This week I was speaking with one of my students, a girl who moved here with her parents from China when she was ten years old.  I was telling her that Aidan never responded to his Chinese name when I called him by it, even though I tried multiple variations.  She said that Chinese parents call their children by the last syllable of their name, repeated twice.  So Peng Yan Shen was Shen Shen.  My translator did tell me, when I asked on our third or fourth day, that she heard the orphanage staff calling him this, but I think that by then he was already used to answering to honey so at that point he didn't respond to Shen Shen, either.  I do wish I had known this before meeting him, though, so I'm posting it here for anyone else getting ready to adopt.

Here are some things that Aidan has learned lately:

*  He loves peanuts and peanut butter and that is carrying over to peanut butter sandwiches, as well.
*  His shadow is not something to be frightened by and it is always with him.
*  The shamrock of St. Patrick's Day decorations can also be found on his Boston Celtic pajamas, so he wore them for the holiday instead of dressing up.
*  He loves to swing now that he has been shown how to pump.
*  Watching sap boil is boring, but checking on the sap buckets and organizing the bottles to be filled is fun.
*  Although he loves to volunteer to help with chores, he does not like being assigned to do things and responds with, "That's not my job," then does it when I tell him that it is if I say it is.  He doesn't even argue with me, so I think the expression is currently popular at daycare with the kids his age.
*  He loves Diego, though he still thinks he is a real boy and wants us to take him to play with him sometime.
*  He loves Sponge Bob, though he doesn't think he's real.
*  He loves Spider Man but he wants to dress up as Batman some time; he said he wanted to have the ears and everything and be scary like Batman.
*  He loves pinwheels but if the wind is too strong, they will blow away.

Overall, his language is absurdly proficient for being here only five months.