This was my favorite thing my boys used to say to me and I have to admit the one thing I miss most of their Spanish. We decided to name our blog after our favorite family saying.
We are back into blog-world, but with far less time and too much to say. We have worked so hard to keep afloat for these first few months that we had little time to do anything else. For our friends and family who have not seen much of us: please forgive us! We are re-starting a blog and promising to keep up on it so that you keep up with the regular antics of our daily lives.
Life has been tough and adjusting to a new family has been hard. It has rewarding elements, but it has been largely exhausting and emotionally taxing. We have been fortunate that my mother has been visiting regularly or the house would rarely get cleaned (she goes straight for the bleach and the shower stalls). The boys have had a bit of a rough adjustment too, but seem to be doing quite well and are happy. We laughed out loud the other day when Josua announced that he wanted to go to a "nice" family when we made him put his clothes in the dresser. We decided this was the ultimate proof of a settled and adjusted child--for the first time, he is not afraid that he might be taken away to an unfamiliar place and a new family. Of course a few minutes later he decided we were a nice family (probably because he wanted a piggyback ride from Papi).
The boys are settling down and now we are starting to remember more and more of their pasts and are learning coping skills, so life is getting a bit more complicated as we learn to navigate these memories, but easier as the boys are working to make sense of it all. We have also had to get deeply creative in our approach to discipline. Recently we introduced the "no touching" gloves--an set of bright orange gloves for dishes and cleaning and the like. We put them on Samuel for 30 minutes whenever he touches something he has been forbidden to touch. We had to figure something out when he walked into a store, ran for the first unstaffed cash register and began pushing every button on the thing. ugh. Good news is that he has been responding well. I think it's some combination of the visual cue to remind him not to touch as well how much he hates losing the tactile sensation. That coupled with adding in some tactile fun (corn starch and water makes a lovely gooey mess that he is particularly fond of) has at least started him thinking about touching everything, so that's nice.
Santiago is still our sweet little jekyll and hyde: often our precious Santi, but with no warning or pattern whatsoever becomes our Iago. Goodness--he is stubborn to a degree I didn't think was possible. Aside from that, he is doing well. All the boys were tested for their developmental level throughout the year to track progress and try to establish firm ages. Santi tested, for the most part, at his appropriate age level of 40 months with one notable exception: our little charmer tested at over 60 months for social skills! We laughed so hard--of course his talent lies in his social skills :)
We are all doing well and working to keep cool and busy over the summer. We'll try to keep blogging not only for our friends and family, but also because we enjoy reading so many other blogs that helped us get through these tough first months. Until next time. . .
We are back into blog-world, but with far less time and too much to say. We have worked so hard to keep afloat for these first few months that we had little time to do anything else. For our friends and family who have not seen much of us: please forgive us! We are re-starting a blog and promising to keep up on it so that you keep up with the regular antics of our daily lives.
Life has been tough and adjusting to a new family has been hard. It has rewarding elements, but it has been largely exhausting and emotionally taxing. We have been fortunate that my mother has been visiting regularly or the house would rarely get cleaned (she goes straight for the bleach and the shower stalls). The boys have had a bit of a rough adjustment too, but seem to be doing quite well and are happy. We laughed out loud the other day when Josua announced that he wanted to go to a "nice" family when we made him put his clothes in the dresser. We decided this was the ultimate proof of a settled and adjusted child--for the first time, he is not afraid that he might be taken away to an unfamiliar place and a new family. Of course a few minutes later he decided we were a nice family (probably because he wanted a piggyback ride from Papi).
The boys are settling down and now we are starting to remember more and more of their pasts and are learning coping skills, so life is getting a bit more complicated as we learn to navigate these memories, but easier as the boys are working to make sense of it all. We have also had to get deeply creative in our approach to discipline. Recently we introduced the "no touching" gloves--an set of bright orange gloves for dishes and cleaning and the like. We put them on Samuel for 30 minutes whenever he touches something he has been forbidden to touch. We had to figure something out when he walked into a store, ran for the first unstaffed cash register and began pushing every button on the thing. ugh. Good news is that he has been responding well. I think it's some combination of the visual cue to remind him not to touch as well how much he hates losing the tactile sensation. That coupled with adding in some tactile fun (corn starch and water makes a lovely gooey mess that he is particularly fond of) has at least started him thinking about touching everything, so that's nice.
Santiago is still our sweet little jekyll and hyde: often our precious Santi, but with no warning or pattern whatsoever becomes our Iago. Goodness--he is stubborn to a degree I didn't think was possible. Aside from that, he is doing well. All the boys were tested for their developmental level throughout the year to track progress and try to establish firm ages. Santi tested, for the most part, at his appropriate age level of 40 months with one notable exception: our little charmer tested at over 60 months for social skills! We laughed so hard--of course his talent lies in his social skills :)
We are all doing well and working to keep cool and busy over the summer. We'll try to keep blogging not only for our friends and family, but also because we enjoy reading so many other blogs that helped us get through these tough first months. Until next time. . .
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