Help Me!

You know the old joke about how you spend the first 2 years of a child’s life trying to get them to talk, then the next 16 trying to get them to shut up? Yeah, well, I taught Ying to say something that I am really starting to regret (and no, Mom, it’s not ARM PIT – nor is it a profanity). She had a habit of going into a different room, then crying because she wanted something. Well, a couple of time she was in another room crying because she had gotten herself into a situation that she couldn’t get out of. Unfortunately for her, I was so used to the crying because she couldn’t reach the rubber duck in the bottom of the tub or get the hall closet doors open that I didn’t respond quickly when she really needed me (like the time her fingers were stuck in the doggy door – hey, I told her not to put her hand in there!). So, I taught her to ask for help – specifically to say “HELP ME” when she is hurt or stuck and needs Mama to come help her. Stupid, stupid Mommy. We now have an average of 7 “help me” situations a day. I’ll be busy making dinner or throwing some laundry into the washer when I’ll hear “Mama, help me, help me”. Yeah, help me get some strawberry milk. Help me strap Blue Bear into the stroller. Help me take my pajamas off. Not one time has “help me” been used in an actual emergency type situation. She’s like that little boy crying wolf. Pretty soon I’m going to stop responding to the “help mes” – and you know as soon as I do she’ll get her hair caught in the dryer door. Some lifes, you just can’t win.

Shhhhhhh

Baby is sleeping. She fell asleep sitting on the bottom of the stairs a J's house. The girls covered her up before J saw her and snapped a picture (then moved her to a more comfortable napping spot).

When the Door Bell Rings at 4:30 in the Blessed AM!

You just know it can't be anything good. I mean, those Publisher's Clearinghouse guys hardly ever show up pre-dawn, right. So when my lovely door bell chimes gently woke me from my slumber at 4:28 am today, I really wasn’t excited to go see who it was. It was my neighbor. On his way to work. At 4:28 am. (It sounds as if his life sucks more than mine.) My garage door was open. Yeah, I forgot to close it last night. Hey, I had a migraine. I’m lucky I remembered to unbuckle the kids. Thanks a lot, buddy. I’ll get that door closed right away. Then go back to sleep – like normal people do at 4:30 in the blessed AM!

I got back in bed and had to move Ying over off of the 2.5 inches of mattress that they allow me to sleep on. Apparently, she was very, very tired and thought I was trying to wake her up. Her response: “Mama, more sleeps.”

Exactly what I need in my life. More sleeps.

It's Hard to Take a Picture of a Moving Target

One Year Ago

Exactly one year ago, I met Little Bit for the first time. I had been looking at the same three little pictures of her for over 8 months by then, and I had her little face memorized. When I opened the door and saw her in the hall, being held by a nanny, my first thought was, "That's her, but she's just a tiny baby." She was 19 months old. Except for the mouth full of teeth, she could have passed for a 6 month old. I was in awe of her. She was so tiny, but she had this little look on her face like, "Hey, don't mess with me, lady." Tiny, but tough. The first time I held her, she was not as into the moment as I was. In fact, she really just wanted to be done with whatever business brought her to this room so that she could get the heck out of there. She was swimming in a huge orange sweat suit and little blue shoes that some other baby had practically worn the soles off of. I don't remember what I said to the orphanage staff. I was too busy drinking in this amazing little girl. She was just so pitiful – trying to be brave. When I look at the pictures of her from that day, I can't believe it's only been a year. She's come so far in a year. She's learned so much – most importantly, she's learned that Mama is pretty nice, and having a Mama is a very good thing. Last night, we were both still feeling pretty cruddy. Ying was being fussy and just wanted Mama to hold her. I asked her if she was tired. Yes. Do you want to go to bed? No. Do you want to go to bed with Mama? Yes. Do you want Mama to snuggle you? Yes. Then she laid her head over on my shoulder and sighed. 366 days ago, we were strangers. Now, we are a family. What a miracle.

Apparently, I Can

be sick. So much for the power of positive thinking. Day 6 and I am still not feeling great.

I CANNOT BE SICK!!

OK, I'm just gonna to put it out there to God and the universe and whatever - I cannot be sick this week. This cough HAS to go. The chest pain - be gone with you! The ever-so-slight fever - I banish you! To put it mildly, I don’t have time to be sick. I absolutely HAVE to teach a class tomorrow. They’ve already been postponed once, twice would NOT look good. I really, really need to get our other lab set up on Thursday. And, of course, on Friday we have to go to Riley for Little Bit’s appointment. That’s a three-hour drive that I can’t do sick. Oh, and we are supposed to go visit the grandparents after the appointment. Mom (aka “poppaw” – yeah, we don’t know why, either) is having knee-replacement surgery on Monday, so I can’t go see her if I’m a walking germ factory. So, power of positive thinking: I AM NOT SICK. I AM NOT SICK. I AM NOT (hack, hack, cough, cough) SICK!

“Failure to Thrive”

Eleven months ago when Dr. E first diagnosed my little Ying-a-Bing with "failure to thrive" I wasn't really too surprised. She had spent her first 19 months in a place where the goal was merely to survive, not thrive. I smugly thought that after a few months of good old American food with its excessive caloric and fat contents, my girl will be thriving. So, I took her home and fed her. A lot. You want French fries, baby? You got 'em! Ice cream? No problem. Six fish sticks? Here you go. She ate, and ate, and ate. And, 11 months later, she has gained a whopping 4 pounds – most of it in her first 5 months home.

So, yesterday we saw Dr. E again. He plotted Little Bit's weight and found that she is no longer following her own curve. See, average size kids (like OBaby) grow on a curve – the older they get, the more they weigh (and the taller they get) so the curve goes up and out. As long as an unusually small baby is following this curve (not on it, below it, but still following the curve) they are ok – just little. The graphic above shows the height/weight charts for girls. The top curve is height, the bottom weight. The red dots are where Ying falls on the chart. As you can see, she's a lot closer to being in the bottom 3% for height than weight, but right now she's in the negatives for both.

Once again, Dr. E labeled her with that awful diagnosis – Failure to Thrive. Failure of Mama to be able to fatten baby up. Unbelievable. I mean seriously, for someone in MY family to need to fatten up and not be able to? Inconceivable! Suddenly I'm not feeling so smug about my parenting skills or that good old American food. She's been eating like a baby truck driver for 11 months, and yet still she fails to thrive. Damn.

The doctor then decided that it is time for Ying to see a specialist – a Pediatric Gastroenterologist. So, next Friday we will trek down to Riley to see the Peds GI specialist. Gee, aren't I getting to learn a whole lot of neat new medical terms. Hopefully, we will find out something that will help get Little Bit onto the charts!

Baby's Feeling Better

I am very relieved to report that YBaby is on the mend. The fever is gone, and she is starting to act like her old self again.

However, today I am reminded of how much worse this virus can be. A woman I work with has a little boy in the ICU at the local hospital today. He had been being treated for pneumonia-like symptoms (much like YBaby’s) when he had a seizure. His big brother is in OBaby’s class. There but for the grace of God . . .

So, today I won’t whimper or whine about how hard the last week was. I’ll just be grateful that my sweet baby is getting better, and I’ll say a little prayer for Baby D and his family. There truly is almost nothing worse than a sick baby.

Quote of the Day

YBaby and I are home sick again today (she’s been sick for 2 days, I’m just sick of being home). She is feeling much better, and the fever hasn’t gone much over 102 today. She is currently playing with a balloon, tossing it up and trying to catch it. Every time she misses, she says her new favorite expression, “Awwww, man!” I don’t know where she picked that up, but it is cute as heck. The best is the way she draws it out. Just too funny. I know, you’re all sorry you’re missing it, aren’t you?

Color My World

Yesterday, as I was carrying YBaby out to the car from her sitter’s house, it was snowing big, huge flakes. We were all three getting covered in snow. YBaby looked at me with this serious little face and said, “Mama, white on me!” I just smiled and said, “Yes, baby, it’s just snow, it won’t hurt us.” She gave me her best fake laugh, and continued wiping the white off of her coat, just in case Mama was, like, not right about the whole not hurting us thing.

BTW, pink is YBaby’s favorite color (OBaby’s has always been blue). However, it is the only color she can’t pronounce correctly. She can say red, blue, yellow – even orange and purple. But her beloved pink is “peent”. Of course, when singing the Wonder Pets song, (“What’s gonna work? Teamwork!”) she does have the cutest little way of saying, “tee-wort” so I guess that means we need to work harder on those ending “k”s.

You Can’t Make This Stuff Up

Ok, my kid just cracks me up. Really, she's THAT funny all the time. Last night we were talking about her birthday party. We have discussed several time how to politely accept a gift – even if it's something we don't care for (like Bratz stuff). OBaby told me that if Michael or Seamus give her a gift she really likes, she is going to give them a hug. I laughed and said, "Oh, you just like to hug boys." Her response – "Oh, Mommy, that's not true. I like to kiss them."

Heaven help me.

Hail to the Chief

The Today Show was on while we were getting dressed this morning. OBaby was listening to Hilary Clinton talk when she suddenly announced, "I want to be president of the U-nited States, Mommy." (OBaby, not Hilary) I just nodded and said "Sure, honey, when you grow up." No point going into the whole "you can't be president because you weren't born in the US" conversation since I totally expect Arnold's people to get that problem fixed long before O is old enough to vote, let alone run.

"No, Mommy, I want to be president now."

Hmm, well, how do we respond to this? Oh, yeah, "Well, babe, you have to be a grown up and at least as old as Mrs. Clinton before you can be the president."

"Oh." Still, I could see the wheels were still turning. "Ok, then can I be the president of the Baby U-nited States?"

So, it's official. OBaby is now running for president of the Baby U-nited States. She is accepting contributions to her college, er, I mean campaign fund.

Why I’ll Never Sleep Alone

Last night, the girls were in rare form – neither one listening to me or obeying my too frequent demands that they get in bed and be quite. Finally, I totally lost all patience with them and sent them both to sleep in their own room. They have a queen size bed in there, so it's not like they can't still sleep together. Well, judging by the reaction, you'd think I'd sent them to sleep in a den of vipers. They both screamed and cried and sobbed. Ying got out of bed and came to me in the family room. I tried the Super Nanny thing and took her back to her bed and explained that she needed to sleep here with jie-jie and Mama would sleep in her bed. I went into my room and closed the door. Through the wall I could hear the wailing. Then I heard Ying outside my door sobbing so hard I was afraid she would throw up. I heard Bella scratch at the door, but still I didn't open the door. A couple of minutes later, I hear Bella coming through the half bath into my room, with Ying right behind her. I could just imagine her telling Ying, "Hey, follow me kid. I know a back way into your mom's room." Bella came in the room, stood and looked at me for a minute, then left – "Here's your kid, lady. She wants you." Now I have a sobbing Ying standing in the middle of my floor. I picked her up, thinking I would take her back to her bed, then realized that the poor little thing was scared to death. I asked her if she was ok – head nod "no". "Do you want to sleep with Mama?" – tiny little whisper "yes". DANG. I am never going to get to sleep alone, ever, in my entire life. They both ended up sleeping in my bed last night. And I ended up feeling like a total jerk because Ying really was just terrified by the idea of not sleeping with Mama. Score: Girls 1, Mama 0.

Chinese New Year, Part I

We went to the first of three Chinese New Year Celebrations we will be attending this year. Last night we went to a party at a local restaurant for our local group of Families With Chinese Children. It was a nice party. There were tons of beautiful little girls there with their families. OBaby enjoyed doing crafts and helping Mommy fill her plate (something I don't normally let her do). YBaby enjoyed a nice nap. Yeah, she fell asleep on the way to the party and slept for an hour and a half. I had to wake her up at 6 so that she would be able to sleep last night. She woke up in a good mood and enjoyed seeing so many of her friends. Thursday (the day of the actual new year) we go to dinner at our favorite Chinese place, then next Sunday is the big new year's event at the Chinese Christian Church and co-sponsored this year by the university Chinese student group. By the end of the month we will have had our fill of dim sum and then some!

Olivia working on her dragon.

Ying all-partied out - before the party!

She finally joined the party and scarfed down some yummy food!

They Grow Up So Fast

OBaby got her ears pierced yesterday. She asked if she could have it done for her birthday. She was very sure she wanted it done – even if it was going to hurt. Fortunately, it didn’t hurt. She held my hand while the ladies did it, and her only reaction was to say “ouch” – yeah, not even a capital letters OUCH, just a very calm little ouch. No tears, no whining, no complaints. She was great. What a big girl. Sigh.

More Pictures

The proofs of the girls photos are online. I can't give you a direct link, but you can click here, then click on the link to Enter Site (the picture of the guy playing a guitar). This will take you to the site homepage. Click the link for the CLIENTS page. My password is DTCA (all in caps). Then you can see all of the amazing photos of the girls. Today my favorites are 05, 06, 08, 09, 17, 18, 21, 22, and 27.

If you need a good laugh

Go check out this lady on UTube. I laughed until I couldn't breathe – family, you know what I mean. She is hysterical and clean! Enjoy.

Hey, Did You Happen to See the Most Beautiful Girls in the World?

I took the girls to have pictures taken by a professional photographer today - you know the kind who doesn't work at Sears! After seeing her sample shots, all I can say is WOW! See for yourself. http://indigomoment.typepad.com/everything_indigo/

About Bella

We have had a run of back luck with pets. First, our beloved Marbles had to be put down back in August. That broke my heart. Then we brought home the cats only to learn the hard way that OBaby is apparently extremely allergic to cats. Back to the rescue group they went. Then, we got Sammy – the perfect dog for us ON PAPER! In reality, not so much so. He was a purebred Havanese so he should have been great with kids. Yeah, no. He was like the Tasmanian Devil – he never stopped wreaking havoc on our house. Plus, he was really way too aggressive with YBaby. The final straw was when he peed ON MY BED not once but TWICE in two days. That's when I knew it was time for Sammy to find a new family to terrorize. We delivered him in all his craziness to a nice girl from the Havanese rescue. So, we were pet-less for about 3 months. See, I told O that we would talk about getting another dog after Christmas. December 26^th, she started in on me again – "Mommy, can we get a dog? Mommy, I miss Marbles. Mommy . . . " I see a great future ahead for her as a lawyer or maybe a police detective. A couple of hours alone with her and criminals would be confessing to crimes they only thought about committing!

So, as of Saturday, we again have a dog. She is a little Chihuahua/pug mix (known as a chug). She's about a year old and lost her home in the floods we had around her a couple of weeks ago. She is housebroken, likes kids, doesn't jump on people, and seems to know how to live in a house like a civilized little animal. She doesn't even beg when we eat in front of her! How nice is that – we can actually eat a meal without having to lock the dog outside.

We've settled on the name Bella. It's cute, and Ying can say it, so Bella she is. Hopefully, this one is a keeper (yes, Mandy, I added that just for you!).

Bella

Being Impor-tant

The other night I was trying to find something to wear to work the next day. OBaby was playing in the laundry room and asked what I was doing. I told her I was trying to find something nice to wear to work the next day because I had to give a lecture and I needed to look important. Without missing a beat (or looking up from her toys) OBaby replied in a very serious voice, "You are impor-tant, Mommy. You're a mommy."

God, I love that kid.

Pee

We are working on potty training with Ying in my typical let's-not-get-in-a-hurry-and-actually-accomplish-anything kind of way. By that I mean I have shown her the potty, talked about it quite a lot, and even sat her on it several times – 2 or 3 times actually resulting in pee pee in the potty (which, of course, requires my patented "Pee Pee in the Pot-tay" song and dance). But, overall, we're not getting too anal about it (pardon the pun!). She likes to run around naked (really, who doesn't?), which in our house, thanks to my baby sister, is referred to as "naked bacon". Yeah, we don't know why either. But, it's totally cute to see naked Ying running around yelling "naka naka" while patting her tummy.

So, back to pee. Last night, I was letting Ying run around being "naked bacon". I explained to her that if she needed to pee, she should tell Momma and I would take her to the potty. Ok, so then I took the trash out. When I came in, Ying ran up to me and said, "Pee, pee, pee". I'm mentally praising myself for raising such a brilliant child, coming to tell me that she needs to go pee. So I say, "Ok, let's go to the potty". She takes my hand and leads me not to the bathroom, but to the hallway where she points to a wet spot on the carpet and proudly proclaims, "PEE!" Darned if she wasn't right.

Sigh.

Back By Popular Demand

Ok, ok, I heard you. You miss seeing how cute and funny and simply adorable the girls are. So, here are some pictures to tide you over until I have time to write up some of their unbearable cuteness.


Christmas angels. This would have been our Christmas card picture, if I had sent out Christmas cards this year.


My pop star wannabe.


"Check me out – I got pony tails!" From bald to ponies in only 10 months.


Yes, she's asleep. She picked the hat out herself – and it's the only one she will keep on her head!

A hug or a head-lock? You decide.

Sleeping beauties.

Breakfast with Santa