Jodi Speaks Her Mind

Family update 11/24/2007

I have been quite busy as may be expected, but I’m going to see what I can throw together as an update.

First of all, Sophie is doing really well. She continues to bless us with a most pleasant personality, a sweet temperament, and a love for her new life. She is eating well, sleeping okay, and exploring her new world with fervor. She smiles so often that I think we are all feeling uplifted by her presence. She isn’t perfect by any stretch and has so much to learn about life in a family, communication, and so many things. But she is taking it all in stride and seems to fit in just perfectly. She loves to get tossed into the air, swing at the park, climb, walk, play in the sand, and so many other things that kids just love to do. She loves her clothes and it is not unusual for her to change her outfit 3 or 4 times a day. This will eventually have to stop, but since she is also a terribly messy little toddler, it is often not such a big deal. And the textures and colors and patterns are all so new to her. She just wants to experience it all, and who can blame her!? So we indulge for now.

As for communication, she is definitely starting to clue in to sign language. She hasn’t completely “gotten it” yet, but she definitely understands a few signs, and there are a few she will sign when prompted or with modeling. She still doesn’t sign anything spontaneously, but we are confident that it will come.

Adelina and Sophie are starting to bond. This is a big deal because, for the most part, Adelina has been rather offended by Sophie’s presence in our house and family. For awhile, everything Sophie did was wrong including standing in the same room Adelina was in. Touching and relocating toys and other items makes her positively insane. Finally, she is beginning to learn how to play with Sophie in simple and fun ways. Their favorite “game” so far is for Adelina to play horse and for Sophie to ride on her back. This is so cute, as they are each just the right size to do their part. Sophie is definitely light enough, and Adelina is definitely strong enough.

I’m not sure what else to share. Life is full and life is fun. Sophie has an easy going personality, so that provides some balance to Adelina’s more “spirited” temperament. I’ve decided to enroll Sophie and myself in a parent-tot swimming class to allow Sophie to begin to get more comfortable in the water. She is still warming up to baths, so it may take some time. Since we’re having a pool put in soon, it makes sense to start acclimating her to swimming sooner rather than later. Also, we’ll be enrolling Adelina into gymnastics starting this coming week. She is really excited, and I think the timing is good. She has enough receptive language to follow along with the instructions, especially since they will be followed immediately by physical examples of whatever the instructions were. She has been working on cartwheels, handstands, and the like in the living room for several months now, so it will be neat to see what she is able to do. If she stays true to past trends, she will do quite well. She seems to be a born athlete.

Adelina started at her new school this past week, but it was something of a rough first week. First of all, it was a 3 day week, and she stayed home on Monday because she was sick clear up through Sunday night, and I wasn’t going to send her off the next morning even if she was fever-free because she could relapse too easily. But she seemed enough improved on Monday, so Tuesday was her official first day. The van that was supposed to pick her up ended up being two HOURS late, which is ridiculous, but evidently that had never happened before. Oh well, even with the delay, her first day seemed to go well. Then Wednesday, only her second day at her new school, and she got sick on the van ride home. She threw up twice and arrived home a most disgusting mess. I felt so bad for her. Evidently they had eaten a huge Thanksgiving feast at school, and then she and a friend were playing with toys all the way home. We are pretty sure it was just a bad case of motion sickness. Unfortunately, her stomach continued to refuse food until Thursday morning, when, thankfully, she woke up feeling fine and ready for some fun with friends.

Thanksgiving was really nice. I baked two pies - (go me!) and a big green jello salad to contribute to a multi-family Thanksgiving dinner. We had a wonderful time. Sophie seemed very relaxed and played well with one of the other kids while Adelina pretended to be a horse the whole time (shocker!). All the kids and adults had a great time. I was amazed at how easy it has been thus far with Sophie to engage in semi-normal life. When we came home with Adelina, that was definitely not the case (see paragraph six).

Well, that’s all I have time for now. Belated Happy Thanksgiving to all my readers!