Airlines!! / Deep meaning

I am accustom to flying. I fly for business and pleasure. I have never had as many issues as we have had with flying to and from Latvia.  We have been trying to find flights that were close to $1200 a person. We were finding $1500 to $2200.  Someone from our church told us about flying out of Canada. I know that is not ideal but last night they posted flights for $1100 a person. We jumped all over it. I was feeling really good about it until this morning. We received a call from Expedia this morning. They listed the price incorrect and wanted another $1,500!!! I started off talking to them but due to my job I could not continue. Jeff talked to them for hours and finally they caved. They kept saying we did not put in the kids birth dates. Which anyone that booked any airline ticket knows you can’t even get to the page to pay without that information loaded on the screen. So they were just flat out telling us lies. They had already cancelled our flights and had to book us all new ones. The outgoing was fine but the flight home will be tough. It is about a 5 hour drive to the airport in Canada and we now land around 7pm. Our kids will be a mess for days. I can’t wait until all the adoption paperwork, fees, and travel are over. I normally stay calm but this started to put me on the edge.

 

The kids are adjusting and feeling more comfortable however, they sometimes act out trying to tell us a message. The message sometimes is really deep and the action is repeated several times before we finally get the message.  For example, Hunter for a while would get upset when we talk about him growing or if we made a comment like “Wow you are getting big.” I honestly had no idea until finally I put some pieces together. In their foster place when they got big they moved to another fostercare or an orphanage. He feels if he gets too big he will have to move to the next home.  I started telling him he can grow as big as Daddy and he will always be with us. It is starting to calm him down but it may takes a few times to explain this. Hunter also hates everything with going to school this fall. In Latvia he went to a boarding school. Luckily during one of his crying melt downs over school I got him calm enough to explain that he will always come home to sleep and will not be sleeping at school. He actually stopped crying, hug me, and went to bed.  Another example, Spencer has been digging in our trash a lot and we keep yelling at him. This has been going on since we got him. Finally on July 3^rd, he told me that in Latvia he would go to trash pull food out, hide by the cars and eat.  Also, that one time he found cake and it was good. He told me several stories. After he went to go play, I had to go cry in the bathroom. So every time he goes to the trash I pull out a snack and have him say “Mommy I am hungry.” Also, with Spencer after 5 min time in, he would sit and whine or pout. One day last week after 5min time in I was calming down Hunter and I started doing “I love you when you are mad.” “I love you when you are happy.” “I love you when you are good.” “I love you when you act bad.” Spencer walked over to me and asked “Even during 5 minute time in?”  I answered yes. His next 5 minute time in after it was done he went to play no whining or crying or self-hitting, nothing.

 

Elliana is the one that I have not figured the puzzle pieces out yet. We got into the biggest argument we have had last Sunday a few hours before church.  She wanted to get into an argument. I could tell it had nothing to do with the actual thing. E “I want to wear a dress.” Me “Then pick one of your dresses out.” E “ I want to wear a dress.” Me “Yes you can wear one.” E “I want to wear a dress.” Me “Yes you are a young lady you can wear a dress.”  E “ I don’t want to be a lady.” Me “You are a girl you will end up being a lady one day.” E “I want to wear a dress and no lady.” Me “ Go pick out a dress and don’t worry about being a lady be my sweet little girl.” E” I want to wear a dress.” Me “What is wrong and what do you need.”  E “I want to wear a dress.” It went one for hours during my entire laundry. She stood outside my shower to continue this.  Then while I dressed. Finally I lost it. I did not yell but I said “Elliana please go away if all you want to do with argue about nothing.” She replied “I hate America and I hate it here.” She screamed and yelled went to her room. Jeff came running to see what was going on. This went on for about an hour. I tagged out with Jeff and he handled Elliana and I took the boys. We arrive at church on time which was amazing. After church service she comes to me and said “Mommy you got mad at me.” I told her I don’t know why she wanted to argue and be mean this morning. If something is wrong you need to tell Mommy what the issue is so I can fix it. She hugged me and said I love you Mom and I am sorry. I felt so much better after that little conversation. I know she did not mean her comments about America but I don’t know why we even had this argument. I wondered if she was testing me to see how much I love her? If someone else knows maybe why please let me know.

 

We are still trying to work on the kids with playing. Elliana and Spencer both will not play with other kids. They will play near them but never actually with the other kids. Hunter still has to be introduced but then he will play. He is a little rough with his hands and we are working on that. We love these kids but we do have to remember they have a past that created their since of logic, reasoning, and behaviors. The behaviors we don’t like we need to adjust but it will take time. It takes 21 times of doing something a new way before you start to create the behavior change. That statistic is for adults. I can’t imagine how many times a kid needs to do it. We are trying to give everything to these kids. I know it is hard with working full time. Sometimes work takes so much out,  and when I get home I just want to relax but I still find strength down deep to give more to my kids.

Trip Three Dates!

We received our trip three dates! I am so happy about this. We'll be going back during the second week of August. This means we can enroll them into school on time. We did find out that trip three has more appointments then we thought. They want us to stay for a full week. I was under a different impression that we only needed to be there one full day. So we will be gone for about 7 days. I am trying to see if we can stay in the same place as before. I thought that might be easier for the kids but I am not sure. We told the kids a few weeks ago that we had to go back and it did not go over very well with Spencer. He has been asking non stop about flying to Latvia.  In hind site we definitely should have waited a bit longer. We are going to wait until a week before we go before we bring it up again. I want them to be mentally prepared but not freak them out. I hope a week is the right time frame, we will find out in a few weeks. 

I was thinking that Elliana was understanding more about family. She wants to read the Berenstain Bears "We are a family" book almost every night.  We were hanging out with one of my friends and Elliana pulled me aside and asked if I was still going to be her mother. She thought my friend was going to be taking her. It broke me up. I tell them and read them books but I am not sure what else I can do. This may be one of those things that just takes a lot of time. She got in an argument with Spencer and said he told Elliana that he never wanted to be hir friend again. Elliana cried and cried. I told her that Spencer is your brother and no matter how mad we get with each other we will always be family. If we say unkind words to each other, we need to work through that and make up. She felt better. That night after dinner Spencer did say to Elliana "We are friends." then hugged her.

We have been working really hard on sitting at the table correctly. Spencer has the biggest problem in this area. Well last night he wanted to look under the table to see who was correct. Dad quickly fix his feet and in the process kicked me. I was laughing because I thought Dad was caught by Spencer but Elliana told Dad he better apologize to me and give me a hug.  Jeff hugged and kiss me. Elliana when we finished said "Oh that was so nice." It was such a cute thing to say.

Spencer has been cracking Jeff and I up. The biggest number in the world to him is 45. If he only knew how close to that age one of this parents was. HA.  He says it all the time. He wants to eat 45 beans. When I say I will be done in a while, he will reply " in 45 minutes?"  I was doing the "I love you this much". He replied I love you that much 45 times.  Last week he wanted to do the alphabet 45 times plus 10. He did it once and said no more. Smart boy.

Spencer also has been talking about his teeth hurting. I thought he just wanted attention because of what Hunter just went through. I kept saying you are fine until about day 4. Then I looked in his mouth and found out he has a loose tooth! He is excited because he gets to go to the store with just Mom and pick out stuff for his tooth fairy pillow.  He wants a dinosaur and tractor pillow. If you have any ideas on how to pull that one off please let me know. I was thinking about a pillow that has one side dinosaur and the other tractor. I have never made a pillow from scratch so this will be interesting.

Jeff and I keep forgetting about Hunter's teeth or lack there of. You would think we should know by now but a few nights ago we made BBQ ribs. The poor guy could not eat it and just mouthed it. When Jeff finally noticed Hunter still gnawing on the same one for 10 min he asked Hunter if he would like daddy to cut the meat off the bone.  He was not OK with us cutting it off and pursued to gum it off.  Additionally, cherries are on sale now and I really want the kids to try all different kinds of food. I never thought about him and how hard it would be to eat. He can manage it but until that gum toughens up it is hard for him to eat certain foods.