Life is good

Can't believe it's been so long since I blogged--funny how that seems to happen when you have a child at home. I thought I would be better but wow--it is lower on my priority list than it used to be. Also I really needed a place to vent and to get support during the waiting time and blogger buddies were fabulous for that and then I needed a way to keep in touch with many friends during the referral and trips period and blogger was great for that. Now, life is going along pretty good and I guess I don't feel those needs so acutely anymore. But...it has been long enough that I miss my blog comments so I had to come back.

We have no big exciting news but have just been living normal life and it has been mostly good.

Hannah is doing very well in her daycare--learning new things, expanding her English so much, and making friends, and going to birthday parties. The only glitch we have had is that last week her teacher (who she loved) quit very suddenly--just didn't show up one day and called in quitting. They have been very good about dealing with that at her school and Hannah doesn't seem fazed but I wonder what she really thinks. I just tell her that Mommies never leave and I will always be there to pick her up from school.

She is very independent and I often hear "Hannah do it" when I try to do things for her but despite that I really think our bonding is going quite well. I have 4 recent examples that all made me smile because they are big changes for us.
I took her to a book signing by one of my favorite authors and when we walked into the book store where lots of people were she said, "Hold my hand Mama".
We were at my sisters house and my sister saw her struggling to put on her shoes and offerred to help. Hannah said, "NO, Mama helps me."
I took her to Toy Story 3 at the theatre and at one point she said "I want to sit on your lap Mama" and at another point she just crawled up on my lap and snuggled in.
Hannah loves movies so we have a movie night once a week at home. When she was first home she would sit as far away from me on the couch as she could get and I remember thinking "I hope some day you will sit on my lap during a movie". Now she wants me right next to her and if I am not close enough she slides as close to me as she can get. Sometimes she will even sit on my lap for most of the movie. If I get up to put clothes in the washer or some other little thing I want to get done, she will come find me and ask "What you doing Mom?" and then expect me to come sit with her again.

She usually never lets me out of her sight for more than 5 minutes when we are home but the other night I was talking to my sister on the phone for at least 20 minutes and I never saw or heard Hannah during that time. I went to investigate when I got off the phone and found her in the bathroom---she had about 8 barrettes in her hair, foundation smeared on her face, her clothes, and most of the bathroom sink, and had black mascara lines on her face. There were also two wet washcloths and towels with make-up on them--I think she was trying to clean up her mess. When I caught her, she looked at me and said "Mama, is Hannah pretty?" OMG--of course I told her she was the prettiest girl I had ever seen. and then--we promptly washed off her face and had a discussion about how beautiful Hannah was all the time and that make up is for grown ups, not little girls. She seemed okay with that.
She is such a girly girl that I fear make-up will always be an issue with us. Every single day when we get home she puts on her princess dress and fancy white shoes and wears that for whatever she plans to do--color, dance, watch movies, play with her kitchen or other toys. I finally had to buy another one so she still had one to wear when I was washing it.

She also enjoys helping me and is quite good at drying the small dishes and putting the silverware away from the dishwsher. She also likes to wipe off the counters, cupboard fronts, and anything else she can reach. She never wants to stick around and help me cook though.

Hannah had her first illness since living with me and it was hard on both of us. I took her to church one Sunday morning as usual. Although she was acting very tired that morning so I let her take her blanket into church. Well it was a good thing--about 3/4 of the way through mass she just suddenly vomited. She was sitting on my lap so it went all down my front and her front and then I caught it in her blanket. No harm to the church but we left immediately. Then she had a fever for the next two days and a sore throat for about a week. Strep was negative--just a virus. During the time she was sick she was not herself. She became very whiney and cried a the drop of a hat. She dissolved into tears when I gave her the wrong part of the apple she wanted to eat and had such a pitiful cry anytime I told her no. It was very hard to walk that line between discipline to stop those behaviors and sympathy and caring because I knew she didn't feel well. I was afraid that if I let them produce postive results they would continue after the virus was gone. But..I couldn't just let her cry and held her and cuddled her every time. Fortunately the virus left and she is back to normal. When I tell her "No", she smiles and says "yes", and then when I repeat "No", she gives in and just says "OK"--that's the girl I know.

Here in Rochester they started a "Music of the World" series of concerts. The very first one was a group called Huun Huur Tu--they come from the Tuvan Republic of the Russian Federation and are known around the world for thier Tuvan throat singing techniques. The group was formed in the early 1990's and they now tour the world. It consists of four throat singers who also play traditional Tuvan instruments.
Hannah and I attended the concert. I thought it might be a bit much for a four year old to sit through a whole concert but she was amazing. She loved every minute of their music. She swayed and rocked along to the beat and clapped wildly after every song through the whole 2 hours. She got close to falling asleep but wouldn't let herself.
The music was awesome--I was truly amazed.
I had a great time enjoying the music and also enjoying Hannah's joy.
We got to meet the band afterwards--they were very happy to meet a little girl that was from their "neighborhood".
It was so fun and I am so glad that I took Hannah. I feel like it was a once in a lifetime opportunity for us.
We didn't get home until 10pm and Hannah fell asleep on the short ride home. I carried her in and got her in her pajamas without waking her and then went to just lay her down but...she opened her eyes and said "prayers first mom". She stayed awake through all the prayers and then promptly fell back asleep. It is so good to know that she is really listening every night.

I would like to add pictures but my computer is not recognizing my photo card right now so I have to figure that out and will put pictures on my next post.


Our life sounds boring when people ask me what we've done (not very much) but it has been the most fun and exciting 6 months of my life.