My Kid Circus

I really wanted to get this up yesterday, but since my life like now is kind of busy (a.k.a. insanely busy), that didn’t happen.  Regardless, it was a special day around here.  Hannah has been with us for one month!

It has been absolutely wonderful to be with her for the past month.  The love in my heart for this sweet girl is growing by the day, and it is an incredible feeling.

Here are some of the things we have learned about Hannah:

LIKES:

FOOD-  All of the time

Having her small blankets to stuff in her mouth

Emptying all of the kitchen cabinets (I could do without this one)

Carrying a purse

Pretending toys are telephones

Making people laugh with her eyebrow trick

DISLIKES:

Not having food

Being told no

Sharing Mommy

WORDS THAT SHE HAS SAID:

Dada

Mama

Uh-oh

Hi

Bye

Thank you

Pat Pat

Yeah

All in all, this has been such an amazing month.  I am so excited to have her with us for the holidays this year, and to see how she will change and grow in the next few months.  I sure do love this girl!

Hannah doing 2 of her favorite things. Having a snack and pretending to talk on the phone. 🙂

Happy One Month to all of our friends in travel group 1771!!

Oh how much better it feels to be getting sleep!  Finally, after 2 weeks home we are all sleeping during the hours we should be sleeping.  Thank goodness!  I had no idea how hard it would be to re-adjust to EST!

A great Halloween with a Kitty, June from the Little Einsteins, Batman, and Ron Weasley.

It has been fun watching Hannah day by day.  I can already tell that she is understanding more and more English.  She is responding fairly regularly to her name, and has said, “hi”, and “uh-oh”. 🙂  When we were first together, she would only sit in my lap facing me, frequently holding on for dear life.  Now she is content to sit in my lap the regular way. 🙂  She also did not seem to have the muscles to help hold herself when being carried on a hip, like most children do who are carried regularly.  That too is starting to change, and she is learning that she likes to be carried, and locks her legs onto me when I start to put her down.  She also doesn’t seem to be making all of the same little sounds that she was making in China.  I’m kind of sad to see those go…

Today we went for her visit to the cardiologist.  As the time came nearer, I got really nervous.  We really had no idea about the quality of her heart repair.  We got there today and she had several different tests for her heart, including an Echocardiogram, where she had to lay still for more than 20 minutes.  Luckily I thought to ask them if they had a lollypop.  She didn’t disappoint me. Her love of all things food won over, and she lay nicely sucking her lollypop the entire time!

After it was over, the cardiologist explained step by step what it means to have Tetrology of Fallot.  I had already done a lot of my own research, but it was reassuring to hear it from him also.  He said what I was most wanting to hear; that her heart was repaired well.  The downside was that one of her valves is leaking pretty badly.  He said that she is definitely going to need a valve replacement at some point in the next 5 years or so.  He really couldn’t say when.  We will be followed closely by the cardiologist, and when the right side of her heart begins to enlarge, she will have the valve replacement.  It wasn’t the best news, but so far from what it could have been!

We are just so glad to have this happy girl!

First of all, Hannah is doing great. I think that she is adjusting as well as she possibly could be. She is sleeping, eating, playing, and affectionate with us all. We are so thrilled to have her here with us.

There is no way around it though. This week was HARD. Adjusting to 4 kids is hard. Getting no sleep due to extreme jet-lag is hard. Meeting the needs of a 6, 4, 2, and 1 year old is hard. Add to that 2 family members getting the stomach flu, and me busting the back windshield of my van, and we have over-the-top hard.

Then, yesterday, we had to have our dear dog, Rizzo, put to sleep. It is hard for me to even type those words. We have had Rizzo for more than 13 years, and loved her deeply. Unfortunately, right before we left for China, something bit her (likely a poisonous spider). She fought hard, but her body was just too week to overcome the damage that this bite did to her body. So we had to say goodbye. A very painful goodbye to a member of our family.

This week was definitely not what I had in mind when I imagined bringing Hannah home and finally being together as a family. I expected that in our adjustment period, we might have a lot of tears. I just didn’t realize that most of them would be mine.

A mother wears many hats, however. Despite my deep sadness right now, I have to be excited about the tooth fairy coming to Z tonight. I have to be ready for 2 school Halloween parties tomorrow, and one of the kids’ favorite nights of the year.  I can do this because my love for my kids surpasses everything else.  And I have faith that week #2 will be better…

As wonderful as it is to be home, which it absolutely is, these past few days have been tough.  Hannah seems to be adjusting to the time change the best of any of us.  The rest of us, however, are really having a hard time with this jet lag.  In the past 5 nights, I think the longest stretch of sleep we have gotten is 4 hours.  We have been downstairs having a meal or watching a show in the middle of the night every night.  Yesterday I was on the verge of tears at every second, simply because I NEED SLEEP!!!!

Poor Z woke up the other morning completely sobbing, saying, “I miss China!!!!”.  I know how he feels.  There are some experiences in life that are so wonderful, and so profound, that you just want to hold on to them.  I am so thankful for our experiences in China for a million reasons, but high among those reasons are what it meant to Z.  He really came out of his shell on the trip.  He made great friends (like his buddy Davis who he loved climbing the Great Wall with), took each new experience in stride, and most of all, he was so very happy. I am sad to know that he has to go back to school tomorrow.  I have loved spending these couple of weeks with him so much.  I am really going to miss him!

Hannah really is doing well, but she has definitely been fussier since we have been home than she ever was in China.  I keep thinking about all the things that she has had to adjust to, and I really can’t blame her.  Every single aspect of her life is different.  Surely at some level she is also wondering how long this new situation is going to last.  After all, even in her time with us we didn’t spend longer than 5 days in one place.  We are just trying to shower her with as much love and understanding as we possibly can, and hope that in time she finds security and happiness here.  We pray that it won’t take very long for her to embrace being a part of this family.

Please send us some good thoughts tomorrow as Jeff goes back to work and we really start getting back to reality.  And if anyone has any hints for being 4 places at once, I would appreciate it! 🙂