Sunday Snapshot {Darcy}

Darcy.  One month ago today her name officially changed from Sun Qing You to Darcy QingYou M_____. And yet it seems like yesterday.  Or was it a lifetime ago? 

While I doubt that she has any idea what she is saying, she can now sing most of the "God our Father" blessing along with Kylie and Caleb at each meal.  She's picked up on a few other phrases too, things that she hears her brother and sister saying.  You know, important stuff like, "That's not funny," and "Ka-chow!"  She has also figured out "Hello," "Good-bye," and "I love you," and more importantly, when to appropriately use them.  From the sound of her words, you'd never guess that she spent the first three years of her life listening to and beginning to speak in a foreign tongue. Her English words that she parrots after her big sister (who goes around the house saying "QingYou, juga bed.  Say bed Darcy.") are clear as a bell.

Unless she's tired she is amazingly compliant.  A simple no typically stops any undesired behavior.  If she has a toy that one of the others want, usually all they have to do is offer her something in exchange and she happily trades.  Pretty amazing coming from an only child.  Unless of course the desired object is her panda bear that we sent her in her care package or her photo album.  And then there is nothing you can offer her to make her hand them over.  NOTHING.

We were told that Darcy ate vegetables at both lunch and dinner every day though we haven't found a vegetable we can count on in her diet just yet.  Carrots are tolerated, but not desired.  I have found that she LOVES macaroni and cheese (only had home made so far, hopefully she'll like Kraft too...) and that she'll eat a few bites of carrots in exchange for a second helping.  I show her the mac and then hold up four fingers while pointing to the carrots.  Then she'll eat a carrot stick and hold up one less finger than I had held up before.  Down she counts as she eats her carrots until she gets her reward.  Thankfully she can power through most fruits (just hold the berries) like there is no tomorrow.  That includes being able to peel and eat a clementine in about two minutes flat.  We're adding more protein sources weekly (she devours scrambled eggs!) and are finding that overall she's a good eater.  Just hold the bread when serving her peanut butter.  Last night she scraped apple wedges across her opened peanut butter sandwich to avoid the bread...

She may be a little girl, but don't let the adorable face fool you.  This gal is THE QUEEN of bedhogs.  In fact she must have been giving lessons.  And she can snore with the best of them.  One day, when Ian and I finally have our queen size bed back to ourselves it will feel huge! During the day though she insists on napping on her bed.  UNDER the covers.  Don't try to put her on top of them.  It won't work!  And also make sure that you have her pillow on the bed.  Cause any other pillow will be tossed on the floor.  But at night you can forget about her sleeping in her room with her big sister.  She's just not there yet, but we hang onto her preferring napping there as a positive sign that one day we'll sleep without feet in our rib cages or hands in our faces again.  

Not much seems to intimidate her.  At the playground she will try anything.  Perhaps she isn't intimidated because she can pretty much do it all.  I see gymnastics or soccer or rock climbing or dance in her future.  She has talent and it will be fun to see what form of physical activity makes her happy.

She's an observer.  Not much gets by her.  She's always watching her surroundings.  My girl is going to be the one in the room to notice details.  Case in point, the day after we met she was studying her photo album we sent (that was labeled to let her know who everyone was) and pointed to Caleb's picture in the album amd correctly identified him as ge ge.  Then she points at Caleb in person, shakes her head while saying ge ge and says, di di.  Guess she noticed she's got a few inches on her elder brother and decided that he must be younger after all.  Detective work could easily be up her alley.

Darcy is a dancer.  If there is music she will move to it.  Even when she thinks she's being still.

When she gets really tired she starts rubbing the back of her arm across her eyes.  You know then that you have about five minutes to get the kid to bed.  Or else she is going to catch a second wind.  And a really tired Darcy with a second wind isn't so much of a good thing...

She has got the best smile.  Really.  Her smile doesn't involve just her mouth, and not even just her entire face.  Somehow this little one smiles with her entire body.    It is nearly impossible to remain in a cranky mood when she smiles.  And on top of the smile is the belly laugh.  So if somehow you managed to hold on to your bad mood after she smiled, you have to cave and at least grin yourself when she laughs.   And one of the thing that elicits laughter of pure joy from this one?  Sight of playground equipment.  How lucky am I that free equals delightful in her eyes?

And she plays so well.  Both with her siblings and on her own.  The first few days at home her playing on her own looked a lot like dumping every single toy out of the toy bins, but now at least she dumps ~ and plays with ~ one bin at a time. 

It feels like just yesterday that she entered my life (in a she's here in front of me kind of way) because each day I learn something new about her, yet she also has a way of weaving herself into life such that it already is difficult to remember a time without her little feet running through the house...

Check out some other Sunday Snapshots or play along over at Ni Hao Y'all.