You've got mail!

If your name is Alice, that is. In the past week she has received 4 pieces of mail from family and a new pen pal (another girl also adopted from China who arrived in America just a few weeks ahead of Alice). The cute card with the bee on it is from her. Very appropriate as her mom and I found each other through the China Adopt Talk forum, commonly referred to as RQ (for Rumor Queen, the screen name of the lady who started it). To protect everyone's privacy, we all use screen names. My RQ screen name is beijingbee and the RQ color is purple so I find the card incredibly clever!

Alice is still less excited about US mail than she would be about mail from China, but I think that as the mail keeps coming (HINT, HINT) she is getting a bit more interested. I suggested she write back to her pen pal and we were almost 30 minutes late getting to bed tonight so she could finish it. Once she got going she had no problem filling up all the white area on the card she selected (basically everywhere except the front of the card where the picture is she filled with her letter - in ENGLISH!) I did help with phrasing and spelling, but she did much of it herself.

Her latest interest is trying to write cursive. I think in China she was only taught to print English, but she has noticed cursive and wants to try. Surprising, since I learned that kids in school aren't using cursive anymore. I just got her an italic handwriting workbook, which teaches cursive retaining more similarity with printed letters. I think it will be an easier transition for her than learning the "loopy-style" of cursive I learned oh so many years ago. She asked about the difference of style and I explained that handwriting has changed over the years from the extremely fancy style used by Thomas Jefferson to the more simplified characters most people use today. I equated it to how in China they simplified the characters, eliminating some of the strokes and making it easier for writing. Not an exact comparison, but she got the idea.

So if you have sent Alice mail, THANK YOU! If you are thinking of sending mail, please do. I'm not sure how quickly she'll write back, but it does give her a chance to work on her English (reading and writing) without being school work. If you have kids from China who would like a pen pal, email me. I think Alice can handle having several pen pals and it would be fun for her to connect with some other adoptees.