Dairy Free Update/Boys Progress

Well, with mixed emotions, I am reporting on our 'dairy free diet'. This is day 3 and our symptoms have definitely lessened. For me, personally, I am glad that when I eat, my stomach doesn't get distended and that I don't have a lot of pain. My littles are happy that their stomachs don't hurt as bad anymore when they eat. We pathetically still miss and want our 'regular' diet back (ice cream. milk chocolate. cheese.). We do continue to have other symptoms, but it may take a few more days before we see notable improvements.

I am trying to adapt a few recipes and readjust mealtime and it is going okay. The cookies I made on day 1 were good enough. I tried banana bread today and while the little kids will all eat it, anyone over the age of ten thinks it tastes like card board, including me. haha. So, back to the drawing board for that one. We have found dairy free bread that tastes okay. And a butter and milk substitute that we are fairly happy with, but right now I want pizza! Or pretty much anything with cheese on it!!

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Quick change of subjects to the boys. I want to document their progress. I often fail to recognize, amidst the day to day struggles, how far they have come. Hopefully I can be more mindful of the sacrifices they have made in coming here to be with us.

Let's start with BoyTwo.

*he has grown. a lot. he eats like an ogre:) I need to measure and weigh him again, but when he first got here, the size 6 clothes I had for him were too long and way too big around the waist. Now, they are nearly floods and we've had to let out the waists.

*his feet have grown 1/2 shoe size.

*he can self feed now.

*he hardly ever swears.

*he has begun to speak English.

*he gives hugs and kisses.

*he doesn't always hit.

*he prays. in fact, he said the prayer at church on Sunday in the primary meeting.

*I only have to attend school with him about two days a week.

*he can count to 20 in both Russian and English (he could do this in Russian before).

*he recognizes almost all numbers 1-30 and can say them in Russian and English.

*he knows the names of his sisters.

*he is learning the names of his classmates.

*he knows the following shapes (he did not know this in Ukraine) star, oval, circle, square, triangle, rectangle

*he can almost write his name (English) without mistakes (he did not know how to write cyrillic)

*he knows the following letters, upper and lower case (he did not know any cyrillic letters), he can name them, write them and knows their sound:

s, m, c, b, a, t, i,

*he attends lunch and recess 90% of the time

*he can brush his own teeth

*he can ski. well.

*he can ride a bike.

*he can almost walk without watching his feet.

BoyOne:

*he has grown. again, I need to have him measured and weighed, but his feet have grown a whole shoe size, his once too big size 12-14 clothing now fits well.

*he agrees that negative numbers do exist.

*(this is big) he asked me to cut his hair last night and wanted it short. that's right folks. he has graduated from wanting the Ukrainian mullet. he even told me that it is 'no good in America.' haha

*he likes to read

*he wears deodorant regularly. i consider this a miracle. i really really really doubted that he would ever do this willingly, let alone on his own.

*he brushes his teeth when we ask without throwing a fit

*he can snowboard. well.

*he gets along with all of his sisters.

*he believes in God.

*he goes to church with us every Sunday willingly. he even wears the proper church attire. he even asked for a tie for Christmas!!

*he showers every day on his own and uses soap almost all the time!! anyone who has a child who comes from a background where this is not the norm will know how truly amazing this is.

*he is learning to write (as in composition)

*he wrote a report. first one ever.

*he does his chores (notice I did not say happily or without reminder, but hey, he's still a kid)

*he doesn't swear at me anymore.

*he doesn't want a purse anymore.

Really, that's pretty a pretty impressive list for both boys. Like I said, I need to be better about seeing their progress. Way to go boys. Rock on.