One More Day!

Wow, I can hardly believe that the day is almost over, meaning we visit Jill for the last time tomorrow and bring her her with us Friday morning! Today we had an afternoon visit, so we slept in, I did a lot of laundry, we watched a movie, and I finished the book Ruby Holler (book review to follow!)We stayed inside for our visit today since it rained a little this morning. They gave us back the little photo album we left for her on the first trip and the notebook I left for caretakers to write notes of memories about Jill's time there. Unfortunately the notebook was only written in by two people; one dated the day I left it there in April, and the other just today! I was a little disappointed about that because I know she has 6 caretakers now and that she has probably had 6 others each year of her life here. I'd estimate that 24 people have worked with her and that's not including her doctor! (The building had about 6 different doctors too.) But, at this point, we'll take what we can get. They also said that they did not have any old pictures of her, that it is against the rules to take the children's pictures or something! I'm going to keep pushing that tomorrow and Friday though. I just can't imagine that they don't take a yearly photo for their records or something that we could get a hold of! They also asked for a $100 donation to the orphanage for medications. We really thought that CHI was supposed to take care of all the donations and that the orphanage donations were included in our CHI fees. So, we said we'd have to think about it. We found out earlier this week that our newest social worker has left CHI and we do not yet have the name of a new one, so I do not really know who to e-mail about that. I thought that maybe if we got some pictures and the notebook back we might, but the notebook doesn't have much in it and so far, no pictures.
When they brought the notebook and photo album out she ran for that photo album! I don't know if she's had it with her the whole time or if she was just seeing it again for the first time since I gave it to her in April. She just loves that book! She carried it to the table and flipped through it, then to the green couch to look at it, then to the black couch to look through it, then......you get the picture! But, she wouldn't let us touch it!!! It was HERS, HERS, HERS! I about held her down with it to try to point out Mama, Papa, Ty and Jake. She whined and "nyet-ed", but eventually let me do it for about a minute and a half. Earlier we practiced saying "Jill" again and WOW! She got the J down right! It sounded great! I pointed to Mama and Papa in her photo book, then pointed to Ty and told her to say "Ty" and SHE DID! Then I pointed to Jake and told here to say "Jake" and SHE DID! Well, it sounded more like "Dake", but that's what most toddlers call Jake. Even Ty called him "Dake" when Jake was born. Then she was off with her book again, taking it from place to place. Twice she sat down and very carefully flipped through each page and was saying things about them. I think she tried to say Ty and Jake again on one page, but I'm not sure. This is how she spent most of the day, but a few other things she did were... brush the doll's hair and put the headband on, actually tried to stack three blocks, but when they fell down, that was the end of that, and hugged and rocked and danced with her baby doll "Lala". Lala is the somewhat 'slang' word for baby. It's really only used by small children. Whenever Jill sees a baby outside she says "Lala" and she calls the baby doll we bring with us every day "Lala" too, so now I call it that as well.
We went to the "French Restaurant" La Vanille for dinner. I got the Ceasar Salad for the first time and it was excellent! Wade go the tuna sandwich again and we both had the famous fruit salad. For desert I got the coffee mouse covered in dark chocolate thing we shared last time, but he got two scoops of vanilla ice cream topped with honey. He loved it!!! His favorite part about it was that is was COLD! He's so tired of everything being served at room temperature, even the milkshakes we got yesterday, and the lack of ice around here. We're planning ahead and thinking if all is going well we may take Jill to this resaturant long about Wednesday. They have a little table that has toys for kids to play with while they wait, and there usually is a kid or two there whenever we go, so it's a good first restaurant to try. If that goes well we may take her to the Chocolate Cafe place sometime too.
For anyone keeping track, we're past the halfway point!!! If we do return on the 9th of July, that's exactly 30 days. Yesterday was day 15, halfway day! My parents and boys celebrated! I guess halfway sounds good to them, but Wade said, "We're only halfway?!" I do think the time will go quickly once we get her in our custody. The 10 days went by more quickly than I thought, and I think she'll keep us busy enough that it will just fly by; and then we can fly home!

Book Review #3
Ruby Holler
by Sharon Creech

This book immediately struck my intrest because it is about two orphans! The children are twins, a boy and a girl, and they are named Dallas and Florida. When they were left on the steps of the "children's home" there was no information on them, no birthdate, no names. The caretakers named them Dallas and Florida because the box was lined with travel brochures and Dallas was laying on the one for Dallas, and Florida on the one for Florida! In one part of the book Florida asked what "that" was; it was a rocking chair. The author explained that she had never been rocked. For some reason I found that to be very sad. I have a rocking chair in Jill's room. I don't know if she's ever been rocked or not, but I plan to hold her in that chair and rock her. Three is not too old for rocking! As for the plot of the book, well, there isn't much of one. There are many stories of these kids-stories while they are living with the nice older couple Tiller and Sairy in Ruby Holler, stories from their past where they were sent to live with some terrible people, all very interesting stories, but no big plot line. By reading the back of this book I was under the impression that the holler was magical and it was a fantasy book, but it is not. I suppose they used the words magical because it was peaceful, full of fresh air, an open place for kids to roam about, run, climb trees, etc. A magical place for children, especially children that had been treated as these twins had been in their past. I really enjoy realistic fiction stories like this, but I like them even better when there is something to be solved or something to really connect the little stories together, some "rising action", "climax", etc! This book, just like Bloomability by the same author, has nice stories about the characters that I enjoy, but doesn't really "go" anyhwere. The ending of Ruby Holler was a little better than the ending of Bloomability as you do know if the kids stay with Sairy and Tiller or not, which, if you call that a plot line, was the general idea of the book. So, there is an answer at the end of this book as opposed to Bloomability which just 'ended'. I would recommend this book more to girls than boys, and I would rate it 4 out of 5 stars. The lack of plotline lost it one star, but I really did enjoy the stories and wanted to keep reading! I finished this 310 page book in two days! I was a little sad when it was over, I'd like to know more of what happened with Dallas, Florida, Sairy, Tiller and they mysterious Mr. Z.