One month with Kai.

Kai has been home with us for one month today!  Shocking how fast that went by.

Kids are enjoying spring break.  We have very little planned.  Just loving the break from the normal busy shedule.

Eric has been working on the props for Lili's play.  Will be good to have that done.

Kai continues on with potty training.  He's not totally thrilled.  He hasn't pooped since Sat. morning.  A few pee  accidents and a few pees on the toilet.  He can really hold it! He likes the celebrating part and he is going willingly but he'd much prefer we left him in a diaper.  Trying hard to keep momentum going while not pushing or creating too much pressure but still trying to be firm. 

Luk is upset that he isn't getting any candy so we've told him he can earn some too.  Just has to tell us when he needs a change.  He hasn't come to tell us once.  Too funny really because he could just say he needed a change randomly and he'd get it right since he is steadily going! 

Kai is really working the temper tantrums. Almost always triggered by Eric moving him.  Tonight's 20 min. screaming fit was because he was kicking over Jia and Luk's Lego creations and Eric asked him to come away and he refused so he was escorted out of the living room. He makes a distinct crying sound of WAH, WAH, WAH when he's not  getting his way.  The actual melt downs from frustration and fear are getting less and less. 

I'd like to know how nannies in China typically deal with tantrums.  He has his tantrum finely tuned.  He manages to squeeze out tears and open his eyes a bit to peek at us and he can stop the whole screaming, kicking and tears in a second flat if he thinks he's going to get his way. I just can't fathom an orphanage setting that would allow that behaviour and he couldn't have perfected this in such a short amount of time.  Could he?

The other four don't react at all when Kai has a tantrum.  They step away from him and carry on.  Luk has thankfully stopped trying to copy Kai. You have to wonder what he's thinking when we all just carry on. 

Other than the few minutes of tantrums  he puts us all through scattered randomly through the day he's doing really great.  He is smiley and joins in.  He likes learning new things.  He's figuring out this living in a family thing.

Luk's Duplo family.

Luk's favorite thing to do is drawing and second is playing with Duplo.

Kai has quickly become as interested in the Duplo. The two of them play together for long periods of time.  They chat away and sometimes work together on projects.

Kai has been restricted to the kitchen with the potty training so Luk hung his head and came to build all on his own.  He came to get us so we could see that he built our family all holding hands  :)

Can't help but notice he's got eight people there!  Yikes.  Wonder if he's picturing the sister Jia is still asking for.

Mom's Tea Party

Mom hosted a boy shower for Kai and I today.  We had a nice visit and good snacks. Kai enjoyed meeting the ladies. 

He was particularly thrilled with a piggy (fox) bank from Gramma and was shaking a bit about getting to open the present and then put coins in the bank.  Cute.

Cousin Debbie fluked onto a very meaningful gift.  I bought a 100 children good wishes tapestry for Lili when we were in China.  Then on Fei's trip we didn't find one.  When we moved to this house our realtor commented on the hanging and I told her we couldn't find one for Fei. Many months later she dropped by with two.  One for Fei and one just in case there was another kid (Jia).  Then for Luk we bought another one in China.  I was just thinking the other day that Kai doesn't have one. Then Debbie gifted us with a table cloth today with the 100 kids good wishes on it!  Crazy. 

Fei and I are hoping to put him in a Chinese outfit and put him on the silk for a photo.  Right after we find time for a hair cut ;)

Cousin Bastion came today and Kai seemed pretty taken with the baby. He's so cute.

After everyone left the girls and I went to Zootopia.  Big girls and I loved it.  Jia was a bit scared. 

Kai potty trained most of the day.  We took a break while we had company.  He can really, really hold it.  From 7am to 1:30 pm and nothing.  He peed in the pull up right away.  I wasn't militant on the timer 10 minute thing.  Once in a while I suggested he go, sometimes he just went on his own.  He did manage one pee at the potty but it didn't technically go in the potty and I missed it.  He also isn't asking for the candy.  It's exhausting. 

Bastion was pretty excited about hearing piano music.

Language

We get LOTS of questions about Kai's English.

Lili was using some Hakka. Fei was speaking Nangchanese. Jia had only heard a local dialect. Luk was speaking Mandarin. Kai understands and speaks Mandarin.  We have no fear, he will learn just as the others have.

Right now he comprehends most of what we say.  We aren't having any communication problems.  He responds appropriately. He tries.  He mimics.  He chats to himself.  He tries out new words constantly.

He is playing right now and told me "it's a tower".  I asked how many towers and he said "ree".  Which I assume was three, so I counted the four towers and he smiled and nodded.  Anyones guess if he got that or not. But he will.

We had a meeting at the school to talk about the boys and their needs.  It went well.  They felt the only reason to wait another year to start would be if there were behavioural issues.  Which there aren't.  They are both able to sit and do busy quiet work.  They are both keen to learn.  I voiced my concerns about Kai's language.  They have offered assistance for him.  Also Luk qualifies so it was suggested they could work together and get more time.  They were also extremely accommodating about Luk's physical needs.  It was all good. 

Kai says things like "ee ou ater" see you later. "Ere is I-o-ba" there is Isabel. Some of it is more clear "why?".  "Mama's home!" "Night night Daddy" "supper time". 

General rule for kids in a new language is comprehension at two months, conversational at six months and scholastic comprehension when they're at equal time to their original language.  Then there is the developmental math. Kai was 4 years, four months when he came to Canada.  Kids from institutional care lose one month for every four.  Which means he should be operating at a young three year old level.  He's higher in some areas and lower in others :)

Mom is having a "boy shower" of Kai and I today.  I should be tidying the house but instead the boys are playing with games and developmental toys out of the Mama cupboard (things with pieces and are supervised).  They're having a great time.  Kai is hard at potty training again today, so I'm stuck to the laminate floor again. Don't want him peeing on the hard wood or the carpet.  We're at two hours and still nothing.

A mere two families.

This is what our kids look like when we get together with Shannon and Ken's family.  A mere nine kids. 

We had a nice visit.  Just a wee bit of chaos. 

Shannon made Kai a gorgeous quilt.  He isn't a blankie kid but we're working on it. Two nights in a row he's climbed into bed under the blankets and tonight he let Shannon  put the new quilt around his shoulders for a photo.

Potty training.

So, ya, didn't see this in my future.  I don't like potty training.  Waiting for that magical moment for everything to click.

Kai gives all indication that he's ready.  I even wonder if he was trained in China.  It's fairly unusual to not be on a shedule at his age from a Chinese orphanage.  Frankly just too expensive and labour intensive to have kids not potty trained. To clarify, orphanage trained would be a whole line of kids sitting on little potties, possibly eating snacks and staying there until they've gone. Not like here where we want them to stop what they're doing and go potty on their own.

Anyways...

Today was the day.  Kai and I spent four and a half hours with a timer and some candy.  Don't judge it works.  So Mr. Kai sat on the potty every 10 mins for four and a half hours.  It wasn't me telling him to go, it was the timer.  Plus there was candy. He held out for the whole time!  No pee.  There was a drop on the seat at one point but he just laughed about it.  I do think some pee hit the water but I didn't see or hear it. 

So while that magic moment didn't actually happen today he showed us he can really hold it a long time.  He also learned today how to pull underwear down, use the stool, turn around, sit, adjust and make sure things were aimed properly and then wipe and get off the toilet and pull those undies up.

Those spiderman underwear are seriously adorable.

Along with our potty training he learned to hold the pencil properly and copy what I was doing on my paper.  He used the cheerio book and showed some stellar sorting skills. He also willingly had a bath with Luk.  He doesn't look so thrilled in the picture but really it went well.

We put him in a pull up and stopped the every ten minute thing because we had friends coming to meet Kai.  He peed in the pull up of course but the moment they left he ran on his own to the toilet and pulled his pants and pull up down and got on the potty, on his own.  Still, no visable pee but he wasn't asking for the candy and overall we saw that as a pretty successful start.

Pressure is on.  He's registered for kindergarten.  Five months left to get this mastered.

Keeping it real.

It's 3 in the morning. Jia vomited in my bed at midnight so I'm laying on a twin size Scooby-Doo sheet tucked in sideways because there was no point putting sheets on without the mattress pad, which is being washed. She just got up again, made it to the bathroom but projectile vomited over the whole floor, then walked through it and didn't tell Eric who went to her and also walked through it. This is the stuff nightmares are made of.  Big brownie points to Eric for cleaning it all.  He's downstairs now doing dishes. I don't think he'll settle down for a bit.

Wish I could say Jia is sick. Sadly this is her attempt at controlling us by not eating. In the on going saga of her not wanting to eat what the rest of us are eating for dinner. She is empty.  Really empty now. And still refusing to eat more than a nibble.

We had cauliflower at dinner and Luk refused it so Eric told him to try it. He gagged on it and spit it out on the table. Ew.  Then refused to eat anything. Truly crazy stuff watching kids reject food. Good food that the rest of us can't get in fast enough.

Luk has also been trying out Kai style temper tantrums. It's not working for him. When Kai loses it, he sits on the floor screaming and kicking his feet, we ignore him. When Luk tries it he is swiftly taken to his room. He is completely mystified about why it is different. And he's tantruming often in an attempt to figure it out. He never tantrumed before Kai.  So, ya' that's fun.

Tomorrow we meet with the district to discuss Luk's needs in the classroom. We're taking Kai too. No clue what we're doing.  Contemplating holding them both back a year and doing preschool. Or home schooling kindergarten.  Or trying kindergarten.  We have NO clue how to register Kai.  He has zero documentation. We still don't even have a medical number, they have no clue how to process his file. The landed immigrant card isn't issued yet.  It's the wrong name anyways. We don't have his landing paper so can't apply for a sin. No birth cert. Nothing but a letter from our agency stating his new name and birthdate. The meeting should be interesting.  We just have no clue what we're doing or what is really best for the boys.

Kai tantrums over really fun stuff like being told he needs sox on to go out. Or that it's time to clean up. Or keep the duplo on the duplo table. Or get out of the bathroom when Jia is in there. We are usually clueless about what the actual problem is and of course he can't tell us.  He will lose it in public too. He's not saving that joy for just us.  We're keeping him home as much as possible. He is overwhelmed. He's happy enough for the most part.  He's fairly easily redirected or distracted. But these very quick melt downs would be so uncool in school.

Jia is vomiting again. Sigh. Or puking as she prefers to say.