What's New?

We have a new kitten, Ms. Kitty.  The kids just love her except Caleb doesn't quite know how to play nicely with her yet.  He gets so excited and pulls her tail or squeezes her fluffy coat.  Cash said, Mom why does he do that?  Why can't he just touch her nicely?  I explained to him that Caleb has probably never seen a kitty in real life and he is just so excited to finally be able to touch one.  We saw plenty of dogs at the orphanage that were not treated nicely by the older boys but never saw any cats.  He just doesn't know how he is supposed to treat her so we have to teach him.

We finally got the kids in for a well check at Children's Mercy.  We wanted to go there because they had someone who could translate for us.  We knew the kids would need at least some shots and so we thought it would go better if someone were there to tell them what was about to happen.  Well, I can't say as it mattered much, pain is pain in any language.  Peyton was glad to have someone to talk to but thought that we had brought them there to leave them.  What?  Absolutely not!  Not in a million years precious girl!  It really was chaos in that small room.  Imagine, Gary and I, Peyton, Caleb, the translator and 2 nurses in a 10 x 10 room with medical equipment in it.  Not alot of room to move around.  One nurse was asking me questions about the kids while I had been given 3 pages each to fill out and I was trying to console Peyton while the translator was telling me what she was saying and the first nurse was still trying to get me to answer questions and I was trying to make sure Caleb wasn't touching all the buttons.  Just chaos.  We did find out that Peyton is definitely going to need her eyes checked as she could not see anywhere near 20/20.  I was shocked at how big the letters were before she could tell what they were.  Caleb is going to need an x-ray of his back.  He has a bump next to his spine down on his lower back.  He also has some breathing issues, allergies and slight asthma or chronic bronchitis as they called it in Ukraine.  So we have some medicine for that.  Caleb was so funny while they were getting ready to give him a shot. He sat there and said, (as translated) I am a big boy and I am not going to cry.  He didn't cry much but Peyton on the other hand didn't do so well.  She was very emotional and was crying before she even saw the needle.  I am not sure how much it helped that the translator was wiping her tears with a tissue trying to get her to look the other way and shushing her.  We were just so glad when it was all over. 

On Sunday afternoon Gary was getting ready to leave the house and go feed hay to our cows.  Carson usually always goes with him as he is quite the farm boy.  This time Peyton was just standing there watching Carson leave with daddy when I noticed a look on her face.  I said Peyton what's wrong?  She said, I want to go with daddy.  I said, of course you can and away she went to get her shoes.  She was so so excited to ride in the tractor.

   










And tonight we decorated the Christmas tree.  The kids were so excited to see all the ornaments that we had to hang on the tree and to hear stories about some of them.  As I watched them hang the ornaments one on top of the other at times I just let them do it.  Normally that would have really bothered me but you know, in the whole scheme of things, it doesn't really matter.  It was worth it to see how happy they were.  And when we were done and the angel was on top of the tree and the lights were turned on, the amazement on their faces was what I will always remember.  But what I liked most of all, Peyton actually called me mom tonight for the first time and I am sure the look on my face was priceless.  

~Tina