The New Kali and The New Bedroom

It's been a few weeks since my last update. Things have been busy around here. Last weekend, Kali attended her first birthday party. She and Carson had a great time (Happy Birthday, Aubrey!). We were a little worried about how she would act when it was present opening time ... she still thinks that everything is hers. She was very good, just sitting and watching the gift unwrapping ceremony without even as much as a pouty lip ... until Aubrey opened the gift that we brought. I hid the gift from both kids until the day of the party, but then I had to take it out to wrap it ... she saw it! Naturally, she thought it was hers. When this one was unwrapped, she jumped up and wanted to play with it. Aubrey's mom was kind enough to let the kids look at it and play with it a little, but then Kali seemed to want to take possession of it and we had to take her away from the toy. Surprisingly, there was a small amount of crying and then it was over! Wow! What a relief!





We decided to move both kids out of the cramped little 10 x 10 bedroom that they were sharing. Jordan had been in the bigger 12 x 17 bedroom, but since he is moving to Austin now (and has been in WI with his grandparents all summer anyway), it was time to give the 2 kids the bigger room and turn the smaller room into the guest/Jordan-when-he's-home-from-school room. I am a BIG fan of color on the walls. Remember that commercial (probably for Home Depot paint or something) where the husband and wife are standing in a white room and the wife looks around and asks, "What do these walls say to you?" and the husband replies "They say clean and fresh and white"? Then she comes back with something like, "They are saying that someone doesn't have an imagination!" I love that commercial! That is how I feel. I know that when we build our new house in a few years, I will have to paint the walls because we won't be able to afford a painter ... they like to come in with a big bucket of one color and spray the whole house the same color. I like every room to be different! Anyway, I digress ... I allowed Carson to choose the colors for the new room. Kali doesn't care ... she's just going to repeat whatever Carson says anyway. He chose pink and red ... yes, my sweet little 4 year old BOY chose pink (his favorite color right now) and red (his mommy's favorite color). I did everything I could to try to sway him to colors a little more genderly (is that a word?) neutral. He would not be swayed. So I bought pink and red ... at least I got to pick out the shades of these colors! I pondered on the colors for a while trying to determine what I was going to do with these colors. Their old room was green and blue stripes, yes painted. But I didn't want to go with stripes again ... been there done that! Then I saw a photo and it all snapped together! I added purple (thanks Mom!) to tie the two colors together and voila! New kids room!!



I am so proud of this room. It works for both a boy and a girl! Carson is really into "centers" because that is what the different play areas are called at daycare. Now their bedroom has a "play center" and a "reading center". And taking the bunkbeds apart was THE thing to do ... Kali has slept through the entire night from the first night in their new room. Maybe she doesn't feel so confined anymore ... she was sleeping on the lower bunk. And Carson loves hanging out in his "reading center" just looking at book after book. And then I had a great time picking out the new color and painting their old bedroom to make it a guest room. Rick told me, "You really didn't want to move them in here ... you just wanted an excuse to paint again!"

We have noticed a subtle change in Kali over the past few weeks. Things have gotten noticeably easier with her. Her defiance seems to be going away finally. Maybe she has finally accepted that we are her new parents and we are in charge?? Maybe she has finally decided that she likes this new family? Who knows, but she is definitely different. She still has her moments, but then so does Carson ... and he has a whole lot more moments than he ever had before now that he has some competition in the house! It's a good thing that the first followup home study is at 3 months and not 3 weeks ... I'm afraid they would have seen Kali sitting in time-out quite a bit! I guess they know what they are doing, waiting 3 months for things to settle. Time-out is quickly becoming what it should be ... the occasional discipline method, not the every 20 minute discipline method. Although, we're beginning to think that maybe she misses time-out. There are times when Kali just won't give up. When she gets mad and starts to pout, she usually wants to make sure you know that she's upset ... she'll kind of push something with a little "take that" grunt, or swat at something ... any little action to show us that she's ticked off. We try to give her a break and just tell her not to do that or show her something to steer her in a different direction. Distraction usually works well! But she just can't let it go. She just keeps pushing and pushing until she's done something that really warrants the time-out. I know that they say "negative attention is better then no attention at all", but this little girl receives LOTS of attention from both of us and her brother, and most of it is good. So why does she push you into forcing the time-out?

Oh well ... I guess once a diva, always a diva! I said it last night ... she is 100% sweetheart 99% of the time! She does two things now that just crack us up ... when she does something by herself, she is so proud of herself, says "I did it!" and gives you the open palm saying "High five!". And the other thing ... her new name is "Me too!" or "I do it myself!" These are her two new favorite sayings!!

Breakthrough!!

Today when Kali woke up from her nap, she was playing with her baby and her puppy (it's really a stuffed cow, but she calls it puppy). After a bit, I noticed her in the time-out corner and she looked up at me and said, "Shhh ... baby time-out." I asked her what baby did to get into time-out and she took the baby's bottle and threw it saying, "Baby throw" and then she went to pick it up. A few minutes later it was puppy's turn to go to time-out. I asked again and this time was told, "Puppy hit" and then she made a hitting motion. She gets it!!!! She actually gets it!!!

The Faces of Kali

The pouty look, all the rage this season!

It must seem to those reading that I zoom in on Kali's "dark side" more than I should. I know it sometimes seems that way to me too. But as I was painting this morning (redecorating the bigger bedroom to move both kids into), it suddenly hit me so clearly!

Yes, I read all the books about adoption, specifically adoption of toddlers. But books are just not the same as living it. I thought I was absorbing what I read, but apparently not. I know I've been too impatient with Kali at times, expecting her to act just like her brother does (or did when he was her age), but I keep forgetting one HUGE fact ... she has not been with us from birth. I know that sounds simplistic, but it so easy to forget that the kids who have been with you from the time they were born or shortly thereafter have had several years of YOUR teaching and YOUR way of doing things. Kali has been with us for 6 weeks ... ONLY 6 weeks. It is utterly ridiculous of us to expect her to behave any other way than how she does ... and yet, it is so easy to forget all of that.


I was speaking to someone I met a few weeks ago who has a 7 year old daughter. This woman's daughter was also adopted as a toddler. As this woman and I were talking, I was describing these "mad" things that Kali does ... the shooting-a-death-ray-through-your-face stare, the little one shoulder shrug, the I-hate-you-and-I'm-gonna-let-the-whole-neighborhood-know scream (and I don't mean crying, I mean SCREAM) ... this woman looked at me and told me that I had just described her daughter shortly after she had adopted her. Her daughter is a blonde haired, blue eyed little girl adopted domestically. Those traits that I thought were uniquely part of Kali's heritage, turns out they are just part of adoption.

It takes me a while, folks. This conversation was probably three weeks ago. So anyway, my epiphone while I was painting ... all of these "mad" traits are saying "Hey, I've already been dumped by one big person. I don't give a flying flip who you say you are ... you're gonna have to earn my love and respect and trust. Now let's see what you're gonna do with this!" Yes, I read this in one of those many books, but somehow it escaped me once we had Kali as part of our family.

The contented look, coming to a home near you soon!

We couldn't be happier or more thankful in our decision to adopt this beautiful little girl. She makes us laugh and smile all of the time. The other day, we had a little argument over a bean bag lizard. Kali kept calling it a "flot". I told her it was a lizard several times, even repeating it slowly so she could repeat me. Every time I said "liz -zard" slowly, she would look at me and just as slowly say "flo-ot". Who is the teacher here?! It hit me several hours later ... she was calling it a FROG! Told you it takes me a while! The "animal" sound she makes when you ask her what a certain animal says is hilarious ... its "waargh" (think loud growl!). Problem is, she thinks EVERY animal makes this sound other than a dog, a cat, and a flot .. oops, frog. She knows their sounds, but even a bunny goes "waargh" according to Kali. Every time she washes her hands, she holds up her soapy hands like paws with claws and yells "waargh" at you like a bear. These are the kinds of things that keep us in stitches with this kiddo.

Her giggle is the best sound in the world. There is something about it that just makes you want to laugh too. She is such a snuggle bug too ... when she wakes up, she wants you to hold her and she throws both arms around your neck, puts her head on your shoulder, and is perfectly content for several minutes. She mimics everything her brother does, even down to the goofy faces he likes to make. Right now, he loves it. I'm sure that some day, it will annoy the heck out of him and he'll be begging me to make her stop.

Kali can sing her ABC's all the way through and loves for you to sing "Itsy Bitsy Spider" with her. Her favorite thing to say now is "Mommy, what you doin'?" And Carson is really Tahson!

So, the point is this ... even though Kali ends up in time-out at least 3-4 times a day (not what we were used to with Carson), that is only about 15-20 minutes out of the whole day. These minutes can be intense, but the rest of the day of sweetness and sunshine make up for all of it!!! The giggle I am hearing right now as she plays with her daddy ... it makes me smile and wish that everyone else could hear it too!

Not much to report

I was asked to post more pictures so here they are. Kali and Carson played in the sprinkler yesterday, the poor man's swimming pool. Kali was a little hesitant to run through at first, but after watching her brother run through it quite a few times, she was not about to be second in Sprinkler Playing!

I am not sure we can really call Kali's time with us a "transition" anymore. She is part of our family and has blended in without any real problems. She came to us potty trained (though we do put a pull-up on her at night); she eats just about anything you put in front of her; she is sweet and loving and compassionate. What more could we ask for??

There is the continuing problem of the tantrums, which come and go. We thought the spitting was over, but she still spits at us when she gets REALLY mad ... and that REALLY mad usually comes with not getting what she wants. I think she has finally learned what the time-outs are for because she will turn and run from us now when she knows that she's done something to get in trouble, although it hasn't deterred her from the swatting, hitting, spitting, etc. Everything with time, right?

One funny thing ... she LOVES her clothes and getting dressed is the first thing she wants to do in the mornings when she wakes up. She has several pairs of shoes, but she has taken a keen interest in one pair ... her pink & white Nikes. Kali was with me when we bought these shoes, so somehow she has attached herself to these shoes with proprietary interest. She refuses to wear any other shoes and doesn't even like to take them off when it is bathtime.

She is all girl!!!

Birthday!!

And the decision is .... August 22! Yes, after some discussion (thanks to my commenters who brought up a very good point that we had not considered before), we are going with the August birthday for Kali.

We were actually given two different birthdates ... 11/10/2004 (most likely the date she entered the orphanage with the pediatrician assigned birth year) and 08/22/2005 (the birthdate given by her mother during a later interview, but obviously the birth year is way wrong!). We had been using the November birthdate from the time we accepted Kali's referral. But the August birthdate is the one that is shown on her Ethiopian birth certificate and passport. We will change the birth year, of course, since she is so obviously not about to turn 2!!

So when we follow through with the re-adoption, we will officially give her a birth date of August 22, 2004.

My dear nephew Soren, I sure hope you don't mind sharing your birthdays with your new cousin!

This just in ...

The daycare director asked me yesterday how I would feel about Kali moving up to the 3 year old room! It is that time of year when they move the kids up into new rooms and they had to make a decision about who to move up out of the 2 year old room. Out of all those kids (only about 8, but still ...), they chose Kali because they think she is ready! Even though English is not her first language, she already speaks English better than some of the other kids her own age ... they can actually understand what she is saying. They tell me that she is really learning well, that every day they can see a difference from the day before.

We do think she is a lot closer to 3 years old than we originally anticipated. We considered changing her birthday to something closer to now after watching her over the past month ... after all, a 2 year/5 month old is still further behind developmentally than a 2 year/11 month old, even though they are both technically 2 years old. But 10 years from now, will it really matter whether she turns 13 in August or in November?

But we did say this girl is smart, didn't we??

Transition to daycare

Kali started daycare her 3rd week home with us. The original plan was for me to stay home with her for a month, but after we decided to host our three teenagers, the plan had to change. That was our first week with Aschalo, Genet and Yesalemush and it would have been much too difficult to try to entertain them AND have two toddlers in tow.

Day 1 - Kali waltzed into her new room at daycare without a care in the world. After all, she had been coming with me to drop off Carson, so what would be different this time? When it became apparent that I was going to be leaving her, that worried look appeared on her face. When the time came for me to actually leave, she wrapped both arms around my neck very tightly and pressed her open, screaming mouth to my cheek like she was trying to suck herself to me. It was heart-wrenching, to say the least! We kept waiting for that ominous phone call from the daycare asking us to come and pick her up, but luckily, this IS a daycare ... they are quite accustomed to children who don't want their mommies to leave. When I picked her up, she was a happy little camper having fun with the other kids and they told me that she had stopped crying before I even left the parking lot.

Day 2 - Kali again went happily into her room, unaware that this was day 2 of daycare. We had the same experience as day 1, but without the sucking action on my cheek. Again, happy as can be when I picked her up.

Day 3 - This time, she wasn't quite so happy about going to school. She recognized the building when we pulled up and started shaking her head 'no'. But today saw a great improvement ... she cried when I was handing her over to the teacher, but she went to the teacher willingly!

(No day 4 or 5 this week ... July 4th fell in the middle of the week and we kept both kids out on Friday to go to the soccer tournament as a family.)

Week 2 - Amazing! Kali still gets the pouty look on her face when taking her to her room ... a few wimpers here and there, but mostly she goes in and immediately begins to play.

Week 3 - Incredible! Kali has absolutely no problem going to daycare now. She heads on into her room and gives me a hug and kiss before I leave. She especially likes the mornings when we get there and the kids have not yet been broken off into their respective rooms. On these mornings, she gets to sit with Carson and watch a few minutes of a cartoon with him.

The teachers and the director keep telling us what a little love she is (like we don't already know that!), that she has not had any trouble adjusting at all. She plays with the kids, she eats her lunch, and she takes her nap just like the other kids in her class. And picking her up in the evenings now is the funniest ... she has a habit of hanging out and playing near the window when she sees that it is time for the mommies and daddies to pick up their kids. She plays, but always with an eye out that window. When she sees whichever of us is picking her up, she lets out this loud scream and runs into our arms, almost as if to say, "I can't believe it ... you came for me again!" But if we get her brother from his class first and he comes in with us, well, he is the recipient of that hug!