So sweet...

Settling in...

I'm too tired to try and torturously construct a 'clever' blog post, so I thought I would just quickly throw up some pictures.  First, our beautiful children:

Today, Christian helped Daddy put together his new wagon.  Then he enjoyed both giving and receiving rides. He was very excited with it and proudly showed me his 'banana holder' (he's already planning on putting a banana in the cup holder when we go out).  Mari seemed rather bemused by the whole experience.

Finally, a cute picture of Mari and her Daddy.  She is holding her favorite thing in the world: our remote.  Thanks to her and Christian, there is now an ominous internal clinking noise when you shake it.

Life imitates art...

I've been thinking quite a bit lately about how life with Mari is similar to the movie "Raiders of the Lost Ark".  I know that sounds utterly random, but before you declare me insane from lack of sleep I will try and explain:

We are trying very hard to get her on a consistent schedule, but sleep is still a problem.  Yesterday morning, I had quite the battle trying to get her down for her morning nap.  Our strategy is to rock her while feeding her a bottle.  Then, once she falls mostly asleep, we transfer her to the crib and sneak on out.  However, there have been several times when I am rocking her, the bottle is almost gone and she is not showing any signs of sleep.  At these times I feel a strong sense of panic because the bottle is the ultimate weapon in our relentless sleep campaign.  Once deployed, it usually works...but if it fails, we have no good backup strategy to get her to sleep and she makes us pay.  Anyway, as I watch the level of tformula slowly decline and Mari's eyes are still wide open, I think of the scene in "Raiders of the Lost Ark" where Harrison Ford and Karen Allen are trapped in the pit with the snakes.  She is waving a makeshift torch in a circle to keep the snakes at bay while he's looking for an escape route and then as the torch starts sputtering she yells, "Indy, the torch is going ooooooooout!"  I myself often feel like shouting, "Jeff, the bottle's running ooooooout!"

Occasionally, we also will try to replace the bottle of formula she is sucking with water.  As I first contemplate the switch, then perform the switch, then anxiously watch her reaction to see if it worked, I think of the beginning scene from Raiders where Indy tries to steal the gold idol from the pedestal by replacing it with a bag of sand.   Makes perfect sense, right?

Hmmm...maybe I do need more sleep :-)

Anyway, we're hanging in there, mostly thanks to my parents who are staying with us for a few days.  Mari is adjusting very well (minus the sleep issues) and is mostly a very happy and content baby.  Christian continues to try very hard to be a good older brother and they are slowly starting to interact more.

She likes him more from a distance rather than up close. I tried to get a picture of them together on the couch, but as soon as Christian put his arm around her she tried to get it off.

She watches him all the time and tries to follow him around.

So sweet! (And staged - I told him to give her a kiss.)

Today I also discovered that in the world of Mari, having a towel on your head is quite possibly the funniest thing ever.  (Note: the purple bandage on her arm was from her visit to the International Adoption Clinic.  They had to take quite a bit of blood for all of the tests.)

This video is definitely the cutest thing ever.  They are starting to have short interactions with each other...