A Chinese-American Mama

It happened!  It finally happened!

Wait...let me back up a little.

Adopting older kids is just different.  My little girls are CHINESE-Americans and not Chinese-AMERICANS.  They changed our world! 

Not that we doing things perfectly, but we have added bits and pieces of their heritage to our family traditions.  Having both girls participating in Chinese dance class helps encourage us to make Chinese holidays and celebrations an important part of our schedule (the Chinese New Year and the Dragon Boat Festival), but eating traditional mooncakes (or moon pies for the rest of the family) for the Autumn/Moon Festival is something we do just because we enjoy it. 

Keziah has forced me to conceed that Ramen noodles with spicy Szechuan sauce added is the "breakfast of champions".  We MUST eat at least one dinner per week that includes rice, and Hadasssah could eat rice at every meal, every day.  Our family quickly becomes well known at local Chinese restaurants, especially during Keziah's phase when she would enter the door and loudly announce, "I"M CHINESE!!!"

My little girls are Chinese.  They can't escape that.  One look at their sweet faces and you know they are Asian. 

However...what about me?!?

See, I'm their MAMA! 

I have six kiddos.  Some of my kids kinda look like me on the outside, but my little girls...??? 

Truthfully, it baffles me at times that you can't look at them and just SEE that I'm their mama. It seems so obvious to me that these are my little girls.  Duh!

Okay!  Yes, being an adoptive parent and hanging out online and in-person with other families brought together through adoption has totally changed the way my mind processes information.  I used to look at people to see if they were family by what they looked like on the outside.  Now?  Family has so little to do with appearances and DNA!  I love to see the beauty of families God has brought together! 

Off the rabbit trail and back to the real story...

So last Saturday, I stopped by one of my new favorite stores at the local mall - Asian Gifts.  The kids and I love this little shop because as you cross the threshhold of the door, it's like stepping into a tiny part of China.  The store is filled with tea pots, jade, and silk.  Of course, I think my kids like it because of all the martial arts posters and weapons on display, girls included (the owners have confessed that the big ticket items keep them in business).  Keziah can't understand why I won't buy her a Bruce Lee poster!

It reminds me so much of shopping in China!  One day I stopped in to buy silk shoes for the little girls to wear with their silk dresses for Halloween.  As I dropped to the floor to look at the shoes on display, tucked in a small corner, instantly the store clerk appeared with boxes filled with more shoes that had been tucked away.  Next thing you know I'm surrounded by a rainbow of silk shoes in whatever size I uttered.  I don't have to barter over price (thankfully) because everything is very reasonably priced...and I KNOW because I have shopped in China!

I've been in the shop before with just a few kiddos here or there before.  I haven't yet drug Christopher with me.  One day I did have the little trio with me after school.  The store clerk/owner raved about what a wonderful person I must be because we had the two girls (hate that part...I'm not so great...these are just my kids...home is where they belong).  The girls managed to score a free pair of chopsticks each decorated with Disney characters just for being so cute and Chinese.

Back to Saturday...I'm out dashing around to finish up some errands and get home.  I all by myself...alone...WOO-HOO!!!!  I just needed to pick up a bamboo plant, and then I'd be done.  I stepped to the counter to pay when it happened...

...the owner told the other clerk (her sister, I later discovered) that I was THE MAMA, the mother of two Chinese girls.  For the very first time, someone saw me for who I am without the two girls in my shadow!

We chatted while they rang up my bamboo and I paid.  More raving (ugh) and also some real and genuine perspective about the lives our little girls might have had if they stayed in China.  (Please note - We didn't adopt our little girls to SAVE them.  We chose to grow our family through adoption.  Some of the by-products of that choice are that our lives and our little girls' lives have been dramatically and forever CHANGED, good and not-so-good all rolled together)  I think I almost skipped out of their shop.  Nothing in my physical appearance or DNA screams it, but in my heart I am totally a Chinese-American Mama!