"Rainbow!"

the rainbow ends at our house!

At the store the other day, I looked over to see Ruby standing right in the way of an older lady, another customer. I told the little shortie to scoot, since the lady obviously wanted to walk through. Ruby straddled her legs a bit to make it clear she was in the way and not moving. She eyed me. She eyed the lady. Just as I was wondering how this defiant toddler showdown would end, she looked back to the lady and said, "Password." I had to laugh. At home the girls sometimes block a doorway or the bottom of the stairs, but they give way instantly if we say the password, which has been "Rainbow" for about two years now. We do not have great encryption. Back in the store, I realized it would be faster to just tell the lady the password than to explain to Ruby that not everyone plays our game. The patient customer gamely said "Rainbow," and Ruby hopped out of her way. 

She also enthusiastically sings the two songs she knows, but only these lines enthusiastically repeated over and over, with no variation, even when we helpfully suggest the other words:
"Jesus love me...the bible tell me"
"Be wise. Be wise. Be wise"

Update: The "password" game has been outlawed. Peace must be maintained.

Another Surprise Update!

We got a letter posted from Chicago yesterday. A Chinese American woman is visiting family there, and she is in charge of the home Ruby's been at since Dec 2010, in Beijing. So she's not in Inner Mongolia at all!

The letter invited me to ask questions, so of course I did. Her kind response is a big encouragement, especially since it came with photos of Ruby opening our care package we sent in June.

It said she has a little rash on her lip because of the heat, and also told us her palate has been repaired (which must be a great blessing for her early speech development)!!

The home where she is cares for just fourteen children, and it is a home full of *blessing* and *spirit*.  What a relief to know that like-minded people have been caring for her all along! And they rejoice to know she'll be coming into a home that will continue their work, the letter said.  So much to be thankful for!

I guess she's been a "treasure in Beijing" for more than 18 months, but soon she'll be a treasure in Central PA.

Names

Ruby’s orphanage assigned her a name, and Jasper was very excited when we finally saw the actual characters and got a chance to work out what it meant.  Jasper worked with Google translator and his Chinese-English, English-Chinese to figure out the meaning of Ju Er's name.

Because of his year in China, he knew to pronounce her first name, 菊儿, like this:  Jew-Are, though with the accent the first one sounds a little more like "chew" cut short. "che--". 

The meaning of the second character 儿(Er) is "child". The meaning of the first character 菊 (Ju) is probably "Chrysanthemum" or maybe "Daisy."

Her last name means "warm."
So literally her whole name would mean "Warm Chrysanthemum Child."

We’re keeping the first name they gave her as her middle name so that, if she every wants to, she can identify herself as Chinese through her name.

I dipped into Google Translate myself tonight as I create thank you cards for the nannies. I’m affixing a photo they sent of Ruby to a red card. Inside I’m placing the message Google Translate spit out for me when I typed in my sentiments.  Hopefully they’ll be able to make out the gratitude!