Daily Rituals

I mentioned last time how happy we all are to be back in our routine, and you probably thought in terms of a schedule -- getting up, eating, going to bed at set times every day.  While we try to do things at the same hour each day, our routine is actually made up of daily many rituals that Sarah counts on and insists on observing.  Some are quite elaborate.

Sarah now goes to sleep on her own at naptime.  Well, that's not entirely accurate.  She counts on Don to perform a series of actions in the same order before her head hits the pillow, then she takes it from there.  Don is going fishing up north again this coming week, so this morning, he wrote down the naptime ritual:

• In living room:
• Kiss Mom "goodnight"
• Drink milk in Dad's lap
• Wipe mouth with diaper
• Go to Sarah's room:
• Arrange bedding
• Close south shade
• Turn on sound machine (Dad does)
• Turn on music (Sarah does)
• Visit and touch panda mobile
• Close west shade
• Turn on fan (Sarah does)
• Move diaper pail from in front of door
• Return to hallway:
• Look at map of Maine
• Go to thermostat -- open, push two right buttons, close (Sarah does)
• Open bathroom door, close, pat (Sarah and Dad)
• Look in the master bedroom for cat on the bed
• Look at Williams needlepoint in hallway and point out "LMS," "85," and sun
• Back to room:
• Hug, kiss, and lay in bed

I'm not joking (how could I make this up?).  A couple of days ago, he tripped over the foot stool in Sarah's room during the process, and she now has to talk about and reenact the incident every time.  Any new action can become part of the ritual, so it pays to be prudent. 

Although not as detailed, there are rituals for getting up in the morning, getting up after nap, and going to bed (and I'm sure I'm forgetting others).  The scary part is that, if for some reason the ritual is interrupted or a step is skipped, it might be necessary to start over or at least backtrack to avoid a tirade.  Sarah takes "high-maintenance" to new heights.

Don just informed me that he left out a step in the naptime ritual.  No big deal...I'm sure Sarah will keep me on the straight and narrow.

These Are the Good Old Days

Carly Simon had it right.  These ARE the good old days.  We've been back from vacation for a week now, and I feel more relaxed than I have in a long time (maybe years?).  I'm not planning anything.  I'm not anticipating anything.  I'm not struggling with or worrying about anything.  I'm enjoying the here-and-now and feeling incredibly fortunate to be married to the man who is perfect for me and mother to the child who was meant for me, not to mention living on a special piece of God's green earth. 

We had our final visit with our social worker on Thursday.  She will submit a report to our adoption agency, who will forward it to China, and the endless stream of paperwork and approvals associated with Sarah's adoption will finally dry up -- after nearly five years.  She has been legally ours for more than a year now, but it's a joy to be finished with all traces of the process.  She has now been with us longer than she was without us.  :)

Sarah seems relieved to be back into a routine.  She is noticeably happier and more even-keeled than she's been in weeks.  She goes to bed cheerfully and sleeps 11 hours, mostly peacefully.  She even goes to sleep on her own at naptime.  This is a huge step.  For the past year, Don has walked her to sleep at naptime.  We decided it was time for that to change when we returned from Minnesota last week.  The first couple of days, she objected vehemently for a few minutes, then babbled for a while and went to sleep.  By the third day, she didn't even protest, and now she dives for the crib.  She still needs to be reminded a couple of times that it's naptime and not chattertime, but then she gets down to business and snoozes for 2 1/2 hours.

"Routine" seems to have a negative connotation in our society, which values the latest high-tech gadgets and newest thrilling experiences.  I enjoy learning new things, seeing new places, and meeting new people, but, like everyone, I thrive emotionally when I have a stable, loving home life.  I've spent many of my years without it, for various reasons, and I get teary thinking of my current good fortune.  It thrills me beyond measure to provide the same for Sarah.

Of course, the routine on the farm changes with the seasons.  It's harvest-time, and we're busy picking and processing the earth's bounty.  Freezing corn, green beans, and broccoli.  Drying tomatoes.  Turning basil into pesto.  With all of our travel this summer, some of the produce overmatured, which is a shame.  Fortunately, the chickens aren't fussy about their vegetables and welcome five-pound zucchinis and finger-sized beans.

As for Sarah, she likes her grape tomatoes fresh off the vine:

And she had fun picking apples with Daddy and reaping the rewards:

Just for fun, here's a shot from a year ago:

She is the apple of both her mother's and father's eyes!

A New Take on an Old Destination

Our trips to Winnie (Lake W*innibigoshish, for the uninitiated) aren't what they used to be.  For five years, Don and I loaded the boat with camping supplies, drove roughly seven hours, motored out to a remote Forest Service campsite, set up our tent, and spent a week alone, with no electricity, running water, or neighbors (unless you count the cormorant rookery down the peninsula).  This year, Don, Sarah, and I loaded the boat with supplies, drove roughly seven hours, pulled into Bowen Resort, and made ourselves comfortable in an adorable two-bedroom cabin with heat, air conditioning, cable TV and Wi-Fi (not to mention hot showers). 

We're adjusting to the "upgrade" pretty well.  The owners of the resort, Gail and Bill, are warm, wonderful people, and we run into them several times a day as we make our way to and from the beach and the boat.  Don and I are both rather introverted, but these folks have made us feel very comfortable.  Our cabin is next to the main lodge, which has a gorgeous great room overlooking the lake.  I spent more than an hour reading in a chair swing there one day, and it was heavenly.

Sarah loves the resort dogs -- Fluffy, a shih tzu, and Topper, some sort of setter.  Fluffy is fawned over by all the kids and even receives mail during the off-season.  She's extremely tolerant of children and extremely intolerant of Cadi, our Labrador.  Fluffy has gone for Cadi's throat four times now.

Our first day fishing, Don caught a 6+-pound northern pike, which escaped while I was trying to net it.  I'm sure Minnesota marriages have ended over lesser offenses.  In my defense, I had a two-year-old clutching my leg for balance as I bent over the side of the boat, and my allegiance was with her.  Luckily, he's since caught some nice walleye, and we had a yummy fish dinner last night.

The bird life here is stunning, as always.  The place is lousy with bald eagles, white pelicans, and common loons.  The pelicans are my favorite.  They're goofy-looking on land, but in the air, they're quite impressive as they soar on thermals or fly inches above the water -- flap, flap, flap, glide...flap, flap, flap, glide....

The weather has been less than perfect.  It's been cool -- highs in the upper 60s and low 70s -- and rainy.  Today was finally beautiful.  We still needed to bundle up to be comfortable in the boat, but it was warm enough for some beach time this afternoon.

I've decided that traveling with Sarah is not my idea of a "vacation."  I get more rest at home, and I don't have to pack.  She hasn't slept well at night and has had only one real nap since we got here.  Since she's out of her element, she doesn't play well on her own, the way she can at home, so she needs to be entertained constantly.  She's been very demanding and contrary, I believe in an effort to control her circumstances.  Changing her diaper is an unreasonable request in her mind, and Heaven forbid I touch one of her toys.  I realize these are typical toddler behaviors, but I think they get amplified when we're away from home.  Fortunately, there are no more trips on the horizon.

I hate to admit it, but one of the highlights of our trip has been cable TV, which we don't have at home.  Staying up to watch The D*ily Show and The C*lbert Report feels deliciously decadent when we usually go to bed at 9:00 after a little PBS.  I've heard more than enough about the so-called Ground Zero Mosque, however. 

Here are some photos:

Someone Has a New Slide

Sarah loves to slide.  So, when we stopped at our local Once Upon a Ch*ld the other day and saw a big Step 2 slide in excellent condition out front, I knew she had to have it.  I'm known for agonizing over even the smallest purchases, but this was a no-brainer.  It's big enough to entertain her for a couple of years and looks as good in our rec room as our back yard.  With all the rain we've been getting, the mosquitos are horrendous in our yard, so it's downstairs for now. 

The Fallout from Two Weeks Away from Home

We made it home from our road trip safely on Wednesday, but not without a whole lot of drama.  About an hour from my mom's (and roughly 25 hours from home), Sarah had a major meltdown.  She screamed and cried for about 20 minutes.  We pulled into a parking lot, and I struggled with her to get her out of the carseat, thinking a little walk might help.  It didn't, and 10 minutes later, I had to struggle with her to get her back into the seat.  She was distraught.  She finally fell asleep down the road a bit. 

She had a couple of other screaming fits over the next couple of days.   She had clearly had enough traveling.  Tuesday night, she had her toys strewn all over the hotel room.  When I picked up a couple of books to make a path to the bathroom, she screamed, ran over, grabbed the books from my hand, and put them back exactly where they'd been.  I ended up riding in the back seat with her for a while on Wednesday because she was begging to come into the front seat with me.

Needless to say, she was thrilled to be home and quite content spending time in familiar surroundings with just Mom and Dad on Thursday and Friday.  Then, Omar, Emily, Sophia, Rachel, and Matt arrived on Saturday to celebrate her birthday.  She was having so much fun that she refused to take a nap, which turned out to be disastrous.

She had a meltdown before dinner, then two in the evening before Omar, Emily, and Sophia left.  She was inconsolable and irrational.  After a poor night's sleep, she was up at 5:45 Sunday morning.  By lunchtime, she had become hysterical.  Poor Rachel and Matt wisely hit the road.  She refused to eat lunch but finally drank some warm milk and went to sleep.  When she woke three hours later and found just Don and me, she seemed to regain her footing.  Today, she's back to her chipper self.

Although two-year-olds are notorious for their emotional tirades, I think there was more at work for Sarah.  Over the last few weeks, she's spent time with many different people, getting comfortable with them, then being taken away from them.  I think this may have triggered some traumatic memories for her -- of spending her first year with a foster mother she loved, then being taken from her.  She had no control over that situation, and she was feeling the same way about the last few weeks.  She was emotionally and physically exhausted.

My last post was about the anniversary of our becoming a family.  Some people feel the day is definitely one to celebrate for adoptive parents but may be bittersweet for adopted children.  After all, it was the day the world as they knew it crumbled around them...probably the scariest one of their lives.  I have mixed emotions about commemorating it.  It's sadly ironic that, as we honored our first year together, Sarah was struggling to deal with new feelings of loss and maybe re-experiencing old ones.  She doesn't have the language to talk about such things, so she showed her feelings the only way she could -- by screaming.

I don't regret our trip because I think the pluses outweighed the minuses for her.  She got to know many important people in her life, and that's valuable.  I'm sorry for her pain, but I think it will be easier for her to deal with such feelings in the future, when she can talk about them.  It will be my job to be open to discussing them with her and validating them.  As she grows, she will also have more say in how we honor our Family Day.  We're all in this together.

I'm a little late posting this; I wrote it almost a week ago. Sarah seemed to adjust to being home again and was pretty happy the last few days -- no meltdowns, thank goodness.  She went to bed beautifully but struggled with sleep, crying out and waking in the middle of the night.  I'm afraid trips will be stressful for her for a long time.

We arrived yesterday at a resort in northern Minnesota for a week . After the fallout of the last trip, I was really worried about this one and regretting our scheduling. I think it will be okay, though, since it will be just the three of us (plus Cadi), and we're staying in one place. I hope it will be a chance for us all to relax. We'll see....

One Year as a Family

A year ago today, in a hotel conference room in Nanchang, Jiangxi Province, China, a sober, scared Zhuang Lu Yi was placed in my arms.  As I write this, in a hotel in Er*e, Pennsylvania, an animated, inquisitive Sarah Grace Hultman is climbing on my back.  We're on our way home from vacation, so our Family Day celebration isn't elaborate, but it is no less meaningful.  Over deep-dish pizza, we give thanks for the magic of love and the gift of family.  Zhuang Lu Yi lives on, but she is decidedly American in attitude these days, and we love her to pieces.

(Thanks for the great photo, Delaine!!)

Our BFT (Part IV -- Grammy's House)

We finally arrived at Grammy's house in Massachusetts Monday afternoon.  What a relief to being staying somewhere for a whole week!  We've had a terrific time, and Sarah has made great strides in getting to know her family and in talking.  She cracked us up at dinner the other night by saying "yes" very clearly and carefully while nodding her head and rocking her fist to also sign the word.  She then went into "no, no, no" while shaking her head and tapping her thumb and two fingertips together for the sign.  It was a routine out of her favorite video, "Signing Time," and it was precious.

She's had a blast with her three cousins -- Forrest (11), Sam (9), and Kelley (7).  They've been doting on her and driving her around in the little car Alison's boys gave her.  She loves it!  It was definitely worth cramming it into our car. 

She's gotten quite close to Grammy and now says her name, crawls into her lap, and gives her kisses goodnight.  Grammy hates every minute.  :)

She went to the beach for the first time with Mommy, Grammy, Auntie Heather, and the boys.

We drove about an hour away to see my brother's "new" house.  It's a farmhouse built in about 1850 on 90-some acres.  George and his fiancee Chelsey are renovating the whole house, inside and out.  It is very cool and will be beautiful when done, I'm sure. 

Yesterday, we had a mini family reunion at my mom's, with my Uncle Bill, "Aunt" Jane, Uncle Bing, Cousin Bitsy, and her two kids.  We hadn't all been together in more than 10 years.  It was nice to catch up.  Here's my brother George, Mom, sister Heather, and me:

And here's our latest family portrait:

We had fresh Maine lobster for dinner the other night, and we're going out for fried clams tonight.  I'm loading up on everything New England while I can.  Tomorrow, we head back to Wisconsin and plan to arrive Wednesday afternoon.  We've had a wonderful Big Fun Trip, but I think we're all looking forward to being home on the farm.