Talkin'

Adam is feeling much better today. His fever is gone and his appetite is back. He's still looking pretty gaunt, but I'm sure he'll get his rosey cheeks back by tomorrow.

We had a meeting with the ESL teacher at the elementary school today. She is going to have a meeting with the principal and another teacher tomorrow or the next day, so we'll see what kind of a plan we can work out. In the meantime she gave us some really nice resources.

Both Adam and Liana have speech impediments in Ukrainian, so it will be interesting to hear how they are going to sound in English. Liana can't say her "sh's" and her "r's" aren't rolled; they're like a "w" sound. The word for "OK/good" is "kharosho," but she says, "khawosso." So far she hasn't been able to say those sounds in English either, but hopefully we'll get that all taken care of. Adam also has troubles with his "r's." Sometimes if they are in the middle of a word, he'll say an "oy" or "w" sound instead of the "r." We're seeing that most obviously as we are teaching him his numbers. The number "four" turns into something like, "foy." Lots of work to do!

Today when I told Liana to put her socks on, she looked at me all frustrated and said, (in Ukrainian/Russian), "Mama, you called these 'put-your-socks-on!' These are SOCKS!" and then said something with an expression on her face that I presume meant something like, "Would you please make up your mind and quit trying to confuse me half-to-death?" Cracked me up.

John and I noticed that there has been a huge difference in their behavior even in just the last few days. We don't have to watch them quite so intensely lately. I even took a nap this afternoon without the baby monitor on, and nobody was killed, maimed, or damaged in any way. And the carpet is still a light grayish blue. In most places.

Liana found a pinecone today that she carried around with her for the rest of the day. She loves the smell of it, and was soooo excited when we explained that if you buried it, it might become a big tree. Time to hide all digging tools.

Food is no longer an issue at all for Adam (though the last few days haven't been the best time to judge that since he's been sick.) He routinely refuses certain foods, and doesn't insist on having seconds, thirds, etc. He eats everything on his plate 9 times out of 10, but doesn't get freaky about it anymore. We haven't found any hoarded food either. Nice to have that behind us for the most part. Now if only Liana and Aleksa would start to like milk... They're our 'juice' or 'water' girls.

Adam and Liana have shared quite a bit with us about their orphanage and pre-orphanage lives. I sooo wish I could understand more of what they were saying, but I want them to keep on talking about it to reinforce their memories. It sounds like they had some fun times along with some very bad ones. I video taped some of Adam's stories today. We really need to start burning all our pics and videos onto cd's. My sister lost her hard drive yesterday to a "Poof!" so I'm a little paranoid about computers now. I needed the wake up call.

I'm exhausted. Time for bed!