3 Month Milestone

We flew into the US 3 months ago today. What a roller coaster it has been! A lot of it hasn't even been Ira. LOL. Speaking of her though, she has made huge strides in these last 3 months. We had a nice little honeymoon stage when we first got home, followed by a few weeks where I was wishing I could take her back to the orphanage. Really wishing.

The last little bit though, I have seen a huge change in her. She is much more kind and loving with Little One. She is not defiant and disrespectful to me. She has become quite the little tattletale and has even lied to me a couple of times (that I've caught her anyway) but for the most part she is a completely different child. Much more like the one I saw last fall. No more do I hear how much she wants to go back or that she doesn't love me. Her English is coming along very well. She understands almost everything at this point and speaks quite a bit too. Little One is still annoying at times, but Ira deserves it just as often. LOL. They are acting as sisters now though, instead of enemeies. I love to listen to them giggling about something together.

Here's hoping the next 3 months bring even more positive changes! Bring it on! :)

Sidewalk Chalk Art

On Saturday Mom and the girls and I went down to the Gateway to see the sidewalk chalk art they had down the middle of the street.  It was pretty cool.  I'm amazed at what people can do with a piece of chalk.  Or, lots of chalk, I should say.  Here were some of my favorites.

Kinda creepy, but cool. :)

I love ones with lots of black, for some reason.

I loved the detail in the horse.

Ah, I love Tangled. :)

This was even more creepy.  Such people were on every corner.  Super weird.  No, I did not get a free hug.

This one was even cooler. :)

Loved the look of this one.

Not sure why I liked this, but I did.

I loved the idea of this one.  She writes a story and it paints a picture.  So true.  I love reading....

Cute

There were fun things in the bubbles of this one.

This one was super cool. :)

Classic

This was probably my very favorite.  Mostly because I got to see the real painting a few weeks ago.

It was so neat watching him draw this. :)

Very cool.

He did a time-laps somewhere on the internet.  I haven't looked for it though.

We tried to get some cotton candy while we were there but there was a HUGE line.  We stopped at the store on the way home and got a treat instead. :)  We could have gotten our hair spray-painted.  I'm such a party pooper though.  Ira would have really liked it, and I'm thinking Little One would have too.  I'm not big on weird hair colors though.  Sorry kids.  Should have picked a different Mom.

Funny

I forgot to mention something cute that Ira said yesterday.  She came in with quite the attitude on her face that screamed, "tattletale."  I knew she was going to tell me something that Little One had done.  Before she could start I said, "Happy face."  After she ignored me I said again, "Happy."

Then, still walking toward me, she says, "No Mama.  This NO happy." LOL

I can't even remember what it was that she was coming to tell me about because I was laughing so hard. :)

By the way.  Yesterday was 12 weeks since we flew back to America.  I'll probably start counting by months at this point, instead of weeks though so our three month mark won't actually happen until next week.  Still, I thought 12 weeks were worth mentioning.

Wow, It's Been Awhile

How time does fly.  It's been almost 3 weeks since I last posted.

The last week of school was nice.  Ira had a couple of really fun field trips.  The whole school went over to the rec center to swim one day and the other the whole 6th grade went to Classic Skating.  She had a blast both days.  Friday of that week was the 6th grade graduation.  The slide show had super annoying music, but other than that, it was a nice program.

She is in the middle with the b/w polka dot dress.

She wasn't quite sure what to do when the principal tried to shake her hand. :)

Since school got out we've had some changes in our family.  Details don't need to be mentioned.  Even though it's been rough on all of us, there are some good things coming out of it as well.  Ira and Little One are the biggest ones.  All of a sudden they are acting like sisters.  They still have their moments where they really bug each other, but there has been a huge transformation.  They ask each other to play a game, for example, and then enjoy the time instead of fight.  I've heard them giggling together.  I've come in and seen them on one of their beds, doing separate thing, but lying together.  This hadn't ever happened before.  I haven't heard, "I want Ukraine!" even once from Ira in the last couple of weeks.  Or, "You love Little One, you no love me!"  It has just seemed to disappear from her vocabulary.  Not that I truly expect it to have completely gone away, but I'm amazed at the difference nonetheless.

Anyway, we've got things planned for the day so I best get going for now.