eat.

After dinner, there was entertainment -- several of the girls in attendance participate in Chinese dancing lessons and performed with their dance troupes. The grand finale was a dragon dance. The twins were mainly interested in the instruments being played to make music for the dragon dance (particularly a very large drum), rather than the dragon itself.

W and R really enjoyed the whole production and we managed to time our exit just right, heading out before they hit the meltdown stage. When we arrived home, however, it was a different story. It was fully a half-hour after the twins' usual bedtime and they REFUSED to take off their dresses. When Daddy finally wrestled R out of her dress (no small feat with those tiny little frog closure buttons), she turned on him, red-faced, roaring and beating her chest like a gorilla, ready to take her revenge on him for removing her finery. Think Mini Me or Chuckie or a particularly angry Ewok. Mommy could not stop laughing. Daddy was not laughing -- he backed up and then left the room. R finally calmed down when Mommy promised that she could wear the dress again "later".

On another note, the party took place one year to the day from when we returned home from China. Baby V wore the "coming home" outfit that R wore when we got off the plane and met our friends and family at the airport. No photo.