More on Dumplings

My Grandmother's Dumpling is the article a friend sent my way (thank you, Lisa!). Those of you with Chinese children might appreciate this bit of family history. The article tells the author's family story of just why dumplings are so important, and how the making of them was passed down through the family tradition.

The article also made me feel better about the shape of my own dumplings, as they are meant to be a reflection of each woman making them--everyone has their own style.

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In the article is a link to a video of the author making dumplings. The music is too loud, but the video is interesting. It's 3 minutes, 13 seconds long. I tried to link it, but couldn't.

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Another thing from the article: Lu is a "real" family name, the one Luci was given in China by the orphanage director. Sometimes a made-up name is given to orphan children, forever branding them as "rejected" by Chinese society. In China, there are relatively few surnames--nothing like the USA, where there are thousands upon thousands of surnames. Thank you, Mr. Li, for giving our children real names!

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photo by Samantha Sin

Just some little things....

We rearranged the furniture in the living room today. If we can't have new stuff, let's make the old stuff look different.

Bryan is doing some study towards the ACT test he'll have to eventually take. He has two books to study from, assigned as part of his school work. The other day he told me he had "a dream about the ACT test--a whole section on the binary system, and I knew all the answers!" I hope that's a good omen!

All of our curriculum for next year is here. I get all excited about the new stuff, Luci is excited (we'll start K with her early). I wish the boys would get even a little bit excited about anything related to school.

Luci's concerned that Daddy won't recognize our living room, now that things are rearranged.

Announcing....JACK!

Here is the little wonder who made Kalyn a big sister! Jack, we are so glad you are here! You are adorable and you have fantastic parents.

Blessed little boy!

We love you, Baby Jack!

Another Reason to Avoid Corn Syrup

If making one of my kids absolutely nuts wasn't enough to keep my family from corn syrup, then this study would have done it:

Study Finds High-Fructose Corn Syrup Contains Mercury

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Here are some quotes from the article:

WASHINGTON — Many common foods made using commercial
high fructose corn syrup contain mercury researchers reported on Tuesday, while
another study suggested the corn syrup itself is contaminated.

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In one study, published in the journal Environmental Health,
former Food and Drug Administration scientist Renee Dufault and colleagues
tested 20 samples of high fructose corn syrup and found detectable mercury in nine of the 20 samples.

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"We went and looked at supermarket samples where high fructose
corn syrup was the first or second ingredient on the label," he said. These 55
different foods included barbecue sauce, jam, yogurt and chocolate syrup.

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"We found about one out of three had mercury above
the detection limit," Wallinga said.

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And my favorite line:

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The Corn Refiners Association challenged the findings.

The Tooth Fairy Messed Up!

This handsome young man lost a tooth yesterday. Hid it under his pillow. Tooth Fairy forgot!! So this morning I'm scrambling around, looking for a dollar bill (she's more generous now, when I was little she only left a quarter). Tooth Fairy was heard to ask, "JT, do you take checks?"

新年快樂 Xin Nian Kuai Le!

Here are some quick shots from today. We had our Chinese New Year dinner with our FCC group. Luci wore a dress we bought in Guang zhou and looked beautiful, as always. She also wore the jewelry that Daddy sent to her...garnets around her wrist and around her neck! With the party favor, a dragon!

Luci handled her chopsticks pretty well. She used them properly to pick up a square of jello! Wish I had caught that on film! (Yes, Feingold friends, I know it was a bad choice in food! She does have that red sauce on her plate for the chicken, but she didn't eat any of that. Just two jello squares and some bean noodles.)

Most of the girls played afterwards. Lots of fun! These photos are much more interesting than the "official portrait" of the girls all together, behaving. :)

And down they come! Right after this, these sweet, sweet girls began tickling Luci...she loved it! The mommas were appalled, but Luci is used to much sillier stuff with her big brothers, and thus enjoyed it!

I'll post more pictures later.

I can *SO* relate to this!

Luci has had me sleep-deprived for 3 1/2 years!

Cops: Woman Shoots Boyfriend for Not Letting Her Sleep

Jiaozi--Chinese Dumplings

Luci has been asking for dumplings--not the Southern USA version, but the Chinese version. Jiaozi. We've watched a Ni Hao, Kai-lan episode about Chinese New Year and Ye Ye (Grandfather) is making dumplings. So I set about to make some. I wish Jie Jie were here, she showed me how to make them 2 1/2 years ago. I think I did a fair job. Here are a couple of pictures of the dumplings before cooking and one of a cooked dumpling...I think they look better before cooking. Now that I've seen Jie Jie's from two years ago (click here), I can see that mine are sorely lacking! But I still think they look pretty. Just not anything like Jie Jie's.

PS--they tasted very good; little meatballs in a dumpling wrapper. Would Luci eat them? Of course NOT!

SNOW!

We had a dusting of snow! That makes any day grand around here. Today I took Luci to the dentist. The visit went well. She had a sedative to help her be calm and it made like a happy, drunken 4 year old. She was pretty funny and talked a mile a minute. But on the way home, she chewed a hole in her lip and it looks pitiful. Oh, I feel so sorry for her!

Now we are watching the Inauguration. What an incredible day, knowing that our country can pass power from one party to the other without bloodshed. To know that my kids think nothing is out of the ordinary when an African-American takes the lead because they see no difference in skin color...they see the person. We wish our President well!

Monday in Birmingham, Part 2

Luci just about broke my heart one day earlier this month when she handed me her baby doll, told me to take care of her because "I'm going to Gaf-ghanistan and I can't take my baby because she might get hurt." Then she got on the couch (her airplane) and flew off into a war zone.

A week or so before that sad scene, I received a newsletter from the International Adoption Clinic in Birmingham asking parents to bring in their children from China adopted since January 2004, to check them out for melamine damage to the kidneys. So, I called for a two-fold appointment.

Here's how it went:

I spent quite a while talking to Leigh Anne about Luci missing her Daddy. She loved what we did with Luci's picture, and the talking Daddy-bear from Build a Bear Workshop. She had some additional good suggestions for helping Luci cope. Easy to do. And that play-acting, Luci's "flying to Gaf-ghanistan" is a good thing, she's processing her loss in a good way.

Leigh Anne also said that this "Daddy leaving" opened up that wound that is deep within her brain of being left by her birth mother (Luci knew her voice from being in the womb) and being left by the orphanage officials when we got her. She does not remember the first instance, but does remember the second, and it is no secret here what happened. In any event, her brain remembers and the wounds run deep. We look at photos, have a story we tell her that is some truth + some wishful thinking (because we don't really know, we never will, so let's think the best, okay?), to help her cope instead of having this be a mystery that haunts her.

Of course, sleeping habits and potty habits and binky habits all got brought up. Leigh Anne said pretty much to do what I have to do with these things, she will eventually sleep on her own, go to the potty instead of wearing pull-ups and won't use her binky in public forever. So don't go about changing everything while she's dealing with Daddy's absence. One big thing at a time. And don't let others' expectations of what they think a 4-year-old should be doing keep me from doing what is right for this precious little girl.

Luci has some super days where everything is goodness and light, and some very sad moments in other days where she misses her Daddy terribly. Leigh Anne said that this would be a difficult thing for the rest of her life, this concern about being abandoned. Luci will learn to deal with it, but it will be hard. Right now, talking to Luci about Daddy's absence is easier because she is in the "average" IQ category. If she were a higher-functioning child, or even a few years older, she would understand that what we say (Daddy will come home when his job is done) might not be true, because she would be able to understand that "things happen, and there are no guarantees."

Thank God for average.

There are other things I could share, but won't here.

Another part of the visit was figuring out kidney damage from the baby-milk. Even though Luci's literature from the Chinese authorities said she was on all kinds of "vegetable powder and meat powder" ?? I think she had only milk formula before we got her. She didn't even like the thicker formula with rice cereal added that we fixed for her (we heard all the babies liked that)--the thickness gagged her, only free-flowing liquid would go down. So I don't think she had anything but watered-down formula for the first 9 months. Certainly not enough formula, if it were full-strength, because she only weighed 15 pounds when we got to the USA.

So we prepared her for the ultrasound. Luci was thrilled that they really did put jelly on her belly and ran it around with a video game-controller (that's what it looked like to her!) but I didn't prepare her for "peeing in a cup." That was a new one to her, and most of it missed (ha ha, I know you are laughing at me). They also did a blood draw (I didn't know that would happen) but Luci did great. The girl who is afraid of almost everything said it didn't even hurt, and was amazed that her "blud is red." I'll let you know what they say about her kidneys, but I'm not expecting any problems.

Monday in Birmingham

After our visit to the International Adoption Clinic, we headed for the zoo. (More on the IAC visit in another post.) JT was wonderful with Luci. So nice since he sometimes feels put out by her still--for taking the baby slot. Waiting forever for Luci's appointments to get done at the IAC didn't help, but wow! what a neat kid Monday afternoon. This tiger was really that close. He walked right up to the window, turned and sprayed the window. We moved out of there quickly. The wall between the tiger and us (his lunch) was not all that high. After the tragedy in San Francisco a few years ago, I decided it was not wise to linger here since he was agitated, and we were the only people around (no other items available for his lunch!).

Wow! This peacock let us get up close. Made me wish I had one of those super-duper cameras. Usually I like my camera just fine.

JT mugging it up....

But Luci took her job more seriously. She felt on top of the world after surviving her doctor visit that morning.

Bryan spent the whole day solving and re-scrambling his Rubik's Cube. And yes, it was cold in Birmingham.

Luci went over the rope bridge for the very first time. Yay, Luci!

And finally was happy on the merry-go-round. She was terrified of DisneyWorld's merry-go-round and has been scared of them since then.

JT was a billy-goat.

Virtual Soccer

Today we were at the McWane Science Museum/Center whatever they call it for most of the afternoon. This was a hoot! The kids playing soccer.

Af ghan istan

My favorite picture from Af ghan istan! John put this in his office area. Now everyone in the Ka bul office knows that Luci loves Daddy! Is this from Star Wars? No--just down the road from the capital city of Ka bul. Don't those towers look like AT-ATs? You Star Wars fans will know what I'm talking about.

If your child is studying geography with Flat Stanley, feel free to use this. This is an Afghan man "visiting" with Flat Stanley.

Last Week

Luci in the library. I loved this shot!

With Hannah.

Luci and Mommy wearing our "working shoes." Notice that Luci is wearing glass slippers!

Mommy and Luci and Blankie.

So Thankful!

Tom, my brother, made it through a heart surgery just fine today. He's probably the healthiest of my brothers, certainly Mr. Physical Fitness growing up, so this need of his was a surprise to me. We're praying for your complete recovery, Tom. (By the way, Bryan looks so much like Tom to me--sometimes it really astounds me how much his personality is like Tom's, too.)

Luci had two cavities filled Monday, and scaredy-cat that she is, I wasn't expecting it to go well. It went great. She had meds to help her be calm and then some laughing gas...and that TV on the ceiling helped, too. We get to do this again in two weeks.

And Luci made it to Af ghan istan! John picked her up in his mail today.

Things that Make Me Smile

Luci trying to make a face just like Curious George...since she was born in the Year of the Monkey, this is rather appropriate!Some new shoes and a cerise-colored jacket. Re-starting Flylady for getting my household in order.

The shoes are for using indoors with Flylady. I needed something with clean soles, as we take off our shoes when entering the house. These are just for inside. Flylady says to "get dressed down to your lace-up shoes." So no flip-flops (zoris to you who know what they are), slippers or stocking-feet. You just feel like you are able to get more done if you have on shoes.

Why Flylady? Because I was not B.O. (Born Organized). In 2001, I started Flylady and was doing very well. Did well until 2005, when Luci entered the picture. Actually, I was doing well with Luci, too, until she started walking, and could destroy a room with the best of them. Our house looked like a blender set to "frappe." Not good. Now I'm working on the Baby Steps again, and feel like we can accomplish a lot here.

Funny, what can make me happy.