Little Acorn

Halloween (and then on to CHRISTMAS!)

Sorry the posting dropped off so suddenly there. Poor David (who just can NOT seem to catch a break lately) ended up having some minor surgery that ended up being slightly more than minor. It's all good and at not even two weeks post-surgery he's feeling pretty good and he'll be returning to work next week, albeit a little slower and more tired than he should be.

Even with everything else going on, we still managed to carve pumpkins, decorate the house and have a lot of fun!

Halloween was a truly epic two week event this year - there was a big street fair downtown where Adeline's violin group performed, a school party and dance, a house party with some friends and of course trick-or-treating! The girls had a FABULOUS time and enjoyed all the costume fun and of course, the CANDY.

Of course Vivian wanted to be an owl this year, and inspired by her latest obsession  favourite movie, Rio, Adeline wanted to be an endangered Blue Spix Macaw. I had a lot of fun making their costumes and they were both thrilled with the outcome and wore their wings, heads and tails as much as I would let them in the weeks before the big night. Halloween night we went to a party and then there was a little trick-or-treating afterwards. Adeline was worn out and she actually asked for it to be over fairly quickly. The two girls still had a fine haul of candy which they finished up in a couple of days. Vivian was pretty thrilled with all the candy in those two days and it's been hard for her to come down off her sugar high. When she was a baby anything sweet would make her cry and cry (trying to feed her a banana seemed cruel, she hated it so much) but now she's got a bit of an obsession with sugar going on. Adeline could take it or leave it, but Vivi likes the sweet stuff a bit too much. We're back to regular eating now, until the candy onslaught of Christmas comes along. Oh Christmas, I'm SO looking forward to you this year. It's going to be GOOD.

Happy Moon Festival!

We had a great Moon Festival weekend. Lots of family fun, a great party which culminated in an epic pillow fight, many homemade mooncakes and as the perfect ending, taking our lanterns to the beach to watch the super moon/blood moon lunar eclipse Sunday night. Both girls loved dressing up in their ao dais, but Vivian was mad and didn't want her picture taken as we were leaving for the party because she wanted to jump on the trampoline. I did manage to get a few shots though, despite Vivi's non-cooperation. Adeline knows she looks beautiful in an ao dai and she really wanted her picture taken and she wanted it to be a nice picture of sisters hugging or holding hands and Viv would have NONE OF IT and started to cry the second Adeline got too close. She wanted everyone to know she wasn't happy about the no-trampoline thing.

The party was a lot of fun and our homemade mooncakes were very appreciated! Adeline will tell you that absolutely the best part of moon festival this year was the pillow fight! Once it got dark we all walked down to a lantern festival taking place in a nearby park. Adeline had the best view of the lion dance from up on her Daddy's shoulders.

That night Vivian was up until 10:15 and Adeline until after midnight, so the next day we were all feeling kind of low and slow. Even though it meant another later night, we wanted to keep our tradition of going to the beach to make our wishes to the harvest moon. Of course, this being not only the harvest moon, but a once-in-a-lifetime astronomical event, the beach was packed which made it less of a quiet, reflective family time and more of a party. The blood moon was less impressive to the littles, but I thought it was a very cool thing to see. I guess when you're young so many things in the world are new to you that it's just one more new thing, but to us, we've never seen the moon look like that before, so it's fascinating.

Happy Birthday, Big Girl!

Just a family celebration for Vivian this year. We started out the day with a waffle brunch. With strawberries and whipped cream, of course.

Here Vivian is working hard to show everybody that she's two. She kept saying "I'm a big girl! I'm TWO!".

Halfway through the day, Vivian got her first big girl haircut. She was extremely patient and she even interacted with our fabulous stylist a bit. The new 'do is taking some getting used to for me, and I still don't know if I should have just kept toughing it out and not gone for the bangs. Vivi does look adorable though, and with her super fine and wispy hair that is still filling in at the temples, I do think bangs were probably the right choice, right? She looks like a kid all of a sudden. Where's my baby gone?

After a nap, Vivian was ready for CAKE! She was an expert at blowing out candles. We had to do a few retakes because Vivi blew them out before they were even fully lit, and I wanted a classic "blowing out the candles" photo. No one minded - Vivian and Adeline took turns blowing them out again and again and then it was time to eat!

My tiny bit of crafting for this birthday was the hat. Vivi has a book about birthdays and she was really into the classic cone hats, so I thought I'd make her a special one for her big day. Nothing fancy, just card stock, fake flowers, glue and a bit of elastic. I expected her to wear it for approximately four seconds, but she kept it on for a lot of the day.

We had other birthday fun planned but the pool was out as Vivian is working through her second back-to-back ear infection and the forest fires are making the air quality terrible and the weather extremely hot and humid, so we just stayed in and Vivi and Adeline had a lot of silly sister fun together. Those two can sure make each other laugh!

Happy Birthday to my littlest big girl!

 

Mother's Day 2015 (part 1)

Mother's Day 2014 is right up there with the worst days of my life and it was certainly one of the worst days of both Vivian's and Adeline's short lives, but this year? Mother's Day 2015 was full of sweetness. Last year we were still in Vietnam and Mother's Day was our hardest day of the whole trip. Vivi had been with us a few days, but she was still crying almost all of the time and would only settle a little if I would just walk her back and forth in the room. If I stopped walking or tried to sit down with her she would begin to get hysterical. What made Mother's Day in particular so hard was that Adeline was sick with a fever, and all she wanted was Mama to cuddle her and to wear her bathrobe (which was hanging on the back of the bathroom door at home) and to be in her own house, and I couldn't give her any of those things, so she cried and cried. David tried to take Vivian from me, which didn't work and he tried to comfort Adeline, but she only wanted me, so it was a solid day of heartbreaking crying from both my girls, often at the same time. Once they were both in bed, I cried as well, just from absolute emotional exhaustion. I think David poured some Kahlua on ice cream and we watched some "American Idol" on television and I know he told me how strong I was and what a good Mom I was. I think we got to sit together for a little bit on the couch before Vivian woke up and realized I wasn't laying next to her and needed me back, but it's all pretty hazy.

Whew.

I told myself then that "It will be different next year. This is NOT our new normal. It will get better and by next Mother's Day it will all be good". I don't know if I totally believed it at the time, but it turns out I was right.

This year WAS totally different. Adeline had worked hard on so many surprises for me. There were sunflower seedlings and cards and a handmade necklace and roses and cake and so many hugs and kisses and declarations of "I Love You" from both my little ones. Adeline kept declaring "We're spoiling you!" and she was right! My choice for a family activity for Mother's Day was the beach, which I know both the girls love. It wasn't as sunny a day as it has been, but that didn't stop them from getting soaked and sandy and having a wonderful time!

I love my family so much and I'm so lucky to be Mama to such wonderful, happy, loving, girls.

 

 

Happy Easter!

Gorgeous weather, happy girls and chocolate...who could ask for more?

Dying eggs -

Community Easter party -

Hunting for eggs Easter morning -

 

Enjoying the surprises in their Easter baskets - Adeline was thrilled to get a package of 24 limited edition 80's Glam sharpies. The colours are amazing and Adeline is loving drawing with them! Vivi liked the chocolate best, but is also spending a lot of time snuggling her soft and sweet new bunny.

Playing outside in the sunshine -

Truly a great weekend!

 

Happy Anniversary to the Man I Adore (that's you, David)

It's a big one - 10 years! We had plans to be back on the beautiful beach in Mexico where we got married to celebrate our tenth anniversary, but instead we'll be leaving both the girls with their Nana for our first child-free lunch and afternoon in ten months.  We're giddy-with-excitement at the idea of hot food and adult conversation! I am so very lucky to be sharing my life with my one true love, my best friend, my team-mate, my biggest fan and the man who continues to make me swoon fifteen years after we first met and ten years after we finally got around to saying "I do". Sometimes life is hard and sometimes it's amazing, and I wouldn't want anyone by my side to for all the worry and sadness and sweetness and joy that life brings but my amazing husband!

Christmas 2014

Another one come and gone...

It was a good Christmas, of course. How could it not be, surrounded by my lovely family? It could have been lovelier though if that lovely family wasn't suffering from another round of wicked colds.

SIGH.

Kindergarten has brought so many new things into our lives, including a slew of novel viruses for our bodies to fight off. Adeline is always the least afflicted and seems to shake things off easily, but poor Vivian is always hit hard and David doesn't often succumb, but when he does it's always a doozy. Vivian doesn't sleep when she's sick and she was also getting a couple of molars, which probably impacted our Christmas the most, as she was tired and needing to hug Mama a lot of the day and night, from the 23rd through the 27th.

So yeah. Sick sick sick.

But that didn't stop us from having a wonderful day. Adeline woke us all up at about ten to seven and then GALLOPED down the stairs before my eyes were even open. She was thrilled with all her presents and excited to give her family the presents that she had made and bought for them. None of us were even much in a treat-eating mood, although Adeline did follow through on her plan to have Cheezies and gummy candy for her Christmas breakfast.

Adeline's Frozen obsession has waned somewhat, but she declared the present I got her better than any of the presents she had asked Santa for. I took a chance and ordered some super cheap Elsa and Anna costumes from ebay to be shipped straight from China. I thought either they wouldn't arrive at all, they would arrive too late for Christmas or they would arrive and be totally lame, but both of the costumes together were only twenty dollars, so I thought it was worth a chance. I was very surprised that not only were they here in time for Christmas, they're both really nice and Adeline couldn't be happier. It was one of her least expensive presents, but they really excited her and she's worn them a lot since Christmas.

The Elsa dress is nice and of course Elsa is Adeline's favourite, but I think Adeline makes a super cute Anna! Anna is the fun and spunky and brave one and is totally the hero of the movie...I don't get why all the girls want to be Elsa...

The big gift Adeline asked Santa for was a real camera. She was very impressed that before it went in Santa's sack, Santa took some pictures in the reindeer stables.

I don't think Vivian opened even one present, but she was content to sit and stand on all the boxes and play with the new toys as they got unwrapped. All the excitement of the big day helped her forget that she was sick and teething and she had a really fun first Christmas!

Happy Halloween!

We're going to be without a computer for the week so I'm wishing you all a Happy Halloween right now and I'll be back with pictures of us celebrating later! Adeline is going to be Kwazii from the Octonauts for Halloween (if I get the costume finished...), but she was invited to a party this weekend and had to come up with a costume from our dress-up box. Here she is as a rough-and-tough-and-ready-for-action pirate fairy!

That girl loves any costume that involves a sword, eye shadow and yelling. Vivi is going to be a princess. Is the princess born right in, perhaps? I've always wondered. Adeline never got very into princesses (although she is a new convert to the cult of Frozen) and while she enjoys dressing up and looking pretty and she's really into fancy hair lately, when it's time to play she'd always rather be fighting off dragons or rescuing animals than swooning in a tower. Vivian said a great big NO to every costume I suggested to her and was downright terrified of a few of them. But then I put the big poofy pink princess dress and a crown on her and she scooted right over to the mirror to admire herself. She patted herself and said "dress pretty" over and over again and she kept that dress on all afternoon, despite it getting in the way of her doing just about everything. She does make a very beautiful princess - I'll be sure to share some pictures soon.

Without a computer for a week...yikes...but then back with a brand new one, which I'm really looking forward to!

 

Fabulous, Fantastic Five!

Turning five is a big deal, right? Kids seem to naturally believe that "after I'm five" is a very special time, when lots of amazing stuff (like kindergarten! and chores!) happens. I wanted Adeline to have a great birthday, but when I was planning it we were newly home from Vietnam and I just didn't think I could face cleaning the house and getting the garden in shape to have our usual very-handmade back yard party. So I asked Adeline if she wanted a BIG party. A big, inflatable-bouncer-at-the-rec-centre kind of party and she loved the idea, since it meant she could invite EVERYBODY. We ended up with a guest list of about 30 kids (YIKES) but because everyone is so busy in the summer last Sunday we ended up with 19 friends at the party, which was just enough. The party people set up the bouncer and the toys and did balloon animals and face painting and all I had to do was the food, decorations and be the host - although that was PLENTY for me to take on this year.

There are almost no pictures from the party. Sigh. It's too hard to take photos when you're holding a baby and trying to be a good host and getting the food ready. We could only get into the venue thirty minutes before the party started, so I was still trying to get the table set while people were arriving and most of my decorations didn't get up. No one noticed or minded though.

Adeline was in motion the whole party, so most of our pictures look like this...

Adeline wanted an Octonauts party (of course) and that isn't a theme you can just buy from the store, but I did my best and Adeline was thrilled. We had a sailor's cap for everyone and lots of orange and blue balloons and decorations. I even carved a watermelon Gup A.

And there were under-the-sea marshmallow pops that David and I had a lot of fun making and everyone had a lot of fun eating...

And I was able to make Adeline's wish for Kwazii cupcakes come true...

With a little encouragement, Adeline decided to not have presents at her party and instead to ask for each guest to bring two dollars for her to donate to charity. We talked a lot about different charities and what they do to help people or animals, and in the end she chose the SPCA, and she raised 54 dollars for them.

At home there were some presents to open. Adeline is still so genuinely grateful that it's nice to get her presents. She was very excited about new Octonauts toys, some science experiments, a real music stand, a Hot Wheels track and some new dress up accessories including a hula skirt and sheriff's badge.

Adeline got to choose what I made for dinner and as it was one of the hottest days of the year and I was worn out from partying, I was glad she had chosen spaghetti, garlic bread and corn as I had most of that ready to go the day before and we mostly just needed to boil the noodles. And there was cake again, of course - an ice cream cake this time.

Whenever Adeline has a wish - whether it's blowing out candles, wishing on a star or finding a wish rock, she always wishes the same thing - "I wish my family will be together forever". A sweet wish, but also a poignant one. It's good to know that it's a wish that we can make come true for her.

Happy Birthday, big girl! Five is going to be GREAT!

 

 

 

Happy Birthday, Baby Girl!

My wee baby is one year old... ONE! So big. So fast.

Vivi had a lovely special day with lots of love from her family...

...a few special friends to celebrate with...

and her first bites of cake. Because it doesn't fit in Vivian's very narrow definition of edible (beige and crunchy ONLY) we didn't think she would even try it, but she used an interesting face-first technique and she seemed to enjoy her few bites of cake and whipped cream.

Then of course there were presents. Viv didn't really get the whole "presents" thing, but luckily she has a big sister who knows all about them. Adeline unwrapped the presents and played with all the new toys while Vivian played with the boxes.

Happy Birthday, my sweet girl!

 

 

Happy Canada Day!

Adeline made the card all by herself. Hp Brfday Canada!

"Like a THOUSAND", an interview with Adeline

Just before we take the tree down, we always take a few pictures and a little bit of video in front of it. It's great to have the perspective of the wicker stool to see how much our girl has grown. Here she is in 2012 , and 2011 and 2010 .

This year we also did a little interview about the Christmas season...

 

 

Hippity Hoppity Happy Easter!

This weekend was all about trying NOT to think about the fact that in just a short time David will be undergoing major surgery (achilles tendon re-attachment, likely with grafting in of tendons harvested from other parts of his body) and then will be in a cast and then a progression of boots and on crutches for up to 6 months (but hopefully only four). It's hard to think about anything else, and just trying to wrap our heads around how we're going to accomplish even just our daily tasks seems to be taking up all our energy. But we had AMAZING May-like weather and a long weekend and a lot of chocolate in the house, so we decided to try to just enjoy each other.

First we dyed eggs on Friday...three dozen of them this year...

On Saturday, Adeline dressed up in her spring-y best and we went to our neighbourhood Easter party. I love my neighbourhood!

There was an Easter egg hunt, face painting, parachute games, the playground, bubbles, a bouncy castle, egg-and-spoon and sack races, crafts, huevos locos and lots of happy little people. We stayed for the full two hours and Adeline did every activity.

Adeline was really hoping the wind would catch the parachute and it would take her flying...

Adeline was a VERY serious egg-and-spoon racer...

and a joyful sack-racer!

Adeline was excited to show her Dad how she could pump REALLLLY high while standing in the swing.

At the face painting Adeline wanted "A monarch butterfly all over my face" and she LOVED her finished masterpiece.

On Sunday there was Easter egg hunting both inside and out, new toys from the Easter basket to play with, a ride to the bakery on her bike, working and playing in the garden and a tasty special supper - the best part of all was just that Adeline got to hang out with her Mama, her Daddy and her Nana all day long.

Or maybe the best part was CHOCOLATE!!!

Tet Trung Thu - Autumn Moon Festival

On Sunday, we celebrated the Autumn Moon Festival with our third annual big party for all our friends who have children who were born in Vietnam and China. We never get any pictures during this, as I'm always so busy organizing the food and just catching up with all the fabulous people that we don't see nearly enough. Luckily my friend Bev always takes great pictures, so most of these are hers. This year our not-so-huge house was filled with a happy and loud group of 13 grown-ups and 9 little (and not-so-little) ones.

Back in 2008, when we decided to grow our family through adoption, we met three other local families who were also in the waiting phase. We would meet for dinner and talk about "the wait" and our hopes for our children and our families, and now here they are - our four lovely daughters! Through all the twists and turns of international adoption not one of us brought home the child we were dreaming of over those dinners - some of us switched countries, some of us changed programs, and one family adopted a different child than the one they were first referred - but we all agree that our girls are the perfect children for our families!

The weather was gorgeous and I rented a bouncy castle for the backyard. Adeline bounced from 3:45 when the bouncer arrived until 9 pm when they came to take it away. She stopped to have some parachute fun, but then she was right back in.

All the families really out did themselves this year and everyone contributed to a FEAST of Vietnamese and Chinese food. Adeline stopped for about 10 minutes to eat some pho ga, a spring roll and a dumpling, but then she was back to bouncing. Adeline loved playing with the two big brothers who were there - they made her laugh and laugh and she loved the rough (but safe - they're super nice boys) play. The other girls got very into all our dress-ups and playing pretend, but for Adeline it was all bouncing all the time.

Adeline and I had made lanterns for the celebration (big plastic containers, lots of glue, tissue paper, ribbons and fake candles) and she was excited to have a lantern parade in the moonlight. I tried to get Adeline to pose with her lanterns once they were finally dry, but was told NO WAY in no uncertain terms.

Once the moon rose, we ate our mooncakes and then most of us got our lanterns and paraded to a nearby park before saying goodbye.

Once Adeline finished her in-the-dark bouncing (the best part, according to her) we had some quiet family time and made our wishes on the moon and talked about how the same moon that shines on us, shines on all the people in Vietnam, including Adeline's birth family and all the people who took care of her when she was a baby. I told Adeline the Vietnamese tale of the lady in the moon and then it was finally time for bed. It was a very late night, but full of fun and good memories for Adeline.

Easter Eggs

If you ask Adeline, the best thing about Easter is CHOCOLATE, but a close second is dying the eggs! This year she coloured two dozen and she really didn't want to stop!

 

 

 

Considering the vast quantities of food colouring on the table it's amazing that besides her monster hands, Adeline and my house remained uncoloured. I, on the other hand, have some newly decorated jeans with a huge slop of yellow down one leg...

Lifebook Project (and a Two Year Home-i-versary!)

Happy Home-i-versary! Two years ago today Adeline started making the big blue house a noisier, messier and most of all a happier place!

The easiest pages to put together for the lifebook were ones like this that talked about Adeline's life since she's been with us...

And I apologize to all the scrapbookers out there, both digital and paper, that I have ever disparaged in the past. Yep, I was pretty snobby about the whole thing. It might not be art and you can get some pretty impressive results using very little creativity, but it's SUPER FUN and with some creativity I think it can really elevate photos to something much more special. Now I want to digital-scrapbook everything!

 

The Birthday Party Season

Ever since Adeline's Birthday we've been PARTYING. There has been between one and THREE birthday parties each weekend for the last few weeks. Adeline is LOVING IT!

Sometimes there are sandboxes...

 

 

Sometimes there's a bouncy castle...

 

 

 

There are ALWAYS good things to eat...

 

 

And the most important part - playing with good friends and lots of new people to meet!

 

 

 

And they always wear everybody out. This is Adeline exactly two minutes after leaving the party this afternoon...

 

 

David and I were both quite shy children and we're so happy that Adeline loves to be right in there with all the kids, big and little. She is wary of new grown ups at first but warms up quickly and she loves to play with other children and will always be found right in the middle of the action. Adeline and I are off next to visit Adeline's Nana for eight days while David stays home to go to work (and sleep all night long, sleep in on the weekend, watch television any time he wants, be able to clean up the toys and have them stay cleaned up, eat treats for dinner and be able to go use the bathroom without an audience, amongst other exciting things). Yes. I'm jealous. Verrrrrrrrrrrry jealous. But I'm glad David is having this time to relax and I hope he enjoys every minute of it! He's allowed to miss us a little, but only a little. Hopefully Adeline will do okay without her Daddy. We've been without him for 5 days in a row before but she was home in her own space with her own routines that time, so this could be harder. Hopefully she'll be having so much fun at Nana's house that she'll be happy all day and exhausted at night.

TWO

No more months to count, as of today my girl is a two year old. Wowza. I don't even know what to say about that. It's BIG, you know. Big for Adeline and big for her Mama.

Sometimes Adeline seems like such a sweet baby still...

And sometimes I can see the happy, smart and stubborn girl and even the challenging teenager that she's going to become...

My girl is growing and changing and blossoming every minute of the day. We're so very lucky to have been given the wonderful blessing to share our life with this amazing small person.

Here's Adeline last year on her birthday. I remember thinking how grown up she was getting and how I was already missing my little baby. Now I look back at Adeline at 12 months old and think of just how little and brand new she still was then. I don't think she'll be wearing this crown on her next big day...

 

Happy Mother's Day

My second! And it was a great day, thanks to the man I adore and the world's sweetest little girl. I'll do a proper post later but I was just busting to wish all the Moms and Moms-to-be out there a great day!

Adeline was too busy making sure that the butterflies were listening to her words to look at the camera. She kept saying "Don't touch Adewine, buttafies! and was making sure none of them got too close.

Happy Birthday to Mylan

A lot of Adeline's little friends have either just turned two or will be two by the summer, and this week it was time for her friend Mylan to have her big day. Her Mom knows I'm handy with a sewing machine so she asked me to make a banner to celebrate the day and to be used for years to come. I can't say this was my favourite project (it was easy, but repetitive,and took way way longer than I thought it would, especially since I decided that the letters had to be hand sewn) but it was a labour of love, so I didn't mind.

I think the banner looks lovely in our side garden and I'm thinking I definitely have to make one for Adeline now. I should start soon though as with all the other things I've got going on in the next couple of months I know I'll be scrambling at the end to get things ready for my girls big birthday!

And doesn't my garden look good in this picture? It's cropped strategically so you can't see the really weedy patch to the left, and my prized peonies aren't blooming yet, but I'm really pleased that a full season of neglect last year hasn't seemed to have done any harm. This year much more is already being done in the garden as Adeline loves being out there and helping is her favourite thing. She's decided that when she helps outside she's a "Helper Robot" or a "Garden Robot" and it's sweet to hear her proclaim "Helper Robot did it!!!" every time she adds something to the compost bucket or pulls a weed.

21

21 months old today! Although I've stopped answering in months when people ask me how old Adeline is - now I just go with "She'll be two in the summer". I'm always amazed that some parents can keep track of the months until their little one is more than three. Soon she'll just be "two" and then she'll be "two and half". Can you believe how close Adeline is to two? Wowza. But before she is two, Adeline gets to have all the joy of being 21 months old!

In her twentieth month...

Adeline talked and talked and talked and talked. Just like her Daddy, Adeline loves the sound of her own voice and she chatters all day long. People think David is such a quiet guy, but at home he's anything but., and Adeline definitely is just like her Daddy. She speaks most of the time in sentences of 2 or 3 words, some of them getting quite complex with up to about 6 words. She is starting to grasp pronouns and uses "I" and "me" and sometimes "you" correctly. I love to hear her talking to her toys. Actually, bossing them around would be more accurate as she's usually telling them things like "Turn around!" "Sit down!" , "Time to sleep", "Look at me", "Everybody eat" and "Uh-oh. No no no. No feet on the table" (which is what she hears me say to the cat). Adeline also learned the words/concepts "everybody" and "nobody".

Adeline learned to use some fun phrases, and knows when they're appropriate, such as "excuse me" (when you squeeze behind someone), "oh well" (when something doesn't go as expected or you give up on something) and "I'm cool" (when walking with her hands in her pockets or when wearing her sunglasses).

Adeline continued mostly sleeping through the night and also started taking some nice long restful sleeps during the day. We hope this trend continues! When Adeline is well rested, she always wakes up super happy and has really nice days! It's been good!

Adeline worked really hard to learn how to do a "thumbs up" but hasn't mastered it yet.

Toilet training is at a standstill after some gains last month. We're not pushing it yet.

Adeline now weighs 24.5 pounds and she's about 31 inches tall! She's wearing mostly size 18 month clothes, although we do have to cinch the waist on many of her pants or she'd be losing them. The Dapper Snapper is an awesome invention for tall skinny girls!

Adeline celebrated her second Easter at home.

Adeline started to spend more time each day playing on her own and it's amazing to see the all the different ways to play she thinks up!

Things that make Adeline really, really happy right now:

- that monkey hat (but only inside)

- chocolate (those twenty or so m&m's at Easter have made her into a chocolate fiend and she asks for it all day long).

- prawns, tofu, pretzels, noodles, cantaloupe and red peppers - her favourite foods (since I don't classify candy as food)

- being upside down, hanging from things, jumping and calling herself "monkey girl"

- pretending to be a kitty and being patted and fed pretend cat food from your hand

- reading books tucked under the covers in the big bed. Her favourites this week are "Home for a Bunny", "Curious George Rides a Bike", "Owl Babies", "Cowboy Bunnies" and "Colour Kittens".

- helping cook

- playing with her animal figures and having them get stuck and then rescued from the fire truck's ladder over and over and over again

- making beds in the playroom by taking pillows and blankets and then arranging them so she can lay under the carpet with her stuffies

- using her toy record player to make her little figures go "round and round and round"

- going to the park to slide and to learn new words from the big kids

- working in the garden with Mama

- the moment when Daddy comes through the door at the end of the day and scoops up his giggling girl

- visiting the chickens that live across the street from us

- bird watching

- getting mail

- the peach coloured marker (she got a set of 20 new markers in her Easter basket and has learned lots of new colours like "magenta" and "teal" but it's the peach one that's really captured her attention

- hugging... I'll stop pretty well anything when I hear a sweet little "Mama, hug Adewine, peese"

 

 

 

Easter

 

And just for comparison...

 

 

Last year Adeline was MUCH easier to take pictures of and didn't even seem to notice the giant bow on her head. This year there was no chance of getting a photo of the girl with her Easter basket and she was all about the CHOCOLATE and absolutely NOT about wearing the bunny ears (although David did look very sweet in them). Easter is our first "second" holiday with Adeline. Last year Easter was just a week after we got home from Vietnam. We were oh-so-tired, sick-sick-sick and hadn't quite found our new normal yet, but I remember it as a happy happy time. This year Adeline was so much fun. She loved colouring eggs and she dyed two dozen of them one after the other with no disastrous results (yay!). Then on Easter day she cracked everyone's eggs, helped peel them, cut most people's in half, added salt and pepper to anyone who wanted it and ate two of them herself! Adeline figured out immediately that each of the eggs that the Easter bunny had hidden for her had a single m&m in it and she was THRILLED. My girl LOVES chocolate. All weekend long she would search our faces in turn and then declare "Happy Mama", "Happy Daddy", "Happy Nana", "Happy Adewine". And she was so right - it was a very happy Easter!

 

20

Certainly I couldn't let this milestone go unmarked! Yup - TWENTY months on this planet! And what a lucky planet it is! 18 months was challenging (and fun) and 19 months was fun (and a little challenging, but that's her job, right?)

In Adeline's 19th month she:

Started sleeping through the night on March 13th. Just like that. From the terrible, horrible sleeps she was having previously to sleeping straight through the night in her own bed from about 7:30 to 6:30 at least 6 nights out of 7. Hallelujah! We're not sure what turned the tide, but we think giving her a pillow really helped, along with adding a few more stuffed friends for her to hug in the night. But really we think that all/most of the challenges of 18 months were typical toddler separation anxiety and it seems to have passed for now, which allows Adeline to hug a friend and fall back to sleep when she wakes up in the night and to wake up in the morning happy and calling for Daddy. We're enjoying this, but know it could change back at any time...

Talked up a storm! 4 and 5 word sentences happen every day (but still impress me!) and her pronunciation and syntax are getting much better. Yesterday while waking up after naptime she came up with a perfectly pronounced "Brobee help Baby Gogo eat", which was not only a great sentence, but the plot of a television show she'd seen days before. Adeline is also a total parrot, so Daddy has had to be a little more careful...

Became a really good storyteller and likes to tell her favourite stories about things we've done over and over. Her telling of the "poo in the bathtub" story is hilarious and it ends with a great imitation of Daddy saying "Oh, man!!!!" and frantically waving his arms around.

Discovered a true and unending (and possibly obsessive) love of the television show ""Yo Gabba Gabba" and especially of DJ Lance Rock. What can I say - we all had the flu for almost 2 weeks - it was such a relief to know that for 30 precious minutes a day she would be giddily happy and totally transfixed and both David and I find it one of the more tolerable shows available for the toddler set.

Finally learned to say her own name! All day long now we hear "Adewine turn", "Adewine do it" and "Adewine check it out".

Got really really LOUD. Crazy loud bellowing and that little girl nails-on-chalkboard screaming that drives her Mama crazy. We're working on it. I don't mind the yelling, but that screaming? Yikes.

Started enjoying some very long books and is very careful with paper paged books now. One of her favourites is the classic Syd Hoff "Sammy the Seal" and it needs at least 3 consecutive readings every time we sit in the big chair for book time. Adeline also loves to watch the seals down in the harbour.

Started doing lots of big art projects and will spend up to an hour at a time at her little table with a big sheet of paper, her crayons, markers and some stickers.

Learned most of her colours most of the time. It seemed to happen all of a sudden in the last week. Blue and purple sometimes confuse her, but other than that she seems to have all the basics - red, green, yellow, orange, brown, black, white and pink.

Can count to 4 and really understands what "four" means. I'd rather her only count to 4 than be able to memorize up to 10 to or 20 and have no idea what it meant.

Got her first "real" haircut. Adeline talks about the haircut and Maggie all the time.

Celebrated the first anniversary of when we legally became a family and when we finally arrived home.

Played outside a LOT as the we had some really lovely spring weather finally. Adeline is a DEMON on the slides. She scares Mama a little and shows up all the other little ones, but she has no fear and she likes to go FAST and by HERSELF. Our girl can be a DAREDEVIL.

Went pee on the toilet. Just once. Accidentally. Well, not quite accidentally. It's the only time she's asked to sit, so it was probably a fluke.

Got too tall for all her 12 month pants but hasn't grown into the waist on her 18 month pants yet. Hopefully the "Dapper Snapper" that David picked up today will solve this problem.

Learned to name pretty well every animal in the world and to imitate what sounds they make.

Got really into birds, especially ones we see every day like seagulls, crows, robins, starlings and sparrows. This is how happy she is when she sees a seagull...

Happy Home-a-versary Weekend!

March 26th, 2010, we finally stumbled in our own door, set down our suitcases and were HOME forever. We were tired, jet-lagged, sick, and adjusting to our new lives, but we were HAPPY. Even Adeline, who was only seven months old and who had just gone through a huge change in her life knew that there was something special about being home. She was immediately comfortable here and hated to leave to go anywhere.

Here is sweet baby Adeline last year in the playroom on her very first day home...

This weekend we celebrated being home for a year by having a full two days of family fun! On Saturday we went to the Ocean Discovery Centre and I've NEVER seen Adeline more excited. She kept yelling "WOW!" and this was the face she had the entire time we were there...

Everything she saw she yelled hi to. And I mean YELLED. "HI FISH". "HI JELLYFISH". "HI OCTOPUS." "HI ANEMONE!" "HI SHRIMP!" "HI CRAB!" "HI SEA STAR!".

After we said hello to all the fish and stood for a very long time in front of every tank we headed outside to check out the seagulls. Adeline is VERY into birds lately and she was excited to see lots of seagulls here near the water and she also really liked running in the big field.

Here she is spotting an "eagull up inna sky, fly fly fly".

And here she is waiting impatiently for more seagulls to appear...

Once I got too cold it was time to find somewhere for supper. We continued the "under the sea" theme with a visit to a restaurant where Adeline had what is likely to become her favourite meal ever - tasty breaded shrimp and yam fries. She even shared a chocolate milkshake with her Daddy because it was a very special occasion!

On Sunday Adeline was super excited to have her friend Mylan over for a play in the morning. They worked together on an art project...

Had a snack...

And of course played, played, played, played, played. Toddlers are notoriously hard to get a picture of as they are in constant motion, but we tried... The trampoline was especially popular and the girls did a great job sharing and taking turns. I just love watching Adeline have fun with her friends!

We finished off the day with a trip to the park and ice cream cake after dinner, just to make it a full weekend of celebrating. I can't believe how fast the last year has gone. Seriously. Someone has put our life on superspeed mode and I just want it all to slow down so that we can really enjoy each stage before we're on to the next one. Adeline was such a little baby last year and here she is zooming towards two years old already and very much a little girl now. I really love the age she's at now, as she's just so happy and curious about the world and is learning new things all the time, but I think I've said that about every age before this one too. The last year has been...amazing. It's a word that gets used a lot, but I am truly and utterly AMAZED by my daughter and how wonderful and funny and smart and sweet and stubborn she is and I'm AMAZED by how much we love each other and I'm AMAZED by how happy she makes me every single day.

 

19

Yes, it's that time of the month again! On the 27th, Adeline became a 19 month old! Seriously - this girl is getting cuter and more fun all the time. Oh, she's a pip sometimes, but fun? So fun. Here are some things we'll remember about Adeline's 18th month making this world a more awesome place...

- Adeline attended two birthday parties and discovered that she shares her Daddy's love of food on a stick!

- Adeline got the last vaccinations she'll need until she goes to kindergarten! Yay!

- Adeline has all her teeth except her her two year molars! We're enjoying a break from teething, finally! Yay!

- Adeline dealt with having a super sick Mama for two weeks. She enjoyed the little bit of television watching that a super sick Mama needed to get through the day just a little too much.

- Adeline stopped putting all sorts of things in her mouth. Yay!

- Adeline learned to recognize a lot of letters...A, D, F, H, K, L, M, O, R, S, T, V, Y. I kind of hate to even write that, as in the past if someone had told me that their 18 month old knew a lot of the alphabet I would have inwardly rolled my eyes and judged them a pushy flash-card-Mommy who likely had a stressed out baby, but we just read a lot and she's curious about the words and has a good memory, I guess.

- Adeline may or may not know what purple is. Her Daddy is sure she does, but I think it's just lucky guessing.

- Adeline uses 2 and 3 word sentences all day long and just never stops talking! She learns new words every day. Her pronunciation on a lot of things is pretty original though. She has  lot of verbs now (walk, eat, jump, play, kick, go, etc) and she uses them in her sentences. Adeline is also starting to add some of the not so necessary but awesome words like "and" to her talking.

- Adeline has been even snugglier and huggier and cuddlier this month. I didn't think she could get more affectionate! She also finally learned to say "I oove you, Mama" (I love you, Mama).

- Adeline can put on her own socks and sometimes her shoes.

- Adeline can take off her zipped up pajamas and diaper...

- Adeline celebrated her first Tet and Valentine's Day at home. She discovered that she loves Banh Chung!

- Adeline went to the big city and hung out with her first friends, who were all adopted at the same time as her.

- Adeline met a jumpy little dog named Bailey who made a huge impression on her even though she was kind of nervous around him. She re-named her black stuffed dog Bailey and she talks about the real Bailey every day and asks often where he is.

- Adeline met a shy cat named Kitty-Boo who also made a big impression on her.

- Adeline learned the "pss-pss-pss" noise you use for calling cats.

- Adeline had her second snow day and her first snowman.

- Adeline went through a phase where she didn't want her feet to touch the ground and she would cry if they did. It was challenging. At least she regularily added "please" to her almost constant demands for "UP!" this month.

- Adeline went through a phase where she would wake herself up super early from her naps and then be tired and crabby all afternoon. It was challenging.

- Adeline went through a phase where she really only wanted to sleep in the big bed with Daddy and Mama. It was challenging.

- Adeline went through a phase where she didn't want to sit in her high chair but would be fooling around and not eating if she sat in a chair at the table. It was challenging.

- Adeline was traumatized by Mommy and Me Music. It was challenging.

- Adeline decided that oatmeal was okay, after it making her sad every other time she tried it. Now the only food she seems to not like is kiwi.

- Adeline's Mama learned to do some cute hairdos on the hairdo loving girl. I LOVE the way Adeline says "hairdo". It's just so perfect and sweet.

- Adeline continued to love to be "fancy". When she is dressed up and accessorized and has a hairdo (especially one with the yellow star barrettes) you can just tell she feels fabulous and she loves to check herself out in the mirror.

- Adeline learned to call for us and will repeatedly shout "DADDY!" or "MAMA!" if we're doing something in another room and she expects an answer every single time.

- Adeline was all about helping with cooking this month. Every time I work in the kitchen she insists on pulling up her stool and getting in on the action. She's actually not much help and she makes every job messier and slower and I'm always worried about her falling off the stool, but it's still fun. Does anyone have a Learning Tower? They look awesome and would likely lessen the odds that cooking with Mama will lead to a head injury. Cooking with my child was something I dreamed about long before she came into our lives so I'm so happy to finally be at that stage with my girl!

- Adeline's favourite games this month were "go to sleep, WAKE UP", which she played with herself, her toys, us, her water bottle...basically anything she could make lay down. She also enjoyed doing a very dramatic slow motion fall to the ground and then would expect a big dramatic reaction "Oh no! Oh dear! Poor sweet Adeline has fallen down! Are you okay?" Sometimes she would say yes and jump up, but sometimes she would say no and you'd have to pretend to call the ambulance and she would make the "weeee-oooo" siren noise. Some days she could do this alllll afternoon. Adeline also loved making Mama cold - by pulling off my blankets or by opening up my bathrobe and then I would have to shiver and say "brrrrrrr" and she would laugh and laugh and then finally cover me back up when I said please. Another favourite game was "Sad Baby, Happy Baby". She would lay back in my arms and say "Wah" and I'd ask her if she was Mama's sad baby and she'd nod. Then I would try everthing until I found just the right thing to make the baby happy - kisses, hugs, nose rubs, pretend bottles, tickles, etc. When I found the right thing (usually pretending to give the baby a bottle) Adeline would pop up and smile and say "Happy Baby!". Adeline's pretend skills are really growing - this month she also pretended to be various animals and would eat and drink on all fours like that animal.

It's the big 2-0 for our girl next month! I know she's only going to get cuter and sweeter and more fun!

 

 

 

Chúc mừng năm mới!

That's how you wish someone a happy New Year in Vietnamese! Tết Nguyên Đán officially started on Thursday and we've been celebrating ever since Wednesday evening and it's not over yet! In the Vietnamese language you do not "celebrate Tet" you "eat Tet" and we've certainly been eating well ever since Tet eve when Adeline pulled up her stool and helped me in the kitchen to prepare rice and fried pork-stuffed tofu with a delicious garlicky tomato sauce. The Vietnamese name is escaping me right now, but it's a family favourite! Adeline LOVED being in the kitchen helping and although it took wayyyy longer than me just fixing dinner I could tell she was very proud to be helping. She measured out the rice and water, drained, dried and helped slice the tofu, peeled the onion, washed the scallions, helped stir the meat mixture and watched as I stuffed the tofu.

The bowl of five fruits was the last thing to be added to our altar on Tet eve and Adeline and I had a very long discussion about our ancestors and all the things on the altar. In one of the frames I included a painting of a Vietnamese woman with her hat obscuring her face to represent Adeline's Vietnamese ancestors. I think about Adeline's birth family a lot, but never more than around the holidays. I always want Adeline to know her story and be proud of where she comes from and to always know that her birth family is a part of our family too, even though we will likely never meet.

I've been trying to learn as much as I can about how Tet is celebrated in Vietnamese families and although I'm sure I got some things wrong, I'm glad to be making traditions with our daughter that she will carry with her for life and that honour her Vietnamese identity. One thing I learned is that the first visitor of Tet is very important and your fortune is tied to theirs for the next year, so we made sure to make our own luck by having David knock and be invited in first thing!

On the first night of Tet we had dinner with Adeline's friend Mylan and her family.

The girls were very sweet together as always and had a lot of fun playing with each other in their high chairs. They both ate a huge Vietnamese feast and were very excited to receive their lucky red envelopes. Adeline was thrilled just with the envelope, but when she found out there were chocolate coins inside she was so very happy!

Saturday (the 3rd day of Tet) was our celebration with some of the other families we know who have children who were born in Vietnam. Adeline wore her lovely pink and yellow ao dai and you could tell she felt like a princess in it!

David and I decorated the house with flowering branches and traditional Dong Ho wood block prints (which is one of the things Adeline's province is famous for) and set out some traditional snacks, including banh chung and candied fruits.

The banh chung looked like a beautiful present and weighed as much as several bricks!

This is the banh chung before it was taken out of the plastic wrap, re-wrapped in foil, tied with string and boiled for an hour to refresh it after it's week in the freezer (instructions were found in "Into the Vietnamese Kitchen" by Andrea Nguyen).

Here it is cut open... I can't seem to make the slices as even and beautiful as it looks in other people's photos - maybe there's a trick I don't know. It may not be the world's prettiest food, but it was really tasty and I'm happy to have 2 more in the freezer!

Many of the littles, Adeline included, couldn't get enough. Here she is eating it...

And here she is using the sign for please because her mouth is too full of banh chung to talk and she really wants more!

Speaking of the littles - Adeline was really happy to have some time to hang out with her friends. Handsome Tai is certainly going to have his pick of the young ladies as the only lad in our very pink world...

Please ignore what appears to be a giant knife and an unattended glass of wine just inches from sweet Natalie... I assure you that there were lots of grown ups there to make sure everyone was safe. Really.

I took quite a bit of video of Tai and all the pink clad little girls (not a plan, but it was sure cute) but I didn't take many pictures. Maybe some of the other families did? (hint, hint). After some snacks and playtime we headed out to a Vietnamese restaurant for another feast!

Next weekend we're off to the big city to connect with some of the other families who travelled with us to Vietnam and whose children were Adeline's roommates, and to attend a big Tet party, complete with dragon dances and martial arts demonstrations.

My world was always missing a holiday like Tet to get us through that inevitable after-Christmas slump. I've had so much fun celebrating Adeline's first Tet at home and I'm already making plans for next year and for some year in the future when we'll celebrate Tet in Vietnam!

18

Yep, my little person has been making the world a sweeter place for an entire year and a half. I can hardly believe it. She is becoming more big girl every day.

Adeline had lots going on in her 17th month...

- started attending playgroup and loves to hang out with all the other little toddler girls. Especially the ones with runny noses.

- finally decided that hair accessories are awesome and asks for ponytails (the more the better) and clips every day. I'm going to have to work on my hairdo skills!

- started eating snacks and some less messy meals at the table in a big chair

- had a very busy social calendar, including lots of playdates with her little friends

- helped make playdough and played with it almost every day and never ate any of it!

- used lots of two word combinations and a few longer sentences like "Daddy at work" and "Daddy work day" and "Daddy home eat" (can you tell that she thinks about her Daddy a lot while he's away?). She also knocked my book from my hands and snarled "Mama book ALL DONE", which while impressive linguistically just couldn't be encouraged.

- decided that she didn't like sharing Daddy and tried hard to get me to stop hugging David. Not going to work!

- finally cut two sharp little canine teeth - one on the top and one on the bottom. There was a lot of drama and a few nights with very little sleep. I'm looking forward to teething being behind us.

- went to the Doctor for the first time since she's been home - her big red mystery bumps were declared heat rash and went away in a few days

- is starting to work on dressing herself and likes to put on David's underwear and my bra over her clothes. Is also getting quite good at the undressing part of learning to dress, which means if you stop in at my house who knows what that girl will be wearing or not wearing.

- found her favourite song ever (at least for this month). Jill Barber's "Oh My My". She sings the "oh my my" part and asks for me to sing it many, many times a day. We just got the cd from the library and she can't get enough of that song!

- she also likes me to sing "John the Rabbit" from one of our Elizabeth Mitchell CD's and gives a very dramatic "Nooooooooo Maaaaaaaam" at the end.

- stopped saying "No" to everything! Whew! This was my favourite thing about the last month as that knee-jerk "NONONO!" to every question was so very tiring. I'm glad that stage was short lived!

 

 

 

17 (a few days late)

One more Christmas morning picture just because...Adeline thought that the orange in the toe of her stocking was very surprising and very wonderful!

16 months was huge for Adeline. HUGE. She changed and grew so much and is becoming such a FUN little person with a mind of her own, an amazing sense of humour and smart? Oh so smart.

This past month:

Adeline went from a tentative new walker to a confident walker, climber, runner and jumper.

Adeline discovered how fun going to the playground is when you can walk and climb, but swinging is still what makes her laugh and laugh.

Adeline started to really get up on her feet and dance and the girl has MOVES and even choreography. If she sees dancing on television she tries to imitate the arm movements. Super cute.

Adeline has started singing. Mostly songs she makes up about her Daddy or cats. She has a little keyboard that she only has in her carseat so she plays the keyboard and sings songs while we drive. Super awesome insanely cute.

Adeline got 3 1/2 molars this month. Ouch. Right now she's working on her eye teeth and the other half of that molar. Ouch. The teeth along with losing the baby fat in her cheeks is really changing Adeline's face. She's losing some of the cute, but she's more beautiful than ever!

Adeline slept through the night a few times (and even a few times in a row) but mostly didn't. I guess that hasn't really changed. It might be time soon to try some different things at night, although we are not going to do any version of "crying it out".

Adeline noticed the print in her books and although I never set out to teach her, she has figured out what a capital "A" is and can find them most of 
the time in the titles of books. She does a lot of drawing with crayons and markers and I always write her name on her paper, so I'm sure this is where she learned it.

Adeline can count to two and really knows what "two" means. I didn't teach her this either.

Adeline has a huge vocabulary and is adding new words every day. Recent new words include "awesome" and "octagon", although she calls all the roundish shapes an octagon and has no idea what any other shape is except the star.

Her favourite word continues to be "NoNoNoooo". She says no to EVERY question even when she doesn't mean it. We joke that she's so advanced that she's even defiant at the level of a 2 year old.

Adeline has been VERY affectionate this month and she has learned how to give big squeezy bear hugs and does it many times a day. If all she can reach is your leg or arm, then it gets just as enthusiastic a hug. I can't get enough of them!

Adeline grew and grew and grew. She'll be weighed and measured next week at her vaccinations, but I know that she is zooming through the 12-18 month clothes which she only started wearing in late fall and she'll surely be in a size 2 soon. Even her diapers are getting small.

Adeline's hair really thickened up this month and it got crazier than ever. Haircuts are traditional for Tet (which is coming up in early February) so I think we'll get Adeline a professional haircut for her first Tet at home. Hopefully she will freeze rather than fight like she does with me. I've only ever trimmed her bangs and I'm tired of them constantly being crooked and it's finally time to cut the back. I think she's going to look like a real kid and lose all the traces of baby once she has an actual hairstyle.

Adeline had her first cold since coming home and along with it came her first big gusher of a nosebleed. It was the first time we'd had blood of any sort and I think I dealt with it pretty well. Of course she was wearing my very favourite shirt when it happened...

Adeline can play "Ring Around the Rosey" "Sleeping Bunnies" and other games and can do parts of some fingerplays.

Adeline discovered how hysterically fun it is to be chased by her Daddy, although sometimes it gets to be too much for her and she starts to cry and needs hugging instead of chasing.

Adeline hung out with her friend Mylan a few times. Adeline calls her "MeMan" and talks about her a lot. If you ask her who her friends are she always starts with "MeMan".

Adeline discovered chocolate and the world will never be the same for her.

And of course in her 16th month Adeline celebrated her first Christmas at home and you could tell she found the whole thing magical and SO MUCH FUN. I think she's going to be very sad when all the lights and sparkles go away this weekend. She's already very disappointed that the advent calendar is no more as she really looked forward to pulling out an ornament and putting it on the felt tree every evening after supper. The thing Adeline misses the most so far are the elves.

The elves showed up on December 1st  and left on Christmas Eve and every night after Adeline was asleep they moved to a new up-high place. By the third day she totally got it and would look for the elves in the morning and was always thrilled to find them and then would talk to them all day long. One day she was trying to get them to come down and sit in her Daddy's chair and getting quite frustrated with them that they wouldn't. She kept yelling "Elf!" "Chair!" and pointing at the chair with a stern look on her face. I already can't wait for next year!

There are lots of new adventures coming for Adeline's 17th month too - music classes and swimming lessons, a visit with her exactly-the-same-age cousin Angus, preparations for Tet, a visit to the Occupational Therapist and the Plastic Surgeon to check on her hands, a new potty arriving in the bathroom (no pressure, just there to get used to and if she wants to sit on it she can), maybe a trip to Vancouver, and of course all the usual fun we get up to!

Merry Christmas!

 Our first Christmas with Adeline was exactly as fun and special and exciting and magical as I ever dreamed it would be.

Opening her stocking at almost 9 am...Adeline gave us an awesome present by sleeping all through the night and until almost 8:30 in the morning, which is totally unheard of.

 

New Christmas pajamas opened on Christmas Eve and worn all day long along with bed hair...we like our Christmas casual.

Opening presents until supper time...Adeline insisted on carrying each one while exclaiming "hebby" (heavy) even if it wasn't. There were also lots of breaks for snacks, playing, reading all her new books and even a nice long Christmas nap.

Becoming an expert on opening presents... Adeline helped everyone open their gifts and was very enthusiastic about each one, saying "hmmmm" as she opened it and "wow" once it was opened even if she had no idea what it was.

Taking time to enjoy her new trampoline and drums! The rubber duckies from her stocking were her most played with new toy on Christmas day though!

Discovering chocolate...Adeline gave us a very wary look the whole time and didn't want anyone too close to her while she was enjoying this chocolate sucker she found in her stocking. I think she couldn't believe that we had given her something that amazing and she kept expecting us to take it away from her. Of course having chocolate necessitated a change into another pair of new Christmas jammies. For supper Adeline had a lot of her favourite foods - prawns and scallops, roasted red peppers, a crepe, guacamole, pineapple, mandarin oranges, black olives and one of her Nana's shortbread cookies.

It was just a perfect, perfect day.

 

 

Merry Christmas Eve Eve!

Presents bought and wrapped?  YES!

Went a wee bit overboard after promising to make it a modest haul for our small person's first Christmas? YES!

All presents needing assembling have been assembled, including Adeline's wee trampoline which only went together with the awesome power of cursing and brute force?  YES!

Tree purchased from the boy scouts in a west coast winter storm of gale force winds and driving rain? YES!

Tree trimmed all around the bottom by a small and very dedicated helper? YES!

 

Toddler pulling all the ornaments off the tree? NO! Adeline gently touches each ornament and says "wow" or "'mazing" (amazing) but doesn't try and take them off

Crazy cat pulling all the ornaments off the tree? YES!

 

 

Adeline having a bad hair day every single day with a combination of desperately needing a haircut, crazy wispy winter flyaways, constant snot and a bad habit of running her fingers through her hair while eating? YES!

Picture taken with Santa? YES! And it's a classic screaming baby Santa photo (but our scanner is a pain)

Outside lights up? YES!

Adeline's stocking made and ready for Santa to fill? YES! (this is what I really thought I'd be doing on Christmas Eve)

 

 

Nana arrived and making life SUPER FUN for Adeline? YES

Adeline super super snotty and cutting all 4 eye teeth and a molar? YES!

David still getting over a bad case of bronchitis? YES!

Christmas baking done? MOSTLY!

Christmas food prepared?  NOT QUITE!

Do I have to go to the stores again? NO! NO! NO!

House clean? NOT EVEN CLOSE! (that's tomorrow morning's job while Adeline and her Nana go out for breakfast)

Only one pocket left on the advent calendar? YES!

Dreaming of a white Christmas? NO! Why set myself up for disappointment.

Dreaming about Santa? YES! At least I am...

 

 

 

16

 
On Saturday November 27th, when people at the birthday party asked how old Adeline was I always replied "16 months today" but then I forgot to come home and write about it.

Some highlights and lowlights of Adeline's 15th month on the planet

- Adeline became a full time walker and can now turn corners, plan her route, stoop to pick things up, carry heavy loads and she's even trying to run and jump!

- She has been working on a second molar for weeks and it just seemed to be sitting there giving  her trouble but refusing to come in.

- She learned more new words than I can keep track of, including her favourite of the last few days "no no no noooo". She is putting words together a little, but  not consistently, although she did say "Cat eat" and "Cat jump" recently.

- Adeline learned to shrug and say "I don' know".

- We played a MILLION games of peekaboo and "hiding" (where she stuffs something down my shirt, shrugs and then triumphantly pulls it out).

- Her other favourite game is to knock on the door or wall and ask "home?" and then shake her head no.

- Adeline had a brief but interesting obsession with my bra and needed to look at it many times a day, including when we were out in public where she would pull down my shirt and yell "BRA BRA BRA" as loud as she could.

- Her dramatic play is expanding every day. She plays with her baby and her puppies and she stirs up food for them and feeds them, puts them to bed with a pat on the back and their blanket, combs their hair, brushes their teeth, puts cream on their hands (like we put on her burn scars a few times a day), makes them jump and dance, has them talk to each other and hug and kiss, reads them books and plays some of the same games with them that she plays with us

- Adeline went to her first parade. She wasn't impressed...

- She celebrated her first Halloween but didn't eat any candy.

- Adeline had potato chips and a few bites chocolate cake for the first time at parties and is definitely a fan of the salty snacks.

- Adeline felt really really cold weather for the first time.

- Adeline played in the snow for the first time and liked it!

These pictures are from today, so well into month 16. Adeline has become very fun to take to the park and she loves to play outside, so we go to play most mornings unless it's actively raining or really windy. The playground is always wet but we don't mind. We have good rain gear, as I assume most west coasters do, but we seem to be the only family at the park most days. Adeline is really making the playground near our house her own. She toddles all over, is very determined to try and climb everything, goes down the small slide (and wants to take on the big one but Mama says no), laughs and laughs and laughs while she swings and explores all the interesting things. Adeline is also feeling confident enough that she gets quite far away from me at the park (always checking in, of course), which is very different from the velcro girl I had not long ago. Lots of big changes from just a month ago!

 

 

My baby's growing up...

 

Christmas Card Photo Shoot, Take 2

Things went a little better at our second try at getting a photo for our Christmas card. They couldn't have gone much worse after our last traumatic attempt. Adeline cooperated for quite a long time for a toddler and she wasn't mad or sad this time, just a little wiggly. Here are some of my favourites...

 

 

 

365

Exactly one year ago today, sweet baby Thanh Lam met her parents for the first time and we were finally able to hold our little one in our arms. Our girl was so very worried, but very brave, and we were so happy to have finally met the small person who would transform us into parents.

A small project to honour this day...

11/24/09 from Lisa Roberts on Vimeo.

 

 

10

November 23rd is a day that David and I have celebrated every year (often quite memorably) as the momentous anniversary of the day we met, TEN WHOLE YEARS AGO in 2000. 10 years. TEN.  I always knew we'd be celebrating this anniversary (or meet-a-versary as we call it). Always. David took a little bit of convincing, but I knew pretty quickly that he was the man for me. Together we've been through the worst and the best of times and as a couple we've shared deep, soul-eating sadness and pure, soul-feeding joy. I wouldn't want anyone else next to me as we face the next ten, twenty, thirty or more years.

 

I'm feeling a little or maybe even a lot guilty. This should be a very special day, but I'm afraid it's only going to be special in our hearts, as we haven't been able to plan anything. Between being the busy parents of a busy girl and the freak snow and wind storm and deep freeze temperatures it looks like we will just be happy to be warm and inside and spending time as a family. There should be a wonderful dinner, amazing gifts and much smooching - my wonderful David deserves all that and more. I guess there can still be smooching - that doesn't take any planning!

These photos were taken in April 2002 in the photobooth at the Cardinal Lemoine metro station in Paris. Weren't we cute? Young, in love and in Paris in the springtime. Ahhh. Perfect. So these pictures aren't quite from 10 years ago, but they were what I could find when I was trying to hurriedly put this post together while David was giving Adeline her bath.

I love you, David. You're the only man for me.

So far...

I'm really getting into the Christmas spirit already. We've got a lot of Christmas to fit in this year so I wanted to get an early start because it's all so fun and magical and I didn't want to miss anything. So far Adeline declares all things Christmas to be TRAUMATIC.

This morning we tried to take some photos for our Christmas card. We'll be trying again...

 

We only made the poor girl endure this torture for about 4 minutes. In every picture she's either crying or about to cry. Not so very festive.   

Then this afternoon we decided to go to the Santa Claus parade even though we're having a freak cold snap here (okay, so it's not very cold but us West Coasters are wimpy about that sort of thing). We bundled up Adeline in as many layers as we could pile on her and wrapped her in a wool blanket but she still wanted absolutely nothing to do with being outside.

Once the parade actually started she enjoyed approximately 3 minutes of it. She smiled and blew kisses to the dressed up dogs and applauded and danced to the bagpipe band, but then the floats and big trucks started to come by and they were all blowing their air horns and Adeline was scared and would start to cry each time. The poor girl was jumpy and worried and not feeling the Christmas spirit, so she couldn't even enjoy the quieter parts of the parade. Then the police siren came and she was DONE. I think her crying was louder than the siren.

Once Adeline was out of the stroller and in her Mama's arms and at the back of the crowd the crying stopped and she was able to see a bit more of the parade, but she definitely wasn't having a good time so we just decided to go.

Adeline hadn't had dinner but we thought that a busy post-parade restaurant just wasn't a good idea and it was a thirty minute drive home, so we stopped and got a cone of yam fries for Adeline and I to share in the back seat while David chauffeured us. This was definitely the highlight of the day for our girl and she stuffed fry after fry in her mouth (after she had hugged each and every one) and grinned.

Maybe tomorrow she'll be starting to feel the Christmas spirit a little more...we're taking another stab at a Christmas card photo, going shopping and going outside to put up lights. Yeah. No. Tomorrow likely won't be a magical Christmas-y day either, I'm guessing. I just hope there's less crying...

So far the one and only Christmas activity that Adeline is really into is checking out all the toy catalogues that we're getting in the mail. I think she's going to have a long list for Santa this year.

 

Happy Halloween!

Pumpkin carving - Adeline was amazed when we took the top off the pumpkin and she saw what was inside. She seemed surprised that a pumpkin was more than what it seemed and she said "hiding!" and spent a long time taking the pumpkin guts out and then putting them back and putting the top back on over and over.

David's soon to be traditional Halloween Bark (it gets its own post later this week)

Getting dressed up - Adeline's kitty collar says "Jinx" because when we were discussing baby names last year David lobbied hard for Jinx and a lot of other names more suited to pets or old west ladies of ill-repute. I hope he was messing with me.

Partying with her friend Natalie at Tai's house. Potato chips were declared DELICIOUS.

On our walk home from the party we stopped to trick-or-treat at our neighbour's house - luckily Adeline is willing to share with her family! Adeline really had a fun day and I've already been thinking about costume ideas for next year! Hope everyone's day was spooktacular!

And now on to Christmas! Yaaaaaaaayyyyy!

15

15 months old. Becoming more and more of a girl and less of a baby every day. But don't tell her that - she proudly proclaims herself (and anyone else under about the age of 12) to be a baby. The rest of the world is categorized into Mamas, Dadas, Nanas and animals. She calls them "amnals". So cute. I try to get her to say it all day long - it's that cute. Adeline got a lot of language this last month, including a few two word combinations like "Daddy home", "bird music" and "eat cheese". We lost count at 50 words back in the summer, but I'd guess that Adeline has around 70 or so every day words now and they are getting clearer all the time. She also knows about 40 signs and will often do the word and the sign at the same time. Adeline is also an expert animal impersonator. Her cat is especially realistic - she's obviously been studying Musette and Zephyr.

Adeline also got quite snuggly the past couple of weeks. We thought it was the teething, but that seems to have (mostly) passed and the snuggling remained. We're loving it as our girl was usually too busy and curious to stop very often for more than a quick hug. Oh the teething... we have had WEEKS of drama and broken sleep. Before the teething she was sleeping through the night quite often, but now we're back to having two wake-ups a night being a good night. On Sunday (why is it always a work day the next day?) Adeline woke up 10 minutes after I went to bed and then shrieked and dug around in her mouth until 3:38. The next day she had a shiny new molar, but that's IT. Weeks of pain and sleeplessness and crabby baby and all we get is ONE TOOTH? The other three that I could see under the gums seem to have retreated for now, only to return and cause misery later.

Thankful

This weekend was Thanksgiving here in Canada. I have so much to be thankful for, including amazing leftovers! This was our first year with a freedom loving, organic and ethically raised turkey and that was one TASTY bird. We had a big family dinner on Saturday with relatives coming from far and wide to celebrate with us, and have been enjoying the leftovers ever since. Stock is simmering right this second to make some turkey and barley soup for tomorrow. That's David's sandwich up there - you can tell because it has MUSTARD on it. Mustard on a turkey sandwich along with cranberry sauce? Ptooey, I say! But I make it for him because that's the way he likes it, and I love him and would let him have anything he wanted on his sandwich.

David's contribution to Thanksgiving dinner was pie, and not just any pie but the quite famous and widely hyped "Crack Pie" which originally hails from the also quite famous and widely hyped Momofuko Milk Bar in New York. We had heard about this pie before, and when we saw the recipe in the latest issue of Bon Appetit I had to encourage David to make it. Well...David's not willing to say that it's the Emperor's New Clothes all over again, as he's never eaten the one from Milk Bar, but he did absolutely everything exactly as the recipe called for and it was...okay. It was good pie. It wasn't great pie. If that is really what Crack Pie is all about and nothing got lost in translating the recipe to the magazine, then I kind of feel sorry for New Yorkers if this is the best dessert in the city. I can think of lots of pies I'd rather eat. I found it barely sweet, lacking in any real defining flavour and more the texture of a bar cookie or square than a pie. I certainly didn't find it decadent or swoon-worthy, but it was a fine dessert. David's other pie -  a classic lemon meringue - was way yummier. We had to try it though.

Of course we all know what I'm most thankful for this year...

Greater Than

Last week had another day worth celebrating in it...I knew we were close, but didn't do the calculations until just now.

Adeline spent 214 days sleeping, playing, eating, growing, learning, laughing and loving in the arms of her special caregiver at the orphanage and after last Saturday she has spent a greater amount of days with her Mama and Daddy than she did there. I've said many times how grateful I am for the loving, attentive and home-like care that Adeline got while we waited to be united, but it still feels momentous to me that she has been with us longer than we were apart. I know that those 214 days helped make Adeline who she is today, and they will always be with her as a part of her history. Who knows what influence they had or how they shaped the person that she was becoming - all I know is that with the combined influence of her biological gifts and her very early experiences with her first family, her early months being cared for by a group of wonderful women and her time at home with us that Adeline has grown into an amazing girl. Smart. Funny. Beautiful. Stubborn. Open hearted. Joyful. Spunky. Affectionate. Creative. Loving... You know I could go on and on...

Adeline has discovered her baby doll and has been taking very good care of her - feeding her often, patting her back, hugging and kissing her, covering her with a blanket and reading her books. Yes, I see myself in these actions but I also see the kind and gentle way I know she was cared for as a tiny baby. We have a picture of Adeline and her special caregiver on our refrigerator along with our other family pictures and Adeline often points to it and says her name and smiles. When Adeline is taking care of her baby I sometimes ask her "Is that how Nga fed you when you were a little baby?" or something like that and she gets the funniest smile and a look of recognition. Adeline does always feed her baby like I saw it being done at the orphanage - with the baby's head resting on the leg of the caregiver. Maybe she doesn't exactly remember, but it's still with her. Who knows?

 

West Coast Weekend

We brought Adeline all the way home from Vietnam without incident, but for some reason I was really dreading last weekends big car ride out to Ucluelet. It was about 5 hours each way with just a brief stop at Nana's house to eat a banana, play a bit and snuggle the world's most kid-friendly cat. The idea of a 5 HOUR road trip gave me the shivers, as it's only quite recently that Adeline stopped crying and thrashing every time she was put in the carseat. Our girl was great though - when she wasn't sleeping she played with her toys, listened to music, practiced her signing, hugged her stuffie, played peekaboo with herself and looked out the window. She only got really crabby once, and passing back a cookie solved that problem pretty quickly. It was only her third cookie ever, so it immediately took all her attention and concentration as she found it VERY delicious and didn't want to waste a crumb. There was no way we weren't going though, because this was the weekend of Adeline's...oh I don't know...second-cousins-but-more-like-aunt-and-uncle's wedding. It was a perfect west coast wedding on a glorious sunny autumn weekend, with a beach fire rehearsal dinner and a barefoot ceremony on the beach complete with the bride being rowed to shore by her father and then rowed away by her new husband. The reception was likely a very good time as well, as it was beautifully decorated, it was a great group of people and the band was just setting up, but unfortunately right after a tasty Mexican dinner we had to go, as Adeline was getting a little freaked out. Every time there was glass clinking and hooting (which was pretty often) she would get a bit panic-y and start to cry. She was already on edge and then well-meaning people tried to touch her and that set off a huge must-hug-Mama cryfest. Once my shoulder was completely wet with my poor girl's tears we knew it was time to go. Adeline hadn't had her regular naps and hadn't eaten well and wasn't having much fun, so we left around 7 for some quiet time back at the cabin and a long sweet sleep for everyone.

Some pictures from the weekend...

Adeline really loved the beach fire on friday night. Here she is having a sand appetizer before she enjoyed her very first hot dog. There were a lot of dogs there that night (canines, not wieners) and Adeline found this VERY exciting. She kept doing the sign and yelling "dog" and saying "woof woof". The dogs were a little less thrilled with her.

The beautiful bride being rowed to shore and the ceremony which was so perfect for the couple and brought tears to my eyes and reminded me of how lucky I am to have found my one true love. I don't usually post photos of people without their permission but hopefully they won't mind.

Here's Adeline after the ceremony standing by the driftwood and salal arbour. I'd like one of these beauties for my garden! Adeline can't won't stand by herself yet, but she was leaning just right to give the illusion that she's up on her own two feet. She enjoyed the ceremony a lot and had a great time meeting her big cousin who was so kind to her and walked her all over the beach and took every rock she gave him as if it was a jewel.

Here's Adeline already looking a little tense at the beginning of the reception. At least it distracted her from trying to pull out her hair clips. I'm just not ready to give up on hairdos even if Adeline would rather her hair was always unadorned (and uncombed too, if she really had her way). Soon I'll work up the courage to try pigtails again. She was soooooooooo upset with me the last time I tried that I've been reluctant to put either of us through that again.

Adeline had a fabulous time at the big beach at Wickinninish. The crashing pacific rim surf made her a little wary at first but within a minute she was right at home. I have so many great childhood memories of spending time on these beaches and it was really special to see Adeline enjoying them for the first time. We live just a few blocks from the ocean and go to our civilized city beaches, but they're just not the same as the wild west coast. Della got sandy from top to bottom and explored all sorts of kelp, driftwood and assorted flotsam. The rottener it was the more interesting she found it... Our reluctant walker (she gets jelly legs as soon as you try and put her on her feet) was happy to trot all over the beach holding one of her Nana's hands and with a huge chunk of slimy and sandy bull kelp in her other hand. She was practically running and had a huge grin on her face. Adeline really loved that piece of kelp but her family said NO to bringing it home as a souvenir, even if it was a great motivator to get her to walk.

It was a great weekend...no one wanted to be home on Monday and we all wished we were back at the beach.

 

 

 

 

14

 

You guessed it...my girl is 14 months old today! This last month seems to have gone by much slower after the big whoosh of our first months together and I'm glad for that. Maybe it's the slower pace of a rainy autumn, but I'm really enjoying this time with my daughter. Maybe these almost endless days of sitting together and reading books and singing while the rain patters against the windows will get to me eventually, but for now I can't get enough of it! Adeline is also starting to play more on her own (with me close by, of course) so I am able to do a bit of cleaning, read my book or work on some small projects while we're hanging out together which has been so nice! Adeline had many things to celebrate in her 13th month in this world, including being home with her family for 6 months! As part of our adoption process we agreed to send progress reports and photos to Vietnam every 6 months until Adeline is 3 and then every year after that until she is 18. Other people might think this a large pain, but I really enjoyed sending off our first "home 6 months" report. It's just a couple of pages on what our girl is up to, how she is progressing and what her personality and family life is like, and I was so glad to have an opportunity to flat out brag about how amazing our baby-turned-toddler is! This report and the photos go to the branch of the federal government that oversees adoptions, so I'm planning to write another letter and have it translated into Vietnamese and gather some photos to send directly to the orphanage where Adeline spent her first months, as our progress reports are never seen by the people who actually knew Adeline. Our girl was cared for in such a loving, warm, attentive and wonderful way by one special caregiver and a group of other amazing women, and I know that they would want to know that their baby is growing up to be a beautiful, intelligent, funny, affectionate, strong-willed, healthy, creative and amazing little girl. It was definitely more than "just a job" to the nounous at Adeline's orphanage and the love that surrounded Adeline was palpable. I always marvel at the strength these women have to love, cherish and enjoy each baby that is placed into their care, knowing that soon they will have to let them go. I will always be grateful to them for the great start in life they gave Adeline.  All the nounous had tears in their eyes as they said their goodbyes and gave Adeline one last hug and kiss. I know that Adeline's special caregiver was happy that Adeline was going home , but sad to see her baby go after they had spent 7 months together, so how could she not want to know that all is well and that her girl is thriving? Thriving is definitely the word for how our girl is doing. She's an incredible little person...We often hear that Adeline is a "lucky baby", but there is no doubt at all that David and I are the lucky ones. To be chosen to share our lives with such an amazing human being is ... no... I'm just at a loss for words. We're the lucky ones.

 

Tet Trung Thu

Wednesday is the Autumn Moon Festival, or Tet Trung Thu as it's known in Vietnam. This important and fun festival centres around children, and we are happy to have another holiday to celebrate being a family and all the joy that Adeline has brought to our life! The Autumn Moon Festival celebrates the largest full moon of the year and is a day to celebrate the end of the harvest and to turn our attention back to our families. On Sunday we hosted a party for our friends who also have little ones who were born in Vietnam. We plan to make this a yearly event for all the families we know who have children who were born in Asia, and it will only get more and more fun as all the babies and toddlers get older. This year was fairly simple with just a great potluck Vietnamese dinner, lanterns and mooncakes and watching the little ones play, but I have great plans for the years to come (lantern parades! music! storytelling! crafts! - can you tell I used to be a preschool teacher?). It was a lot of fun - we're so lucky to have such a great community of families that were formed like ours were here in our town. I just love the idea of all these children who share a birth country and an early history growing up together and hopefully forming close friendships. On Wednesday we'll be celebrating again, but just as family, with a special Vietnamese dinner and then we will take our lanterns outside to share mooncakes in the light of the full moon while I tell Adeline the story of Chú Cuội or The Man in the Moon.

 

Thirteen

My big girl is thirteen months old today! This last month Adeline just seemed to really relax. Attachment is a process, not an event, and that is true for all relationships, not just those between children who are adopted and their parents. Attachments grow over time and have to be nurtured and I really feel good about the place we're at now. It's true that Adeline bonded to me immediately, but it sometimes had the quality of a drowning person clutching a life preserver, not the calm, loving, trusting, joyful and tender relationship we have now. From the moment we met, Adeline knew she needed me, and she enjoyed me and liked me and knew that I was her special person, but she didn't trust that she wasn't going to lose me and understandably that made her pretty anxious sometimes. In the beginning this would often show itself by her trying hard to put on a big show to charm every "mommy type" in the room to make sure that if I left that someone else would take care of her. That broke my heart, but now she is appropriately shy around strangers, clings to me or her Dad in new situations and is just plain charming, but not because she thinks she has to be in order to survive. Getting from there to here took time and it took some work, but it was so important and the calm and loving place we've arrived at is wonderful. Adeline knows I'm her one-and-only Mama and she knows I'm not going anywhere. It wasn't always easy though and being that needed often left me exhausted. There were long stretches of time in the past months when she had to be touching me every waking moment. Many days in a row where she would only nap while on my shoulder. Times when she would beg to come up on my knee only to squirm down off my lap immediately and start to whine and then repeat that process over and over all day long. Weeks when it seemed like she had a magic circle of about 6 feet around her and if I stepped outside of that circle her world would fall apart. Not saying that we might never re-visit those times or have some up and down times in our relationship, but for now all is well.

Happy baby. Happy Mama.

These are some pictures from Saturday just before her haircut. There's nothing Adeline loves more than to have David and I both just hanging out with her in the playroom and she kept smiling and laughing and throwing her arms around us for hugs. Doesn't she look so happy and relaxed in these photos?

 

We're in a good place now. Not that we were ever in a bad place - Adeline has always been a happy, open hearted baby and I knew that in time she would learn that having a family means forever. I'm so glad that our relationship will continue to grow and change over the years as I get to be Mama to my baby, my toddler, my preschooler, my girl, my teenager, and eventually my grown up daughter. I love my girl so much I feel like my heart could burst sometimes!

 

David has reminded me recently that ALL relationships are based on attachment and those attachments must be nurtured if they are to flourish. I think it's some fancy talk for "Daddy needs some attention too". Duly noted, David. Duly noted.

A Trip Back in Time (but just to a couple of weeks ago)

The weekend before last Adeline attended her first birthday party as a guest! Sweet baby Natalie, who came home from Vietnam just a little while before Adeline did was having her first birthday and it was quite the party! The two girls are just a few weeks apart in age and I just love to see them together. Adeline fell asleep in the car on the way and had trouble waking up once we arrived. There were a lot of people and Adeline is really in a stage of feeling a lot of stranger anxiety, so she wasn't ready to party for quite awhile once we got there. Luckily Daddy could still enjoy a mimosa while cuddling his girl.

 

Once Adeline decided that she was ready to party we had brunch and then got ready for a dip in the pool. Adeline loves the water!

Of course, CAKE was one of the highlights of the party for Adeline!

 

Then she was ready to play play play!

Twelve

 

There it is. The big zero one. My baby girl has been making the planet a better place for a whole year now. In the last month Adeline just seemed to get smarter, cuter, more beautiful, stronger, funnier and more confident.

Other things Adeline did in this last month include:

- started to eat with a fork. She still has the table manners of a Viking and takes great delight in tossing food onto the floor, rubbing it into her hair and doing spit-takes with her water, but at least she's using a utensil and a plate a lot of the time. Not a spoon though. She'll have none of that.

- ate her first grilled cheese sandwich

- started to use a lot of words and to mimic what we say. Consistently she says "hi", "bye bye", "bird", "kitty", "piggies" (what she calls her toes), "eye", "Mama", "up up up UP", "bottle" (although I'm sure no one but us could recognize this one), "plane" (a lot of float planes fly low over our house as they're coming in to land), "ball", "bear", "baby", "Nana", "pat pat pat" (mostly during hugs when she is patting your arm, but also when she's giving inanimate objects affectionate pats) and "cracker". She's really working hard on "thank you" (she has the rhythm but not the pronunciation), "bubble" and "blanket". She is pointing to things all day long wanting them to be named and she returns again and again to her special blanket as she really wants to be able to talk about it, I think.

- stopped saying "Daddy"...now David is a Mama too

- it feels like Adeline whined less this month and cried more, but I might be wrong

 

- perfected her cruising and started to walk holding onto our hands and behind her riding toy

- worked really hard on her climbing (uh oh)

- started to really give strangers the once over, act shy around them, look serious and furrow her brow

- learned three new animal noises - lion (raaaawr), monkey (chi chi chi) and bird (twee twee twee)

- really listened to everything we say - we were walking down the street and I was talking about a Dim Sum restaurant with "lion" in it's name. Even though this was an adult conversation that had been going on for a long time, she said "raaaawr" as soon as I said the word "lion".

- started to enjoy books even more and now has the patience to sit through up to 4 or 5 without wanting to turn the pages to her favourite parts or wander off. Adeline also loves to read on her own and in her playroom will often gather her favourite books and sit and look at and talk to the pictures for a long time.

-really enjoyed meeting some new babies!

- had her first big party and ate cake for the first time

- ate her weight in blueberries

- gained a whole pound since last month and now weighs 19.12 pounds!

- didn't see any Doctors or Specialists or even the Occupational Therapist at the burn clinic! (although she does have a few appointments coming up)

- finally really started to enjoy playing outside, although she'd still prefer not to touch grass

It's Official

Today's the day when my baby girl is officially one year old! ONE! A whole 12 months on this planet! Can you believe how time has flown? Adeline is growing and changing so much every day it feels like we are zooming away from the baby days so quickly. We had a little family party today, but Adeline was quite out of sorts, so we kept it simple and she ended up with an earlier than usual bedtime and lots of extra cuddles. We've had a lot of company lately and a lot of changes in Adeline's routine and I think she was just telling us that she'd had ENOUGH for a little while.

We saved the Asian first birthday tradition that Mimi mentioned in the party planning comments for today as we thought it would be too much for Adeline on her big party day. We gathered lots of tools and materials representing many different professions and after showing Adeline each one she was set down to reveal her destiny by what she picked up first. We put out a calculator, a paint brush, a pen, a spatula, a gong that we brought back from Vietnam, a flower, a camera, a hemostat (a surgeon's tool that I use for crafting), a computer mouse, a toothbrush and a sea shell. I thought for sure that Adeline would go for one of the usually forbidden objects like the camera or the mouse, but as soon as we set Adeline loose there was no hesitation and she headed immediately and as quickly as her hands and knees could take her straight for the gong. She picked up the gong and the mallet and began to gleefully make a wonderful noise. Do we have a future musician? Adeline certainly loves music, singing and dancing so I wouldn't be surprised. Or maybe there's a deeper meaning?

Eleven

Yikes! Time is hitting warp speed these days! I can't believe my sweet bundle of joy is 11 months old now (since Sunday) and is heading towards toddlerhood at lightning speed!

This last month was a big one. Adeline grew and changed so much, did so many new things and her funny, spunky, loving, curious, thoughtful and creative personality really started to shine.

In her tenth month on this plant, Adeline:

- may or may not have said her first words. I'm not sure because she didn't use them consistently, but she did use some words quite a few times and in context. Many times she said "up" while she held her arms out to me, she said "bye bye" while waving to Daddy as he was off to work quite a few times and she has repeated "ball" and "bird" and "light" and "all done" but not used them by herself. She also says something over and over that sort of sounds like "da-day-a" while talking to or about her Daddy. She just started on the "M" sounds last week, so I'm still waiting for a "Mama" that she really means!

- had a week long obsession with lights - pointing out all the lights in any room and demanding that all of them be on at all times

- had her first immunizations in Canada, which made her so sad and confused, but she got over it quickly

- had an infant development screening that put her at or above age level in all skill areas

- perfected her standing and started to cruise, but still has quite a few things to work on before she's ready to walk

- learned to stand on her tiptoes so that she can get the few extra inches she needed to reach things on the table top and the third shelf

- learned to blow kisses, pretend to talk on the telephone (her hand or a toy held up to her ear) and fake sneeze (so so so cute)

- learned her first animal noise. Ask the question "What does a fish say?" and she does the sweetest little fish impression

- got really really scared by a toy that made a siren noise

- added a nice pat to her already awesome hug

- learned to kiss with her mouth closed

-started to pretend play with her softies - her puppies Coal and Snowy get lots of hugs and kisses and she also makes them jump, dance, eat and snuggle each other

- grew lots of hair and had lots of crazy hair days, which makes me think it's getting to be time for a haircut, but I just can't do it! Her hair is still very brown and definitely has a bit of wave in it.

- did her first painting and drawing projects

- slept all the way through the night, but only twice

- had her first trip to the petting farm where she got to hang out with baby goats and pat them gently. It's one of the places I couldn't wait to take our small person as I have such great memories of going there when I was little.

-spent 5 days without Daddy, which taught us all that Daddy at home is not just best, but necessary!

- ate and loved lots of new foods including her super special new favourites, roasted asparagus, garlic scapes, red peppers, strawberries and steak

- discovered her favourite Vietnamese food - my homemade Bo Kho (slow braised beef with tomato and lots of carrots, spiced with lemongrass, star anise and five spice powder)

- ate her weight in vegetables

- wore shorts for the first time when our weather finally warmed up and then went back to corduroy and sweaters when "June-tober" hit

- had a brief exploration of biting and pinching, but within about a week had learned that Mama doesn't like hurting and now she is mostly very gentle and gives sweet kisses, loving head bonks, nose rubs, light pats, awesome hugs and blows raspberries on you when she is feeling affectionate and emotional, which we realized was her main trigger for biting. She still gets into a bitey mood sometimes, especially when she's sleepy, but we're working on it.

- grew and grew and grew and is getting very tall and sturdy

- celebrated her first Father's Day

- learned how to take her pressure gloves and bandages off, but lucky for us she has only done it twice

- really got into reading. Many days after lunch for about half an hour I read my book and Adeline sits beside me and looks at her books. She also loves her bedtime library book time with Daddy.

- made the connection between the people in photographs and the people she knows. She carries around her laminated picture of her family and pats all the people in it many times a day.

- started to watch a little television. Oh, how guilty I feel about this, but she loves it and less than 2 hours a week won't ruin her for life, right?

- learned to talk like a pirate. A few weeks ago she started babbling in a low, gruff, growly voice sometimes, so now if we start talking like a pirate she'll use that voice to talk back to us. Cute, cute, cute.

- played her first musical instrument. I brought out my childhood electric keyboard and Adeline has been enjoying making some music. She even dances along while she's playing!

- got more beautiful, smarter, funnier and more curious every day!

I didn't think I could love this baby any more than I already did, but my love just seems to grow and grow and grow

 

Three

Today we have been home with Adeline for three months...

Happy First Father's Day

I'm almost at a loss for words to tell you how great a Dad David is. I always knew he would be a good, patient, kind, fun, caring, respectful, responsible and loving Dad, but I never knew just how amazing he would be or how much my heart would swell with love to see him treat our daughter so well. David has always taken such good care of me and now he takes such good care of both his girls. I love watching David and Adeline together and seeing their bond grow is wonderful. My favourite part of every day is seeing the huge smile light up Adeline's whole face when her Daddy walks in the door after work. No one can make her smile and laugh and giggle and chuckle like her Daddy can!

Adeline did her first painting project last week and made some handprint pictures for her Daddy to have at his offices - here she is showing them to Zephyr, who was mightily impressed.

 

We also went shopping for a present for Daddy and bought him possibly the coolest Father's Day present ever - 8 flavours of ice cream (including all those ones that only he likes like bubble gum and sprinkle party cake and rainbow) and some cones so that he can have a sweet, sweet summer.

Other than that it was a very quiet day with a big 2+ hour family nap in the afternoon which did us all good. After our big outing yesterday (a post about it soon, promise) we were all pretty wiped today and a mellow day at home, mostly spent in our pajamas was just what we needed.

TEN

Okay, seriously now. Someone is messing with the clocks because there is no way my sweet baby is 10 months old already! Time is FLYING by. Wow. Ever since I was a grown up time has moved faster and faster, but since Adeline came into our lives it feels like it's reached a dizzying pace. TEN months? Yup. Ten.

In her ninth month Adeline did a lot of things...

- Learned to pull up and stand and is working on getting her feet organized to get walking. She even forgot what she was doing a couple of times and stood all by herself for a few seconds.

- Fell over backwards and bonked her head really hard a few times while learning to stand.

- Really perfected her crawling and is getting faster all the time.

- Learned to understand lots of new words including "nose", "eyes" "puppy" "cuddle" and "no touching" (although she mostly gives you a devilish grin and keeps right on touching).

- Took her first ride on the ferry to Vancouver.

- Had her first blood test, which made her MAD!

- Wore two pigtails for the first time and it was cute, cute, cute.

- Grew in her two top teeth, with much drama and very little sleeping.

- Got too tall for a lot of her footy pajamas - she's twenty eight inches now and seventeen and a half pounds! She's still wearing size 6-9 month clothes though.

- Went to Butterfly Gardens. Touching the leaves very gently was her favourite part. Riding in her carseat was her least favourite part.

- Learned to whine. Not Mama's favourite accomplishment, but Adeline thinks it's awesome and it really does get results (for now). We're working on words and sign language to get what you need, but I think the whining is here for awhile. Sometimes she combines the whining with pant leg tugging for a double whammy.

- Celebrated her first Mother's Day and her Mama's Birthday. There were a few bites of vanilla ice cream on both those occasions and Adeline declared it the BEST! THING! EVER!

- Was fitted for a second pressure glove so now she is wearing them on both hands to help minimize the scarring from her accident.

- Decided that the exersaucer was her enemy and that she was never going in it again.

- Didn't sleep for weeks. Then slept great. You can guess which week this next picture was from...

- Learned to play ball although the game usually devolves into hugging shortly after it starts.

- Started to babble just in time to say she did it at 9 months!

- Laughed too many times to count. Smiled too many times to count. Ate too many crackers to count. Gave her Mama too many hugs to count.