Newsflash!

Well, it's a first. Lanhua allowed me to take some video of her and mama doing their best rendition of that "Snow White" song, "I'm Wishing." The world did not end. I repeat, the world did not end.

Enjoy!

A Picture Equals...How Many Words?

Well, it's been a while since we've posted last. Mea culpa. Scout and I have been crazy busy and have lots to report on, including Lanhua's first visit to Disneyland with some new cousins and aunts and an uncle, as well as a paint-fest to help her Aunt Tina and Uncle Andrew move into their new place.

But until we get it together and actually post about these events, I thought I would post a bunch of photos from the past several weeks...these should be good for at least 10,000 words!

Wo de jia.

Had a great weekend, culminating in a wonderful Monday morning. Yes, I actually wrote those words together: “Monday,” morning,” and “wonderful.” I’ll explain soon enough. First, though, a quick look back over the weekend.

On Friday night, I took a crack for the first time at making sweet and sour pork. Found a couple of recipes online, and sort of combined them – took a bit from this one, a bit from that one, etc. – and, well, just went for it. I was a little nervous as the recipe calls for deep frying the pork (required for s&s pork) which I have never before attempted, and also because it is a very common Cantonese meal. Thus, I fully expected Lanhua’s standards to be pretty high when it comes to this dish. Would I blow my first attempt at this paradigm of Cantonese cuisine? Well, I’m happy to say that I didn’t – it came out surprisingly well, and lo and behold Lanhua mowed it down! Very, very happy result (both with the actual success of the cooking as well as Lanhua eating so much), although I must say the kitchen looked like a disaster area afterwards. It also took me nearly 2 hours. Hopefully, I’ll be able to streamline the process in the future.

After dinner, we played a favorite game of hers – it’s a portable “board” game called “Airplane” or “Flight” (we’re not sure which), and although at first it was strictly by what we call “Lanhua Rules” to ensure that she does not lose (example – at random points in the game, Lanhua gets to roll the die 2 or 3 times in a row), she now plays pretty much by the rules and will take a loss with grace (well, ok, maybe not grace; she is fiercely competitive and does not like to lose).

Also on Friday night, Lanhua made her first phone call. Well, mama made the call, but Lanhua took over from there. All week she had been dying to see her yay-yay again (that would be grandpa Andy), and she insisted that we call yay-yay on Friday night. Pam made the call, got Andy on the phone, and then handed it over to Lanhua, who proceeded to chat amiably and excitedly in Cantonese. It was so cute. Poor yay-yay; he had no idea what his new granddaughter was saying to him, but boy was he happy that she wanted to tell him anything. Truly a priceless moment.

On Saturday, we headed over to grandma and grandpa’s house (or Gigi and yay-yay, as they have christened themselves). Andy had a brand new soccer ball ready for Lanhua, which she loved, and the afternoon was spent hanging out, playing, and chowing down on some hot dogs and a yay-yay specialty: popcorn. To give you an idea of how enamored Andy is with his new granddaughter: he let Lanhua paint his fingernails with some new nail polish give to Lanhua by Gigi.

Saturday night we discovered that Lanhua had a far more favorite use for her new soccer ball: as a basketball. The girl is crazy about dribbling. I had noticed it before on a couple of occasions, but that night she came up with a new game: how many consecutive dribbles can you do without messing up. It soon became clear that she has spent some serious time dribbling a basketball. Not only was she easily reaching hundreds of consecutive dribbles, she was doing so switching from hand to hand: a hundred with her left hand then a hundred with her right, then back to her left, etc. Seriously, the girl has mad ball-handling skillz! Now I just need to teach her a nasty cross-over… (Of course, now we’re thinking basketball camp…)

Sunday we went bowling! Some friends of ours, Lisa and Tom, offered to meet us for an afternoon of bowling with their daughters Rachel (age 9) and Allison (age 12). First up was some sushi at Poway Sushi Lounge (excellent…we’ll definitely be going back), then on to Fun Bowl! There was a bit of a wait for some lanes when we arrived, so the girls hit the arcade, which, as every adult knows from memory, is also great fun. Rachel and Allison were awesome! (The first thing Rachel said when we arrived at sushi was, “Hi Lanhua!” Super sweet, and even though Lanhua was at first a bit shy and her usual inscrutable self when first meeting new people, I’m guessing the greeting from Rachel made her very happy and feel very comfortable.) The girls really made Lanhua feel welcome. The bowling itself was a great success (although I think Lanhua struggled a bit more since these were regulation-sized lanes, as opposed to the shorter lanes of East Village Tavern, so her ball was usually barely rolling by the time it reached the pins), and of course for Pam and I it was great fun to hang with Lisa and Tom. We’re very much hoping that there will be more such get-togethers in the future with these guys (and I know of one in particular, and that’s to watch Allison in “The Philadelphia Story” – she was auditioning for the part of Dinah today…hope it went great Allison!)

Sunday night was pizza night followed by another “consecutive dribble contest” (which Lanua naturally one), as well as some games of Airplane. The highlight of the night, however, was Pam and Lanhua doing some drawing on Lanhua’s dry-erase board. First, Pam drew a picture of me (curiously, I look an awful lot like Curious George…), and Lanhua. Then Lanhua asked her to draw a picture of herself. And then Lanhua took a stab at drawing one of our tabby cats, The Woody Show, who was curled up next to her. Lanhua drew Woody’s head, and mama helped her add the body. After the portraits were complete, Lanhua began to label each drawing both in English and in Chinese. Very cute, and she was very intent.

It wasn’t until this morning that I took another look at the family portrait and noticed something that made our day. I noticed that at the top of the 4 portraits she had written something in Chinese, and under it written, “Wo de jia.” I asked Pam if she (Pam) had written this, and she replied that Lanhua had. Pam thought that she had been trying to write “Wedel.” Not so.

“Wo de jia” means “My home.”

Well. As you can imagine, Pam and I both lit up like Christmas trees when we realized this. This is the first indication we’ve had from Lanhua that she views this new and crazy situation for her as a “home,” and the first time she’s associated herself with it. A very small thing, maybe, but for us? As big as it gets.

I think it’s going to be a great week…

(Attached are some photos from the weekend (a fave is the one of mama and Lanhua apparently practicing for the circus on our bed)…including the family portrait, which we may have to get framed!)

English, Grandpa, our dog Milton and promising progress

Today marks the 1 month anniversary of Lanhua's arrival in the United States. Looking back, it's difficult to imagine that our early days together in Guangzhou were spent less than 6 weeks ago. Life has changed so dramatically for all of us!

I'm hoping that the title of today's Blog Post summarizes the spirit of the past month. With each day, we learn something new about each other, our family, the English language and ourselves. It's an incredibly challenging, happy, frustrating and amazing process. We're so fortunate to have this wonderful (most of the time) child in our lives. Once again stating the obvious: Everything has changed in ways that we never could have imagined.

Our communication challenge continues (as expected), however we've experiencing significant daily improvement. Lanhua communicates more effectively with us and we're improving in our ability to communicate with her. She isn't speaking English yet, but clearly understands a good amount of basic vocabulary. Next week, an ESL tutor named Al will begin in-home bi-weekly tutoring sessions with Lanhua. I see a long-lasting friendship in our future with Al. Steve and I felt a positive vibe as soon as we met him. Hopefully, Lanhua will feel the same.

Lanhua still seems to enjoy going to school each day and has made friends with some of the kids in her class. She's developed a huge crush on her Grandpa (aka "YeYe") and has grown very close to our youngest dog, Milton (in photo). In the upcoming weeks/months, we hope that more of our family and friends are able to meet Lanhua and join us with her continued introduction to this new life. Cheers!