Home for a Week

We've been home for a week. Can you believe it?!

In some ways it seems like we never left. Some days our time in Ukraine seems like a dream, a blur. Sometimes it seems like Vera has always been here...always been with us. Other times I'm left thinking, "Seriously, God?" Overall it's been a really good week. Vera seems to be adjusting amazingly well. She loves her siblings and they love her. She loves our pets...a little too much. Vera loves her room and her toys and will sometimes even play in her room all by herself. Sometimes.

Our daily routine:

Vera wakes up between 6:30 and 7:00 each morning. Today she woke up at 7:10. It was glorious! I get up with her, take her to peezit (potty) and we head to the kitchen. She eats yogurt and some fruit.

Next we play. If any of the kids are up, they play in Vera's room with her while I check email.
The big kids eat breakfast between 9 and 10 and Vera usually eats something with them. Vera told us one day when Sasha was with us that she doesn't like hot cereal. But she loves oatmeal. Especially if the big kids are eating it too. We clean up breakfast, brush teeth and either get Vera dressed or give her a bath.

Then we play...sometimes in Vera's room, sometimes the living room. Sometimes we go back and forth. Sometimes she'll sit and let me read to her. Sometimes not.

After lunch Vera needs extra attention. She just gets ornery. Every day so far we've gone through ALL of our movies and EVERYTHING else in the living room. Vera picks up each thing and asks, "Is this mine?" She's gone through all the cupboards and drawers in the kitchen with the same question. She's gone through all of my books with the same question. We do this EVERY DAY! Sometimes more than once a day. Will someone please tell me she'll eventually stop this? My answer is always the same. Sometimes Vera will try to negotiate with me and convince me that whatever is in her hand should be hers. Of course, she negotiates in Russian and I have no idea what she's saying, but it's obvious she is negotiating. She never wins her little one sided debate, but how many times will we play this game? As Vera would say, oy! This part of our day truly wears my patience down. Mostly because I want to say, "I already told you, this is so-and-so's!"

We (I, now that Jon is back to work) spend most of the afternoon running defense with Vera trying to keep her out of mischief.

Then comes dinner. Vera is eating really well. Especially if we put a cookie or brownie in front of her. The other day she turned up her nose at macaroni and cheese for lunch. Come on! What kid doesn't like mac & cheese?! I put a cookie in front of her and told her she could have it when her lunch was gone. She ate it all in about 5 minutes. What do you know! We haven't forced her to eat everything...we have found that she'll gag on food she truly doesn't like. Usually when she takes a bite of something she's never had, she makes a face like she's not going to like it. She'll chew a bit and taste it and then she smiles and nods and sits forward to continue eating. Different friends have been bringing us dinner each night since we've been home. This has been such a needed amazing blessing. I'm still worried about how I'll do it when the meal train is over, but I guess I'll figure it out when the time comes. Afternoons are very difficult. And what will Vera think the first day that no one comes in the afternoon with food and gifts for her?

After dinner we either play some more, read, listen to music or continue to run interference with Vera.

And then, my favorite part of the day...BEDTIME! I remember looking so forward to bedtime when the big kids were little. Here we are again. Either I'm getting older or Vera is worse than the twins were combined. Vera usually goes to bed at 8:00 without a fight. We brush teeth, peezit, put PJ's on and head to her room. She always wants Jon to stay in her room while she falls asleep. She's been falling asleep in less than 20 minutes. With very little swaying and jerking. For this we are thankful.

On Tuesday Vera was a pill ALL DAY! From the time she woke up until she went to bed. When we went through the videos playing the 'Is this mine?' game, she got upset and just started pulling them all off the shelf. Same thing with my books. Jon or I would remove her and bring her to her room and show her HER books and HER toys and HER things. She would chase the cat around and grab her underside. She would chokehold Toby. She would repeatedly and continually touch things that we told her not to touch. (I could be describing Abbi at the age of two!) It was a trying day. She had a tantrum late in the day that, thankfully, Jon handled. It was all about a magnet. That's another thing we go through repeatedly. The magnets on the fridge. 'Is this mine?' We told Vera one or two of them could be hers but they had to stay on the fridge with all the others. She did NOT like that. Whenever we tell Vera that something is hers, she takes it away and hoards it in her room. I'm sure this is typical orphanage behavior, but it is rather annoying. We're trying to teach her that she can have her things in other rooms and they will still be hers. We won't take her things when she's not looking. Her things will stay in the same place unless SHE moves them. I guess it will take time for her to figure that out.

I've told a few people that Vera is like a two year old trapped in the body of a 6 year old. We can't leave her on her own like we could with our big kids when they were 6. She cannot be trusted. Not that we're trying to leave her alone, but I would love to take a shower one day and not have to rush through it for fear of what Vera is doing. The big kids can handle her for a bit, but Vera gets to the point where she needs mommy or daddy time. I'm getting to where I can see she's heading there and intervene before crazy Vera enters the picture.

Someone asked me the other day why I say that Vera is like a two year old. Behaviorally she is two. Emotionally she is two. Maturity wise she is two. I think most of this is because she grew up in an orphanage. Her behavior is pretty typical for institutional living. I also think some of her behavior is because she's used to getting what she wants. Her caregivers at the orphanage would give her what she wanted to keep her from having a tantrum. One day when she was so upset about going back to her group and having a meltdown outside the door, a caregiver came out and told Vera that if she stopped screaming and came inside she could have a piece of candy. Nice. So, I think part of her ornery-ness is that she's waiting for a bribe. She's slowly learning that bribery is not our game and we will not give in to her tantrums and negotiations. Mommy and Daddy don't give candy, but we do give hugs and kisses and I love you's. She's slowly learning, with much repetition, that Vera is not in charge. Mommy (and Daddy) is the boss.

Discipline is a challenge. Because of her background, we can't spank her. There are moments when all I can think is, 'You SO need a spankin' little girl!' We can't put her in time out. She would live in time out if it were an option. She is figuring out self control though. She throws things when she's mad and when she does, we take away whatever she's thrown. When she calms down, she gets her toy back. With the big kids, we would've had them wait an hour or two (or all day) before giving them back whatever they had thrown. But by giving Vera her things back as soon as she calms down, she's learning self control. Sometimes she'll calm down as soon as we pick up whatever she's thrown. Every once in awhile she'll even look at what's in her hand and contemplate chucking it across the room. This is good progress, though we know it's still going to take much more time for the tantrums to subside altogether. If any of you have advice about how to handle the toy throwing, please share. Vera had her longest tantrum yet this afternoon and I could see her looking around for a toy to throw that she didn't care about losing. Maybe our tactic of giving things right back isn't the way to go. I'm at a loss.

Communication is going pretty well. We don't always understand her, but we think she understands most of what we tell her. This morning she wanted Cheerios. She had set the table (photo coming) and I asked her if she wanted the cereal on her plate or in her bowl. She pointed to the bowl and said, "bowl." She can always answer our questions accordingly with a 'yes' or 'no' or if we've given her a choice between two things, she'll choose one. Yesterday after she had gone through all the movies for the 9th time, she came across the kids' baby albums. She looked at each of them and then said, "Where's mine?" Oh, break my heart. I will never have a baby album for Vera. I will never be able to tell her about the first time she rolled over or sat up or smiled or laughed. She kept pointing to the kids' albums and then went in to a long lecture to me. She was talking and pointing to the albums and pointing to herself and pointing to me. She said something like, "Jacob has a book. Caleb has a book. Abbi has a book. Why doesn't Vera have a book? Vera needs a book too." Later that day she was looking at all the pictures on our refrigerator. There are two of our family before Vera. She went through each person and named our names. Then she looked at me and said, "Where's Vera?" Oh, sweet Vera. You're here now. We will do everything we can to make up for the 6 years that we missed.

I do have more to say, but I hate long blog posts so I'll close for now. I need to share about a few other things and get some thoughts and advice from those of you who have already walked in my shoes. Stay tuned. AND, the blog is no longer private! Many of you sent me messages saying you wished you could share certain posts with your friends. FEEL FREE! Share with the world! We're home now and there's no reason to keep the blog private anymore! YAY!

And of course, I can't leave you without pictures!

Vera loves the tickle game!

She negotiates with each of us how many times we have to let her tickle us.

She tells us to lay down and close our eyes.

She goes into the kitchen and then sneaks up on us to tickle us.

She is not a quiet walker though, and we can always hear her coming.

Vera is finally learning that if she is soft and GENTLE, the cat will come to her.

She also learned that if she pinches the cat, the cat WILL bite her.

It was a gentle bite that didn't even leave a mark, but Vera cried.

AND she let me console her and kiss her owie. Progress.

Vera got a haircut on Monday!

As you can see, it went VERY well!

She learned how to make popsicles with apple juice.

Vera LOVES to set the table. When we were in the apartment in Ukraine, she would set the table several times a day. A great friend of mine brought Vera some plastic dishes yesterday. This morning Vera did not waste any time in setting the table...complete with every single placemat she could find.

Today we had to run to the grocery store to get a few things. Vera was beyond excited when I told her. She picked out her own ensemble for the outing. This proves how much I've relaxed since the big kids were little. I never would've let Abbi leave the house looking like this. Now my attitude is WHO CARES?! Everyone will think she's darling...and everyone did!