If you look back on a couple of posts and remember what we were told from our Host Program about all the different "Should and Should Nots" ... Well, to be honest...we ended up doing a lot more "Should Nots". Not that we were trying to do it that way, but, it was something that we just couldn't help. In looking back, I think we thought that we were doing the right thing. We saw this beautiful child and felt like she deserved all the "doting' and loving that she could get and we wanted her to have the most spectacular Christmas ever.
We bought her and our girls all dresses for Christmas and then to go and see Santa Clause. From the moment that she arrived, it was go, go, go, go.


I work at the YMCA and the next day that she arrived, I took her to work with me. She was like a rock star. Everyone wanted to see her. The next day was on the go also. We were off to go and meet our friends Angie and John to pick up the Chaperone (Luda) and to see the other children from Ukraine. We stayed busy the next day and then we threw Alyona and Luda a Welcome/Christmas party and neighbors and family came by with Christmas presents galore. Mind you...Christmas hadn't even hit yet.

Slowly, the angel that floated down the escalator started to lose her wings :). But, it couldn't be anything that we were doing, right? We had done all of our research and we knew it all.... :)


The next day, we were off to a Christmas Eve party.
We just couldn't figure out why our sweet Alyona was starting to melt down and to not listen and to run around the house as if she had eaten a bowl full of sugar.

THEN....it was Christmas Day. Never in my life and definitely in her life have I seen that many Christmas gifts for one child. They were gifts from everyone from everywhere. She was just blown away. She just ripped through the presents, not even taken the time to really look at them. Things started to slowly get out of control.

What was it again that our Hosting Program told us to do? :)