A New Canadian Citizen

Well, we've been home for over a year now and it's FINALLY official. I had no idea how much work it would be to make Emma a Canadian citizen. Going through all the paperwork again was very reminicsent of the adoption process. Ugh!

I finally sent off all required paperwork in January of this year. At that point I felt the worst was over and soon Emma would be a citizen, but alas, we recieved a letter stating that citizenship takes 12-15 months to establish once the government receives the paperwork...WHAT!!??!! I know it's alot of paperwork to go through, but 15 months? Seriously?

Turns out it only took 9 months. On August 4, Emma became a Canadian. She was very excited to see her new certificate and her shiny new citizenship card. And we were very excited knowing we could now travel with no restrictions. The day after Emma got her citizenship card, we were down at Canada Place applying for her passport. It should be here any day now...yay! Vacation, here we come! Christmas on the beach perhaps? We'll see!

One Year Ago Today....

...Emma set foot on Canadian soil for the first time! And we returned to this glorious country after two months away. One of the happiest days of my life! Time to celebrate! :):)

Our Little Two-Wheeler

It's a miracle...it finally happened! The training wheels came off a couple weeks ago. I didn't think it would ever happen! If only you could have seen Emma a year ago when grandpa first presented her with her bike. She didn't have the foggiest idea what to do with it. For the first couple of months, we couldn't even get her to pedal! She would just sit on her bike or get off and push it around. Finally, in the late fall, our four year old neighbor taught Emma how to pedal.

We were so confident that balancing would come very quickly after learning how to pedal. Unfortunately, winter came and that ended our bike practice.

In the spring, we started up again. We tried to explain to Emma how to balance, but the concept just seemed a little too much for her. So we raised her training wheels to the highest level and Emma rode around, constantly at a 45 degree angle from one side to another. She wore those little training wheels right out!

Then one day, out of the blue, we noticed that she was balancing. It's just like something finally clicked and she got it. Shortly after that, the training wheels came off and she took off like she'd been doing it her entire life.

I was so excited and such a proud mommy. I was out there taking tons of pictures and video. I think I could equate my feelings with the way a mom feels when a baby takes it's first steps. It was such a huge accomplishment for her and it was wonderful to see how happy and excited she was. She kept riding around saying what a big girl she is. :) And then it was off to see all of our families and friends so she could show off her new skill.