First Day of School

I've been educating my children at home since (gulp) 1986.  No that isn't a typo.  It really has been twenty-seven years!  As it turns out it was excellent training for the task I am currently facing - that of teaching the Little Princesses how to understand and communicate in English. 

Can you imagine attempting to learn a new name for everything in your life?  Food, your possessions, your emotions, the weather - EVERYTHING?  I am exhausted just thinking about it!  These two are doing wonderful though.  They are very smart and learning quickly.  While it may take quite awhile for speech therapy to kick in enough that their verbal skills are understandable, their comprehension just four months after coming home is pretty amazing!

I've been seeing back to school photos all over Facebook, and not to be outdone, here are ours from Tuesday:

Jen is usually smiling!  She is so much fun to work with, and she is a HARD WORKER too.

Oh the wonders of playdough!  Abigail is learning colors while getting  a great fine motor workout too.

 We purchased a new (to us) desk and Tikvah had fun painting the inside with chalkboard paint, green and PURPLE GLITTER paint!  I simply cannot believe that she is in middle school this year.  She is pretty excited about a unit study that we are doing and a new Language Arts curriculum that just came out in August.

The desk closes all up to protect her school computer and books from prying little hands.

Today we went to the first co-op of the year.  Our co-op meets once a week.  Tikvah's classes this year are Musical Theater, Art and Spanish.  The Little Princesses are in the preschool class since they are just learning the alphabet and to count in English.

Abigail and Jen were a little nervous, but very excited about carrying their backpacks and lunch boxes to this new adventure that we called, "school."  I am assisting in their class the entire time so that helped to reassure them.

I'm excited about our new year of learning, and better yet all three girls seem to be also.  I love it that we can spend the day together and I get the great privilege of being there when the proverbial light bulbs click ON and they understand something new.

Officially back in the China program

Our notarized homestudy has arrived at our placement agency, and we're officially back in the China program.  Since our USCIS applications have been at the agency just waiting on the updated homestudy to arrive, our case manager is currently assembling the documents to send out.  This "Supplement 3" to the i800a form (Application for Determination of Suitability to Adopt a Child from a Convention Country) is the last document needed for our dossier to go back to China on its second round.  Unlike the last time, we don't need to be fingerprinted since our prints have not yet expired from our application with the Little Princesses.  Since the i800a is currently taking roughly twice as long for approval as it was last year at this time, we're hopeful that skipping that step will speed things along.

Homestudy Update Approved!

It seems as if the homestudy process for Issac has taken so much longer than the process with Abigail and Jen.  I anticipated that an "update" would take much less time than an entire homestudy.  As I compared the timetables, I discovered that our homestudy for the Princesses took fifty-four days from the beginning to approval by our placement agency, and this time it was only fifty-two days.  If it was two days shorter than why did it seem to take twice as long?

I believe the explanation may lie in where the time was spent.  The first time WE were busy fulfilling educational requirements, rushing around gathering documents, mailing things back and forth, gathering the dossier, etc.  This time our paperwork was pretty simple.  We had our documents turned in only eight days after beginning the process.  But then we had a longer wait.  Why?  Because other people were busy.  That left us simply in "wait" mode.

While  parents in the adoptive process normally live in some kind of a time warp where every day seems a week long, they are typically busy at this stage with the gathering of the dossier requirements.  Since we didn't need to do that this time, I believe we noticed the days even more.  Likely no one but fellow adoptive parents in process and my mother-in-law will care anything about this analysis, but since we APs are an obsessive bunch I will indulge myself.  The rest of you feel free to skip the next paragraph.

It took five days longer for the social worker to visit this time after we turned in our paperwork.  As our file was compiled at our homestudy agency, they discovered a few requirements that hadn't been included on the to-list we received from them.  This resulted in waiting on documents later in the process.  While it took only nine days after the social worker finished her visits to receive the rough draft with the girls, this time it took twenty days.  All told it was only ten days longer to approval after turning in our paperwork, but it honestly felt like months. 

What now?  Well.... we are waiting.  Once the placement agency receives the notarized copies of the approved homestudy they will send our paperwork to the USCIS.  There is some amount of confusion about how to approach this step since our fingerprints on file don't expire until mid January.  Here's hoping for a clear answer and a quick approval!  The clock never stops ticking on a parent's watch - especially when they are just waiting.

The Little Princesses get their teeth fixed

Friday morning came VERY early as we found ourselves in the van at 4 AM and heading to Indianapolis.  While I am certain that there are very capable pediatric dentists in Ohio, we've loved and trusted ours for over a decade.  When it came right down to it we couldn't make the switch after we moved.  Because of the amount of restoration that needed to be done he recommended doing it while they were under general anesthesia.  We arrived at the surgical center right on time at 6:30 AM.  The girls were fairly calm, albeit somewhat confused as to why we got them out of bed so early and put them in the van in their pajamas!

Jen was the first one on the schedule.  She was the more nervous of the two, and fussed a bit beforehand. 

She came out of the anesthesia very well, and was fairly cheerful when it was all done.  They were not able to save a couple of the teeth that were supposed to have had root canals.

Abigail was the opposite.  She was all cheerful before the surgery, excited for her turn to ride on the wheeling bed, and waved goodbye all the way down the hall.  She had only one tooth that could not be saved.  This Little Princess was NOT happy when she came out of recovery though and just wanted to GO HOME!

I believe they may have sprung us a little sooner since Abigail was so insistent that we leave. It was a long drive back to Cincinnati, and we had to pass the barf bucket around more than once.  (I really began to question my sanity on keeping our old dentist at this point.) We arrived back home right about noon.

The Little Princesses continue to be opposites.  Jen played happily (well except for being miffed that they took her teeth) but Abigail fought nausea for the rest of the day.  Thankfully when Saturday dawned, they were both back to normal.

I am so glad to have the dental issues behind us.  They both had a lot of decay and must have been uncomfortable living with those mouths! 

Adoption Jewelry!

I've been busy creating adoption themed jewelry as a fundraiser for Isaac's homecoming!  I hope you'll visit us and find something you like!  Here is the link   http://www.etsy.com/shop/AsOneRescued

We have necklaces and earrings, and Isaac's advocate made some really lovely glass bead bookmarks.  A few examples of what you will find.

Thanks for taking a peek!

Puzzle Fundraiser for the Prince

Some friends are requesting a puzzle fundraiser for our Prince, and it does seem as though he ought to have his own.  So I was pretty excited to find this puzzle of his province.  It is a photo of rice growing on the mountain side.  How they carve out these fields is FASCINATING!  If you get the chance watch episode #1 of the series "Wild China" on Amazon or Netflix to get an idea of the beauty of Isaac's province.

Never heard of a puzzle fundraiser?  How does it work?  Very simple!  Make a donation of $5 to help us bring our prince home and we'll put your name on the back of a puzzle piece.  claim as many pieces as you'd like!  It is FUN to watch it come together and very touching to see the names of the friends who helped us along in the journey.  Here is a photo of the Little Princesses' puzzle when it was in progress

And when it was completed.

We glued it together and framed it in double glass.  It is on display in the entryway of our home.  We see it everyday as a reminder of the many people who helped to make their homecoming possible.

Want to be involved?  Our goal for Isaac's puzzle is to raise the funds for his airline ticket home.  This will take approximately $5 per puzzle piece. Just click the Paypal donate button in the right sidebar to claim your pieces!  Or you can donate (tax exempt) through our Reece's Rainbow link here.   Please let us know if you donate for puzzle pieces through Reece's Rainbow as we don't get automatic notification of it and want to be sure we get your name on the piece(s).  Thank you for your involvement!

UPDATE:  If you'd like to see the puzzle's progress, there are photos HERE!

Building Wonder World

My husband has been busy for a few weekends.   A friend was finished with their play set and its equipment and wanted it removed from her yard.  And oh, by the way, their neighbor had a couple of sets that they wanted removed also.

  So he took them apart, rented a trailer from U Haul, and brought all the pieces home.

On a quest to have enough play things for all of our kids AND our grandchildren he is building Wonder World!  One of our married daughters was visiting with her two children, and when I told her our goal was for each of the children to have a swing, she replied, "Better keep on building!"

 At last the slide was attached...

I believe The Little Princesses approve of the project so far.

Stay tuned.  It is still very much a work in progress.  As aforementioned daughter above put it... if we build it, they will come!  Anyone have ideas for making a portion of it accessible for a wheelchair?