A Sweet Sunday

My mom recently made Anna Grace a gorgeous smocked dress. She spent hours hand stitching little rows of flowers and hearts, and I thought it would make the perfect dress for Anna Grace to wear to church for Valentine's Day.



I love how the sleeves have little ribbons that tie at the wrists.


This was the first Sunday ever that Anna Grace cried when I was leaving her at Sunday school. The minute I started to get ready to leave, her eyes welled up with big alligator tears and she said, "No, Mommy. I don't want to stay." Because of her past, we have to do things a little differently with her than we did with Cole & Alex. I never want her to feel like she is being abandoned all over again, so I promised that I would not leave her until she was ready. I stayed by her side while she ate a snack and started to play. She still did not want me to leave until she heard the teacher say that they were going to play outside on the playground. I told her that if she wanted to play outside, I was going to big church, but I would be back.
I feel like this was actually a big step for us today in the attachment process. She is such an outgoing and friendly kid that she really doesn't meet a stranger. Maybe I am the one that needed to know that she really does want me to be the one to take care of her. Attachment is a process. It doesn't just happen over night with an adopted kid. She has had so many let downs and disruptions in her life that she has learned to go with the flow. I worry that Anna Grace doesn't quite realize in her little 2-year-old mind that she is with her forever Mommy and Daddy, and she will never have to adjust to a new life again.



Anna Grace and I went to a birthday party after church. Her friend, Janie, who was adopted from Taiwan, was turning 2 and she had a party at the jumping place in the mall. Anna Grace was so excited that she was giving Janie a set of training chopsticks, some Kia-lan bubbles, and her all-time favorite Chinese cookies. Anna Grace will do anything for one of her cherished Chinese cookies, and she was thrilled to give a box of them to Janie- although she kept trying to convince me as we were driving to the party that we should only give one cookie out of the box to Janie!

I was amazed at the party to see Anna Grace scaling the climbing walls to the slides with the other 2-year-olds. I kept thinking about the baby who came to us just 9 months ago who could not even climb into her toddler bed or crawl across our bed in the hotel. And here she was, jumping and climbing and sliding with the other kids. We have truly come a long way!!