A Sister for Grace

Thanks to all who let me know my link didn't work!

2009-06-13T14:30:00.002-05:00

http://www.mysandwichlife.blogspot.com

I'm not sure why it won't let me put in the link. If you don't mind cutting and pasting, this is the name of our new blog.

Please continue on our journey with our new blog!

2009-06-12T12:31:00.003-05:00

For a number of reasons, I will no longer be posting to this blog. Our lives have continued to change and I thought I would shift the focus just a little to our lives in general.

My new blog is call , referring to those of us in the "sandwich generation", raising kids, while caring for our parents.

I really don't have to care for my parents and think they end up caring for us, but thought this was a good name for our lives.

Hope you will make the switch and subscribe to our new blog!

Going off line for a while

2009-06-11T23:18:00.002-05:00

Just to let you know, I will be going off line for a while and the blog will not be available for viewing.

Please email me if you have any questions!
Jerri

Summer is here!

2009-06-10T20:16:00.003-05:00

Although school was officially out last Wednesday, it feels like summer vacation just started this week!

Last week I was in the midst of the last minute planning for our largest event of the year, our Pink Ribbon Tea Party. We were expecting over 400 women of all ages, which requires a LOT of planning. What an understatement! Plus having been out for the almost 2 weeks prior due to surgery I had not been carrying my share of the work!

So while the girls had to entertain themselves, basically, I tried to do what I could to help ensure success by Saturday.

Part of it was coordinating children to be in our fashion show.

Handy that I had to "willing" models.

So on Wednesday as soon as school was over, FINALLY!, we made our way to the Cozy Cottage at the Bishop Arts District and found VERY cute outfits for each to wear.

I was determined to have some sort of celebration for the end of the year, so first we stopped at Dicho's for one of Cretia's fantastic cupcakes. Grace has figured out that too much sugar is not good for her, so she turned down a cupcake. Annabel was all for a cookie, only. Hard to live vicariously if they won't comply with all I want to eat :)!

We ended up at Bolsa to buy a gift certificate for our fantastic emcee, Chris Arnold, of the Dallas Mavericks, and decided to stay there for dinner. It was such fun eating something different and enjoying eating outside. They make the BEST flatbread pizzas. Annabel opted for the soup, which was tomato. I asked several times since I could not remember her ever eating tomato soup.

When the soup arrived, she looked at it strangely, tasted it, looked again, tasted it. I knew something was wrong. Finally it came to me that she thought it was POTATO, not TOMATO! She ate it anyway!

I don't remember Thursday. I'm sure it was a great day, just kind of blank tonight!

Friday Mom and Dad wanted to take everyone out to eat to celebrate the end of school. Only responsibility dictated that we visit the funeral home due to a sweet family from church's losing their mother. So our celebratory dinner was at Braums!

Saturday was taken up with the tea party. Thank goodness I have Mom and Dad to run the girls around for me! They did beautifully in the fashion show, the tea party went off without a hitch, and we got to see Aunt Lisa for about 24 hours! She came to take pictures of the tea party so I could see what all I missed!

Thank goodness we have a great group that shares info on events in the area and I found a soccer camp, just up the street for only $30 each! So Monday morning the girls started soccer camp and have been having a great time ever since.

Grace told me tonight though, that every time they break into teams, that she is always the last one chosen. Oh dear! I have tried to explain to both that they have had NO experience playing soccer so how would they be expected to be the best? Yea, it sounds good, but we know it hurts!

On Monday I also found a swimming class at the local YMCA that started that night and had openings for both of their level of ability. Plus it was only $55 per child! So we start off each day at soccer camp, Mom and Dad pick them up at noon. I come running home and we run off to swim class at 6:00!

I don't think I realized that Grace can swim so well! She amazes me at how far she can go. Annabel is still struggling to feel secure jumping off the side into the pool, but each day she ventures out a little more. The teachers are excellent and really take the kids from their comfort level to pushing them further than they thought they could go!

So far they have not had a chance to get bored I don't think!

Even better, starting next week they get to go to the art camp that Marcie is teaching at! And it is FREE!!!!

I have been determined for us to take a vacation this year. For the last 5 years my trips have been centered around 2 to China, which could never be described as a vacation! First I looked at us driving somewhere and realized that Florida is at least 2 days away, with a hotel stay and meals, and me arriving exhausted, it just didn't seem like a good fit. Then Lisa thought we should go to Atlanta to see the pandas. Same thing. It is just too much for me this summer to try to go that far after 2 surgeries in 2 months.

So I have really shocked myself in making reservations for us to go to Cancun! 5 days and 4 nights, with a whole program just for kids! Hopefully there is plenty for the girls to do and I will get some down time! I cannot wait!

One more day!

2009-06-02T21:27:00.003-05:00

School will end this year tomorrow.

It absolutely could not come too soon for me.

But my daughters have continued to prove their resiliency.

Today was the Awards Assembly and Mom and I were in the audience to cheer on our girls.

Each won so many awards. I was so proud. Annabel won awards for participating in gym, her "Best in Show" for her art project, and Most Improved, among others.

For Grace it soon became the "Grace Show" according to her teacher for receiving so many awards. They finally handed her a sack to hold all of them! She got awards for her outstanding work on the Hoops for Heart fundraiser, the amount of books she read, and then her academic proficiency.

It was really hard to sit still and not say something to the girls who had tortured Annabel all year, but of course I controlled myself!

Sunday was Grace's piano recital.

She was so nervous and concerned about trying to play without her music. I convinced her that it would be fine and was so relieved when others also used their music. I just wish everyone could have heard how beautifully she played it at home, with the dynamics where they belonged and the emotion woven into the piece.

Sunday night Grace decided she would sew an outfit for Ollie, the dog, and in between teach Annabel how to play the piano. I LOVE when they work on things together so they got to stay up later than usual. The outfit was pretty funny on Ollie. Annabel decided it was a shirt for him to play basketball in.

Tonight Annabel had a new piece that Grace was teaching her, but instead picked out part of Beethoven's V Symphony instead.

Last night we had to go to Hobby Lobby to pick up some things for my job. While there we were looking around, there was a display of crosses. Annabel said to me that she knew I liked them. Yes, I have a collection of some really pretty crosses. She told me she knew why, because Jesus died on the cross.
They never cease to amaze me.

The tooth fairy calling!

2009-05-29T14:02:00.004-05:00

This recovery is taking too long!

My girls have been so sweet trying to take care of me, but they need attention and I am ready to move it from me to them.

Still not up to speed yet, so want to make a quick post.

This week on our way to karate the discussion of the tooth fairy came up again.

One night recently Grace got up and pulled her own tooth without even telling me! Then she went into the kitchen and got some salt to gargle with to make it stop bleeding! Her explanation was that it hurt, so she pulled it!

So if you have read my blog for any time, you know I am the most errant tooth fairy in the world and the discussion of whether the tooth fairy would come was up for discussion.

Annabel and Grace have decided that the Easter bunny and tooth fairy are not real.

As far as Santa, Annabel thinks that she is not too sure on that one yet!

I really never meant for them to believe in these things so I had always kind of did a soft sell on each, but I guess that is just a rite of childhood to believe in these "gift givers"!

Grace actually received money from the tooth fairy on the first night!

Slowly recovering

2009-05-25T10:32:00.003-05:00

This is surely the longest between posts in a while! I still feel like I have anesthetic related amnesia or something. I know there has been lots of research on this topic and some poo poo the idea, but to me it seems very real. Plus the whole trauma of going through surgery, not just on me, but on my family.

So even though it has been a long time, this will still be a short post.

This morning Annabel and I work up early, well early considering it was a holiday.

Penney's has some clothes on sale that the girls must have so we planned to go early and hope that I can last that long.

First Grace came in showing me her tank top was almost as long as her shorts.

Then Annabel came in wearing jeans, a long sleeve Christmas shirt, and a coat.

My yin and my yang.

Pollinating your ice cream!

2009-05-17T22:21:00.004-05:00

Picture this:

We are driving home from the Chinese market, right at twilight, when traffic seems to be the worst, and I am juggling an ice cream cone, swerving to avoid sudden stops on the freeway, when Grace asks:

"Mom, is ice cream pollinated by air?"

HUH???

She continues, " Ms. Dunham told me that everything is pollinated either by air, bees, or something else that I can't remember. So is ice cream pollinated by air?"

I got an immediate vision of a beautiful pasture with ice cream cones populating the field like wild flowers and started laughing so hard I was afraid I would crash!

We went on to Annabel wanting to know if ice cream was made out of ice or cream or what.

I'm not sure that Grace understood or was convinced that neither ice cream cones or milk are pollinated by wind.

We have had such a great weekend, it is hard to see it end.

Saturday started with breakfast at Applebee's for a fund raiser breakfast for a friend's baseball team. Although Annabel was intent on not liking the pancakes, she ended up eating all of them, as well as the sausage. The rest of us knew we liked pancakes and sausages.

Annabel is going through a stage of not liking foods that she has been eating and not understanding the English words I know she uses and knows.

I remember Grace going through a similar stage about the time I thought she was getting comfortable here. Maybe they finally get comfortable enough to make more choices for themselves!

The rain that was supposed to end by noon kept on all day, so this limited outdoor activities, especially the new basketball hoop!

Late in the afternoon we headed to the Chinese market to stock up on noodles and look for any other delicacies. I think I am feeling guilty about being laid up again for a few weeks and wanting to make sure they have their favorite things. Plus it will make it easy on me to have plenty of noodles on hand!

We can spend a LOT of time looking through all the aisles in the Chinese market and always wish I had a guide to help me know what to buy and how to prepare it. More than one time the girls decided they missed a certain food but that I would not know how to cook it! I think they remember the noodles that I tried to prepare and they ended up molding before I could figure out how to cook them!

We toured through most of the other shops and stumbled on 2 books in Chinese that Annabel thought she would like, Little Women and a comic story she remembered. It is so difficult to find anything in Chinese that is appropriate for her age. We bought quite a few in China, but now wish I could fill up a whole suitcase full for her.

Since we had not had Chinese food in a while I was determined to remember which restaurant along the row was supposed to be the best. I think I found it since there was a wait to get in and the menu was written in Chinese so Annabel could recognize some things she was really hungry for! They ended up having spicy seaweed, some noodle dish, and then steamed dumplings. The dish I ordered for myself came with rice covered in a hamburger looking meat, with 2 varieties of green things on either side. I soon lost my dish too! That was just what they LOVED!!! Most people left with doggie bags, but we ate everything except my pork chop! The dogs enjoyed it for breakfast today.

As rainy as it was yesterday, the opposite was true today! It was a fantastic, glorious day. Dad had mentioned trimming our tree on the parkway since it is brush pick up week. With all of us involved in trimming the tree it made it a good time until I broke Dad's chainsaw! He creatively repaired it and we completed the job.

A friend had given the girls a basketball hoop and they had a great time with it today! They do very well and made up their own games, laughing and shooting baskets all afternoon. It isn't a standard size hoop, but it didn't affect the fun! Maybe it made it better since they could make a lot of baskets. I keep thinking I should find a basketball camp for them this summer, but the ones I found are very expensive! Over $300 each sounds like way too much just to learn about basketball!

Annabel continues to change, sometimes subtle and sometimes dramatic. Today was the first day that she wanted to sit by me at church. We were also discussing whether I would need to be in the hospital 2 or 3 days, and she said she just hopes that I will stay until I feel better and can come home.

There are only 2 1/2 weeks of school and I hope that Annabel can find some relief for the last few days. They had hoped to have her "help" with one of the kindergarten classes, but last week it was storming during the assigned time.

Ups and downs

2009-05-15T21:22:00.003-05:00

This has been one of those weeks where Annabel has had more ups and downs than anyone deserves.

At the end, I have felt like she was intent on doing one of the two things:

Proving to me that she is unlovable, unworthy, unwanted

or

So disappointed in me for believing her teacher over her that she is having trouble dealing with it.

Since our first weeks together, Annabel has settled into a pretty easy routine. There has been no acting out, shouting, screaming, like I read from other adoptive families. Instead misbehavior has usually because she did not understand, not purposely trying to cause problems.

But this week we have both struggled with the repercussions of the meeting I had with the teachers, principals, and counselors this week.

Each day we have struggled with minor incidences becoming major problems.

Tonight we came home from eating out with Mom and Dad, with a little shopping at the end.

She was so quiet and just at odds with herself.

She finally told me that she was filling sick to her stomach.

After a dose of tums, she was back to herself and full of talk and fun.

But each day there has been a little something that just did not set well with her.

I have told her over and over this week that I am here for ever as her mother. No more changes and no matter what has happened in the past, I am not that person. That doing something wrong does not make you a bad person.

She has also refused any compliments, but I did feel good that she came running back for her good bye kiss one morning!

In the meantime, Grace has been attending a human development class. Annabel forgot to bring her permission slip home, so she has been excluded from the class.

This must be the MOST thorough discussion on this topic, only not every thing is completely understood, so every day we are making sure that EVERYTHING is understood! BUT I am thankful I had checked a book out of the library because I wanted to make sure I got it all right and keep the lines open for more discussion when needed!Whew!

I told Grace that Mom had never really discussed all of these things with me, so now I think she has decided she will teach Mom. She has been making her sit down with her and she shares what she learned!

I've continued having problems keeping food down and so the doctor has moved the rest of my surgery up sooner than I wanted. I dread going through that again and don't want to upset our usual routine, but will be glad to finally get it completed.

We are looking forward to the weekend. First thing tomorrow is a pancake breakfast! Yum!

She said, she said...

2009-05-12T22:45:00.003-05:00

Sometimes I am a little slow to learn.

My day started with a meeting with teachers, counselors, and the principal regarding Annabel's school progress. The sole purpose was to show me how much they have done for Annabel.

The meeting started with the principal reading a list of things I was supposed to have said at our last meeting. I don't remember everything I said at the last meeting, but can almost guarantee that I did not say they ignored her or made her play on the computer for hours on end.

Actually I had very few problems with the way these 2 teachers had handled things, as I had said over and over again. My problem was with the other teacher, who again "missed" our meeting. He has not been to a single meeting that has been scheduled for Annabel.

And the other problem was a LACK of resources available for the teachers to help Annabel. 30 minutes of personalized attention just doesn't seem like enough.

They reported that when Annabel did not want to do something last week that she threw herself down on the floor crying and throwing a fit.

Just not a behavior I have seen, but I rarely let it get to the point where a fit needs to be thrown either.

They also reported that she NEEDS a LOT of attention. Hmmm, Annabel?

Then they told how she had not been required to sign the behavior log even though she did behaviors similar to others that were required to sign it, but they were afraid she would "throw a fit", so they had decided to make allowances for the cultural differences.

Oh my goodness! Now how is that a help?

So my daughter who is NEEDING so much attention but when she misbehaves you allow it?

I was glad there were counselors there to back me up on the assumption that not signing this log still separates her and makes her "different", a HUGE issue for her.

From one of my earliest contacts with the teachers and principals, I urged them to apply consistent discipline for her as the rest of the class, AFTER she learned what the rules were. She should not be treated differently and exempted when she clearly breaks the rules, like getting out of her seat, requiring "personalized" explanations of assignments.

The counselors wanted to talk further and sign release forms. One counselor will meet with her on peer relations, meaning, face the kids who have been bullying her. The other wanted to provide an ego boost for her, taking her to the lower grades and having her help out in a kindergarten class.

Both ideas are great.

When I finally got home and we sat down to eat, I asked a few questions about what goes on in the classroom. She admitted to jumping up and down a lot during classes, wanted special attention from the teachers, and crying.

BUT when asked if she had thrown a fit and gotten down on the floor, she insisted she did not.

She was very hurt that I believed them and not her. Grace came out and talked to me and said that if Annabel had behaved the way the teachers said she did, she would have known. Whether she would have seen it or not, the kids would still have been talking about it. Good point, Grace!

We talked in detail about her behavior in class.

Here is where I just don't seem to learn.

I told her that if she gets out of her seat, she will have to sign the behavior log, and if she signs it 3 times, and gets suspended, now here is where I got really stupid; I told her that I would take away all electronics for 6 months. No effect. I would take away karate. No effect. I went silly then trying to find her Achilles' heel, but there isn't one.

There is nothing you can TAKE away from her that would have an impact, as this is what has always happened in her life.

People have come in and taken away her clothes, her home and foster parents she knew, her group home and friends, literally she is more familiar with people taking everything away rather than receiving things.

It hit me while we were at karate.

This is not the way to reinforce the behavior she needs to conform to.

We had time to talk again, and I told her I would not TAKE AWAY, but I would ADD TO. If she gets in trouble, then she will need to read more and do workbook problems for 2 hours! Boy she hates that idea.

I am so glad there is only a short amount of time left for this school year. She was finally removed from the teacher's class where the problems seem to stem from, but today they were trying to put her back into it. Their take on what happens in his class is that he is not loud in stopping behavior like bullying like they do. She told me again tonight that he did not stop the kids when they start saying mean things to her. I believe her perception on this is what counts!

Dogs in the house!

2009-05-11T19:39:00.004-05:00

Tonight I am sure that Marcie and Drew's house is cleaner than ours.

While trying to prepare dinner for another family, the girls decided they wanted to play outside.

They were cleaning up something and wanted to give the dogs a bath.

Only the dogs did not want a bath!

In the meantime, the police helicopters and news helicopters were circling around and very loud. (There had been a car chase for a stolen car which ended a few miles away. It just added to the confusion at our house!)

So on our deck are Grace and Annabel and the dogs, a water hose going, shampoo, helicopters circling, Grandmother trying to help, and I am in the kitchen trying to cook.

All of a sudden in comes Ollie, followed by Nina, followed by Annabel, followed by Grace, and a trail of shampoo and wet dog circling the entire house, barking, shouting, dogs running, and girls yelling!

Finally the dogs were captured and returned outside to complete their baths.

Only the water hose somehow sprayed Annabel until she was dripping wet. I am sure it was an accident, don't you? Grace got wet enough that they both had to get right into the shower, so now I have a pile of wet clothes and dog towels!

I cannot imagine why our house does not seem as clean as Marcie and Drew's.

PLUS I must surely be the messiest cook in the world! While they worked their magic on the rest of the house, the kitchen looks like I must have fed an army a 5 course meal!

The dogs do smell better though and dinner was a success.

Happy Mother's Day!

2009-05-10T23:23:00.003-05:00

In China, there are two women who gave birth to two little baby girls just over 11 years ago.

Because of their circumstances they were unable to keep their daughters.

BUT because of their love they placed their daughters where they could be found.

And because of this, I am a mom. I hope I can provide the love and care these mothers wished for their children when they made this heart wrenching decision, to help them develop into the people their birth mothers hoped and dreamed for them.

Last weekend when we were in ER with Mom, I simply could not allow myself to even conceive of the idea of something happening to Mom. My mom has been with me through some very difficult times. She spent a LOT of nights perched on a radiator/air conditioning unit when I was having brain surgery. Most recently she spent two nights in uncomfortable chairs in our hospital after my surgery. But with her there, I knew I was taken care of and could rest.

She is also the best grandmother in the world and I am glad to be a mom so she can be a grandmom AGAIN! Not that she has a lack of great grandchildren, but living next door provides plenty of opportunity to spoil her closest two!

And they love her and tend to her making sure she is taken care of! Annabel has started grabbing her by the arm and walking her to and from the car. And when Annabel has a hold of you, you know it! Tonight Mom cooked dinner and I left Annabel to help clean up the dishes, while I cleaned up a project we had started, and Grace did homework. Annabel banned Mom from her kitchen and jumped in unloading and reloading the dishwasher.

Marcie, my niece, and her husband Drew, had everyone to lunch at their house. What a fantastic treat! The food was delicious and we enjoyed all being together. Mark and Martha surprised me with a Starbucks gift card. MY FAVORITE!!!

My only gift I wanted was a nap this afternoon. Although I had one, there was more than one time I was woken up by the very loud whisper of "MOM" followed by something terribly important. Then the dogs came through several times barking, and then I decided to give up!

Saturday was supposed to be our biggest event of the year. Last week at this time all the news was still around the swine flu, so I chose to postpone it. So it was very strange to be off on a day that is usually so busy that I want to sleep through Mother's Day.

The girls were registered for another class at Lowes and made cute planters for Mother's Day. Since Dad was with us, we made REALLY QUICK trips to the dollar store and Ross, but spent plenty at all locations!

Mom wanted and needed a new sweater. I had almost bought one last weekend but at Ross found I could get 3 for the same price as one! Sounds like a commercial. Since I was in a hurry and found lots of good choices, all on sale, I just bought them all! Now hopefully she won't be cold.

We managed to fit in a trip to Sam's and then dinner at El Fenix, before I finished the day off with mowing our yard. It was a great day with lots accomplished.

The previous week was difficult, waiting to hear the test results for Mom and in the meantime I began throwing up after every meal, which gets old in a hurry. I now know what an upper GI is (Yuck), with the result being the need for the other part of the surgery needed much sooner than expected.

Thank goodness there are only 3 weeks and 3 days left of school. I am anxious to see what the plans are for Annabel to learn everything before the end of school.

Today Grace asked what I used to do on the weekends before I became a mom. I simply cannot remember, but guessing it was not nearly this much fun! She also commented that Marcie and Drew's house was a lot cleaner than ours. Surely not! She said there just wasn't as much stuff in their house. I explained that with kids it does add to your house. She wanted to know if I was disappointed that ours looked like it did. I told her I would not change it for anything!

I need a cell phone!

2009-05-06T08:04:00.004-05:00

When Annabel was asked if anyone had talked to her at school yesterday, she told Dad, no, she didn't have a cell phone!

OK, that was not the talk I was expecting!

Yesterday I met with the principal and assistant principal to discuss what could be done to help Annabel through the rest of the school year.

While there have been attempts to help her with her adjustment to the English language, there has also been the continued bullying. It is amazing how many people I have heard from that were bullied. The only person I remember trying to bully me was stopped very quickly when my cousin threatened to beat her up. Yes, he was willing to beat up a girl for me! It was great to have a defender!

What I have worked and worked with is trying to assure Annabel that she has a defender in me and the rest of her family. Slowly I see her crossing that big divide and learning to rely on me as mom.

So none of the changes promised by the school took place yesterday, I have high hopes that some will occur today.

I need her out of the environment where she feels threatened so she can learn and some counseling to help her understand she is able to trust adults to help, not just punish her.

This week has been great because my niece Katie came to help out because of her concern for Mom. Katie is the one who came and cleaned, organized, and decorated our house while we were in China. I was glad we had it in good shape when she came so she would know how very much I appreciated all her hard work.

With Katie here, Mom has been able to take things a little slower. Thankfully she had Katie because I have been so distracted with the school and work, that I have not been much help, other than serving char burned burgers Sunday!

Last Friday the hospital threw a party to celebrate my 10 years of employment. It is VERY significant to me, as I have never worked that long in the same job title. One of the best parts of my job is planning programs to help educate the public. Being a breast cancer survivor myself, it seemed like a great idea to do something annually to remind women of the need for early detection and treatment. So the Pink Ribbon Tea party was started. It is always the Saturday before Mother's Day. This year it did not seem prudent (a good George Bush term) to continue with the plans with the threat of the swine flu. It has almost been as much work to postpone the event as it is to plan it. As soon as I announced we would delay the tea party, the CDC announced we should return to "normal". Life, funny, isn't it?

This morning as I am trying to pick up a little before rushing out the door, it dawned on me just how great a support group we have around us. The kindness and love shown me celebrating my employment to the care and concern about mom to the candid remarks and sharing from others who have been through similar situations as Annabel, humble me. Whether you are near or far, your thoughts are greatly appreciated.

2009-05-05T19:51:00.000-05:00

Today was the meeting with the principal and assistant principal.

I had all of my documentation with me of all the times I had made contact with the

Good friends!

2009-05-05T19:50:00.001-05:00

Too bad Annabel is so afraid of these doggies! Just kidding!

Mug shots!

2009-05-05T19:48:00.001-05:00

Our cute muts being easily distracted. Too bad they didn't look the other way too!

Swinging

2009-05-05T19:44:00.001-05:00

Everyone has loved Katie being here. She decided to show the girls how she swings!

Next door is good

2009-05-03T20:46:00.005-05:00

Tonight as we came back into the front door, Annabel stopped as if a light had gone off in her head and said, "it is good that we are so close so if Grandmom and Poppa need us!". AMEN, Annabel!

Last night we had a first hand experience of why it is so fortunate that we are so close.

But I will get to that in a minute.

Annabel had announced Friday night that she was tired and planned to sleep until 10:00 Saturday morning. She reminded me that she was still tired from our road last weekend and that it had been a hard week.

Of course she was up early!

We headed out to pick up our fruit and veg coop shipment, buy gas, and came right back home.

All I really wanted to do for the day was sit and read. I'm struggling with deciding whether to postpone our big event next Saturday, and hoped I could find my answer. Some time on the deck with a great Alexander McCall Smith book, seemed to be the best idea!

Annabel has a LOT of trouble filling "down" time, so she came out to keep me company. No time to think!

The back yard was way too high and knew it needed to be mowed before the rain hit, so it was time to get busy.

Everyone pitched in reworking a flower bed and moving stepping stones, my park bench, and just general cleaning up. The whole time we were working Dad kept saying that it was tornado weather. The humidity was so high, it was overcast, and very still.

We finally found a stopping p0int and got in right before the storm hit.

Dad was pretty close on the money when you see what happened to the Cowboys' practice field. The lightening and thunder were scary. It looked like it was striking right in the front yard.

When there was a break, we had dinner, girls had showers, and we watched the new Jonas Brothers show.

It was time for my shower and Grace came running in saying that Poppa had called and there was something wrong with Grandmommy.

So with shampoo still in my hair, I tried to get out as quickly as possible, dressed, and over to see what was wrong.

Mom had been talking to my aunt and suddenly could not make the words come out. She told her that she had to hang up and then told Dad what had happened.

So I quickly try to remember what are the symptoms of a stroke and after Dad had checked her blood pressure, Annabel gave her an 81 mg. aspirin, I asked if she could tell us the name of the president.

You could see that she was stumped by the question.

I asked if she could remember the one before the current president.

Again, she could not.

I asked if she could tell me the names of the girls sitting on the couch.

She could not.

OK, that was all the evidence I needed to rule we had to get to the hospital.

The three of us ran home and changed from pajamas, got shoes, and locked up the house. The whole time I am trying to decide what were my options for the girls but decided we didn't have time to work it out at that point.

Thank goodness the hospital is SO close and they triaged her immediately with an EKG performed within a few minutes of arriving.

Knowing the ER waiting room is not the best place to leave kids, since everyone coming in is sick or hurt, the staff moved the girls into a family room.

I felt the ultimate in being part of the "sandwich" generation, as I made my way from the examination room to the family room, and back and forth all night.

After all the tests, a million texts to Lisa, the doctor announced she had a TIA, or a mini stroke, and she had the choice of going home or checking in.

Gradually she had remembered Annabel's name, and then Obama's name, and finally Grace's name, so she was ready to go home.

Today we had a VERY quiet day ending with me burning burgers for everyone on the grill.

I got my shower tonight, but sleeping with the phone close.

Drastic measures

2009-05-02T11:35:00.004-05:00

Yesterday I took a drastic step and filed a complaint with the Office of Civil Rights regarding the treatment of Annabel at school.

Once I went back through my notes of all the things that had transpired and the treatment she had endured I just wanted to cry. It has consistently been an issue. She has been harassed and discriminated against because she is Chinese, I believe.

If Spanish had been her primary language there was plenty of help, but nobody could bother since she spoke Chinese.

Over and over the students have been allowed to pick on her, kick her, spit on her.

In discussing it with a counselor I realized that the "orphanage" mentality is still prevalent because she has also endured additional punishment from the teachers whenever she reported the harassment.

She cried to Grace the other night that she did not want to be labeled a "Mommy's girl" so the kids would not pick on her. Grace was trying to convince her to tell me more of what was going on.

That is another thing that bothers me. I only know about the events she has reported to me. There have surely been so many more.

I tried to go higher through the school district to resolve the issue but was told that I had to fill out a form to request help and the only place that form was available was at the school. When I went to the school they did not know where it was or what I was talking about.

I tried to reach our school board member with absolutely NO response.

This week there were two situations, one by the students, the other by the principal. This is after meeting and assurances that it would NEVER happen again, if it REALLY did happen because they were convinced it was just that she misunderstood.

In going back through my notes I found where the teacher whose class most of the instances have happened in told me on October 30 that due to the language barrier that he could not help her and she just did not understand. Then on November 2 he told me that he had a talk with her and explained that the kids weren't being mean, she misunderstood.

That is phenomenal isn't it? If you have tried to learn Chinese, like I have, after several months of class I gave up. He learned it in 2 days!!!

The counselor also told me she was concerned about lifelong repercussions of the bullying. I can't let this go on.

I had left a message and emailed to the school after what happened Tuesday. I finally got a call back Thursday afternoon asking if I wanted a meeting with the teachers again.

I started to agree then decided that was a waste of time. I have done that over and over. I will meet with the principal and the assistant principal, but also ready to see if the media is interested in treatment of a student whose primary language is not Spanish.

I am thankful we have today to basically do nothing. I always hope that time spent together, especially when Mom and Dad are involved, that we can rejuvenate and recharge her and let her know that she has a family who is here to love and support her.

Out of gas?

2009-05-01T22:38:00.003-05:00

Tonight after Annabel had eaten 2 1/2 ears of corn and after she had already eaten 3 bananas, she announced that a boy in her class had run out of gas today.

Run out of gas?

Yes, he had been tooting a lot during class and he finally ran out of gas!

The previous post does not do justice to today

2009-04-30T22:54:00.003-05:00

This is what I have to do at work.

I sit working, thinking, being bombarded on all sides by phone, email, and think I have done my best. Then if I take a break I can remember all the details I still need to cover.

My last post did not do justice to what happened today.

While all the other 5th graders were taking their science TAKS test, Annabel spent the day in the 3rd grade classroom with one of my favorite teachers. She had a GREAT day. She learned something. She was admired by the other students who were disappointed to learn she would not be back in the class tomorrow.

But her day started with being called to the principal's office.

According to her, the principal talked to her about what was happening in her class. She was told to come to her any time she needed to, but that she, the principal, could not stop anything the girls were doing. HUH??????

Yes, that is what she told her. That girls were like that and she could not stop them.

She had a couple of other teachers tell her basically the same thing.

I appreciate everyone who left comments about the situation. I will keep you updated.

Too much on my mind

2009-04-30T21:26:00.003-05:00

Tonight there is so much on my mind, it feels like I am playing the audio for a bad movie and I am the narrator.

So I will sound off about a few things that are bugging me first and hope to get the rest cleared up.

Ants in the kitchen. I have tried to handle getting rid of the ants in a reasonable way and less drastic methods so I put out boric acid and ant traps. They literally walk over the boric acid and probably sleep on top of the ant traps.

The swine flu which is to be renamed by the World Health Organization to avoid people killing off all their pigs.

The flu itself is not bugging me, it is my reaction to it. I am a news junkie when there is a major event happening, not something like the election, just stories that are interesting. (That one is for you, Holly!)

They closed an elementary school in our neighborhood today.

They keep reporting there are only a few confirmed cases yet they have also called off major events scheduled this weekend.

Next weekend we have our biggest event of the year. Planning began last year. So I am anxious to hear the news tonight! I will watch it on as many channels as I can just to be sure I don't miss anything!

Back to us.

A friend recommended I contact a friend of a friend, who might be able to help about the problems at school.

With only minor details, she agreed that things had not been handled correctly with the bullying and the lack of instruction provided for Annabel.

She is working to get resources for us.

I feel such mixed emotions.

For the first time I feel some relief but also guilt, that I did not force the school to do more.

I finally got a return call from my voice mail on Tuesday and also my email on Wednesday. It was offered to set up a meeting with the teachers again.

I was shocked! My email clearly stated that I expected her to be removed from that classroom. I was told we could discuss it next week.

So do I just keep her out until then?

But to show how "normal" our life is, tonight Annabel was showing me a spot on her toe. It took a magnifying glass and a bright light to even see it, but she was quite concerned that it was something major.

I got so tickled at her because I told her it looked like she had scratched it.

She assured me that she had NEVER scratched her toe.

NEVER?? In all 11 years?

No, never. I said that would have to make the blog!

Good news and bad news

2009-04-28T22:37:00.003-05:00

Today was the last of a lot of doctor's visits trying to catch up on medical exams to determine if there was a need for additional medical treatment that might have been missed in China.

I cannot thank God enough that all the reports were good! No problems!

Regular check ups are all we need. YES!!!

The only trouble, before we left for the doctor, and as Annabel came from the school, she was crying, huge tears.

She had gotten in trouble at school for shouting out an answer during a "jeopardy game" in class. And so even if everyone else was dong it, when she did it, a number of girls in the class began taunting her to the point of making her cry. The teacher allowed it to continue and shouted that he did not know how to deal with her, so he sent her to the principal's office.

Only Annabel refused to go and cried for the next 30 minutes, which was actually the second time that morning she had cried, until it was time for her doctor's appointment.

I really hoped from the last meeting that we were over these problems and actually thought we could make it through the end of the year.

Instead I am desperately searching for alternatives to avoid Annabel having to return to that classroom through the end of the year.

I just can't see having her confidence, her self esteem, her growth stifled by a teacher who seems oblivious to doing his job of controlling his class.

Grace does not want to leave and I don't know if you can get into a private school this late? Or a charter school this late? Or home school? I really don't know what to do.

Texas A & M school of balloon artists!

2009-04-27T21:45:00.004-05:00

During spring break I came up with the idea of visiting Texas A & M's school of veterinary medicine to get a preview of colleges for Grace.

For quite some time she has said she wanted to be a vet. I'm not sure if she understands what that means, but she has stuck with it for a while.

My background of working with career exploration for clients showed me that people need to take time to really look at potential careers, not just pick a degree and hope that it fits.

When I went to college, I did not think women had a choice in a career, but being a nurse or a teacher and since I could not stand the sight of blood, I went into teaching. While I enjoyed teaching, no one mentioned how low the pay was back in the days when I taught. So after just 5 years I went on to something else. And something else. And something else.

So why not help my daughters do their career exploration early?

I had checked with A & M and they explained that spring break wasn't the best time to come since they would also be closed, but they had an open house at the end of April.

I really was not sure if we would make it since Grace was not up to speed on Friday, but a good night's sleep and she was ready to go. Annabel and I packed quickly and we headed down to Bryan and College Station.

Surprisingly I have been to China twice but never to College Station.

The drive was just beautiful and the wildflowers are just beginning to bloom. There were so many pretty little towns that you could easily see yourself relocating to if your kids ended up in College Station.

By the time we arrived it was quite evident that a LOT of families had the same idea. There was a wide variety of activities, most with long lines.

Since teddy bear surgery had been a big draw to making the trip, we managed to wait the 1 1/2 hours to get into surgery.

Annabel left her stuffed animal in the car, but thankfully they had plenty to choose from for a small donation. For almost the entire time we waited, Annabel worked through her thousands of choices of stuffed animals switching from large to small, dogs to bears, and at the last minute settled on a dog that had a heart hanging from its mouth and "LOVE YA" on its back side.

When we finally got in, the vet students made sure the girls were "prepped" for surgery. They had hair nets, masks, gloves, gowns, and even slippers over their shoes. It was all quite believable from appearances. The vet students then did a complete examination of the animal and asked each girl what was wrong with their animal. Grace took her bear "Starry" which is the bear I sent her while she was still in China. It was one of the only gifts she actually received from all the care packages I sent, so she did not want major surgery on her bear.

But Annabel was all into it and decided the heart hanging from her dog's mouth needed to be removed and inserted in where the heart belongs. The vet student was very meticulous in her stitching up the dog with it's heart back in place. Grace's bear ended up with a back brace due to some recent "falls" she had experienced.

From there we wandered through the rest of the many displays. There were so many dog rescue groups with dogs available. It was really hard to leave with no new ones!

At the end of the open house, we found where they were doing face painting, liquid nitrogen experiments, color examination, and the most popular event of the day - balloon animals! I thought the girls were going to stay there the rest of the time. The only way they left was the chance to see some ferrets.

So if veterinary medicine does not work out, they can fall back on their new skills of balloon artistry. I've even bought them both a kit at the dollar store and loads of new animals are being created!

We had a room reserved in the Memorial Student Center, which took calling twice to get directions. Upon inspection I wished I had spent a little more so we had more than room for just the bed in the room! I don't think I have stayed in a room that small since a time in London and then it was only me! BUT the girls LOVED it. They did not want to leave the room and thought it would be spectacular to stay in the rest of the day and watch the TV!!

BUT we had places to go, people to meet, and things to do.

My mom had begged me to call a distant cousin, which I did, and we met for dinner. It was great fun and her daughter, who is only 5, entertained Annabel throughout the meal!

Afterward we enjoyed a huge scoop of homemade ice cream and a trip to Half Price Books. Annabel was VERY disappointed that she could only find 1 book in Chinese. Actually there was another, but it was Harry Potter and we have it n Chinese!

Although it was a very late night and everyone was way too tired, Grace could not give up and go to sleep until I laid down. I think I forgot to mention that our room had one king size bed. There had been a lot of discussion as to who would sleep in the middle and I guess I drew the short straw because it was decided I would.

So to gt Grace to go to sleep I jumped into the middle of the bed and within minutes, all of us were asleep and slept much later than intended!

Denny's has done too much advertising and made me want to eat there! Only everyone in town also had seen the ads. Annabel grows way too impatient when making her wait. I keep trying to help her learn deep breathing so she doesn't have to drive me CRAZY tapping, clicking, snapping anything she can find!!!

We made it home safe but along the way heard about the adventures Mom had with the dogs while we were gone.

The pet sitting service didn't show up as planned so it left Mom to take care of our hounds! They seemed very concerned about the situation and where we might be so they did not want to do their usual routine. Then Ollie found an opportunity to run!

Evidently Dad's voice works the same way on dogs as it does on kids and for once, Ollie came running back!

We made the trip home safe and sound and the dogs were very glad to see us. Not nearly as glad as Mom, so we could take over our dog's affairs.

The girls practiced their new vocational goal tonight - balloon artists! Great!

A science lesson

2009-04-24T21:55:00.003-05:00

Watching the news tonight reminds me of what Annabel was telling us tonight.

She was trying to tell us what her science teacher had told the class today.

There was something about how amazing that pigs, birds, and humans all share the same "spot"??

Hmm, don't know about any spots that all of us share.

She showed us how on her arm and again talked about the spots that we all share.

Could it possibly be that he was talking about swine flu?

Oh yeah, that's what it was.

Out of a funk

2009-04-22T22:37:00.005-05:00

I usually write my posts over and over in my mind long before it ever gets on the page. When this happens, I try to work it out so that what I end up writing will focus on the girls, rather than the distractions that at times cloud my life.

Yet, this time, it has been difficult.

I have a degree in counseling and so I try to rationalize, compartmentalize, and then justify the feelings I am experiencing.

The timing of tax day along with our 6 month follow up, was substantial.

It required reviewing the past year on so many levels.

Starting with the financial, I became overwhelmed when I looked at what I had earned, seeing how little it had increased from the previous year, but with the bottom line being that regardless of the amount, we had been through one of the toughest years financially that I have had in a LONG time.

It worried me.

With all the economic problems most are facing, had I been a good steward of the money God provided through my job? I felt like I was the receiver of the talent that had gone and buried it showing nothing but the original gift provided. Yet I could see the cost of the adoption in the other column and easily could see why money had been an issue. But once you get down on yourself, then you can begin to worry that even that talent will be taken from you. And during this time you are susceptible to rumors you hear at work, the impact evaluations of you and your performance have, and then just like that you doubt it all!

But thankfully all I have to do is step out on my deck and receive words of encouragement from having wonderful parents next door. It's not necessarily magic, but does make you feel that at least 2 people think you can do something right!

Preparing for the visit by the social worker, I was looking for pictures and other things she would need to complete her report to China.

I came across documents from our initial return home. Can I just say that was a REALLY difficult time and think I am still tired from that. Much less adding Annabel's surgery and then mine!

OK, enough about my funk!

Sunday at Earth Day was a great time.

It is amazing what has been accomplished developing Earth Day for Oak Cliff in just a few short years. Marcie, my niece, has been in charge of the artists and their displays. Probably best that I had 3 kids who did not want to look at everything there, as it saved me money! But what was even more difficult to ignore was the number of cats and dogs there who needed homes! Oh my goodness, I am so glad I can be rational sometimes. Some might even call it evidence based decision making, even though I have received low marks on that!

It was a very nice experience meeting Grace and Annabel's friend. She was a breath of fresh air compared to what they have endured from the other kids in their class. She was very polite and I especially liked that she made time for Annabel to join into the conversations!

Annabel had her first experience in a porta potty! If you have been to China you know that even their restrooms can be pretty bad, not much better than a porta potty at some public facilities. BUT after eight months here, she was not too sure about trying out our "temporary" toilets!

Grace found out that she has passed the math TAKS test, but did not get commended. I felt badly for her as she had made commended last year and was hoping to again this year.

Tonight seemed to be a good example of when too much can happen on a school night! I knew we would be pressed for time between school and piano and actually put something in the crock pot before leaving for work.

With the girls getting out of school at 5:00 and needing to leave for piano at 6:00, I was glad we did have time to sit and eat and talk together. I taught 5th grade for one and half years and very glad I don't teach it now! Stories of what happens in those classes are chaotic! It seems like everyone on facebook is helping build some final project. Their class is actually making their final project at school out of those thousand popsicle sticks! YIKES!!!!

When we came back from piano we met with a potential "dog sitter". Thankfully she thought she could handle our two ragamuffins. After she left our neighbor dropped by worried about a suspicious person who had been parked in front of our house. Good to have good neighbors.

He volunteered to watch our dogs, but the dogs just would not be his friends. Too bad!

A brief conversation with mom gave me an update on my aunt, with dementia, and a cousin diagnosed with prostate cancer at way too young of an age, plus learning a long time church member had passed away. So while the girls took their showers, I turned our meal into stew for that family.

Tomorrow morning we are celebrating volunteer week with a breakfast and then again dinner! I am so grateful to the fantastic volunteers I have worked with. They have taught me so much. Plus they are always just grateful at the wide variety of programs I keep coming up with and thankful that I care.

New school, art exhibit, the zoo, karate, and taxes!

2009-04-18T21:48:00.004-05:00

This has been a busy week and when I realize that I last posted the day before the infamous April 15, it explains a lot. But I think I will start from today and try to work backward, while in extreme pain!

Today was a great day, very busy, but full of important details.

We started the day with a great breakfast from Grandmom's Restaurant, which is conveniently located next door. It was so cloudy and overcast this morning, we all overslept, so really helped to have breakfast prepared for us.

Our first stop was North Hills, the school I have chosen for the girls for next year. It is quite a ways from home, but every time I go, I am so impressed with the students and their impressions of the school. They always have students as volunteers leading future students around the campus. These kids are engaging, very conversational (is that a word?), and extend their hand to shake, smile, and look you in the eye.

We had our pre-admission conference at 9:35.

We met the PE teacher who did our conference. It was supposed to last 30 -45 minutes, but with 2 girls that were full of questions, ours took more like an hour. Then they had a math placement test. Annabel breezed through hers since she guessed at all the answers, because they were word problems.

I thought Grace had been swallowed up in a math black hole because she took 1 1/2 hours!! She told me a few of the problems and I was impressed that she even tried.

They had a special display set up for ESL! Thank goodness! I spoke to the teacher and she said they would be pulling Annabel out for special classes. All I can say is, "FINALLY!"

After three hours, which was supposed to be maybe an hour, we raced home after stopping by a Korean restaurant for lunch for the girls.

The dogs were supposed to get groomed today, but we were 2 hours overdue for that appointment. Thankfully they agreed to take them late. Dip and Clip on Davis is the best about that. Most places require you drop them off early, even though they won't be ready for hours!

So I left the girls to eat their noodles and take a shower while I ran the dogs to the groomer.

From there we went to the Ice House Cultural Center. There was a special "Dia de los Ninos" exhibit and both girls had a piece on display. Grace has had several pieces on display, but it was Annabel's first. AND Annabel WON! BEST OF SHOW!!! I was so excited for her and it was hard for her to conceal her pleasure. She got a nice red ribbon and was only 1 of 2 winners out of 120! It was a clay piece and now she has decided she LOVES working with clay.

At North Hills they had a choice of fine arts; band, choir, art, or theater. I was sure they both would choose art, but when Annabel found out that clay would not be done EVERY day, she chose band. This was pretty funny, because I am not sure she knows what band is, BUT she loves to play like she is playing drums. Grace chose theater, which was also a big surprise, since she has really been quite shy lately. But when she learned it would be like the Christmas Carol we saw, she decided that's what she wanted to do!

After the art show we came home to get ready for our 6 month visit by the social worker for the adoption agency. It has actually been 8 months, but we had some conflicts getting it set up.

Amy, the social worker that did the original home study, was the same who came today. She is so kind and helpful, it really was not as stressful as it could have been.

She was telling me about some recent research, specifically on adoptees from Ethiopia. They have discovered a relationship of the neurotransmitters and the heightened stimulation of older adoptees due to the extensive trauma endured. These are treated with supplements and tremendous improvement seen. I relayed that I was concerned that Annabel was not grieving for her foster parents the way that Grace did, yet I know she must miss them at least as much. After all, they were the only parents she knew for about 8 years. We still have lots to work through and will follow up with some suggestions Amy made.

After that we went to pick up the dogs and it is so nice for them to smell good if even for a little while.

Facing the second surgery, I decided I had to get in better shape. It is really hard to work in working out once I get home, so I took advantage of a special at a gym that included a couple of sessions with a trainer.

When he asked how long it had been since I had worked out regularly, it dawned on me that it was MUCH longer than I had realized. So here I am WAY out of shape and WAY over weight and the trainer started me off with squats and lunges. About half way through i thought about what was missing, WARMING UP!!! I am so sore! Duh!

But I knew I probably still needed to keep moving. The zoo was having a special for members to spotlight the new albino alligators. It was really interesting being at the zoo after dark since most of the animals are nocturnal. It was difficult to see some of them, but kind of scary too. Regardless of the pain level, much less the fear level, we kept on until 9:00!

The last stop was the carousel.

While there, Annabel pointed out a family whose hair was red. She could not understand how someone's hair could be that color! There was also a Chinese family behind us in line. Annabel whispered, rather loudly, "I think they are Chinese". Really??

At karate Thursday night, the girls had sparring.

Maybe parents are not supposed to watch.

I get so nervous when the girls actually have to "fight".

There was one little girls taking her exam for a yellow belt and first up was Grace to spar with her. Grace just wouldn't fight back. She looked terrified! Pretty quickly it was Annabel's turn and she had overcome her fears from the last bout. She went right into it, headstrong, and did a great job of defending herself. I told them I was going to hire a big old boy that could take their punches, to practice with! Annabel was concerned she would hurt him! I LOVE HER SPUNK!

Wednesday was the dreadful tax day, which really wasn't dreadful, since we should get a return due to adding Annabel! But to file your taxes you must have your children's social security numbers. That was why I had applied for Annabel's back in February.

BUT it disappeared. It truly disappeared.

I searched this whole house, going through stacks of mail, adoption papers, magazines, coupons, books, drawers, files, truly everything.

I looked at work. I went through every single thing on my desk and trust me, it was a LOT. It had simply disappeared.

I finally went back to the social security office and got the number.

While putting things back into their files, there was the card. Also my pants that I had lost showed up! I knew if I could take a long enough break from looking that both would be easy to find. I would almost think that someone was just playing mean jokes on me, but guess I not!

Tomorrow, Sunday, is the Earth Day celebration in Oak Cliff. Grace wanted to invite her friend to go with us. I'm glad she did. Last year her friend who went with us ended up joining forces with the class bully and I think she has been very sensitive to extending her hand in friendship again.

If I can withstand the pain, I must stand up and call it a day!

The mystery of the Easter eggs

2009-04-14T09:09:00.004-05:00

I'm glad we did our Easter egg hunting on Saturday because the weather forecast was correct. Rain!

We had a great church service, then on to Mark and Martha's for a delicious lunch. My girls LOVE seeing their cousins. And their aunt and uncle of course. My brother ALWAYS works with the most unusual characters and is very entertaining telling about his job.

In anticipation of the next surgery, I've decided I have to get in better shape. I took advantage of a 6 week program at Anytime Fitness so we stopped by there before going to Tom Thumb for breakfast necessities, and then McDonalds for dinner.

When we got home, I noticed the egg carton on the table was all torn up. Neither girl claimed responsibility and that was when I noticed the remnants of egg shell on the floor.

I guess I need to install a video camera to see who actually manages to climb up on our table, as both dogs are very small. But whichever one, they were capable of tearing apart the egg carton and getting out the egg, consuming all but a small bit of the shell. I hope the shell works as roughage!

Neither dog will talk or sell out the other!

When Grace first became ill with allergies last time I ignored her fatigue and general malaise as irritation over something else. But then she got sick and was pretty miserable for 2 weeks.

Last night when I got home, she had the same symptoms. This morning she climbed into bed with me, so that is where she is, sound asleep. I just cannot get over how much the two of us are alike. When I start having allergy/sinus problems, my body just wants to rest. If I can take a day to do that, then I nip it in the bud, otherwise, I can count on weeks of coughing, blowing, and overall just feeling badly. I hope we might stave it off this time.

It still feels odd sometimes when it is just Annabel and me, like it was for breakfast this morning. But I did notice we are finally becoming more comfortable. I grabbed her by the head as she ducked out this morning in an attempt to plant a kiss on the top of her head. AAAHHHH!!!! Why did you do that Mom?? At least she didn't wipe it off!

The Easter bunny is coming to town

2009-04-11T22:34:00.004-05:00

I hope the Easter bunny is more reliable than the tooth fairy!

When we were growing up, I remember going to a huge Easter egg hunt in Paris, Texas. It was so much fun and I was always hoping to find one of the "special" eggs to win one of the "big" prizes. I'm not even sure what the "special" eggs looked like or what the prizes were, but the thrill of the hunt was what it was all about.

This is just one more holiday that is difficult to explain to Annabel.

I know we did all of this for Grace, but maybe since she was only 6 and had her cousins here to celebrate, it doesn't seem like it was as difficult to introduce these holidays.

But for Annabel at 11 years old, it seems "late" to just now be having these holidays. But it doesn't seem to lessen her interest in participating.

Today we dyed eggs, which did not make any sense, but she enjoyed it anyway! She is always afraid that her things are not good enough, but i thought she did a great job.

While they were busy dying eggs, the Easter bunny hid the eggs, since it is supposed to rain all day tomorrow.

So now I have made her dye eggs, which are supposed to be eaten, then I send her out with a basket to look for her food.

Still she didn't mind and got into the pleasure of the hunt very quickly!!

Amazingly both girls found almost the exact same number of eggs all 100 times we had to hide them!

OK, so it was not 100 and pretty quickly they decided they would rather play, but on the third try I used the smaller "hide and seek" eggs and hid them so well that at least 5 are still out there somewhere!

The three of us played soccer, or our version of it and then progressed to "Four square". I had forgotten about playing that until today. I LOVED that and kickball at their age.

We kind of made up our rules as we went along but had a good time.

I called it quits when we were all tied.

Annabel wondered if they would be getting gifts when they woke up, since Grace told her they would.

I think they were afraid that being grounded would eliminate the visit by the Easter bunny. Jana sat the standard for HUGE Easter baskets. Or was it my Auntie Betty?

At our house, the Easter bunny always came the Monday after Easter. But one weekend we were at my grandmother's at the same time that my Auntie Betty and her 4 boys were there. The Easter bunny was coming to see the Hogue boys, so they also had to come see us! That ruined the bargain Easters from then on!

I took the easy way out, I have to confess. Annabel did not have an Easter basket and for just the basket alone, it was $10!!!! Can you believe that? At Sam's I found a great Easter basket with a soccer ball and tons of other great things. But f I don't get them out of the car, it will start raining or the Easter bunny will be as bad as the tooth fairy!

I mamam

2009-04-11T00:00:00.004-05:00

Some days seem to be more full than others. Or at least in 24 hours, a lot can happen.

Last night on our way home from piano, I asked for the third time if anyone had homework.

A very quiet voice from the back answered, but I could not hear what Grace said.

Finally Annabel just blurts out that their math project is due tomorrow. This would be the math project that had been assigned 4 weeks before, I'm guessing. LOTS of days had passed with NO homework and lots of free time.

This assignment had them watching five 30 minute TV shows and recording how many commercials they saw. From there they had to make a graph and determine what conclusions could be drawn from the results.

Believe it or not, they had also watched plenty of TV in the last 4 weeks too.

Thank goodness for DVR or TIVO or whatever, since we were getting home at 6:30 and faced 2 1/2 hours of just watching TV before doing the rest of the project.

We had plenty of shows that we had recorded so I took control of the remote and we breezed through the shows and stopped at the commercials. Quite the opposite of the usual way to watch TV.

But the commercials on Disney and Nick are pretty entertaining too so I switched and made them watch a Food Network show, Good Eats. Much more interesting to me, but found out they have a LOT more commercials than Disney or Nick. Very surprising!

When it came time to write their conclusions, I had to help Annabel with spelling. So she wanted me to help her write, "I am surprised...". So I spelled am, a m. So she spelled it back, mamam. HUH???

Every time I tried to explain a m then she said, ok, m, now what?

It took me a while to understand that each time I said a, she thought I meant like "the" M, so she kept on adding mamam. I'm not sure if that makes sense, but it was pretty funny.

Today I had my appointment with 2 of the 3 teachers and the assistant principal. It has taken a while and lots of visits to the school, phone calls, and emails, but I think they finally understood what I was explaining and what Annabel had also told them.

Yes, Annabel still has a LOT of adjusting to do, language to learn, rules for a western society, manners, how to participate in groups, etc. BUT regardless of any or even all of this, she does not deserve to have someone taunt her, calling her bad names, make fun of her ethnicity, and spitting on her.

No specific plans were made but it did help that I knew specific situations, where they had happened, who all was involved. It has taken Annabel a LONG time to get to the point where she has shared this much.

This afternoon I decided that we needed to go shopping for something new for Easter. The girls have received so many clothes from friends that we have not bought anything in a long time and money is still so tight, but when you shop at Target, you can at least get a pretty good value and all the "extras" that girls need.

We had such a good time and ended the evening with Taco Bueno and thanks to coupons that was less than $10!

So when I write it all down like that, it does seem like a LOT for 24 hours! Plus work, plus volunteering at the book sale.

Speaking of work, this has been one of the crazier of weeks. Not due to the work itself, but due to the problems so many brought to us this week.

Then late yesterday afternoon, my co-worker Gloria, whom you have read about before, has been told that a spot on her eye may be cancerous. Not the best bed side manner, but the doctor was very frank about the risks and told how a similar patient had died within 2 months of surgery. Gloria is handling it much better than I could especially with a 15 month old and husband of 2 years.

The surgery cannot be scheduled for 2 more weeks, so there is plenty of time for prayers.

I'm thankful my friend Erika's husband is coming back from helping with the fires that have plagued North Texas. The weather is forecasting LOTS of rain, so hopefully he won't have to return any time soon.

Tomorrow has a day with building a bird house at Lowes and then possibly a craft at the Ice House. This is Annabel's first Easter, so this will be interesting.

A few more. I wish there was an easier way to add pictures.

2009-04-10T00:14:00.001-05:00

Grace's birthday pictures

2009-04-10T00:10:00.002-05:00

OK, so I am a lot late, but wanted to finally add some pictures. These are from Grace's birthday party at the bowling alley. We had a great time.

Tomorrow I finally have a meeting at the school. Anxious to hear what they have to say.

A fun filled day to Killeen, Texas

2009-04-08T22:19:00.003-05:00

While some of what goes on in our lives probably is quite dull, it keeps my life quite eventful!

Today the 5th graders went to Killeen, Texas for an all day field trip.

If you had been here for the preparations for this day trip, you would have thought we were packing again for China. There was a check list that was checked twice! At least!

BUT you just cannot risk not having such vital components as your nintendo and MP3 player for the day, right? Plus your hot cheetos, yogurt, and oreos.

The preparation started last night and continued until they went out the door this morning. They made sure that Poppa knew that they had to be there NO later than 7:15, so 7:05 was the agreed upon time!

I couldn't help but worry all day for lots of reasons, but a main reason was concern for Annabel and the risk of being a target for the "mean" girls while spending so much time together.

The best part of the trip was that no one knew where and why they were going! So I have googled it and found out they went to Central Texas College.

According to Grace, the first stop was the nursery.

You know, the place where you learn to be a nurse. From there they think they had lunch and saw some movies and the library.

Annabel sat by her favorite teacher on the bus and I feel that I should apologize to the teacher. Annabel reported that the teacher kept trying to fall asleep, but that Annabel managed to ask her a question any time she nodded off.

When Grace called to tell me they were coming home early the noise on the bus was so loud it was almost impossible to hear her.

While hearing all the details, I kept asking if they were hungry, as it was getting late quick. No, neither were hungry, no problem.

Then as I sent them to get ready for bed Annabel announced that she had not eaten her dinner on the bus and was VERY hungry. I can't stand the thought of sending her to bed hungry as I am afraid she has done enough of that in her previous life.

It is not easy to prepare something that she can eat at 8:00 p.m. as she can take up to an hour just to eat a bowl of noodles. She does not like sandwiches, cereal, peanut butter and crackers, so I made rice! Thank goodness for Annabel, Grandmother brought home chicken tenders left over from her Luby's LuAnn special.

Last night at karate I thought I was going to cry.

The karate uniforms are $30 and I was just sure I could find one cheaper, but attempts at ebay were foiled as we are blocked from ebay access at work!So I kept losing out.

I had decided to go ahead and ask the instructor to order Annabel one. We got one for Grace from a neighbor whose daughter quit after just a few lessons. But Annabel was the only kid in class who did not have a uniform.

The instructor maintains a tough exterior pushing the kids to reach new levels of skill and ability while maintaining a strict environment.

But last night he came up to Annabel and handed her a new uniform.

We looked at each other shocked.

She quickly put it on and it fit perfectly and she quickly became just one in the class.

I don't think he expected to be paid but I was so glad for Annabel to "fit" in, I didn't care how much it cost. He took the check for the uniform but would not let me pay for her t shirt. What a nice guy!

A good weekend with hopes for a better week!

2009-04-05T22:54:00.003-05:00

When you adopt a child from China, there are really strict rules on the qualifications for the adoptive parents. One of these is age. I think I know why.

By the time the adoption of Annabel was complete, I was actually past the maximum age limit, but had started the application in time, so they approved.

This weekend, I have felt every MINUTE of my age.

Friday night I helped with an auction that benefits the girls' school. This was done by a group that helped us out so much when Jana died and then again when I adopted Annabel, that I was glad to help them out for a change. ONLY all of those parents are MUCH younger than the maximum age for adopting.

We helped with setting up, then went back to get our clothes to change. While trying to make it up the steps to the party, I fell. Big time.

Our focus at work this year has been on falls and fall prevention. I had felt somewhat smug during the discussions because it had been a couple of years since I had fallen.

Friday's fall made up for it. I landed on one side, so my arm, shoulder, and leg are bruised and VERY sore. Then I had to stay on my feet through the whole thing and dogs were yapping by the end of the night.

The girls had a great time spending the night with Mom and Dad. They even went to IHOP without me and got to stay up much later than I allow!

Saturday was a day for errands and if I had not had my girls, not sure if we could have done it all.

At the grocery store, I gave the girls the coupons of what we were shopping for and away they went. I realized it was a good way for Annabel to practice reading too.

Later we went to pick up the dogs' medicine. While there, I thought the girls were just going to stay. Thankfully we have a kind and patient vet who took the time to answer thousands of questions. When I mentioned that Grace wanted to become a vet, he showed a number of scars from bites and scrapes from the animals he has treated. I don't think that was a deterrent.

Since Annabel had a hard week, I always think a visit to the Chinese buffet provides "comfort food". I told them that while we were eating and realized they are completely unfamiliar with that term. Pretty funny to explain.

Tonight while eating dinner, I asked Annabel if she had to wash her own clothes in China. She had told us before she did, but I was not sure how she did it. I am not sure what she was describing, but somewhere behind the group home, she was responsible for washing her own clothes, as well as her foster brothers. She knew how to get out the stains and rub the clothes together to get them clean. There was also some sort of scrub board they used. I forgot to ask how they dried them, but when asked about her foster family and washing clothes, she told me that her foster mother had a washing machine. I hope so, but really doubt it.

Grace had told me before about going to the river to help her foster mother wash clothes. Today she mentioned that you had to be careful not to lose your clothes by them floating down the river.

I asked Annabel if she was surprised when I adopted her that she no longer had to wash her own clothes. She said she wasn't, but she also mentioned again about her foster mother calling her "Annabel".

Grace mentioned something else that happened when she first got here and didn't tell me because she was afraid to tell me. I asked why she was afraid. She and Annabel answered quickly because in China they would have been in trouble for a lot of things they were afraid to tell me. So the safer way was not to tell me.

I wish the amount of love and support they get during the weekend could hold them through the week. This is a hard week too with another of the TAKS tests and a day long field trip. At church today, a dear sweet man prayed that they will triumph over these bullies. So do I.

A double whammy

2009-04-02T23:11:00.003-05:00

When will this school year be over?

Last night I was overhearing a conversation between Annabel and Grace about school. Annabel was very distressed. Something had happened and it went from one topic to another finally ending with her despair over never having had a friend.

She came and laid down on my bed face down crying.

We talked for almost an hour about the problems she continues to have with just a few of the girls in her class. This isn't news. It is something we have been dealing with from the very beginning of school and continues to be the same small group of girls causing all the problems.

Annabel is so desperate to fit in and to make a friend that she has tolerated all sorts of abuse from these girls. The name calling, the pushing, the spitting, all just make my blood pressure spike!

I tried to reason with Annabel that there had to be other girls to be friends with and to just ignore these girls. I even threatened to take away privileges if she continued to pursue their friendship.

Of course I know that none of that will help.

What I really don't understand is how this continues to take place. Evidently Annabel cries at school often because her feelings are hurt. She just does not cry at home. UNLESS she is talking about things that happened at school.

Tonight I wanted to clarify a few things she told me last night. So I brought it up again.

This time I asked Grace if she had heard any of the girls saying the things that Annabel reported.

Grace began to cry and told me that something had happened at the end of the school year last year that she was afraid to tell me about.

One of the same girls that has tormented Annabel had started a "club" called IHG. While they told her it stood for something else, she knew it stood for "I hate Grace". How cruel is that? One of these little girls had been to our house several times and Grace to hers. The other has been in her class since the very first year.

She was afraid to tell me because she thought I would call the mothers involved and then then their daughters over her. Oh dear. How can I build their confidence in my love for them.

I feel so emotionally drained and overwhelmed.

I've asked for a meeting at the school. So far it has not helped, but feel I need to continue trying. I have to make sure they know that they finally have a mom that will take care of them and fight their fights.

Monday morning is not the time to give your mother a note from the Principal

2009-03-30T20:51:00.003-05:00

Picture this:

7:00 a.m. Monday morning.

Brushing your teeth, breakfast is on the stove, you are scrambling to get ready while ensuring everyone else is also getting ready, and then your daughter hands you a sealed envelop addressed to the parents of .... from the school, you are almost sure it is not going to be good news!

Friday afternoon, Annabel had meekly confessed to being sent to the Principal's office for talking. There seemed to be some question as to whether this was her second or third strike, which would prevent her going to the field trip next week, among other things.

The story sounded familiar: Somebody was talking to her and asking her a question, and she couldn't be rude and ignore her, right? So she had to answer her. When she did, she got caught and sent to the Principal's office. Funny thing. That no talking is "for real".

But once she got down to the Principal's office there seems to be some question as to what transpired next, but she was sent back to class.

She and Grace are in the same class, so I turn to Grace and ask what happened. Crickets could be heard from the deafening silence.

Annabel thought she had been suspended.

So did they send anything home with you? A paper from the office?

No, nothing. She still was not sure, but she knew she had done wrong talking, so I dropped it.

Then this morning, after spending more than 48 hours together, the magical letter from the office appeared summoning me to school for a "hearing" for minor misconduct.

Somehow you know the day is just not starting right.

When I had the chance to look at it more closely, the dates of her infractions had been in February and the last one was dated March 5. But instead of maybe 2 or at the most 3, there were 4, therefore a hearing was needed.

Today's schedule for work did not include time for a hearing at school too, so I went by on my way to work.

The assistant principal is such a nice person. He asked what I thought was going on and I remembered that this was during the time that the girls were teasing Annabel so much and she had finally resorted to kicking one kid, gotten in trouble for talking back to one, and finally this principal had interceded on her behalf.

He agreed. Signed the letter. And that was that.

Almost.

I had told Annabel that she was grounded from watching any TV, no video games, and no MP3 player. Glad she can't text or have a cell phone. Too many electronics. Anyway, her grounding was to last for one week.

My parents never grounded us. We never left the house anyway, so that wasn't a punishment. They couldn't send us to our room, since we all shared one, so I think we just got lectures.

I decided the only person truly punished might end up being me, so this afternoon we talked about it again. I told her I understood that most had happened during a "difficult" time at school, but it was no excuse for her actions. She agreed. I lessened the punishment to two days.

I know in China, from her stories at least, punishment was usually a spanking or a slap. I knew I needed her to understand that it did not make me stop loving her and I would not resort to hitting her to make sure she understood the lesson, but did feel I needed to make sure she understood that this could become serious.

It is not much of a punishment though, since the weather is brilliant and she would much rather be outside!

Monday morning is not the best time to present Mom with bad news

2009-03-30T20:49:00.000-05:00

Monday mornings are difficult enough, but when you are trying to brush your teeth, and your daughter hands you a sealed envelop addressed "To the parents of" at 7:00 a.m.

Grace's birthday

2009-03-28T20:50:00.003-05:00

I am sitting here typing in the dark as we participate in Earth Hour. I hope they will publish satellite pictures if you can really see the difference turning the lights out for one hour made.

Today is Grace's 11th birthday.

Sometimes when I look at her, she seems so much older. It also feels like I have had her all her life. It is very strange and difficult to find the "right" words for time before Grace and after. So if someone recalls something from the past, the question was, "Was I here yet?" I think we need to come up with better wording. I will work on this.

I digress.

Warning! Warning! Mother beginning to brag!

Grace has such a kind soul. She is so kind and sweet with both her grandparents and her cousins. I did not realize Grace was quiet until I adopted Annabel. She always has a smile. She is so laid back, nothing seems to ruffle her. She continues to grow in love, wisdom, maturity. She loves music, just like the first reports from the orphanage said she did. You cannot hurry Grace. She takes her own sweet time on EVERYTHING. She would much rather read, draw, or play the piano than just about anything, but she has developed an enjoyment in playing outside since Annabel loves to. She rarely asks for anything. She hates to disappoint anyone. She follows the rules and makes sure I do too. She is a back seat driver making sure I follow the posted speed! I cannot imagine life now without her. I pray that her life will always be blessed with many blessings, the strength to meet all challenges, and the courage to stand up for herself.

To celebrate her birthday we started with a bowling party last night.

This was her choice.

We have only been bowling once and at that point, Grace could put on a good pout if she lost!

But she was sure this is what she wanted to do.

We invited some family and friends and had a great time. To hit any pins was a HUGE success for most of the group, so laughter was usually the music they bowled to.

After bowling was cake and presents and running out the door as the temperatures continued to plummet.

I don't think it has ever been cold on Grace's birthday and this is the first time her birthday has been on a Saturday, I guess not in her whole life, but her life with us.

Grandmom offered to fix her "deluxe" breakfast for the birthday girl and anyone else who got up in time. After that Poppa took the girls to Lowes to build a flower rain gauge. VERY CUTE! If I were Holly, I would have pictures!

Then we all went to Texas Land and Cattle for lunch.

When I sign up for things on the internet, I fake my birthday by putting in Grace's with another year, so I got all sorts of birthday greetings today, including a free adult entree at Texas Land and Cattle.

While it was very good, we have decided McDonald's is more our style!

After that we were bound and determined to get Grace some shoes that actually fit. I'm not sure why they don't do corrective shoes anymore, since I was "blessed" with them. (Not a single boy in my classes was exempt from getting kicked in the shins by my gigantic pigskin lace ups! and I wonder why I am not married??)

Since GG has green (or were they yellow?) converse, Grace decided that's what she wanted. We went to The Academy, but all we could find were some more Sketchers and a million people all trying to find shoes.

Although we were then cutting into the grandparents' nap time, they obliged us by going to Whole Earth Provision. That place has the largest collection of feet friendly shoes I have ever seen.

We lucked upon a pair on sale, so for once in Grace's life, she has 2 good pairs of shoes, that fit and do not hurt.

Annabel found herself a harmonica and entertained us all the way home.

A game that we have lots of fun with but had never had is Connect Four. So that was part of her gifts. I ALWAYS win. So the girls are always challenging me to try to beat me.

BUT my little baby has grown up and now whupped me on EVERY game!!! Annabel and I played like we were beginners! Grace won 14 games! Annabel and I each won 3, but we never had a long winning streak before Grace won again.

She is easily as competitive as I am and knows I try my best. So when she wins, she truly wins!

Dinner was Grandmother's soup, great for a VERY cold evening.

Showers were fast so we could turn out all the lights in time. But first Grace got to try out one more of her birthday gifts, her OWN hair dryer!

My new blog

2009-03-28T20:13:00.003-05:00

My life seems split between the young and old.

One of my co-workers worries that I don't have any time with people my own age, but older adults and kids have always been my favorite groups. PLUS, I am quickly reaching the "older" group.

I have started a new blog especially for older adults and the caregivers of older adults. I am posting resources, special events, discounts, and all the other things that help make this your "Finest Years".

The website is http://thefinestyears.blogspot.com.

Spreading the word about adoption and greatest fears!

2009-03-27T14:11:00.003-05:00

Yesterday, at work, we hosted a program on DVT, deep vein thrombosis, and our special guest was Melanie Bloom, widow of David Bloom. David Bloom, you might remember, was a reporter for NBC, and shortly after landing in Iraq to cover the war, he died unexpectedly from complications of a pulmonary embolism after long flights and then long nights sleeping in a tank.

Regardless of who I meet, lately, stories about my daughters seem to jump right into the conversation!

I was actually explaining why I was late, but it also provides a great introduction to the older children who are available for adoption.

Melanie Bloom was very interested in our story as she had a good friend who is interested in adoption, but did not want to adopt a baby. You bet I can provide you with some resources! I hope her friend will follow up as having my daughters is by far the best thing I have ever done in my life.

Now it still is not easy but it is so worth it.

Last night Annabel started telling me about being afraid of ghosts.

If I had been blogging while Grace was in 2nd, 3rd, and probably even 4th grade, we would have been talking about the same thing.

I'm not sure why the little girls in their classes are so fixated on ghosts. But there are lots of stories going around at school about ghosts and how you can call up one ghost by turning out the lights, and on, and on.

Annabel says that the scariest part is when they talk about "bloody ghosts". This is one of those stories that make me wonder how I did not laugh as she told me.

I've always tried to address their fears by being rational and helping them decide IF the stories they have heard could actually happen.

I asked why would a ghost need blood.

She didn't have an answer for that. She told me she tries to remind herself that God is with her and she does not need to be scared, but then her head keeps talking about ghost until it feels like it could bust open.

Nothing I said could allay their fears, so we added it to our prayers, and then slept with the bathroom light on.

Grace told me this morning how some of the kids were being mean to Annabel again yesterday. Asking a few more questions even uncovered that one of the teachers has been making fun of some of the kids. Yes, the same one I have had problems with. Grace said he made fun of one little girl because she is Irish. I asked if she thought he had made fun of them. She said she thought IF he did, he probably would have pulled his eyes sideways like the kids did to her in 2nd grade. Insert the noise of my heart breaking for her here.

I cannot wait to get to the new school. North Hills has 52 countries represented. Hopefully there will be no room for singling out one nationality as different.

I know there were other things I meant to write about this week, but I have been fighting the bug that Grace shared with me and feel my head is pretty foggy.

Tomorrow is Grace's 11th birthday. I cannot believe she is already that old, but of course acting SO much older.

Warning some material is PG 13

2009-03-21T18:09:00.004-05:00

Amazon had a great deal on Guitar Hero some time back and so I bought it. When I bought our Wii, I explained to Grace that it was MINE, so she would have to earn time to play on it. That has worked out pretty well.

Well when Guitar Hero arrived, and I was making her "work" for her time to play, I told her I had to do something to "earn" Guitar Hero.

She decided today that I had earned it so while they are putting the stickers on "my" reward, I am going to update about some of what has happened today.

First off as a Mom, I have learned that a primary purpose of children must surely be to "check" your ego. At breakfast they were commenting on the sandwiches I made for the trip to the zoo. Somehow all of our conversations take a long introduction, so I sat patiently waiting for them to tell me how delicious they were. Instead, they told me they were gummy and the bread and meat stuck to the tops of their mouths!

For lunch I made sliders, you know the little hamburgers. This time I am thinking how brilliant of me to fix our lunch for about $5 when an order of sliders anywhere else is at least $10 x 3, think of the money I saved.

I made too many (and they are not something you can have on a soft diet after all) so after they each ate 2, they asked if they had to eat any more because they were very dry and salty. You will probably not want me to prepare sliders for you since they did not like theirs and I had to upchuck mine!

Annabel and I started talking at the table, where all really good conversations start in this house. She told me she can't wait to be bigger so she can have a boyfriend, because she wanted to kiss him.

This is an ongoing conversation and since I really was not sure how to kiss a boy until I was 49, then I have not known exactly how to handle this topic.

But this time she went on to say she had already kissed her boyfriend, who is the smallest kid in the class.

I told her that kissing boys is just the beginning and can lead to having babies.

She said that is exactly what she wants to do.

I know I was going to extremes, but since it is a constant in our conversations, I decided I needed to be pretty frank with the discussion.

She said she wants to have a boyfriend and kiss him and if she has a baby, then she will just kill it.

Insert shocked expression here.

I said we don't kill babies here.

She said, she would get her boyfriend to kill it.

Again shocked expression.

Trying to recover quickly with a response.

Annabel, if you kill a baby here, they will put you in prison for the rest of your life.

That's ok with her, she just wanted to get to have a boyfriend, kiss him, and have a baby.

She has told me before how her friend in China in the group home got pregnant by going to bed with a boy. She wasn't sure what they did with the baby.

This whole conversation makes me know that we are going to have many more talks about the value of life. The people in China have been in EXTREME situations and even Amy Tan writes about the disposability of a human life there. If you have read the book, "The Lost Daughters of China", the author plainly talks about the way babies have been "disposed" of to avoid facing the penalties of the law. I have no idea if it is true. But I have never lived in a communist country where the law is STRICTLY enforced and the law only allows one child per family. For a family to have a daughter, the parents know they will face their old age in even more impoverished conditions than when they are able to work for a living, because their daughter will be responsible for her husband's parents. She cannot take care of her own parents. There is no social security, 401Ks, mutual funds, or retirement accounts.

I know Annabel tells some tall tales and loves to joke, but since she has brought this up so many times I know I can't ignore it. But today of course we went further with the conversation than usual.

She recently told how they had a cow when they lived in China, which is probably NOT true, and how she went to the zoo one time and saw a panda and some dogs. Gillian and Grace thought she was kidding, but the zoo we visited in China did have dogs and chickens!

This afternoon when I checked the mail box, there was a letter from China.

She had written a letter almost as soon as we got home from China and worked on it until around Christmas, when we finally got Ms. Wu to help us address it to Annabel's foster family. I was so glad to have Ms. Wu be able to interpret for me and know she was not begging to go back to China.

I had just commented to Marcie that I was surprised they had not answered her.

Today it arrived.

I fretted over whether I should have Ms. Wu translate it for me before giving it to her. Dad and I decided maybe this would be the best.

Mom and Grace thought she needed to have it.

Grace was afraid she would get mad if she knew I kept if from her, which she would, but Mom felt like Annabel is secure enough here now to read the letter and be ok with it.

I am glad Dad and I got overruled.

I put it back in the mailbox and then sent her to check the mail.

She was so excited that she got a letter!

She wanted to duck into our house, but Poppa told her to bring it to their porch and read it to us.

She always wants to please Dad, so she sat down and started reading.

She knew her foster sister had written it because her foster mother does not know how to do that kind of writing and her foster father does not know how to write.

I am SO glad it was the sister who wrote.

She kept it light and funny from what Annabel told us.

She said her foster brother wants to grow up and take a plane and come find her so they can play together. They hoped she was being treated well and missed her. Most of this Grace translated for me and I was THRILLED that Grace could read that much in Chinese!

Annabel was very happy to have gotten the letter and know she was not forgotten. Her primary purpose in her letter, was to tell her foster father she loved him. Ms. Wu said from what she understood that Annabel had never been able to tell him that while there.

Somehow it does not seem right for an 11 year old to have this many life experiences. When I am with all 4 girls, I worry about the stress all 4 have already endured, so much so in comparison to my own "Father Knows Best" childhood. Prayers are always appreciated, for all of us.

Spring Break!

2009-03-20T15:47:00.005-05:00

Spring break can sure go by in a hurry! We loved having Gillian and Darcey for all the fun, but they are now on their way back to Round Rock and Mom, Dad, Grace, and Annabel are on their way home.

I am enjoying a few minutes of quiet. I love my deck and watching as everything comes to life for spring.

I ended up having to go to work this morning as a reporter for the Dallas Morning News wanted to do a story on our line dancing classes. The instructor introduced a new dance called the Obama Hustle. I am so glad so many will come, despite their aches and pains, and do something so beneficial for themselves. If it ends up in the news, I will put a link later.

When Gillian and Darcey got here Sunday, Darcey was still recovering from a bad cold/sinus/bronchitis, not really sure. I don't think Grace could have caught it from her that quickly, but now Grace is so sick. She coughs in spite of the amount of cough syrup I put down her, and sneezes, and blows her nose. Just overall feeling like yuck. But that has not slowed her down but a little bit.

This morning as I left, Annabel had convinced Darcey to attach the jump rope to the scooter, and pull her down the sidewalk. Those 2 are something else! I hope Annabel will start growing soon or Darcey is going to pass her.

Gillian was helping her grandfather vacuum out the car, plant some flowers, steam press his pants. She just does not stop. She made 2 kinds of cookies yesterday. She also fixed meat loaf and several other things while here. She loves to cook, but has little opportunity at home. She is becoming more like her mother every day. I told her we did not have to miss Jana, because we had her in Gillian. Thanks to all the ladies who prayed fervently for Jana to get pregnant. I don't know how we would have handled this loss without having Gillian.

My Grace was keeping her grandmother company on the swing and trying really hard to feel well enough to make the drive to Waco to drop the girls off.

Last night was karate and I tried to convince Grace not to go, but she was adamant.

For some unknown reason, I did not think about karate being about fighting.

Last night proved me wrong.

The instructor had invited another black belt, an older man, to come and "spar" with the students.

I thought he would just do it with those who had been there for a while.

We soon found out that EVERYONE would have a turn, whether they wanted to or not.

Gillian, Darcey, and I sat there in a panic, watching, waiting, breathless of when the girls would be called up. Darcey kept covering her eyes with my hand.

Annabel was up first and she went after him. She did her kicks and hits the correct way, so he started "fighting" back. Pretty quickly though it was no longer fun to her and she froze and I could see the tears welling up in her eyes. I know this is what happens at school. It happened a few times when we first got home when she and I would knock heads.

I did not know what to do. My first instinct was just jump up, hit the instructor and wrap my arms around Annabel.

But I know they cannot always have me there to defend themselves and that is the purpose of the class in some ways, so I just sat there, trying to discretely get her attention and give her a thumbs up for trying so hard.

Grace's turn came and we all froze again!

The instructor took some time explaining what she needed to do and she got him pretty good.

I wanted Annabel to have another turn to work out her bottled up anger, fears, emotions, but of course that didn't happen.

I wish I knew what had happened in those first 11 years that make her shut down and not fight back. I don't really want her to fight, but she does need to find a way to express her emotions, especially anger. I keep trying to decide if some counseling would help, but maybe later.

Yesterday morning, Marcie and Drew volunteered to take the kids to the zoo. We picked them up and were at the zoo within 5 minutes of it opening. It was a good thing, because by the time I dropped them off, even the back parking lot was full.

I took advantage of the time and actually thought I was going to go trade cars. OK, you can quit laughing now. I know I couldn't do it that quickly, but I really hoped to find a car that would bring down our monthly payments. The doctor and hospital bills are keeping me awake at night as they continue to pile up, and mine haven't even started yet. It seems like if the economy is so bad, car dealers would love to just get the cars off their lots. Not really. The 3 I visited are getting to keep all of theirs.

I had to work on Wednesday, so Mom and Dad took all 4 girls shoe shopping. I have done it way too many times and know how CRAZY that can be. Only 3 out of 4 found shoes and I again want to cuss the people who squeezed Grace's feet into so tiny shoes that it is almost impossible to find shoes that fit.

Mom reported she almost had a nervous breakdown from the experience. All 4 love to try on the higher heels and make you look at each pair. And when the 4 are together in a tight spot, they just get really loud! I am so sorry I missed the fun.

I can't even remember Tuesday right now and my battery is almost dead. I do have the pictures and will add them later.

Pictures to follow

2009-03-16T22:50:00.003-05:00

I've got 4 girls on a big pallet watching one of the Air Bud movies at almost 11:00 at night. They are full of ice cream bars, cookies, pizza rolls, taquitos, and bagel bites. Here's hoping they are worn out enough that sleep will not be an issue and that no one will throw up!

Today has been a great day where you feel like you got your money's worth of a vacation day.

We started early going to the Dallas Arboretum. After all of these years living in Dallas, this was just my second trip ever and for all the girls, their first. They had amazing displays of flowers and incredible playhouses based on a variety of children's books, like Peter Pan, Alice in Wonderland, and the ever popular, One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish.

They also had a great Texas Early Settlers display of original Texas homes, sod homes, tepees, etc and a whole town from Little House on the Prairie. These were favorites of the girls.

With 66 acres, it seemed like most were filled with toddlers and their moms. I was thankful that my girls are big enough to know where they should be and not in the middle of the flower displays picking flowers!

While there Lisa took pictures for one of Marcie's students for her senior picture. Since we lost them early on, we were ready for lunch before we could find them and spread out our place on the really damp grass but eagerly consumed three foot long subs from Subway!

The girls were constantly reminding me to sit down trying to make sure I did not over do it, but tonight I feel every step i took.

Of course the younger of our group were not tired after all of that and jumped out playing, riding bikes, and jumping rope! They even went with Marcie to help her plant some flowers while I took a nap!

Since we planned our sleepover for tonight we had to have "special" food and DVDs so we made use of the gift card from Gloria for Christmas to provide entertainment tonight. Thanks Gloria!

I know it is hard for the girls to stay here but hope if we are all sleeping together, it will be ok. Mom is standing ready to let everyone back in if they need to retreat.

Last night we stayed up watching Ice Princess but everyone was up at 8:00 for Grandmother's breakfast.

The whole weekend seemed to be focused on just waiting on Lisa, Gillian, and Darcey to arrive, but we had a great Saturday, sleeping late, and taking it easy. The girls were anxious to finish their quilt pillows they had started a couple of weeks earlier and worked until they were completed. Very interesting quilts, free form is the understatement, but a finished project and I am impressed with that!

We met some of our friends for dinner at Hunky's and enjoyed visiting. It was nice to compare notes with other moms of girls of similar age! And we all have the same issues, regardless of whether you have been here six months or most of your life! I love for the girls to have the chance to meet up with other girls from China and for once not be the only ones.

It was nice to be back at church after missing the last two weeks. It was even nicer to know the girls would be home soon after we were and all sit down to one of Mom's famous roast dinners. It was easy to forget what I was supposed to eat with everyone around the table and regretted it too soon! Even with the new "miracle" cure from a friend at church.

Tomorrow we plan on lots of play time and a great meal at El Fenix! Lisa is leaving a day earlier than expected since no one at her house can find anything without her! The girls have decided to stay and hope that works out.

Air Bud has now learned to play football and the new boyfriend has just proposed, so we are probably halfway through and we are slowing down. More tomorrow! Plus pictures! Promise!

Feet and karate

2009-03-10T21:29:00.003-05:00

It is so helpful to have online friends who have gone through similar situations. I have heard from so many in their care and concern over the bullies the girls are dealing with at school.

One mom wrote and told about her own experiences and how she handled it as a teen. She did not recommend handling it like she did but did suggest the idea of karate classes to help build esteem and confidence.

A long time ago I took the girls to see a class and determine their interest. At the time the only class I knew was across town and did not seem like something workable.

In the meantime I had learned about classes at our local rec center, with more reasonable prices. So this afternoon we dropped by to check out the classes, prices, etc. The girls were interested and we went back to give it a try.

It was hard to sit on the sidelines but I have not been released to do this type of exercise because the girls seemed to really get into it. There was a LOT more exercise to it than I expected but they made it through and decided they could not wait to go again on Thursday.

I can see why it does build confidence and is a good workout. It teaches you to work out your brain as much as your body. Both have continued their "workout" even in the car.

I got help to keep going tonight, since it had also been my first day back at work, because Mom made her world famous chicken and dumplings. They were delicious and easy for me to eat!

For my first day back it seemed to be packed, not just with work, but also the girls had a doctor's appointment this afternoon.

When I adopted Grace, being new to being a mom, and probably just slow, it took me several days to realize the shoes they had put her in to meet me were so big it was difficult for her to walk. Grace's feet had evidently been forced into such small shoes usually that she has had problems with her feet for the last 4 years. It has been so difficult to find any shoes to fit and lately she has complained about them hurting even more.

After our visit to Children's Medical and the comprehensive exam there, the doctor urged me to contact a podiatrist for Grace's foot problems. It seems that the foot pain has been from plantar fasciitis. No wonder she has been complaining. I know a lot of adults who have been felled with this! I am glad that I had him look at Annabel's feet because she too has plantar fasciitis! He ordered orthotics for both and hope that they will help.

Every time we make improvements in their life I fight the feelings of anger, sadness, and then hope. If my girls feet can get better and their self esteem improves, look out world! They will be on the top of their game.

Hard to leave beauty!

2009-03-08T21:55:00.003-05:00

This has been a beautiful weekend and it is hard to turn loose of the girls to face their challenges of the coming week.

We spent Saturday going through clothes, trying to sort out the cold winter clothes, since we think that part is over! But with Dallas weather it could still freeze and snow on Easter. But the girls needed to find something for our 89 degree weather!

Mom came over to help and instead had a good laugh at me dealing with issues she knows way too well from all of us.

Growing up, our house only had 2 bedrooms and 1 bath. There were 6 of us, so that meant one bedroom had 4 for the majority of the time. With it being an old house, there was also a HUGE LACK of closet space, more like a coat closet in each bedroom. But if you have 4 sleeping in a room there isn't a lot of room for dressers or chests of drawers either, so we ALWAYS took time to box up our clothes at the end of each season. Unless of course they were pants that had gotten too short and then they transcended the seasons and became shorts. Or a sleeveless shirt from your long sleeved one also was created.

We were fashion plates!!!

Even though this house is bigger than what I grew up in and have half the people, we still seem to be without any storage space!

So we put it all in the dining room and began to sort through it.

Quickly both girls became bored with it and the more bored they were the grumpier they got and the more Mom laughed as I tried my best to keep them on task. Goodness what a great way to spend a beautiful afternoon! But at least they could find something to wear today so we did have success!

This afternoon we made it all the way to the grocery store to pick up prescriptions and while out, I knew I did not feel like trying to think of something for dinner, so we took advantage of a coupon from McDonalds.

While there, the noise level was so high with the children way out of control, yet the parents only seeming to ignore it, I feel I got an idea of why there are the problems in the girls' school. If this is a sample of how the children are disciplined at home, no wonder they have no concept of appropriate behavior in school.

I know it is an area to have a good time, but this was just bad behavior, with one bully pouring her water down another kid's shirt, one hitting another, and that was just one group.

Which brings me to my original thought. It is hard to send my girls back to school when I am not sure they are any better prepared to deal with the bullies there.

I got a great email from a friend who told about her own experiences with a bully at school. She ended up making her point with her bully in a physical way. It is tempting to urge them to try this at this point, but she also suggested some martial arts classes to help them in building self esteem. I think this might be a good idea.

I've also added a prayer specifically for the primary bully. After what I saw at McDonalds I think she needs more help than what can be provided without some help. I am praying for a better week for both.

One up, one down

2009-03-06T22:40:00.003-06:00

This afternoon I decided to call the assistant principal and instead of pointing the finger at the students who had given Annabel such a hard time all week, ask for his assistance in helping both us know the better way to handle this.

As soon as he answered he said he had meant to call me.

Seems like Annabel's friend told her she did not win a game they were playing, Annabel's feelings were hurt and she started crying. And once those tears started, the rest of the week must have come out too and she could not stop crying.

Her teacher wanted to know what was going on and for once Annabel decided to trust someone to help her and told her all that had happened. Thank goodness for this teacher and interceding on Annabel's behalf.

When I called, this teacher had just been in to discuss the matter with the assistant principal. He had decided to call the girls into his office and have a talk with them.

At the end the girls were told to apologize to Annabel and ask to be her friend.

Annabel was on cloud nine and felt like all her issues were resolved. I HOPE SO!

But then Grace sat down beside me to tell me a rather long and complicated story that boiled down to the fact that Annabel's primary tormentor had taken a permanent market and marked out Grace's face on her copy of the class picture.

Grace was so hurt. She was the only person she had done this to. She cried and cried.

I pray that this girl, who seems to get so much joy from hurting others, will find the help she needs. I don't know anything about her home life, but best guess is there are some problems there. She obviously is not a happy person that by the age of 10 derives her only pleasure from the pain of others.

I went for my post op visit yesterday and found out that out of 25 years of doing this type of hiatal hernia repair, that I rank in the top 3 of the worst! He filled me in on some of the details of the surgery and I will need a second surgery to complete the process. I don't look forward to this as I have been extremely sick to my stomach tonight by trying to eat something a little different. Annabel designated herself to be my caregiver guarding me from any jumping dogs!

Three strikes

2009-03-06T00:06:00.003-06:00

Last night, Annabel finally told me what had happened at school in the afternoon program.

She had found a ball on the playground on their walk down to the nature center, where they have their program on Wednesdays.

While she was showing the ball to her "friends", one girl spit on the ball.

Yes, you heard me correctly. She spit on the ball.

I was flabbergasted. Why would she spit on the ball?

Because she wanted it and thought Annabel would drop it then. BUT they had done it to Annabel before and she decided this time to hold onto it.

Do you see the steam coming out of my ears?

I am so upset that any child has such a lack of upbringing that she would think it is appropriate to do something like that.

Now in China everyone spits.

When I first adopted Grace, she spit at the table even. If you get something that doesn't seem right while eating, you spit it out.

BUT it was also one of the first things I worked with her, that it was not acceptable in our culture to spit.

Now to have someone spit on something that Annabel was holding makes me livid.

This is the same little girl that has caused so many problems and swore her undying devotion to Annabel at first.

If you have not met Annabel, you might consider her what most stereotypically think a Chinese girl should be like.

But that is not Annabel.

She has so much spunk and wit and kindness, all wrapped up in this tiny package that has seen more hardships that should ever be allowed, with a pretty solid outer shell. She makes me think of both of my grandmothers, one that could fight bears, and the other, I can't explain but at times feels she is a reincarnate of my other grandmother. Neither were lacking for spunk and both seemed pretty solid.

So here is my little fighter of bears who continues to be defeated by bullies in her class.

I try to think of ways to help her face these kids, whether to stand up to them, report them, ignore them, but none seem to be the way Annabel wants to handle it.

We talked in detail about that she is the one who has to make the change, as no one else can control these kids' behavior. Obviously not their parents, or else their parents act as badly.

Last night in our prayers I included a special one that my girls could learn to control their own behavior around people who did not treat them right, as I have explained, this will happen all your life.

This morning I took charge of the breakfast prayer and reiterated my plea for God to help both in their dealing with others, to befriend appropriate kids, and learn how to deal with others.

Annabel has begun giving me a hug in the afternoons, ever since my surgery.

Today she avoided me like the plague. She hemmed and hawed and finally told me I would be mad.

She had gotten her third strike.

Evidently after three strikes then you are at risk of being suspended for three days.

OK, deep breath and the question, "what happened?"

There is always one kids in every class who looks like he or she has been held back at least twice and stands a good six inches above the rest of the kids and probably outweighs them by 50 pounds.

Well this kid is forever telling Annabel that she stinks and then makes a farting noise.

Annabel has a long tolerance level, evidently, but today it snapped, and she tried to kick the boy.

The teacher, same one where most of these things happen in his class, asked what the ruckus was.

Well each kind of told what had happened.

The teacher asked the kid if Annabel had tried to kick him and he said no, but then another kid, who was so not into this whole conversation jumps in and starts saying Annabel did too kick the giant kid.

So she was required to sign the book and as they changed classes, this teacher told the next one that she had gotten her third strike. Annabel was devastated.

I talked to her.

Mom talked to her.

Dad talked to her.

I have also tried to explain that she cannot tease and "pretend" punch or kick and not expect to get into trouble, that people do not really like that kind of behavior.

For all the wisdom she brings and maturity on more complex matters, Annabel is really immature for her age in dealing with her peers.

No, she was not in trouble with me and I was not mad. I would be if she just jumped up and kicked someone, or said something bad about them, or she had started it, but no, under the circumstances, I was not mad. And if she gets suspended, we will deal with it then.

In some ways Annabel wants Grace to rescue her, but Grace is somewhat reluctant as she does not want the attention drawn to her. She has learned to ignore them or report it or at least threaten to report them to the teacher.

I don't know what to do.

Grace asked me very casually the other morning whether you always had to deal with bullies. Yes, unfortunately there are quite a few adults who like to bully others and so you have to learn early how to deal with that issue.

Paris, Texas

2009-03-02T21:14:00.005-06:00

I've spent too much time tonight trying to get some of the pictures from my aunt's birthday party loaded and finally realize it just won't happen tonight.

When the girls returned from Paris, I was anxious to hear their impressions of everything.

Paris, Texas is where we spent most weekends, holidays, birthdays growing up. If you are not familiar with it, it is almost on the Texas/Oklahoma border almost to Arkansas too, with a population of about 26,000. Coming from the BIG CITY of Dallas, we felt like we were way out in the country, but it was where our grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins lived, so we suffered through!

The girls were ready to go when Dad honked the horn so from there I am relying on others' reports of what happened.

Seems like the first thing that happened was both girls slept for most of the way to Paris, which is just about a 2 hour drive.

When they woke up they had plenty of questions. The most important, of course, how long till we get there. From there they expanded to searching for cows, sheep, goats, and the ever present, road kill. Annabel had millions of questions about the cows and then shared a story that they had a cow one time in China that they cooked. Mom asked if I thought that was true, but I personally cannot remember seeing a cow in China, not in the city they lived in. Who knows! Grace knows they had a rabbit in her foster family, which I was told she enjoyed having. When I adopted her I asked about the rabbit. She thought it had died. I think it was probably dinner one night!

They went to church at a congregation that had lots of memories for us too. Our beloved minister, growing up, decided to relocate his family to Paris to that congregation. With that connection, we combined our youth groups for wonderful things like summer camp, Six Flags, friendships, etc. So when we were in Paris on a Sunday then we became part of their "group".

Someone made an announcement from the church about Camp Deer Run. This was the first camp we went to and the beginning of lots of fantastic memories of camp, making new friends, the bugs, swimming, the devotionals, so many important things. Grace asked her grandmother if they could go. I looked it up and it now costs $195 per child per week! Wow! I think when we went it was only about $25 per child.

I am just thrilled at knowing that my girls will get dressed up, go on this trip, visit a new church, and seem completely nonplussed by the whole thing.

After church, there was a visit to Uncle George's house to wait for the party to start. Annabel was not sure if she knew him but needed to know instead what time party start? We had tried to explain that Uncle George was Poppa's didi or little brother. I have a feeling there were tons of questions there too.

At the party, I'm glad to know they can now recognize some of their relatives but Annabel said they all had to kiss her, yuck! Her first question was why does everyone kiss so much.

They made themselves at home with all the "little kids".

When it was time to eat, Annabel found a delicious meal of crackers, only. Grace on the other hand found lots of everything she liked, sat down by my cousin and began engaging everyone in conversation. Annabel sat with Mom instead. They both enjoyed the cake.

See I need those pictures but will have to get them from Dad instead.

Pretty quickly they were on their way back home and Annabel slept most of the way back!

Overall they had a good time and spent time with relatives that we rarely see.

Last night the whole theme of the evening was preparing for the TAKS test. I think this test is just administered in Texas and about the only thing taught in the schools any more. If the students don't pass, the teachers are held accountable, so you can see why it is the focus of most of the teaching during the year. Thankfully for Annabel she is exempt due to her lack of English.

They both were up early and beginning preparation on a very FULL breakfast by the time I woke up. I am still having considerable pain at night and cannot get comfortable, but even worse is the heartburn. I'm eating only the most bland softest items on the list and small amounts but it still kills me at night.

Breakfast consisted of congee, bread (toast to everyone but Annabel), and fresh strawberries. I think we covered every food group with that meal!

Grace thinks she was the third one finished. Last year she got commended on the reading and I hope she does again!

Tonight we were the fortunate recipients of a great meal for the girls. The RECPTA people have been so good to us providing meals at important times. It was nice to give Mom and Dad a break tonight, but we crashed their meal thinking we would share the great lasagna, but Dad tricked us and Mom had made him a giant steak. There is NO getting away from us!

Sunday and stories from Nanchang SWI

2009-03-01T10:57:00.003-06:00

Here I sit, having my appropriate soft food, and trying to actually let myself heal.

You might wonder how I could do this type of thing?

Everyone else is in Paris, Texas today for my aunt's 87 birthday party!

But the most important thing so far today, she ran back to me for a hug before they left!!!

Last night we tried to explain who all the relatives that Annabel would meet today. Before we could get through one family, she was confused on the first ones. I tried showing her some pictures, but think it will be pretty funny Sorry that I could not be there. There are so few family get togethers any more, after feeling like there were SO many growing up.

Annabel has recently started telling me some really odd stories. It seems that she must have already told them to Grace and she urged her to tell me.

Before I adopted Grace, they moved her from her foster family back to the orphanage in preparation for the transition. When I would ask her about where she lived, she always called it the "hospital". I REALLY hate the word ORPHANAGE but wasn't sure what the children might have been told to call it.

Anyway, Annabel started telling me about when she was at the "hospital" and some of the people there. I wish I had recorded it so you could hear her explanation about a boy who walked like this (maybe a crutch? or a problem with his leg?) and how he had (finger made into gun and shoot in the head) a bunch of old people at the hospital. They would see him and everyone knew it but no one did anything. Then there was a pond with fish in it and that a LOT of people would walk into and drown, like they were in a deep sleep.

Last night she was explaining the meaning of a song that she had told Grace was VERY sad. There was something about a father who did not have a mouth, he could eat though, but ...I'm guessing he could not talk. The explanation of the song lasted just about the same amount of time it would take to perform most operas and I always get lost in these tales, but glad she wants to tell me.

I tried to find out if the stories from the "hospital" were things she had personally witnessed or been told. That was pretty scrambled too but know how imagination can make some of these stories really good.

Can you get the number of that truck that just ran over me?

2009-02-28T20:41:00.004-06:00

I guess I should start at the beginning of this week to explain some things but not sure if I can remember it all.

My surgery to repair my LARGE hiatal hernia was to begin at 2:25 p.m. on Monday. It was difficult to prepare the girls breakfast, lunch, and send them off to school, knowing I would not be home when they returned. We went over the details again to be sure everyone knew the plan.

I took advantage of the time doing a few loads of laundry, washing dishes, all those things I knew I could not for a while afterward. Plus tried to get caught up on emails from work trying to avoid leaving too many things hanging. I hate to leave my co-workers with more than they usually have, but know they can handle ANYTHING that comes and usually ANYTHING and his cousin EVERYTHING happens the minute I leave.

I packed my bag and went get Mom and Dad to go to the hospital.

OOPS!!! They were just sitting down to some lunch. Of course you know the drill, nothing to eat or sleep after midnight the day before, so sitting and watching someone eat did not seem like fun so Dad dropped me off in the circular drive.

When you have a LONG and COMPLICATED medical history, but are as healthy as I am, it takes a LONG time to get everything written down, and you worry that if you leave out one detail that might be the one thing the doctor really needed to know!

One of the funniest things was the need to do a pregnancy test! I got charged for one for Annabel before her surgery too, but knew she did not pee in the cup.

I went into OR very apprehensive, but within seconds of something in my IV, I know longer cared.

Unknown to me the surgery ended up much more complicated than he had anticipated and instead of 1 hour, it took 3, which then caused 3 hours of recovery. The hernia had caused the stomach to push up into my chest and twist around the esophagus and everything else that stays in that area was all entangled and nothing where it was supposed to be.

All I know was that i woke up in recovery in that state of panic that I always do but they started trying to explain that everything was late and that Dad and the girls were going home.

I looked up and could see the girls waving, Grace with these huge tears running down her cheeks, and Mom telling me to say bye and wave back. I don't remember anything from there, all though Mom tried her best to make me understand that it was very late and she was staying with me and Dad would take care of the girls.

I just knew I needed pain medicine because someone had driven a Mac Diesel through my chest!

Sometime later I asked again where were the girls? Mom said that Dad took them home. I thought I was surely hallucinating, learning that my Dad took my 2 little princesses home, fed them, got them ready for bed, heard their prayers and then started the whole routine over again the next day, which is really the more complicated side of the equation.

I'm not sure how many times I asked that because the whole idea seemed so bizarre! Not that I don't think Dad could do it, just has been a while since he did. Usually when Mom went to have a baby, Dad would load us up and go make a big purchase like a stereo while Mom was left at the hospital with their other new bundle of joy.

Tuesday morning he was woken up when Grace probably did like she does to me and hoovers over me while I am sleeping and begins a conversation in the middle of a thought and seems surprised that you are still asleep! Then Annabel will wonder in asking what the weather is like and that she is hungry! So it is a quick trip through the kitchen to prepare their expected breakfast, help with sacking up lunches, signing important papers, ensuring that everyone brushed their teeth and left with an appropriate outer garment and their backpack.

By the time Dad got up to the hospital, I'm not sure who was the most tired, Dad with the 2 girls, or Mom who was up and down with me ALL night. But they escaped to breakfast, some errands, and hopefully a nap. The doctor came late in the afternoon and decided I could go home. But shortly after he left, then my fever went up, blood pressure went sky high, and the pain became unbearable. Calls were made and the doctor decided I had to stay another night, which threw everyone into Plan C mode and Dad once more took the girls home, prepared dinner, oversaw showers, hair drying, dessert, etc. It was a rough night for Mom and I too, but we had some support on our end.

Discharge could not come too soon on Wednesday but knew I had to be home when the girls got there.

While I thought I had good care in the hospital, I had not been the recipient of my daughters' caregiving! Boy you want to be sure on your feet if you mention needing to go to the bathroom around Annabel, because she gets you under the arm and you are there QUICKLY, stays with you, and even prepares your toilet paper for you. Now that is full service!

We stayed at Mom and Dad's so if there were any problems, the girls would not be on their own.

I know there was a lot that happened in the next few days but when you are consisting on just liquids, clear liquids at that and pain pills, things just kind of blur.

I remember getting to spend some time on my deck in my wonderful new chaise lounge, viewing my new lemon and lime trees.

But with the time to think I realized what Mom and Dad do to make sure their visitors don't stay too long: they keep the temperature at 85 degrees! Even if it is 90 degrees outside.

So here it is Saturday night, I've broken all the rules that the doctor laid down, and feeling it. I was supposed to move to soft food this weekend. What I thought would be good is telling me now that maybe mashed potatoes would have been better.

A splendid weekend!

2009-02-22T22:51:00.004-06:00

Since Annabel had such a rough week I was hoping we could do something a little special to make up for it.

I love my Blackberry Curve so I can get emails without sitting down in front of the computer because then I learn about fun things even at the last minute.

This happened Saturday morning.

While we were glad to have the whole day ahead of us, it just seemed like we needed a good activity out of the house too. I got an email about a quilt making class at the Ice House Cultural Center, right in the neighborhood. When I called about the class I was told it was full, but being someone who plans this type of class all the time, I know there are usually a few who do not show up.

The girls greeted the idea eagerly, even Annabel, who I am going to guess, really did not know what a quilt was before Saturday. She liked the idea of cutting and sewing.

The girls have been fortunate to have a great art teacher at Rosemont who has introduced them to LOTS of great mediums including sewing.

When we arrived at the Ice House only 1 person had showed up for the class so we were guaranteed a place! Yippee! I thought I would just observe, but they had the most gorgeous display of some fantastic quilts and I got motivated.

My sewing skills earned me a C on an a-line skirt that took 12 weeks to make in homemaking in high school, so I have never done much sewing since.

But the instructors made this look easy and we were doing free form, so we could do it however we wanted. They had all the supplies and while some labored on selecting just the right fabrics others chose quickly and got started cutting out squares. The instructors commented on how different the girls are and it was so evident in doing something like this, Grace chose each piece of fabric so carefully, drew each square, and cut with deliberation. When she sewed it was at a slow steady pace.

Annabel and I figured out that as long as it had a right angle then it did not matter if it was exact and we whizzed through our sewing like we were in a race.

After 2 hours we still weren't finished but our projects had grown from a planned 10" x 10" square for a cushion cover and ended being the size of a king size bed. We didn't care and were proud of our accomplishments.

We went with Mom and Dad to Lowes to find a replacement for my chaise lounge and enough dirt to plant my new trees and attempts at vegetables. Mom and the girls always like to go to the dollar store while Dad and I like to go to Lowes. I let the girls take some money to spend and they were SO excited about the possibility of buying treasures at the dollar store.

We finished off our great day with dinner at CiCi's. Thanks Mom!

Today proved an even more glorious day with the weather just right.

After church the girls and I went to Tom Thumb to make sure we had enough for their lunches and other special things for the coming week. I don't know how we can go in there with a short list and spend $75!

After lunch the girls helped me with planting my Lemon and Lime trees and my potatoes, onions, garlic, and ginger. I think Dad giggled over the way I was planning to do this but it will be great fun if any of it comes up!

Facing surgery tomorrow has made for lots of last minute details that I think have to be completed! When we used to go to Colorado each summer and as everyone else was packed and ready to go, we had one uncle who insisted on so many last minute details like watering the plants, sweeping out the car, and who knows what else, that the rest of us just had to sit and wait until he was ready.

I feel like I have done the same thing, trying to take care of such important things like planting my potatoes that probably won't grown and washing the girls' coats. None of the things I felt like I HAD to get done were really that important, but some of the things off my mind that have been bothering me. The surgery is not until 2:25, but as usual, nothing to eat or drink after midnight tonight, so I am trying to make sure that I don't wither away in the morning.

Tonight Annabel prayed that my surgery would make me OK, Grace prayed that she would be OK, and then that I would be OK. I love it.

You little pig

2009-02-20T20:21:00.004-06:00

Annabel has had a pretty hard week.

It seems that no matter what she did someone found a reason to tease or make fun of her at school.

Here at the end of the week after all my coaching, she admitted today that when one girl pushed too far, she told her to shut up. I told her I understood and sometimes you do get really angry but it wasn't the best way to handle it. Then she said, I think you might be mad though because I said the other word too.

The other word?

What other word besides "shut up"?

I know when I first adopted Grace, Gillian and Darcey taught her that the "sh" word was "shut up". There are lots of other words that start with "sh" that I could think of that were a lot worse.

Annabel finally admitted that she told the girl, "Shut up little pig", which is what the same girl had said to her earlier in the week.

I think for now the lesson is lost especially when I had to stifle a laugh at the expression she chose to tell someone off with.

Last night after piano I planned for us to go out to eat Chinese food, but remembered a new Mexican food restaurant had opened in the neighborhood. Just a couple of months ago, Annabel would have fought against that idea.

This time, she was all for it, but Grace did not want to go.

Two against one since I love Mexican food!!!

Annabel took the bowl of chips and the bowl of hot sauce and started chowing down! She ate almost all of the chips and hot sauce and was ready for dinner. I can barely dip my chip into the hot sauce whereas she is scooping it up and piling it on each chip.

The place is known for their chicken soup but I gave them the choice of soup or stew, or guiso de res or guiso de puerco.

I have never seen a person eat a dish so quickly as Grace, especially for someone who did not want Mexican food! They loved their guiso, except Annabel doesn't think she likes their rice. We're glad she now understands that the chocolate is actually refried beans.

I had promised Annabel that we would go back to the Chinese church this weekend but last night she was asking if we HAD to go. Of course not, but I did wonder why. Ms. Wu had told her it was the last day before her parents returned to Hong Kong and they were planning a "special" service at church. Annabel understood that the service would be especially long and I think that had something to do with it, but I really think she just wanted the safety and security of going to church with her Grandmother and Grandfather.

I am scheduled to have surgery Monday so I am glad not to have too much planned for this weekend, except getting me a new chaise lounge to recover on.

One last thing - We missed the premiere of the latest Disney movie on Monday so Grace and Annabel had planned all week that Friday night we would watch the repeat. Annabel told Mom that she needed a nap because they had 3 movies they were going to watch tonight. NOT ON MY WATCH they won't be seeing 3 movies tonight.

Turn the other cheek

2009-02-19T07:45:00.001-06:00

As I tucked the girls into bed last night, Annabel started opening up about some things that are taking place at school.

It seems that she is the recipient of mean and rude remarks, as well as taunting and teasing about everything from how she talks, the fact she is Chinese, the food she chooses to eat, and I guess just about everything else.

Grace chimed in that she too continues to have people making fun, starting fights, and overall making her life miserable at times.

The more specific they got in what is being said, the madder I got. I was ready to storm off to school this morning and fight their battles for them, or maybe wrap them in bubble wrap to protect them, or tell them mean things to say back.

It seems that a lot of the derision is said in Spanish and then causes everyone to erupt in laughter.

Like I said, I was so angry, so my initial suggestions won't be recorded. No need to focus on the negative and I was VERY negative.

After they went to sleep, I stewed on this for a long time. A LONG time! I knew that I was seeing just one side of the situation and know that Annabel can be pretty good at taking care of herself, but still needed to find a way to help them through this situation that was appropriate not just for elementary school but for life. Now I am not the best to be giving advice on something like this, but have learned that just because someone is unhappy with themselves, does not mean they can make me dissatisfied with myself.

So this morning we talked about it again.

I explained that a lot of times when someone says something mean, it can usually suggest that they are very unhappy, jealous, or a lot of other things causing them to lash out at others.

I suggested instead of trying to find a way to "get even" we need to pray for them, for whatever is causing them to react the way they do. We need to follow Jesus' teaching that if someone strikes us on one cheek, we turn the other to him also. Hard concept and Annabel was listening closely.

I suggested we start with practicing this at home and only say nice things to each other, getting into the habit of thinking the best. Shoot, I guess that means I have to be nice too. Just kidding.

Who planned this?

2009-02-17T22:26:00.003-06:00

Some days you think if you can just get through your work day then you will go home and ....... You can fill in the blank because you are sure that you will have a relatively quiet evening, the worst that can happen is washing an extra load of clothes, quick trip to the store, etc.

I've heard recently that to make God laugh, make plans.

So yesterday afternoon I'm talking to dad about something relatively unimportant when he casually mentions that they had had a rather tough day.

It took a while to get the details out, but seems that they were in the parking lot of the local Wal Mart when a woman was looking down, rather than the crowd she was headed into, and hit mom and Mom landed on her hood.

Of course Mom's big concern was not hurting the woman who hit her feelings.

Annabel and Grace sprang into action as nurse and caretaker providing ice packs, cold drinks, and wet washcloths. I prepared dinner and had to fight with mom the whole time trying to keep her still.

After considerable badgering from one of their children, Mom and Dad finally broke down and went to the ER to have Mom checked out.

The doctor was shocked and glad to announce that nothing was broken. He could not believe that mom had ended up on the hood of a car with only deep tissue bruising, sprains, and strains.

A prescription of "taking it easy" is a waste but I know mom didn't feel too good since she let me good dinner again.

The girls had been given a math assignment almost a month ago, so thankfully they waited until tonight to get started, the night before it was due! So while I am trying to fry chicken, then I am explaining to Annabel what we are doing and why.

The assignment was to record the amount of time it took to melt an ice cube, prepare a chart/graph of the variations, and draw your conclusions from your hypothesis. Again, pretty difficult to explain, so I had Annabel dictate to me what she wanted to say about the experiment. I think we need a lot more time on the reading and translating end of learning a new language.

A funny from Dad!

2009-02-16T15:42:00.004-06:00

When I'm an old lady, I'll live with each kid, And bring so much happiness...just as they did. I want to pay back all the joy they've provided. Returning each deed! Oh, they'll be so excited! (When I'm an old lady and live with my kids) I'll write on the wall with reds, whites and blues, And I'll bounce on the furniture...wearing my shoes. I'll drink from the carton and then leave it out. I'll stuff all the toilets and oh, how they'll shout! (When I'm an old lady and live with my kids) When they're on the phone and just out of reach, I'll get into things like sugar and bleach. Oh, they'll snap their fingers and then shake their head, (When I'm an old lady and live with my kids) When they cook dinner and call me to eat, I'll not eat my green beans or salad or meat, I'll gag on my okra, spill milk on the table, And when they get angry...I'll run...if I'm able! (When I'm an old lady and live with my kids) I'll sit close to the TV, through the channels I'll click, I'll cross both eyes just to see if they stick. I'll take off my socks and throw one away, And play in the mud 'til the end of the day! (When I'm an old lady and live with my kids) And later in bed, I'll lay back and sigh, I'll thank God in prayer and then close my eyes. My kids will look down with a smile slowly creeping, And say with a groan, "She's so sweet when she's sleeping!"

Family

2009-02-16T07:27:00.002-06:00

My mom, my aunt, and 6 of the kids.

Mike, Becky, Kathy (looking for sharks), Lisa, me.

Auntie Dora is on the left and Mom is on the right.

I am the only one standing and facing the camera with

her tummy sticking out and the beautiful haircut done by placing a bowl on your head.

Here my cousin Dubby is excited because he pinched me, I bit him,

then I got pulled out of the baby bed screaming!

They never let me play! Kathy is on the floor, then Lisa and Becky behind.

Dubby was everyone's baby, even his sister Kathy!

These kids are just pretending to be good.
From left to right is Kathy, Mike (in the back), Kathy, and Lisa.
I was probably off eating something!

When we were growing up, our aunt and uncle and cousins lived around the corner from us. Almost everything we did something together.

Mom dropped us off at their house on her way to the hospital to have each of my younger siblings. I remember jumping out of the car with no long goodbyes. I didn't know she wasn't coming back soon and when she did she would come back with another kid!

My cousin, Dubby, is a lot younger than me, NOT!!! He is only 2 weeks younger but you would think it was 20 years. Kathy and Lisa were the same age. Becky and Mike were older and gave us a glimpse of what being a teenager in the 60's was like. Becky provided me with a picture of Elvis which was highly treasured. I think she had every Tiger Beat printed so there were plenty of Fabian, Elvis, and all the others on her wall. Mike taught us about Vespas and then hot rods. I'll never forget the time that the cops stopped him when he left the motor running so he could run into a store. They thought he was going to rob it. He knew if he killed the motor it would not start again.

With a cousin like Dubby in your class, you could be guaranteed that someone would fight your battles for you even if it was against another girl! Dubby also taught me to be resourceful and when we wanted a popsicle, we would scour the neighborhoods for discarded bottles to redeem for their deposit. If we couldn't find enough, then Mrs. Moore, the owner of the store, would be sure she split it evenly between us.

I'm still banned from traveling through the alleys though because we were caught riding our bikes through them. My girls think that is hysterical that I won't even venture into the same alleys. I mind my mother very well!!

Dubby and I shared everything including going to the bathroom together, which provided our current names for male and female anatomy. So when Darcey was injured the other day, I had to explain the facts of life using these very incorrect anatomical terms. Annabel comments on Ollie, the dog's, frequently now with the new terms. I am sure I should correct them, but I actually believed you had a bottomend, since that was what my mom called it.

As we grew up then we all started going different directions.

While Gillian and Darcey lived so close, it brought back memories of how we grew up with cousins just around the corner.

Soon after Lisa, Gillian, and Darcey arrived Saturday, our cousins Becky and Kathy and Kathy's granddaughter, Audrey came for a visit. I cannot believe Kathy is old enough for grandkids, but at least she finally got her a girl. Kathy and Becky both have 2 sons, so they missed the fun of buying girly girl things for their kids. But what a cutie she has.

Grace holding Audrey.

I know it is grainy but I took it with my phone and the sun was streaming in behind them.

We enjoyed our visit and catching up and getting to know Audrey.

Lisa needed to do some Valentine's Day shopping for her husband, Ken. When your husband is a state trooper you choose a different kind of place to shop, so we made our way to Smitty's, the local gun store! I think I might get a part time job there. It is obviously where men hang out. Now if I could just find a man named Tom Smith.

Then on to shopping for my birthday present.

With my new deck, obviously the only choice would be found at a nursery.

Calloways provided an Eden and source of too many choices.

My new lemon and lime trees will be perfect additions for my deck. I had no idea that they smelled so wonderful while in bloom. Now we just can't have another freeze though! Otherwise they will be coming inside with us!

When we got home we found Dad cooking! It is still such a shock that I always have to comment on it. Steaks and shrimp for a birthday dinner. Yum! I think this is the longest I have made my birthday last in a long time and I think everyone is tired of it!

They always leave too soon and their leaving produces lots of tears from Grace. She loves Gillian so much and it hurts to lose her each time. For Annabel, it has a different feel because she feels left out once Gillian gets here. So it leaves me trying to explain that it is important for Annabel to find her place within the dynamics and to remember that Darcey also can feel left out. Rather than forcing Grace to change, I do think it is important for Annabel to learn to join groups. While she has friends at school she still feels the outsider. I also explained to Grace the importance of explaining things to Annabel, to help her not feel left out. I know the conversation goes pretty fast, as Gillian can talk up a storm at a high rate of speed, so while Annabel has made great progress in learning English, she does have trouble keeping up, especially with slang.

When I was growing up and my best friend suddenly dropped me for another best friend, I was devastated. Mom's soundly advice was to find someone else who did not have a friend, and be their friend.

I try to impart this wisdom on my girls, but so far not having too much success. I'll keep trying. Also I know their self esteem has to be sound so they do not feel it is necessary to always be part of a group. Even as an adult it hurts to not be part of the "popular" crowd. My crazy friends at one job always said that we were the popular table and everyone else wanted to be with us. It was the only time that I was ever in that group. Still good friends, but still crazy!!!

I don't know how to get rid of this extra copy of this picture, so I just put it at the end!

Happy Valentine's Day

2009-02-14T11:31:00.003-06:00

I survived getting another year older and enjoying the benefits of the gifts to help assuage the pain of aging! I LOVE my deeper sinks where there is little chance of the constant streams of water going down the counter top from over zealous helpers and I LOVE having a chaise lounge (what a fantastic word!) for lounging and enjoying my new deck. Now I just need my next door neighbors to improve my view from my deck. They planted a fig tree and I hope that we can soon sit on the deck and reach over for some delicious fruit!

We are eagerly awaiting the arrival of Lisa, Gillian, and Darcey. Annabel woke up very early just in case she misunderstood when they were going to arrive. She woke up Grace who then came in to wake me up to tell me that Annabel woke her up. Thanks!

Annabel has continued to make such huge progress in learning English that she is now able to find songs in English she likes to sing. The only trouble is she truly takes after her mother and cannot get the words right, who was sure the ever famous War song, "Why can't we be friends" actually said, "I get real depressed" and argued vehemently with her older sister on her accuracy.

So as I have mentioned before, Hannah Montana's song, "The Best of Both Worlds" has been for a long time, "It's basketbaaaaaaaallllllllll", which is just as good I guess.

But now she wants to learn more of the words, so I looked up the lyrics so we both could learn them.

So now the line is, "You get the limo out front. Hottest styles, every shoe, every color." In between is a lot of oowa, oowa, yea, yea.

I explained what a limo is and what the phrase the limo out front would mean, what are the hottest styles, and the concept of every shoe, every color.

Then she belts out, "You get the lemon out front. Shoes, every color."

I corrected her to limo, yea, she knows, lemon, no, limo, yea, lemon, no limo, yea lemon. You can see it is a lost cause!

We haven't even tried to learn the next line.

Valentine's is one more of those holidays that we celebrate that is very difficult to explain. I realize it is disdained as a greeting card industry holiday, but the sentiments behind it are sweet - showing your love to others.

But when you are in 5th grade and seem to have a crush on a boy in your class, then Valentines' becomes "eeeeeeewwwwwwwwwwww".

We were at our local Chinese Buffet at 7:07 pm on Thursday night when I casually asked if they were sure they did not need valentine cards.

Oh yes they did!!!

A quick trip to Tom Thumb provided a new product where the candy and valentines are in one package and thankfully we had a couple of choices that would not make them feel geeky by providing something too childish. Annabel didn't want to be bothered with writing out cards so she chose a bag of suckers.

This child who probably had very little candy in China has definitely developed a taste for it here.

So her bag of 24 suckers came back with almost half of them left so she could have them.

If I had just given her a tub of butter and a loaf of bread she would have been even happier, all things that she deplored when she first arrived.

We continue to learn!

You know you are getting old when ...

2009-02-11T22:57:00.004-06:00

Your girls get into an argument about whether it is cruel to mention your age.

65 degrees outside makes you put on a jacket!
At 66 degrees then you are sweating!

You spend lunch at a grief support luncheon.

Your child who is still learning English tells you what your present is and you think she means a disposal and you get all excited about that. BUT instead you get a new REALLY DEEP sink and you are just as excited!!! And even more important, you want it to stay spotless like it is today!

You get another clock radio to replace the one you accidentally fried, so now you can see what time it is in the middle of the night!

There are 3 messages on your machine at home and you think it is probably well wishers for your birthday and instead they are messages for your 10 year old daughter.

And your knee isn't relieved even by 2 aleve.

Having Tex Mex 2 days in a row makes you worry that you might end up in the hospital!

But you also get to have a Sprinkles double fudge cupcake with a glass of milk after everyone goes to bed, even though you know you are going to have to get up in the middle of the night!! But at least now I will know what time it is!!

I wrote on my Facebook that this is the first time in a long time that I was actually looking forward to my birthday. My life is so good and each day brings new rewards.

My birthday got started early this year.

Mom made me a delicious homemade German Chocolate Cake, my absolute favorite.

But she decided it wasn't up to par, so we got to eat it Monday after a wonderful meal of chicken and dumplings. The girls were a little confused, but hey, delicious cake is appropriate anytime, right?

On Tuesday my co-workers decided we needed to celebrate since we would all be tied up with our big book sale today. And while they tried to surprised me by inviting Mom and Dad to lunch too, my Dad doesn't keep a secret very well. But they took me to one of my absolute favorites, La Calle Doce, so life was so good.

Then about the time I was thinking they couldn't fool me, I get a call for an emergency meeting, which sounded serious. I practically run out of the office into a set up for a surprise party! All our great volunteers and co-workers were there. And another delicious German Chocolate Cake!!!

Annabel surprised me the most with a cute card she made.

The weather forecasters got it right that there was a bad storm coming last night. About the time the girls got settled down and just about asleep, the tornado sirens sounded and hail started pounding the windows. Their room has 6 windows and I couldn't stand for them to be that far from me, so I woke them up and put them in my bed. Just a couple of weeks ago they were able to share a twin bed and Grace and I have shared her twin bed too, but my queen bed suddenly was too small for them. And about the time they finally got settled in and questions about God and storms were covered AGAIN, the storm was through.

So my bed is filled to capacity, the storm is past, so I end up on the couch!

Tonight though Annabel decided that I could give her a kiss good night since it was my birthday. I had told her that in the US that the moms got to get their kids birthday spankings on their birthday, but instead she let me give her 53 hugs and kisses!!

Life is so good!

A morning short

2009-02-11T07:57:00.003-06:00

Grace - "Happy Birthday, Mom! You are 53 today!!!"

Annabel - "Grace, you are being MEAN to Mommy!"

Grace - "No I'm not. That's how old she is."

Annabel - "But Grace, that's OLD!!"

Happy Birthday to me!!

Subjects and simple subjects

2009-02-10T19:15:00.004-06:00

The normalcy of our life seems like it isn't noteworthy enough to record, but I am very grateful for it.

We were discussing how far Annabel has come in such a short time and then sometimes I wish I could wave a magic wand on her behalf and speed up the process to make her life easier

I believe you could put me into a foreign country for the rest of my life and I could never have adapted as well as she has. Her English is so good that one teacher "thinks" she can take tests in English. The result was quite amusing. She guessed at the multiple choices, since she really could not read ANY of the questions and made a better grade than those whose primary language is English.

This week I have been helping her with some homework. I know it sounds odd to comment on that, but she has not had any. I'm sure I should have taken the time to help more with her lessons, but she gets so frustrated with herself, then me, and ends up crying and in a terrible mood.

This week she had to pick the subject and simple subject. OK that was really hard and a LOT of tears! I don't think Chinese has subjects and predicates. I could be wrong, but the characters can represent so much more than what it takes us pages to explain!

Then she had a test to take, reading comprehension. I read the passages and the questions to her. It was all about virtual telescopes, hard concept to explain. Anyway, I was shocked at how many she got right! Just listening and she could pick the answer. She also pointed out that it seemed that the majority of the answers were C!

This little bit that I helped with made me appreciate the hard work her reading teacher has done with bringing her this far. I worry constantly about next year for her. I'm not sure how the new school handles kids who need ESL assistance. She really has very little interest in reading or seems not to, but I think she is terribly unsure of herself and feels illiterate as a result. That is why I wish I had a magic wand, to speed up her reading skills and I think the rest would fall into place.

The girls got their report cards and I think for once the grades were actually representative of their abilities. Grace made a 100 in math! Quite an achievement! The rest of her scores were in the 90's. Annabel made all in the 80's. Wow!

Mom made chicken and dumplings for us one night and always takes the extra flour tortillas and fries them to eat along with the dumplings. Annabel LOVES these and asked to take the extras in her lunch. Cold fried tortilla strips does not sound good to me, but a lot of what she has taken doesn't sound good.

She has them in baggie at her place at the table.

While I was preparing breakfast she was packing her lunch.

She could not find her baggie of tortilla strips.

I really think she thought we had hidden them from her.

I suggested she look in her backpack since she had just put some things in there.

She was sure they weren't there and would not look.

I suggested they might be in her room since she had taken some things to put away.

NO WAY would they be there.

Grace finally told her she better go look as I was always right on these things.

Instead Annabel pouted sure that her lunch was ruined.

In the afternoon she came into the kitchen with her baggie of tortilla strips.

Guess where she found them?

Yes, in her room, under the book she had put up.

I am tired of not feeling like myself and lacking energy. Going back to work in addition to mommy work has made for a hard week. It has been so difficult to find food that I can eat and keep down. But I believe I have managed not to lose a pound even without eating!!

We can't wait for spring break next week. I wish our finances were better so we could go and do some things. I realized I am paying about $500 a month on doctor and hospital bills and there is no end in sight yet. This is still trying to pay off Grace's surgery from July and now Annabel's in August and I am making only a minimal payment on each of thousands of bills!

At least Lisa, Gillian, and Darcey are coming for part of the week and we just have fun being together.

My girls continue to amaze me and make my life so wonderful. They have been so conscientious about not letting me do too much and have helped out any way they could, even taking on washing clothes! As far as spring break, they are just fine with staying home. I had promised them a special treat for all the extra things they have had to help with. Grace told me that it was OK, they were glad to do it. I am still restricted on how far I can drive so it has been hard, but they never complain.

Value in the hand of the holder and dogs and decks

2009-02-07T19:34:00.004-06:00

It's Saturday night and we are watching a Doraemon DVD, a Japanese anime that has Chinese subtitles, about a cat with a magical pocket full of all sort of contraptions that take the kids in the show on remarkable adventures. Tonight's took the group to prehistoric times, but also had aliens. Too bad I don't understand any of it.

But the girls are eating their favorite meal of noodle bowls. Thank goodness someone gave me the idea of "adding" to the noodle bowls and making them healthier. Today was our organic produce day and this week we got fresh kale. It looked like what I had cleaned out of my flower bed at one point, but I washed it and put it in the boiling water into the noodles and the girls had a much healthier meal! Me? I chomped on the delicious celery. I just can't get over how much better organic produce tastes.

Today has been a bit different.

We were sad for Ken and Lisa and their family as they attended the service for Ken's dad, but the funeral was more than 5 hours away and a hard drive considering we would try to return after the service.

Instead Mom and Dad wanted to attend the annual brunch for members of the research studies at UTSW for the Alzheimer's program. The group of doctors are on the cutting edge of understanding the cause of Alzheimer's which will put them that much closer to finding a cure. Mom and Dad are glad they can help, but it is a running joke that they may keep them one of these days.

Grace and Annabel accompanied Mom and Dad and hoped to win a door prize, but no luck. Annabel is still convinced this is her unlucky year. But they enjoyed going and Grace has been several other times, so they got to help with passing out the prizes and drawing the numbers at least.

I on the other hand had to work.

We are having a book sale at work to raise money to buy more books for our library. The first few times we did this we got a fair number of books, but nothing like what we have received this time. So it was decided we would try to make short work of a big project by focusing only on that on a Saturday morning.

The best part was the vast collection of Texana literature that we received which required a specialist's opinion on the value.

Enter a local Cliffite (what you call someone in Oak Cliff) who had some of the most interesting stories and an extensive knowledge of books. It was very interesting learning what he was looking for to help decide value. Books had never been interesting to me until I had Grace. When she was trying to learn to read, we read together every night. When she was finally able to read, then we each would read our own books together before bedtime. Now to see these very interesting first edition Texana books has really piqued my interest. But even if they are first edition and even autographed, there is not enough to retire on, barely enough to buy new books. I'm sure there are some that are valuable, but as Fred explained, value is in the hand of the holder.

Value in the hand of the holder.

I like that. I know I have two of the most valuable people I have ever met and now they are my daughters.

The deck and our dogs.

Before our deck was complete, we all had to try it out. It is SO high!! our yard is on such an incline that is not noticeable until you add something like this on the back.

It's a pretty good jump to the ground.

The first time we let our dogs out it caused a great deal of confusion.

Our dogs, Nina and Ollie, were "adopted". If you have children who are adopted this is not the appropriate phrase to use, because when you really should get rid of the dogs you can't because they are "adopted" and if you would get rid of dogs, horrors that you would consider getting rid of your children.

I had to have my long time dog Buster put to sleep the day before Thanksgiving a year ago. Then when Lisa came for Thanksgiving and shopping the day after, we made the mistake of stopping at the SPCA adoption center in the mall.

There are display on a leash in the mall was Ollie.

Now Ollie is a cute dog. Looks like a white mixed terrier with a black head and black saddle or skirt, whatever you call it. He has a pleasant face and is a good dog. But hidden inside the display was Nina. Nina is much smaller and seems to either have problems with PMS or menopause. Thankfully with meds she is much calmer now.

But neither dog will be in the Westminster Kennel Show or any competitions for skill.

So here are the dogs on the deck that requires several steps to get down and they look over the side, glance at the steps, and then just dive off the deck sailing toward a notorious squirrel who has the nerve to cross into their territory.

After a while they are ready to come back in.

Ollie and Nina run under the deck looking for the concrete stairs. They both run back out again perplexed that the stairs no longer go to the door.

We call to them from the top of the steps.

They run back under the deck.

We call them.

They run out from under the deck and circle the new stairs.

They go back toward the tree, get a running start and run directly under the deck, like a little extra steam will get them up those concrete stairs to us.

They come back from under the deck.

Finally Annabel and Grace get on the stairs and call to them.

Meanwhile Ollie is at one end of the deck jumping up as high as he can trying to figure out how to get back up to us.

Nina is back under the deck.

Finally Ollie gets it and runs to the stairs. Slowly he begins to climb and finally is back on top. Nina is making bigger circles under the stairs waiting for the magic door to open.

We have to pick her up and carry her up the stairs.

This has happened almost every time they have gone out. It is so funny and they are so upset and cannot believe that we are in a different dimension than them.

We love practicing our twirling around on the new deck. It is so much fun and we cannot wait to take fun advantage of it. I promise to add pictures soon.

No idea!

2009-02-04T19:28:00.003-06:00

When you come home from work and you are not feeling well, but know you left your kitchen in a mess, but don't really feel like cleaning it up, and then you walk in and find your kitchen all clean and the dishes in the dishwasher clean, you just have to say, "Thank you Mom!!!".

Wow! What a great surprise! Something like this is the best gift of all!!

I also found a strange car (actually a truck) in my driveway, but soon realized that my longed for deck was being built!

Since our house used to be a duplex, there were just two small sets of concrete stairs outside of the back doors. And for so many nights, I have wished there was a place to sit down and just think, take a breath, look at the stars, listen to the neighbor's fiesta, etc., but now I will soon have that place! Yippee!!

Last night Annabel was pretty bummed out because she had homework.

I asked what was the assignment.

"No idea!"

I had not realized how often I said that phrase until it is now repeated on a regular basis back to me. And it doesn't matter how many different ways you phrase your question, you are going to get the same answer, so we head into homework that she does not have any idea how to do or what to do, but knows it is math.

So I look to Grace for help.

Grace rattles off something about weight and length, but she can't remember what the third thing is. I'm not even sure I know what the first two things are. So I ask again and ask to see where they wrote down their assignment. Oh no need, since it was memorized!!

Right.

Something about household items, volume, capacity, and measurements.

So is the homework about measuring things?

Not really.

I decided I owe Mom and Dad a lot more for all the times they have helped with homework.

With a few more "no ideas" the assignment was completed.

I have "no idea" what kind of grade she will get though!

All I can do is worry about how things will be next year.

Lunch with Annabel

2009-02-03T08:04:00.003-06:00

For a while Annabel was buying her lunch.

But whenever there is something good for dinner, the first question from Annabel is whether she can take some in her lunch.

Last night Mom made her trademark goulash.

Oh boy, Annabel wanted to know if she could take some in her lunch.

Now Mom and I know that she does not have access to a microwave, so the thought of room temperature goulash does not sound good to us, but of course Grandmom agreed.

So we went through all of our butter tubs and assorted plastic containers looking for just the right size to hold a lunch size portion of goulash.

But Annabel decided she also wanted to take the left over cabbage.

So this is what Annabel packed for lunch today:

1. Plastic container of goulash, heated in the microwave this morning, but expected to be cold again by lunch.
2. Plastic container of cabbage, again heated in the microwave, but expected to be cold, but definitely has the smell of cooked cabbage!
3. A baggie of hot Cheetos.
4. A candy cane.
5. The last few pieces of gummy strawberry candy from the Chinese store.

Well a lunch as good as that draws some attention, so Grace convinces her to pack some goodies for her too. So Grace added in:
1. One baggie of hot Cheetos.
2. A serving of seaweed.

Blech!!!

It was all so good that it would no longer fit in her cute little purse that my friend Lori gave her. Now it is in a large, economy plastic Wal Mart bag.

As time goes by....

2009-02-02T21:15:00.005-06:00

Today my brother in law's father passed away.

His mom died less than a year ago.

Both were hard working people. His father, once he left the corporate world, moved to the Hill Country and ran a produce stand. Seems like a nice life to me.

But in the end cancer took him and way too soon.

Last Monday was the funeral of a woman that I have known for the majority of my life. She and her sisters gave Mom a shower before Jana was born. That was a long time ago. After her husband died she found a new life in hobbies and friends and getting out and going. She came to our bingo game every Monday. She lived life to the fullest up to the last minute. It was hard to see that empty seat today at bingo.

Our bingo caller has been out for almost a month. She has been very ill. She had cancer in 1956 that no one thought she could recover from, but she had young children and knew she had to. She is one of the hardest working people I know.

One of our strong supporters had very serious surgery today. While he recuperates though, it leaves his wife with no one to help her get in and out of her wheelchair.

Yesterday was my 10 year anniversary at my job. That's the longest I have ever worked in one job for the same company. Some days are harder than others. Some days it is really difficult to leave the worries and concerns for those I work with and for at the job. As time passes more of the people I have met are gone, or their bodies give up, or even worse, their minds do.

But then I come home.

Tonight I had my Tigger and Pooh, my yin and my yang, around the dining room table working on a book for school. They were laughing and talking and working together to achieve their goal.

With them I have a future.

Mom and I were discussing how different my life would have been if I had married either of the last two men I dated. Each had children from relationships that happened long before I knew them, yet I know that my future would have been dictated by those children and their mothers if I had married either.

Wow! when those relationships ended I certainly didn't think it would be good without them, but instead, it has been better!

Monday mornings

2009-02-02T07:52:00.003-06:00

Some mornings by the time the girls walk out the door, I am exhausted.

I wake up with Grace sitting on my bed, talking to me. It's almost like she is mid sentence and I finally realize that she is talking and then she asks me what I think. Huh? I'm sorry, I didn't understand, could you say it again?

In the background Annabel is singing a song, probably one she does not know the words to so is just making sounds, kind of like meow, meow, meow.

Since we only have one can of soup and I had some bacon leftover, I thought I would make rice with bacon and vegetables.

Everyone sits poised at the table in eager anticipation for the rice cooker to switch to done, ready, even though it takes at least 20 minutes to cook. The entire time Annabel is still singing her song, only louder and throwing a few questions to me in between, Grace is coughing, sneezing, and blowing her nose, and I am trying to remember if that was 3 or 4 scoops of coffee.

Annabel announces that she will only eat a little of the rice since she is sure she does not like it and then quickly refills her bowl for seconds, maybe thirds if she had enough time in between singing and asking questions.

Grace just looks at me with a pained expression so I can fully understand how badly she is feeling.

Then when it is time to go, Annabel races to the door, singing, dancing, and waving good bye.

I stand there telling Grace to "HURRY!" because Poppa is waiting to take them.

"Hurry" must not translate even after 4 years of knowing English, because it is still a foreign concept to Grace. She slowly and methodically pulls on her jacket, ensuring that the sleeves are the exact length on each arm, adjusting her hair, and then pulling on her coat and going through the same process again.

In the meantime, in the car is Annabel and Poppa. By now I am sure that Dad's ears are pounding with the singing and questions and he is knowing they are going to be late, when Grace finally saunters out, after stopping to kiss me good bye.

Whew!

You little sunburn! and pillows

2009-02-01T17:28:00.003-06:00

While growing up, I always volunteered to help or teach Vacation Bible School. We had begun driving big school buses through the neighborhood and would pick up all the kids who wanted to go.

One summer I had a large class of rowdies, maybe 2nd graders? Anyway, one day a little girl was sobbing her heart out. Still being in my teens it was great that I knew EVERYTHING! So I was going to resolve this issue.

I put my arm around her and asked her what was wrong. She told me the little boy at her table had called her "a little sunburn".

I have no idea how I kept from laughing, especially since this child had probably never had a sunburn, but it has stuck with me how delicate a child's ego can be when denounced by another. It's also a trademark expression that Lisa and I still exchange showing contempt for someone, "You little Sunburn!!!".

Last night after getting everyone settled into bed, or so I thought, Grace came to tell me that Annabel was crying under her covers.

Earlier in the day I told her about the report I had received regarding her development before adopting her and how accurate the information had been. It reported that she liked to play outside, liked small animals, and not too fond of school. She wanted to see the report, so I had shown her.

I am never sure how protective to be of my daughters and their past, not to ignore their beginnings, but not to focus on it either. I know it brings up lots of memories that sometimes can result in tears late at night when it is quiet and they start thinking about things.

But I was wrong this time. It was FAR worse!!

I was afraid she was missing China, but instead, she and Grace had discussed the fact that Grace had 3 pillows and Annabel only had 2. Grace's response had been that she was lucky, according to Annabel, which of course implies that Annabel is not. Luck must be an important quality in China.

So now it was a BIG deal that she was still short a pillow.

I love it when I can solve something easily.

Of course she could have another pillow. I told her she could have one from my bed.

It meant a lot to me that she chose my pillow and then dumped the others on the floor. I guess just having it is the important point.

But when you are this upset it sometimes takes even more. I volunteered to sleep with her but she said I was too big. Maybe she needs the Dale Carnegie course on how to win friends and influence people.

Annabel announced that she wanted Grace to sleep with her.

Grace looked at me pleading, but I felt it was important that Annabel wanted her and it seemed the perfect payback since I had spent a LOT of nights recently in Grace's bed.

Somehow in swapping beds it was decided I should sleep in Grace's.

But first, there was a need for a story, a first time request from Annabel.

So we each climbed into our newly assigned beds and I told a story that ended with the 2 little girls needing to go to sleep! I finally got permission to leave, but Grace told me she stuck it out until 3:00 a.m.

Today has been quiet except for the bursts of coughing and sneezing from Grace. We stayed home and Annabel went with her grandparents to church. I think we have had almost 12 hours straight of Disney TV and I might be close to insanity.

I have to be at work tomorrow, so I hope it has paid off staying in and being quiet all weekend.

My guilty pleasure and Confucius, two completely unrelated topics

2009-01-31T14:46:00.005-06:00

100 years ago I had a car accident, where the truck ran a stop sign and I swerved to avoid being crushed underneath him, only to find myself sailing through the air, Dukes of Hazzard style, and landing in a field. I was carried out on a board and ever since have had issues with my back, especially with small repetitive movements.

This is my excuse as to why housework is difficult for me.

It's as good a reason as any not to want to clean house, I think.

So my guilty pleasure for the last few months has been to have a cleaning crew come once a month to clean house.

It is the one time during the entire month that every floor is clean, every mirror is polished, every sink is hygienic with no trace of toothpaste, and the beds are all made.

This lasts approximately, well, that depends, on how quickly the girls get in and the dogs make a mess. So for this brief moment, I am in my CLEAN house enjoying the smell of clean, I've locked the dogs in the backyard and Annabel and Grace are at their grandparents.

Ahhh!!!

In my previous life I would have spent this money on maybe a facial, or a pedicure, or maybe even a massage! Now I am so thrilled to have a clean house I've decided it can be my one and only vice, or excess, or guilty pleasure.

My time in this nirvana is almost over.

The dogs are barking madly and Annabel and her Poppa are outside the door!

Oh well, back to reality.

The deadline for getting the paperwork into the new school, North Hills is February 1.

I gathered all of our paperwork and took it to the school, fearing our postal system would let me down. I was sure I would be greeted with a warm welcome and congratulations on beating the deadline. Instead the secretary told me she would put it in the person's mail box, thanks.

Maybe it was her off day or everyone had bugged her with these applications. I hope!!

If I believed in Confucius, then I would be sure the "gods" were angry with me and showing their superiority to me, as I bragged one too many times about all of us staying well. The girls got out early yesterday or I am sure I would have gotten a call from the school to pick up Grace. She has her usual sinus infection that quickly goes into her chest and gets worse. She has enjoyed laying on her grandparents couch watching a record number of TV shows, falling into slumber from the high dosage of benadryl to help dry up the yuck.

This has left Annabel with nothing to do and very bored.

Yesterday afternoon I took Annabel to the grocery store. I guess it was the first time that we had done this together. I realize that Grace has to be the one to carry the conversation or just that go-between as Annabel and I continue to work our way into a relationship. I have realized a change where she is no longer a "guest" but becoming part of the family, carving her own little niche. I would never have thought it was possible to adopt a child from China who could be so much like my dad, but Annabel is very similar, in taste, personality, behavior. It is amazing.

Annabel and I had a good time at the store though and she enjoyed being the center of my attention. I know you are supposed to set aside time with each child to give them your attention and I have great intentions of doing that, but so far it rarely happens.

Annabel is still small enough that she grabbed the front of the cart and I whizzed her through the store, only to be stopped every few feet by either a crowd (what was that all about?) or someone we knew. Yet we successfully purchased our short list and came home to find that Grace had slept the whole time we were gone. Of course then she could not sleep last night and as I dozed off could hear her up in their room. My body just had to give up last night and I was out before the girls for once.

On Thursday at piano, I apologized tot he teacher that Grace had not practiced. It had been a crazy week, especially for me, as last Friday our office and everything else in the lobby of the hospital was under water. Then on Wednesday to have a snow day really threw off our routine.

But Grace sat down and played beautifully as if she had spent hours each day laboring on the keys to achieve perfection. She really seems to have an ability and I hope she will continue to develop it.

I continue to fight off a sinus infection knowing I have a Z pack of antibiotics ready for when I can no longer fight the infection. But while I have a chance to let my body heal itself, I think I should.

You have to love Texas weather, when you have ice and snow on Tuesday through Thursday and then on Saturday, it is 68 and sunny!

No School!

2009-01-28T22:47:00.003-06:00

When I got our gas bill last month I was shocked at the price and decided that I needed to adjust the thermostat down at night and keep it lower while we weren't here. Plus Annabel has been complaining about being hot at night. Probably I should have done it after this ice storm, but at 6:00 a.m. this house was cold!! But I got up and as soon as I turned on the TV the announcement that DISD had cancelled class was made.

It has to be pretty bad for DISD to close school, but all the other districts throughout north Texas had closed too. I read where the President was surprised that the Washington DC schools had closed. Obviously he has never been in Texas during an ice storm. If we don't close down, then the number of wrecks, and injuries is so high that it's not worth it!

But Grace and Annabel were not so sure that I was telling them straight.

I'm not sure how many times they asked me if everyone was out of school or just them. I wonder if they had snow days in China? Last year at this time most of China was hit hard with one of the worst snow storms in history. There were areas that were cut off from power and supplies and the need for support was huge. Yet Annabel thinks that it is colder here.

Tonight I was going through all my records on the adoptions trying to find what I need for registration for the new school. I had forgotten about some of the pictures I had received of Grace. Every picture of these little tiny kids show them so bundled up that their arms are sticking straight out.

I think I know why Annabel has been hot at night, she probably has 3 layers of clothes on! It certainly makes for a lot of laundry too. But this is what she is used to and actually how it is suggested that you dress. For me, I am just ready to hang up the coat and wait for summer!

I know I had some great plans for us to do if we had an ice/snow day, but instead I tried to fight off a cold? sinus infection? bronchitis? and slept most of the day while the girls watched TV non stop. Annabel got to see 2 of Grace's all time favorites, Lion King and Lion King 2. When we first got home Grace would watch Lion King up to 3 times in one day if I let her. She always had lots of questions to ask and now Annabel started the questions. Her big question was why did the little lion roar so softly an the big lion roar so loudly.

After a long quiet sedentary day, I knew that we needed to get out and move around. Since it was still so cold outside, I tried to think of a good indoor playground, so we went to McDonald's for dinner. I knew they had finally done enough when Annabel came over and told me her foot was tired. Not feet, but foot.

Annabel is still having problems with her pronouns and as she told me a story about her teacher, he switched from him to her to he and she. You really have to pay attention and make sure new characters were not thrown in.

A cold, blustery, icey winter night

2009-01-27T20:33:00.003-06:00

Mom and Dad had us over for dinner and we were back home with plenty of time and no kitchen to clean so I have a few minutes to catch up. We are waiting to see the extent of the STORM that is coming through and if there will be as much ice as they say. If we lose power I am claiming the two dogs to keep me warm! Actually if all 3 of us got into one bed we could stay plenty warm since both dogs would jump in too.

The girls got their report cards today.

Each six weeks I look at the grades and think "what did I miss?" Somehow they are significantly as much lower in one class as they are higher in another. I don't understand. I am not sure if there was one major assignment that did not go right or a lack of understanding of basic concepts or what?

Annabel came home with a 73 in PE. A 73? Now how did she do that and why wasn't I notified? Her simple explanation? "You mean gym? I not like that."

There you go! They are playing volleyball and she would prefer basketball. She has been talking about volleyball the last few days. She said she likes it OK until the ball comes to her. Now I don't blame her for that. I tried to explain the importance of team work, but that lesson seemed lost. Getting good grades wasn't much of a motivator either.

I offered to hire a tutor to help her with English. She wanted to know what I meant. To help her learn English. No thanks, her teacher was teaching her enough. I suggested a tutor could help her learn to read English. NO. Not interested in that at all.

Well the precipitation continues to fall but the school district will probably wait until the morning to make a decision, although all the others have. Oh well!

I found the list below on the internet tonight and thought others in the Dallas area might benefit. I hope we can go out to all of these!

AllGood Café
2934 Main St, Dallas
Tuesday: Buy one get one free entrees

Black Eyed Pea
Kids eat free Tuesday nights.

Breadwinners
3301 McKinney Ave. - Dallas
5560 W. Lovers Lane - Inwood Village
4021 Preston Rd., # 611 – Plano
Tuesday: 50% off appetizers
Wednesday: 50% off wine
Thursday: 50% off martinis
Sunday: FREE dessert

ButcherShop Steakhouse
808 Munger Ave, Dallas
Friday Lunch: $7.00 Sandwich Bar

Carino's Italian
Monday Night: Family-size entrée for the price of a single portion.
Wednesday: Half price bottles of wine.

Chick-Fil-A
Tuesday (6-8 pm): Free kids meal w/purchase of combo meal.

Chuy's
Happy Hour: FREE fully loaded 'Nacho Car' & $3.50 margaritas

Colter's BBQ
3904 W. Camp Wisdom Rd, Duncanville
Monday: 2 Can Dine for $13.99
Tuesday: All You Can Eat Ribs $11.99
Wednesday: Kids under 12 eat free w/adult purchase
Thursday: Famous Rib Plate $2.00 off
Friday: All You Can Eat Catfish $8.99
Sunday: 10% off entire purchase with proof of Church Bulletin

Cru Wine Bar
3699 Mckinney Ave., Dallas
50% off champagne on Thursdays

Deep Sushi:
2624 Elm St, Dallas
Lunch special: 2 for one sushi, Monday through Friday.
Happy hour 5-7pm Mon-Fri: 1/2 price drink and 2 for 1 sushi

Denny's
Tuesdays: Kids eat free 4pm-10pm

Dickey's BBQ
Tuesdays: Kids under 12 eat free w/purchase of adult entree.

Dream Café
2800 Routh St, Dallas
Mon-Sun 5pm-Close
3 course meal (soup or salad, choice of 4 entrees and dessert) $12.50.
Tues-Sat 8-9p: Half price wine and cocktails.

Eatzi's
3403 Oak Lawn Ave.
Buy one get one free entrees, bakery items and select items in the chef's case, every night after 9pm

El Chico
Thursday nights: $0.99 kids meal w/purchase of adult meal.

El Fenix
Wednesday: Enchilada special $4.99.

Golden Corral
Tuesday night: Kids eat free.

Humperdink's
1601 North Central Expressway, Richardson
Sat. and Sun.: Kids 12 and under are half price

Kathleen's Sky Diner
4424 Lovers Ln, Dallas
Sunday 5-10pm: Entrees are 1/2 price

Luby's
Kids eat for $2 on Wednesdays.

Monica's Aca Y Alla
2914 Main St, Dallas
Tuesday nights: 1/2 price nachos, burritos, tacos, enchiladas

Patrizio (FLower Mound, Cedar Hill, Plano)
Sunday-Thursday, 11am-10pm: Kids eat free.

RJ Mexican Cuisine
1702 N. Market Street, Dallas
Lunch Deals
Tuesday: Beef or chicken enchiladas $6.99.
Wednesday: Chicken, beef, or fish taco's $6.99.
Thursday: Seafood enchiladas $6.99.
Friday: Beef or chicken fajita's $7.99.
M-F Happy Hour, 11am-7pm $4.00 Margarita's.

The Rose Tattoo Grille & Wine
3610 Shire Blvd., Richardson
Monday: Half price on all bottled wine.

Scampi's Cafe
1057 W. Magnolia Ave., Fort Worth
Wednesday night: Kids 10 & under eat free.
Thursday: 6:30-8:30pm free wine.BYO beer and wine with $5 cork fee everyday.

Souper Salad
Kids 5-12 years old eat for $2.49 (drink not included).

Spaghetti Warehouse
Monday nights: $0.99 kids meal w/purchase of adult meal.

Steak & Ale
Wednesday: Kids eat free.

Steel
3102 Oak Lawn Ave # 100, Dallas
Sunday 5:30-10: 1/2 off bottles of wine. Complimentary sushi, special on appetizers and cocktails. $4 import beers and $3 domestic. (2 drink minimum for free sushi)

Texas de Brazil
2727 Cedar Springs Road, Dallas
Everyday: Kids under 6 eat free (ages 7-12 are 1/2 price)

Texas Land and Cattle
Saturday, 11am-4pm: Kids eat free.

Texas Roadhouse
Early Bird Special, before 6pm: Two meals for $14.99.

Trece
4513 Travis St, Dallas
Family day on Sundays (3 course dinner menu for only $15.95, and kids eat FREE!)

Hair when you are a tween

2009-01-27T20:18:00.003-06:00

This weekend, while getting ready to go to the Chinese New Year's dinner, Grace decided she wanted to do something with her hair. So while I was getting ready she got out my curling iron, which has a short in it and turns itself off all the time.

I checked on her and suggested she get the flat iron, maybe it would do what she needed.

I checked on her again and realized she was trying to make ringlets around her face. I got out the smaller curling iron.

After at least 30 minutes trying to get her completely straight hair into a curl I finally brought out the big guns! My hot rollers! The only trouble with those is I have lost most of the clips and by then Annabel decided she wanted to get in on the action.

So at the last minute I am trying to get enough hot rollers in both girls to be satisfied with the results and at 10 and 11 running out the door with rollers in their hair with a bag to put them in! I felt like I was having flashbacks to my own younger years. But I don't think I started that until junior high or high school.

On Sunday we started the process again and even though we had been up for hours almost were late to church trying to get the perfect 'do!

Monday morning Grace came into breakfast with her hair pulled back and the front part slicked down. She asked what I thought and said she had used the hairspray and hoped that it was ok. Sure, no problem. Thankfully before she left she changed it one more time.

I keep knowing I am having a glimpse of the future.

Wàn Suì (long life) and the blurring of memories

2009-01-26T22:13:00.004-06:00

Happy New Year! The Year of the Ox - Annabel's year!

Yesterday we went to Denton to visit the Chinese church again. It seemed appropriate in light of today being Chinese New Year's and knew that Annabel would enjoy it.

Grace asked me tonight if I ever got embarrassed any more. I told her rarely because if I was brave enough to stand up in a church full of people all speaking a different language and introduce myself, I decided little can ruffle me any more!

The girls' music teacher and her husband were in charge of the music and I enjoyed singing so many songs I have always known in English, with everyone else around me singing in Chinese. It was wonderful to see how God transcends all languages and there is no barrier in expressing your love to God.

The whole service was in Chinese except the preacher would switch from Chinese to English at times. He was comparing the difference in perversity and pervasiveness of sins. Very interesting.

They have lunch together afterward and I think this is my girls' favorite part! It is their one opportunity to have home made Chinese food and sit and visit with a wide variety of ages of people from China.

The music teacher's parents were visiting from Hong Kong and while her mother did not speak English, her father did and very well. I enjoyed visiting with her father and husband and they were very curious about Grace and Annabel's history and adoption. At the same time our conversation was taking place, a woman from the church came to meet the music teacher's mom. Everyone had mentioned that they looked similar and that had been my first impression as well. Her mother had "lost" her younger sister. I've read so many stories about life in China through the 40's - 60's and know that life was so hard that it was not unusual to "lose" a family member due to poverty, relocation, family issues, and deaths. I compared that to what might have happened to Annabel and Grace's birth parents and honestly explained that we would probably never know the circumstances surrounding their births and the decision to place their daughters available for adoption.

On our way home we stopped at an Asian market. They had the most fabulous produce section with so many fruits and vegetables that I have never seen! I've been to lots of Asian markets, but this surpassed anything I had ever seen. Annabel insisted that she had eaten a LOT of the things when she was in China.

We had invited Marcie and Drew for dinner for Chinese New Year's. Since not everyone likes Chinese food and the important dish is noodles to indicate long life, we had spaghetti!

We were running late from spending too much time at the market and company was coming soon, but I had also committed to opening my office space for a meeting with the community gardening group.

I ran out of here and locked the girls in with instructions on making the salad and dessert. But when I returned, they had made not only the salad and dessert, but also the pasta, set the table, and were reading for the next step!

We had a good time at dinner and I was so proud of what the girls had done.

One of the things that seems to be happening to Annabel is blurring the memories of what happened in China and what has happened here. I don't know whether to correct her or not. She told us about the time her foster mother said, "Annabel", which caused Grace to promptly remind her that her foster mother would not have called her Annabel. That stumped her. But then yesterday she told us about taking a shower in China and I know that was probably not very likely. She has told us other stories and placed them in China, but I know they happened here. I feel like she is trying her best to hold onto her previous life and I don't want her to lose it, I want it to be a melding of both, but I also understand how delicate her ego is right now too. I guess I will wait a while longer before having the whole "confrontation" on the truth.

Chinese dresses, Chinese New Year's, and bullies

2009-01-24T22:16:00.001-06:00

Chinese Dresses

Back when I adopted Grace, buying Chinese dresses for her was a HUGE priority for me before we left China.

I had this dream of surprising her each year with one more beautiful dress that she would ooh and aah over and would insist on getting her picture made in. Probably use them as gifts for Chinese New Year's or for class pictures.

So after a very full day, Jana and I and the girls made our way to one of the favorites for Chinese souvenirs, Jennifer's. This store is what you imagine a store in China to be, packed from floor to ceiling, with very narrow aisles. It had to be 102 degrees in there and the brightest light was about a 20 watt bulb.

I was sweating to death and still had very little experience being a mom, much less buying clothes for my little dumpling. So I dug through stacks of these beautiful dresses, holding up colors and trying to ask Grace if she liked it. Her attention span was about as long as a gnat's and I am trying to get her to choose colors and styles of dresses that she will want up until she is 18 years old!

So I have more than enough help from the store personnel, who spoke limited English, and trying to pick these dresses, and when I got home and started looking through what I had bought, I realize that I have several in some sizes, and nothing in others!

Then Grace outgrew all the dresses I bought within the first 2 years and showed little interest in any of them! She maybe wore two of them, maybe....

Chinese New Year's

Last year on Chinese New Year's when Grace came home, I asked how she liked my hair cut.

"Mom! you are not supposed to get your hair cut on Chinese New Year's! It is very bad luck!!! At least you did not sweep the house!"

Oh my! Of course I just had swept. I had swept the whole house to get rid of the mud the dogs had tracked in!

Whether I had a year of bad luck might be questionable. Some of the best things in my life had happened this year, but every time something bad happened, Grace chalked it up to my year of bad luck!

This year I am determined not to make the same mistakes, so i got my hair cut Tuesday and today cleaned house, since Chinese New Year's is Monday!

Tonight we went to Grapevine for a Families with Children from China Chinese New Year's dinner.

But before we could go selecting just the exact right thing to wear gave me a glimpse of the future of having 2 teenagers.

Annabel decided she would LOVE to wear a Chinese dress and so Grace decided she also wanted to wear one.

I began looking for all these dresses and then trying to find the right size for Annabel. She decided to try on every single one of these dresses and there are a lot. She finally chose one and we started on Grace. The chance that one would fit, since she really outgrew them two years ago! She found a top to wear with jeans and I thought we were on our way. But there was a need to do hair too. So everyone got some curl in their hair, even though it fell out before we got to the car.

We had a great time and it was wonderful to see so many happy families as a result of their adoption.

I should have learned the last time when we were faced with a raffle not to buy tickets again! Annabel feels that winning shows that you are lucky, which is very important! Thank goodness on the very last item she won! That cute little bear only cost $21!!

Tomorrow we are going to Denton to visit the Denton Chinese Church. When Annabel was feeling low this week I suggested we go. She has been so excited all week and prayed for their church every day. Her teacher gave her instructions on what time we should leave and what they should wear. Thanks!

Bullies

One day this week Grace greeted me with the news that her friend said two girls in 4th grade were saying bad things about Annabel. Annabel immediately asked me what Grace said. I glared at Grace and made up something about what she might have said.

Later I talked to Grace about our previous conversation. I asked her what benefit would it be to repeat something bad about anyone. I also questioned a "friend" repeating something bad about your sister to you. We talked about this and looked at it a lot of different ways. I explained that if anyone else was talking bad about either of them that I did not mind coming up to the school and laying a bunch of whup *ss on them!!! It burns me up for anyone to pick on my girls and then for "friends" to share this info makes me even madder. I know I can't fight all of their battles so I have to make sure they are prepared to handle them on their own. Probably offering a bunch of whup *ss wasn't the best though!

Mom, can we talk?

2009-01-20T21:35:00.003-06:00

Last night, Grace urged Annabel to come and talk to me.

While they had been playing, Annabel had opened up about some things that were bothering her.

She had lots of questions about the how and why of our family, maybe a clearer definition of each other's roles? She also knew and could recall each and every time I knew I would be losing "Mother of the Year" due to my ineffective parenting skills!

She began to open up about life in China. Sometimes it went so quick it was difficult to keep up with who she was talking about, but I think I understand.

And after 24 hours of thinking about it, I realize she was wanting to know why I did not act like her "moms" in China, although she had seen that I could.

Family life here does not consist of her being spanked or slapped daily, being required to take care of the younger children, older adults, etc. Here she does not have to wash her own clothes, cook her own food, go to school, and have tons of homework. She admitted that she rebelled against doing so much homework after cooking, cleaning, and caring for all the younger children. And the amount of homework was "huge". And if she did ANYTHING wrong she was hit.

She told me that when she moved to the "hospital" (which is the same thing that Grace always called the orphanage) that she refused to call her foster mother "mom".

I sat and listened quietly, asking a few questions to ensure that I understood. I tried to explain some of my actions and apologized for my failures. I told her I knew that I was not perfect and that I tried hard each day, but some days just did not turn out like I planned.

We also talked about how much we all had grown to know and understand each other, much more than we did in August.

I told her that it had been difficult at first but was so much better now.

Last night I thought about all the times that I had failed because she could remember each one, but I know that the reason she could remember each is because there have not been that many. That actually life here was SO different that instead of pointing a finger at me for my wrongdoing, I think she wanted assurance that it would be this way.

Our prayer together last night included each of us asking God to help us and to help me be a better mom each day and for us to be more aware of each other's feelings. And that my hair cut mmake my hair longer.

She let me kiss her good night. And again tonight.

What a beautiful day!

2009-01-19T20:59:00.003-06:00

Today was fantastic! I actually got to take a whole day off and did not check my email or voice mail (until now :)).

But I feel like I need to start with Sunday first.

When we were in China and would go out to a nicer restaurant, Annabel jumped up and down and wandered all through the restaurant during the meal. The guide would laugh and say what a great spirit she had or how bright she was. To me it was just reinforcing bad behavior.

When we got home, this continued for a while, especially eating out and at Mom and Dad's house.

Yesterday we had lunch at Mom and Dad's with some long time friends. One was a man I have known the majority of my life, who is now 96 and can still out work me on any project. The other is our missionary/friend who is in Iowa.

Annabel and Grace sat so quietly during the entire meal, eating their food quietly, and asking and answering in quiet tones. I was so impressed! They were perfect dolls. They whispered and asked if they could be excused to go play. I didn't blame them.

But I really enjoyed talking to our friend from Iowa about the weather there. He said they had snow drifts that were as high as their car hood. He told stories about getting stuck in snow drifts and basically disappearing and how important it was for each to watch out for the other. It made me shudder to think about. He explained that it was law to clear your sidewalks and driveways. He had lots of stories about someone going to rescue someone and them getting stuck. School is rarely called off because the kids would just be playing in the snow if there wasn't school! I'm sure the kids see advantages to that.

We ended the day working and playing outside. It was such an incredible day here you almost feel guilty for those in places like Iowa.

Today was great!

The priority for the day was to take Annabel to see our minister in the hospital.

But first Grace decided to cook breakfast. I am very impressed with her hard work and diligence to get a variety of things prepared. Annabel thought she might starve to death in the meantime and told everyone that it took Grace a "huge" time to cook.

But Grace had soup and bacon for them with hot chocolate and for me a bagel and coffee. Wow! I felt like I truly was having a vacation day. I can't believe she cooked bacon all on her one. She would not allow us into the kitchen until she was ready.

Then we had to get flowers to take to hospital. After a lot of discussion we made our purchase and headed to the hospital. At that point Annabel asked what the flowers were for. OK, is it just to keep me on my toes?

Once we found his room, Annabel basically parked herself. She had asked how long we would stay. I suggested 5 minutes. She wanted 20. I said maybe 10, so she bargained for 12.

We found him trying to eat lunch but seeing the girls meant much more than trying to eat while in a semi reclined position. He had three guest come in right after us and I suggested that we leave, but Annabel said no. Thankfully his wife came in and suggested we go see the display in the lobby.

The display is of bronze hands a famous people from around the world. It was very interesting to see the variation in those who do similar tasks. Van Cliburn's hands looked exactly how you would expect a pianist's hands to look, long and slender fingers. Roger Staubach's little finger had a big lump on one side where it had been broken. Your hands definitely show your age as we looked at some where the veins were so prominent and the hands looked so frail and delicate.

We had a quick lunch at the hospital and returned hoping to find some solutions to our storage crises. This house is great but I think our stuff is more than it can hold sometimes. It doesn't help that the closets are very small and I have one filled with treasures that I can't part with for now.

Instead the girls began playing and I made a quick trip to Home Depot. I have a beautiful sunroom that I wanted to make as my retreat. It has instead become the docking station for all bikes, skates, skateboards, and plasma cars. We have a garage and a shed, but both have dirt floors and doors that are very difficult to open. Anyway we are still working on a way to keep those bikes safe yet easily accessible so they will be ridden!

We are all off again tomorrow!

I have an appointment to get my hair cut but changing my mind! Annabel prayed that my hair cut would make my hair long. We'll see!

More on prayers

2009-01-17T23:00:00.002-06:00

I hope that all the "church" people did have a good day today!

Annabel keeps wanting to go to the hospital to visit our minister. He had back surgery and really has not been up for a lot of visitors, but each day Annabel asks Dad if he is going and can she go too.

Now when has this child actually ever visited a person in a hospital and has the ability to know and understand what it means? I don't think she has, so it is pretty funny. Today Grace wanted to know if his wife had seen his back and could tell how big the scar was. I'm so glad we have plenty to talk about.

Speaking of talking, we went to Costco today. Annabel went with Mom to get her glasses adjusted and Grace went with Dad to look at TVs. I made it through the grocery area all by myself.

We met back up in the snack area, one of Dad's favorite restaurants! Just kidding. But as soon as I was in sight, both girls had to start talking and telling me all that they had seen, the people, and the number of big TVs they had. Pretty much the conversation was non stop. I love that they missed me and filled me in on all I missed.

Our prayers again tonight included prayers for the church people, that Annabel might find her clock (watch), and she might have help cleaning house tomorrow. OK, sometimes it is really difficult to keep a straight face.

But it did remind me of when Grace first started praying.

It never seemed to fail that whatever she prayed for happened. A good friend's mother and father were going through a difficult time. One night Grace prayed that their furniture would be ok and that her father could get a job. She called the next day to say her dad got a job and there was something else about their house and furniture that did happen so we were convinced that Grace had a straight line up to heaven!

I have promised Annabel that we will go visit our minister Monday since we have the day off!

Annabel's prayer tonight

2009-01-16T21:12:00.003-06:00

After now I lay me down to sleep, she says quite loudly, just in case God is hard of hearing, I think:

And please help all the church people have a good day tomorrow.

And the man who gives us the quarters (Mom, what's his name? Wes) and please help him have a good night's sleep and be ok tomorrow and what else, Mom?
(That he gets well? His back feels better?)

Yea, and please help her have a good day tomorrow. (pronouns are still tricky)

And that all the people have good day.

For Annabel, like with Grace, learning that God does not require you to kowtow and beat your head on the ground to hear your prayers must be a huge relief. I love how they are eager to learn about God and the Bible. I know that Grace was taken to the Buddhist Pagoda and taught to burn incense, as she showed me how when we were there. I'm not sure about Annabel but will be glad when she can tell me more.

Not sure I know why I feel compelled to post this

2009-01-15T15:55:00.005-06:00

Parents Reject China Milk Settlement By ANDREW JACOBS

BEIJING ¡X A group of Chinese parents whose children were poisoned by tainted domestic dairy products said they would reject a government-sanctioned compensation package.

Instead, they said they would press for long-term health care for the victims and demand medical research into the illnesses that still afflict tens of thousands of children.

The parents, who have gathered 250 signatures since Sunday, have become an irksome challenge to officials seeking to quell public anger over the widespread contamination of the nation's dairy supply.

Nearly 300,000 children became sick and at least six infants died after consuming milk products laced with melamine, an industrial chemical often used in the manufacture of plastics and fertilizer.

Melamine, which causes kidney ailments, was added to watered-down milk in an effort to falsely indicate the presence of protein.

Zhao Lianhai, 37, the father of a 4-year-old boy made ill by the milk, said the $160 million compensation plan announced last month was inadequate and failed to address the medical needs of children whose health had been profoundly damaged.

"Our biggest demand is not the compensation, but medical treatment and academic research on the influence that melamine will have on the health of our children," Mr. Zhao, a former journalist, said in interview. "We want to know what kinds of lives our children will face."

The current offer, which is to be financed by 22 dairy companies, provides about $29,000 for each family that lost a child and about $4,400 for each child who suffered serious kidney damage.

The families of children with relatively minor health problems would receive about $290. That is about three months of the average worker's salary.

In recent months some of the parents have filed lawsuits against the companies, although the courts have refused to accept the cases.

On Jan. 1, five people, including Mr. Zhao, were detained by the authorities shortly before they were to hold a news conference in Beijing. They were held overnight and released.

Last week, the former chairwoman of Sanlu, one of the nation's largest milk producers, pleaded guilty to selling adulterated baby formula. The executive, Tian Wenhua, could be sentenced to life imprisonment or death.

In testimony late last month, Ms. Tian said the company knew about the contamination as early as last May, but had failed to notify the authorities.

Mr. Zhao said that the parents posted a version of their letter online on Saturday demanding greater compensation, but that it had been blocked by government censors. Among the parents' complaints, he said, is a rule that withholds compensation for children over 3 years old. He added that the package provided no assistance to the families that incurred tens of thousands of dollars in hospital bills.

He added that his own son still vomited, and that many parents were worried that unforeseen health care problems could emerge over time. "The compensation is really not the most important thing," he said. "Money won't help if our children are still sick 10 years later."

Huang Yuanxi contributed research.

Mash and a hug

2009-01-14T22:05:00.004-06:00

If you were wondering what Annabel learned at school yesterday she will be glad to tell you she played all day.

I asked this afternoon if she had played again today.

No, she had to do some mash (not sure if she was working in the cafeteria or doing math), then she watched somebody do something, then she watched somebody else doing something else, and then she did something.

The school is doing "benchmark" tests, which I think determines who needs additional assistance to pass the final TAKS tests later this year. But thankfully Annabel is exempt from taking these tests, so she has been doing other things.

She shocked me Monday afternoon when she came running from the house as I pulled into the driveway after work.

Her first question was if we were going to ride bikes. Sure, I had promised the day before.

When she received the answer she was hoping for, she grabbed me and hugged me around the waist. A FIRST!

She actually did it again tonight.

She still covers her head and refuses to let me kiss her good night, so I have just started hugging her through the comforter and kissing through it.

I meant to take time yesterday and jot down all of the questions that I was asked before they could leave for school. I know one thing that was bugging Grace was the meaning of "stale".

Since Annabel discovered donuts, I bought a dozen donuts to have this week. Yesterday Grace wanted to know if she could have a donut for breakfast. I told that I thought they were stale. So she wants to know what is stale. Before I can answer that question Annabel has a few questions and trying to come up with a definition for stale kept getting pushed back so the question kept coming. Sometimes by the time I get to work I am just tired!

We have a book club at work and for the month of January I suggested we read something by a Chinese author in honor of Chinese New Year's. The leader of the group suggested that we read Amy Tan's Joy Luck Club. I tried to find a different book because it has been difficult for me to read anything by Amy Tan as she was Jana's favorite author. But after trying a lot of other books, by a lot of other Chinese women, their stories were all so difficult and so sad, that I agreed to go with Joy Luck Club. Not that it is not sad and difficult! It tells the story of 4 Chinese mothers and their 4 daughters who were born in the US.

But it has made me really think about being the mother of Chinese daughters.

Every one of those mothers instilled ancient Chinese wisdom into their daughters. I feel like the only wisdom I have imparted is to wash your hands! Of course every one of the daughters rebels against what their mothers teach, which also worried me.

These women had long histories to share, recipes to teach, and a passion to drive their children to achieve their best. I don't know. I just worry that I can do the kind of job that a Chinese mother would. I know that they would insist that Annabel continue with Chinese school. I met a lot of mothers whose children were not only in Chinese school, but music lessons, math clubs, chess clubs, and that it was expected that they would participate and succeed in all. Somehow I think my daughters need a chance to play, to bond, to visit, ride bikes, and be kids. I think I am right, but it does worry me.

2009-01-12T10:25:00.001-06:00

http://crafts.kaboose.com/holidays/chinese_new_year.html

I haven't completely lost my mind, maybe

2009-01-11T21:56:00.003-06:00

I labeled the last entry as Basketbaaallll but forgot to explain why.

Our good friends gave Annabel an MP3 player before we even left for China. For some reason i thought this was a MUST have, probably because every little girl here has one, but wasn't important to Annabel until recently.

On it was a great mix of Disney favorites including several by Hannah Montana.

Just recently Annabel has taken an interest in these shows on Disney and recognizes the names and voices and UNDERSTANDS what they are saying.

For all the Hannah Montana fans, you know her theme song, "The Best of Both Worlds" but if you aren't sure of the words, then you put in words you do know which makes the song's words "Basketbaaaalllll!" at the top of your lungs since you have on headphones. It was quite entertaining.

We had a great time at our friends' house last night with a good dinner and great company.

They sent a bag of movies, books, cds, and another bag of clothes.

I think they hit the jackpot as two of the movies have already been watched, Annabel is sleeping in new warm pajamas, and Grace was reading one of the books.

It's great to have good friends who will share!!

We were late getting to our friends' house because of all the primping and fashion going on.

One of the main reasons I got nothing accomplished yesterday is because Grace and Annabel got into their room and started really playing. I just can never break that up. I was explaining to someone else today that Grace really did not know how to play. I think her foster mother must have used the TV as her only entertainment. She does well if someone else initiates the play but has trouble playing creatively on her own. So with Annabel the two come up with new games and pulling out toys that have sat for a while and don't realize how much bonding is going on.

When it was time for their shower, Grace announced that she had helped Annabel put together an outfit. I should have grabbed my camera as both had their hair up and "inspired" outfits. They repeated it for church today too. I had to brag on how great they looked after all the work that went into it!

Annabel and I talked at length about Chinese school.

She mentioned that they gave too much homework.

I refuted her point with the fact that she always got it completed on Sunday.

She went a little further and said sometimes she did not do too well on her homework. I would not know because I cannot help her out, but evidently her teacher did not mind pointing out her faults and she felt that he was "mad" at her, not mean, but mad.

At that point I knew what she meant. It seems there is a level of achievement that most Chinese families expect their children to reach and that is why they are so successful, because they work so hard. But, I am afraid, we don't quite push as much.

It has been difficult at times when we run into someone who speaks Chinese and they engage Annabel in a lengthy conversation. I don't know what is being said and only rarely does the adult translate for me. But the other day Annabel asked if I would not introduce her to people and tell them she can speak Chinese. She does not like these long conversations.

Back to my point, these people who pull her into these conversations as well as perhaps her teacher, set the standards that a typical Chinese family have for her as well. They have a tendency to chastise her and scold her about things, which if I could understand what they were saying, would never allow. I think they feel it is their obligation to impress on her their "standards".

And so she is tired of it.

I think part of what she is discovering about her new life is the ability to self monitor, that I trust her to make good choices, but will continue to provide guidance and direction when and where she needs it, but I want her to also get to be a child and enjoy this time of her life.

I explained part of that to her last night and we agreed that we would not pursue Chinese school for now. Maybe later when she is in 6th grade. Who knows, maybe never. I pushed Grace into going to Chinese school for 2 1/2 years and she hated every minute of it and in the end did not have much to help her in communicating in China.

Prayers tonight included asking God for a good week. My prayer too.

It's BASKETBAAAAAAALLLLLLLLLLLL!!!

2009-01-10T17:59:00.003-06:00

I feel like Suzie Homemaker with a peach cobbler in the oven, my order of organic fruits and vegs by me, and my two girls getting showered and ready.

I love a day like today even though I have not gotten my long list of things accomplished.

Last night Dad answered my call for a drill by doing the work rather than just loaning the equipment! I had bought a closet system to put in the girls' closet. It had been just this big square with no shelves or hanging rods. Now it has both and with Dad's help, it was a easy project. I know if I had done it I would still be on the first page of the directions.

We started going through the girls' clothes to find what needed to be hung up, folded, clean, dirty, too big, too small. Lots of stacks without finding an end in sight. Yes it was a priority to finish today but too many other things ended up being more fun, so it was pushed till tomorrow.

We picked up our first organic produce order this morning. A wonderful person on an email group offered her organic russet potatoes at Thanksgiving. I was lucky enough to get them. I had no idea how much the REAL taste of vegetables had been lost through the processing they now go through. These reminded me more of what we would "dig" from Grandmother Locke's garden.

So when the opportunity to join the organic coop came up, I jumped at it.

The girls grabbed the very heavy container to carry to the car. It is so nice to have help sometimes.

Now I have to make a brief aside.

This week, my co-worker Gloria bought donuts for the office. For some reason they were not all eaten and she sent them home.

I offered Annabel one and she said she did not like donuts. But without stopping for a breath, asked what donuts were. She tried a sugar covered one and found her new favorite food. She had a second on her walk to school and asked if she could have one when she came home.

This morning she had the last one with her "good morning soup" then asked why we no more donuts. Best guess is it is not something we normally buy, but since I knew we had errands to run promised one at the grocery store.

So the vegetable stop was tolerated with the anticipation of choosing her own donut.

I reminded her of the "cake" we had in China that was actually more like biscuits with chives and other assorted vegetables. Not sweet for sure.

We dropped off half of the produce order to our new sweet friend who sent her husband to repair my dishwasher a couple of months ago. She has the sweetest baby and the girls were very entertained with him and their two dogs.

All I really wanted to eat today were tater tots from Sonic. I could just taste them!

But I felt rather guilty having good fresh ingredients knowing the girls and I could benefit more from them, so I made a big pot of spicy chicken noodle soup. Annabel pronounced that she did not like it and then ate 3 bowls.

The rest of the day has been spent in the kitchen and cleaning and washing.

We are on our way to our friends' house for dinner.

Annabel has announced she does not want to return to Chinese school, so more later.

Update on Annabel's ears

2009-01-07T22:46:00.003-06:00

Today was our follow up with the otorhinolaryngologist who did the surgery repairing Annabel's ear drum. First was a hearing test which showed normal hearing in her ear!

Then the doctor said that everything had healed and looked good and we did not have to come back unless there was a problem!

Thank you LORD!!

I knew it was better because she speaks more in a conversational tone all the time. I am so thankful that this was easy to fix and brought back such an important thing as hearing.

While being at the doctor, she missed some classes.

A friend told her that she had to complete a worksheet from science.

The worksheet was on electromagnetic fields!

It seems like the one daughter who has a pretty firm grasp of English could explain it, but she wasn't even sure.

So this afternoon Dad tried to replicate the experiment on the worksheet to be able to answer the questions.

Annabel didn't bring it up to me until 8:50!! Right as I was trying to talk to mom.

So I had Mom's version, Annabel's version, Dad's version, and Grace's version.

Finally it was determined that her friend Carl (Coral) told her to do the worksheet.

Coral's word seemed to carry a lot of weight, but I think there was an error there somewhere.

I wrote the teacher a note and explained the situation. If she is supposed to do the assignment, then more later!

FOUND or abandoned

2009-01-06T08:00:00.001-06:00

This morning, without even thinking, I grabbed one of my calcium pills that had been laying on the table for several days and swallowed it.

Afterward I commented that I was reminding myself of Mom.

Annabel asked, "You mean Grammy? Or another mother? Do you have more than one mom?"

No, I only have one mom.

Annabel - "Then why do Grace and I have so many moms?"

OK, good question and a very difficult one to answer in a short amount of time while they were having their good morning soup. One that we will need to come back to, probably time and time again.

Last night Grace had a nightmare.

Against my better judgment I laid down with her for a little while in hopes that she would go back to sleep.

While we were laying there I thought about what a sweet little baby she is for me and my mind wandered back to China.

I thought about the many families who seek out the location of where they child was found, probably with less emphasis on where they were abandoned, but rather FOUND!

My thoughts continued to drift, as we had discussed going to see the pandas in China some day, and from there I wondered about trying to locate where my daughters had been FOUND.

But it was late and instead I began to think about where they had been abandoned.

There is a lot of difference in the idea of FOUND and abandoned, the difference of hope and future, of love and life. For abandoned it is all uncertainty. None of us know the circumstances that led the birth mothers of these two sweethearts to make such a difficult decision as to abandon their babies.

It gave me some comfort to know that Grace was found in May and Annabel in July, so hopefully the weather was warm.

I hope they were placed just before they knew someone would discover them.

Were they put there by a family member or the mother? Where was the father? Did the birth parents have a choice? Was this a child that they loved and cherished but could not care for? Was the mother too young? The father lost?

I think about a tiny baby and how vulnerable they are, how open to risks and dangers their little bodies must have been.

But God took care of these two darlings.

He watched when no one else could and saw that they were FOUND!!! not just abandoned. And while I did not know what my future would hold even 5 years ago, God was with me and perhaps nudged me or maybe just pushed me to be the mother who FOUND her daughters.

Annabel's really huge big story and an icey day

2009-01-05T20:52:00.004-06:00

Most schools started back today but not Dallas, so the girls had one more day off. The weather was really rotten today. I've decided I would like to be a meteorologist. I might have already said that. But you just kind of guess and then when it isn't right, everyone accepts it and you go on.

The forecast for today included rain and freezing rain, but no accumulation on trees and streets, so no concern about power outages, etc.

Well at work today the power went out and when you work in an office with no windows, it is REALLY dark. And if you work at a hospital any power outage seems LONG!

On the way home I was shocked to see the trees covered with ice! Many bent down with branches broken. It was nasty.

So the girls spent the day being rather lazy at Mom and Dad's. Bedtime was early in preparation of getting back to school tomorrow.

Before we went to China I paid to have a camera sent to her to take pictures. She finished up the camera after we arrived and it has been sitting around since we got home. I finally took it to Walgreens last week while they had $.10 per picture developing. In one of them, Annabel turned the camera on herself and snapped her picture. Of course it came out distorted and made her face appear "HUGE". She cannot seem to get over this and continues to talk about the picture of her HUGE head.

So last night while painting my nails, she grabbed the camera and made some pictures to show her "client" (me) other parts of her life that were HUGE!

Here is her HUGE face!

Here are her HUGE eyes and nose!

Here is her HUGE mouse (mouth)!

Here is her HUGE dog, Nina!

Here is her HUGE bread!

Here is her HUGE bowl!!

Here is her HUGE dog Ollie!

Annabel and her huge big head story

2009-01-05T20:51:00.002-06:00

Our stair step beautiful girls!

2009-01-05T20:48:00.001-06:00

They all looked so pretty I had to take 2! I wonder if they will stay stair steps??

I did not know I had that much STUFF on my porch!

OK, here is the whole gang! The snowman is my secret boyfriend. Just kidding!!!

Packing up the girls to meet their Daddy.

2009-01-05T20:45:00.001-06:00

I am so sad my GiGi is leaving!

OK, just a few more things to pack!

Who me? Imma Annabel!

Why is Grace crier? (crying)

Annabelism - words you learn from your daughter

2009-01-05T14:47:00.003-06:00

Annabel came into the bathroom this morning to get her boots. Don't know why my bath has to be the place to store boots, but whatever.

She showed me her socks and then said,

"Mom, these socks you franken them."

"Huh???"

"Mom, these socks you franken them to me."

"Those socks are scary? huge (word that is constantly used)? Frankenstein?"

"MOM, YOU FRANKEN them to me."

I explained that I was sorry but did not know what franken meant.

Annabel, "Franken? Mom, what you talkin' bout? I said your friend gave them to me."

I hate science fair projects!!!!

2009-01-04T23:27:00.003-06:00

Yesterday afternoon I seemed to run out of energy. My legs felt like lead weights that could not take another step. I finally gave up and slept in today.

The girls got up and got dressed for church. I should have supervised this more. The temperature had dropped about 40 degrees over night but they were dressed for the 80's like it had been on Saturday. At least they had their nice warm coats that Audrey gave them for Christmas.

When they got home from church, Mom sent over a bowl of chicken and dumplings. What a lifesaver! That is one dish I have never learned, but today didn't even feel like preparing toast, so I was very glad to get this delicious meal, especially coming from just next door!!

Grace came in to tell me she loved me and that her science fair project was due on Friday.

Oh my goodness.

We have known about this since the first of December.

I really wish my daughter was not so much like me!

They have been out of school for two weeks and today she remembered it was due Friday!

When I was in school, science fair projects done by me were minimal. I will never forget the time I completely forgot and at the last minute cut up food to test for what? I don't even remember, but I think you put iodine on it. We found a scrap of corrugated cardboard and I used toothpicks to attach the food and then covered with saran wrap. Completely professional! I think majoring in elementary ed for my bachelors was a great idea. The only science I had was science for Elementary teachers, so I never had to learn much more. I worked in the physics department at college but understood NOTHING!!!

When Grace was trying to pick a project I told her about a test I had done for speech, not science. I can't remember if we had to do an experiment or what the topic was for that speech, but Mark, my brother, and I each had a pepper plant at the time, that seemed to be affected by the type of music we both listened to. Mark listened to Black Sabbath and other rock groups of that era (my memory has failed me) and I listened to The Carpenters, etc.

Mark's plant was tall but had scrawny leaves. Mine had big full leaves. I used the two plants to prove the effect of different types of music on the plants.

So Grace decided this was perfect.

I guess I wasn't planning very well because I didn't think about the LACK of plants available in December/January.

It didn't matter, I had to get off my sick bed and we went to Lowes looking for plants that would grow in one week and recorded for the purpose of science.

There were very few plants, of course, mostly succulents. I have no success with this type of plant and know it is a slow growing species, so that would not do.

We met the sweetest lady who worked there and she took us from plant to plant and made suggestions. We settled on buying amaryllis bulbs, but there weren't enough left.

On top of this, Annabel was told she needed to do one. Oh my! It reminds me of Grace's first grade project and how we did it with her lack of English.

Annabel kept asking if I would buy her a plant and what was an experiment. We settled on calling it homework but she was sure she did not have any.

So in the middle of trying to determine a proper species I am also trying to explain the concept of a science fair project to Annabel. It does get confusing.

We settled on forcing hyacinth bulbs for Grace which would each be subjected to one hour of a different type of music. And for Annabel, three crocuses that would be forced in three different types of water.

Since I did not feel like cooking, we made our way to the Chinese buffet and each girl ate their weight in crawfish and octopus! YUCK!!!

When we got home I discovered a terrible mistake on my part. I left my bedroom door slightly ajar and our miscreant dogs had left their mark on my bed that they were not pleased with being left home alone!

We got all of the bottles labeled and the music playing for the plants. Annabel borrowed fertilizer from Dad for her experiment and Grace worked on the rest of her holiday homework. School for us doesn't begin again until Tuesday so she has another day to get it all done. I stripped my bed and cursed our dogs!!

While Grace worked on her homework, Annabel decided she would paint my nails. She asked if she could call me Jerri during this time. She was so funny trying to make small talk as the manicurist. She asked me if I worked a lot, had kids, and dogs.

I will have to share her stories she told me tomorrow. They were quite hysterical!

Saturday

2009-01-03T23:59:00.003-06:00

Today I was just sure that Annabel had reached a whole new level - I thought she said "thank you for lunch". I answered "how very sweet of you, you're welcome".

Grace said, "Uh, Mom, she said, 'Is this lunch?'"

They were watching Kung Fu Panda and the "master" turtle had just said, "There are no accidents."

Perfect timing, right?

As we were packing, getting the girls ready to meet their daddy in Waco, my cousin called and said they were on their way over.

While growing up, we lived one block from my aunt and uncle and their four kids, so it felt like we all grew up together. Our moms were best friends and we spent lots of time together.

Now everyone is scattered as far away as Missouri. OK, not like it is all the way to China or something, but it might as well be!

Gillian texted her dad and asked if we could meet 30 minutes later so we could see everyone.

We always called my cousin, Dubby. Dubby is my age, despite his constant reminder that I am two weeks older.

Annabel misunderstood.

She asked if that girl, pointing to a picture of my sister, Lisa, was coming and bringing her dog.

What????

First I am confused that she is still pointing and calling Lisa "that girl", which I know is going to go over well with her. She also calls her my sister. In some ways I think she still feels this is temporary and no need to learn all of this.

But I digress, so unusual for me.

Lisa coming and bringing her dog???

Oh, her dog, Buddy.

No, this is my cousin, Dubby.

It was great seeing my cousins even though it was for a short time. I wish I would follow through and start making road trips and go see them.

They were headed to El Fenix after we left. YUM!!!

We loaded up and hoped that we had all of their stuff.

It is so difficult to hand Gillian and Darcey off to their dad. We all miss them so much but thrilled over the time we had together.

I, being the pragmatic mother that I am, drove through Burger King, even though we had just been in using their facilities, bought bags of chicken fingers, and headed home. This is when I was just sure that Annabel had said thanks for lunch!

The girls took a nap on the ride home, but Annabel had asked if we were taking the dogs to get a hair cut.

This is one of the great things about the changes in Oak Cliff, now there is a dog groomer who will take our dogs at the last minute for grooming on a Saturday. The Dip and Clip is great! So I called and they said yes, so as soon as we got home we took the dogs to the groomer and on to the library where we paid the huge fines we had amassed from DVDs.

Annabel did surprise me again when she read the sign that said, "Please do not slide, thank you" on the hand rails.

It is still a few days away from being home for just five months! She only speaks in English, rarely gets stumped by a word, but will ask now when she doesn't understand something.

Another huge surprise is that Dad has learned to cook out on the grill. And does an excellent job at it! So even though Mom and Dad were exhausted from this week, they made sure we had a nice dinner together before calling it a night. Which is exactly what I need to do now.

Who is this child?

2009-01-02T23:54:00.004-06:00

I don't know what happened while I was at work today, but something changed.

Annabel has continued to keep me at arm's length. She doesn't mind hugging others, holding hands, being touched. But if I come close, she immediately withdraws and sometimes even gives me an "EWWWW!" to ensure that I understood my touch was not acceptable.

But tonight I commented on a picture that she had colored and how well she had done. She really has improved dramatically in her artistic ability. The first drawings she did had people with very stunted arms with hands protruding from the side of the body. It looked more like a 3-4 year old's drawing.

This was her Hello Kitty poster that she bought with her money from the games. It was done with a bright selection of colors, done within the lines, and completed.

She decided it was for me! Wow! That was a huge change!!!! Grace suggested she give it to Gillian and Darcey since they were leaving tomorrow, but she insisted that it was for me.

Then we were going to play Clue. It is difficult for Annabel to play games like this since a considerable amount of reading is involved.

She decided she and I would be partners! I was so surprised! We didn't win. Actually no one did. It was a very strange game of Clue! I'm not sure if they have really read the instructions or not!!

It has become a game at bedtime for her to hide under her covers to avoid a good night kiss. The only time she allowed me to kiss her was when she had her surgery. I think at this point she would be very disappointed if I didn't try!

Today was such a change from yesterday when she seemed grumpy and hard to please.

Last night she had called me into the bathroom when they were getting ready for their shower. "Mom! What's this?" was the question as she showed me her underwear. Oh NO, am I going to have "THE TALK" on 1/1/09???? I wasn't quite prepared for that. With a little more questioning it was determined that she needed more fiber in her diet. Whew!

We went to Golden Corral for lunch/dinner(?) tonight.

One thing for sure, those four girls get their money's worth! They really work well together - when one wanted to go back to the buffet, there was always a "partner" that wanted to go with them.

I am still trying to find a car to buy. I've leased so long and have decided it is time to actually buy something and have some collateral, like Dad suggested. I had seen some good buys at a dealership close to downtown.

As we went through downtown we saw the protesters outside the federal courthouse. The girls were very interested, as we all were. When I tried to explain, I realized I didn't know how to. How to explain the Israel/Palestinian conflicts? Mom jumped in and did a beautiful job explaining the conflict and the girls seemed to understand.

I didn't buy the car and dread shopping for one!

On our way home we took a side trip to drive Gillian and Darcey by Neiman's. They had seen a program on TV about the window displays and were anxious to see it in real life.

The girls are going home tomorrow. It doesn't seem like a week has passed. Gillian continues to amaze us at her creativity, hard work, and caring personality. She was very sensitive to Annabel when she felt left out, she found ways to include her in "special" ways. Darcey continues her sweetness. She can ask more questions than anyone I know, but her vulnerability is so endearing, you just want to hold her close so no harm can come to her.

We haven't decided who gets to drive the girls to Waco tomorrow. More on that later!

New Year's Eve

2009-01-01T23:30:00.003-06:00

New Year's Eve certainly has changed for me. I was sure it was the ultimate "date" night, but none really sticks out! And none were as much fun as they are now.

Nowadays it means running to get your discount on gas before your "rewards" ends and getting your prescriptions filled one more time before you start over again with your deductibles!

After I got those important things handled, then we started our "party"! Annabel was not sure what the party was for and when it began and ended. I don't think we quite do up New Year's like they celebrate in China for New Year's.

Our first stop was for the get together at church. I am so proud to take these four beautiful girls anywhere. They always are so sweet and well behaved. But they were also wound up and excited about the "party" and staying up late. And hungry, so even though we had just eaten, we stopped at KFC on our way home to "round" out our meal.

It's funny to get a bucket of chicken here. It's not something we eat often here either, but it certainly was nice to have in China! Both trips saw us buying buckets of chicken with the bonus Pepsi. I hadn't thought about that in a while.

Even though Christmas was just a week ago we seemed to be at a loss on what to do. How do you fill 5 hours to ensure you can be awake at midnight? My first thought was we scap the idea and go to bed. But that wasn't quite what they had in mind.

Thank goodness I had a secret box of fun!

When my friend Lori had given us all those clothes and toys recently, one box was full of craft kits, spa kits, and other goodies to make and play with. The girls had so much fun with all of these things. I snuck in a quick nap knowing there was NO way I could stay awake until midnight.

Mom and Dad went off to bed after the news, so we turned to the Dick Clark New Year's Eve show since our favorite group, Jonas Brothers were performing. These girls are just at the really cute stage, where they recognize that boys are cute, but really don't know what to do with it, so they just giggle! There was lots of giggling last night.

Somehow we stayed busy and awake and right before midnight we ran outside with our horns, confetti, and streamers and greeted the new year. Grace kept asking if we were waking everyone up. The only ones we woke up were Mom and Dad! They had also asked how we would know when it was midnight. I knew we would know, there is just too much noise in our neighborhood at midnight to miss it!

Today these sweethearts helped me get all of our Christmas decorations down, packed, and into the garage.

From there we went to Walgreens. A very sweet lady at church had bought the girls four different games. Unfortunately she bought the Spanish version of most of them, so we had to return them. They didn't have English, so the girls got the cash. In the last week they have had access to so much more money than they have ever had in their entire lives. Usually they are really careful in their spending, but today they were just sure they had to spend their money quickly. I wouldn't let them buy another Webkinz or any other stuffed animal, which was their first choice. We finally ended up with the school/office/art supplies. There they found bargains on mechanical pencils and sketch books.

We still had to go to Wal Mart, but I had promised everyone ice cream for all their help. So we stopped at Sonic for treats first. It is easy to treat everyone if you make it between 2-4 since the really good treats are half price!

We made a speedy trip through Wal Mart, but that didn't stop me from spending a LOT of money. Length of time does not seem to affect the amount of money you can spend at Wal Mart!

Tonight we celebrated my brother's birthday, even though his birthday was Monday. 50 years! Hard to believe. Mom cooked a delicious dinner and the girls made him a cake.

There were no arguments on going to bed early tonight!

Christmas Eve dinner at Neiman's

2008-12-31T01:00:00.001-06:00

The popovers are HUGE!

Not the best pictures, but these are the plasmacars!

2008-12-31T00:55:00.001-06:00

This is the plasmacar. You sit on it and inertia and twisting the steering wheel makes it go.

I think Grace had too much caffeine!

It's hard to catch up!

2008-12-30T23:43:00.003-06:00

One of the first things that Darcey asked after they arrived was whether we had celebrated her birthday yet.

I wish that I had done better when we saw them in November, but here is was December 28 and her birthday was December 4. But she knew we had not done our usual celebrating.

Dad surprised us all by taking us out to eat after church to Olive Garden.

What a great break!

Plus I LOVE their salad.

I reminded Dad that this was supposed to be Darcey's birthday celebration, so he ordered a cake, the waitresses sang, and Darcey was shy, but I hope she enjoyed the attention. They both told how the birthday dinner in Round Rock was not quite a "children's" idea of celebrating.

Lisa was intent on getting some pictures of the girls after lunch, so we stopped at Bishop Arts. The girls were more intent on playing and horsing around, so no new professional pictures.

Darcey was having trouble with her Sunday shoes being too small, so she decided that was what she wanted for her birthday. So we headed to Payless. Annabel needed house shoes too, so we got both taken care of!

Where else do you go for a "special" kid's birthday dinner? CiCi's Pizza, of course! Only the one by the shoe store was packed with a line out the door, so we went to the next one! I LOVE the cinnamon dessert pizza! I'm glad they have added chicken noodle soup so Annabel can enjoy 4 bowls each time!

Uncle Ken and Aunt Lisa gave each girl a $50 Visa gift card. WOW!!! They decided they would like to buy a new Nintendo game. We checked out the prices at Gamestop, especially for the used ones. So our best laid plans were to go Monday and buy their games. Unfortunately my plans at taking the day off didn't work out.

I know it was an extremely long day for Mom and Dad with all 4 girls and it is always hard for me to get away from work so I was late getting home. Mom, Dad, and the girls had taken care of Christmas returns, including taking my beautiful TIFFANY necklace back to add a couple of inches to the chain.

This afternoon I took the girls to Barnes and Noble since they got gift cards from Uncle Chip. Darcey had left hers at home, but the other three took their time to find just the right combination of books to get the most for their money. At first Annabel was not interested since all the books are in English. There were copies of The Tale of Desperaux, but it was too advanced for her at this point. I tried showing her some of the activity books, craft kits, stuffed animals, etc. Then she got a great idea - she loves word find books. They had good choices for her focusing on learning words. She also loves dot to dots, so she found several that fit the bill.

When we checked out, she had a balance of $3.77. The chance of finding something for that amount was slim, but the cashier suggested she buy a hot chocolate from Starbucks. That didn't seem quite right since none of the rest would have something. Gillian and Grace picked out books that actually went over their $25!!!

But Annabel wanted chocolate.

One of her new vices she has learned from the Western culture. That and butter!! (seems more like my own flesh and blood every day!)

She decided to buy some chocolate and share with the others.

They had a small box of Godiva chocolate with 4 pieces of candy on sale for $3.50. She LOVED buying that and then sharing! I got to just smell of the box!

We pressed onward and went to Target where Nintendo games were buy one get one free.

It took a LOT of explaining that they could go in together on the buy one get one and split the price of one game.

Aha! They finally understood that they could get a game for $15 instead of $30! They agreed on their choices, and thankfully we found a kind man who checked us out and agreed to split the costs between the different gift cards. He must know little girls, as he also gave each their own sack!

Since they still had a balance on their gift cards we decided to check out Gamestop just in case there was a bargain there. Grace had taken her Gameboy and all her games to check out selling them back. Wow! This was quite the transaction, but she decided to go for it and have even more gift cards!!

Since we were in North Dallas we got to eat at my all time favorite restaurant, Taco Bueno! Now that is some good eats!!! When I was going to school in Abilene I could get a small drink and two menu items for $1!!! OK, now you can't! In fact I had to go back the second time and buy more!!

We came home and all four decided to take showers at our house. So much laughing! I'm really surprised that my bathroom was still in pretty good shape after that many laughs!

Poor Darcey had also mentioned that she was missing a pair of her jeans. I wasn't sure if I had seen them, but she decided that the ones Annabel wore today might be hers. When I saw the brand was DKNY, I knew I hadn't bought them for Annabel! I guess I'm not too observant! We've just been so fortunate to have people supplementing Annabel's wardrobe that I hadn't paid that much attention. I offered to wash them and she agreed, IF I would put her name in them.

Mom came to get the girls and it took an extra 15 minutes for the girls to tell each other good bye! I'm so glad they have each other!!!

These are great days!

2008-12-28T00:48:00.003-06:00

This has been a great time for us.

The weather was perfect yesterday, except for a lot of wind. Sunshine started our day but got pretty cold by the afternoon.

But with this kind of weather, it is so nice to be able to come in and out without coats. The sunshine also seemed to raise everyone's spirits.

Yesterday I was being pretty lazy after so much leading up to Christmas.

Annabel went with the dogs in the backyard, but then yelled, "Ollie/Nina"!!!

The call was pretty frantic and Grace and I knew what it meant.

The dogs were loose!!

Annabel can run really fast and had caught Nina before I could find shoes, but Ollie really wants to explore the neighborhood and had taken off! We made it around the block before he finally came with his tail between his legs like it was a lot of fun!!!

We were cleaning out some things, especially boxes from Amazon. Thank goodness for Amazon otherwise Santa would never have made it.

But they waste so much in packing and shipping.

Dad loaded up his car with boxes to take for recycling. But one box would not fit.

I nominated Grace and Annabel to carry it to the recycling bin, which is only a block and a half away. It was too funny seeing them dragging this box down the street and chasing the paper that kept blowing out.

The girls got to play their games, Clue, Life, and Monopoly with their own set of rules. I had planned to help clean up their bedrooms, but they were laughing and playing so well together, I did not want to interrupt it. Grace did a great job of helping Annabel understand the games well enough to play.

The one thing they still wanted to do was have me play with them.

So after showers and beds made again, we started playing Monopoly. It was pretty hysterical to play and try to explain the idea of Monopoly!

Grace kept commenting that Annabel didn't even understand and was doing the best.

When it was 10:00 we had to call it quits with Annabel having a huge wad of cash and Grace and I close to bankruptcy.

Grace couldn't believe that in real life that you would get a bill for taxes that would be the exact same amount of the money you just got from passing go! I don't think I had played it since it really became so REAL!!

Today we spent time trying to do our usual chores and clean up some neglected areas, but all we really wanted to know was what time Lisa, Gillian, and Darcey would be here.

Since we would be opening the last of the presents, I knew I needed to get the rest of mine wrapped.

I bought a plasmacar for each of the girls, only one won't be here until next week. Dad put the other three together and when we got to the last detail, the bolt was missing.

Mom and I dug through my whole recycling bin trying to find it.

Dad took one of the cars apart and took the bolt to Home Depot to find a match.

I could not do this crazy things if I did not have Dad right next door to help me out. When I went out to ask for help, there sat Mom and Dad on their steps with a tablecloth for cover and my mother scooting as close as she could to Dad to get warm. Sweet picture!

When Lisa and the girls finally arrived, presents were tops in everyone's mind. They were very excited about some great gift cards and ready to go shopping again!

Lisa totally surprised me with a BEAUTIFUL necklace from Tiffany's! I have ALWAYS wanted something from Tiffany's. It has two little hearts to represent my two girls.

It has been very difficult to be on the receiving end only this week, without reciprocating. Everyone understands that $ was just not there and surprised me with such wonderful gifts.

The girls got to try out their plasmacars. I can't really explain them and will just have to get a picture.

Then we ended the day with a delicious traditional Christmas dinner. Mom and I have laughed about what we ate on Christmas. For us it was leftovers and them it was a can of soup! But tonight we had the whole meal with all the trimmings. Delicious!!

The girls are so good together and everyone is surprised at how much Annabel has learned in just one month! Annabel calls Darcey "sweet little Darcey". I'm so glad they have each other too.

Happy Birthday Holly!

2008-12-26T00:25:00.003-06:00

Maybe it is still her birthday in her time zone!!

I managed to stay awake and get all the presents moved from their hiding places. It was one of the few times that I wished there was someone else here to help! I felt like I made 100 trips, then when I looked to admire my work displaying the packages to the best effect, it looked like such a tiny amount!

I had set my alarm, but the soft setting must be too soft.

Thankfully we have a dog who knows it is time to go out and jumped up and woke me up!

Grace had been awake since 7:00 but Annabel was still snoozing. I was shocked at that and still not sure if she was faking it.

We had to wait for Grandmother and Poppa, but even then, neither girl seemed ready to tear into their packages.

Annabel took a long time playing with the dogs!

Grace always prefers being the follower and kept holding back.

Finally each opened one package. The most lame ones are always on the front. Since it wasn't a computer, neither were very interested.

It took SO LONG to get them to open their gifts.

I've spent most of the day trying to find a meaning behind their reluctance to open their gifts. They were labelled with their names, but Annabel REALLY was not that interested. She was concerned that on the tag it only said To: with their name, but Santa did not write his name on the From: side.

She announced a few times that Santa had not been here. This each time from returning from the back yard. Not sure what was out there to tell her.

She was mostly concerned about having to take care of MORE babies. The new Nintendo game is babysitting 6 babies, she already has Shomba, Yo Yo, Whyo, Ho Ho, just so much pressure and so much work!

She finally did get the Barbie computer, but there were no more puppies, no cell phone, and no real laptop. A major disappointment!

I tried to buy things that would build companionship, but instead, each took a different toy for a while and played with it separately.

But we finally got down to some real play stopping just long enough for breakfast at Mom and Dad's.

The whole Dallas area family got together later at Mom and Dad's for dinner and gifts.

I am rarely surprised by a gift, but they blew me away this year!

I got my own GPS! I used to be able to find my way anywhere I needed to go. Went back to the same Bed and Breakfast in Edinburgh, Scotland, even coming in a different direction.

Now ---- I have trouble finding the street at the end of the block. I was looking at my directions when we had our car wreck the other day. I don't know how I lost that ability, but was thrilled when Dad let me borrow his to go to Houston back in the summer. It was the one and only time I actually found my way around.

Now I just have to find a different car to buy and get that thing mounted!

There are pictures and I will get them posted. Promise!!!

I hope you had a great holiday too. Now we are just waiting on Lisa, Gillian, and Darcey to come. We hope they will be here Saturday.

I must stay awake!

2008-12-24T22:37:00.003-06:00

How can Santa come if (s)he falls asleep?

Well my girls are all safely snuggled in bed with visions of sugar plums, or toast dancing in their heads. I still need to wrap a few things, but all I want to do is close my eyes for just a minute! Biggest fear is that Annabel will wake me up in the morning with laptop open, tv on, and no presents.

Annabel is still not sure what all of this means. I hope I can remember always her reaction.

Merry Christmas to you all!

Christmas Eve at our house

2008-12-24T13:38:00.005-06:00

Annabel just came in and described "Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer", only she was saying Grandmommy, and at the end she went splat and no one could find her and that's all.

These short conversations really tickle me.

Having two kids still mastering the English language can make for some funny conversations.

Monday night Annabel was so disappointed that the restaurant had no more corn, because she LOVES that corn for the ice cream. I knew they had corn on the buffet, so it had to be cone! She loves the cone for her ice cream.

Grace then read Annabel's fortune cookie. Annabel was to do something with her uniquequinciness.

We had so much fun spending their gift cards yesterday.

Annabel had never been in a Toys R Us store and I think it was somewhat overwhelming. It was so strange to see the store so empty. The girls decided to pool their cards so they could buy one, get one half price on a new Nintendo game. Yes, Father dear, I know tomorrow is Christmas. But the gift cards were the gifts! I know you understand the logic there.

What surprised me was they picked a game where they are taking care of babies. Annabel immediately started fretting that she could not handle 7 babies, the six on the game and her doll, who is named Shomba (?).

They plugged in the games and immediately started playing. Only with this game, if you do not take good care of your baby, then it cries and cries and cries and cries! Annabel couldn't get hers to eat and started talking to it that the rice was so good. Grace questioned feeding the baby rice. Annabel said, ok, green beans then.

We also went to Limited Too as those gift cards were burning a hole in their pocket. The priority was pants or skirts. We could find neither, so they both have cute new tops.

Today we are going back to a tradition I started for us when Jana and the girls first moved to Dallas. Prior to Grace, Annabel, and Jana and her girls, I used to take Mom and Dad to the Fairmount on Christmas Day for brunch. But it is not cheap, so I found Neiman Marcus has their usual "lunch" buffet on Christmas Eve. Somehow we missed it last year, but we are getting ready to go. They have such delicious food and you feel quite festive just being at their store.

Later is church, but then in the morning, the first Christmas ever for Annabel!

I think that Grace was so overwhelmed that first year that she couldn't get past the first package.

I am sorry if you did not get a Christmas card to you. I still plan to mail some, even though they will be late. My way of ensuring the holidays last longer!

I am thankful we are all well and can enjoy these special times together. I am especially grateful we are not in British Columbia where it continues to snow!

More later!

Annabel and Christmas

2008-12-23T12:32:00.001-06:00

After Saturday night's gift exchange, I asked Annabel if that was enough.

NO!!! She wanted 500 toys!

OK, maybe she has outguessed the meaning of Christmas. I'm trying to make her understand a much more realistic view of what Christmas is, but not making much headway.