I am a terrible blogger.....

Lucy and Jude's first day of school in America


Over the past 2 months we have moved from China back to Arkansas.....yes, total chaos. Now you understand why I haven't posted...I haven't had the opportunity or energy to do so.
Anyway, Lucy is doing great. She entered the US on November 20 just in time to enjoy her first Thanksgiving then began 1st grade on November 29. She loves school and her teacher. We aren't sure how much she is actually learning, but she loves to go. She had no problem embracing the Christmas holiday...she knew all about Baby Jesus and Santa Claus. She sat in Santa's lap and told him that she wanted a Barbie house and Barbie car....and he delivered.
Lucy's English has exploded. She has problems remembering to use the verb "is" because that word is automatically built into Chinese adjectives. So, we would say, "She is nice" and Lucy says, "She nice." Surely she will eventually get it....or else she will go to college saying, "Her my friend."
Lucy really cracks us up about keeping her room clean. She makes her bed as she is getting out of it every morning. She wants everything to be in perfect order. She cried the other day because I told her told to put her change of clothes on her floor until I could get in there to hang them up! I wish her good habits would rub off onto the rest of us, but as of now we are still slobs.
Lucy hasn't missed a beat with her new life with us or in America. She is one tough little girl!

Better late than never......

One good thing about living in Siping is that we are the only ones who recognize Western holidays, so we can celebrate on whatever day we choose. The Halloween costumes came in the mail a little late this year, so we just trick-or-treated a few nights ago. In case you are wondering, we only go to the other English teachers' apartments. It would have been interesting to see what a local would have thought about the Grim Reaper, Iron Man, and Snow White knocking at their door asking for candy. Actually, it isn't much stranger than them burning play money for their dead relatives to spend in the afterlife.
Lucy took her first train ride last week. She and I went to Beijing with a teammate for the day and we took the night train there and back. We saw a friend there who asked Lucy what her favorite food was and she said, "McDonalds!" Spoken by a true Clements kid.
Many people have commented about how Lucy will be a tomboy since she only has boys to play with, but I don't think that is going to happen anytime soon. Yesterday Lucy and Will both had a purse on their shoulder heading out to play in the hall. A little while later Daren told me that they were ballroom dancing. What is wrong with my kids?

These last few weeks have slipped away without me updating the blog. We have kept pretty busy doing school, watching movies, and playing (and playing and playing.) Lucy and Will discovered some old sunglasses, so they spend alot of time looking cool.
Lucy is doing well learning her alphabet. Her English is really coming along. Each day we put stickers on her word tree when she learns the English name and then she repeats all the words to me. I noticed today that she was saying the names without even looking at the pictures, so I guess she has them memorized in order now. That sorta defeats the purpose of the exercise, I think. I may have to rearrange the stickers when she is asleep tonight and see if I can trick her up.

Before it is too cold......

Winter weather will hit Siping in the next few weeks and stay until May, so we are trying to get the kids out as much as possible now. We took a walk to the pond on our university campus and Katherine took these pictures.
Lucy said her first English sentence on Friday. We were walking to the market area and she said, "No school tomorrow...yippee!" At first I was really proud that she was able to put those words together, then I worried that maybe this was the first indication that she was going to be an academic slacker. It is probably more of an indication of what a mean teacher I am.

Photo Shoot!

I asked Katherine to take some photos of Lucy yesterday in her sweet little Southern Belle smocked dress. She was so excited when I pulled out the new dress and hair accessories and then she really hammed it up in front of the camera. I thought she was going to be my little clone because she can't carry a tune or throw a ball, but now she has the photogenic thing up on me.
By the way, aren't those dimples cute!

4 weeks together

It is hard to believe that we have been a family of 5 for 4 weeks....in some ways it seems like longer and in some ways shorter. Honestly, the first 3 weeks at the Holiday Inn shouldn't really count....I get light-headed even thinking about that hotel room.
This past week has had its ups and downs, but I think we may come out on top in the end.
Lucy's English is really picking up. Today at the grocery store, Will walked off in the opposite direction and she said, "This way!" She also says, "cool." So now it is official....her English is better than my Chinese.
We have found that going out with Lucy almost attracts more attention than the boys do. The problem is that the Chinese try to talk to her and we really don't know most of what they are saying which is not in our best interest. I guess that is part of raising a child in her home country when it isn't your home country....confusing, at best.
Our teammate, Mark, brought a Build-a-Bear back from the states for Lucy and she really likes it. She makes sure she has it when she goes to sleep at night.
So, we have cut paper and washed dishes.....that pretty much wraps up what there is to do in Siping.

Trying to settle in.......

We have been back in Siping for 5 days now and we are trying to establish a new normal routine. Lucy is adjusting pretty well so far. She is doing great during our home school time. We only do about 2 hours a day and we take about 30 minutes of breaks during that time! There is only so much you can teach someone who doesn't speak your own language......I bet she is thinking the same thing about me.
We watched about 5 hours of Brady Bunch DVDs today. Lucy really likes Cindy. She laughs out loud at some of the episodes. I'm sure Lucy wonders why she got stuck with us instead of an awesome family like the Brady's. I use to wonder that, too until I realized how screwed up they were in real life.
We are finally discovering things that Lucy won't eat (no comments on my cooking please.) She cannot stand the texture of oatmeal and she doesn't like tuna fish, either. I finally made her some ramen noodles after she turned down the tuna fish. She slurped those down, literally.
Nothing much else to report here.....we are basically just staying home and working on family dynamics. I understand what the expression "2 steps forward and 1 step back" is all about now.