My dolls

The girls were playing with their dolls before bed tonight.  

Here is ZoraLin and Kanani.

Tessa and Piper.

Kendalan and Roxie.

Jordis and Jordan.

Ho Ho Ho!

Hard to believe that Christmas has come and gone.   After Santa and Mrs. Claus visited opening the present was kind of anti-climatic.   We opened the gifts on Christmas Eve day as I had to work Christmas Day.   The night before we did our traditional one gift of Mom and Dad's choice.  Even though we have done this for years, the girls always forget that the gift is pajamas!   I bought them all H@nna And*rsson jamies this year and they were so soft and warm I wish I had a pair myself!

Today we headed to the closest American Girl store so Kendalan and Jordis could cash in on their gift certificate from Santa for their choice of doll.   Tessa and Zora each took their dolls to get new outfits. The store was crammed full of girls and their dolls!!   I would love to see what the total sales were in the store today.    Jordis came home with her doll who is named Jordan.   Kendalan has Roxie.   These two girls join Zora's Kanani and Tessa's Piper and they are all a well dressed group!!

Visitors!

We were getting ready to start supper last night when the door bell rang.   All of a sudden I heard "It's Santa!"   Sure enough, Santa and Mrs. Claus were at our house!   The girls were pretty much in shock.  Their manners went out the window as they stood and stared at the pair.    I suggested that Santa and the Mrs. have a seat.   The girls sat stiffly on the couch while Santa asked them if they had been good this year.   He also mentioned that an Elf named Dasher had come to see him with some information.   They looked a little nervous when Santa asked them if they know Dasher!   They told Santa that Dasher had left last night and we hadn't seen him since.  

With Mrs. Claus helping, Santa read "The Night Before Christmas." to the girls.   After the book Santa invited the girls to take turns telling him what they wanted for Christmas.   The girls were very shy and we chose RaeAnne to go first as it was also her 13th birthday!   She told him she wanted either a laptop or a video camera.

Jordis was next and she told the man in red that she wants an American Girl doll with a purple dress.

ZoraLin finally sat on his lap and wasn't shy about telling the duo, "I want it ALL!"   One of everything in the Justice store that is.  

Tessa is still under the weather.   Even though Santa tried his best to coax her, she remained laying on Dad's lap.

Kendalan told Santa that she wanted an I-pod.   She has her brother's old I-phone but she can't get new apps for it.

Evidently Santa must dance in China as Linzi was all excited when Santa arrived and showed us many times how to wiggle your hips and head.   She made sure that Santa was the real thing by pulling his beard and she told him something in Chinese.

Soon it was time for Santa and Mrs. Claus to go back to the North Pole and see if the Elves are getting everything ready.   They weren't gone a few minutes when I heard a chorus of  "I'm hungry!"   Santa forgot to ask me what I wanted for Christmas!!

The girls love Dasher

We first met Dasher on December 6th, 2010.   The girls L~O~V~E Dasher!!   So much that they are seeing who can get up the earliest to find him each morning.   Kendalan and Tessa have started setting their alarm for 5:30AM to come upstairs and look for our Elf.

So Dasher has been found hanging out on the floor lamp.   From this area he can watch the Christmas tree and see if anyone is peeking in packages.

Dasher hid in Daddy's stocking one day.   I am not sure why, but the girls really had a hard time finding him there.   I mean, he was right at face level...maybe it was just too obvious.

Then Dasher decided to get a real birds eye view of the lving room from the clock.   He also thought he would blend in with the red of the China flag and be missed....but not by my eagle eye girls!!

Then one night Dasher decided to hang out in the kitchen.   I think he wanted to watch them do homework and go back to Santa and report what they are getting grade wise.

I think that Dasher needed a nice easy night of watching the girls.   How better than to be really close to the Christmas tree and right in the living room where the girls are talking, and fighting all night!!   I bet that Santa got an ear full that next morning!!

Then Dasher wanted to hang with the girls!  

Then Dasher found himself another woman!!   He was in her arms all night long!!

Tonight Dasher is doing a little undercover work.   He is at an advantage point in the room.   It will be pretty interesting to see what he reports to Santa from this site!!

The truth is hard.

Just to update where things are:

We had Linzi to the pediatric infectious disease doctor yesterday. We
took Tessa to this physician after she first came home too. Dr. Harris
will run her vaccination titers to see if she actually did receive the
immunizations in China as we were told. While we were in the office
Dr. Harris also had Dr. Crouch a pediatrician see Linzi. Linzi does not
like doctors very well. She started screaming and crying when they first
called her name and tried to weigh her. She continued to cry, kick and
wave them off. When Dr. Crouch was visiting with me we both tried to
turn our backs to her so she would think we weren't talking about her and
to try to get her to be quiet. Dr. Harris finally found Dr. Zhao who is
a neurologist and had him come in. Dr. Zhao is from Taiwan and speaks
Chinese. Linzi did kind of talk to him. Since Dr. Zhao had not been in
the room he did not know what was going on. Once Linzi responded to his
Chinese questions he looked at all of us and said "There is something wrong
with her." He says that her responses were not really correct and that
her Chinese is not very good, her speech is kind of slurred. We explained
to him that she had just been adopted from China and that she was in an
orphanage with many Down Syndrome and severely delayed/handicapped
kids. He again tried to talk to her. He asked her something and she told

him no. He said that he had to kind of guess what she was saying to him.

That her responses were just words that didn't totally make sense.
He then again said "Something is wrong" and he mentioned

autism or autistic? The other two doctors said they don't think she is

autistic and that they see hope that she may become able to be a productive individual.
They did see the "self stimulating" behavior I have seen from the get-go.

She is in constant motion...if she is standing she will rock from foot to
foot, if she is sitting down she will rock back and forth. She also will roll
her hands together and in a circle while repeating the same thing over and
over and over and over...to the extent that it drives me crazy, especially
as I have no idea what she is saying!

She is adorable.   She is Loud.  Has she bonded?  I don't know.  She calls
me "Ma" and will hug some of us and pat us on the back.   She will also
go to strangers and hug them.   She loves to "talk" to anyone and everyone.
Well. except for the doctors at first.   After she realized that they were not
going to do anything to her she was fine with them.   When I drop her off
at school she happily waves to me and says "Bye bye."   She did not get
upset when we left the orphanage staff either, just happily waved.


We did start her in Kindergarten for 1/2 days. The teacher says that she
follows around the other kids and kind of does what they do. The teacher
is pleased how she is doing at this point. We plan on
moving her to full days after the first of the year. We are fully planning

on her repeating Kindergarten again next year if she needs too.

She is constantly on the move. She can sit still in the car and occasionally
on the couch, but she does not have the attention span to watch TV,  play
video games or DSi games. The girls are all very disappointed that she can not
play with them and they feel like we are just babysitting her. I have heard
them call her "stupid and crazy" and ask "What are we going to do with her?"
We have reminded them that Tessa and Jordis didn't speak English when they

first came home either. It is frustrating for all of us.

She is really rough on everything. I am sure that this is from being in the
orphanage and not learning the proper behavior. She does know when she is
doing something she shouldn't. I have gone to the bedroom and as I come back
into the living room she is shutting the laptop...she knows she is not supposed
to be on it. She went from being scared of the cats and dogs to chasing them
around and being rough with them. We keep working on "Gentle" I was told that

Ching Ching Da means Gentle?

She is very happy most of the time. She will eat anything that we put in front
of her. We do have to be careful that she does not overeat. The orphanage
warned us of that. She is definitely spoiled and gets mad if she doesn't get
her way. She is a total clutz. She can fall over her shadow at times. So
her legs are covered in bruises.


It has been tough, tough, tough. I feel like I brought this on the family as
I was the first one who wanted to adopt again. I also feel like I jinxed the
adoption because I had Linzi tattooed on my arm before we got her....I know
crazy but that is what I think sometimes. Zora has told me that the adoption
was stupid and lame. Honestly we have talked about disrupting her but again
then we feel like we have failed. But, this is not what we were expecting.
We feel that it is possible that we are not meant to be her family, that it was
just our job to get her here so we could help her find the family she was destined

to be in.. A "pay it forward" from our getting Kendalan through a disruption.

It is rough. I feel like we are plodding along, pretending that everything will

be okay and knowing that it will never be the same.

To the mean, negative posters who think they are authorities who have left comments about this...if you REALLY knew what you were talking about you would post with your REAL names!   We have NOT said we are going to disrupt..just that we have thought about it.   I would have left her in China if we were going to disrupt.   This isn't our first adoption.  DUH!
This is why people do not post the truth to their blogs because nasty people are very
quick to judge those they do not know.   If you want to give helpful suggestions great!
If you want to cuss at someone go find someone else!! 

New photos

Had a chance to have some family photos taken last weekend.   Belinda has taken photos of the girls for the last 4 years and we like how they turn out.   For those of you on our Christmas list, you will be seeing more of them!   This is kind of a sneak peek!!

Linzi had a hard time sitting still.

Tin grin

RaeAnne had braces put on Thursday afternoon.

I remember when she had to have her molars capped because they were so weak.   We were living in Texas and the pediatric dentist tried to sedate her in his office.   Unfortunately the "cocktail" they gave her to drink actually wired her up instead of making her sleepy.   We had to resort to having her put under for the procedure.   She has been a white knuckle dentist patient ever since.  

So I was really proud of her when we found out that she needed braces.    She did a great job...well, we did have one little catch.   The assistant was busy getting her teeth ready for the brackets and she was going to put some cleaner on Rae's teeth.   The tool that had the cleanser in it did kind of resemble a syringe....RaeAnne just about climbed off the end of the chair!!!

Now to pay for them for the next 30 months.   And Tessa has an appointment in February to see if she needs braces too!   Yikes!!

Things are looking up.

I think I am finally getting over the shock.   It could be because we are really seeing an improvement in her behavior and balance.   She still has the institutional rock, but we have seen a decrease in this.   She can sit and concentrate for 10 to 15 minutes at a time now before jumping up and running through the house.    She is still doing the repetitious things like saying the same thing over and over and over and over.  

Yes...I am really tired of that.

She still grinds her teeth   really L~O~U~D!!

She has gotten over being scared of the dog and cats...now she chases them and pulls their tails.   For the first time we have seen our laid back dog actually look like he would snap at her.   The one cat has bit her and the other has scratched her...she is still learning.

The pediatrician ran all kinds of lab tests on her...we are still waiting for the results and I am curious.

She still talks L~O~U~D!!    She will tone it down when I tell her Shhhhh!!

She will eat anything and everything we put in front of her.   As quickly as possible.  She doesn't complain about the vegetables!   And she has stopped going to the cabinet and whining for more food.

She still falls a few times a day.   We had her evaluated by the school district yesterday.   They think she has good potential.   She will start Kindergarten next week going 1/2 days and ride the bus home with her sisters.    If she is doing good by the end of the year, she will start all day Kindergarten after the first of the year.    We are all prepared but praying that she will not have to repeat Kindergarten.

She is ornery!   She knows the things she is not supposed to get into...but if you leave the room for a few minutes...she is on the laptop...until you come back into the room and she will slam the lid down.  She gets into the markers and writes all over her arms and legs!   She runs around and shuts all the doors!

She loves KC Wolf.   She found him in a toy box and carries him all over the house.   She hugs him and lays him on pillows.   Tonight she was covering him with a blanket.

She really likes her Daddy.   She runs over to him and lays her chin on his chest.   The other night he kissed her forehead....she turned around, grabbed his face between both her hands and turned it to hers and gave him a kiss on the lips!   Tonight she watched Kendalan and then Tessa give me hugs and kisses goodnight...then she threw her arms up in the air and ran over to me, gave me a big hug and a kiss on the lips and said  "Bye Bye!"    First kisses!



I think we will make it.  

Home

We walked out of the security area to a wonderful Welcome Home sign!   We have been trying to get into a groove at home.  The night after we arrived home, four of the girls had their awards ceremony to receive their camo belts!   They had the ceremony at Sk8away and then the kids could skate afterwards.   I used to love to skate, but now that I am old and my bones are probably more brittle, I don't think I will be doing that!   Tessa, Kendalan and Jordis decided to give it a try and they all did pretty good.   They did spend some time on their bottoms on the floor!!

Linzi had an appointment at our pediatrician's office on the 20th.   Dr. Conroy does not think that the way she walks and her balance issues are related to cerebral palsy.   She recommends that we enroll her in martial arts to help her with her balance.   Our Taekwondo instructor really got a kick out of that recommendation!

Linzi definitely has more going on than we thought.   Exactly what will take sometime to figure out.   We are not sure if she is a product of her environment or if it has anything to do with the initial diagonsis she was given in China.   She does have delays and we will be having our school district try and evaluate her and see what their recommendations are.   We are hoping that we can get her enrolled in Kindergarten or Pre-school and start helping her learn.   The more she is able to learn will be encouraging to us.   At this point we are concerned that she may have learning deficits.   However, we are praying that she does not.    It is going to be a work in progress for sometime.   She is cute as can be and has gotten over her fear of the cats and dog.   She seems to love following her sisters around, but her attention span is very short.   She has enough energy to wear us all out and fortunately she is ready to go to sleep very soon after she gets in bed.  

Almost home!

It has been an adventure...sometimes not one for the faint of heart.   Linzi shocked me when we first met her.   Her reports were off..so much so that I would say they were completely wrong!   She was/is much more delayed than what we had even expected.   They said that she was basically independant.   That was a stretch of the truth.   They said she could go up and down the stairs by herself, that is true IF you have a long time to wait for her to do so.   She has very poor balance.   I can now see why she had bruises in her updated referral photos...she falls a LOT!   I have developed much stronger arms from holding her hand and keeping her from falling most of the time.   When she runs around in our room..she falls many times a day.   She can almost fall over her own shadow!  No joke!   She is very head strong and wants to do things herself.   She did not know how to use silverware or chopsticks.   She has learned to use a spoon to shovel food in her mouth, she is working on the fork.   She can not eat without making a total mess...kind of like a toddler.   When she plays, she does things over and over again...in a repetition pattern.   She says the same things over and over again.   She does remember doing things and will repeat those to our guides.   She has no where to go but up from here.   She is very loving and quite the tease.   She is super cute and was super spoiled by her nannies.

 

First day with us....

 

Yesterday...the difference a few days makes!

We are in Hong Kong at the airport Marriott.  Tomorrow morning very early we will board the first of several planes which will finally bring us home to Kansas.  

Looking forward to the rest of her sisters meeting her and ready to get unpacked and things put away!!

Leaving on a jet plane!

Our Travel Approval is here!   That means that I will be leaving for China on November 1st.   ZoraLin and I will be leaving KCI at 1:50pm flying into Detroit with a 4:47pm arrival time.   After a few hours hangin' in the airport there (which is a pretty nice place!) we then hop on a Delta Boeing 777 at 10:20pm which arrives in Beijing at 12:15am on November 3rd.

We meet Linzi Rose MingShan on November 5th!!!!   We will travel to Tianjin to her orphanage where we will meet her.    We stay in Tianjin for at least a day and I am hoping maybe two days.   I really want to visit the Prince of Peace Children's Home and Philip Hayden Hands of Hope Wall while we are there.

Then we will go back to Beijing until the 8th when we fly to Guangzhou to finish up the adoption.   I will be posting at Journey to Me while in China as I don't have a VPN or know how to use one!   We will be arriving at KCI on November 18th at 4:30pm.   Home for my birthday and Thanksgiving!!  And what a blessing it will be!

RaeAnne was just a little mad that she is not going to China this time.   This is the reaction I received when I asked her if she would miss me.

Guess not!

The girls do not have school Friday or Monday.   I am not sure if the teachers tried to cram more work into the shorter week, but Kendalan was exhausted tonight.   She crawled up on the couch and I told her a couple of times that she needed to go to bed.   The next thing I knew I looked over and found her and Oreo sleeping together.  I think maybe Kendalan had been admiring her pretty fingernails when she fell asleep or maybe showing them to Oreo!

Little Miss Kendalan is just as beautiful sleeping!   

It finally happened!

Kendalan lost her other front tooth yesterday!   She is still pretty cute even without them...but of course, I am biased!!

We saw Tessa's cardiologist this week and her echo was good news.   The aneurysm has not changed in size!  

And on the adoption front...our Article 5 was picked up from the US Consulate in Guangzhou Tuesday.  Our agency think that we will travel in November!   Yay!!  Linzi Rose MingShan will be home for Christmas!!

Blankees

I have been cleaning or you may call it rearranging things.   Many years ago after suffering some water damage to things that were stored in our basement, I became a Rubbermaid kind of gal.    By that, I mean I had everything stored in Rubbermaid containers.    And I do mean E.V.E.R.Y.T.H.I.N.G.   And because we didn't have any children.....yet.   I was very anal in my storing things.   Every container was itemized!   There was a index card on the outside of the container that was kept inside of a ziplock baggie.    Everything was listed.

We moved from Edmond, KS to Wichita and my things were easy to find and my containers kept the bugs, the moisture, and the stuff clean!   I bought containers that were all the same size and they stacked so easily.

Then we moved to Keller, TX.   All was well until Mark took a job back in our home state of Kansas.   Not only did I have to leave a job that I loved!!    When the movers came to pack...unbeknowst to myself...they took things out of my itemized, well kept, well organized containers and packed them into boxes!     They then stacked all the containers together...with the ziplock baggy still hanging on the side.    Ackkkkkkkk!!   Did they have any idea of what they had done to me??!!    I have never gotten over that.    I have never been able to get my life back to organized as it was.   I am again trying....please pray for me!

I hope to have a garage sale for a few hours Saturday morning.   I need to move out some clothes that we have an abundance of.    I am calling it the mostly $.50 cent sale.   Just about all the clothes will be
$.50 each.

So the point of this post...other than to make everyone think I am really anal...I am.     During my re-organization plan I came across a blanket that I had made for RaeAnne before she was home with us.   I have one of those names that you can never find spelled right on many things.    Our daughter's have the same problem.   Especially RaeAnne and ZoraLin with our play of capitals in their names.   So when I found this great site for crochet blankets with your child's name throughout the blanket...spelled right.   Well, I just couldn't resist!!   That blanket has been put away.   I know why have it if they can't use it.  I didn't want it all snagged up...sorry!    So RaeAnne was snuggling with her blankee today and now I have a couple of others who want to know where is their blanket??

This is the company Blankees and I will probably be ordering a small one for each of the girls.   Oh the things we do for our children!!   Let me count the ways I love you....

Recipe post

I hopped over to stalk check out a new post on a blog that I follow today.   Lori at Joy Unspeakable had posted asking for recipes.   How convenient that I had made one of my girls' favorite foods today!   They have been begging me to make this for a couple of weeks.

Bowtie Pizza Pasta Salad

1 lb. large bowtie pasta

16 oz shredded pizza cheese

4 oz turkey pepperoni cut in halves

1 10.5 oz package grape tomatoes cut in halves

6 green onions thinly sliced

1/2 C. red wine vinegar

1/3 C. grated Parmesan cheese

3/4 C. vegetable oil

1 tsp salt

2 tsp dried oregano

1 tsp garlic powder

1/4 tsp black pepper

     Cook pasta per package directions.  Drain, rinse with cold water and drain again.   Place in a large bowl and let cool.   In a medium bowl (or salad shaker) combine oil, vinegar, oregano, Parmesan cheese, garlic powder, salt and pepper.   Mix well and chill.  

      Mix the tomatoes, pizza cheese, onion and pepperoni into the pasta, toss until well combined.   Pour dressing mix over the pasta and toss until evenly mixed.   Cover and chill for at least 2 hours before serving.

My girls consider this a meal in a bowl and will stuff consume several bowls each!

I think that the original recipe called for sliced black olives and regular pepperoni, but my food critics are not too keen on black olives and I think that the turkey pepperoni is probably a little more healthy.    They give it
5 thumbs up!

Happy Birthday Linzi Rose MingShan!!

Linzi is SIX years old today!!   We so wanted to spend this milestone with her, but since we couldn't we did the next best thing.   We sent her a Care Package!!    So she received a cake today and a bunch of goodies for her, the kids and the orphanage workers.    We also sent a couple of disposable cameras which we really hope that the nannies use to catch the action!!   We received 10 photos of the party.   Unfortunately the quality of the photos is not the best in the world.   But some photos are better than none at all!!

This will be the L~A~S~T birthday that Linzi spends without her family!!   It still looks like ZoraLin and I may be traveling in November to bring her home!!    We are keeping our fingers crossed and sending a few prayers out for speedy and safe travels.

We also sent a letter to her telling her that she has a family and we are hoping to be there soon to get her.   I so hope she is prepared as well as she can be to accept us into her life!  

We L~O~V~E you Linzi Rose MingShan!!   We can't wait to meet you and have your join our family FOREVER!!!