I’ve mentioned before that Eliana starts Kindergarten in the Fall.

We heard last year about a school in a neighboring town that everyone - parents and teachers alike - just raved about. It’s a charter school but the school is free like public school and the children who attend don’t have to live in the town where the school is located.

The school is so popular that the administration holds a lottery at the beginning of every year to determine the new children who can enroll for the upcoming year. Carmi attended a requisite open house at the school back in January when I was so sick to put Eliana’s name in the pot. She came home and announced that there were over 300 children wanting one of only 30 open slots available. Taking our usual luck into consideration, we knew there was no way in heck that Eliana would be a student there.

The lottery was held on February 20th which was Eliana’s birthday. Would have been a great birthday present but alas it was not to be.

Our ‘Dear John’ letter came in the mail today. Bad news is that Eliana lost the lottery. Good news is that she’s only number 283 on the grade K wait list.

Maybe next year.

Eliana is 5 years old today and she is, in her own words, officially “grown up”.

Back in October, I posted an entry called 100 things about Eliana. In honor of her 5th birthday, I thought I would give you 5 more things about Eliana that you didn’t know:

1. She always wants to drink my White Chocolate Mocha from Starbucks. I’m not quite ready to give her a Starbucks card, though.
2. When something doesn’t go her way, she crosses her arms in a huff and mutters, “Fine”. We hear that a lot.
3. A true sweets lover, she licks all the icing off before eating a slice of cake.
4. She could sit for hours and put puzzles together.
5. She prays for Karys almost every night.

Happy Birthday, Little Empress. Mommy and Daddy are proud of you and we love you so very much!

This was a busy day.

Eliana’s birthday is Tuesday but we had her big party today. We threw the party in our church’s fellowship hall instead of trying to do it at our house. Eliana has NOT been doing well lately with sharing toys if a friend came over so we knew she would absolutely freak out if ten little people were messing in her stuff.

There were games and crafts. Carmi had story time and read the kids a neat book called How I Became a Pirate which the children listened to quite intently. Eliana opened her presents and then everyone gorged on pizza and birthday cake.

Tonight we threw a Chinese New Year party at a local Chinese restaurant. Our group grew considerably from last year.

Last year we had 24 people present and there were a total of 5 China girls. This year there were 40 people and 10 China girls. What’s amazing is that there were 9 families that weren’t able to attend so we’re growing to a sizeable number of families with children from China.

Nothing says “I love you” on Valentine’s Day quite like a pink (Cheerwine) ice cream float.

Mmm...I’ll take this kind of lovin’ any day!

Happy Valentine’s Day, Carmi. I love you!

Bless her heart. She knows that this is as close as she’ll come to getting any flowers from me for ANY occasion.

But hey...who needs flowers when you have me every day. Right, hon? Hon???

Happy Valentine’s Day, my little Empress. I love you ‘beary beary’ much.

Thank you for letting me be your daddy.

This journal offers a peek inside the Henderson home where you'll find two Little Empresses. Eliana stole our hearts on October 29, 2002 and Karys forever became a part of our family on September 17, 2007. Is a Little Emperor in the future?