And Life Begins Again....

It's hard to believe we've been home for 2 days now. We gratefully touched down at Dulles on Friday evening, one hour ahead of schedule. About a dozen family and friends were there to warmly greet us; it was salve for our souls. Sophie took it all in stride as she does w/ most things. She is very laid back and flexible; she fits so beautifully into our family.

We stopped at Burger King on the way home and inhaled a REAL burger...it never tasted so good! We were thrilled to watch Sophie explore the house for the first time; she acted like she was in a castle. Upon entering her room and opening her closet, she incredulously looked at me and pointed to herself, saying, "Sophie's???" With happy tears, I replied, " Yep, this is Sophie's room." How long I've waited to say that to my sweet gal. She slept by herself in her own bed from 11:30pm- 6am. I saw her light on and heard her sniffle, wondering if she was catching a cold, but then heard her softly crying. We quickly scooped her up and tucked her b/w us in the water bed and she fell asleep for another half hour.

She's never been able to play in the grass so the next morning, after awaking and re-exploring the house, she attempted and LOVED the trampoline! She was hesitant to step in the grass and run; b/c Beijing is a huge city, any grass stepping is strictly prohibited. But after seeing Jie Jie and Ge Ge run, she took off!

Sunday brought church; we wondered if we should take her, but decided if it was overwhelming we'd just leave. She asked to wear her purple traditional Chinese dress and I acquiesced. We were enthusiastically greeted  by our church family and worshiped  as a family. She participated and sat through the whole service like a little lady. She remembered many friends who greeted her at the airport and quickly played w/ them.

Our fourth year anniversary church picnic was after the service. We changed clothes and decided to go for awhile and see how she did! Amazingly, she ate and then went to play w/ new friends till 6pm. I stayed very close by and watched her make new friends, eat ice cream and jump in the moon bounce. She was definitely a celebrity and "Queen Bee" for the day. Her determination is admirable. She watched her friend Summer master the monkey bars and decided to try....after about half hour of help, a little less help, and falling many times, she was able to cross halfway on her own.

She still doesn't cry when she gets hurt. She fell pretty hard on her hiney/back from the bars, but laughed, got up and tried again. If she cuts herself, she sits alone and nurses her wounds. We're going through lots of Dora Bandaids as I offer my mommy care and kisses. It's so weird for me to see this and it's eventually where I want her to be; when my kids were little, I'd say, "If you aren't bleeding, you're fine. Go play." But she's not had anyone care if she's been hurt before, so we're back tracking somewhat in this particular area.

We left the park and she was asleep by the time we buckled her in the car seat. She awoke his morning at 4:30am and we had breakfast at 5 after some snuggle time. She's loving Nittany who will kiss her sweet lips; yucky to me, but a big step for her! I did some "school" w/ her at 6am~ an alphabet puzzle. She can repeat the letters, sing the ABC song, but after the letter D, she's lost. It gave me a good starting point!

She wasn't happy to see Baba leave for work at 6am; he reassured her that he'd be back later today. We'll probably meet him at Costco for groceries around 12pm!

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Grateful for each of you~ Shari