We are SO excited for Christmas around here.  The first reason, of course, is that we have Jacinda home.  Over the summer, we were preparing ourselves for the possibility that we might not have her home by Christmas.  All the paperwork was just so uncertain at that point.

There is a lot that we don’t know about Jacinda’s first 2 years.  We have no idea if she ever received presents.  So we’re a little excited to see her when she opens her presents.

Back in December of 2008, before we had Jacinda’s referral, I had this conversation on Facebook:

12/6/08:  Me – Sherry Barber Wolfe is SO happy Immigration approved us so quickly after getting the new document!!!!!!

12/6/08:  Janna (my sister-in-law) – Way cool Dude! Maybe I'll have another new niece by next Christmas!

12/6/08:  Me – Janna, it will probably be longer than that, unfortunately. But crazier things have happened!

I think I need to listen to Janna a little more.  She must have known something we didn’t!!!

The other major reason we’re excited for Christmas is that this is the first year Luke really understands all the hype.  He knows that Christmas is when God sent us baby Jesus.  He knows that we get to open presentqs.  We took him to a store and let him pick out presents for each of us and he’s helping us wrap them.  So he also understands the giving part of Christmas.  We let him choose some of his old toys to give away to kids that are in need of gifts this Christmas.  He also helped us put together shoeboxes for Operation Christmas Child.  It’s really been a lot of fun for us to see him learning about all of this.

This is also the year that Aaron and I have been discussing what we want to teach the kids about Christmas and what traditions we want to start and continue in our house.  We really want our kids to know that Christmas is not all about opening presents.  Yes, that’s a really fun part of it, but it isn’t the most important part.  We want to give them things they want, but we already have so much stuff.  We also want to instill in them a desire to help other people who don’t have as much as we do.  And not just at Christmas, but all year long.

We’ll definitely post lots of pictures of the big day, so stay tuned!

While I have a semi-quiet minute, I thought I’d type out a little update about what we’re up to around here. Both kids are eating a snack and playing together and dinner is simmering on the stove – Navy Bean Soup.

The kids and I are settling into a routine during the weekdays. We usually run an errand or two in the morning and then try to go to the park if it isn’t raining. Even if it’s cold, we bundle up and go! The kids love running around and it’s good for all of us to get some fresh air. Then we usually come home and have lunch and the kids take naps!!!!!

The kids still have their moments, but they are slowly playing together better. So that’s good news! Jacinda continues to leave a path of destruction wherever she goes. She gets into things that we forgot we had! She undoes everything I do. Or, she makes a bigger mess somewhere else while I’m getting something done!!!! Needless to say, our house is not clean and tidy all the time! We have been having both kids help clean up all the toys every night before bed. So at least the floor is toy-free at some point during the day!!!!

We should be starting her speech therapy soon. She qualified for once a week therapy. Because of the holidays, we don’t have a starting date yet, but that should be coming soon.

We met last week with the Craniofacial team at our children’s hospital. We are so fortunate that we have the Operation Smile doctors here locally. The consult went really well. Jacinda was very cooperative with everyone.

The orthodontist we saw said that her teeth looked great so far. Right now, we just need to do what we’d normally do with a 2 year old, which is brush her teeth. He said we’d need to start orthodontic work probably when she’s 5 or 6.

The plastic surgeon was very informative. He said that during her surgery, he would do 3 things. The most important thing he will do is close her palate. Then, he will touch up her lip just a little. He was pretty impressed with her lip repair, though. The third thing he will do is try to even out her nose a little bit. He said that that is the hardest part and that her nose will probably be a bit uneven forever. We don’t really care, because that’s something you don’t even notice unless you’re looking really closely.

He also said that we need to meet with the ENT surgeon at some point soon. If she needs tubes in her ears, they will do that during the surgery as well. As far as we know, she doesn’t have issues with ear infections, but it’s pretty common with cleft kids to have ear fluid issues.

We also met with the team’s Speech Pathologist. She doesn’t deal with speech really, mainly just with feeding issues. She was very impressed that Jacinda is using sippy cups and not a bottle. She will work with us while we’re in the hospital to teach Jacinda how to eat with a repaired palate. She also said that if we need any help getting Jacinda’s speech therapy services taken care of, she will help us.

Surgery is scheduled for Wednesday, February 3rd. Jacinda will only need to stay in the hospital for 1 night, assuming everything goes well. She will need to be on a liquid/soft food diet for at least a week. She’s going to LOVE that part! The good news is that our surgeon does NOT use arm restraints for kids Jacinda’s age. It’s fairly common for kids to have their arms in splints after surgery so they don’t mess with their surgery sites. We were really worried about that and were happy to hear that we won’t have to deal with it.

We just had Jacinda’s evaluation for Speech Therapy services today (Tuesday). She is developmentally on track in all areas, except speech. In fact, she is ahead developmentally in a few areas, like fine motor skills. She does have delays in expressive and receptive speech. Pretty soon, she will start speech therapy once a week.

We are currently in Lancaster, PA. Well, near there, anyway. A few weeks ago, I had the brilliant idea to come up here for a weekend. We love this area, Aaron already had today off work, and we could see all the Christmas decorations. So we left early this morning. The kids slept off and on until we got to DC. Just past DC, Jacinda started screaming. At first, we thought she was just tired of being strapped in her seat. Then it occurred to Aaron that the last time she was in a car for that long was in China when she left the foster family and came to meet us. So we’re not sure if today’s trip was triggering some bad memories or not. We really hope that she didn’t think we were taking her somewhere and planning on leaving her.

We stopped just north of Baltimore to eat lunch at Baja Fresh. Yes, we plan our vacations around where we want to eat. More on that later ……….

Our plan was to go to Hershey, PA tomorrow morning and go to Chocolate World. Well, we had a crazy idea to go tonight and go not only to Chocolate World, but Hershey Park as well. It is their Christmas thing, and we thought it would be fun to see Santa and his real reindeer and to ride some rides. Sounds fun, right? Well ……….

It was 45 degrees outside ….. and the wind chill ……. around 39 degrees. Yes, that’s right, we walked around a theme park for several hours in 15 mph winds. Fortunately, the kids were dressed approriately, although they could barely walk! They had on fleece pants, heavy coats, hats, and mittens. Aaron and I on the other hand were not so fortunate. Aaron had on jeans, a long sleeved t-shirt, and a fleece pullover. I had on jeans, a light sweater, and a heavy coat. I had left my gloves and scarf at home. The wind was whipping right through my jeans. Needless to say, we were pretty cold. I seriously do not know what possessed us!!!!!! We did have fun, though. Luke thought the rides were just the best thing ever.

After all that, we went to one of our favorite restaurants ever … Isaac’s Restaurant and Deli. It’s basically a sandwich place. They have some sandwiches on bread made out of pretzel dough. YUM!!!!! And, it’s a great place to take kids. When we sat down, they gave us the standard crayons and kids menu. They also gave each of the kids a small package of pretzel goldfish to much on. Brilliant!!!!!! We ordered and they brought the kids’ side dish before the meal! Again, brilliant!!!!!!!! And the best thing is that we had a free sandwich coupon!!!!

Tomorrow’s plan is to go to a few outlets in Lancaster, and then we’re surprising Luke with his first real train ride!!!!! I think we might be more excited than he will be!!!!!

Oh, and we left our camera cable at home, so you’ll have to wait for pictures until we make it home! Our camera is pretty much dead anyway, though. We’re hoping it will hold out for the weekend.

On a lighter note …….

We have started calling Jacinda “Captin Destructo”. This girl is crazy. She tears up everything. She makes a mess out of everything. It’s like nothing I’ve ever seen. Luke was a piece of cake compared to this girl!!!!! We are having to babyproof even more things. More baby gates. More doorknob covers. More everything.

She also never stops! She never sits down and just relaxes. We just follow her around and laugh. I have never seen anything like it.

When she falls down, most of the time, she just laughs and gets up and does it again! In fact, we are getting pictures taken tomorrow, and she has 2 bruises on her forehead!!!!!

As far as how we’re coping …. we’re hanging in there. The crazy thing is that both kids are better behaved when we’re at a store than when we’re at home! Seriously. In the mornings, I usually try to take them to run an errand or two, and then we go to the park if it’s nice outside. When we’re shopping, they are perfect angels. Isn’t that the craziest thing?

Yesterday, I was beginning to seriously doubt that we could handle this parenting 2 toddlers business. It was a pretty rough day.

I should warn you here that this post is not going to be all sunshine and roses. Just trying to be real …… If you don’t want to read about the hard part of adoption, stop reading now.

All day long, both kids were screaming. Luke was crying because he fell down (very dramatic these days). Luke was pushing Jacinda down for no reason. Jacinda walked into the corner of the table, so she was screaming because of the huge bump on her forehead. Jacinda was pulling on the cat’s tail. One thing after the other. All.Day.Long.

Also, many other things happened …….. I found out I need a root canal. Our buddy, Steve, tore down what was left of our old fence. One of our neighbors freaked out because their dog got out and Steve brought it back. We had NO clue they had a dog, otherwise we would have told them. Lots of drama.

By the end of the day, I was DONE. I was really starting to wonder what we had gotten ourselves into. After Luke had pushed Jacinda down for about the 100th time, he went to his room. Aaron went up to talk to him and finally got the truth out of Luke. Luke was wondering if we could take Jacinda back. It was the first time he’s said something like that to us. So they talked about it and we all went to bed.

This morning, Luke fell down or something and was crying. Before Jacinda came home, he totally would have just gotten up and been fine. Since she’s been home, he cries at the drop of a hat. So I took him into my lap and asked why he was so sad all the time. He said, “Because Jacinda is here and I’m not the only kid any more.” (Aaron had said something like that to him last night.)

So Luke and I talked about a few things. First, I told him that Daddy and I love him just as much as we ever did. Second, I told him that we’re a family, and families work things out. I told him that this is hard for all of us. But that we would all work together and figure things out and be happy. He seemed to be satisfied with that discussion.

We, of course, knew that there would be some transition time for all of us. I don’t think we realized it would be this hard. Luke is used to sharing, but he’s not used to sharing HIS stuff, and HIS mommy and daddy. I’m not sure we realized how hard it would be for a 3 year old to have his entire world turned upside down.

Today has been better. Hopefully yesterday was just a bad day. I’m SO thankful that Aaron is working only part time this month. It’s been so helpful to have him home.

We’ve been home just over 2 weeks now. We’re pretty much over the jet lag, finally. Adjusting to life as a family of 4 has been pretty difficult. The kids love each other, when they’re not fighting over anything and everything. Right now, they’re both laying next to me on the bed and they’re kicking each other for no reason. And now they’re both screaming.

Luke has been handling all of this as well as a 3 year old can be expected to. His whole world was just turned completely upside down, and that was after mommy and daddy were gone for almost 3 weeks. So he’s had a hard time. Sharing toys is pretty hard for him. I mean, he’s had to share before at church and school, but not so much on his home turf.

Jacinda screams. A lot. We think it’s largely because she can’t communicate with us. She doesn’t say anything at all due to her cleft palate. Part of it is probably grief from her world being turned upside down, too.

They’re actually better behaved when we’re not at home! Of course, that might be due to the large amounts of snacks they get while we’re out and about!!!!! We’ve also been spending lots of time at our neighborhood park. The weather has been nice lately, so we’ve been trying to get out and enjoy it.

But we’re hanging in there. Aaron is working part-time this month, so that’s a huge help. He goes into the office in the mornings and then comes home at lunch. He’s able to help me get the kiddos fed and down for their naps.

Pictures from our trip are HERE.

That’s it for now! I must attempt to put kiddos to bed!

A lot of you know this already, but we are home. The journey home was quite eventful, and I don’t want to relive it here! But we made it home!!!!!! It was SO nice to sleep in our own bed that first night!

We missed Luke so much. It didn’t really hit us how much we missed him until we saw him again. We could tell he really missed us, too. I feel like we missed a whole chunk of his life, which makes me a little sad. I think he grew a lot, too! I don’t remember him being so big.

Jacinda is a dream. She is just perfect for our family. She and Luke so far have been doing great with each other. They both have had their moments, but overall, things are going really well. This morning at breakfast, they were eating next to each other and no adults were at the table. Jacinda started crying for her cup and we asked Luke why he took her cup. He said because she was playing with it and not drinking!!!! Mr. Bossy! It was pretty funny!

Jacinda goes to see our pediatrician tomorrow afternoon for a checkup. I’m sure he will tell us that she’s doing great. She’s definitely tiny, though. But her cleft palate is not affecting her eating and drinking at all, so that’s good. Speaking of that, her consult with the cleft team is December 1. We will meet with a team of surgeons from Operation Smile. Our insurance will pay for everything, but the doctors at our children’s hospital are the ones that work with Operation Smile. We are confident they will take very good care of her. We’re probably looking at her palate surgery early next year. Then they will redo her lip repair after that at some point. We’ll get a lot more information at that Dec. 1 appointment.

Just wanted to check in and give you all an update. We’re recovering from jet lag … Aaron and Jacinda seem to be handling it pretty well …. me, not so much! But we’re hanging in there and adjusting to life as a family of four!!!

The good news is, we got Jacinda’s visa today after all – a day early.  The bad news ….. we still can’t leave yet.  There’s no way to change all our travel arrangements to leave a day early.  So now we have most of the day Friday to kill here in Guangzhou.

Then we leave late afternoon for our train to Hong Kong.  I’m not sure if we’ll have internet access at our hotel in Hong Kong.  So if you don’t hear from us for a couple of days, that’s why.  We leave Saturday morning our time (Friday night Eastern time) to head home.

Thanks for all the good wishes and thoughts.  See you all soon!!!!

This morning, we had to wait around in our room in case there was an issue with our paperwork.  There was an issue, but it wasn’t our fault, so our guide said she told the US Consulate to fix it!  I guess we’ll see!

This afternoon, all the families in our group loaded up in a bus to go to the US Consulate.  We had to swear that all the information we had provided was accurate.  We also had to turn in Jacinda’s application for her visa to get into the US.  She’ll travel to the US on a Chinese passport, so she needs a visa.  That’s the whole reason we spend a week in Guangzhou.  Apparently it takes that long to issue the visa.

In the room at the consulate, there were probably over a hundred people, all adoptive families.  The lady at the Consulate gave a little speech about what the Consulate is there for.  Then she had the nerve to say that all the babies were getting restless!!!!  REALLY??????  Then she got around to the swearing of the information.  Then she told us congratulations and that we could go home!  In actuality, we can’t leave until we have that visa in our hands!!!!!!  It was all quite humorous.  Well, the kind of humorous that if you don’t laugh, you’ll cry!

The good news (if there is such a thing at this point) is that our Consulate Appointment ended up being a day early.  The bad news is that we don’t get her visa any earlier.  So now we hang out for 2 more days waiting for her visa so we can leave.

We’ve been really frustrated the past 2 days with all the paperwork.  Apparently the US Consulate changed some things around.  So we have felt really out of the loop as far as what we need to do and what is happening.  We’re not sure if our agency isn’t communicating with us very well, or what.

Tomorrow, we have one last paperwork meeting.  We’ll find out all the details of how we actually get Jacinda’s visa in our hands.  We’ll also find out the details of how we’re getting to Hong Kong on Friday and then leaving for the US on Saturday.  We arrive in Norfolk Saturday night.  We are SO ready to be home.  It’s been a great trip, and of course we’re thrilled to have Jacinda.  But we’re done.  We’re mentally, physically, and emotionally exhausted.  Home is sounding very good to us.