Eva, Sweety

This morning in class, one of my students was joking with another student and in their "pretend" insulting told him, "You're adopted, no one loves you." I stopped my class, told him I didn't appreciate what he said and made him apologize for his statement. Then I told him that my daughter was adopted. It just made me realize how ingrained in our society is the negative image associated with "being adopted." The fact that it was natural to him to connect being adopted with not being loved disturbed me greatly. How do I insulate my daughter from this pervasive thinking, when it is so ingrained that it's even part of a casual joke? When a person adopts, they confirm over and over again that they want that child. It is an extremely difficult process that requires an amazing amount of love for a child who is unknown in many ways. The only way that one can actually survive the process is to love. I guess I am just going to have to educate this entire world on the subject one person at a time.

Last weekend, Eva was carrying around a can of vegetables (she packs everything around) and she dropped it on her big toe, cutting the skin next to the toenail. There was blood everywhere. Eva was very concerned about it, and insisted on being comforted by her mama. (Yea for attachment) I cleaned the cut, gave her some motrin and put a bandaid on it and told her that she would feel better. She did, until her bandaid fell off. She cried again, until I put another bandaid on. Mama discovered in the process that bandaids apparantly have magical powers, heretofore, unknown and undiscovered. Oh my word, did that make all the difference. Bandaid off = hurts, bandaid on = all better. It was cute.

Mrs. J's son has been sick all week, and so daycare has been closed. Eva stayed home with Granny this week. She's so cute and busy and delightful. She wants to wear her Panda Bear costume all the time and tries to dress herself in it, Granny lets her. When you ask her where something is, she shrugs her shoulders, puts her hands up in the air and says, "don't know." She can feed herself with her spoon, loves to carry around her blanket and check to see if her dolly has a wet diaper. Although, she hides from Granny when it's time for her diaper to be changed. She has recently discovered the doggy bone biscuits. Our dog has never had so many biscuits given to her... she really likes Eva. Seriously, Eva is feeding her about 12 a day now. We're going to have to go and buy more soon. She will help me unload the dishwasher and she repeats the last word of every sentence we say. I can't get over how fast she is growing. As quickly as she grows, so does her desire to test her mommy increase. It was a rough day last Friday.

I love her more than I thought was possible, and my heart melts everytime she grins up at me, or giggles, or hugs me, or pats my back, or gives me a kiss. Oh... and when she says "I love you" back to me, it is powerful.