Katya's Birthday

"How much more days?" was a phrase that we heard around our house very often beginning in April, although I think towards the end it had actually become "How many more days?" since I had corrected her so many times! The countdown was on to Katya's birthday - the eventful day that was to occur on May 15th.

We decided to do a swimming party. This was partly due to Katya liking to swim, but probably mostly due to our other options such as Boondocks or Cowabunga Bay being way to expensive! Katya was limited to inviting 15 guests total, including herself, Allie and Kaylie. You would think that this wouldn't be a very hard feat but actually I think it was a little hard for her to narrow down her guest list. Once she did, she made a "party people" book complete with a red bow on it! Don't ask me what the names are since I think half of them are spelled with a mixture of English and Ukrainian!

I was very worried about the day being anticlimatic. This being her first birthday in America, I know she was excited about the presents and excited about getting two birthday parties (a family one and a friend one). Other than that, I wasn't sure exactly what she expected and I really didn't want her to be disappointed. We kept asking her what she wanted for her birthday and she would just reply, "Whatever you want to get me". We did warn my mom that Katya was sure that she was going to be getting her a wedding Barbie from Target!

The family party was fun. Katya seemed to think that we were going to be having the party over at Uncle Harold's house since that is where all the birthday parties lately have been held. As nice as it would have been to go and mess up someone else's house, we did end up having the party at our house. I had the brilliant idea that a BBQ would be awesome, as I seem to have a memory block when it comes to parties and forgetting about how much work they are! I think I thought that Alex would be home that Friday - since he normally is - but he had to work and I was left with all the planning and preparation. Fun! Katya and I made her cake. Not only was this cheaper, but I think Katya really had fun icing it and decorating it. This is something that I'm sure she has never done before!

With the exception of my two brothers and sister-in-law, I think all the rest of the family showed up so we had quite the houseful - about 35 or so people! Katya scored in the present department and she was very thankful and generous - making sure that all the gift givers got a
hug and a "thank you".

Among her spoils were two Moxie girl dolls, two Barbie dolls, some clothes and a very nice music box from the Pottery Barn that my mom got her - too bad that I now refuse to buy the girls any more jewelry! (if you saw the way that they take care of it you would totally understand!). Before the party, Katya had asked me if it would be OK if she got up in front of the family and said something to the family. This sounded interesting and I told her since it was her birthday, she could do whatever she wanted! Evidently, she wimped out after the guest count ended up being so large and instead decided to present her letter individually to Alex and I. She made Alex read it himself and I at least got to hear the words from her mouth - which really helped out in the understanding department! Below is an image of the letter and I will try and translate it as best I can :) Mom and papa I love you and you so cool and I love to be with your family. and I draw the photo of you (I'm a little fuzzy about what this says...) and no matter what I do I still love you. and you mom you so cool and you my best friend and you my best mom ever. and you papa you too I love you and you are so awesome and you my best papa ever and all the family I love my family and I love my grandma so much. and I love Kim she is the best aunt. and Sky (Kaylie) to be my best friend. and I love everyone. and I love my Tony and my sis so much. and if my sis was in the California I miss her so much. and (I think this may say) my mom forgot about me and I still love her and here I went I miss sometimes I still love. Love you mom and the papa.


Her swimming party ended up working out OK. When we got there, apparantly I didn't have the room reserved from 2-3 as I had thought but instead 1-2. I'm am still not entirely convinced that they didn't tell me 2-3 although it is definately possible also that I just remembered wrong! Since there was another party scheduled at 2:30, we had to rush the kids to eat the pizza and cupcakes, open the presents in the conference room instead of the party room - only to watch the party room sit empty up until the time that we left! How frustrating! Oh well - the kids ended up getting to eat some more pizza after swimming and finished up the last of the cupcakes (yeah! More cupcakes around my house was the last thing I needed since I still had leftover cake!). I think they had fun swimming. Only one boy showed up, though, so it was probably a good thing, Wendy, that Alex didn't come! I think all the other boys were at the Zoo field trip for the school's Safety Patrol kid volunteers that Katya was very disappointed that she couldn't make it to (sometimes you just can't do everything - there's not enough hours or energy in a day!).


The only problem we had swimming was Katya's friend Allison. I have come to the conclusion that she doesn't play well with others since she has had problems with both Kaylie and Allie. At one point she was supposedly crying because Kaylie had "dunked" her, although I got info from both Kaylie and Allie independently that Allison had originally pushed Kaylie and told them to go away because they both get to see Katya at home all the time and she never gets to see Katya! This was a hilarious statement because although Kaylie definately sees Katya quite a bit, Allie comes for possibly four days A MONTH and there is no way she sees Katya more than Allison. In any case, after talking to Allie about flirting with Isaac, the lone boy that Katya "kind of likes", and steering clear of the rath of Allison, the kids seemed to do all right! Alex definately got some mileage and some smiles from Katya by teasing her that she was so cool that the kids were fighting over her!

We survived the day is all I can say and I think Katya had a good birthday!

Surveillance Adventure

My sister-in-law Kim and I drove up to Idaho on Sunday and then back to Utah. It was quite the long trip - 12 hours straight in a car! Fun, fun!

We were playing private detectives, complete with the big sunglasses, hats, binoculars, and camera. Kim has a little boy named Cadian that just turned seven - on Sunday actually. When Cadian was about 4, Kim and her husband were in the process of getting a divorce and settling custody in court and her husband he took off with her little boy, disconnected all his phone numbers and left no address. I'm sure that your first thought will be - as mine was - just call the cops. Sadly, the cops claim that they can't do anything in this situation. Because there was no custody arrangement, neither one of them legally had custody and thus no kidnapping charges can be filed. So, Kim has not seen her son for almost three years. She paid a lawyer money that was supposedly going to a private detective to track him down but not only didn't the lawyer find Jake, but he didn't write up any of the papers that needed to be filed with the courts to make it so that Kim would win custody by default if Jake didn't show up to court which would then make it so that kidnapping charges can be filed.

I took it upon myself to track Jake down. How hard could it be after all? Isn't that what the internet is for - to find stuff about people that they don't want you to know? I'm proud - and also extremely mad at the lawyer for taking money from her and obviously not doing anything for it! - to say that I found a potential address for him after about two hours and $50 worth of background checks and address searches. So, we drove up to Idaho to see if we could tell if Jake and Cadian lived there or not.

It was about a four and a half hour drive up there. I actually quite enjoyed the trip. I got to talk to Alex's sister more than I ever have in the whole twelve years that I've been married to Alex! Kim actually lives with us and - as sad as it is to say - I really don't know her. I always kind of wondered why she wasn't turning the earth upside down looking for her son and I now understand her frustration - that the situation is basically left up to lawyers and cops, neither of which seem to care too much! We got to our destination and really "lucked out" I have to say. We seriously could have been on our surveillance operation all day without being any better off than we were before. However, we drove by the house once then twice and I just happened to mention that it was too bad that there wasn't a name on the mailbox. Then Kim exclaimed, "That's his mailbox! He lives here." It was definately a very distinct red mailbox painted with bright orange flames on both sides and apparantly he had a habit of taking it with him wherever he moves. We were about to drive by the house again and by some miracle Jake and Cadian came outside. Luckily, we had time to inconspicuously turn the car around before driving right by them because although we wanted to know where Jake was, we definately didn't want him to know that we had found him. So Kim got to see her little boy for the briefest of moments! They left shortly after and we headed back to Utah, having accomplished what we meant to - to determine if this was a valid address.

Although, I know that Kim was disappointed. I'm sure she had in her mind that she was somehow going to get Cadian alone and grab him - after all if they won't arrest Jake for kidnapping then they couldn't arrest her either. That would have definately made our trip more exciting - maybe a little more exciting than I was comfortable with! But for now, we have to settle on knowing where he is, strategizing what to do next and coming up with the money to pay the lawyer (definately another lawyer!) to hopefully do something!

Sidewalk

This isn't a recent story but I will sometimes randomly think of it and want to blog about it so that I will remember it later and today I actually thought about it at a time when I actually could blog it!

This happened probably about a month after Katya had first gotten home - sometime in August 2009. Katya loves riding her bike and at first she was actually very scarey while riding her bike. She liked to ride next to you and then swerve into you slightly thinking that it was funny. I remember one time getting so mad at her doing that to me that I made her take the bike immediately home. She didn't seem to have any concept of riding in the street or watching for cars and would ride down the middle of the street and just blindly breeze through intersections without looking! It was quite a thrill riding with her sometimes - and not always in a good way! One particular day we happened to all be out riding. Tony was hitching a ride in the baby carrier on Alex's chest and we had all been out for an hour or so "park hopping". We have so many parks in our neighborhood and they are all so close together that it is easy to just ride to one and then the next one. They all have different attractions. For example, one park has the seats you can sit in and then spin around and around really fast. I remember Kaylie throwing up after visiting that park. Another park has this tall cylindrical thing with metal bars that you can stand on and use the force of your weight to spin around. My nephew got a goose-egg on that one :) Across the street we have this skateboard type thing that you can stand on and pretend like you are skateboarding. I've seen too many young kids to count fall off of that one! Anyway, not all the parks are so dangerous and we had been to several of them and were on our way home. Alex called back to Katya, "Make sure that you are riding on the sidewalk!". A moment later I see Katya dismount her bike and starting walking with it. I couldn't figure out why she was doing that as she is normally so anxious to ride faster than anybody else. Then it dawned on me...Katya actually didn't know what a sidewalk was. She had taken the word sidewalk and interpreted it the only way that she knew - as two separate words: Side and walk. And thus she really was following Alex's instructions! She was walking on the side of her bike. This made me laugh so hard!

Mom, what's your happy today?

I watched an interview with Michelle Obama a couple of months ago on the Today show and she talked about this conversation starter that their family does at dinner that she calls "Thorns and Roses". Everybody in the family has to tell what their best and worst moment of the day was. I thought it was an awesome idea and tried it a month and a half ago. The first time it was on a day that Katya was mad about something and so it didn't go really well. But since then, it seems to have caught on with Katya. I don't actually usually remember to instigate it at dinner a lot of the time but Katya (depending on her mood) will remember for me. She will say, "Mom, what's your happy today?" I'm always excited to hear what she will say is her "happy today".

The other day at dinner, Katya was trying to tell me a riddle and it was hilarious. I finally had to have Kaylie translate for me, as I was sure that Kaylie had played a big part in putting this riddle in Katya's head in the first place. Here is the riddle - see if you can figure it out:

You are a detective trying to solve a mystery. There is a man that has hung himself in a house. The house is completely empty, except for the man on the rope and a puddle of water under the man. The question is, how did the man manage to hang himself when there was nothing for him to stand on?

Magical Moment

Last weekend Katya and I had what I see as a turning point in our relationship. I almost didn't blog about it because it was so tender that I didn't know if I could capture the actual feeling but when I look back on my parenting experience with her I want to remember this moment and so I want it memorialized. Truthfully, I don't know if I will actually publish this post but I am going to write it all the same...

It was last Saturday. We had our normal busy Saturday with her flag football game at 8 am and then her soccer game at 2 pm. I had given Katya a list of chores to complete between the football and soccer game, one of which was to clean her room. I was doing yard work while Tony was taking a nap and periodically checking on how her room cleaning was going. Each time I checked, it appeared that the room was even messier than before! Needless to say, she didn't get her room cleaned, let alone the other two chores done, before soccer. Watching her clean her room reminded me of a book I had recently read that talked about kids that have had chaos in their mind and lives and how they really don't know what organization is and I wondered if this was her hold-up to getting the room cleaned! Anyway, after the soccer game, I took pity on her and helped her finish cleaning her room, she completed her other two chores and then she asked me if she could play on the computer.

Using the computer in our house is a real priviledge, as it is normally "locked down" since our virus mishap. Since she had been so cooperative in doing her chores without complaining I had no problem with letting her play on the computer. However, I gave her the instructions that I normally do: "You can only go to the websites that are bookmarked under your name and NOWHERE else without asking me". I took advantage of Tony's afternoon nap by doing some more yardwork. Yet, when I came back into the house to get Tony, there was Katya on google - which is NOT a website that is bookmarked under her name.

I am proud of myself because I didn't yell and truthfully I wasn't all that mad - more annoyed that she had disobeyed. I also didn't really feel like punishing her so I didn't really say anything to her - just shut the computer off - and then she went to her room on her own accord. Alex had been at work all day and then got to go to the Lakers game with his friend and I really did just want to go do something fun with her. Plus, I have been trying to take a "breather" during situations like this so that I don't end up yelling because I think it really is more constructive to have time between the issue and the discussion. My plan was to go out to eat and have a discussion in the car. Despite the fact that she didn't want to go out to eat at first (she was now in one of her noncomplacent moods), I let her pick the place (sort of - with a little prompting that we should wait for another day to go to In-and-Out with daddy). She chose Panda Express. So we piled in the car and had a very quiet ride over there. Although I am sure that she thought I was really mad - I really wasn't. I was quiet because I was reflecting on what I wanted to say to her and here is an abbreviated version of the conversation we had on the way home (although in reality there was very little conversing as I am the one that did all the talking!):

I told her that I wasn't really mad at her but that I was more disappointed. I asked her if she knew what disappointed was and then explained that it was more a feeling of sadness than anger. We talked about the two reasons why I don't let her go to just any website. The first reason being that I don't want another virus on our computer and the second reason is that there is a lot of stuff on the internet that kids shouldn't see and that she really had no idea what websites she was going to. I also took the opportunity to talk to her about how you couldn't find boyfriends on the internet. Since Alex had this conversation with Allie a couple of weeks ago because the whole "boyfriend on the internet" was her idea in the first place, this seemed to be a perfect time to bring it up with Katya. Katya replied, "I know" with a very authoritive tone - as if she had already tried! Awesome :( I explained to Katya how the internet is a great tool for people because you never really know who you are talking to and that the 12 year old "boy" is mostly likely a dirty old man that wants to do bad things to little girls.

Katya was very quiet through this conversation and I was reminded of why my mom used to like to corner us in the car to lecture us. It is really the perfect spot because where can the kid go? Nowhere - they have to sit there and listen to you! When I asked her what she was looking for on the internet, she glared at me and replied, "I was looking for a present for you." (I must note here that the next day was Mother's Day.) Oh darn! Really - how can you be too mad at your kid for that? We finished our conversation on the internet with how you can't even buy anything until you have a credit card and in order to get a credit card you have to be 18.

When we got out of the car, I walked over to her and gave her a hug and told her that even if I got mad at her, I still loved her and that it was very nice of her to want to buy me another present. I noted that she was not very responsive to my hug and that it looked like she was about to cry as she headed up to her room. Although I knew she was upset, I didn't go after her right away. I knew I should have but our food was going to get cold, I was hungry, Tony was hungry, and instead I went a put Tony in his chair and gave him a spoon to entertain him while I organized the food. In my pre-"Beyond Love, Logic and Consequences" days I have to admit that I wouldn't have gone after her at all. Sadly, I probably would have reveled in the fact that I was avoiding conflict and eating my food in peace. But I did go after her, leaving Tony strapped in his chair with his spoon and no food, to see if I could quickly get her to come downstairs and eat. And I am so glad that I did because if I had just stayed downstairs to eat my orange chicken in peace what an important moment I would have missed!

I called this post "Magical Moment", although in truth I think of a magical moment as a really fun moment and this wasn't really that. It was actually a very sad moment because it was one of those moments when you actually see your kids at the core - you understand what they are feeling and you honestly want to comfort them. Katya was under her bed. She has taken to going there when she is upset or wants to be alone. Her bed is very high and she can fit easily under it. She has little trinkets stuffed on the wood boards and pictures taped to the bottom of the bed and it really is the equivalent of her "hideout". It is the only place in her room that Tony is not allowed. She was curled up in a ball and crying. "Katya, are you hungry?" I asked, knowing that she would of course say no and inside my head I am screaming "Please just come down and eat - I am hungry and I don't want to deal with this right now!". It took some real will-power to not just walk out of the room right then because after all - I had tried hadn't I? I could hear Tony downstairs babbling and I am thinking that it is only a matter of minutes before his babbles turned into cries of impatience at being confined to his chair. Instead, I get down onto my tired knees (I had been doing yardwork all day after all!) and crawl under the bed with Katya. "Katya, what's wrong?" I ask. "Nothing." She replies. "You are crying so I know there is something wrong." I say softly and gently push her over so that she is facing me. After a moment, she looks at me with an odd expression and replies, "I miss my mom." I realized that I think the expression she gave me had a tinge of fear in it - as if I was going to get mad at her and I would be lying if I said that the statement didn't make me a little bit angry. Why would she miss her mom? I'm here - doing all these things for her that her mom didn't. I help her with her homework, I make sure she takes a bath and that she has clothes and toys to play with. I put her in soccer, football, tennis and all kinds of other fun stuff. How can she miss her mom whom she has maybe seen four times in the last six years? All this I am thinking as this statement hits me in the face. But do I say this? Of course not. Instead I say, "It's OK to miss your mom. It's OK to love your mom and miss her and to still love me and daddy at the same time. You loving your mom doesn't make me mad. I know that you have had a tough life and that your mom did some mean things to you but I am sure that you still had moments with her that made you happy and that make you miss her."

I said a bunch of other stuff that I don't recall exactly, all the while listening for Tony's screaming to start (which by some miracle never did start - he was still just babbling away having a good time with his spoon!). I remember telling Katya that she can tell me whenever she wants that she misses her mom and that I won't be mad but rather that I will be sad that she is sad. I told her that I hoped that she gets to see her mom again someday. I told Katya how happy we were that she became part of our family and and that no matter what she does we are not going to send her back. I told her that I couldn't imagine our family without her. This statement for me has always been true, since the moment Katya has come home. Through all the ups and downs and the moments when I wanted to pull my hair out (and hers too!), if I try to think of our family without her I really can't. But one thing that was a little bit different about this night was when we ended our conversation with a long hug filled with tears and "I love yous", the "I love yous" seemed to mean more - for both me and her. I remember someone telling me one day that with adopted kids, you don't love them right away. That you need to define loving a child as being "in-tune" with their needs and trying to help fulfill those needs and then one day you will just wake up and genuinely love them. Am I completely there yet? Maybe not. But am sure closer.

Guitar Class

I put Katya and I in a guitar class because I wanted to have something fun that we did together that didn't involve homework. I've been trying really hard to actually enjoy Katya instead of always thinking about what homework or chores she should be doing. Parenting is supposed to be somewhat fun and I realized one day that I was not having fun at all! I've been reading parenting books on how to connect with your child and figure out what is behind their bad behavior and I thought that Katya and I really needed a fun activity that we could both enjoy and since Katya told me she wanted to take guitar and I wanted to learn the guitar it was going to be perfect.

Katya lasted three lessons. Normally I wouldn't have let her quit except for the fact that she wasn't having fun and I wasn't having fun. The last class we went to together went something like this: I had to go and find Katya who was out riding her bike and was supposed to be home by five thirty but of course wasn't. By the time I found her, it was about 10 minutes to 6 and after driving to the lesson we were about 15 minutes late. The lesson is only an hour long, meaning that we only had 45 minutes left anyway, but as we were walking in Katya asked what time the class ended. Then during the class she didn't pay attention, thought it was funny to play the strings on my guitar instead of her's, raised her hand during class to ask the teacher if she could go to the bathroom and then raised her hand again to ask what time the class ended at. She was counting down the minutes to 7 and at that point I was pretty mad. I gave her a lecture on the way home about how rude it was for her to act that way, that the teacher was there to teach us and that she didn't have the right to disrupt everybody else's learning experience.

I decided by the next week that I was not going to make her go anymore because I actually did want to learn the guitar and didn't really want to be miserable doing it! So, I took my 15 year old nephew, who had a very nice electric guitar that I later learned he had purchased to learn to play one extremely hard song (I don't remember which song). He only lasted for one lesson! At least Katya lasted longer then him, I guess. Kids - they think they should be able to pick up an instrument and magically be able to play it without any effort! Oh well - I will finish the last 4 lessons by myself actually being able to pay attention without any distractions. Awesome!

I really should have done the art class because I know that Katya would have stuck with that. I really suck at art though...

Catherine's Wedding

My little sister Cathy got married yesterday (Sunday, May 2nd). She looked so beautiful in her dress (I will post pictures later) - it brought tears to my eyes to see my baby sister so happy! She has a definate sense of style and the dress she chose echoed her personality perfectly!

Apparantly, Sundays are good days for weddings as there was unbelievable turnout! My mom said that everybody but about 10 people had RSVP'ed, requiring a bigger food budget than was originally anticipated :). This will be my mom's last girl to get married off and I'm sure she is glad of that - weddings are stressful! All the planning involved, the tiptoeing around so as not to upset the mother-in-law, the unexpected costs, the little "thank you" boxes that you have to tie ribbons around and make cookies for - all these "fun" little things aid in making this event very stressful! It was a very nice wedding, though, and hopefully my sister thinks it was worth all the time because that is what is important - right?

Katya behaved very well, much to my delight. Katya and Allie were flower girls and neither of them cared too much for the dresses that Cathy had picked out for them. Allie is too polite to say much. Katya, on the other hand, has no qualms of making her opinion known. She was very forward about telling Cathy that she didn't like the dress, to which I later gave her a lecture about how a wedding day is all about the bride and not the flower girls and that you are supposed to wear dresses that you hate and never wear again! I think Katya was more upset about the dress being size 12 (Katya usually wears size 8) because Katya seemed to think that this made her fat - which is a whole other issue! I have to admit I was a little afraid of the day when it started out by Katya complaining about going to my mom's for breakfast, about having an ear that hurt and then refusing to play "slug-bug". But luckily with curled hair and a bouquet that I think the wedding lady had remembered to put a rose in, Katya forgot to remain in her sour mood. She was pretty "scared" of walking down the aisle in front of all those people but in the end we were so rushed that I think she even forgot that!

Tony was a big hit at the wedding. He was dressed in a little suit and tie and about halfway through the wedding Alex had undone the top button on his shirt and clipped the tie back on which made him look like he was getting all relaxed ready for the next round of fun! He was totally "working the crowd" with his dance moves and kisses. He found this cute little blonde girl that he loved and kept giving her kisses. What a little ladies man! I'm sure we will have so many pictures - between the pictures that Alex took and the wedding photographer - that we won't even know what to do with them!

My uncle, aunt, and three cousins came from Seattle for the event and it was fun to see them. I hadn't seen them since we took our road trip up there to see my grandma two years ago and before that it had been about 12 years between visits! All the cousins are grown up now and it is fun to get to know them as adults.