There's No Place Like Home

I couldn't for the life of me add text to the photos below, so I'll just do it as a separate entry. Beatrice has finally busted into a size 3 shoe, and Auntie Mary Jane rewarded her with two new pairs: some pink and faux fur boots, and those pink with orange bow numbers that every girl should own once in her life. They are ridiculously cute on her, and go just perfectly with this sweater jacket that we'd bought years ago for Linden and just got back in a batch of hand-me-downs. It's been nice and warm for the crazy weather we, and much of the country, has been dealing with the past few days. It was in the 30's and 40's and rainy yesterday, with huge wet snowflakes falling at times. None of it stuck to the ground in our town, but places nearby weren't so lucky and even this morning a colleague of mine had to scrape his car for 15 minutes before heading out. At least we know we've won the fight against global warming! Looks like we'll be back to normal tomorrow and the rest of the week though, and 70 degrees is even in the forecast some time later this week.

On another note, Beatrice's cold is still hanging on, though improving each day. She had a few coughing jags and loads of fussiness last night which resulted in me yawning through a very busy day at work and needing an afterschool latte. Work has been unusually stressful lately. You can see from the photos below why late afternoons are my favorite time of day...

Garden Gnome

Halloween Countdown

I cannot believe how many people have inquired about what Beatrice is going to be for Halloween or if we're taking her trick-or-treating. Apparently this holiday is way more important to many folks than I ever imagined, and I've discovered that it is to be ingrained deep in the psyche from very early on. So, after a little debate, yes we are dressing her up and yes she will visit a few house of relatives and yes she will go the to insane madness that is our downtown's trick-or-treat. I found a mask buried deep in the toy chest today. Wish I'd remembered it was there for Tet Trung Thu! I put it on, expecting her to give a "no, no, no," which was her overwhelmingly most frequent response in the Halloween section of Target this week. Instead she smiled widely, touched it, and even let me put it on her. Maybe we'll get a chance to use all four of the costumes we've inherited if she loves dressing up this much!

Show Me Your Teeth!

Beatrice had her first dentist visit today. She was remarkably agreeable to showing off her multiple pearly whites and the hygienist had many seconds to do a look-around. Everything looks just fine. She'll go for an official appointment when she's three years old. Her cold is really out now and it would be abusive to post photos of her today, so I'll post some more from Linden's visit last week. Last December, we got pictures of Beatrice at seven months old that had me in tears. Her eyes were half shut and watery, she had a rash all over her face, and her hair was all over the place. I now understand that she must have had a cold in those pictures. I'm applying Aquaphor several times a day as the wipes of the nose and water from the eyes chaps her skin so quickly. Despite the misery I'm sure she's feeling, she's in a mostly decent mood, is eating well, and doesn't have a fever. Such a trooper.

On another note, today is day #2 of her putting herself to sleep for a morning nap. Anthony gave up on trying to get her to sleep yesterday so he laid her down and within 10-15 minutes she was out. Today I could just see that she wasn't going to sleep, so I asked her if she wanted to lay in her crib. She nodded yes, I gave her a kiss and patted her tummy and told her to have a nice sleep. She fussed mildly for a few minutes, then just sat up and played with her blanket quietly and was sound asleep shortly thereafter. In the past she screamed bloody murder if we tried this. Our social worker assured us she would let us know when she was ready to be alone, and it looks like she was right. Speaking of which, we have our final post-placement meeting with our social worker this afternoon. I'm preparing a pot of pho to share with her, a good choice on this remarkable cold November-like day. I remember so clearly one day when I was so discouraged with what seemed like an endless wait, and Christine told me "before you know it I'll be over here and a little person will be running around from room to room." I don't think I believed her when she said that, yet here we are. So soon.

Cold