This is Eleanor with her best grimace to show off her new gap-toothed grin.

Our 6 month post-placement visit with our social worker (coming up in September), may include descriptions of how this cruel mother yanked the teeth out of poor Eleanor's head. We'll see how well that goes over. Of course, the tooth was REALLY loose, had been really loose for a really long time, and I could see the permanent tooth coming in BEHIND the loose baby tooth, and I could envision Eleanor's reaction to THAT kind of dentist visit (and my reaction to a big dentist bill for pulling a tooth that was already really loose - man, I'm cheap)... so I took matters into my own hands, so to speak. Two good pulls with just my fingers, and it was out. And Eleanor let me do it, she was a trooper, although she wailed when she could taste a little blood for a few seconds afterwards. Sarah assisted by showing Eleanor how the tooth fairy worked, and showing her a few teeth she had lost herself (I um, "bought back" Sarah's teeth in their little decorated envelopes from the tooth fairy, for demonstration purposes).

Genevieve watched the proceedings, and her eyes got big as Eleanor's tooth popped out. Gennie broke down into tears and screamed, "Mommy! I don't WANT to be 6 or 7 and have my TEETH come OUT!!! Waaaaah!" Eleanor was thrilled with the opportunity to decorate a plastic baggie for the tooth fairy, so she happily busied herself with the stickers, and I sat with Genevieve and rocked her, telling her she wouldn't have to worry about teeth coming out for a good, long time.
"But, my next birthday, I'll become into 5! Then 6!"
"Yes, sweetheart, but loose teeth won't hurt a lot. It'll be okay."
"But Eleanor had BLOOD!"
"Only a little, and look, she's okay now."
"But she cried that it was owie."
"A little bit. But her tooth was a little stubborn. I bet yours won't be owie at all. And we have to have a few more Christmases before your teeth get loose."
"Oh, Mommy, I don't WANT to be 6 or 7!!"

I tried to tell her that it would be a long time before then, but felt like I was lying. It's felt like no time at all for her to reach 4 years of age, and all of a sudden she'll be in kindergarten next year. So I soothed my snuggly baby girl, knowing that it won't be long before she is losing teeth, and that not long after that I'll be losing my mind with three teenaged girls. :)

Dave and I snuck into Eleanor's room to attempt to find the baggie and slip a buck under her pillow, but she had buried it somewhere in her covers where I couldn't find it. She finally woke up as I was rummaging around, and Dave made some excuse about saying goodnight to Gennie, and that I was looking for something I dropped (on the top bunk... sure). I told her this morning that the tooth fairy called me and said she couldn't find her tooth, so that tonight we'd have to make sure it was right under her pillow, maybe with an edge sticking out to make it easy. The tooth fairy doesn't have the best eyesight, after all. So Eleanor made a really big sign that said TO THE TOOTH FAIRY, which she plans to employ tonight. Stupid tooth fairy.

Wish the tooth fairy would bring me a buck. We've been noticing a weird plasticky-burny smell this weekend. Turns out we need a new electrical panel in the garage, since we had a loose main line and it was melting everything in there and starting to melt the insulation in the wall surrounding. Glad the house didn't burn down. That would have been worse news, don't you think? (We will also be paying a plumber and a car mechanic for various jobs this week - yippee skippee).

Grandma Jean recently moved to the area after landing a job at the local university. We were really excited about this - grandma's going to be close! We'd wanted to have family nearby for a while (it gets lonely out here on the frontier). The kids love having grandma visits, and maybe, just maybe, Dave and I would get an occasional DATE NIGHT!? (Wonders never cease). Jean is also not one of "those" mothers-in-law, that is, she's actually someone I really enjoy having around. We gab and giggle and complain about the things we can't complain to anybody else about, and we take care of each other.

Well - one unexpected side benefit of having Jean move to the area was that she moved into a lovely house that had a hot tub. A hot tub that she didn't really want to maintain. We volunteered to give it a good home. Jean volunteered to visit it at our house every so often.

Now, we all know there's no such thing as a free hot tub. We had to pour a concrete pad, get the thing moved (definitely not something I wanted to try myself), get a dedicated electrical supply hooked up, buy a new cover, make sure I knew how to do the chemical treatments, etc. etc. I even sprang for a solar shower that we bolted near the patio, so folks can rinse off before getting in/after getting out with warm running water (very nice, and much better than having the kids squishing water all over the carpet, since the nearest shower is upstairs). Thankfully, the innards of the spa seem to be in good working order; no immediate repairs needed.

I have to say that the look of complete GLEE when the kids hopped in this morning was great, and SO worth the trouble. Eleanor and Genevieve begged for the animal face sunglasses at the grocery store the other day, and while I'm not sure how they actually see out of them, I think they're pretty cute. We limited their time in the tub, since children in particular shouldn't be in hot tubs for too long (we're keeping the temp a bit on the low side anyway, since it's been a bazillion degrees outside recently and we really don't need to be warmed up much), but the kids LOVED their time in there. And as David and I relaxed next to each other in the lovely warm water this evening, we thought it was pretty spectacular, too.

THANKS GRANDMA!

Believe it or not, Miss Eleanor Zitao has already grown out of the clothes we bought her in China. Her pants are too short in the leg, and while her waist hasn't filled out to, say, Genevieve's proportions, she's got both more meat and more fat on that little body than she used to.

It figures that this growth has occurred - this kid eats like she's got a hollow leg (surely the hollow leg phenomenon is responsible for the sudden spurt in leg length). Not only that, but most of her day revolves around food. Whether we have the food she wants most in the house. Whether Mommy can be snookered into allowing her to have the food she wants most, if it happens to be in the house (poking Mommy while Mommy is on the phone seems to be a favorite strategy, as modeled by her sisters). Whether this food can be eaten in lieu of something Mommy wishes she'd eat instead.

Now, it must be said that I've been pretty lenient on this point. When Eleanor first came to us, she had her pockets full of candy from her foster family, and when we gave her food, she stuffed as much of that into her pockets as she could, too. Rather than restricting her hoard supply (although I did have to take some items away that would have become, erm, rare culinary specimens if they weren't taken care of in a timely fashion), we tried to simply make it obvious to her that food was going to be available. Always. That she didn't have to create an emergency food supply within the confines of her jacket. In China, she had free rein. She pretty much lived on watermelon, whatever candy she could get her hands on, and plain noodles for that first week and a half.

Since coming home, I've been trying to create reasonable food rules while still making nutritious food available to her at any time. So, when she comes to me saying, "Mommy, I want eat," I say, "Sure, Eleanor. Do you want an apple, banana, or yogurt?" And she gives me a look that says, "You are SO disappointing," and replies, "No, Mommy. I want.... (pause for time to examine the entire contents of the pantry, refrigerator, freezer, etc.) ice cream!" And then I have to say, "Ice cream is not one of the choices. Apple, banana, or yogurt? Zhege, zhege, zhege (this, this, or this)?" The "you're disappointing" look then degenerates into the "you are a mean, mean person" look, and is sometimes accompanied by a quivery lower lip and exaggerated sniffly noises. (This is another thing we've been working on; she tends to wail at the very least contradiction to her will, which I find exasperating, and I have to breathe deeply and make concerted efforts to think of pleasant, relaxing things instead of how she's getting on my last nerve.) I then ask her why she is crying (duh), and since she realizes that she's getting nowhere on the ice cream issue, she punts, and might complain about something Genevieve did that was unpleasant yesterday afternoon (and so Eleanor thought she might wail about it now... sure, why not - maybe Mom will take pity on this poor, poor maligned child). To which I reply, "Yes, well, Genevieve said she was sorry yesterday, and you still aren't getting ice cream. Would you like an apple?" "WAAAAH!" (Five minutes later, she will realize that I haven't morphed into a sucker yet, and will ask for the apple after all). I have given up on putting sandwiches into her lunch for day camp, though. I keep finding whole sandwiches, still in the plastic baggie (thank goodness), moldy or squishy or just plain disgusting, wedged into the most interesting places around the house. She just won't eat them, Sam I Am, and I'm giving up on the peanut butter and jam.

Still, she does eat the nutritious stuff I give her. And the food battles have been getting much better with time.

Even so - I stifled a giggle tonight when I went into the younger girls' room. Genevieve sleeps on the lower bunk, and Gen had recruited me after 10 pm tonight to help her find a specific toy that is apparently needed for proper generation of delta brain waves during sleep (sheesh). Genevieve was rather vocal on this point, "I NEED the baby lion. I have the Mommy lion, but NO BABY LION!" So, I plowed through the other dozen or so crucial, must-sleep-with-all-of-them toys on Gen's bed to see if a baby lion might be in the mix. I did this in the dark, while actively trying to soothe and shush Genevieve, since Eleanor was already asleep on the top bunk and there was no way that some stuffed baby lion was going to screw up my evening entirely. Well, Gen wouldn't be shushed, thank you very much, and Eleanor did stir a little at one point.

Eleanor began talking in her sleep, saying, "Mommy, I eat. Look, eat it all gone." She sighed deeply, turned over, and went back to whatever yummy dreams she was having. I tried hard not to laugh, located the baby lion (much to Gen's delight), and kissed my youngest girl goodnight for at least the third time since the lights went out. I would have kissed Eleanor, too, but I didn't want to interrupt her dreamy sampling of what might be the best ice cream she's ever tasted. Eat up, Eleanor. Mom's going to greet you with those unexciting cereal choices tomorrow morning, yet again.

I was on the phone chatting with my mother for a couple of hours today. One of many things we discussed was gossip about what had become of various childhood friends and playmates of mine, and she mentioned some girls who had gone on to have babies by a different father each time (with the implication that these girls/women had gotten into their share of trouble and/or had a rough time of things). I reminded her that each of my children has had a different biological father; she laughed and said, "Actually, I had never thought of that!" To tell the truth, I don't think about it much, either.

My children may have different genetic makeups, but truly, they only have one father. There's only one man who has been there to read them bedtime stories every night, only one man who has helped with homework, cooked dinner more than his fair share of evenings after mom's come home tired from the lab, taken them to the library, gone to elementary school music shows, and done his best to pitch in with laundry, scrubbing, supervising bathtime and tooth-brushing, etc. David is my dearest love, and the dearest father I've ever seen.

He married me and took Sarah under his wing, eventually legally adopting her when Sarah's biological father signed away his rights. Dave was the one clapping and cheering when Sarah learned how to ride her bike this summer (we had really stretched the training-wheel window, and we told her this year that she was just too big to have training wheels). So - her birthday money went to a nice new bicycle, and she learned to balance in a whole TWO DAYS. (I'm glad it was so short, because I did my fair share of running behind the bike holding her seat level, too!) Now she goes on rides all over the neighborhood - usually with her dad. We've also been going out on the lake with our canoe a bit recently - here's a picture of Sarah in the front seat (I paddled in back), happily gliding through the water around sunset. Dad was at home with the two young ones, giving Sarah and I some time to be together.



Being with Sarah since she was two, and realizing that he really could be "dad" and do a good job of it, helped Dave feel good about having another baby. We conceived Genevieve a little over a year after we were married, and I realized that pregnancy could really be a wonderful thing with a supportive partner. He came to birthing classes, and gave backrubs, and rubbed my feet, and cooked and cleaned and took care of cat box duty. He laughed when the baby kicked his hand off of my tummy, and smiled when he saw the ultrasound (we could tell Gennie had big cheeks even then)! He was right by my side for labor, and held my hand during contractions. Towards the end, when the pain was worst, I was even grabbing the rim of his pants pockets so I didn't squeeze his hands off; he took it all in stride. He awkwardly held Genevieve, who was all bruised and red and wrinkly after the birth (which was quick, but rough!) and looked at her in awe. Gennie was his first and only newborn, and before long, he picked her up with ease and changed diapers with the best of them. We lived on rather little sleep for the next couple of years. Genevieve was as bright and sunny (and stubborn and willful) at 3 am as she was at 3 pm; something that took a while to resolve! She would walk around to Dave's side of the bed in the middle of the night, and cheerfully exclaim, "Hi, Dad!" And Dave didn't yell, he would just sigh and say, "Hi, Gen." as he escorted her back down the hall. Again.

I had looked into adoption when we were considering having Genevieve. I really wanted to adopt. And I was pretty sure I wanted to adopt from China, for a plethora of reasons, not the least of which was that I knew waiting kids really needed me. I wasn't old enough, though (age 30 is minimum for China), and I did want to have the experience of being pregnant one more time. So I got plump instead of a passport.

About a year before my 30th birthday, I basically had a breakdown, and told Dave that I REALLY wanted to adopt as soon as possible. Well, lack of sleep with our last child was still fresh in his mind, and he really wasn't sure about adding more kids to what already felt like a very busy life. A year went by, the kids got another year older, he got another year more comfortable with the idea, we got more sleep, and he decided to take that leap of faith with me. Because he loved me, and because he knew that he could love another child.

And he has done so. Really well. Eleanor took to her Baba first (smart move), before I could even get close to her. While I am often the parental unit of choice these days (simply because I'm at work less), she knows that her Baba is game for story-reading, to get a snack, to help her put her shoes on, you name it. And she receives as much care from him as she does from me. Eleanor has recently refused to speak Chinese at all, and has told me in no uncertain terms that she is "Eleanor, Mom. Not He Zitao." I have asked if she wants to call her Zhonggua Mama and Baba (foster parents); and she says "Not yet." I hope the pendulum will swing the other way when she realizes that she is safe and secure with us, that we will always, always be here. I am very grateful that she had a Zhonggua Baba, for he taught Eleanor what having a Dad is all about, and he was the one who wept when she left with us (such a hard day!) And now David is the forever Daddy. Forever Daddy will be going to the Dragon Boat Festival and the Boulder Asian Festival with his new daughter this summer (we're coming too!), hoping that Eleanor will remember that she can love both places, she can love all her families.

I watch David in action, and sometimes my eyes do tear up thinking about how much I adore this man. You wouldn't think he'd be the type: a somewhat awkward and anxious Ph.D., who when he first tentatively picked up two-year-old Sarah (at my request), held her like she was radioactive. (Of course, her diapers were sometimes close to radioactive...) He really stepped up to the plate, learned that children could actually be fun, and is the go-to guy for every weird question under the sun (this man KNOWS why the sky is blue, and what stars are made of!) I snuggle up to him every night, and am so glad that he is with me, and that he will be the one to cradle our grandchildren someday.

Happy Father's Day, sweetheart. I love you.