Luke gets his smile back

Well the long dreaded dentist appointment happened today and I could not report any better news! No cavities! no issues and a little work with pumice and a pick removed most of the brown spots! What a difference it made as you can see in his picture. The best part was his behavior. He actually fell asleep while the dentist was busy scraping his teeth. They spent over an hour cleaning, x-raying and scraping and he just kept his mouth open wide and watched what was going on. I highly recommend child style dentist to anyone in the Springfield area, the staff and Dr. Carie are so kind and patient and great with kids. Luke is now a member of the cavity free club and got to ring a cow bell. I had visions of high dentist bills and many trips but we don't have to go back for 6 months. They cannot do anything for the missing front tooth but the dentist says the adult tooth will come in fine. It looks like he had trauma to his mouth at some point as there are chips on several teeth as well as the missing one. Poor baby! We celebrated with a yogurt parfait at McDonald's and some new sand toys from toys R us.

Lily's gymnastics

Lily has been taking gymnastics at Springfield gymnastics for the past year. Yesterday they called and asked her to be on the pre-team. This means she will be in an advanced class two days a week and will compete in monthly meets starting in October. It seems awful young to be starting competition but in gymnastics, the younger the better. She just has the body (and genetics I believe) for the sport and has done very well. She will be with 4 and 5 year olds. She loves gymnastics so was pretty excited when I told her she had been selected. If I could select the sport she was to excel in, it would be gymnastics-no hot days in the sun at ballgames or cold fall mornings on the wet grass at soccor games-it is inside and I love watching the sport. I can't wait for the Olympics to start so Lily can see what it is like at the top.
Luke is at Carol's today for a half day. He looked so sad as I was leaving. He continues to make improvements every day. This morning he clearly yelled out "Bye-bye Lily!" as she was getting in the car to go to school. Last night he kept repeating the word "tramp-o-line" while jumping on the trampoline. He can now climb the ladder into the tree house by himself and runs across the swinging rope bridge after Lily. His coordination and balance have improved so much. I will probably start him in a gym class sometime this summer.

Party Boy

Luke had a wonderful time at Princess Jada's birthday party. When we drove up to her house and he got a glimpse of all that was waiting for him, his eyes lit up. There was Ronzo the clown on site to make balloon figures of just about anything you could name, a train, a blow up jumping house and the frosting on the cake was the two horses who showed up for "pony rides." Luke had choice anxiety in a big way and hopped from one thing to another. He watched the horses intently and I could tell he was picturing himself up in the saddle and trying to decide if he could do it. The first time John tried to get him on he immediately shouted, "No, No, No" quite adamant about his decision, but he continued to watch the other kids ride. Finally John tried one more time and this time he did it get on and looked so proud while in the saddle. The attendant walked the horse down to the end of the property and back and Luke held on bravely the entire way. I don't think he will forget that anytime too soon. I have some pictures taken during the party and may be tempted over the years to tell him this was his birthday party (since it really was his birthday) but all the princess garb would probably give me away eventually. We did celebrate his birthday at dinner with a chocolate cake and candles and he did get excited and seemed to understand that it was his special day.

The second party of the day did not happen for us. Miss Lily decided to have a melt down after we got home and I decided it was better for her to take a nap than to be rewarded for her behavior by going to a party. She slept three hours!

Sunday was a beautiful day here weather wise so John and I took the kids to the park. Luke has come a long way with slides in one week. The Sunday before we worked on him to teach him how to go down the little inside slide in the nursery room at church. He was actually scared to do it but the high school girls who were babysitting that day made it so much fun for him that soon he didn't want to stop. This Sunday he was climbing the largest slide in the park all by himself and going down into the arms of Ba Ba at the bottom. He has gained so much confidence over the past week that now I have to be careful he doesn't take on a challenge that is out of his league.

Today Luke went to Carol's house for two hours. I was able to get a few things done at home that don't get done with a new four year old in the house and Luke apparently had a good time playing with the other kids. Wednesday he is going back for a few more hours. He is hardly coughing at all now and has only two more doses of antibiotics to take so is on the mend. Not looking forward to the dentist visit on Thursday.

Happy Birthday Luke!

It is Luke's birthday today. We are keeping it low key since he really does not understand it at this point and he has been getting presents all week so presents today do not seem so special. Actually the kids are both going to a birthday party for Jada Jones, another Fulinger (just like Miss Lily) I know the party will be lots of fun with outside games and crafts, Lisa always throws a great birthday party.
At 4:30 we have another party to attend through our families of international adoption group. It is celebrating kids from South America and the party is at a gymnastics facility so the kids will be highly entertained.
I added some short videos from our China trip. If they don't pop up when you click on the you tube, go to the videos titled: Lily tries to take over, Musical trio, Ghongzhou China and Lily and Luke dance. My sister had a hard time getting to them since it wants you to have an account. I know it is a pain in the you know what, but the videos are worth it. The Lily and Luke dance is especially cute.

Luke had his first medical check up yesterday. I was so glad to go to the doctor as he has been coughing all week. She put him on antibiotics as there was some crackling going on in one lung. John and I are both fighting the same kind of bug. Dr. Andrews pronounced Luke to be in good health. He is 40" tall and weighs in at a whopping 30.5#. He's in the 50% for height and 10% for weight. Turns out he is 3/4" taller than Lily and weighs the very same. I could have sworn he weighed more, guess the weight is just distributed differently. They did a blood draw and that was a bit unpleasant. The first stick resulted in no blood so they had to go to the other arm. He cried but the tears quickly subsided when I handed him a sucker I had prepared just for the occassion. We go back in two weeks and at that time she will start his shots. They basically ignore the shots he had in China and start the kids over to make sure they are protected.

This week we went over to meet the babysitter. Carol is getting ready to retire Sept 1 after having a home daycase for over 30 years. She is down to only 6 kids and this will be a great place for Luke to start out, kind of quiet but yet kids to interact with. Lily was with Carol for two years and it worked out just great. Luke went to the playroom and started playing with the kids right away. The other morning as everyone was leaving Luke told Yue Jia in Chinese that he wanted to go to school too. I guess staying home with Mommy is not all that exciting! He is going to start slowly so on Monday will go for 2 hours. He is used to being around other kids during the day so I know he will have a great time. His behavior has changed so much in the past two weeks, no more hitting, no more running away. He comes up and puts his arms around me, asks me to hold him....it is such a great change to see.

Ok, time for a lunch break, the crowd is gathering in the kitchen. More later.

More Photos

Luke and Lily blowing bubbles in the park across the street from our hotel in Urumqi


Lily in her new family reunion day outfit purchased at the bazaar in Urumqi


Open food in the bazaar in Urumqi


Scarey food prepared outside, no refrigerators or hot holding in sight!

YouTube - My Videos

YouTube - My Videos

Adjustment period

We have now been home for five days and I see the routine is starting to settle in. It has been a real struggle to get all four of us off "China time" and get back to US time (13 hours difference) I think Luke has adjusted the best. If I tell him it is time for bed, he crawls in kisses me good-night, turns over and goes to sleep. In the morning he wakes up all smiles and ready to go. Miss Lily is completely the opposite. She tries to stay awake until she just drops in her tracks, fighting the whole way. In the morning she is a bear to wake up. It has not helped that the weekend weather was cold and cloudy. My plans to get the kids out into the fresh air and sunshine fell a few sun rays short. Monday meant Lily went back to pre-school and meanwhile the weather improved dramatically so that today, Tuesday, she is pretty much on schedule. I had both kids bathed, books read and asleep by 8:40pm, a record for me.
Daddy, Luke and I have all developed a nagging cough, kind of like the one I had when leaving for China. Today Luke woke up from his nap all flushed and he indeed had a fever of 101. It went right down with Tylenol and has not returned. I'm trying to hold off on going to the doctor because he already has an appt. scheduled for Friday. I will have to see how he does in the morning. Lily seems to be the only healthy one at this point. I'm sure our immune systems hit an all time low during this busy time of travel and time changes.
Luke is changing day by day. The first day we gave him a wooden alphabet puzzle, he just picked out all the letters and proceeded to throw them around the study. When I tried to show him how they fit back in it was clear he didn't understand how to turn the pieces around to get them in. After a couple of days he is now turning the pieces and actually getting them to fit( most of the time). He is so proud when it works and his face just lights up. I think a lot of this is new to him and it will just take some time to reach his potential. He does on occasion get frustrated with me when I don't understand what he is saying but we have not had any melt downs for a couple of days now. I took him to the nursery at church on Sunday and stayed in to watch him with the other kids. There were 10 kids in a small room and he behaved himself just fine, he never hit or tried to take away a toy from someone. He enjoyed going down the slide with the high school girls throwing him up in the air and played with many of the toys.
When we went shopping at Walmart he started pointing with excitement when we were in the aisle of children's clothing. I could not figure out what he was pointing at except a row of ball caps, then it hit me, he was pointing at "his" hat as he has one exactly like it at home.
Lily has a play microphone with speakers and he loves singing songs in Chinese into it. I'm still working on teaching him proper pet etiquette. He is no longer terrified of the dog but delights in hitting him or kicking out at him. He told Yue Jia (in Chinese) that "dogs bite" so it may be that he had a bad encounter with a dog. Tobi is very tolerant (thank goodness) and has not nipped at him, but I can tell he is close to the breaking point. I just try to reinforce that Tobi is our friend and we must treat him kindly.
So Friday is the doctor's appt and next Thursday is the dentist appt. I don't think I mentioned before but his teeth are terrible. He is missing a top front tooth and the other front teeth have brown lines running through them. I hate to say it, but they look like the "hillbilly teeth" Lily picked out as one of her prizes at incredible pizza. The dentist has talked about sedating him to do the work but will know more once they see the damage. It leads me to believe he never had his teeth brushed at all. He will let me brush them although I can't say he likes it. Lily has never liked having her teeth brushed and fights me everyday over it.
Time for bed, the rest of the family is already asleep. This is my only quiet time of the day for now at least.