3 Months Home with Kelcy

It is hard to believe that Kelcy has been home with us for just over 3 months.  It has been a very busy 3 months with many blessings but also some losses.  Kelcy enjoyed her first Halloween with a trip to Blowing Rock to Trick or Treat with her brother and cousins Alec and Kadin.  She picked out her own costume this year and decided to be a Lady Bug.   We actually showed her some choices like various princess costumes but she kept going back to the Lady Bug costume.  She enjoyed all the games and the parade in Blowing Rock and totally got into saying trick or treat to all the merchants handing out candy......and ended up with quite a bit of candy for her first try at this.   She was a pro when it came time to trick or treat in our neighborhood but the weather was not to cooperative and it wasn't as fun to trick or treat in a rainstorm....so the soggy lady bug stayed home and had a great time handing out candy with Mom while her Teenage Werewolf brother Conner headed out with Dad and hit the enitre neighborhood up with some of his school friends.  We were also very fortunate to have visited Tommy's parents the weekend of Halloween on our way up to Blowing Rock and they were able to meet Kelcy for the first time.  Unfortunately, Tommy's Dad passed away 10 days later and we are so grateful that he had a chance to meet Kelcy.    Tommy and Kelcy have spent some time with his Mom (Nana) since his passing so Kelcy has had a chance to get to know her Nana a little more.  We spent Thanksgiving up at Nana's house with Tommy's sister Robin and Alec and Kadin so Kelcy was exposed to all things Thanksgiving.  She really enjoyed the turkey but was not impressed with the pumpkin pie.  We also exposed her to our yearly ritual of picking out a Christmas Tree on a tree farm.  I think she is still confused as to why we put a tree up in our house but Conner has explained the whole concept of gifts from Santa that go under the tree so that has caught her attention. 
Kelcy continues to amaze us as to how quickly she picks things up.....she is really picking up english and putting together complete sentences....I think that we are all feeling better about our communication with each other so we are seeing her personality come out more and more.....she loves to be silly and joke around and she loves to talk!  She has been attending preschool for 2 half days a week and she loves it.  She asks if she is going to school every day and gets excited when it is a school day and she can pack her princess lunch box up and head to school to play, paint, sing and learn more mandarin.  She hugs the teachers when she leaves and has been participating more in circle time.  She also transitioned well to my going back to work.  I have gone back to work full-time and Tommy had an unexpected opportunity to spend some time at home taking care of Kelcy and Conner -  which is probably a blessing right now so that he could focus on helping his Mom out after his father passed and attach more to Kelcy..she is definetely comfortable with either one of us.  She is hanging out at the hockey rink quite a bit with Daddy and Conner.   Conner loves being a big brother and she loves to torment him so they are negotiating through the typical sibling ups and downs - one minute they are arguing over something and the next minute she will grab his hand and head outside to play....  Life is hectic right now and but it is all good and we feel very blessed.  Here are a few random pictures of Kelcy enjoying some fall activities :-)

Life with Kelcy after 7 weeks home

Time has flown by and we have been home about 7 weeks now.   I had hoped to post updates sooner but I can't seem to find a good 30 minutes in my day to sit down and update.   We have all been adjusting to new routines and trying to fit everything into our days :-)  Conner is doing great in school and hockey season just started up so Kelcy is learning the hockey family lifestyle - the one where you spend your weekends in a hockey rink somewhere in our area.   She is a very sweet little girl who is getting more comfortable with her new family. 

Here are some fun things that we have enjoyed learning about Kelcy:

- She loves to sing the ABC song - I have the CD in my car and everytime we get into the car she yells out "Mommy - ABC song" before I even start the car
- She loves sour cream and onion potato chips....it has become our ritual now...everytime I take her grocery shopping she gets to hold the bag of chips in the cart and then eats a bowl of chips when I get home and unpack the groceries....probably not the healthiest choice :-(
-She loves to take a bath and play with the plastic letters......she still likes to wash her own hair so I have to coach her through the shampoo rinse process but I respect her need to have control over washing her hair so we work it out.
- She loves to brush her teeth and was ecstatic when Daddy bought her a whole Princess Toothbrush and Toothpaste set....she reminds me every morning and every night that it is time to brush her teeth. 
- She loves Curious George and anything that involves a monkey..she takes naps with this huge monkey that my friends Elise and Greg gave her and makes sure that the monkey has a blanket during nap.
- She loves to look at and have books read to her and she looks forward to having a story read to her before bed.
- She loves to wash her hands - the scented soap makes her so happy....which will be helpful during the flu season right?
- She loves her big brother Conner and copies everything that he does.....Conner loves his little sister and tries to sneak in hugs whenever he can...
- She is transitioning more to our type of food - but once in awhile she will eat chinese noodles.  I try to give her a choice at lunch time - but she still goes for turkey meat or pepperoni these days.....and she eats a lot of bananas :-)

She is actually picking up more english and speaking with more sentences....we are doing a lot of "Elmo speak" in our household but it is working and we are all able to understand each other.  She will be starting a preschool in November and go two half days a week.  She seems to like the school when we visit so we pray that she transitions well to preschool - we think that she is ready for the structured activities and socialization because she was going to school in China and is somewhat familiar with the routine. 

I will be heading back to work in November and pray that Kelcy makes it through that transition as well as smoothly as she dealt with change so far.

Tommy and I feel very blessed to have two precious children in our lives (we also feel very tired at the end of the day!).

Here are some random pictures of life with Kelcy.....

Playing Basketball with Daddy and Conner

Chef Kelcy

Working on her dunk for her future scholarship

Conner dressing up his sister in hockey attire

A very tired Kelcy eating Cotton Candy at the State Fair 

Posing with "George" at the State Fair

Ready for action

Playing hockey with Conner at Marbles Museum (notice a trend here...)

Hanging out at home - group hug

Ending the day with a bowl of popcorn - she could eat popcorn everyday!

There is No Place Like Home!

After our own personal ordeal of planes, vans and trains.  We are happy to be home and we are are now dealing with some jet lag.  The house has been taken over by piles of laundry and toddler toys.  Kelcy seems to like her new room and even asked to go to bed tonight and feel asleep on her own in her toddler bed.  She has been sleeping for about an hour in her bed the past couple of nights and then comes and finds our bed so we will see how she does tonight.    We were glad to get home and be greeted by my sister Joy and her husband Todd and our nephew Tyler and our good friends Greg and Elise and we were so surprised to see banners and balloons at our house welcoming us home from our great neighbors and Greg and Elise :-),  I will write more soon but I wanted to add some pictures.  Conner starts school tomorrow so I will have an early morning but I do want to share some reflections of China and will do that on my next post.  All in all it was an awesome experience and adventure and we are so happy to have Kelcy home!

What We Have Learned About Kelcy

So we have spent about 10 days with Kelcy so far and have started to learn some things about her personality.  Did I mention that she just turned 3?  First of all she is a very brave little girl - she said goodbye to her Foster Family last Monday morning and got on a bus with a nannie from the orphanage and then drove for 3 hours to get to Nanning where she met us in a shopping mall pavilion. We can tell that she was well loved and taken care of by her Foster Family - she has a healthy build and her foster mother packed all kinds of snacks for her.  She wears a size 3T and weighs about 30 pounds so she is a little bigger than we thought and were so happy to have access to a stroller.  She did great her first day with us,,,took a nap, ate dinner, took a bath, and went to bed....she even smiled a little.  She is getting more comfortable every day and is able to tell us what she wants and does not want.  She loves her yogurt drinks and instant noodles - much like the ramon noodles that I ate in college.  She also loves pork - anything pork so we are hoping this is a phase because she may not have had a lot of meat in her diet and will try and balance her diet when we get home because living in a hotel makes it difficult to get into a routine.  She loves to take baths and use soaps and she loves hand lotion.  She also likes to brush her teeth and I have been able to get her to do so in the morning and night time - I think that she thinks its fun to spit in the sink.   She also goes down for a nap fairly easily and I hope that that continues when we get home.  She loves to play and laugh and be silly and she will run up and give us hugs.  She loves Conner and will only hold his hand when we are out walking and Conner has been a great big brother and takes her hand when we are out and about. 
She does not like to keep shoes on her feet and will kick them off the minute she sits down anywhere- taxi, restaurant, stroller.  She does not like to wear seat belts in the vans that we are traveling and did not like having to put one on the airplane - so we are worried about how she is going to handle a car seat!  She is also comfortable letting us know when she DOESN'T want to do something or give up something - did I mention that she is 3?   She can scream extremly loud when she is unhappy with something and she has learned how to hit very well.   Our guide mentioned that some toddlers are allowed to have melt downs and tend to hit their parents - we actually saw that ourselves on the streets and saw some similarities in how Kelcy would react to us.  Our guide mentioned that Kelcy may have been spoiled so Tommy and I need to set guidelines when we get home but our guide mentioned that we don't start until we get home,  So many of you will probably see some of this behavior when we first get home so our challenge in the first few months will be to learn how to communicate better with her and also to correct some of that type of behavior but that will come in time.  We feel very blessed to have her in our family and we are all getting settled into a family of four.

Life in Guangzhou

Well it has been quite a busy week in Guangzhou to say the least.  We arrived late Friday night after a two hour plane delay in Nanning where Tommy and I were an international spectacle trying to calm down a tired and hungry toddler while people continued to stare and touch Conner.  Did we mention that Kelcy just turned 3?   So she would like to do things on her own including running up and down the airport corridor and running back through security and really didn't appreciate us telling her that she could not do that :-) We were exhausted when we arrived at the beautiful Garden Hotel - it is very 5 star and not the way we usually travel so we felt a little under dressed when we checked in :-)  I was so glad to see a bed and we finally got Conner and Kelcy to sleep around 12:30am so they were able to get a little sleep before we had to take Kelcy to her medical review the next morning at 8:30am, which went pretty smooth and then she had to have the TB test which she passed :-).

We then did a little shopping and toured the Shamian Island where we grabbed lunch at Lucys which is a restaurant the has an American ambiance and sat by a table that had license plates from Wisconsin and Indiana on the wall.  We also had a chance to let the kids play on a playground and walk through a park with different statues.....I found the island to be very peaceful, yet very active with all kinds of photography shoots from models modeling clothing for catalogs to young brides and grooms getting their pictures taken right before they get married.  We are in the popular month for weddings and couples get their picture taken in the morning and then it is developed in time for their reception so they can post in the lobby where their reception is taking place:

We have spent the week shopping and relaxing a little at the hotel.  Did I mention that it is hot!  I have been breaking out in a sweat the minute we walk outside so I gave up styling my hair on this trip.   We have enjoyed a huge buffet at breakfast and have enjoyed some chinese meals and of course have found every fast food option around our hotel.  Tommy and I are looking forward to having a huge salad when we get home and a drink with ice since we have to avoid most raw vegtables and fruits and for sure ice.  We have enjoyed many meals with the Gallagher and Stevens families that we traveled with and we celebrated our last night with all the families at a Mexican restaurant by our hotel and were so happy to see that Kelcy enjoys chips and salsa just like Conner and I :-)  Per tradition all the families from our adoption agency went to the White Swan hotel and took our pictures on the red couch.  First we just had our new daughters on the couch, our Kelcy and then Gabby and Ana - all so adorable!  Gabby would rather sit with her family though and we determined that Kelcy needs to get used to wearing a dress so we have been putting shorts on under her dress :-)

The White Swan also has a beautiful waterfall in the lobby so we were able to do a group shot at the waterfall

Today we had our consulate appointment and processed the paperwork that will allow Kelcy to be an American citizen when we fly back home.  Tommy and I took an oath and now the entire process is officially complete.  We will get Kelcy's visa tomorrow right before we travel to Hong Kong for our last night in China.  We will fly out of Hong Kong on Friday morning at 9:45am and arrive in Raleigh at 7pm on Friday....but keep in mind that we get to add 12 hours to our day.....so our Friday will be a 36 hour day :-).  Here are some random pictures from our stay in Guangzhou:

  Kelcy was pushing Conner in the water while he floated on his back.  The roof top pool area was beautiful and we hope to enjoy the pool tomorrow before we pack up and check out at 3pm.

   

  

Conner is a Rock Star!

I am so grateful for one of the nurse's at our pediatrician's office who mentioned that Conner would be very popular here in China due to his blond hair and blue eyes.  So we were able to prepare Conner for the attention and he knew that people would consider him to be good luck and want to touch him and have their picture taken with him.  So he has been very gratious and good natured when he gets constant attention from many people....including cute teenage girls :-) We are very proud of how he has handled his popularity and how he has handled the trip in general!  He has been touched by people when walking on the streets - they just reach out and tap him and many people ask for permission to take his picture.  Yesterday, we were all eating lunch at the local zoo and many people took his picture and even ours as we were eating lunch.  I have to say that it gives you a fresh perspective when you are the minority in a culture, which will help us remember how Kelcy will feel when back in the states.  It has been a crazy couple of days so I will post more later but I wanted to share some pictures of Conner being a rock star and also some pictures of our trip to the local zoo in Guangzhou.

Happy Birthday Kelcy!

Yesterday was Kelcy's Birthday, August 25.  We celebrated by going to a park in Nanning that is quite beautiful and has a variety of things for families to do.  It is actually in the heart of the city on a mountain and we spent some time in the stone stature garden and then feeding the koi fish.  Conner and Kelcy loved climbing on the rock sculptures that were of different kinds of animals and then we took a shuttle bus to the lake where we fed the gigantic koi that hung out by the bridge....waiting for kids to feed them.  Here are some pictures from the park:

Today was a great bonding day for Kelcy and Daddy.  Kelcy warmed up to Tommy quite a bit and wanted him to carry her through the park.  We think that our accent on how we (okay me) pronounced the word daddy may have caused some confustion.  In chinese the word for daddy is ba-ba and the word for afraid is pa-pa so we both said pa-pa and pointed at Tommy by accident a couple of times so that could have caused some confusion :-)  So now she really prefers Daddy to Mommy today....but the good news is that she seems comfortable with all of us...she really loves to laugh and sing and chase balls and chase after her brother and be silly. 

We celebrated Kelcy's Birthday at dinner where we ordered long noodles and she really enjoyed our sweet and sour pork :-)  She does love anything pork....her first couple of days with us she ate quite a bit and now she is slowing down...we are hoping that she feels a little safer with us and that we will provide what she needs. We bought a little cake at the local bakery and took that to the restaurant and then sang Happy Birthday in English and Chinese.  I think that she was confused as to why we celebrating - her Chinese Lunar Birthday is July 25 and we think that her Foster family celebrated on that day. 

Today is our last day in Nanning and we are packing up.  Tommy and Conner went to work out and Kelcy is taking a nap...she actually lies down on her own when she is tired and curls up with her stuffed unicorn and blanket that we gave her....she also holds onto whatever toy is her favorite while she sings herself to sleep.  She is comfortable telling us what she likes and doesn't like in true toddler form...which is a good thing because we are able to see more and more of her personality.  She loves putting on hand lotion and brushing her teeth now.  I found out from our guide that most toddlers do not brush their teeth - the parents usually rub the teeth down with cotton wipes...so our pediatric dentist might have a little work to do when we get home.  Conner continues to be a trooper through all this travel.  Tommy and I have not lost a single pound because we have been eating fast food so that Conner gets at least one meal in his system every day.  So far we have had McDonald's, Subway, Burger King, Dominoes Pizza, Pizza Hut and Kentucky Fried Chicken with mashed potatoes.  We have been staying at the Marriott hotel so the breakfast buffett is very international so we have had a great brunch everyday...and Conner is able to eat cereal and Kelcy gets her fill of sausage links.  We are heading to Guangzhou tonight and it will be an hour plane ride for Kelcy - hopefully it will go well and she will be able to get on the 12 hour plane ride scheduled for next Friday.  We are looking forward to seeing the other families that we met in Beijing and their daughters and catching up with everyone.  Guangzhou is where Kelcy will get her medical appointment and will be sworn in at the American Consulate on Wednesday.  I will write more when we get settled in and we really appreciate everyone's comments!  We pray that everyone stays safe in North Carolina with the impending Hurricane heading to the NC Coast and we hope that everyone is okay after the Earthquake.  It is very hard to hear this type of news when we are so far away and all we have is the UK and Asia CNN tv channel.   Take Care everyone!