Throwing Food!

Grace has done very well this week. We have marveled at how smooth the transition is going (for now) and how she is feeling like this is her home. She has been playing with the other kids more each day and is now comfortable to be out of my sight for a short period of time. She played with the girls some outside today and then watched the boys building things with their legos.

She has enjoyed riding in the car and looking out the window and singing!

The last few mornings James has gotten her when she woke up and given her breakfast. (freeing her from the crib and giving food has been the "way in" for Daddy).

The first several days she was here after she ate her meals in the highchair she would hand me her plate but then take out a little piece of food that was left and hold onto it for a long time. If it was a piece of bread she would walk around with it for almost an hour just holding it. She tried to walk off with a bowl of oatmeal, that obviously didn't work so I took that away only after I had given her some crust from a bread.

I think it was her security. To know that this is still her food and she has something left. She still gets irritated and anxious and cries if her food is taken away and she is not done, or if she thinks she is not going to get something.
This is obviously part of living in an orphanage. We have heard that many times kids especially older ones will hid food in their highchair or their rooms, because it is a big issue.

Yesterday I noticed something though. Grace has begun to do what many babies do when they are done eating, and that is throwing food off the high chair and onto the floor. Throwing her cup onto the floor when she is done.

I can not tell you how HAPPY I am to see this.
Not for the mess on the floor that it makes, or the game that throwing the cup down then becomes.
But because this means something more.
This means that she is beginning to know that she will always have food here. If she is thirsty she can have a drink. That she doesn't have to fight for her meal, that it will be taken away from her or that there will not be enough.
I think she is learning that we will provide food and drink for her every day and as much as she needs AND as she wants.
This is reason to celebrate and throw your pasta on the floor!