Xanthe the MVP

 Xanthe is the MVP in her class this week!  She made her poster twice because she wanted to do it weeks in advance, so she got it finished well ahead of time.  Then, the week before her big spotlight week, her teacher gave her a special posterboard to do her poster on.  Worried that it wouldn't count if it wasn't on the special posterboard, which was red instead of white, she did it all over again.  And now I can't find pictures of either poster!  Or the trophy Xanthe took for her big show-and-tell day today.  (She played a graduation piece at her last recital.  Woot woot!!)  I'll have to take some pictures after school, if Xanthe can stop long enough to pose.  Thursday is the day she comes home fast and gets ready for ballet!  Even though it's not until 5:00, she likes to get right down to business after school.  It's been a fun week with our little MVP.  She is just blossoming this year.  First grade is crushing at our school.  It can suck the life right out of you.  Now that she can breathe without fear of recrimination, she is taking off with reading, piano, math...everything!  We're so proud of Xanthe.  She is a fighter in every sense.  (Some of her siblings and cousins even have scars to prove it!)  We're so proud of Xanthe.  Here is the letter I wrote for her teacher to read to the class:



Xanthe Mary Mei has been waiting to be the MVP at school all year. She has
had her poster planned for weeks! Xanthe loves to be organized and
prepared, and besides that, it's awesome to be the MVP, and she could
hardly wait!

Xanthe was born in China on April 10, 2005. On that day, her family here
in Utah didn't even know she had been born, but we were waiting for a
special little baby girl to join our family. When Xanthe was about 10
months old, her nanny at the orphanage took some beautiful pictures of her.
Those were the first pictures we saw of our little daughter. One Xanthe's
first birthday, our family celebrated at Chuck E. Cheese. Xanthe wasn't at
the party, because she was still waiting for us in China. It's OK, though,
because Xanthe was really scared of Chuck E. Cheese when she was little.
Imagine how scared she would have been when she was only one year old!

Xanthe's mom and dad went all the way to China to pick her up when she was
13 months old. She was scared, but she liked to giggle and stick her
tongue out at her dad! When she got home to Utah, she discovered that she
had three older sisters and an older brother. I'm not sure if she was too
happy about sharing the spotlight at first, but now she is really glad she
has siblings. And that's good because she also has a little brother and a
baby sister! Xanthe is a good sister to everyone.

Xanthe loves to dance. You should see her fly across the lawn when she
shows us her dances in the front yard. She has only missed ballet one time
in three years, but sometimes she has a bad dream that she forgot to go to
ballet. She just loves it so much, she couldn't live without it! She also
loves to go to tumbling class on Mondays and piano lessons before school on
Thursdays. If you see Xanthe on a Thursday and she is really tired, it's
probably because she got up way too early for piano! At least she gets to
stop at McDonald's on the way, right?

I hope everyone in the class gets to be friends with Xanthe because her
cute little smile will make you happy and her laughter will make you feel
like the sun is shining all winter long! We love you, Xanthe!

Love, Mom