Our daughter has been mostly quiet for the past couple of days. By “quiet,” I mean she’s not using her words very often. She makes plenty of noise! But yesterday we received a voluntary Chinese sentence – “不要!” This was in response to telling her we’re going to the park – “Don’t want!” I’m glad she felt comfortable enough to tell us that she didn’t want to go but that didn’t stop the outing.
We’ve also heard a couple new English phrases:
“oh no”
“hurry up”
“hey”
“oh my…”
Apparently I was taking too long with my turn at the game so she was urging me to “hurry up.” So amusing. As a side note, she does know some English; she had English tutoring at her orphanage before adoption. I’ve never told her to hurry up! I’m not sure how much English she knows, but assume that she’s like my Chinese skills in that her receptive skills are much better than expressive. I’m also assuming that she doesn’t want to use English yet until she’s confident that she’ll be understood.
It’s interesting to recognize that my own feelings mirror that of so many other parents. We’ve only been a family for eight days; we’ve only been home for five. And yet it feels longer than that. We’re slowly finding a routine, even knowing that baba goes back to work on Monday.
DoubleShot is still sleeping. We’re waking her up earlier each day, trying to nudge her toward a normal wake/sleep schedule. Yesterday I woke her up at 12:45. Today the goal is to have her out of bed by 12:15. I’m hoping to make it to church this weekend, which starts at 11:15. I’m not sure if that is within reach or not!