2 year anniversary

Happy Anniversary!

It's been an interesting year. As I have said so many times before - Halle continues to grow and flourish. We are so fortunate. I look back at her referral pictures and see such a sad little girl. I'm happy to report that she is now a very happy girl, especially as we head into the last quarter as a 3 year old. (Whoever said terrible twos are the worst definitely didn't have a three year old at the time ;)

We continue to go to Chinese classes twice a month. We also belong to a play group that meets at least once a month. I'm not sure how much Halle is actually getting out of the class but it is nice that she gets to interact so much with other little girls and boys that are just like her. I think that can only be helpful as she grows older. It has also been very nice for me to make new friends and to be able to share the trials and tribulations of international adoption.

This fall has brought several changes for Halle. The most significant is that her "Cher" went off to college. I think that Halle actually faired a little better than Sami at the beginning. But boy we sure do miss her. We have been able to Skype several times although I'm not really sure Halle grasps the concept. The other big changes for Halle is that she started preschool and is also taking a pre-ballet class. She goes to preschool 2 mornings a week. She is doing fairly well at school. The last few sessions have brought a few tears but she promises me that she isn't going to cry anymore. She will cry for a few minutes when I leave but then is usually happily coloring before I leave the building. The pre-ballet class has been great. She LOVES to dance. I must say that is one of the highlights to my week. There are 6-10 little 3-5 year olds dancing around the room. She really loves it. Halle is also going to our friend's house again this year for one day a week. She gets to spend some time to play with her friends from last year and I get some work done.

As I mentioned earlier Sami is away at college now. She is at Ohio Northern University majoring in nursing. She seems to really love it although the thing she loves most now is soccer, not so much the classes! She has done an amazing job as a freshman on the field. She is the leading scorer for not only her team but for the whole conference! Her regular season is done with only the OAC tournament yet this week. Go Polar Bears.

Jacob is a sophomore in high school this year. He is also excelling in both his school work and on the soccer field. He was also one of the top scorers for his team. One of the exciting things for him at school this year is that he is taking Chinese. While he is struggling through it I think that it is going to be great if he can stick with it. He just changed into a different section where one of his friends who is Chinese is in the class and is helping him. The class is Chinese only with no English spoken. I know that is a successful way to teach in elementary but I'm not convinced it is the same with high school kids. He is also currently taking his driver's training classes so he will soon be able to drive himself to basketball practice when it starts next week!

Paul & I continue to merrily chase the kids around. It was lots of soccer this fall and I'm sure the same will be said for the upcoming basketball season. We celebrated our 23rd wedding anniversary last month and feel very fortunate to not only have each other but 3 great kids as well. Life is good.

One year annivesary

One year ago today we became a family of 5. It's hard to believe how quickly the year has gone although on the other hand it's hard to remember what life was like without Halle. She is definitely the center of our household.

Halle continues to grow and thrive. She has lost much of her baby fat rolls and is getting much taller. Luckily she continues to be quite healthy so she hasn't been to the doctor to get measured. The last check she was in the 75th percentile for her height and weight which is huge for an asian baby. Most of the girls I have seen or read about are lucky to even hit the American growth charts.

Halle's vocabulary is unbelievable. She is still having problems pronouncing more than the first sylable but we can usually underestand what she is saying. She is stringing more and more words together too. And it's hard to remember the last time she didn't understand something we were trying to tell her.

We are currently going to Chinese school a couple of times a month. She seems to really enjoy it. There are 6-7 other little kids in the class. The class lasts for 35 minutes and consists of singing and dancing to Chinese nursery rhymems. The instructor gave us 2 CDs with the music on and we often play it while driving. At the end of the class in June will be a recital. I'm so looking forward to that. As she gets older she will be able to participate in more of the classes. They have dance and language and writing.

Halle started to go to daycare at one of our friends house 3 mornings a week. It is working out so well. I thought it would be a real struggle at the beginning but she didn't have any transition problems at all. She just went with the flow, as she ususally does. It gives me a nice break and helps me get some work done.

The big kids continue to be great with Halle. Sami, or Cher as Halle continues to call her, is still like a second mommy to her. They share quite a bond. I'm sure it will be a struggle for everyone when Sami goes away to college next year. Jacob has made great strides with Halle. They no longer have the love/hate relationship that they had when we came home last year. Halle's early interaction with Jacob was throwing blocks at him and running him over with the stroller. I think she thought she was supposed to beat up on him every time she saw him. Now they can play together very nicely. She loves to jump on the trampoline with Jacob. For awhile Jacob was the bath man too. I still can't convince him to put a diaper on her though:)

School is going very well for the big kids. Jacob is have a MUCH better year. He even brought home a report card with all A's, the first time since elementary! Sami's grades continue to be very good also. The big kids just completed fall soccer at school. They both did really well. Jacob made the JV A team and did a great job with the team. He was even selected to dress with the varsity during tournament time. He got to play in 2 of the games and was the sacrifical body drawing 2 red cards and a yellow card in the last game. Sami's highlight of a very difficult season was scoring the winning goal in the tournament game against Davidson. She also made first time all conference and 2nd team for the division. She was also in a 3 way tie for player of the year for her conference. While she didn't win, I think that is quite an accomplishment!

Foster mom

One of our travel mates found a person that lives in China that helps adoptive parents locate their child's foster mom. I thought it would be a good idea to get the information for Halle for when she is older.

The person that was written on the information we received from the SWI was incorrect. Bruce, through the help of his friend at the SWI, was able to find the correct person. I was a little leary but they did provide a picture of the foster mom holding Halle when she was about 9 months old.

The biggest question that we had was why Halle went back to the orphanage so much earlier than the other babies (April). The news that we got from the FM was that she didn't go back that early, she didn't go back until November. While I would like to believe that is true my instincts tell me it isn't. Halle is way too possessive of toys (she likes to sit on them when other kids are around). She also showed almost no emotion after being hurt. She could have a hard fall and jump right up like nothing happened. Now she has to have it kissed, medicine put on (usually pretend) and then she kisses it herself:)

We also received several pictures of the foster mom, her house and some of the city she lived in. Most of the answers we received were somewhat generic but I'm hopeful that all of this will be helpful to Halle when she gets older. One thing that was included was Halle's nickname. It is Zhi-Zhi. I'm probably pronouncing it wrong but when I say it to Halle she totally responds to it. She just started calling herself "Halla". But when I say Zhi-Zhi she immediately turns around and points to herself like she does when we say Halle. I'm reading an adoption book now that says it is very important to not wait until the children are older but to talk to them about their lives prior to the adoption as much as possible. I usually do it when I am rocking her with her bottle. She hasn't shown much interest in anything else I say but she definitely recognizes her name. The book also recommends having a group of 3 pictures (referral picture, first meeting and later at home) to use to talk to the kids about. I'm still working on that part - of course :)

6 months today!

I'm not sure what happened to month 5 or how I've let 2 months slip by since last posting!

But, today is our 6 month anniversary of receiving Halle. I know I must sound like a broken record but I must say she is an amazing little girl. Other than a few bad dreams and of course a few 2 year old temper tantrums she has transitioned, dare I say, perfectly. Her language skills continue to astound me. She is still having trouble pronouncing the whole word she knows which words to use and when. And she continues to pick up new words every day. It has been so fun to watch her little personality come to life.

One of our travel mates from our China trip recently found a person who was able to look up their child's foster mother. He was able to get a whole bunch of questions answered from the foster mom - first words, first teeth, favorite foods, other family members, as well as pictures of the family, their house and their village. I just contacted that person myself and he said that he has located Halle's foster mom. I'm very excited to be able to help find a few of the missing puzzle pieces that I'm sure will be quite important to Halle as she gets older.

We had our 6 month check up with our social worker this week. It went well. She thought that Halle was doing very well. Of course, I already knew that but it was nice to get it confirmed :) We are required by China to do a 6 month check up and a one year check up. The social worker asked a bunch of questions about Halle's transition and health. We also had to supply her with 4 pictures of Halle and one of the whole family.

Halle continues having a very strong bond with Sami. They still take a "tubtub" together almost every night. Their new activity is bouncing on the big trampoline in the backyard. You can hear them giggling a few houses away. Jacob is also developing a much stronger bond with Halle. It took awhile but it is definitely there. She gets upset when Jacob isn't around in the evening to give her a kiss goodnight. She has a ritual of kissing everyone goodnight while I make her bottle. She definitely notices if someone isn't there.

We just got back from Sami's friend's house. We were taking pictures of them for prom. She looked so grown up! Sami is continuing with her college search. She has 2 coaches that seem very interested in her. Unfortunately they are both smaller D3 schools so they are quite expensive. She is looking at Ohio Northern and Capital. Her first choice was Ohio Northern until we visited Capital. She thinks that her favorite will continue to be the one that she has visited last so Paul is looking for a cheap school to send her to for her last visit! While I would like her to go a little farther than Capital it sure would be nice to have her so close so I can watch her soccer games. She went to a tournament last weekend and it was very hard sending her off with a friend. As of now it looks like Sami will pursue nursing in college. She went on a field trip this week to a hospital and really enjoyed it.

Jacob is anxious to finish off this school year! Classes seem to be going a little better but this hasn't been his best year. Jacob is excelling in his sporting activities. He is currently playing 3 sports, more times that not 2 on the same day. He is playing volleyball for his school, club soccer and also subbing for a basketball team. Needless to say he doesn't have much downtime.

Paul's school kids took the OAT last week so hopefully the rest of the school year will be a little easier. They put so much pressure on the teachers to teach to that stupid test. He is held accountable for kids who don't care about it as well as their parents. There was a great analogy in the paper a year or so ago that I wish I would have kept. It likened it to a dentist being responsible for his patients cavities. He kept saying that he can't control the amount of sugar the kids eat or how often they brush their teeth. Same principles in my opinion.

My work is starting to pick up. It has been pretty slim pickings for many months. It's been nice having so much spare time with Halle but with our new "used" van payment and college looming in the not too distant future it has definitely been on my mind. Luckily one of the fringe benefits of getting Halle is that we're getting a HUGE income tax refund. We are using a majority of it to fund my IRA but hopefully we can finally get our kitchen finished with the rest of it. We haven't had any tile on our walls since before our China trip and the floor is starting to peel up. It is definitely time for a remodel.

I'm hoping to publish new pictures soon. We just bought a new camera that Sami took to prom tonight. I'll wait for those pictures.

4 months today

Today marks our 4 month anniversary of being a family of 5. My how our lives have changed - upside down, inside out and everything in between! I keep saying that I can't believe how time is flying by but the details of China seem to be getting fuzzier as the days pass. I've at least managed to put the bad details out of the forefront. I can finally say we've completely recovered from our various diseases - even Paul - finally!

Halle continues to thrive. She is quite the character. Her personality continues to evolve. She seems very happy to be a part of our family. I often wonder how much she remembers or thinks about her life before us. She doesn't seem to do as much jibber-jabbering in Chinese as she used to. I'm not sure if it because she is able to express herself in English or she is starting to forget her Chinese. It is probably a combination. It still makes me sad that she won't have any memory of her early life. We have 2 pictures of her from when she was a baby but that's not much. I've been reading articles written by adult adoptees and they often were quite troubled by their missing holes or missing branches from their family trees. I'm so thankful that Halle is doing so wonderfully now but I'm trying to be cautions and keeping an eye out for any attachment/abandonment issues.

Okay, on to the happier issues. Halle's vocabulary is great. I'm assuming she has close to 100 words now. Her favorite at the moment are "mine" and "no" courtesy of her favorite big brother. Can't blame that on the Whites like we did with Sami ;) She knows many body parts and animals. I've been working with her on colors but we haven't been to successful yet. She knows "O" and "H" as far as letters but that is it.

We bought her a cute little bike this weekend. It's a little too cold outside to use it much but Paul has taken her out a few times. She seems to like it. She is also starting to use the trampoline a little more now too - I guess we just had to take down the protective netting to get her interested in it!

February was a blur for me. I had 2 really big projects to work on. While it was nice to be working (and earning) it was a little more than I would prefer. Luckily Grandma was available and helped out with Halle a ton! Halle has really taken to Grandma and didn't seem bothered in the least when I had to go work.

Sami continues working hard toward her goal of playing soccer in college. She is practicing with her team twice a week and lifting several days a week at the Y. She just got her first ACT test scores back and is pleased with a 25. She has some kind of soccer preview this weekend where coaches are coming from around the state to watch girls scrimmage. We're not sure what to expect from this. Her exciting thing is her first official college visit next weekend. We are going to Ohio Northern. We will be meeting with the financial aid people, someone from the school of nursing and the soccer coach. She is very interested in this college but unfortunately it is VERY expensive. Bottom line is that the soccer coach is going to have to dig very deep with scholarship money in order for her to attend there.

Jacob is between sports now. He finished his club volleyball yesterday - thank goodness! We learned our lesson about making him do something that he doesn't want to do. He starts club soccer and school volleyball next week; not too much of a break. School doesn't seem to be his favorite thing this year. He is already counting the days/weeks until school is out for the summer.

Happy Birthday Halle - part 2

I've got to learn to post when I write these and not wait until I have time to upload the pictures. Here is a post I wrote a ways back. Sorry it is so late getting posted. Luckily I've had several work projects that have been keeping me busier than I would like but I'm not complaining about that now! Anyway, enjoy the old news. I'll post new info and pictures next week when I get a minute.

We kept Halle's birthday pretty low key this year. For one thing she really doesn't understand it. On top of that we had a major snow/ice storm so the schools were closed on her birthday and the next day. And the final blow was that Paul broke is toe the day before. We had planned on taking her to Chuckie Cheese for the first time. Instead we got take out Chinese food. That way we took care of the Chinese New Year too :) We blew up a few balloons that she enjoyed playing with. We also had a cake with 2 candles. She seemed to understand about blowing out the candles and she was able to with a little help from Mommy & Sami.

With all the snow we received everyone has had fun times playing in it. Keisha still loves it the most though. Kitty even likes to go out and play. Halle is outside now playing with Grandma. It's a nice sunny day here, although it is still chilly. She doesn't seem to mind the cold too much. I'm sure it corresponds to her high tolerance of pain - unless she is really uncomfortable she just goes with the flow. Grandma and I took Halle to the park yesterday. Halle really enjoys the swings. She likes to put her head back and look up at the sky. She also enjoys trying to get/kick me when she swings up. She will get a great big belly laugh when I act like she pushed me. I guess that sick Atkinson humor has already rubbed off on her.

Halle had her 2 year check up on Friday. The doctor said she is doing remarkably well. She is in the 69% percentile for height and 71% for weight. She's a big girl. Just ask my back muscles! The doctor wanted to give her 8 shots. I thought that was a little much. We decided on 4 shots that day and 3 shots next month. She did really well. I think the nurse did a great job. I thought she had just done one when she said she had already done all of them. Similar to the big kids, I had to fight back my own tears. It is such a helpless feeling. Halle did great and only cried for a minute. After that we ran errands. She fell asleep after the bank and slept through getting in and out of her car seat at 3 other stops.

The doctor asked how her language was progressing. I guessed that she was saying 30-40 words. He thought that was great and said that 2 1/2 years old most kids will say that many with the parents understanding 50% of them. For kicks Grandma & I started a list of her words to see how many she actually had. We are past 40 now. Yes, I'm going to list them all to have a permanent record!

We went to the gym at the community center again this morning. She really seemed to have fun. She seems to be doing a little better about not hoarding all the toys. There are only a few other kids around so it is a good chance to get just a little interaction but not overwhelming or intense.

Jacob had another volleyball tournament in Dayton on Sunday that I took him to. We had to leave at 5:50am. Way too early in my book! While Jacob isn't too thrilled with it all he seemed to have fun and his skills are really improving.

Sami is working hard conditioning for soccer. She is going to the Y almost every day after school lifting weights. She also has conditioning with her club team 2 days a week and usually an indoor game once a week too. She is taking the ACT for the first time this weekend so she is going to review sessions at school. Hopefully she can earn some scholarship money through her academics and sports considering her 401b plan lost about a third of its value last check and I'm sure it is even more now!

Happy Birthday Halle - part 1

Okay - I started this post last week. So I don't have to completely start over I'll just make it into 2 separate posts...

I can't believe it has been a whole month since my last post and next week will mark our 3 month anniversary of having Halle. Time sure is flying!

All the holidays/time off school are behind us. Halle and I are finally starting to get into a routine. Good news/bad news on my work - good news is that it has been pretty sparse so Halle and I are getting to spend lots of time together. Bad news is that I'm not doing much to contribute to the family's bank account. This is typically my slow period so I'm trying not to get too worried about what the economy is doing to my livelihood at this point. I'm hoping that the t-shirt end of things will be picking up shortly with the upcoming school spring sports. And luckily Paul has one of the most stable jobs in the country right now.

So, Halle and I are trying to keep busy. We went to the library story time last week and plan to make it a weekly event. It was the second time we went. This time was much better. It was for toddlers. The first one we went to was for preschoolers and she was a little overwhelmed. There is singing, story telling and book reading. I think she spent more time looking around at the other kids to see what they were doing than she did participating with the leader. Today we went to open gym at our community center. They had mats out, a few riding cars, blocks, tunnels and lots of balls. She seemed to enjoy it. She is still anxious when other kids get near the toys she "was" playing with. Once she touches something, it's hers. It seems to be getting better but there is still the orphanage mentality that it's mine and you can't have it. I'm hoping that these two activities will get her more exposure to other kids and help elevate those fears.

I'm trying to put off finding permanent day care until after spring break. At first it was after the holidays but with my work being slow I'm thankful to have the extra time with her now. I'm still not sure what we are going to do yet. Best case scenario would probably be a few mornings a week. That would give me time to get a few hours of work done in the morning and then she could come home for lunch and a nap. I guess I'll put that on my list of things to worry about tomorrow :0

Halle's vocabulary continues to increase daily. She's got so many words I can't count them now. Her best pronounced word is Keisha and it is usually done in a yell. Mirrored behavior?? She still hasn't given a name to Sami yet and she won't say her name either. She usually calls herself baby if she sees a picture of herself or looks in the mirror.

Monday was Chinese New Year. We didn't do anything to celebrate it this year. I'm sure we will do something next year when she can understand some of it.