Christmas Letter

Dear All,

I don't usually write a Christmas letter, but I thought what with the blog and all I might make a stab at it this year. And just think; no trees were felled in the writing and delivery of this note (just all the coal-powered energy that it takes to run my computer and yours, and don't forget all the servers chugging away somewhere, and, well, the Starbucks cup that was necessitated to sit down and start this whole rant, but I digress) If you live nearby or have been following the blog, this won't be of much interest, but I did include the blog address in a few Christmas cards to people we don't talk to very often, so if you're one of those, this might be helpful. In the spirit of Christmas I shall recap:

This year, for those of you who are really out of the loop, our family grew by one as we adopted our third daughter from China. Her name is Grace HuaXue Hojnacki. HuaXue was her first name for the first twenty months of her life when she lived in an orphanage and with a wonderful foster family in the city of Nanning, Guangxi Province, in the south of China. She was born with a cleft lip and palate, and yes, we knew that when we adopted her. Her lip was repaired in China at the age of 11 months, and we have just recently undergone the palate repair surgery here in Grand Rapids. You can check out some of the previous posts to see how that is going. We celebrated her second birthday, shortly before the surgery, on Dec. 1st. She is (apart from our somewhat traumatic post-op period) a very good natured, happy little girl with a stubborn streak about a mile wide. She is thrilled to have two new big sisters who are equally thrilled to have her as their new "Mei Mei" (Chinese for little sister) Her name in Chinese means "Chinese Snow" so we think it's appropriate that she has landed here in Michigan.

We spent about two weeks in China at the end of July and beginning of August. We spent some time in Beijing, Nanning, Guangzhou and Hong Kong. Our good friend, Laura Drake, accompanied us part of the time and did some of her own traveling as well. We did get to meet Grace's foster family while we were there and they obviously loved her very much. It was clear by her development, that they had spent a lot of quality time with her. So we are very lucky to get to take up her care from this point on.

Sophie turned six this Fall and is in Kindergarten. She loves school and is very enthusiastic about learning to read and write. We're lucky to live very close to her school so that we can walk and ride bikes when the weather permits. She loves swimming and bike riding, navigates the computer like a pro, and has developed an affinity for Chinese food since Grace came home. She is a typical "first child," likes to be in charge, organizes all the younger kids into activities and can already generate a good eye roll combined with an exasperated "Mom!" or "Dad!" if we embarrass her in any way.

Lily is no longer our baby and boy doesn't she know it. Her favorite game right now is, "Let's pretend I'm a baby and you hear me say my first words!" She'll be turning four this Christmas Eve, but we have her convinced to wait and have her party on her half birthday in June. We got her hooked by promising a picnic, so now we just have to hope for good weather. She goes to pre-school three days a week, which she also loves and is just starting to write her name and a few other small words. She is also fulfilling her role of middle child with gusto. She is very social, outgoing and goofy as opposed to Sophie's more serious and responsible demeanor (although the two of them together can be goofier than anything either one of them can dream up on their own) Despite all of my efforts to the contrary, they are complete girly-girls who like to dress up, play My Little Pony, and have both asked Santa for a Barbie doll with wings and a mermaid's fin who I think rides on a unicorn to boot. Sigh. I have already been able to exert my power by convincing them that their Strawberry Shortcake books are (in their words now, not mine ;) "not very good writing" since 70 (that's right 70!!!!!!) exclamation points in one short bedtime story don't make for the best literature.

As far as Dave and I go, see above. That pretty much sums it up. We did manage a ski trip to Colorado last January and, of course, two weeks in China wasn't half bad. The girls stayed home with the grandparents, so we squeezed a little vacation time in along the way. We're still quite happy with Grand Rapids and Dave's job doesn't offer any sign that we would be going anywhere anytime soon, but who knows what the next year might bring. In addition to adopting Grace, our small attempt to "be the change we wish to see in the world" was to trade in Dave's car for a Toyota Prius Hybrid. It's a zippy little green hatchback which we are very pleased with, not the least because we're averaging about 50 MPG. The whole family is still very active in our church (although our church tends to take the word church rather loosely) It's an unafilliated, liberal place where our minister's sermons about the world in general, and George W. specifically, often cause controversy that reverberates on the op-ed pages of our paper for weeks here in conservative West Michigan. We've met a lot of kindred spirits there and are happy to continue stirring things up as much as we can.

That should catch everybody up for now. If you haven't been here before, feel free to browse through past posts if you want to catch up some more, and leave us a comment to let us know you were here! We wish each and every one of you a Great Christmas and a prosperous new year in every way possible!

Peace and Love to you all,

Susan

It's a Small World

When we checked in to the waiting room for Gracie's surgery, there was another little Chinese girl with a caucasian mom sitting across from us. It has become so common to see them , that I don't always even ask about them, but I could tell that this one also had a repaired cleft lip so I just asked if she was there for the same surgery as us. As it turned out, she was, and after asking about birthdays we determined that they were only a few days apart in age. The next standard question in these types of exchanges is which Province in China they are from. That brought us to find out that they were from the same city, Nanning.

We both kind of stared at each other for a second, and then it suddenly became clear that these two girls were not only from the same orphanage, but they had been listed together on the same special needs list from our agency, back when we chose them to be our daughters. What that essentialy means is that had either of us chosen the other one, we could have been raising each other's child. The other mom remembered Grace from the list and then I remembered that her daughter had also been pictured, but was already on hold when we saw the list for the first time. I remember her picture, because she was shown (as Grace was) with her unrepaired cleft lip and had a big smile on her face. It was quite an emotional moment.

She was scheduled for surgery the next day so we were able to go and visit her right before we went home and she had just come out of surgery. We exchanged emails so that we could get together once the girls were feeling better and are already trying to plan our first meeting. The final kicker to the whole story is that we have both determined that we have a picture of the two girls standing next to each other on the grounds of the orphanage in Nanning when they were probably about 14 or 15 months old. The orphanage gave us each a photo album when we adopted the girls with pictures they had on file from their stay there. Even though they were each in foster care, they went back to the orphanage for meetings and classes and that is probably when the photo was taken. You can obviously tell that it is both of them there in Nanning, and now here they are, destined to be friends in Michigan. It is quite mind boggling.

Meanwhile the recovery from palate surgery has taken a sharp downward spiral. For the past four to five days, Grace has decidied that she doesn't wasnt to have any of the liquids that we are offering her. Then she got a little stomach bug that had her throwing up, so we ended up back in the hospital for an i.v. She has completely shut down on us emotionally and has just had it with the whole thing. She doesn't understand why we won't give her food any more and is completely despondant. At this point the only thing she'll eat is popsicles and juice, so that's what we're giving her. I tried force-feeding for a day or two but it just wasn't happening. She cries for half-hour stretches at a time, not wanting to be held and just kicking and screaming if we try to do anything for her. It's not a pretty picture, but it's only for eight more days and then we can at least start with some baby food. Oh what a Merry Christmas that will be!!! Let's just say that this year our advent calendar is serving a dual purpose.

Susan

Surgery Update

Just a quick note to let everyone know that Grace made it through surgery with flying colors and is home recuperating now. She is currently sitting on my lap rocking out to her new electronic keyboard (and trying to add to this message!) Everythinyg (vvvg nm) went well and she is being quite the trooper. We came home Wednesday evening and she's been sleeping pretty well since then. She'll be on a total liquid diet for the next three weeks which hasn't (hbbbb g ga) been a problem until now as she hasn't felt that well, but now that she's perking up a bit she's starting to show an interest in food again which is going to be a problem! We'll post more later. I have to share the world's best "small world" story ever, when I have time.

Gracie's Two!!!

It's Grace's birthday today and to celebrate, our little "Chinese Snow" has brought us just that; an ice storm last night followed by a predicted 12 inches of snow today which is falling steadily and looks like it will live up to its billing. School has been cancelled so the morning play-date with the twins from Sophie's class has turned into five kids racing around the house just waiting to get bundled up and go outside. We are all decorated for Christmas already in anticipation of Grace's surgery next week. We thought it would be a good idea to get everything done before that since we'll all be a little sidelined for the next few weeks. The tubes in the ears and the unexpected root canal all went very smoothly. Can't really tell yet if there's any difference in her hearing but she has started to say "Mama" in the appropriate context, so we think there's something getting through. She also mouths the words "baby" and "bye-bye" but doesn't vocalize them yet.

She continues to amaze us all with her level of happiness. People who meet her for the first time can't believe how well adjusted she is. She goes easily to the nursery at church and doesn't even cry any more if a sitter comes and she sees me leave. She still gets really excited when there is a big group of people around, especially kids. Thanksgiving with Dave's family was a blast and she played with all the big kids, even let several strange relatives (double meaning there certainly not meant :-) pick her up. The biggest help is that she's starting to settle down around the house as far as what she's interested in and what she can touch. She understands more about what a toy is and what things are off limits. She understands if we say "no" or "don't touch" and doesn't have a problem with it. She's even left the Christmas tree and decorations mostly where they started out.

We switched bedrooms around as Sophie really wanted a turn sharing rooms with Grace and Lily was ready for a break. Now Grace is in Sophie's room and Lily got the double bed in hers. It seems to be working out fine. Sophie is a little more tolerant of all the noise Gracie makes when she's going to sleep and sleeps right through any fussing at night. We've been told to expect a long stretch of sleeplessness after the surgery, so I'm considering moving into the basement with Grace. I could sleep on the futon and we could put up the port-a-crib for Grace. That way we could also sanitize the area of sharp stuff and she and I could hang out down there when everyone else is eating. That's definitely going to be the hardest part about it: the eating. She'll be on a total liquid diet for the first three weeks, then a week of baby food, then two weeks of only soft stuff. The test for what passes as liquid is that it has to pass through a cheese cloth (if anybody has one of those any more) The hard part will be that this kid loves to eat. I think she'd sit in her highchair and eat all day if we'd let her. She also notices everything that I give to the other kids or eat myself. Forget trying to give them something and not her. She cranes her neck and points and starts throwing a fit the second you put it down in front of them. So obviously she is not going to be happy if she sees them eating away and is not allowed to join in; hence the basement idea.

We took her out for her first excursion in the snow today and she really liked it. When she first saw the kids getting their stuff on to go outside she went into the hat/glove basket and assembled her own ensemble (see rather gangster-like picture) Then I decked her out in everything and put her in the little sled. I pulled her up and down the street for a good half hour and she was smiling and dragging her mittens in the snow. It was coming down pretty heavy so by the end she had a nice dusting covering her hat and coat. She even liked to be pulled down the little hill in the neighbor's yard with all of the other neighborhood kids. I took pictures until the camera battery died, but I think I captured her first snow experience on her second birthday. How appropriate for little HuaXue (chinese snow) Her foster family sent many birhtday wishes by email today and told us that their other foster child, Grace's "little sister" is being adopted by a family in Spain and will be leaving them on Dec. 18th. How funny to think that she will be growing up speaking Spanish while Grace is here speaking English and they both started out together in China. It is a strange world we live in.

Funny birthday story: Yesterday we received a card from Dave's Aunt and Uncle in South Bend and I remember thinking "that's a really nice card," because let's be honest, greeting cards aren't always the most memorable of works of art, but this one was really sweet with a nice little rhyming story and a pop-up flower on the inside. So today two cards came for Grace in the mail; one from my Mom and Dad and one from my Aunt. Our mail gets delivered directly through a slot in the front door and the girls always run to get it as soon as it comes in, so they found the cards right away and asked if they could open them for Grace. Sophie opened hers first and we all started laughing because it was the same card we had gotten the day before, and then Lily started yelling because she opened hers and it was also the same card! So I guess everyone agreed with me that it really was a nice card :-)

It has been noted by several dogged blog followers that Dave does not appear in any of the pictures posted since we returned from China. Even the foster family asked, "what has happened to Grace's father, Dawei?" So in response I have made it a point to post a picture that includes Dave. You may all rest assured that Dave still exists.

If you're wondering about the picture of the big ship, that is the Queen Mary 2 arriving at the port in Hamburg to be repaired. Some of you may not know that I took a quick, five day visit to Hamburg last month to surprise a dear friend, who is not in the best of health, for his birthday. While I was there the "Queen" arrived and it was quite the happening. She came in around 8:00 p.m. and there were thousands of people lining the port just to catch a glimpse. It is an astonishingly large ship. It's probably hard to tell from the pictures, but those buildings looking dwarfed at her side are not as small as she makes them look. Anyway, it was an event to say the least. I had a very nice, but too brief visit with the Fahls, who were sort of my family away from home when I lived in Hamburg. We celebrated Lothar's birthday and had lots of Kaffee und Kuchen. Edda and I got to wander around the city for a day and visit all of the old hang-outs. We even found the Seebeck, the ship Dave and I were married on. It was hard to say good-bye as Lothar has been diagnosed with a cancer that is not treatable and I will probably not see him again, but we all did surprisingly well and it meant a lot to all of us that we got to have that good-bye.

We'll try to keep you posted about Grace's progress after the surgery. Keep us in your thoughts on Tuesday (and Wednesday, and Thursday....) Happy Holidays!

Susan

Pictures Only

In looking back at the blog I realized that I haven't really put many pictures on, especially since I didn't post anything for a month. So here is a post dedicated entirely to photos. Enjoy! Please see the previous post for all of the updates and Halloween pictures

Halloween and Beyond

O.k., so probably nobody's reading this anymore since it's been so long since I've posted anything, but I'll keep writing. If a blogger blogs in a forest and no one's around, does anybody read it?

Halloween was a big event. We had a six-year-old woodland fairy, a three-year old brown dog, and a little ladybug, who made its third appearance at our house. Dave took the big girls out trick-or-treating and Grace stayed home to help me hand out candy. It only took her a while to learn that all of the candy wasn't for her. Then she really got into the handing out, digging her hand into the bag and pulling out huge fists full to drop into the bags. Needless to say she was very popular on the block. The girls got back at 8:00 and Lily was asleep on the couch by 8:05. We now have enough candy to last us until next year and beyond.

Unfortunately the weather in Michigan this Fall has not been the greatest so we haven't been outside much. The leaves are spectacular right now, but it's been rainy and quite cold most of the time. We still manage to ride bikes to school on occasion wearing our winter hats and mittens, but we've already had to resort to the car more than I would have liked. We got to go to an apple orchard outing last week and were lucky that it was one of the few beautiful days we've had. The kids got to ride ponies and horses and go for a hay ride as well as picking their own apples and playing in a life-sized teepee.

Grace is gearing up for her palate surgery on Dec. 5th. Of course the ENT doctor who is putting in her tubes called this week to say that he can't put them in when she is having her other surgery so we are going to have to put her under twice for each separate procedure. And the pediatric dentist wants to work on her teeth before the other two in case there is any decay in her mouth (which I think there is) to get it out before surgery. So that will mean three rather traumatic events over a period of several weeks. Such coordinated care; way to go team!
Otherwise she is just humming right along.

She has adapted so well that there are rarely times when her actions seem any different from any other 23-month-old. She still has a few odd ticks. The worst is that she cannot stand it if I sit down anywhere in the kitchen, other than right next to her at the table, when she is in her highchair. As long as I'm walking around, cooking or doing dishes she's happy as a clam. The second I touch down on a stool at the counter or even try to sit in one of the other chairs at the table, she goes ballistic: kicking, screaming, crying and throwing food. What's that all about? You got me, but for now it means that I'm not doing much sitting in the kitchen. Honestly I haven't been doing much sitting, anywhere, lately. Grace is one happy little girl who is happily bonded to all of us. She goes happily with babysitters and to the nursery at church and then runs laughing back for a pick-up when we return. But this little girl can also happily dismantle a room in about ten seconds flat and she is not afraid to do so...Every day...Several times a day.

She is learning signs as fast as we can throw them at her. Her newest ones are "cat" and "hat" (which don't rhyme nearly as well in sign language). And if we really get in her face and repeat it over and over again, we can usually get her to say "mama" - actually say it, as opposed to pointing to her chin which is her sign for Mama. The speech therapist has told us that she is capable of making some sounds which only require putting her lips together, such as "pa, ba, and ma" so that's what we're working on. She's also starting to put her tongue between her teeth and say "la-la-la" and is greatly encouraged by a big round of applause and some cheering, which she always joins in on.

We picked up Dave's new car today, but don't have any pictures yet, so I'll save the big reveal for the next post. Along that same line, if anyone is interested in a lovingly maintained 2000 Nissan Maxima, please let us know. The dealership was not in a giving mood when making their trade-in offer, so we decided to give it a go selling it ourselves.

Only one more week of basketball which will determine if we end up with a winning or losing record. While it will be nice to have my evenings free to be at home again, it has been nice to have the distraction as well as the opportunity to get out of the house and put on real, adult-like clothing and wrap my brain around something other than child-rearing. I've actually petitioned to be able to go down to the junior high and coach the 8th graders next year. It's a somewhat shorter season and they desperately need someone to work on fundamentals before they get to the high school.

That's it. I'm out of ideas. Until next time

Mid-Autumn Festival

Today is the Chinese Holiday celebrating the harvest moon. In China they are making moon cakes and eating their dinners outside under the stars. This year there is the extra bonus of some sort of celestial alignment which has given us the closest look at the moon in nine years. Grace's foster family wanted us to connect "our webcam" so that they could all see her during their celebration, but we still haven't gotten caught up with our Chinese friends in the technology department. I thought we could use my friend's webcam but apparently it's not that simple. There's some kind of issue with each side using the same server, but I haven't figured that out yet. I still think it would be nice for the family to be able to see her, but I don't know if she would be able to comprehend that she could see them but that they weren't actually there. She's looked at pictures of them and not been upset at all, in fact she was smiling and pointing at them, so I think she'd do just fine.

Otherwise Grace has had a kind of tough week. She has a cold. Or allergies, I'm not sure. If you've never experienced a child with a cleft palate and a cold, it's not much fun. The bodily fluids that usually stay put in the nose, don't. So she's very drippy to say the least. Her recurring ear infection still hasn't been resolved so she's on a pretty heavy duty antibiotic which is giving her diarrhea and a nasty diaper rash. Last night she was in her crib while the girls were getting ready for bed. We were brushing teeth in the bathroom when we heard a huge crash. Running back into the room, we found that she had somehow managed to pull a three foot long solid wood shelf out of the wall and down on top of her head. I have no idea how she managed to reach it. Lily slept in that crib for three and a half years, is twice as tall as Grace and never touched the thing. Anyway, she's got a gash above her right eye so it's just as well her foster family couldn't see her today. They might have changed their mind about us. So Gracie got to go to bed early on this Mid-Autumn Moon Festival. Hopefully next year's will be better for her.

We have scheduled her palate surgery for Dec. 5th. That should work out well since basketball will be over, she'll still get to celebrate her birthday, and she'll be back to a somewhat normal diet by Christmas. We're seeing the ENT Doc. next week and are expecting to schedule tubes to be put in her ears at the time of her surgery. After that we will begin speech therapy. That's about it for us. Dave, being the banker that he is, has Monday off, so we're looking forward to a nice family weekend; the girls and I are going to the ballet tomorrow afternoon, Michigan/MSU game with neighbors tomorrow evening, church on Sunday, school for the girls on Monday. Happy moon viewing to you all!!

New Pictures

Last weekend we went down to Collins Park on the Lake in East Grand Rapids for a "Picture Party" that our neighbor had organized. A professional photographer gave us each 15 minute photo shoots and will send us all the proofs online if we want to order any. I haven't seen the professional shots yet. Our priority was to get some pics of all three girls together. Not sure that we accomplished, as Grace wasn't too into sitting still, but we may have some good action shots. Anyway, I took my camera along and took the opportunity of having three girls with their hair brushed, dressed in nice clothes and all together on a sunny day to snap a few of my own pictures. Again, none with all three, but some good individual ones. Those are the above images. A shout-out to Melissa Fronek for the adorable polka-dot dress Grace is wearing and around which all the others were chosen.

Saturday Football Game

The local high school football game was cancelled last night due to thunder and lightning and rescheduled for this afternoon. We thought we would take the opportunity to go catch a game and see our neighbor/babysitter, who is the drum major. Dave's friend Brian from Denver is visiting this weekend and the two of them were out golfing, so I will treat you all to the rollercoaster that is, "A Trip To The Game With Three Kids."

1. We decided to go to the game. We had to get dressed. Thus commences a half hour production of "what's the temperature like? Can I wear a dress? Short sleeves or long sleeves? Long pants or a skirt? If I wear my watermelon tank top do I have to wear a sweatshirt? Can I wear sandals or tennis shoes?" I insisted on long pants and sweatshirts since the house was quite chilly from the night before. I dressed Grace in a turtleneck and sweater with leggings. I, myself wore jeans and a sweatshirt. We got shoes on. We were ready to go. We were happy.

2. We stepped outside the back door only to be hit by a blast of warm, humid air the likes of which we haven't felt here in weeks. We were obviously all overdressed, so we shed our sweatshirts and loaded into the various bikes and contraptions to head off. We were all still happy.

3. About halfway to the high school Sophie had a near miss with a pedestrian. She was coming up behind him and he had moved over to the right so I thought he knew we were there. I called out that we were on his left and told Sophie to go ahead, but apparently he didn't hear me and just that second moved back to the middle of the sidewalk. They collided and he gave what appeared to me to be a dirty look. I apologized profusely and we continued on, but I told Sophie to stop so that I could tell her what to do the next time that happened. She thought I was mad at her and began sobbing in the middle of the sidewalk, when of course the walker caught up to us and felt awful for causing her to cry and began to try to cheer her up. Anyone who knows Sophie, knows that such attempts are futile if not downright detrimental so we were caught in a vicious cycle of him apologizing, her crying and me trying to make them both feel better:

Man: It's o.k. little girl you just surprised me.
Me: Oh, she's fine, just a little surprised herself.
Sophie: (crying) I'm sorry Mommy, I didn't mean to hit him.
Man and Me: No! you didn't even hit him/me. Don't worry.
Sophie: I want my B!!! (blankie)
Me: You're o.k, let's just keep riding.
Man: (bending over Sophie and laying a hand on her back) My granddaughter has a bike just like that. When did you learn to ride it?
Sophie: (shying away from strange man touching her and afraid to answer)
Me: (overly cheerful and wishing he would just keep walking) Oh, she learned this summer, didn't you honey?!
Sophie: (wailing) I don't know why I'm crying!!!!

we were not very happy.

4. By the time we got to the game, all had been forgotten and we couldn't wait to see the band perform and watch out neighbor "run out into the middle of the field and throw that thing up in the air" (in their words more or less) We parked the bikes and went in. No admission. Yeah! No band. Boo!!! Had I thought about it long enough I could have guessed that it would have been nearly impossible for all of those teeneagers to cancel all of their other Saturday plans to show up in the middle of the day for a band performance, but I obviously hadn't thought about it long enough. There was general consternation and despair, followed by vain attempts at distraction, ending in buying them each a snowcone. We were happy again.

5. They wanted to sit in the top row of the bleachers. We did. They were happy. They saw their friends from school down in the front row and weren't happy any more. I told them they could walk down and say hi. Happy. One spilled snowcone on pants. Unhappy. Sophie went down to meet friends and Lily followed. Lily apparently froze halfway down the steps where there was a break in the railing and refused to move. She was led back to me in tears. Unhappy. I walked her down to sit by friends. Happy. Friends had stuffed animals, too and a rousing game of "The kitty cats take a bath in the tub that is a bleacher seat" ensued. Very Happy. It begins to rain...I'll spare you the rest in detail, but you get the drift.

You'll notice that none of the drama involves the "just back from China and getting adjusted" adopted child. No, she was perfectly happy to ride to the game and sit on my lap. What a trooper! We got home, changed and put Grace down for her nap. The girls played while I fixed the ripped out screen in our front door for the fourth time in as many summers. I believe I have now made it a fortress against all hands below 24 inches. Just as I was finishing it started to pour, making the previous rain look like a mere drizzle. Then the tornado alarms started going off and I flipped on the T.V. to see our county highlighted in red with a big Tornado Warning plastered everywhere. One of our neighbors was over so all of us hightailed it into the basement. Sophie, Grace, and our neighbor Marie were perfectly happy to play downstairs and Sophie showed everyone how to duck and cover your head just like she had learned at school. Lily, however was terrified and kept asking what was going to happen when the tomato came. Priceless! "What is a tomato?! What happens if a tomato hits you??! I'm scared of the tomato!!"

We safely rode out the tomato scare and emerged from the basement to find the street flooded and the rain gone, so we all donned our galoshes and headed out to stomp in puddles; more like small ponds for the girls. Sophie's boots were leaking so she kept taking them off and dumping gallons of water out. I kept expecting a frog or something equally quaint to come spilling out as well.

So that was our day. Dinner, p.j.s, playtime, story time and into bed. No one got out of bed, not even once, which means I have achieved my goal of completely exhausting them until tomorrow. I have no new pictures for you. Try to get right on that. Until next time.

Getting back to normal

You've all probably noticed that I haven't been posting as often recently, and I do feel bad about that, but the fact is that one day is not so different from the other any more and everytime I sit down to write I think, "what else is there to say." Maybe it's due to the fact that everything that went on in China was so monumental and now I'd be talking about sibling rivalry and carpooling. Still, this is the stuff of life and maybe easier for others to relate to. The dichotomy now is that things are going so well and at the same time the honeymoon is soooo over.

Grace still cries rather easily about little things and sometimes wakes up out of a dead sleep and in inconsolable for about a half an hour. At other times she is running up and down the sidewalk laughing and chasing her sisters. She is also giving out smiles to more and more people (including men!) Sophie is still very patient and likes to share and help out. Lily's recent behavior is probably a combination of the honeymoon being over, starting school, not napping as often, and being three-and-a-half. She is trying mightily though and her heart is in the right place. The most fun time of day is bed time when all three girls gang up on daddy and jump all over him. It's so conducive to quiet, sleepy children! Our success curve with Grace has also flattened out a little. In the beginning she was doing so well and we had read so much about how quickly these kids improved once they got home. Now that we've been home a little over a month, we keep expecting to see the "fast-motion improvement" and what we actually see is a kid still struggling with some grief and displacement. Underneath that though we are getting a good, clear picture of her true personality which is definitely happy and easy-going. And after talking with other mothers of kids in the same age range we are remembering that many of her behaviors simply come with the territory, adopted or not.

She is still pretty clingy but has become more comfortable with Dave. I have been able to sneak out to basketball practice on my own a few times and even made it to a game while she slept and the babysitter had the other two girls. For those of you who don't know, I am helping out with the Freshman girls basketball team at East Grand Rapids High School. In this crazy state of Michigan where they still insist on making the girls play in the Fall (until the Supreme Court rules on the challenge working its way through the courts) we have played four games already and are currently 3-1. Two of the games have come down to last second shots and both of them have come out in our favor. Our only loss so far was to a big consolidated school district that has routinely been beating teams by forty points or so. We lost by about twenty-five which we chalked up to a moral victory. The team has really come together since the beginning of the summer and already improved their record from last year when they won a total of one game.

The first three games, Grace came along and sat in her stroller at the head of the bench; just another part of the coaching staff. We quickly found out that she likes popcorn so she sits, holding her bag of popcorn and watching the action move up and down the court. Usually by the third or fourth quarter she gets antsy so I walk the stroller back and forth behind the bench and send the subs in with a tap on the head from behind. Hopefully we'll have her all groomed and ready for her point guard position in a few years.

School is still going well for everyone. Sophie and Lily both love their teachers and look forward to going to school every day. The rain has finally stopped and we were able to use the bike trailer for pick ups and drop offs which worked out well time-wise. Grace seemed happy in the trailer. I just have to keep her awake on the ride home so that she still takes her nap when we get there. Our neighbor loaned us a little push-car which is just right for Grace. The neighborhood kids are all clamoring for a chance to give her a push up and down the sidewalk. Those are the newest pictures.

First week of school

We've now officially made it through the first week of school and everybody has lived to tell about it. Sophie started Kindergarten on Tuesday. We all make the trek to and from school on our respective bikes; Sophie on two wheels, Lily on training wheels and Grace either in the stroller or in the seat on the back of my bike. We have invested in a bike trailer so that when Lily starts on Monday, she and Grace can ride in that while we drop Sophie off at Kindergarten. Then I can pedal Lily over to preschool. Then it's home to get Grace down for her nap and two hours later we do the whole thing over in reverse. Luckily the drop off/pick-up times are staggered enough to make the whole thing work, and I can get an extra dose of exercise at least until it snows.

So far Sophie loves Kindergarten and her teacher, Mrs. Doele. I'm getting very detailed reports about all of the activities and which kids had to take a time-out that day. She also loves all of her birthday/back-to-school clothes, especially the knee socks; "They're not socks and they're not tights, Mom. They're knee socks!"

Grace continues to do well. She's just such a happy child for the most part, with a few moments of sadness spread throughout the day. We took her with us to see Lyle Lovett at the Meijer Gardens outdoor amphitheater last week. It was a sold-out show so we were pretty packed in and I wasn't sure how she would do, but she had a blast. We were right down in front, just a few feet away from the front of the stage, and Lyle had brought his "Large Band" with him, a back-up orchestra of about 15 musicians. Several of them were watching her dance around and giving her smiles when she would look up at them. She got braver and braver as the night went on and by the end she was venturing several chairs away in either direction to visit with people and "borrow" snacks from their picnics.

This weekend Dave took Sophie and Lily with him while he went to South Bend to see a good high school friend. Grace has been enjoying the attention that leaves her with but she definitely misses having Lily in her room at night so I have had to move in with her for the weekend. The weather has turned colder so I've already had to go through the clothes in the basement again to pull out her Fall and Winter wardrobe. She's so thrilled with all of her "new" clothes.

I finally got some pictures uploaded. Most are of the first day of Kindergarten. The ones in the field are of the farm where we bought a share in a CSA (community supported agriculture) farm. We (or usually our neighbor who splits the goods with us) go every Tuesday to pick up our share, and on some days we get to go out in the field and pick some of it ourselves. Last week we got to pick cherry tomatoes. One of the pictures is taken just as both girls bit into a tomato to try them out. Sophie thought they were o.k., I didn't react fast enough to capture Lily spitting hers out onto the ground. Oh well, it was fun anyway, right kids?

Love,
Susan