Angelina Jolie I am not

Christmas Eve we went out for dinner with my parents before church. The waitress was really taken by E and how cute she was. Sam too, was a real charmer that night. It is pretty obvious that she is adopted. My parents gushed about how this was her first Christmas here and all that. The waitress goes into this thing about Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt, about what great people they are because they have adopted children from other countries and they are such good people for that. Then she goes on to say that David and I are just as good of people because we adopted E and rescued her. These conversations always make me really uncomfortable and I never know how to respond. I think I said something like, it is really different for normal people to adopt, or thanks. The truth is, we wanted a daughter. We wanted another child. We were not motivated by these altruistic tendencies of wanting to rescue a child from a bad situation. We wanted two kids, we wanted a girl, we wanted a relatively healthy child and we wanted to go to a country with a good adoption process and China fit those criteria. Yes, E benefits from our desires and yes she is in a better place and yes we got her out of a not so great place. We all win. But, really, the process started because we wanted a daughter, not to rescue a child. Now I am not sure of the motivations of celebrities. I don't know them or their situations. I do know they seem to sail through the process in such a short time, unlike those of us who struggle through the process for years. Money can be a useful thing.

So, there it is, my selfish confession. I need to think of a good comeback the next time someone compares me to Angelina Jolie. Like, "Yes, I know I am beautiful just like her". Or, "no, I am not like Angelina, my husband is much more handsome." Or, "thank you, I did it all for the good press it brought me too.". Or, I could respond like I did to the waitress, "Can I have the fish fry and a Pepsi?"

E is Two!

Yesterday was E's birthday. She is two! Man is she ever two, but that is for another post......

Today we had her party and she enjoyed it. Grammy Fran made a turtle cake, actually two turtles. She was really excited and wanted to eat them right away. She got great pink and girly toys too!

Here is a picture of her eating the cake and ice cream.

Big Girl Bed

Yesterday we moved E into Sam's room. We took the bunk beds apart so now they both have a twin bed. She seems to like it and Sam does too. He was really excited to have her in there. Hopefully it stays that way. This morning Sam was calling me in the monitor, "Mom, come down and get Bitsy, she is keeping me awake all night!" "Mom, come down and get her!" He tried to tell us she was up all night, but they both slept all night. Now they are both sleeping. It is so quiet here.

We are hoping it helps her sleeping issues. Maybe when she wakes up in the night she won't be scared and alone, since Sam is there. Also she has more room to move around with her brace and won't be bumping the sides of the crib with it when she rolls over. Also, if she is upset, I can just go lay with her. It was worth a shot, her sleeping had gotten so bad, no one was sleeping, so it can only get better from here.

This morning, E helped me make banana muffins. It was really messy, but she had a good time. It may not look like it from the pictures, but she still just gives me the stink eye when I take her picture.

Rude?!

Since today was Monday, Elizabeth had Grandpa School. I volunteer in Sam's class and E gets to go play with GPK. He usually has some field trip planned. Today it was the Mitchel Park Domes. For those of you not from Milwaukee, they are three big domes filled with plants. E loved it. He said she ran around touching and smelling all the plants. She did not like the arid dome too much since everything was prickly. While they were there a mom looked over at her and said, "Where did you get her?" My dad said, "my daughter brought her over this morning." She said, "no, what country?" Dad said, she was available locally. The woman figured out Dad was not going to give her any information and she stopped asking. I have not had any rude people like that yet. Usually people are really curious, but nice. I thought Dad handled it really well. I am glad he was so quick with his comeback.

This picture has nothing to do with the story, but it was taken on Saturday and I know you all like to see pictures.

Nature vs Nurture

I imagine we will always wonder this with Elizabeth. What of her traits are nature and what are from nurture. It is more of a question with her than with Sam, we know about his gene pool. Since E has an older brother, her house is filled with Lego bricks, Matchbox cars, penguins and triceratops. She does love to play with those things, but she really loves the toy kitchen. We have had it since Sam was young and it was never really played with. Now, E loves it. Today she got out her baby dolls and was for the first time playing with them. She made beds for them and was taking care of them. I have not encouraged this, just made them available to her. I got her a tea set over the weekend, and she was so excited to have dishes for her kitchen. On Sunday we were at my brother's house and she really enjoyed playing with the babies, stroller, and kitchen there. The picture above is at their house. She loves that duck and was trying to play with it and the baby carrier at the same time. I think this girl thing is just nature. When Sam was this age I tried so hard to get him to play like this, but he would not. Sometimes he would when he played with friends that were girls. So for Christmas and her birthday I think it will be an explosion of pink and girly for Elizabeth!

Here are some recent pictures:

We just love her hair in pig tails, she always pulls them out and we also love this post-pigtail look!

On Sunday we went to the Christmas tree farm. The kids were all bundled up. E's snow pants are way too big, but I can't find them smaller. She did not like all the winter clothes.

Pretty in Pink for Church.

After E goes to bed we like to do special things with Sam. He has been really into playing Monopoly. This time he won big. He had all the money, all the properties, hotels on all of them. Daddy and Mommy had nothing. He loved it! The game is helping him with his math skills too. Shhhh, don't tell him he is learning and having fun!