Happy Birthday to our sweet Little Guy, who turns 4 years old today! Hopefully you had a smile going all day long that was just as big as the one you have in this picture. It's just two short weeks until we start our trip over to China. We wish like heck that we were there today, but we'll be there soon.
Lots of love and hugs and kisses,
Mommy & Daddy
Jazz is a thief. She steals whatever she can, sometimes to chew on the thing, but more often to entice Teddy or I into her favorite game of chase. Of course, if we don't catch her at it, she apparently gets bored waiting for us to find her, and we run the risk of her consuming whatever it is she stole. We only find out about when she vomits the thing back up, sometimes 3 or 4 days later.
And the smell of something that has been hanging out in her stomach for 3 or 4 days? Not good. Not good at all.
So, there's a fine line between giving in to the chase, and getting the towel or sock or underwear or whatever away from her before it turns into a fibrous, if temporary, snack.
Now, anyone who has dogs will tell you that when they are playing, one dog can sound like an entire Calvary storming through the house. This is generally the first sign that she has something we don't want her to have. However, and I swear to God on this, tonight she was actually tip-toeing past me with the kitchen towel. She tip-toed past me until she got just around the corner where she then waited, and when I appeared she broke into her Calvary run. Either she really wanted to chew on that towel for awhile, thus the sneaking around me, or she has changed up the rules on her game of chase.
Here's a picture of her other newest favorite pastime, nestling amongst the hostas and happily grazing on the leaves.
So. Suppose you're out kickin' in your pontoon boat on an early Sunday evening, enjoying a beverage of the malted hops variety. You see, off in the distance, an inflatable fun raft adrift in the lake, fairly far away from shore. You head over to the raft, upon which several kids and an adult are waving their arms for attention. You discover they have indeed blown away in the breeze, and can't paddle towards shore. You throw them a rope, and motor towards the beach, where they are able to reunite with friends waiting for them on dry land.
Then, after a good chuckle, you head in for some snacky-snacks, attend to the dogs and their business, and take care of some other chores.
And suppose you head back out, not quite two hours later, for a final sunset cruise, and see the same inflatable raft, in about the same location, this time being pulled ashore by another pontoon boat. You drive past, and the kids recognize you as the first rescuers, and wave "hi" as if they are having the time of their lives.
Forget for the moment that there was a small toddler on board the raft. My question is, if you had been a few minutes earlier, and happened upon them before the other pontoon boat, would you have pulled their asses to shore a second time? I'm not sure I'd be that charitable.
Hey Little Guy,
28 days! Hokey smokes.
We are busy, busy, busy. Busy with work, busy making arrangements for our absence, busy getting things ready for you. The project this evening for your dad is stripping the dresser for your bedroom, so that we can re-stain it. The dresser used to be your dad's, and it was showing a lot of wear and tear. Your bedroom is painted except for some finishing touches on the trim.
My project is to get some things in order at work. We've never been away from work longer than a week, or half way across the world to boot. I'm putting in some long hours now so that I can afford to be away once we get home. The plan right now is for your dad and I to stagger our hours, with one of us always home. I can also accomplish a good bit of work from home. Hopefully that will work okay.
We're narrowing down our packing lists, and I'm anxiously awaiting some news regarding your current height and weight - hopefully the clothes I've bought so far fit. The next packing task is some toys and games for you.
I've got Jazz all kinds of confused when I'm driving in to work in the morning. I use the time to practice some Mandarin phrases. This involves one speaker on the CD saying a phrase in English, and then there's a pause while I try to remember the Mandarin words, and then another speaker says the phrase in Mandarin twice, with pauses in between so that I can practice. So, for instance, the speaker will say "This is your sister", and I'll say "Zhe shir ni de jie jie", and Jazz will pop her head up from sleeping, trying to figure out what new command "Jie Jie" is.
(Or, I practice on Jazz when she is misbehaving, as in "Qing bu yao yao" - "Please don't bite!" She isn't really biting, per se, but she does get a little nippy when she's excited. Good thing you won't be able to read this for a while!)
Wo ai ni,
Mommy
It's beginning to concern me that we were parents to a 4 year old and a 5 year old a mere 15 years ago, and still things are escaping us.
What time is bed time for a 4 year old? 7:00? 7:30? 8:00?
We were fortunate in that bed time was never a struggle for Teddy's kids. They generally went to bed without much fuss. The Boy Child, when he was very young, would literally wind down as if his batteries had run out. At night, he would play on the floor with a toy, and his motions got progressively slower until he finally just shut his eyes and went to sleep. Many a night we carried them both to bed.
Also, at that age, Teddy and I were both working two jobs each, and I remember being immensely grateful that their bed time was so early that I had a great excuse to go to bed early myself. (I remember being tired all the time back then.) The Little Guy's paperwork says that his bed time is 7:00, but that seems awfully early to me. Of course, it also says that his dinner time is 4:30, and, um, that is going to change if the three of us ever want to have a meal together.
Neither Teddy or I can remember much about giving the kids baths. Or, for that matter, when the kids stopped taking baths and moved on to showers. Was it the same time that they stopped taking baths together?
My last memory of bath time was probably one of the first bath times. The Boy Child, as is typical of most boy children everywhere, would ignore the call of nature until it became painfully evident that peeing was, in fact, eminent. So, on what happened to be our first Christmas together, I took charge of getting the kids ready for a trip to grandma's and grandpa's by first running a bath for the kids. As a completely inexperience step-mom, I did this after I myself had gotten dressed. As I sat on the edge of the tub running the water, The Boy Child suddenly realized that he needed to use the bathroom in the worst way, ran in, missed the toilet by a wide margin, and...
...he peed down my entire leg. I always got the kids dressed first after that.
Strange, isn't it, the things you remember?
Lastly, and this has nothing to do with kids, but neither Teddy or I can remember the duration of Abbey's crate training. Jazz is secured in her crate during the night, and any time we are away from the house, which is no longer than 4 to 5 hours at a time. We did the same for Abbey. However, Abbey now has the run of the house, and has for quite some time. We have no idea as to how that came about, except that it happened gradually - working up from maybe 20 minutes at a time to several hours.
I do know that Jazz is no where near ready to be left out of the crate unsupervised. She is still much too destructive with her chewing, and having her in the crate is as much for her protection as it is for the furniture. And she is still perfectly content in her crate. She seeks it out on her own for sleeping and for comfort; she has a hard time settling herself anywhere else. So, I know that it will be her behavior that dictates when she is ready to stay outside of the crate. But, it's strange that we can't remember this transition with Abbey.
We should have our visas next Tuesday. We're using a courier that has been able to work around the new China Consulate visa requirements for adoptive families. If we submitted the applications ourselves, we would need our complete travel itinerary, which we don't have yet. Also, we don't have to take the time off to go into the city, and stand in line.
One more thing to check off the list.
Hey Little Guy,
So, we're 5 weeks away from meeting for the first time. It seems like it's still a long ways away, and it seems like we don't have much time left to get things ready for you. That makes no sense whatsoever, I know. But, each day we wish it was today that we were leaving, and then we remember that we need to get ________ done, and part of our day is consumed with getting ___________ done.
I find myself thinking, "Oh, next time we do this, The Little Guy will be with us. Cool." Take for instance, this weekend. Chicago in the summertime means weekends filled with street festivals. And oh, we like festivals. Some of the festivals revolve around specific foods - i.e. Strawberry Fest in Long Grove, or Rib Fest in Naperville. Some of the fests center around a specific ethnicity - Swedish Days in Geneva, or Greek Fest in Chicago. Some of them are named just for the towns, or for a specific street or neighborhood in the city.
When I was a lot younger, one of the best festivals to go to was the Italian Feast in Melrose Park. That is, if by best you mean lots and lots of really good food, because the Feast was aptly named. And hardly a year goes by that we don't make the trip up to Long Grove for Apple Fest in the early fall. Apple Fest means freshly made apple donuts. Freshly made apple donuts means lots of happy people.
Many of these fests have carnival rides, which is what always attracted The Boy Child and SassyGirl. They could spot a Ferris Wheel ten miles away. Or, I remember SassyGirl liking the pony rides. We tried to get them to listen to the music coming from the band shells, but usually they fell asleep on the blankets we laid out instead.
Anyway, we went to two different festivals this weekend. We ate quite a bit, and I got to hold and bottle feed a baby tiger. I can't wait to take you to these different towns, and see these street fests through your eyes. We'll probably bore you with countless re-tellings of past experiences, but hopefully you'll have fun anyway.
35 more days... we can hardly wait.
Love, Mommy
I just made hotel reservations in Hong Kong. Woot!
