Fitting in

It's only been a few days and I honestly find myself frequently forgetting that we are here because we are adopting Darcy.  There are moments, like the ones captured above, that it just seems like she's been with us always. 

The girls have fallen into a routine of pulling out the dress up clothes every time we walk back in the door to our room.  Sometimes they put on the princess stuff, but usually they go for the matching leotards and pink skirts and then follow each other around the room, imitating "dance moves" and hop scotch jumps rather than relying on language.  I did crack up as Kylie was adamantly telling Darcy something while they enjoyed the fruit portion of their "in room" lunch.  (That also included the family sharing a bag of French Roast Chicken flavor Lays chips and a sleeve of Strawberry creme filled sandwich cookies ~ nutrition at its finest.  Just easier than hitting the street looking for somewhere that has an English menu...)

And then just when I fear that my sweet boy is going to feel left out, she hops up and shows that she shares his TV addiction.  And his love for peanut butter bagels (don't ask why we didn't break those out BEFORE the chips, it was an afterthought).  Then while Kylie brushed her My Little Pony's hair, Caleb and his Mei Mei watched about 30 minutes of Cars together.  She may not understand the language yet, but hearing them both giggling during the funny parts and saying, "Uh-oh!" when Mater and Lightning McQueen almost get mowed over when they go tractor tipping was precious.

Of course I don't want to make it sound "too good to be true."  There are a few Keeping it real things that I'll share because I know that many of you will focus some prayer in those areas for us.  First of all, it is wonderful that Darcy is getting more comfortable with us.  I couldn't be happier about that.  But that also means that in the past 24 hours she has started to "buck" what is generally considered acceptable behavior.  And if you correct her, she shrieks.  LOUDLY!  And folks, right now we don't really need a shrieking child to draw more attention to ourselves.  She also  goes from "just playing" to pretty hard hitting rather quickly.  Not sure yet if it is out of frustration that no one understands what she says, or simply not knowing the difference between playing too rough and playing gently.  (This has visions of RAVs flashing in my mind...)  And her independence, while it has some positive aspects, is also making it difficult to establish for her that Ian and I are here to help her and take care of her and that she doesn't need to do everything for herself at the tender age of two.  (We are seeing some improvement in some areas of that though.  For example, the first night she refused to take her formula because I insisted on holding it for her.  The second night she let me hold it for her, but remained stiff in my arms and kept trying to turn her back to me as I held her.  The next night she relaxed a bit and sat sideways across my lap, and last night she let me lean her back as you would hold a baby and even made eye contact with me for several ten to thirty second intervals).  And this one has less to do with Darcy and more to do with us as the "walking freak show."  For the first few days it was (somewhat) easy to laugh it off.  And we don't mind the second glances that bring smiles to people's faces.  They at least seem somewhat approving of our family.  It's the ones that stop in their tracks (or almost walk into something) as they stare.  I'm not just talking about a quick glance kind of stare.  I'm talking about the stern, sour face expression kind of LONG stare.  Sometimes with folks even getting up from their table in a restaurant to stand at the end our table with disapproving looks kind of stares.  Ian and I can almost handle it.  But it makes all three of our children very uncomfortable.  And no, making eye contact and staring back doesn't make most of them go away.  They just keep standing.  And when they talk to my kids in harsh voices I almost go through the roof.  It confuses and upsets Kylie and Caleb, but at least they don't know what is being said.  Darcy frequently hides her head or turns to me and I feel so powerless as I have NO IDEA what people are saying.  (I don't want to make it sound like everyone looks at us this way, but it happens at least four or five times a day and frankly it is wearying...)  Thanks for praying for thicker skin for all of us.

An additional prayer request ~ Caleb's head cold just won't give it up.  Kylie seems to be recovering well from hers, and Darcy had the sniffles, but also seems to be on the upswing.  My little guy however has been tossing and turning for about an hour (the reason I'm up in the wee hours posting) and is running a fever now.  Not good on a day that we fly.  Our flight is at 7pm local time which will be 6am EST on Wednesday for all you back home.  Would you please petition the heavens along with me that he'll be back to his mischievous self within the next 12 hours?

Oh, and by the way, Savor was successful on her passport mission and we got Darcy's passport yesterday ~ A DAY EARLY!  Praise God for small miracles...

**FYI for any traveling soon with "littles."  My brilliant husband came up with the idea of having gifts for the children to exchange with one another to help in the transition.  So before we left home, we had Kylie and Caleb each pick Darcy a small gift (Ky chose a My Little Pony that matched hers so they could play together and Caleb selected the Sleepover Kai Lan figures set).  And Darcy "got" Caleb the Cars movie and Kylie a four pack of princess dress up shoes.  (I only packed two pairs for the trip).  These long desired gifts have produced a lot of goodwill between new siblings, and provided for lots more in room entertainment!**