Peter's Cross Station

Proud of My Girls

Selina:

A couple of days ago, Selina mistook someone on the street for Babysitter J (her favorite person on the planet Earth).  She called his name happily, but we told her it was someone else.  The man turned around and looked at her with distinct annoyance on his face.  "Say hi!" we cajoled Selina, because we felt awkward.  But after a couple of times being told this, Selina looked the obviously disgruntled man in the eye and said, calmly, "I don't want to say hi."

Well good for her.  She shouldn't have to make us feel less awkward about a perfectly harmless baby mistake or feel the need to be polite and conciliatory to strangers who aren't polite and conciliatory themselves.  Anyway, that's my humble opinion.  I think it's a very good thing to be polite and gracious, and we are certainly teaching our kids that.  But you know, girls are asked far too much by our culture to smile and act nice for the benefit of others.  And they shouldn't have to if they don't want to.  I was proud of Selina for discerning that this strange, annoyed man was not someone she really wanted to engage.  She wanted to engage her beloved J.

Nat:

Nat is a champ in her Spanish class.  She really loves the teacher and I think the teacher is rather fond of her too.  But they do this weird thing at the school.  They use a plant mister--a little spray-bottle full of water, and they squirt the kids with it as a reward when they respond in an exercise or game.  I can't even imagine how anyone came up with that idea.  I see a water mister and think "cat punishment" right?  But the other kids (not Nat) just laugh and giggle and seem to love it when the teacher squirts them with this water bottle.

So it was Nat's turn, and she dutifully did whatever the teacher was aiming for her to do and the teacher squirted her. I was peeking through the classroom window and I saw Nat flinch.  I happen to know she hates to be sprayed with anything, because she complains whenever I spray water or conditioner on her hair when I'm braiding it.  So the teacher made it around the circle and got back to Nat again.  She asked Nat for a response again, and Nat hesitated, looked the teacher in the eye, and said calmly but clearly, "I don't want you to spray me with that water."  The teacher told her that was fine and she promised not to spray Nat any more.  Then Nat gave her the answer she wanted, and the teacher cheered her sin water sprayer.

I was just really impressed that Nat didn't cry or throw a tantrum or try to leave the circle, (or come looking for me) but neither did she submit to something she didn't like.  She named her boundary politely and made sure it was going to be respected before she went on with the exercise.

Really, I think I was as proud of that as I was of her quick and ready responses to the instruction.  Prouder even, maybe.

I wouldn't have done that at four.  No way, no how.  I would have rolled over with whatever awful thing the adult was doing or telling me to do.  I was a meek little kid.  Nat is not meek, but she is not rude, either.  Go Nat!

Garden Growing

  These are my squash.  It's difficult to see them, and yes, they are teensy, but there are four little squash on the vine so far.  This was taken two days ago and the "big" one here in the middle is already twice this size and the next biggest one is this big.

  My other squash died after being decimated by a sudden thunderstorm.  Its main stem broke and that was all she wrote.

  But I am somewhat surprised and definitely pleased by how well the remaining one is doing.  Next year, I'll probably plant four of these.

 This is the same plant, but I wanted you to see my nifty self-watering bottle.  It's a terra cotta stake that goes into the container and then you fill a bottle of water and stick it down in there.  These are mineral water bottles I painted to keep the light out so they wouldn't grow too much algae.

  Here's one of my tomatoes.  Except not really.  Fine, I broke down and bought two plants.  Both are doing well.  They had blossoms when I bought them, which I pruned off.  Soon they had more blossoms and now they have green tomatoes.  I have about four on each plant now.  My actual tomato seedlings are  still only about an inch tall.  What's up with that?  I started them in early April!  They are healthy, but only have four leaves each!

  Remember the silly milk bottle in the middle of this planter?  It's finally doing what I had planned and hiding under the wild flowers.  Some are getting buds, including the teddy bear sunflowers I put all around the outer rim.

The lettuce produced beautifully for a month and we had many delicious salads.  It's pretty much done now, so I planted carrots in that planter.  I also put carrots in the pots where the cucumbers bit it and in the space which held the short-lived and under-producing broccoli raab.

This has nothing to do with gardening.  It's Nat's picture of a guitar on her magnadoodle.  She was very proud and keen that I take a picture and preserve it forever.  I have to say, I am impressed.  It's pretty good for a magnadoodle, don't you think?  She drew it from life, copying her ukulele:

 

Two Over Two

Selina's second birthday has come and gone (Saturday) and was, I have to say, a huge success.  She was aware this year, that she was the birthday girl (she remembered Nat's birthday from February and knew what it meant) and enjoyed--really for the first time in her life--a real place at center stage.  Nat was a gracious supporting cast member and terrific big sister, helping (no, really just helping) Selina open her gifts and appreciate her cake.  Well, Selina didn't really appreciate her cake at all.  I had hoped she would recognize Sandra Boynton's hippopotamus, but for one reason and another, she didn't seem to.

  Nat did, though, so that was nice.  Actually, it was pretty amusing.  For the party I had veggie crudite and dip, plus some whole apples and pears.  Selina usually gets cut fruit, but Nat can eat a whole fruit.  So Nat had been munching away on an apple, but when she heard cake was imminent, she handed the apple to Selina, who was really excited about getting a big, whole apple, like sister usually gets.  So the cake sort of didn't register in the wake of her excitement about the apple.  She held it in her hand while I tried to get her to blow out the candles.  Cake was really underwhelming for her.

She did like eating the cake.  But I am not sure she liked it more than the apple.  (Nat did, though!)

Mama Fern was here (along with Grammy and Granddaddy, Babysitter J, friend Krystal and her guest, Justin and neighbors K and D) , which was nice, as she was unable to get together for Mothers' Day this year.  I have to let you know something, though.

I have decided not to blog much about our specific adoption experiences here anymore.  I will still be blogging about adoption in general and about our family on a surface level, but I have been unable to figure out where the line is for me in sharing too much of others' stories.  Since the kids are too little to help decide how they feel about sharing their own stories, and since neither of the first mothers in our family have computer access, I feel too much responsibility for the control of the story.  I am going to err on the side of telling too little, rather than telling too much.

I guess I've had this policy for a while, unofficially, but now I'm letting you know.

Meanwhile, I want to also let you know that if you ever want to email me and ask to hear more of our experience in order to help you sort out your own, please do feel free.  I don't have a problem discretely sharing with you as an individual.  I just think publishing on the WWW is a bit too much for me at this point.

Suffice it to say that we have what I think of as successful open adoptions in the sense that all parties are doing all they are able for the best interest of the children.  But that doesn't mean we have happy, rosy stories. "All we are able" is sometimes quite short of perfect and that is the case in our family.  But I also feel that "all we are able" is something the children will understand and appreciate as they grow up.

I will also say in vague terms that open adoption is HARD.  Sometimes I fear people will think it is easy for others and so when they don't find it easy themselves, they decide it must be wrong for them and they close the adoption.  I will say it again, I am finding open adoption to be a serious challenge.  A struggle.  Painful.  But all in that way where you know the pain is good for you and means you are growing.  I am especially convinced that it is good for my children, which is why I work so hard at it, however challenging I find it.

I think both kids--especially Nat--are beginning to really understand some things about their families in an age-appropriate, organic way that will prevent sudden surprises that might really hurt them and turn their realities upside down to learn later.  So again:  hard but good.  And again, feel free to write personally via email to share your story or hear more of ours if you feel it will help in any way.

And now we are off for family adventure day at the aquarium.  We hear the dolphins and whales are back from "vacation!"

Arty

Nat has made some fun pictures lately.  I thought I'd share a smattering (so I don't have to actually keep them.)

This is a drawing Nat calls "Go" which she is still learning with Babysitter J, who says she's coming right along:

Here's a pretty painting.  Only recently, she's started paying more attention to filling space and color in a way she finds pleasing and balanced--as opposed to just going nuts with the brush for kicks.  I like this one, because it's in my favorite color scheme:

I dictated the letters and Nat wrote Selina's name.  I thought it was pretty good:

Nat has started to write a lot of words lately.  I only dictated this one.  Others she's written include "bear" and "apple."  She spelled bear correctly on her own, but apple, she spelled "APPL."  But I was impressed that she put two Ps in there.  Invented spellers at Nat's stage would typically just write APL.  And Bear--maybe BR.  But she reads a lot, so I guess she picks up some spelling that way, unconsciously.  I want to start writing stories with her, but I need some pointers on getting good stories out of children.

Here's a fairly typical face these days.  Sometimes, though, they do get quite elaborate with jewelry and appendages and clothing.  She still hasn't hit the torso stage.  When she does limbs, they come straight from the face:

 

And finally, a cameo from Selina!  Her style is interesting. Unlike Nat, who I mentioned has only recently started thinking about filling te space consciously (painting above), Selina is already quite focused on filling the page in a balanced way, with similar marks, in a variety of colors, evenly spread over the page:

Hola Amigas

That's about the extent of my Spanish.  But yesterday, we took Nat for a free trial Spanish class at a language school (it's a big national company, sort of like Berlitz, but geared to kids 2-10).  I had found it online and was a little skeptical that it might be one of those things that is fun and all, but not particularly educative.  You know, like toddler music classes or baby yoga or something.  I have nothing against those kinds of things, and in fact will be using the cheap versions offered through Parks and Rec quite a bit, I'm sure, but I didn't want to pony up big bucks for "fun but not particularly educative" seeing as how fun can be cheap and even free--right?

But it was both fun and educative.  I have some experience teaching English to adults in this model (the Berlitz-type model, but I taught for a smaller company) and basically, that's what they were doing, just geared to preschool kids.  Nat sat in on a class (they keep all classes under 8 kids) for kids aged 3-5, and even though it was the end of a session for the class, the teacher was just brilliant about giving each child (including newbie, Nat) access to success in the language at her own level.  She just kept going and going without a break for 90 minutes, changing activities about every 5-7 minutes to keep those kids engaged.  She had nary a "discipline" problem, as the kids were just always on their toes to keep up with her next activity.

I think the goal of the day was the verb "to play" and maybe also "to like."  The kids were putting balls in basketball hoops and kicking them and jumping up and down on one foot and holding hands and doing ring songs/dances and just all kinds of busy.  Nat just stared and listened with complete attention for the first half of the class then started joining in a bit in repeating words and phrases.  She absolutely loved it.

So we ponied up the cash and signed her up for one 90 minute class per week for ten weeks this summer (they also let you make up any classes you miss while on vacation or something).  I know 90 minutes a week is not enough to have her a fluent speaker in ten weeks, but it's a good start for her.  This one yesterday was the longest she's ever been in a classroom setting.  She'll be in preschool in the fall for three hours a day (though I'm thinking of keeping her home on Fridays), so this will help ease her into that classroom/peer/teacher experience.

I also plan to explore good opportunities to reinforce the Spanish just through life in our neighborhood.  We live in a neighborhood full of first-generation immigrants.  Right on our block, it's mostly African immigrants, but a couple blocks down you hit a very intensively Mexican immigrant neighborhood where all the stores have signage in Spanish and that's the dominant language on the street.  I'm thinking that I can find a playground right in that neighborhood, a grocery store where we might pick up milk every week--that kind of thing--to give Nat some natural life exposure to Spanish.

Then there's all the Spanish-language programming we can get on demand on t.v.  If the kids are going to watch 1-2 hours of t.v. per day (which is about what we average in the summer months--more like 2-3 in the winter months), an hour of it can be Plaza Sesamo, which Nat already loves to watch, even though she doesn't understand a word of it.

The school she is going to in the Fall does Spanish once or twice a week.  I doubt it's intensive immersion, but it will still be some reinforcement.  And maybe if I can find the cash, we can keep up the language school in the fall.

Overall, it does look like this is going to be a good start for Project Multilingual Kids.

Maundy Thursday

Church tonight was really fun--which is pretty weird for Maundy Thursday, I know.  But they cleared out the sanctuary and put in dinner tables and fed everybody right in there--a whole meal, featuring a few Passover standards among the dishes.

They were washing feet all around too, and when Nat saw that, she of course wanted to do it.  So I helped her off with her tights and she took her turn.  Except she was way too short for her feet to reach the basin from her chair, so they stood her up right in the bowl.  Why oh why did I leave my phone with the camera in my coat pocket in the hallway?  It was excruciatingly adorable to see a white man in a business suit bending over my daughter washing her feet in the middle of the church--and her grinning with getting away with something completely crazy.

Afterwards, Nat kept saying "I got my feet wet!" and "I got my feet wet in church!"  Then when they cleared away the dinner things, Nat turned to Cole and said "do you like the church restaurant, Cole-mom?"  It was Disney Land as far as she was concerned.

I put the kids in the play room after that and they did a Eucharist and stripped the church.

They do theatre really well at this place.  I have to hand it to them.

Nat, by the way, barely touched the food.  She has finally hit a picky stage.  Selina, on the other hand inhaled humus, veggie salad, eggplant, couscous and lentils, apples and walnuts, matzoh, all with great relish and glee.

Why I Like Working at Home

J. made the kids super capes out of baby blankets.  Moments later...

Nat: Mama Shannon!  We are supers! I am Super Nat and Selina is Super Selina and J. is laughing and laughing!

Off to the rescue!

J: Who are you going to rescue?

Nat: Selina!  and Selina is going to rescue me!

Come on Super Selina, let's go fly some more!

In Which Early Reading Becomes a Problem OR Nat Discovers We've Been Holding Out on Her

The scene: our favorite neighborhood restaurant.  I hand Nat the "kids'" menu and tell her to look it over and choose two things.

Nat: "oatmeal, scrambled eggs, yoghurt, fruit, (pause) pancakes with chocolate chips?"

Mama Shannon: (casually) "we aren't getting that."

Nat: "cheese pizza, grilled cheese sandwich, milk, (pause) chocolate milk???

Imagine the incredulous look in her eye.

The good news is she chose plain yoghurt, cheese pizza and water.  And then she got really, really excited when the water glass came with two straws.

Wonder how long these days will last?

Nat at Four (now with postscript)

This time last year, I was hoping the crazed behavior was just birthday excitement and cake sugar coursing through her veins, but it didn't let up for a good ten months.  Nat was a terrible three.  Which is, after all, what they say.  Twos aren't so bad--twos are even great--but it's three that's tough.  Once again, we are misled by alliteration!  (Don't you hate when that happens?)  And we did, after all, move her not once but twice in the last six months.  I can hardly blame her for having had a rough year.  But she had me tearing out my hair for the better part of it, all the same.

But about a month or six weeks ago, Nat's crazy, defiant, hyper, whiney three-year oldness started smoothing out a bit. And presto! now she's four and a dream.  Anyway, given all the excitement of her party yesterday and the sugar and the guests coming and going and Grammy in town and church this morning (where she always manages to come by more sugar one way or another) and everyone wishing her happy birthday and spoiling her rotten, she is remarkably sweet, calm and easy going.

Which brings me to the coolest thing about parenting so far.  It's just so gratifying to watch her grow into a person, and a person I like.  Nat was a cute baby and a sweet toddler and is a pretty child (to put it mildly!), but she is a good kid, too.  She really worries and cares about the welfare of other people.  She's smart and interested in everything and polite and kind and adventurous.  She gives everyone a fair chance and then some, to become her friend.  It's amazing how much stamina she has to spring back from a social snub and keep trying to bring folks into her inner circle.  You know how it is when little kids approach people who just aren't into little kids?  Nat just won't give up on people like that.  She takes names and keeps trying by calling them out as if they were her best friends in the world and it was all mutual.  She sits wide-eyed and obedient on her rug in the Sunday School class (where I'm peeking through the window) listening to the teacher tell her the day's story with rapt interest.  She sings with enthusiasm and claps with glee to the Caribbean hymn we sing before the Gospel.  She shares with her birthday party guests and even with her sister, mostly with a willing heart.  You could not pay an actor to be happier and more appreciative of the ugliest birthday cake ever, made with no expertise at all by Mama Shannon.  

She is just an amazing kid.  And we are so lucky and so grateful that we get to have her around every day and watch her grow up!

P.S. I have all but abandoned the photoblog since I have gotten more punctilious about facebook.  If you friend me on facebook you can see photos of the girls any time, including a few recent birthday ones.  I'm Shannon LC Cate.  Just mention you came from Peter's Cross Station.

Party Time

Tomorrow is Nat's birthday, but today is the party.  I made a hideous cake, which of course, Nat loves.  I should have unveiled it a little later though, because she had a major breakdown this morning and wailed, "But I don't want to take a nap, I want to eat my rainbow cake!"

The butterflies are cupcakes made with a pan I couldn't resist picking up at Target.  Just enough of them came out for the child guests (of which there are two, plus Selina).