One more week down!

November 11

"We are in human relationships to master all of the conditions we have placed on love." ~ Ken Page, Nancy Nester

Wow I cannot believe how fast time is flying. 3 weeks from today I leave. It all feels like one big dream.. it still does not feel like I live in Romania. At the same time, I feel like I have lived here all of my life and that my family is just a faint dream from the past. It is weird. Home seems too good to be true. I feel like I am going to go home and just not believe how nice and clean everything is. How perfect everything is! I am so incredibly blessed with my upbringing, my family, my beliefs, my lifestyle, my boyfriend, my chance at education, my job, my car, my medical care, my own bed. I feel like I am just going to cry when I get home.

So today at the orphanage was so great. I feel like it just gets better every day. The kids are still pretty sick. Darian and Chica (forgot her pseudo name sorry!) have Varicela now. One special thing about today was that I was able to spend the first hour with a lot of the children I do not usually play with. I spent a lot of time with Letzu, Ionut and Gita. After reading the last couple write ups on George and I have really tried hard to spend some good time with him. He was so happy. He has one of the sweetest smiles and laughs out of any of the children. He absolutely loves pat a cake (cu ajuta) and this little piggy. He is very very clingy and not very good with his legs so you have to be careful but he just eats up all of the attention. He can be very repetitive with rocking behaviors. If I would do something like tickle him he would turn it into a repetitive rotation, let me tickle him then rock away, then rock back and let me tickle him then rock away. He loves having his back rubbed although it is really ticklish for him. Today he was a bit temperamental and I hope it was not because I gave him so much attention this morning. Harry Potter (not to be mistaken with J.K Rowling's Harry Potter) is so incredibly cute. He is such a soft tender little boy. He is tiny actually. He has a big birthmark on his forehead that looks like Harry Potter’s scar haha. He is on the verge of walking but not a lot of the workers work with him so I like to hold his hands and help him walk around. Jello is speaking like crazy.. i mean he cannot speak in full sentences but he has surpassed Sidekick now in his speaking abilities. Sidekick has been leaps ahead of Jello for a few weeks but Jello has improved exponentially lately. AU is doing really well with his numbers and math I am really proud of him. He totally surprised me with his abilities today. He was able to do a lot of things by himself. I came to the conclusion that he likes help because it is easier, more convenient, and makes the game more a game than a learning exercise, and like all of us, games are more fun! Today though he answered 3 questions in a row without my help! Sometimes it takes him a bit longer to answer a question but I love seeing his eyes move around as he is trying to think. You can see that he is working through the processes in his mind and it is just cool. I am making some new picture cards for this contraption he has this weekend so I am excited to start with those on Monday!