Someone Turned Two on the 18th!

Cassidy really enjoyed her first birthday at home! She made out like a bandit and really enjoyed having visitors. After she opened her presents, she quickly became possessive of everything she got. She kept everyone on a short leash but was nice enough to let me put her new baby stroller together. She is definitely all girl.

Dancing Machine, Dancing Machine

The last 30 seconds of the video make the whole thing more than worthwhile. Observe the rhythmic stylings of the next Beyonce - albeit a modest, fully-dressed version.

New Experience

Yesterday was a big guys' day out for the Yeager boys because we had to go make our pinewood derby cars for upcoming races. While I was looking forward to it on the one hand (as evidenced by the fact that I still have the derby car from my scout days), I was also concerned how taking that time away from the house would impact my relationship with Cassidy. I didn't know if she withdraw and distance herself or excitedly greet me (didn't really care how the boys fared with her). I was also concerned about compounding things by going straight from hours away from home to plugging directly into the Cardinals' NFL playoff game.

I can happily report that Cassidy was happy to see all of us, and she even seemed very intent to spend time with me. As I sat on the floor watching the game, she hovered around me, rarely leaving the room. While that was all well and good, I was concerned that if she remained in my proximity, I might inadvertently scare her. You can try to contain the emotions, but you never know when a slip up might occur. I had been very mindful of that over the last 10 weeks... but last night's game was exceptional!!

It's one thing for your team win a game, but it's another thing for your team to embarrass the opponent. Arizona just destroyed Carolina, and in the process of annihilating those poor Panthers, I slipped... with Cassidy sitting two feet in front of me... as she was looking directly at me. I yelled, "YEAH!" and threw both of my arms in the air as if to signal "touchdown." I then came back to my senses and remembered that my sensitive little Cassidy was sitting so very close. Before my eyes could pan down from the screen to see her, I heard her yell gibberish and experienced the joy of watching my little girl raise her arms as I had! She had the biggest smile on her face, too.

Of course, it was also great because my boys love to hear me get into a football game. To date, the hardest Zachary has ever laughed was when Arizona played Dallas earlier this season. After I was done going crazy and the laughter died down, Zachary said, "Do it again..." So now it's kind of fun for me to listen to the hardy guffaws outlast my emotional outbursts. So I had the additional joy of listening to Jake laugh two rooms away.

What a great day! Derby cars with the boys and then football watching with Cass.

I Have Arrived!

You now see what I've been waiting for! I couldn't hope for more - besides her being free of the "vascular anomalies." I'm pretty close to being exactly where I've wanted to be with her. Truth be told, I don't care if I ever reach that mountain top. This is good enough for me. As of last night, I was able to send her to dream land by laying her on my chest. She knows me by name. She freely gives me hugs and her version of fist bumps. She actively seeks to wrap me around her finger. What more could a daughter's dad ask for?!

So what if she doesn't want to lay on me or near me at 2:00 in the morning...?! I don't want anyone laying near me at that time of night anyway!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

A little time has gone by since my last post, and I do apologize for that. It really is my intention to update this regularly, but the road to somewhere nasty is paved with good intentions, right? To catch you up to speed in a nutshell, there has been good and bad and ups and downs. If you're able to step away from the immediacy of minute-to-minute, you will see a huge leap forward! In the last week, Cassidy really has warmed to me. She fist bumps now (which she learned strictly by observing the other children doing it), and she even gave me a single kiss on the cheek last weekend (none since)! Last night, she even gave me the Mommy treatment. What is the Mommy treatment? Whining at me any time I put her down. Of course, the reasons are pretty different. She likes being held by Mommy for the peace and love of it. She wants me to pick her up because she's a daredevil/thrill seeker. She finally figured out that I am the human roller coaster. She likes being hoisted into the air and riding on my shoulders as I gallop through the house (in the house only, though). She even likes being flipped in my arms (which Shari doesn't like watching). She likes riding on my foot as I walk around, and she likes being spun around, albeit slowly. The rough part for me is that once I do anything like that for her, every other kid in the house wants to do the same thing. Let me tell you that there is a huge difference in weight between a 23-month-old, undersized girl and an almost-nine-year-old, oversized boy! I think I'm probably an inch shorter than I used to be just by virtue of my spine being compacted by the resident food vacuum sitting on my shoulders...

Okay, I confess. It's not all about the acrobatics. She also wants me to pick her up because I'll hook her up with the peppercorn potato chips. (She likes things with a little kick...)

Below is a rather long three-minute video of Cass' first Christmas. I recorded and posted the whole thing mostly to showcase just how long it took her to work through one present. As a bonus, you will also get to hear lots of happy screams from the other kids as well as me correcting Jake... who, as I found out moments after the filming stopped, was actually in the right. Enjoy.

So Christmas was exactly what the doctor ordered for us. While I'm certainly not equal to Mommy in Cassidy's little eyes, she has certainly warmed up to me. She has napped on my chest. I can now put her down for night-nights without having to trap her on her side in my arms. She reacts enthusiastically when I get home from work. She can say "dadda" now, and she is actually talking about me when she says it. I know some people didn't understand or appreciate our decision to stay home for Christmas, I'll never regret it, and I'd do it again in a heartbeat. Next year, we can give her the customary traveling Christmas experience...

Mystery Solved

For weeks I have been wondering, "What is the deal?!" I've wondered, "When is Cassidy going to commit to liking me...?" We've played well together one moment only to have her stare at me with the look of terror the next. I've had her rolling with tickles only to have her stop without warning and slap at me like she was ready to fight. I've had her practically leap out of my arms to get back to Shari. I've had her greet me with a smile when I get home from work only to have her treat me like I have cooties by the time I get my coat off. Well I identified the problem on Saturday.

The problem is my wife. On Saturday, she had to run errands for most of the day, so I was left to care for the entire brood... by myself. As usual, Cassidy cried as she was handed over to me. As usual, she cried as Mommy went out the door. As usual, she was done crying by the time Shari had pulled out of the driveway. I didn't hear another cry for the rest of my alone time with her. She wasn't clingy, and she wasn't whiney. Actually, she was generally content. Occasionally, she would wrap her arms around my legs to let me know she wanted to be picked up... just like she does to Shari. When it was nap time, she went down without a single whimper. (It was the first time I didn't have to rock her by trapping her on her side while holding her!) As a matter of fact, I was even able to get her to go back to sleep when she was rudely awakened by Zachary (sometimes the boy has only one range of volume... loud and louder). When she woke up, she was even happy to see me! It went so well that even when Shari got home, she was not quick to dive out of my arms. When we sat on the couch four feet apart, Cassidy did not scamper over to where Shari was. It was amazing.

Of course, that was Saturday, and then there has been every day since then. I'm surprised I was able to share the last paragraph with you because it seems so long ago to me. Unlike the heavenly nap night-night experience of Saturday, last night's experience resulted in unsuccessful experimentation and tough love. "What did you do...?" you're wondering. Well, as she was crying, I decided to see what blowing in her mouth would do... since she's not an itty-bitty who would lose her breath as a result. That didn't go so well. While it did manage to shorten her cries, she seemed to get more hacked off... a little more quietly.

After a minute of that experiment, I decided to try putting her on the floor and then picking her up once she calmed down. She didn't stop crying until I picked her back up. When she started to cry again, I set her back down. When I picked her back up again, she was done with the crying, and she went right to sleep. (Of course, she ended up in our bed yet again after midnight.)

It's tough to gauge where adoption/orphanage trauma ends and terrible-twoedness begins. Since I knew she would immediately shut off the tears as soon as she came in contact with Shari, I was willing to gamble and assess that I was dealing with nothing more than a temper tantrum. She has those. Don't we all.

That's all for now.

Tough Patch

Over the last few days, we've found ourselves in a little bit of a downward trend. Cassidy is back to being a little more fearful and clingy as she was several weeks ago. She is also more extreme with her emotions. There is a lack of carryover peace from one activity to the next. By that I mean she can be fine if you're doing something that she likes, and you're screwed if you aren't. Last night, she loved me if I was walking her up and down the stairs (over and over and over again), feeding her, or putting lotion on her (did you know Asians are prone to dry skin?). If I wasn't doing those things, she really didn't want to have anything to do with me. I guess the good news is that she seemed a little more content in general after I did all of the stair walking than she was prior to that. I got to enjoy her most intense sleep-time crying ever. She finally quieted down when she decided to go #2 just before completely dozing off (not a good combo). Miraculously, she slept through the diaper change. I think I used up all of my mojo on that, though, because she ended up waking up around 3:30 and joining us in bed... again.

I am looking forward to the day that she no longer cries as she leaves Mommy's gravitational pull. I'm looking forward to her no longer crying herself to sleep in my arms. In the meantime, I try to marvel and wonder about her idiosyncracies. For example, when she cries in my arms, she tends to cover up her wide-open mouth with her arm. It's like she's screaming, but she doesn't want to be heard. It makes me wonder if this came from the orphanage experience and what that experience was exactly. A funnier behavior is when she wants me to read her a book (or three words off of one page), she kneels down to look and listen. After a sentence or two (or a word or two), she'll get up take the book from me, walk a couple steps, turn around, hand me the book, and repeat the process multiple times.

The excellent news of yesterday was that we finally received Cassidy's official citizenship document. She's bonafied American now.