Three! (and other stuff)

Our little L turned three this past week.  I know I've said it before, but the fact that we got to celebrate his birthday with him was one of the biggest gifts we were given in the timing of the adoption.  Choosing just the right present (a Big Wheel) and finding a cake he likes (a brownie--he's not much of a sweets boy just yet) was fun and something we had dreamed about for a long, long time.  We had family over for a small party, and I teared up when we all sang the happy birthday song.  He absolutely loved the attention, and our families were generous and thoughtful, and I think were as excited as we were to be at his party.  It's been a long time coming. 




Checking out his new dump truck and school bus.

 

Getting ready to blow out the candle.

 

Post-party roughhousing with Dada and cousins.  These were some tired kids at the end of the day!

We also had our first post-adoption home visit, which must happen in the first month of custody per China.  The visit went really well, and I was far less stressed than homestudy visits of the past.  Of course, I still cleaned like a maniac, but some things will never change. 

We took L to the pumpkin patch as well, and I think he enjoyed it although sometimes I think he must think we're a bit nuts.  He loves pumpkins, though, and insisted that we not only purchase one for each of us but that we pick out one for Maggie (our dog) as well. 




Fun at the pumpkin patch!

 

Happy Mama

Happy Dada 

Things here continue to go pretty well, actually.  Over the past week or so, L has started to show some real interest in learning English.  He's now repeating most of what we say, and is holding things up so we can tell him the English word for it.  In the past, he usually corrected us when we would tell him an English word --he'd look at us like we were just a bit slow, and repeat the word in Mandarin.  It's complicated, this whole international adoption thing (understatement, yes).  We are dying to communicate with him, and since he talks constantly, we would really love to know what in the heck he's saying.  But losing his native language is sad--it's a big, big loss.  There are certain little catchphrases he says that have now entered our vocabulary that we don't want him to lose, such as "Baloo!" which means stinky and is accompanied by a funny face.  We have lots of video of him speaking Mandarin.  And we need him to have some vocabulary to communicate with those around him, and our Mandarin is pretty limited.  So we're working on it.