What do you mean they don't come with instructions?

I'll be the first to admit that my house is pretty darn militant. It's the southern way. From the time they can first talk, my children are expected to say "yes ma'am" and "no ma'am", "yes sir" and "no sir". This takes years of training. Daily training.

So what happens when you adopt a 3 yr old that doesn't even answer you 99.9% of the time? You go batty, that's what you do. You spend a lot of time being coached by your mom and husband on the fact that she isn't like your other children and that you'll need to be patient and creative in training her.

Oh, the agony to see her role her eyes and not be able to give her push-ups because she hasn't hit the minimum age limit of 6. Oh, yes. I'm one of those. Or when she closes her eyes so she can't see me. Because you know, if she can't see me than she won't have to do what the Google translator or my sign language is telling her to do.

I thought having had two children already would prepare me for our littlest one. After all, I've already been through the terrible twos and threes and I was wearing full armor. I was so wrong. Laughably wrong. Although Squeak can't talk with her mouth, she talks with her facial expressions, her squeals, her speaks and her cries. And I understand it all perfectly... most of the time. The rest of the time I pray for that day when she cares that I am upset that she washed her baby doll clothes in the fish tank or that she continues to pull the cat's tail and poke him in the eye, even after we have "discussed" this through Google translation.