Getting Better All The Time

and how could she not be with a nurse like Mary Clare? After the physical therapist brought a small pedaling therapy tool, Mom's been using the girls' tricycle with the back end propped up on books to exercise. Mary Clare provides the entertainment. I think my mom is the most amazing woman. Through this whole ordeal she has never complained and just keeps trying to think of positive ways to look at her accident. She told me she'd just been worrying that she didn't get to spend enough time with Maggie Rose and now here she is with nothing but time. She told us we were not going to look back on this as the Christmas PoPo broke her hip but rather as the Christmas PoPo came to stay. My girls will certainly never forget it and even though she only lives a mile away they are going to be heartbroken when she goes back home.

Bad Hair Days

This is a picture of Margaret Rose from last fall at Huazhou. You can kind of see why everytime we mention trimming her bangs and hair she cries and wraps her arms around her head. Well Mom gave it one more try today and told MR that we really needed to just give her bangs a little trim. Margaret Rose did what she always does but this time had enough languge to tell us, "No! No cut hair! In my China they make me bald headed!" Well this was the breakthrough moment and somehow Mom was able to explain that we would never make her bald headed. Once she was convinced that the little trim would only add to the pretty she was on board. I didn't cut much so that she might let us have another go at it. Next time we'll try and get Miss Debbie who cuts Mary Clare's and Grandma's hair to do a professional job.

BEFORE

AFTER

Let's Make a Mermaid

Oh how I love this smile!

Lee and I are alternating days to be home with Mom for awhile. Margaret Rose adores school and is happy to go each day but Mary Clare really dislikes daycare so she is staying home with us and she is deliriously happy. She gets up each morning smiling and brimming with plans for PoPo. She's been wanting to make a clothespin mermaid out of a Chicken Socks book and today was the perfect day! After crafts she helped me cook lunch and while sitting at the table she said, "Mama, this is a fine day!"

Look who's home!

Yesterday and this morning we were preparing for Mom to be sent from the hospital to a rehabilitation facility for several weeks. Around noon her wonderful doctor came in and asked if she didn't want to just go home. He said the nurses told him that Mom had been up on her own walking in the hall and was doing all the exercies the physical therapist had shown her. He said if she had someone to stay with or someone who could stay with her that she'd be just fine at home since she's so motivated to recover. We moved a twin bed into our den and had her home by 4:00. The girls are THRILLED! Margaret Rose enjoyed having breakfast on the Pooh couch after giving PoPo her tray.

Thanksgiving

Well this certainly wasn't how we pictured spending Margaret Rose's first Thanksgiving but we are very thankful that my Mom (the girls' beloved PoPo) is recovering well and is in good spirits. Mom fell picking MC up from daycare and has broken her hip. They did surgery Wednesday and were able to fix it with pins and are hopeful that that a replacement can be avoided. We are quite put out -okay maybe furious is a better word- with the daycare director who left my mom alone with MC while he went to review his surveillance tapes so that he could assure her that she'd fallen over MC's feet and not the daycare door threshold. I'm sure that made her feel much better as she sat there in pain hoping MC didn't run out the door into the parking lot. The lack of compassion just completely appalls me.

Margaret Rose is in serious need of a hair trim but she refuses to allow us anywhere near her head with the scissors. We took her to Miss Debbie who cuts MC's hair and she wouldn't let her trim it either. She just grabs her head and repeats "long hair, long hair" over and over. So we'll put up with the shaggy look for a bit longer.

The drought situation was brought home for me as we were walking to the car today. It started to sprinkle and MR looked up at the sky and in all seriousness said, "Turn off, peas (please)." Guess we haven't had enough rain for her to even know what it is.

Here's Mary Clare in her wonderful turkey overalls. MR wore them to school earlier in the week so today was MC's turn. And here's MC doing her flat frog imitation to entertain PoPo in the hospital.

God's children by adoption baptized into his grace

Today was Margaret Rose's baptism. It was a wonderful day and we were happy that so many of those we love came to be part of our sweet girl's initiation into Christ's Body the Church. Both our girls share All Saints' Day as their baptismal day. We sang two of my favorite hymns - For All The Saints and I Sing A Song of the Saints of God- and the choir once again used the descant that Lee wrote for Mary Clare's baptism for the hymn on the way to the baptismal font. Early Sunday morning I was able to show Margaret Rose a video clip of another child being baptised and she watched with great interest. She is an extremely neat child and we were afraid that the water getting all over her clothes would upset her. Before leaving the house we were running through the checklist - camera, bulletins, coats and Margaret piped up with, "I need towel. He gonna wash da hair." Well, I guess that is what it looked like in the clip she saw. During the entire service she showed remarkable poise and was nothing but cooperative. I think her lovely smile says more than I ever could about the signifcance of the day.