Juliet's adoption is complete!

Hooray!

This morning we had our adoption court hearing in Salt Lake City. We flew out last night (fussy teething baby plus late night wasn't a great combination) and flew home this afternoon, so it was a whirlwind trip.

Here I am with Juliet in her Adoption dress (aka Christmas dress, I know. I figured I put enough work into it that she better wear it at least once more,'cause it's getting short.)



And adoption court was pretty...um...uneventful. I won't say boring or pointless (though I might think it), because after all, adding this little girl to our lives is a wonderful gift, and we treasure her. But some of the paperwork and legal hoops feel less like treasures, and "rituals" not being particularly important to my personality type, this one felt like rather a bother.

To clarify: many of the adoption court judges in Salt Lake City will waive the requirement for an out-of-state family to appear at their adoption finalization. We drew a fairly new judge, though, and he required us to show up in person with the baby, in order to answer a few earth-shatteringly vital questions like, "Are you married to the man sitting next to you?", "Have you seen this document before? Is that your signature on it?", and "Do you realize that this child will have the same rights as any biological children?" (to which, with an inward eye-roll, I wanted to reply, "um, of COURSE...that's the whole point why we're here!") I confined myself to a polite series of yesses, though, thank you very much!

Here we are in the courtroom with the man I grew to think of, not precisely as Evil Judge, but perhaps as Nitpicky Judge (who was a very nice and kind man who probably cares deeply about the welfare of children, which is why he wanted to see us in person to make sure we're not meth addicts or involved in child buying or something).



Our lawyer (whom we'd never spoken with before) did a fine job, as he ought to for $200/hour or whatever it is we paid him.

And we received an entirely unexpected blessing, too. The adoption agency sent a representative (as apparently they are required to do). After we were finished and waiting for copies of our paperwork, this woman told us that her youngest adopted son was Juliet's double-first-cousin! Jules' birthmom is a twin, and her twin sister had placed her son for adoption five years previously.

This was just so thrilling to me! We have a closed adoption with Juliet (not by our preference), so we do not have any contact with any of her birth family, though if they ever choose to look for us, we've told the agency to please give them our contact info. So while Miles and Eleanor will grow up able to email/call/Facebook/visit with with their birthmothers and even a few other birth relatives, Juliet will likely not have this option. This cousin may be the only relative she would have the option of meeting. And I call him a double-first-cousin because not only are their mothers twins, their fathers (the boyfriends of the respective twins) are apparently also brothers.

AND this adoption worker, bless her heart, brought us copies of a number of photos of her son, of Jamie (Juliet's birthmom) and Jasmine (Marcus' birthmom) with baby Marcus, AND of a young Malasha, Jamie's older daughter and Juliet's full sister, whom she may also never get to meet.

I am getting teary just writing about this, but the thoughtfulness of this other adoptive mother really blessed me, and I hope I can do the same for someone someday. What a gift: the gift of family, of origins, of a biological connection to someone. Juliet may never desire that, may never care; I know some adopted children don't. But I am so grateful to have this to share with her just in case she does!

unwelcome surprise

It's been a bit of a rough week. First, I hurt my back working out on Tuesday (not seriously injured, just stressed/sore/strained muscles), so going up stairs or bending over to pick up anything at all has been challenging. Also on Tuesday, our stove died, right in the middle of a massive amount of freezer cooking. So now I have a fridge full of chopped vegetables and raw chicken, and I have no way to make the appropriate sauces to complete the dishes. The replacement part is ordered, but will take a week to get here.

Incidentally, do you know how hard it is to come up with a non-cereal breakfast without a stove? Eggs...no. Pancakes..no. Oatmeal...no. I know many of those have a baked version, but that takes a lot more time to cook and plan-ahead-ability. And most of my go-to quickie dinners also involve the stove. Macaroni and cheese? Pasta with some kind of sauce and sauteed veggies? Stir-fry with rice? Even breakfast-for-dinner? All out.

So today, I've been icing my back and lying on the sofa as much as possible, which isn't as much as I'd like. The kids are playing quietly downstairs (always a bad sign, I know). Juliet wakes up and I head downstairs to see...this.



"Mommy, we knew you weren't feeling well, so we made ourselves sandwiches! And we made you one. Smashed cheese!"

Eleanor adds, "Yes, peanut-butter and cheese!"

Miles: "There's a BIG glob of peanut butter on the floor. But we put it on a towel!"

Thanks, guys.

Here is Miles' sandwich:



It's basically crumbled cheese with about a fourth of a cup of Miracle Whip Light. A closer look:



Eleanor's may look better at first glance, but believe me, it's not.



She apparently opened my new jar of peanut butter, and slathered it on. No jam, nothing but a THIRD OF A JAR of peanut butter! I kid you not, this sandwich is an inch and a half thick. Did she eat it? Well, she started to. I think she got full after about 3 bites. So she says, "It's OK, I'll save it for Daddy!" So we did.

Trying to figure out my daughter

I know that all parents have that, "What on earth is my child thinking? Why is he acting this way? I just don't understand!" reaction fairly often. And while I know all children are little mysteries, my older daughter sometimes is more of a mystery to me than I would like.

I typically find myself describing her as "stubborn" or "a little strong-willed", and while that is accurate, it does not fully describe the aspect of her personality I can't figure out. Here is a prime example:

Last night we were playing a family game of Uno. Both kids enjoy it, and while Eleanor needs a bit of prompting, matching the colors or numbers is well within her grasp at this point. But the game goes sort of like this:

"OK, Eleanor, it's a blue 2. Do you have a blue card?" (since she can't hold all her cards, they're sitting on the table, making it pretty easy to help her out.)

She smirks, hides her cards in her lap for a moment, and pulls out a green card! She knows perfectly well it's green, but chooses it anyway.

Several times, she figured out an appropriate card to play by herself. Once, she played it in the right place...but upside down. Once, she played it on top of the deck we draw from. Once, she tried to play it but hide it under some other cards in the stack. Once, she tried to play two (appropriate) cards.

She loves playing Wild cards, and whacks them down with gusto. But when we ask, "What color do you want it to be?" she won't ever say a color. She clams up, and eventually will hold out a card from her hand and wave it at us, and we say, "OK, Eleanor picks yellow" or whatever.

She likes to deal, but after going around the circle adding cards once, she wants to switch directions. Then she wants to start in a different spot.

She wants to play. She even likes to win (though she doesn't at all mind losing). She does not want to quit...but she doesn't want to follow the social "rules" of appropriate behavior when playing a game. In linguistics, we'd maybe say that she is flouting the maxim of cooperation, or that she does not understand or care about the pragmatics of the situation.

The Uno example is just kind of cute and silly, but it really exemplifies her behavior in all areas of life. Basically, she does not ever want to cooperate or do what she's "supposed" to do. Why on earth not? This is so unlike me, my spouse, and my older son that I'm not sure how to handle it.

Often, like in an Uno game, it's not important enough to need to "handle". But envision this kind of reaction - not quite rebelling but definitely not obeying - every time you ask her to do anything: put away your toys, stop sitting on your baby sister, hold hands while crossing the street, tell me what sound that letter makes, be respectful to your babysitter. Sometimes reverse psychology does work on her, and sometimes bribery or threats work. But sometimes nothing does. And I don't want to resort to bribery or threats; eventually, shouldn't pleasing mom/dad/teacher/friends/God be a reward in itself? The intrinsic societal and spiritual reward of cooperation and obedience? (I know, I know; this is my natural people-pleaser personality talking.)

So what IS this behavior? Yes, she's three and a half; I don't expect perfection, but I also know a whole lot of other three year olds. The compliant ones tend to cooperate, the strong-willed ones will throw tantrums when thwarted. Is this being passive aggressive? Is this just a different kind of strong-willed behavior? Is she just trying to be cute, or creative? Does she just want extra attention?

I should note that I haven't noticed this behavior much when she's playing with other kids, or at least when she's playing with Miles. I also don't see it as much in class situations; she seems to listen to and more or less follow directions in gymnastics, in Sunday School, and in swimming (though it's possible her teachers might disagree with me here!) But with authority figures whom she knows well - mom, dad, grandparents, babysitters, etc. - it appears pretty regularly. Is that because she knows those people well and is comfortable with them?

And most important of all, how do I teach a child like this? How can I encourage her to obey, to cooperate? I pray that her stubbornness and creativity will turn into assets for her as she grows up; I know they can be great strengths if she learns how to harness them. But a child who does not respect authority or any kind of convention is not going to be well-liked or successful in life.

Being a "trailblazer", going her own way, being unconventional - those describe choices we make as adults that can be great life decisions. But somehow, I have to teach my daughter to function in society without society crushing her before she reaches adulthood, because a lifetime spent in time-outs and detentions and being held back a grade and being avoided by other children just cannot be good for her psyche no matter how independent-minded she is.

Advice welcome!

conversations in the car

So we're driving along, and I'm trying to lead the conversation away from "what I want for Christmas" and toward "what would Jesus like for a birthday present? What makes Jesus happy?"

Miles responds, "but we haven't SEEN Jesus...not for a while."

Eleanor, in utter disdain, retorts, "No, you have to DIE to see Jesus."

Miles objects rather incoherently.

With total confidence, Eleanor assures him, "Oh yes. You are going to die."

boy or girl?

So today at one of Scott's innumerable doctor's appointments, a well-meaning older lady asked if Juliet was a boy or a girl.

This is what she was wearing:



We've got a pink outfit with embroidered flowers, pink satin bows, a pink tulle ruffle, and pink-and-purple butterfly shoes.

People, I realize this may not be the face that launched a thousand ships, but surely that outfit doesn't scream "BOY" in our culture, does it?

Incidentally, Juliet is getting better at sitting up. That's not to say "good", but she can balance for a while if we're lucky. Here she is midway down on the descent - I'm just including this photo because it's about the only one where we've caught her smiling so far!

another new hairdo and the comment that inspired it

And I outdid myself this time. At least, Eleanor sure thinks so, judging from the amount of complaining she did. We did "star" braids on each side of her head, coming together to form two little pigtails of braids.




The problem here is that, because her hair is so short and fine, these braids will start to get fuzzy in just a few days, and will be past my fuzziness-toleration-quotient in a couple weeks. So all this work will need to be picked out and redone. On the plus side, I think I'm getting faster; this style only took about two-three hours over the course of two days.

Funny story (or funny if you weren't me): I was down at the Moody Church Halloween festival with the kids, and it was a nice diverse crowd. Eleanor's costume is a flamingo with a big feathered flamingo hat. Very cute. But she stopped wanting to wear the hat about halfway through the evening, and so I was holding it. Unfortunately, we had taken out her last set of braids the previous evening, then washed her hair and combed it out into what was (I thought) a cute little Afro with a headband. I usually let her hair "rest" for a few days between braided styles, both to let her follicles relax and because after picking it all out, I just don't have the energy or time to tackle another complicated hairstyle immediately.

But I guess I should have taken the trouble this time. Her little Afro got smashed flat and funny looking under the hat, and in addition gathered tiny pink feather lint all over it. And then she insists on removing the hat. And this very kind, well-intentioned African-American woman walks over to me, and asks, "Are those your foster kids?" I say, "Well, they're adopted, but they're my kids, yes." She takes my hand, leans in, and gently asks, "Do you have any African-American friends who can help you with her hair? Do you know how to do it? I would be glad to help out if you need some help."

Sigh.

It was a kind offer, and I admit, Eleanor's hair did look unfortunately like "white mama hair." I politely tried to explain the situation and I hope I came across not too defensive. But now I know I need to plan better: if we're going to be in public, I guess her hair needs a bit more style (this coming from the woman whose only hairdo is a ponytail).

Or else we need to invest in hats.

the aviary

Our thanks to Aunt Cammie for the hand-me-down mother/baby flamingo costumes! We got lots of compliments on them. And Miles was an owl, in case you couldn't tell.