Saturday, October 31, 2009
Halloween 2009
Halloween 2009 can be best summed up in one word.
Rain.
There was misty rain when we first pulled in and were situated in the parking lot for trunk-or-treat. The mist soon dried up and stayed away for about an hour. Then the heavens opened.
Eliana dressed up as a ninja.
Karys dressed up as a rainbow. Appropriate, eh?
Zane didn’t dress up as anything. He wasn’t the least bit interested. But brother let me tell you… he was digging the candy.
Oh yeah. This is an American tradition he could get used to.
There was one teenage guy dressed in a unique - and yet somewhat disturbing - costume. This kid is in our Sunday School class so I’m sure he’ll be the topic of conversation if he comes to church tomorrow. And probably even if he doesn’t.
Friday, October 30, 2009
Zane’s 6th grade school photo
Thursday, October 29, 2009
Fall fun
We won’t be able to enjoy many more days like this after I come home from work.
Once our clocks turn back an hour on Saturday, it’ll start getting dark e-a-r-l-y.
Bleck.
Zane couldn’t wait to launch himself into that pile of leaves.
But he found out real quick that the big pile of leaves was not nearly as cushiony as it looked.
The ground smacked his scrawny backside and he yelled, “Oww dad! That hurt my heiney!”
After I checked to make sure he was ok, I had a good laugh.
Mainly because he said “heiney”.
It’s fun to watch Zane enjoy himself so.
I tend to forget that he’s probably never experienced the simplest pleasures we may take for granted.
7 years ago
How our lives have changed since we met Eliana, 7 years ago today! God has blessed us more than we ever imagined when we set out on this journey.
As I think back to that first meeting, the most amazing thing was that she did not cry and did not appear to be scared, just curious.
Who are these strange looking and sounding people?
Of course, she did cry sometimes when she was tired or needed to be changed…which brings us to the fact that these kiddos don’t come with instructions.
I had changed one diaper in my life and Doug had never changed a diaper. What were we thinking to have not practiced any prior to leaving for China? Oh yeah, and we were by ourselves, no travel group with other experienced parents to offer assistance and advice. Fortunately, diapers are not so hard to figure out; it’s the other “stuff” that will get you. Not to fear, we had many wonderful friends that we were able to be in contact with via email and many of them had children so we did get great advice.
We believe she has turned out fine despite the inexperienced parents she had to start with!
Today she is a sweet, thoughtful, sensitive daughter who loves to spend time with her family. If we had written out a list of characteristics of our “perfect” daughter we could not have done any better. We are so proud of Eliana and look forward to seeing her continue to grow into the person God wants her to be.
Many of you may have read or heard the story about our first meeting, however, so you don’t have to search through the journal, I’ll repeat just a little of it here.
When Doug and I arrived in Changsha on October 29th in the early evening, our guide Winnie told us we would meet our baby that night at about 9:00. After eating a quick meal in the hotel restaurant, we decided we better return to our room to get ready for our daughter’s arrival. We got into the elevator with 2 men and a woman holding a bundle that looked like it must be a baby but you could not what was in the bundle because nothing was “showing”, not even a nose that we could see! Of course, they were standing behind us and we could not very well turn around and stare but we sure did try to look thinking to ourselves that this might be her!
Meanwhile, we are wondering where Winnie our guide was as they were early if this turned out to be our daughter.
Sure enough, all 3 individuals got out of the elevator and followed us down the hallway to our room. We turned around at our door and they were all standing behind us just grinning! They followed us in and the lady unwrapped the bundle and handed Eliana to me while the men got on their cell phones.
I later learned from Winnie that in their minds this was a good sign and I am happy to say they were right.
{extended}Eliana Family Day #7
Eliana officially became a Henderson 7 years ago today.
You can read our journal from that trip in 2002 here. There was no such thing as blogging back then so what you’ll read are emails that we sent out to a list of people.
How archaic, right?
I’m not talking about us. I mean the fact that we didn’t blog.
:mad:
Anyhoo, it was an interesting evening. And this is the first picture I snapped of Carmi and Eliana.
If I remember correctly, Eliana’s first words after the orphanage people left were, “When do we eat???”
Carmi can still pick the Empress up.
She just… uh… has to shift the weight around a little.
Wednesday, October 28, 2009
Little punkin
We’ve never really done the Halloween jack-o-lantern thing.
Mainly because like, with everything else, the day sneaks up on us and we just don’t get it done in time.
Today Eliana brought this little punkin’ home from school.
She said she removed the pulp from the big class pumpkin this morning and liked it.
In her words… “It was cool. And mushy.”
So we just might have to operate on that rascal Friday when all 3 kiddos are out of school.
The orange punkin’, that is. Not the black-haired one.
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
Over the top
Even though Carmi and I have never discussed adoption from Korea, it still sucks to know that we have aged out of an international adoption program as I discovered this morning.
45 is the limit.
We’re over the top.
Bleck.
{extended}First flight to China
7 years ago today, Carmi and I were on a plane headed to China for the very first time.
There was some little black-haired, brown-eyed beauty waiting for us on the other side. And we couldn’t get there fast enough.
Oooooh, I just want to pinch those chubby cheeks.
Monday, October 26, 2009
The effects of rising early
Even the thrill of shopping can’t always offset the effects of rising early for preschool.
Where they don’t belong
Some stickers are boldly going where they don’t belong.
[cue the Star Trek theme song]
Sunday, October 25, 2009
Southern mom
You know you have a good Southern mom with a sign like this in her front yard.
Saturday, October 24, 2009
Joy
Karys loves to get to play with big brother and big sister.
Hardcore
Carmi is hardcore.
She’s playing a game on Facebook and watching TV at the same time.
Friday, October 23, 2009
Has it been 2 hours?
We had finished up with dinner tonight and I started clearing the table off.
Eliana asked, “Dad… has it been 2 hours?”
What? I had no clue what she was talking about and I’m sure that my expression showed it.
“2 hours?”
“Yeah.”
“2 hours since what?”
“2 hours since I came home.”
I was clueless as to where this was headed.
“Well let’s see. I brought you home around 5:45 and right now it’s 7:45. So… yeah. Actually it has been 2 hours since you came home.”
“YAY!”, she screamed. “Now I can watch TV!”
Then it hit me.
Yesterday evening I told her not to do something and she did it anyway. Twice. Because she forgot. At least that was her story and she was sticking to it.
So she was not allowed to watch television for 2 hours after coming home this afternoon.
Only thing is… I forgot all about telling her that.
But she didn’t. And it’s a good thing, young lady.
{extended}How is Zane doing?
Carmi and I had a conference this morning with Zane’s 2 teachers at school. Nothing is wrong. It’s just that time of year.
There were really only 2 items that they felt Zane needed to work on.
One is his organizational skills which, translated, means he has a tendency to misplace paperwork.
For example, he has a book project due next Tuesday. He showed me and Carmi their class instructions for the project maybe a week ago. When we mentioned the project to his teacher, she laughed and said she passed out those instructions to her students within the first couple weeks of the school year starting.
Better late than never, I guess. But you know what Zane will be doing this weekend.
Second is the speed with which he completes in-class work such as worksheets or tests.
You might think most students were prone to be slow and not finish their work in time. Zane is just the opposite. He zips through his work lightning-quick and makes careless mistakes.
Otherwise, his teachers raved. They are amazed at how far he has progressed in such a short amount of time.
The other students in the class really like him and the teachers went on and on about how bright he is.
I’d like to say that he gets his smarts from dear old dad but we don’t exactly share the same genes. So maybe I’m just a good influence.
Yeah, that’s it.
{extended}