Friday, January 30, 2009

What a frustrating week it's been!!!!!

I feel like nothing has gone right this week. I dropped Ping off at school with the scratches over and under the eye, a little bruise on her forehead and the nice new hairdo. I went to swim. It was hardly enjoyable as I imagined the school was writing me up for abuse of my child!!!!! Would you believe me if I told you after school, I got a call from Ping's teacher? She just had a question, but I thought for sure she was going to ask what I was doing to Ping in the afternoons!!!! Her teacher is wonderful. She has children of her own. Ping has a few teachers and they are all great. I am sure they understand what can happen in a mere minutes, but I still feel awful in general about what this kid has done to herself this week!!!!

Today we had the furnace cleaned. It's working great, so no worries there. I spent the day doing a few things. Not getting half the stuff done that I wanted to. Somewhere late afternoon, I got really drowsy. Not sure why. I didn't give in though. Well I did, but not till Ping went for a bath:)

So tonight in the mail I get something from the passport office. They are asking for more documents stating that Ping is a US Citizen. This makes me very ill as I sent originals to them with the application. They have her Chinese passport, our adoption decree and a copy of her US paperwork we received after she was home for a month and a half. This immediately left a pit in my stomach. Do they know how important those documents are? What else can they possibly need??????? I immediately called, but with any agency, you never get anyone that can help you and you can never call the people you need directly because they don't accept outside calls. Why are these people always protected from the outside??????? So I am sick waiting to find out more. They will call me! NICE! She kept saying "when are you traveling?" Who gives a shit when, I want the answers now. Where are my daughter's documents!!!!!!!

The second piece of paper in the mail was from my credit card who is unwilling to credit me some money for my horrendous stay at the Pinegrove Ranch. I was sad over that. However, that is easily remedied. I will cancel them and that will bother them in general. I pay monthly, I pay on time and I usually pay the balance in full. When it's not so high of a balance that is:) So I can only hit them where it counts. Cancellation. There are plenty of cards to be had in this world. I know because everyone asks me daily by mail if I want to sign with them!

Mail can be a drag. It delivers bad news and carries bills. Hmmm. I only like it when it's my birthday or Christmas. If it's not good, keep it at the post office!

I have a tendency to get bad mail on late Friday afternoons. It makes it impossible to contact anybody due to the hour and then I have to wait the weekend for answers. This happens to me all the time. So irritating!

Well Miss Ping is sleeping soundly. Bill is in the family room sleeping soundly and I need to get to bed. I will leave you with a few more photos from our lunch the other day!

Mama Out!!!!

Up close and personal!

Sam with tres sombreros!

Love this one of Ping loving the big hat.

Where are you?

Miss Jillian.

Master Sam.

Three amigas!

Mucho locas!

Good buddies.

Look, they are all so happy.

All smiling.

Precious bunch.

Thursday, January 29, 2009

Today was a better day

Shayla had school and I had swim. It's good when the day starts out with a routine! After I picked Miss Shayla up at school, we headed to lunch with Ayi Meri and Ayi Jenn. In tow were Lucas, Sam and Jillian. The kids were so well behaved. I was proud of them. We had lunch at a local Mexican place. For some reason, I feel like the lunch absolutely flew by. We did take a couple of cute photos of the kids. I had my camera and Meri had hers. I will show you what I got. I am waiting on Ayi Meri's.

After lunch, Ayi Meri dropped Lucas off at home to hang with his Dad and the three of us girls went to Target. Ayi Meri was looking for maternity clothes. We were also looking for something like headbands and hats to see if we could cover Ping's new and not so improved hairdo! Ayi Meri found a cute heart one, so we bought that. Other than that, we didn't have a lot of luck. It was hard for me to walk around Target. I noticed a lot of people looking at Ping's hair. I am not sure if they felt bad for her because they didn't know if she was sick or not? All I know is I felt like I wanted to sink into the floor. I was embarrassed. Not because of Ping because I adore her. I was embarrassed because clearly this happened on my watch. I allowed this to happen and I feel like I am the worst mother out there. I am not saying that is what people thought. I just know what happened and felt like it was written on my forehead.

We got home about 4 pm. Ping watched a little TV. She decided at one point to go upstairs. I wasn't sure why as she isn't allowed to wear her Princess dresses right now. It's a consequence from yesterdays mishap. She knows this and even said she wasn't allowed to wear them because she touched the scissors. So I was wondering what she was doing. I went to the bottom of the stairs to ask her what she was doing. She really wasn't doing much of anything. So I went back to doing what I was in the middle of. She came downstairs a few minutes later. She told me that Neesha "got" her. So I asked her to come over to where I was sitting because she walked away so fast after she mentioned that something happened. There on her face are scratches. She has like 5 of them around her eyeball!!!!!!! Thank god she didn't get her eyeball scratched. I asked her if she annoyed Neesha and she willingly admitted that she did. Well at that point, what can I say? Neesha would never willingly hurt Ping. She loves Ping and always is rubbing her ankles and such. I know if Neesha struck, it's because she was caught off guard and was protecting herself. I was glad that Ping willingly admitted that she harrassed the cat. What the hell though. First the hair and now the scratches? It seems like Ping is looking to get as banged up and as maimed as possible!!!!! She looks terrible and it makes me look terrible!!!!! I am thinking a padded room is needed till she is like maybe....30? She is 3.5 years old. She is allowed to move throughout the house. I keep an eye on her and talk to her all the time, but stuff still happens. God knows what people are going to think of us!!!!! I hope no more damage is done! I am going to have to cancel plans and hang out in my cave if one more thing happens!!!!

I will say that it was nice to be out today. The roads were not great and the parking lots at the Y, her school, the restaurant and Target left little to be desired. Talk about major ice. I walked like a slow penguin! It was nice not to be stuck in though. Laughing and being silly with friends is always fun!

I hope you are well.

Mama Out!!!!

Lucas, Jillian, Sam, Ping.

Best of buddies.

Loving the pink sombrero. Fries still in mouth!

Hola Chicas and Chicos.

So cute. Look at the belly!

Ayi Meri and Lucas.

Sam with three sombreros.

Miss Jillian with sombrero.

Wednesday, January 28, 2009

Devastated at what Ping did!

I was upstairs and Ping was downstairs. This is what I came downstairs to.

I put the pig tails in to see if it would make a difference. It doesn't. What is done is done. I spent the morning in tears. Talk about negligence on my part!!!! We have some upcoming things too and I was hoping to get some really adorable pictures.

Monday, January 26, 2009

Happy Chinese New Year - Year of the Ox

We have had a relatively quiet day here. Ping went to school and I went to swimming. After I picked up Ping, I went to CVS where she got to pick a special treat and then to the bank. I had ideas of doing a million things around here. Nothing got done. I hate days like that.

One thing we do daily is we empty Ping's backpack and she shows me what she did for the day. She loves to do this. She takes extreme pride in this. Everything she makes is supposedly for me and she always asks if Daddy is going to love it. Well of course he is, how couldn't he. Then as soon as Daddy gets home, he gets to see what is in the backpack. Then she tells him she made everything for him. It's adorable. Well today she hands me a brown paper bag and says there is a snack in there for her. So of course I open it because this is all very odd. Well I pull out a packet of raisins, an old carrot, some birdseed, some nuts and a 1/2 of an orange with some seed on it. I said "Honey, I don't think this is a snack for you, I think it's for the animals outside." So I told her we would show Daddy when he got home. So of course the minute he came in the door, we showed him the contents of the bag. He says that it's obviously for outside and then Ping pipes up and says "yeah, it's bird seed." Okay, why did you tell me it was a snack for you then???? Anyway, I encouraged the two of them to go out in the dark and put it all out in the yard. So I suited up Ping in warm gear while Bill put his boots on and they trekked outside in 6 degree weather to put all the snacks out for the birds and squirrels, etc. It was so adorable. I handed them a flashlight and from inside I tried to take some cute photos, but none came out nicely. I then got the video recorder out. I need to now listen to see if you can at least hear them as the recorder wasn't picking up their image at all. It was so adorable. Ping is yelling at me "Mama I did it, I did it. Daddy, don't let me fall. Daddy, you are making a big mess, a big mess. " She didn't understand why he would allow the seed to overflow the bird feeder. She also was wondering where the ants were. If anyone remembers, she had an ant issue where they flew up her legs during the summer. She forgets nothing!!!!! It was so cute to see them both out there bundled up at 6:30 pm and just hanging out feeding the birds. It warmed my heart. It was such a beautiful thing to witness. She was so cute. She kept saying "Don't let me fall Daddy" because we have a banking that drops right down to the street. It can be a little scary! I told her to make an angel before she came back in. I had never done it with her and neither has Bill. She knew how though. They must have taught her at school. It was so precious. I didn't get a picture of it though. Bummer. I was proud of her for ripping off her Princess dress and getting dressed again in her earlier day clothes just so she could fee the birdies and such.

After the dark excursion, Bill heated up our Chinese take out. It was okay. Nothing grand. We gave Ping her card and some lai see. That is money in a Chinese red envelope. It was rather hysterical. Twice this girl had me in stitches today. Earlier I said "Ping, Daddy is getting us some Chinese food for dinner" as I clapped my hands and smiled with excitement. She looked at me, scrunched her face, crossed her arms over her chest and said in a very angry voice "I want cow." It wasn't whiney like normally, it was downright angry. Between the voice and the face, I just broke into hysterics. She had been asking for cow just before I told her about the food, so she didn't care what I had to say. LOL. Cow is Ping speak for chocolate milk.

Tonight she goes to open the red envelope and she finds the dollars in there. Married people are supposed to give unmarried people and children these red envelopes with money in them and they are supposed to be in even denominations. So I said to her "show me the money so I can take a photo honey." She literally slips the money into the top of her dress!!!!!! Bill turns to me and says "Who the heck taught her that?????" It was hysterical. I was able to get a few photos of it. This little one is so happy. She really is a complete joy.

In other news, Sarah's mom is being transported to a rehabilitation hospital, so that is great progress. She will get excellent care and hopefully grow stronger so that she may come home and enjoy time with her friends and family!!!!

Hope you are well and Happy New Year!!!!!

Mama Out!!!!

Getting ready to open.

Opening.

Money!!!!

Way cool, show me baby.

Nope, down the dress!

Where is it???

Here it is Mama!

Putting it away now! I love this photo. However she has spare rib stuck in her teeth since we just ate. LOL.

Losing the dress. This is a dress that was given to her. Way too big, no buttons, but she loves to wear it daily!

Money Mama!

Card and lai see.

Lucky Cat figurine from Meri and there is a book in the bag that I can't wait to read!!!!

Ping wearing Daddy's shirt over her dress.

Daddy making it a straight jacket.

Isn't this funny Mama? Look what Daddy did?

Get me the hell out of this!!!!!!!!! UGH!!!!!! MAD PING!

Some additional photos of the girls

This one is my absolute favorite. Stacy got this great shot!

Hugs