Building a lot

The new washer and dryer unit was delivered and we got that up and running to tackle laundry mountain this weekend.  Then, Kiddo’s bed was delivered and her and I got to building it.  I needed J to help with a few parts, but for the most of the 3 hours it took to build, Kiddo just hung out and helped as needed.  Mostly it was passing me parts and screws and the like, but she didn’t get impatient or push me on “when’s it going to be done” and just hung out and helped.  With the exception of lunch, she was with me and we just had on tunes and built the thing.

As you can see, she was over the moon happy and excited.  So far she is loving the thing and has SO many plans for the underside of it and how it can be a den for friends, a shop, a restaurant, a hotel, a hideout for her new friend Y and her.  Y, I should note, lives in the LQ complex and they play most nights.  They’re a nice family and the girls are about the same age so it’s nice that she has the connection.  It’s also been a fast friendship.  They just click.  It’s cool to see.  Y is not a SMIC student, but we haven’t gotten a reason why yet.  As the girls get closer and as the mom and J become better friends, I’m sure we will get the reason, but for now, they play nights at the playground and we’ve had a couple of play dates and the like.  

Other than that I’m doing more laundry today and catching up on a few other errands.  I’m heading out later to get a rice cooker (it’s Asia, it’s needed) and a few other things, but I’m a little sad about that.  I’m solo.  As much as I’ve been looking forward to NOT having to be on Kiddo all day M-F, it’s a bit strange not having my little buddy with me all day.  Who am I going to eat lunch with?  Who am I going to chat with during the day?  Who will chatter my ear off as I do dishes?  Who can help me pick items at the grocery?  

Mondays are uniform days and isn’t se cute?  I just want to eat her up.  However, I’m feeling a lot of emotions.  We’ve been here for 3 weeks now and I don’t have her all day.  As I said, I’m glad about that in a lot of ways, but also sad in the same number of ways.  Kids are a TON of work and they want to play and engage all day and that can get so so so tiring, but at the same time, once that’s gone, it’s a sense of loneliness and quiet that is a little overwhelming.  I feel like the energy in the house is down in the hour that she’s been gone.  Not gone, but just different.  There’s a loss of noise, of little yips and yaps and glee that she adds - even if we are doing our own thing.  She’ll play alone and I can hear that.  Or she’ll be watching a show and I will hear that.  Or she’ll just want to share something and pop out to see me with that factoid or little thing.

On top of that, the house is only half set up.  We don’t yet have a sofa or TV (coming in about two weeks) and so it still only feels like a half house.  It’s nice to have laundry to do, to have errands, to have stuff to accomplish, but at the same time, it’s still only half done.  In a month, we will have a lot more and the place will be 95% complete, but for now, it’s not complete.  That adds to the sense of missing Kiddo.  She helps fill that empty space in play and with her energy.

I’ll get used to it, but for now…. I don’t know.  It’s just a mix of emotions.  It’s also the first day of school, so I’m a bit raw with that.  I also had to deal with an anxious, excited, scared, nervous, wonder-filled Kiddo this morning and those feels and emotions are still with me.  Dealing with her and letting her feel those feelings without judgement or anger.  Giving her a neutral and brave face so she can be scared and nervous and anxious, but also excited and happy to have school and new friends and more that just Dada all day.  

So, I will wash.  Cook.  Errand.  Task.  And then pick her up and hear all about it and give her the brave face again as she tells me about the good and the bad, the fun and the boring, how it’s different than BASIS and how she wants to go back to the familiar.  Then, just as quickly, she will want to play and do and set up the new bed and explore her new space.  Make it her own.

She is making so much her own.  Her room.  Her life.  Her personality.  We try to guide that and not judge it.  Sometimes she is very much a little girl and sometimes she is very much a teen.  Sometimes she asks and sometimes she barks.  It’s her becoming her, feeling out things.  Exploring likes and dislikes.  I have to give her a ton of credit however…. She is willing to try.  To put herself out there.  To do brave things.  To try new foods.  To shop at new stores.  To take on Bangkok, Zihua, and now Shanghai with a sense of wonder, excitement, and awe - taking it in and letting it come to her in whatever way it does and just rolling with it.  She will tell us her likes and dislikes, but she will continuously try.  We had dumplings in Bangkok and she didn’t care for them.  Here, she is loving them.

Kiddo accepts.  Even the things she doesn’t like.  We had to shop and look at some electronics and technologies this weekend and she didn’t care for it, but she accepted it and made the best of it.  She got to show J the dumpling place and introduce her to dumplings and she was chatty and explained the taste and what and why she liked them.    Even getting her shoes was a 4 store exploration and she never complained.  She rolled with it and gave feedback about likes and dislikes between brands and shoes.  

It’s amazing to raise a person.  Not some drone who will just do as she is told.  She is a person.  She pushes back sometimes, but mostly, she explores it with us and gives feedback after about the good and bad, the likes and dislikes, and then tells us about the funnest parts or will ask about things she didn’t understand.  She constantly questions - wanting to know more and more.  About Shanghai, China, the world.  About the little things like why we got item A instead of item B at Costco.  She wants to understand.  She wants to know.  I’m most happy that she wants to share.  That she trusts to ask.  That she’s willing to help, hangout, and just be with us.  Even if it’s just putting a bed together and handing me screws and bolts.  

J and I must have appeased some deity or another.  Or we got really lucky.  Or we put in a lot of work to get this wonderful person that we get to call daughter.  She amazes me daily, but on days like today, on the first day of school, she blows my mind with her complex bravery… Filled with wonder and hope, but also nervous and scared.  She cried on me this morning and then laughed with me.  All within the space of 5 minutes.  But, she trusted me to give me both the laugh and the cry.

Let’s go, Kiddo…. It’ll be another year until the first day again, but in-between that, we will have a lot to do.  To explore.  To see.  To learn.  We’ll even have more stuff to put together.  I’ll (of course) need my little helper for that and for a million other little things.  You are the bravest, boldest, more unique person I’ve met and I’ve met a lot of people.  You amaze me every day.  I love you more with every passing second.  I hope we amaze and wow you 1/10th as much as you do us.  I love watching you become and I can’t wait to see each new butterfly that emerges from each new little cocoon as you grow and change and take the world in and give yourself to it as well.