No other blogs to read, so I guess I'll write my own

The kids and I were at a fundraiser Thursday night (go CSD students! you rock!) and I ran into a former colleague who said, "I loved your blog; I can't believe how tall Nora has gotten!" This made me nostalgic for the blog, which was always such a nice distraction from work (lately work NONSENSE has been consuming my every minute). So here I am, two years and two weeks since my last post. Jack has been home 2 years and 5 months (holy crap!) and has been implanted for two years, 2 months. He goes to regular preschool and is doing great. Nora is in second grade and loves running, crocheting, playing chess, drawing, and playing Star Wars with her brother. We are down to 1 dog (finally) which it seemed we never would be. But time just keeps marching on! Generally speaking, my life is pretty boring, so I'm not sure what I'll write about anymore. Hopefully an inspiration will strike me...

Progress

Yeah, I suck.

And I'm not even going to pretend to have a reasonable excuse. My kids are not super-hard; they both go to be easily and early, sleep through the night, and wake up late. My job is flexible; I get a lot of vacations and people WANT ME to bring my children into work.

I'm just still processing all of this. And, let's face it, I'm kind of old to be chasing around a toddler (and I do a lot of chasing--he doesn't hear very well, so I can't just yell. Much as I love to do that). I'm tired. I'm overwhelmed. I'm constantly running.

Also I've been doing a terrible job taking pictures. I can never find the camera.

But for those who are curious, Jack is doing great. Oh, and we've started calling him "Jack", because it really....fits! Jack now has bilateral cochlear implants. He has been hearing sound for exactly seven weeks today. Here is what he can do already (keep in mind that he has only been hearing English for SEVEN short weeks--that's not even two months):

He understands many animal sounds (moo, woof-woof, quack, bawk-bawk-bawk, meow, baaaahhhh, squeak-squeak, ooo-ooo-ah-ah [monkey]); sound associations (la-la-la, brrrrr, ahhhhh, shhhh, woo-woo-woo, choo choo) words (bye-bye, hi, hot, shoes, please, open, more, milk, up, poop [yeah. poop], head, uh-oh, ow, down) phrases (all done, change your diaper, night-night, sit down) and songs (itsy bitsy spider, head shoulders knees and toes). And today, he said "mama" for the first time! He also says "up," "more," "ow," "ahhhhh," "meow", "moo", "hi." I'm sure there are things I'm missing. He's impressively smart. Oh, and he identifies and signs about 13 letters of the alphabet already.

Nora has transitioned well to sisterhood, and is a great big sister and helper. Jack loves, loves, LOVES her. He wants to be with her all the time and wants to do whatever she is doing.

Nora turned six in February! I just can't believe it. Here they are playing Twister. Sort of.




We made spam musabi. At Nora's request.


Here is a letter that Nora wrote to us:

Boys v Girls (or, my boy v my girl)

I'm not one for gender stereotyping, but I am enjoying the differences (and similarities) that are emerging between my two kids.

The Boy: Wakes up cheerful. Really, Crazy Cheerful.
The Girl: Almost always wakes up in a bad mood.
The Boy: Loves the dog. Terrified of the ferns in the front yard.
The Girl: Completely indifferent to the dog. Fears nothing in nature; once touched a snake to her face and then asked if it might bite.
The Boy: Sobs uncontrollably if I put a different pair of shoes on his feet.
The Girl: Never met a new shoe she didn't like. Would wear a new pair of shoes every days of the year if we could afford it.
The Boy: Completely emotionally transparent. In fact, one may even describe him as a bit "simple."
The Girl: Takes us minimally two days to figure out why she is upset.
The Boy: Does not hold a grudge
The Girl: Remembers personal transgressions we committed two years ago. At least. Reminds us of them frequently.
The Boy: Is easily consoled either by a hug, or food.
The Girl: Makes us work for it.
The Boy: Falls down a lot.
The Girl: Fastest kid in kindergarten, and possibly first grade.
The Boy: Wants to cuddle.
The Girl: Wants to ski, run, bike, swim...etc. etc. etc.

They are, of course, both perfect. perfect. perfect. Nora claims to love Jack Kai--hard to say really. He is a little bit indifferent to her, and she isn't happy about sharing her cars (they are actually his cars, but if he doesn't play with them for at least five minutes, she takes possession of them).

While Jack Kai is still stuck to me like glue, I did manage to take a shower yesterday without an audience. Yay for privacy! So his anxiety about being abandoned is subsiding, albeit slowly. Hopefully when he can hear a bit better, and/or his communication becomes more sophisticated, he will begin to understand all of this craziness. In terms of his communication, he understands a bunch of signs: shoes, please, thank you, more, banana, milk, water, light, sock, ow, sleep, yes, no, dog, cat, daddy, sit down, eat...and he has used: ow, water, no, thank you, please, more, light, yes, daddy, all done, cat, and dog spontaneously. Every day it seems he learns at least one word. "Light" is BY FAR his favorite word. The communication piece is harder and, at the same time, easier than it was with Nora. Kai doesn't understand as much, but he is a much "clearer" communicator in many ways. He wants us to be able to understand what he wants, whereas Nora was a bit more stubborn.

As is clear from the below pictures, despite their differences, they are bonding. Rather, Nora is doing her best to bond with him. And he is going along for the ride, as long as the game she is holding looks like fun.

My kingdom for one millimeter of personal space

I'm not going to complain, though. I love this velcro boy.

We had a mellow Christmas...very civilized under the circumstances. Nora woke up at a reasonable hour and ran downstairs. She was most excited and impressed that Santa remembered the soccer ball bike bell that she saw several weeks ago at Kulshan Cycles ("What the heck? How did Santa know about this?!").

Jack Kai cared only about food (as is typical for him first thing in the morning. Here's how it goes: He wakes up. He looks for me. He drapes himself over my body like, "I'm going to pin you down here. You are never leaving my side, not even to get up and pee." I bring him downstairs. I make my coffee. I shove a banana in his mouth and pray that he will let me put him down long enough to go to the bathroom and feed the dogs. Usually he does not, but this is getting better). He did manage to open a present or two and then lost interest entirely.

You will notice that in most of these pictures, my boy is eating.

Nora, on the other hand, enjoyed Christmas immensely.

More cuteness, less food:

In other COMPLETELY AND UTTERLY FABULOUS news, all of our cochlear implant candidacy appointments are scheduled for early- to mid-January! Kai may have surgery as early as the end of January or in early February. We are so lucky and grateful to have such wonderful people at Seattle Children's Hospital working on Kai's behalf to move this process along. And Kai is SO ready. He is chattering away, trying so, so hard to communicate with us and just "fit in." It really is totally adorable. It is remarkable how easy it is for me to determine exactly what he wants, even though he can't tell me. He is just a very, very easy kid to read and he uses wonderful strategies. We're excited to see how much he can do once he can hear more!

Merry Christmas everyone! And Happy New Year!

Chicken pix, giardia, hearing tests, oh my!

We are hunkered down here. The chicken pox have passed, but Kai tested positive for giardia, so we've moved on to bigger things. This wasn't at all a shock...I've been changing his diapers for three weeks. But I think the pediatrician felt kind of bad about giving me the news.

Yesterday, Kai and I made the 2-hour drive to Seattle Children's hospital for his first behavioral hearing test! It went A LOT better than I expected. A LOT. He figured out the task immediately (much to everyone's shock) and we were able to get an entire audiogram for both ears in about 15 minutes! As expected, he has a pretty severe loss in both ears. Then Kai was fit with hearing aids. Definitely it was a little bit hard for me to watch when they first put in the hearing aids. I realized just at that moment that he would be reliant on technology for the rest of his life. Of course, without technology (and/or lots of other supports) he would not be able to communicate with anyone, or be educated, or learn to read. So at the same time, the technology is really miraculous and also a gift. And he has done really well so far with the hearing aids. He doesn't hear a lot with them--he is currently being evaluated for a cochlear implant because of the severity of his loss--but he definitely noticed when the hearing aids were turned on. He even pointed to the test booth (where his hearing was first tested) when he initially heard sound through the hearing aids. But otherwise, he is still quite dependent on visual cues.

Home and well (except for the pox on our house)

True to form, we arrived home at 4:00 p.m. on Friday afternoon and were at the pediatrician's office first thing Saturday morning. Kai has chicken pox! He must have been exposed in China, and it's a good thing he didn't completely break out in a rash until last night, because we might have been quarantined in China for a week (or two)! John would have left us there, I'm certain. He and Nora are SO OVER China.

Otherwise, Kai is doing beautifully. He has a sweet spirit this little guy--very good-natured and cheerful. He wakes up happy, he goes to sleep happy. He loves, loves, loves to be held. He is already developing a healthy attachment to both John and me (worries when we leave, won't go to strangers). And he LOVES Maia. He wants me to take her out all the time. He communicates like crazy--chatters, signs, points, pulls. He is (dare I say)...easy. But it could also be the chicken pox taking him down a little. ;-)

Here are the signs I have seen him use: please, more, no (this one is super-cute: he throws something, then shakes his head VERY seriously and signs NO at himself), sleep, light, strawberry, water, dog, shhh, thank you, car, eat, help. I think that's all. Whenever I sign "mother" or "father", he gives me a high-five.

We are all happy to be home! China was hard this time; I'm not gonna sugar coat it. First of all, the process has changed a bit, and we had a lot of short appointments spread out over many days (medical appointment, TB read, consulate appointment, visa pick-up). And unfortunately, in Guangzhou, our hotel was a 30 minute cab ride from everything. The Garden, while luxurious, is in the middle of the Guangzhou business district (charmless, busy, noisy, not-at-all-kid-friendly). We much preferred the location of the Holiday Inn ShiFu (where we stayed for Nora's adoption), just for its walkability and proximity to Shamian Island, the Market, and Number 9 Street. Also, this trip was really hard on Nora--it was boring and lonely for her and she was not on her best behavior (of course, that might have had something to do with all the HBO and junk food we allowed). She is just so, so SOOOO happy to be home with her buddies. Thanks, friends, BTW, for thinking about Nora so much since we've been home. The second we got off at the Bellingham exit, Nora woke up and exclaimed "we're HERE!" so happily and sweetly. She is officially a pacific northwest girl. She asked me "if we get home early enough, can we take Kai into Fairhaven to meet Penny and Kelly [they are the owners of "A lot a flowers" in Bellingham]? He needs to learn his way around and meet everyone." It's nice to live in a small-ish town. Nora is also very worried that once Kai gets his hearing aids (next week! YAY!) he will be very confused that no one is speaking Mandarin. I wish he had heard some Mandarin...I'm doubtful.

The pollution, traffic, and overcrowding in China were especially apparent and difficult on this trip as well, probably because we were trying to get two children in and out of taxi cabs, elevators, and busy shops--and Kai is a really big boy! And neither of the kids like being hot (hard to avoid when four people are squeezed into the back of a herky-jerky taxi cab for thirty minutes). Driving was the harrowing experience that we remembered and expected; we had to do much more of it on this trip, though. And I've decided, it's not that pedestrians don't have the right of way in China, it's that there really is no notion of "right of way". It doesn't matter if one is a on a bike, in a car, or on foot. Pretty much the rule appears to be, "whoever gets there first and is the biggest has the right of way."

It just wears a person out. It really, really does.

And, I'll admit, I'm totally overwhelmed with the idea of having two kids, one with significant needs (and oh my god...! It's not even an IDEA any more!). There were moments of doubt in China (there are still moments of doubt). But he has such a beautiful personality, this kid. It's impossible not to love him. It's plain criminal not to love him.

It's not that there weren't some amazing things about this trip. It had its lovely moments. Visiting Kai's orphanage and meeting all of Kai's friends and care providers was wonderful. I was able to take pictures of many of the kids who are waiting to meet their families. While we were waiting to travel, so many families who visited Xuzhou took pictures for us, and I am so grateful to them; it felt good to be able to return that favor. We weren't able to visit Nora's orphanage, so I didn't really know what to expect with that--there were many, many boys. I would estimate that nearly 90% of the waiting toddlers were boys. In the infant room, the ratio was more like 50/50, but all but one of the waiting toddlers were boys. The girls just get matched faster; families are much more open to girls, and girls with more significant needs--I know I've stated this before, but Kai would never have waited had he been born a girl. And literally ALL of the children at Xuzhou had special needs. We met NO families during our trip who were adopting NSN children (we saw dozens of adoptive families in our hotel and on the island). This is exactly the opposite of what we experienced on our last trip (last time, we were the only family of a child with special needs and there were not that many families completing adoptions while we were there). The face of Chinese adoption has certainly changed, even since we adopted Nora. This is largely due to economic changes in China--I saw at least a dozen families with more than one child on this trip. Our guide in Nanjing told us that many people in China want, and can now afford to have, more than one child.

Anyway, I don't think anyone in this family will go back to China any time soon. Nora is especially China-averse, it seems.

And, for those of you who are local, we are taking visitors, as long as you're chicken pox immune. :-)

Here is Kai, getting ready to head to the airport in Guangzhou! Last moments in China...

Here is Kai with our guide in Guangzhou, Aron. She was extremely competent, although I think we disappointed her by not doing a lot of site-seeing.

Both kids were SUPER on the 12+ hour trip back to the states.

Playing with all his new toys (Nora's old toys).

The ubiquitous "sleeping" picture. So cute. He loves to suck on his shirt when he's tired, sweet boy.

I think I hate blog press

I just wrote an ENTIRE "goodbye China" post, and right at the end, Blog press crashed. And since I have to get up in six hours, I don't have it in me to write it again. We will be home soon!

Here are some pictures anyway (I hope).




























- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Location:Jianshe Rd,Guangzhou,China