Week 2 of school begins tomorrow

Things are going quite well by my estimation. Maybe my expectations were out of line, but the girls seem to be blending in with family life at a faster than expected pace. I am still ignoring a few things that I don't have language to extinguish in behavior. I believe they are significant but can wait for the right time.

I remember when our Social Worker came to our home and asked us what our house rules were. I could only think of one. How pathetic that made me feel. I thought, wow, we must have no structure or discipline around here. I had a feeling though that I would be faced with more house rules when the girls got here. I would remember, oh yea, that's right, I don't like that. I imagined it would be things like messes, property distruction, stealing or some such. What I've found is 3 kinda trivial things I never allowed when my bio children were small and because I disliked the things so much, the behaviors have not been around here for a very long time.

If you know me, you know I hate when someone mocks someone's sincere laughter. Do Alla and Lena do that? Yes. Try to explain with 3 words not to mock. I have found myself mocking laughter right back to them and saying "no". I'll let you know when that starts to work. I was thinking today that in some way it's one of the few things they can imitate easily and so maybe they are imitating more than mocking. Their attitude looks like mocking, but I'll have to believe the other for a while. The next thing is making fun of people (kind of in the same family of 'sins') I'll let you know when my sour faces and ignoring the comments/laughter works. Last, but not least, whining. Boy can these two whine. Makes me wonder if it ever got them anywhere in the internot. How could it have? Anyone know? Just yesterday I started working on whining. I let it go all these weeks, with no comment really, not giving in to it, but not disciplining it. Yesterday I decided to go for it. Hasn't extinguished yet, but I have begun the "discussion".

Now that I've told you the truth about some discipline issues, I need to say that there are also times when their energy gets the best of them and they have trouble coming back to calm. But if I were to generalize I would still say things are going very well.
They are obedient and helpful. They manage their hygiene, bed time, and eating. Hair maintenance is still a bit lacking but until we have that 100% with a bio kid, who shall remain nameless, I can't really tackle it big time with the younger two.

Week 2 of school begins tomorrow. Neither of them expresses much joy about that. They began at Westside Middle School (nearly 1000 7th & 8th grade students!) on Tuesday of last week. They seem to be getting the general idea of expectations, but I imagine the teachers have their own list of things they are trying to figure out how to shape. Alla and Lena are in English for 4 periods in the a.m. together and then they split to 7th and 8th grade classes of Math, Science, Business, P.E. and some fancy named class that has a variety of things going on. (curriculum night is coming) I believe both girls will eventually like school. It may be next year or in 11th grade, but I think they have it in them to do well in school. I have already noticed improvement in English in one week. The school personel have been so encouraging and willing to help. I'm impressed so far with WMS. That being said, I can't even begin to imagine what these girls must be feeling as they walk in that huge building every day. Or how they feel walking into the lunch room! yipes. Pray for them.

Michelle Maly has been so nice to help with interpretiing at the Dr. , school and home. There are just things for which one needs language. Lela Steele called last night (the missionary from Odessa -Alla's class) She is in Florida with some health issues. Pray for her. It was very fun to hear from her and to find out she has Alla's photo albums and watch from the internot. I don't remember if I told you we couldn't get those because the keys to Alla's room were not available (Lena's keys were, but Alla's weren't) So that is one piece of unfinished business almost done.

It appears that there may be others moving toward this adoption idea. I just would like to say to anyone reading this if you are a person that senses God calling you to adoption, go for it. Email me and ask anything you want. If you've been reading this blog, you know I'm not a terribly private person. I really welcome any question (I hope that's true). I have the faces of children we met who are still in the orphanage system in my mind. The face of one boy who sat on the curb with the longest face as we took Alla away. Another of Lena's friend who was crying as Lena left. I know from a missionary that those kids wonder why not me? I wonder that too. I'm blown away by the number of people I know who are walking in the direction of adoption. God bless you. Email me javanputten@yahoo.com