ALICE'S CHRISTMAS 09

(with wet hair!)

CHRISTINGLES AND CHRISTMAS EVE!

We made Christingles at our local church service nearly a month ago! Then Alice was ill for her school service, my school service was earlier this week and the weather made going to the service a risk, so we missed that one too. But today we finally made it to another service - with GMA and my old parish church in A'g, a very different service and a Christingle with sweets on it (beautifully made in advance) - I hadn't seen sweets on a Christingle for many years!

GFN came for coffee this morning, Alice ate his fudge cake for him and he gave her the plastic tat train - which he and I then took many minutes to assemble, we seemed to recreate the Christmas cliche of the adults assembling the toys whilst the child played with the box! We watched the DVDVD (as Alice calls them) of her Nativity - she looked like she had head lice as she scratched throughout the performance, she didn't (just a hot head from the lamb's costume!) Then this afternoon we went to the Christingle service, home for a simple sandwich supper in front of the TV (HUGE treat) before laying out the goodies for Father Christmas and hang the sack up, then it was bedtime with the story of the Nativity before I came downstairs to start preparing tomorrow's meal etc but also a lovely, simple supper of smoked salmon and avocado, yummy!

Happy Christmas, I'm off to check NORAD, have you?

WHAT AN ADVENTURE!!

We had a busy morning. We got off to a late start after a poor night's sleep. I couldn't plan how the morning was going to be as I was waiting for a phone call, luckily it came relatively early and so didn't disrupt the day, it went well and an important decision was made (more to come on that in the New Year).


Then it was a morning of mopping up loose ends, a quick shopping trip for last minute chocolate presents, delivery of a late birthday card (why can't I get more organised?), delivery of some of the choccies and home for some lunch.

Then fun really began! J arrived with O (one of Alice's BFs) and baby R and we went off to see Father Christmas, we left in plenty of time because of the weather - there is still snow with thick ice underneath on minor roads.

Luckily we arrived with time to spare and it was magical as it started to snow. We caught a little steam train and travelled through the snow to see Jack Frost, the children gave him an icicle and in return he gave them a magic badge, then we travelled back to the station where the children rubbed the magic badges and Father Christmas came down the chimney! He told them a little bit about his workshop and the reindeer and then the elves helped him to give out presents. In previous years we've been on a full sized steam train (different location) and queued through a carriage to see FC in family groups. This year the train ride and Jack Frost were magical, so was FC coming down the chimney, but the actual meeting FC was better at the other train, but the presents this year were extremely generous and the snow added a specialness to the whole event. The snow also made the journey home treacherous - it took 40 minutes to get to the station and nearly 2 hours to get home, the first mile took nearly an hour! The delays in the journey were just due to the amount of traffic on untreated roads and the lack of ability to cope with a small amount of snow - we don't get enough snow to justify the investment in equipment that would help us cope, today my 4x4 COMPLETELY earned it's money - it kept us safe and stopped the mummies worrying! Luckily I have a treat bag stashed in hiding in the boot, the children (with only a little help from their mummies) were kept occupied and finished it in the dark while watching the snow. It was a very Christmassy, magical, slightly worrying but happy adventure, one that we'll never forget!

THIS WEEKEND

Another busy one!

On Saturday morning Alice was invited to a double birthday party at a soft play centre (not our local one but one closer to school). Through a series of coincidences I discovered that there are other children in her nursery class who are adopted domestically (so not so obvious). I definitely felt a connection to their parents and have found some reassurance knowing that I'm not alone as an AP at school.

Then we went on to the Thai Adopt Christmas party. We both had a good time - Alice played lots of games, there were balloons and then Father Christmas popped in! As soon as Alice saw FC she stood up and waved and then said loudly, 'I'm over here!' (this was a direct result of last week's sighting of FC, he spoke to the little girl next to us but ignored Alice - she was making sure that it didn't happen again!) She was delighted to receive a princess torch (one of the original 3 items on her second list - all of which have since been eclipsed by the plastic tat of the Christmas train!!) For me the party was good for very different reasons, importantly catching up with other APs, gaining information and opinion but most of all meeting baby E (10 and a half months, just home from China, tiny, beautiful and totally gorgeous!)

It was a thought provoking day and an emotional journey home. Over night I found some calm in a decision and got the ball rolling on a new path, today I got to talk it through with 3 friends with very different perspectives, tomorrow I hope for a professional opinion.

This morning we were surprised by a last minute invitation to see FC arrive at a local community farm. The weather was atrocious but the friends are very special and we had lots of fun. Timings worked really well and we ended up with an impromptu visit to see FC - Alice has remained firm on wanting the plastic tat train (phew!) and FC today was delightful - patient, friendly, very traditional in a lovely setting, excellent value and a good gift (another torch!!)

PS, Photos - hopefully I'll receive one from yesterday and I'll find my camera to share a lovely one from this afternoon!

ALICE'S 1st, 2nd AND 3rd BIRTHDAYS

FIRST FULL DAY OF BEING 3!

Alice woke at the usual (ish) time, I sang HB and she began the day with a huge smile. Then she had a bath - it shows how much she loves the water that she still didn't want to get out after 30 minutes and the reminder that there would be presents downstairs!

I directed her towards the largest present first and she was pleased to FINALLY unwrap her baby! She wasn't overly excited about the baby but then played with her almost all morning, I fell in love with her all over again watching her play so gently and caringly with her baby. She insisted that it was called, 'Baby' but when pushed pronounced it to be, 'Baby Sister'. It's an interactive baby that talks baby talk, cries, opens and shuts it's eyes and when you give it a dummy or a bottle it makes slurping sounds while the mouth moves! After 2 minutes of 'Dadadad' Alice told it to stop and asked why it was making that sound.

I tried to get her to have breakfast after she'd opened 'Baby' and initially she agreed but then insisted on continuing the pressies until they were all opened, as it was her birthday I let her dictate the pace but I'm forewarned for Christmas! We had a relaxed morning - Alice played a lot with her new toys before wanting a cuddle in front of a princess DVD, I was only too happy to oblige! Nana arrived after lunch, Alice opened her presents and then showed her Baby and the other things from this morning while we gently got ready for a birthday tea. C and L (T's sons and Nana's grandsons) and GFN joined us for tea and more presents.

So we had a lovely day, relaxed and happy, Alice loved her presents - her favourite was eventually NOT Baby but 2 goldfish from T and the boys (a present that I've dithered over for the last year!) So we now have Gold and Silver to add to the menagerie!

AND NOW SHE'S 3!

By 4pm it was the 15th in China, so we started to celebrate, Alice helped me to sing 'Happy Birthday' and she even changed the lyrics to 'Happy Birthday to ME!' I put a candle on a cupcake and she blew it out several times with a large grin on her face the whole time. Then she opened a present (of my choosing), instantly she looked to see if it was a 'baby' (as the main pressie I'd left that one for tomorrow!) and she quickly and sadly decided that it wasn't, but her sadness was quickly replaced by big grins as she realised that it was a witch's costume - I was going to call it a naughty fairy, but she already knew what it was!!

In the second photo she's reading one of my favourite books - The Gruff@lo, it took a long time for her to warm to it but now she loves it as much as me.

MY BIRTHDAY! (AND SLEEP, AGAIN)

(yesterday!)

Alice said I was '3 too!' The cake had 'fork handles' (think 2 Ronnies) on it but 21 written on it. None of them were right, all too small and all made me laugh.

At times I did wonder whose birthday it was. We spent the morning at soft play with one of Alice's best friends and then went to her other best friend's house for tea in the afternoon! Then last night I went out for supper with GFN - Alice knew that I was going out but I daren't tell her who I was going with (after the grief I got following the pub lunch several weeks ago). Luckily she'll be seeing him this week.

I'm beginning to notice a pattern with sleep on the nights that I'm out for the evening. She went to bed at usual time, she was tired but not exhausted, she was crying before we left so I went up and resettled her (but it wasn't as easy as it usually is). When we got back I could see the visual monitor from the car and it was easy to see that she wasn't asleep or settled, so I went straight up to her and the moment she realised it was me she relaxed and snuggled down. She woke again as I went to bed and with all the disturbance of the evening I offered my bed, she accepted immediately (the night before she'd declined) and when she came into bed she demanded a cuddle and tried to sleep holding my hand and snuggled up to me. I don't think that there was any coincidence that she needed physical reassurance last night - which leaves me with very mixed emotions, sad that she still needs that level of reassurance but relieved that I can provide that reassurance.

A final note about my birthday - since Mum's death I've always struggled on my birthday, this year was significantly better, now I've got to get through the 12th.

STILL CELEBRATING IN A SMALL WORLD!

(Photo from yesterday)

Another busy day at CBH! Alice had nursery this morning, I dropped her off slightly later than usual just before 9am so that I could go straight on from there to an osteopath appointment. Then I came home to talk to a journalist about IA. 20 minutes after she left I had to go and collect Alice from nursery so that we could continue our celebrations. In a last minute change I'd swapped handbags, but forgot to transfer the tickets, so having collected Alice we had to scoot home before going to Cardiff.

Even though the lunchtime part was rushed we arrived in plenty of time, I scored a fabulously convenient parking space and we got to the theatre with over 10 minutes to spare! When we found our row there were 2 sets of blank seat, luckily ours were the closer ones, a couple of minutes later the other seats (only 6 seats away from us) were filled by my cousin L and her daughter M (I went to school with L, we were close as children but, sadly, we aren't any longer - I hadn't met her daughter until today). We were at the theatre to see 'Be*uty and the Be*st' or as Alice calls it 'Beautiful and the Beast'!! Anticipating this production I'd bought Alice the DVD so that she'd know the story. She sat on my lap cuddling flat panda (the smaller one!) and me through the first half and then at the interval she insisted that it was time to go home!

(There was a good reason for her expectation to leave at the interval - we went to a D*sney performance in Bristol just before Easter. I didn't blog about it. We got stuck in traffic and arrived with minutes to spare, not enough time to park in our usual car park, I saw a space on the road and parked before I realised that it was limited to an hour. The show wasn't great and I was fretting about where I'd parked so we left at the interval, thinking Alice was too little to understand what she was missing!!)

I quickly explained that we only seen half the story and that we were stopping for an ice cream (she promptly demanded a lollipop!) During the interval Alice was naughty (screaming and shouting - perhaps a natural reaction to sitting still and quiet) but I still had a chance to catch up with L and M. Alice sat really well through the second half and enjoyed the performance but she did need to visit the loo about 20 minutes after the interval - I'd put her in a feel and learn pull-up so I was really pleased that she whispered that she needed to go, I was pretty proud that she'd WHISPERED the request too!

We got out of the city really well considering that we left at 5pm, but then got caught in roadwork traffic, so the return journey took about 30 minutes longer than the journey going.

It was a busy but successful and fun day. It was Alice's first full visit to the theatre except for pantomimes and our first visit with just the 2 of us. She did really well and we both enjoyed it. Another day making happy memories! (And in case anyone's wondering why we're still celebrating, today was the 2 year anniversary of Alice's adoption!)

2 YEARS ON, WHAT WE DID TODAY!

I 'treated' Alice to a bath first thing this morning, she loves water!

As soon as she was dressed I reminded her that it was 'Alice Day' and asked what that meant, whilst she didn't tell me about China, she did remember that it meant presents! We came downstairs, she found her pile of pressies in the hall and immediately sat down and ripped them open. A hoola hoop, egg and spoon race set and a princess DVD, later in the day a new large flat panda arrived.

We had a usual Wednesday morning - a music and drama group followed by a trip to the supermarket! Then we came home so that I could put the fudge cake together and ice the cupcakes - Alice requested that they become pink and so I had to pop round to Nana Next Door to 'borrow' some red food colouring (despite 1 home delivery and 2 supermarket trips in the last 24 hours!)

This afternoon we had a series of visitors, M, T and her sons L and CC, GFN and D and A, we drank long, iced drinks and ate cake whilst the littlies splashed in the water table and paddling pool.

While GFN was here Alice took advantage of his indulgent nature and splashed him repeatedly, I decided to splash her back with her water (but forgot that at the last minute when I was making the drink that Alice had requested squash instead) and so I dowsed her with squash!! Just an excuse to tip more water down her back!

It was a much more low-key day than last year but just as much fun and another day packed full of happy memories. Tonight, as every night, I'm counting my blessings and I can't believe my luck.

THE CAKE!

Last night Alice helped me to make a cake for today's adoption anniversary.

This morning she decided that she'd better check it tasted OK - so she took a bite!

I decorated it 'simply' with a Chinese character, I hope I got close to the meaning that I was seeking, but it probably says something like, 'my dog has bad breath'. Anyone brave enough to guess what it says, or clever enough to tell me what I actually iced?

1ST JULYS - 07, 08,09

I struggle to believe the changes in just 2 years.

In order the photos are:
2007 - just back from meeting Alice, in the hotel room, within 2 hours of the first moments.
2008 - in the playroom, I remember being amazed at how grown up Alice looked sitting like a 'big girl'!
2009 - coming downstairs this morning, anticipating presents!

2 YEARS?!

Where'd it go?

WOW!

2 WONDERFUL YEARS AGO

I woke up for the start of another normal week. I had a doctor's appointment and then I went on to aqua aerobics. The doc and my aqua friends were all aware that referral time was looming again, several people asked about the situation and I said that it could be soon but it might be another 2 or 3 months away.

It was a busy morning, I got home at noon and immediately rang my buddy 3CMum and refreshed RQ (a website for those following the Chinese Adoptive situation). C answered the phone I asked whether there was any news and as I did so RQ's leading post was that new referrals were arriving and that 1st Nov 05 was likely to be the cutoff, midway through asking C a question I blurted out . . . 'OMG I'm in!' or something like that! I could cry just remembering that lunchtime, it took 2 more days before I could confirm that I'd been referred a child and to discover that my baby was still so young and 7 days after that I finally got to look at my baby for the very first time, sitting in my car outside A'g sorting office before 7am!

The April 07 archive's here.

(Sadly that was 24 months ago and in the time since then just over 4 months more have been referred, my wait was 17 months (which was agony) but now some of those still in the queue have been waiting nearly 3 years and 2 months - my heart goes out to those people still waiting.)

EASTER 2009

Alice's Easter egg this year was a
toddler's roller-coaster, I think that she liked it!

T and C came round and we had an Easter egg hunt, Alice soon caught on and was into finding eggs, she had a bit of trouble putting them into her new basket (made by Nana Next Door, Alice's is pink with a panda and there was also a purple one with an elephant for Little Sis!) There were so many eggs that Alice 'borrowed' Little Sis's basket!

THE PRIVILEGE OF MOTHERHOOD?

. . . is to embarrass your children . . . isn't it?

Alice, Easter 2009, her first Easter bonnet, homemade by Mum, half-destroyed by Pud, worn nevertheless!

ALICE AT THE WEDDING

Yes, Alice wore her Baptism Dress again, with new shoes and cardigan and this time she wore the 'fluff' that I'd bought for the Baptism but didn't need because of the beautiful weather, she probably didn't need it on Tuesday but she had a stinking cold (still has it) and I might be a little overprotective as she doesn't express her needs so I always worry that she's too hot or too cold!!

She loved the columns in the chapel and had a super time spinning round them.

THE BRIDE'S PARENTS

THE WEDDING FAMILY!

The wedding was on Tuesday and the reason for our visit to the Scillies. The bride's maternal grandfather's family were Scillonians (I think that that's the correct term), so that's why we all migrated (mostly from South Wales) to the IoS for the wedding. The bride also worked on St Mary's for several years.

We had a specially arranged boat to take us from Bryher to St Mary's (the largest island) for the wedding. We then went to a hotel overlooking the harbour to get into our wedding clothes (and to chomp on pastries and nibbles whilst slurping fizz) before a short walk to the Weslian Chapel - St Mary's Register Office in Hugh Town, for the wedding at 11am.

I'm sure that the ceremony was lovely, unfortunately I was rather distracted by Alice and (despite a tube of colourful choccies) her inappropriate, loud and poor behaviour - not helped by most people thinking she's older than she really is (because of her size). By the end of the service she'd even got to know the photographer intimately (I was too busy trying to remove her to manage a photo of that!) Luckily the bride works with pre-school children and so Alice's antics didn't surprise her, in fact the whole wedding party were very understanding, but that doesn't stop me feeling embarrassed by her behaviour, she is VERY 2 at the moment.

After that we went to a local bar (not sure if it was a hotel or not) where the bride had worked. Alice was much better behaved - distracted by a glass of water and a straw whilst sitting at the bar - somehow that makes me more nervous! Then it was back on the boat to get back to our hotel for the reception. We had a delicious buffet lunch and lovely wedding goody bags (they were too generous to call favours!) Alice went into meltdown shortly after pudding so we missed the cheese and speeches (and probably other things too) for Alice to go for a nap and then through a series of unfortunate events we also missed the later celebration on the other side of the island.

It was a lovely day and we were incredibly fortunate with the weather - it couldn't have been better for the main parts of the wedding but it did get stormy by mid afternoon.

WHERE HAVE WE BEEN - REVEALED!

Well done S - you guessed correctly! We've been to the Isles of Scilly.

On Monday we drove to Penzance, then we caught a helicopter to Tresco, a tractor took us from the heliport to the quay, a very short boat ride got us across to Bryher before a L*androver took our luggage to the hotel. Some of the family met us from the boat and so we walked across the island to the hotel. We were in the IoS for a family wedding - many more photos to come!