Boy at Play

Here are a few shots from today. Kai has been enjoying his new toys and is keeping busy as usual. Not a lot of eye contact, because he was very intent on what he was doing. In the first picture, I was hiding under a table and took the shot once he peeked under to find me. I've said it before and I'll say it again, my kid's a cutie!

Merry Christmas!

As you can see, Kai was very busy visiting his family and playing with his new toys. This last one cracks me up. He got a couple of Zhu Zhu hamsters for stocking stuffers (they are critters with wheels instead of feet). The little critters run around the house, so he has designated the kitchen drawer as their pen; he's been to the pet store enough times to recognize that rodents live in cages. How cute is that?
This time last year, we were celebrating the new photos we had received of Kai in China and were eagerly awaiting the next steps we needed to take to get our travel approval. This year we had our first Christmas as a united family. Thank you to everyone that has helped us welcome Kai home. We have had a very busy (and sleepless) few days. Kai was overwhelmed with all the presents he received from family and friends. He is thoroughly enjoying all his new toys...The timing is excellent, because we are due to be housebound by a blizzard headed our way tonight. Here are a few photos of the little guy from Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, and today.

Proud Architect

Kai loves his books. Sometimes he looks at the pictures, sometimes he points out the words as we read, sometimes he names each picture. Other days, a few stacked books makes for great seating, a thin hardcover makes a heck of a frisbee, and best of all, the whole lot of them can be fanned out and stacked 5 feet high.

I have a funny moment to share. I wanted to get it written down so that I don't forget in the day to day chaos that inevitably ensues. I was trying to wrap one remaining gift yesterday, but was foolish/brazen enough to do it during Kai's witching hour (4:00 is NOT his best time of day). Kai was doing his very best to convince me to abandon my activity, i.e. crying, pulling on me, did I mention crying? I offered him a square of wrapping paper and rolled his toy into it. "Here Kai, wrap it." His response, in sign, was "rabbit". Hee hee hee.

Change of Scenery

I just realized that the blog's background was still showing autumn leaves. Well with today's first real snowfall, it was time for a change. I may still mess around with the background; I'm not loving the "blue hue", but we'll see if I have time to care that much.

Okay, today's photos are very funny. Kai played in the snow for the first time tonight. Rob had not yet removed the awning from our screen house (oops) and wanted to get it down before the snow did. He took Kai out with him to "help". He seemed to enjoy the snow, but really, really enjoyed his new foot-wear. Once it was time to come in for dinner, I took off the wet layers and his boots. He let me know pretty quickly that he prefered to wear them as he ate, so I complied. After dinner, he was his usual messy self and needed to be stripped down to a diaper so that his clothes could be tossed into the wash. Well, Kai again requested that his boots be put back on his feet. Please note my fashion forward baby's lovely outfit: Blue polar bear boots and a Seasame Street diaper. He danced and stomped around the kitchen - so happy to be sporting clunky, chunky boots.

Kai loves, loves, loves to decorate. He spends a good deal of his day hanging and rehanging chimes, ornaments, dog leashes, and whatchamacallits.Here he is before breakfast trying to hang my birdhouse chime on his high chair. For the record, I pitched the chimes into the trash when he wasn't looking. It was a moment of weakness. He was making me "help" him hang it, a thousand times over, and was obsessing over finding new locations to place it each time. There are only so many places to hang something at toddler height.




When I took these pictures, Kai had made the connection between his fire engine and a book about fire fighters that he found. He looked so cute riding on the truck while studying the illustrations.





So, back to my point about Kai's decorating sense. He has taken pride in helping with the tree decoration. The only dilemma is that every single ornament he touches is doomed to live out the month in very cramped quarters. At last count, Kai had arranged 13 ornaments on this poor little, sagging branch. Oh, there were more, but those were star shaped. Kai favors stars as his very most favorite shape and so had removed them from the tree to give them a special place of honor. (And yes, he moves those around constantly, too.)
Kai is a busy, busy boy. He cracks me up on a daily basis.

Well, I just took a look at how long it has been since I updated Kai's list of signs. It's been months! If I counted correctly, he is at 115 to date. There is a chance that there are a couple that I can't remember, but I try to record them in a journal as he goes.

So let me tell you, Kai IS killing me! He woke up crying the other night, so I went in to comfort him. He needed to be held in order to relax. Okay, no problem...since his surgery, I do this once a week or so. He put his head on my shoulder and took in a slow deep breath. Perfect, I think; he's going to fall back asleep quickly and I will get my sleepy self back into bed. It is just before 2 a.m. and we have an appointment to meet with his surgeon later that day...I want he and I to be well rested for this visit. In the darkened room I realize that Kai has spread his arms wide. The silence is suddenly broken with the sound of my son clapping. What??? Is he mocking me, I ask myself? Suddenly he is alive with the rhythm of music that ISN'T playing...did I mention that it's 2 a.m.??? And so, we we're up. I had tried to put him back to bed once I realized that he couldn't be rocked back to sleep, but to no avail. He was leaping and bouncing in his crib, playing his musical lullaby toy, kicking on the wall with his little footie pajama feet, and talking at full volume. Eventually I caved and brought him downstairs for an early breakfast. I naively thought that I could make him drowsy with food and then set him down for a long nap. No such luck. He only slept and hour and a half at 6 a.m. By the time we were on our way to the hospital, he was in rare form. He was an unhappy camper on the way down, but he perked right up once we were in the waiting room. Kai is quite the little ambassador (for those of you who have not met him). He charmed all the families in the waiting area. He is a riot. Oh, and the best part...The little boy that was terrified of medical personnel loves, loves, loves his surgeon and the nurses in the office. This is probably because he has no idea that this doctor is the one inflicting all the pain of surgery on him. He is still very anxious around anyone wearing scrubs or lab coats, but the progress he has made is HUGE. You would think that he would be all about sleep after his extended day, but he napped only briefly on the way home, he was cranky as all get out at dinner-time, and had zero interest in sleeping come bedtime. He's kill'n his Momma.

As far as the doctor's visit, he is scheduled to have palate surgery on Jan 12th. His open palate was "repaired" in China a few weeks before we travelled to adopt him, but it wasn't done properly. As result, Kai had to wait until now to have it fixed (the scar tissue needed 6-9 months time to heal before it could be touched again). Unfortunately, the existing scar tissue makes it harder for the newly constructed palate to retain the sutures. Fistulas (holes) can develop and would require future repair work. Kai will have a restricted diet for 6 weeks. The first two weeks will be strictly liquids and purees. {YIPPIE}. The following 4 weeks will consist of very soft foods such as slightly undercooked eggs, overcooked noodles, etc. Oh boy, Kai is not going to be happy about missing out on his crackers. Kai will stay in the hospital overnight 1-2 days depending on how well he is able to drink. Nothing will be able to enter his mouth during this healing period, so he will not be able to use utensils or put his fingers in his mouth. Kai will have to be fed his food using cups and extra large serving spoons that are too big to go into his mouth. Oh yeah, can't wait to tell my two year old that he can't be independent at mealtime. I am going to request different pain meds; maybe we can avoid some of the side-effects that we saw with his last operation. It's not going to be easy, but we will get through it. We have a very talent surgeon working on our little guy, so he'll be in good hands.

Kai is not yet two and he is doing somersaults on the couch. Arrrggh. This boy is one good bump away from a concussion. He made an attempt at one a couple of days ago and this afternoon he was delighted when he executed his first one. I think we are going to ask Santa for wall to wall padding and a helmet.

Rob caught a couple of shots of Kai wearing his work boots this morning after breakfast. He was pleased as punch to be sporting Daddy's shoes.


These pictures show an all too common scene these days. Kai apparently remembers the "good ol' days" and has resumed wearing his food dish on his head after eating. It's not a big deal after dinner because we pop him into a tub soon after, but mid-day messiness is kind of a bummer. Ah well, that's the beauty of toddlerhood...apple sauce = body paint.