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Her Chinese name
is - Qian HongHu
She was born on May 17, 2005.
She currently lives in the Qianjiang Social Welfare Center in
the Province of Chongqing.
As of 11/29/05:
Height - 25.02 inches
Weight - 13.20 Lbs.
1/26/06
This has been the wildest 24 hours ever! We were
awake at about 8am and of course the pacing began! We received
word from our agency that they expected the referrals to arrive around
noon their time, 1:00pm our time. At 2:00pm, we received an
e-mail from them saying that the delivery was delayed and that they
expected it to arrive in about an hour! At 4:00pm, we
got the e-mail that our referral had just arrived!
We got our "CALL" at 4:53pm. When the
phone rang, Jon & I just looked at it. Neither one of us
could move. Jon snapped out of it first and answered the phone.
I got on the other line as soon as I could figure out how to turn it
on!!!!
Krista, from our agency, said Congratulations! You have a
daughter! She told us her name and age. Then she said
she would e-mail us her picture. We opened the little picture;
all we could say was "Oh my God! She's BEAUTIFUL!" All
three of us were crying. It is a moment that Jon and I will never
forget.
One of my on-line friends that is with our agency and
received her referral yesterday too was at our agency and took a photo
of Krista calling Jon and I. Here is Krista of Great Wall China Adoptions;
she is on the phone with us telling us about our daughter.
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Krista telling
us that we have a daughter.
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The rest of the day is pretty much a blur. We sure
slept well, once we settled down and could get to sleep.
2/6/06
The rollercoaster continues! We were told that the
hardest part of adoption comes AFTER you receive your referral. I
thought that there was no way.......waiting for our referral was so
hard! But, unfortunately, it's true. Once we saw our darling
Natalie, the aching got so many times harder! Her picture is on
the wall above the TV, the focal point of the living room. We see
her sweet face, but long to hold her in our arms.
I charted her height/weight on a Chinese growth
chart. Natalie is in the lower 10% for both height and
weight. But that is normal for her area of the country.
Babies from there seem to be more petite. Healthy but tiny.
She was 6.6 lbs and 19 inches at birth. And it looks like she
will be 15 lbs and 26 inches when we get her at 10 months old.
I'm planning on taking 6-9 months clothes for her. If those don't
fit, I'll just pick up something for her while we are there.
Where we will be staying, there is a huge shopping center right next
door! Convenient - huh?
It was so much fun updating our registry at Babies r
Us. When I first registered, I didn't know how old Natalie would
be. Now that I do, there were a lot of things that I hadn't
thought I would need. We were prepared to receive an older baby,
about 18 months old. It was such a pleasant surprise to find out
that she is so young. Even though we were told that she is
crawling, there is a good chance that they were being generous.
Natalie is spending most of her days in a walker, so she does not get a
lot of 'floor time' needed to learn to crawl. Once we get her
home, she will progress in leaps and bounds!
Her nursery is just about finished. It is so
cute. I will post some pictures as soon as I get it done.
The clouds on the walls look pretty good - if I do say so myself.
And I put butterflies, dragonflies, bumblebees and flowers floating
through the clouds. It's like walking through a park when
I enter the room. I think Natalie will love it in
there. She better, because I'm not changing it for quite some
time. Ha-Ha.
Even though we don't know when we are going to travel, I
have been packing and unpacking. We are only taking one carry-on
for each of us and a diaper bag for the baby. Picking the right things
are very important since we will be limited in what we can take.
I pre-packed my carry-on last night and it worked out great - even
with the few things left over for the baby. Jon will wait until
the day we leave and throw a few things in his bag and call it
good. He's not as fussy as I am. Probably why he is a lot
calmer about the trip than me.
2/15/06
Tomorrow, Thursday, Jon and I will take the Amtrak to
Chicago. We are taking ours and Jana's passports to the
Chinese Consulate to get our Visas. We will need visas when we
travel to China, hopefully, next month! We should get them back
next week. Woo-Hoo!! One small step towards bringing our daughter
home.
I have also began making arrangements to have Natalie
baptized. And talked to the pediatrician about getting her in for
her first check-up. Oh my God! I'm becoming a
'Mommy!'
3/3/06
When a child is found, the officials from that town
place the child's photograph in the local paper in an attempt to locate
the child's parents. If no one comes forth, the child is then
taken to an orphanage to wait for an adoptive family. We were
able to locate our daughter's finding ad. She was just 3 days old
when she was found and thankfully we now have a photo of her at that
age. That new photo means a lot to us because it gives us
another link in the puzzle of her past.
We received our Visas from the Chinese Consulate in
Chicago, so we are just about ready to go. The last thing we need
is what is lately being referred to as the "Golden Ticket" -
our Travel Approval. This is a document that gives us approval to
come to China to adopt our daughter. We were told by our agency
today that CCAA is planning on mailing out the TA's next
week! Keep your fingers crossed that it makes it here
safely. The last batch of referrals sent from CCAA were lost in
the mail!!!! I pray that they are found soon - the waiting
families must be frantic!
3/13/06
We have received our Travel Approval from the Chinese
Government!!!! Now all we need is our American Consulate
Appointment and we can go get our baby!!!! We should know when we
get to go by the end of the week. If our agency gets the consulate
date that they asked for, we may be leaving for China on March
19th!!! Keep your fingers crossed.
3/14/06
This morning we were informed by our agency that our
US Consulate appointment is for Wednesday, April 5th at 10:30am.
We are awaiting confirmation from the travel agent, but tentatively, we
are leaving on Saturday, March 25th. They will place Natalie in
our arms on Tuesday, March 28th (14 days from today!!!). And we
will be able to leave China on Friday, April 7th.
I can hardly believe that after nearly 2 years, we will
finally have our precious daughter in our arms ....... forever!
3/21/06
We have our plane tickets in hand and are anxiously
waiting for Saturday when we head to Detroit to begin our 18 hour
journey to China. We have plane changes in Minneapolis and Tokyo.
We should get to Beijing on Sunday at 8:15am our time. Since it
will be 9:15pm there, I will try and post to let you know we got in
ok. Unless I fall asleep as soon as we check in. We
are staying at the Sino-Swiss Hotel in Beijing.
3/25/06
It's 4:00am and we are leaving in about 30 minutes to pick
up Jana (Jon's mom) and head to the airport. Sleep was out of the
question, too much nervous energy. But hopefully, we'll be able
to sleep on the plane.
Please say a little prayer that we have smooth
flights. I HATE to fly but since that is the only way to bring
Natalie home; I guess I have no choice. The next time you
hear from us, we will be on the other side of the planet!
3/27/06
Hi from
China. We made it to Beijing last night at about 9:00pm.
Flights were LONG!!!! We are great! Will post more when I
have more time.
3/29/06:
WOOOOHOOOOO!!!!
We have our baby!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
We had fun in
Beijing. We visited the Great Wall and the Forbidden city. The funniest
thing was the Starbucks inside the Forbidden City. 1000 year old royal city
and they have a Starbucks.
Flew into
Chongqing yesterday. Checked in to the hotel, then went to the civil
affairs office and picked up Natalie. It was AWESOME. We filmed the
whole thing for everyone to see!! Sorry no pictures yet. I (Jon) am
using the hotel computer and can't down load them.
Today we went
shopping. Wow. Everywhere we went a mob of people followed us
talking and pointing! 99% seemed very happy that we were adopting the
little girls. People come up to you in the street and scold you if she
is sucking her thumb or if her legs are showing. Its 75 degrees and the
locals have their babies in snow suits and hats. LOL.
I hope everyone
at home is well. I also hope you enjoy reading this as much as I do
writing. We will post again soon!!!
3/30/06
Hello
everybody!! We are doing great. Natalie is a little grumpy today. We
tried to change her food. She let us know in no uncertain terms that
that was NOT OK!!!
Tonight for
dinner I had a traditional Chinese dish called "Hot Pot".
With the emphasis on HOT. It nearly made my eyes bleed. Imagine a
mystery stew with many unidentifiable slimy things floating to the
surface and you will have a clue of what it was like.
Tomorrow is a
day off. We are just going to hang out in the hotel. Then on Saturday
we are going shopping.
3/31/06
Today’s dinner
was just a bit different than last night. Our guide went to Pizza Hut
and brought back WONDERFUL American pizza. It made me home sick.
Natalie is doing
much better today. She has been smiling and laughing. Plus she is full
of energy! She loves to walk in her walker. She also spent an hour
staring at herself in the mirror. She is just such a sweet, wonderful
baby. I can't wait until you all get to meet her.
Tomorrow we go
to the old part of Chongqing to go shopping. The guide says that this
is where you get everything dirt cheap. We still can't go anywhere without
drawing a crowd. This bothers some of the families, but I think it is
cool. Our guide gave us these little signs on lanyards. They tell who
we are and why we are here. So when I gather a crowd, I just let them
read the sign. They all smile and clap and tell us how happy they are
that the baby will get a chance at life. I then tell them that we are
the lucky ones to get such great and beautiful babies.
Sue and my mom
are doing great. They went shopping at the mall near by today. The
malls here are no different than the malls at home. It's strange to be
half way around the world and see the same displays, brands, and
products as you would at Meridian mall.
Well it's off to
bed. I think that it is about 9 am Friday at home. Here it is 10pm Friday.
4/2/06
Today we went to
the zoo. We got to see panda bears and tigers. There was also an art
gallery that had local arts and crafts. After the zoo we went to Walmart.
Yes that Walmart. The only difference between Walmart here and Walmart
in Lansing was the smoked pigs head at the entrance.
Yesterday we
went to a flea market. It was cool, but the people looked at me funny
when I started taking pictures of the cute dogs and cats that were
sitting out in front of the food booths. I didn't realize until later
that they weren't pets.
Natalie is doing
great! She has an amazing sense of humor. Plus her favorite game is to
be thrown up into the air.
Tomorrow is a
day off. We are going to hang around the hotel and do nothing.
4/8/06
We are finally
home! Sorry for the lapse but it was expensive to get access in
Guangzhou. But, better late than never - right? The flights......well,
we'll talk about THAT later! Natalie is prefect! She is now
an American Citizen. When we touched down in Detroit, she became
official. What a relief, all went smoothly and actually quite
quickly. Customs and immigration lines weren't that bad at
all.
All I have to
say is....Dorothy from the 'Wizard of Oz' had it right. There
really is "no place like HOME!" China is a wonderful
place to visit, but our hearts belong to Michigan and the US of
A.
It is 6:03 am -
EST Saturday morning and 7:03 pm, Saturday evening - China
time. We've slept about 2 hours since we got up at 5:00 am Friday
(China time). Can you say - Jet Lag! Natalie is sound
asleep and Jon and I are rearing to go. Our minds are going a mile
a minute.
Our trip was a
blur of activities, tours and lines. The day we got Natalie was
like walking in a dream. We flew from Beijing to Chongqing,
arrived at the hotel and had to leave right away to go get the
babies.
When we arrived
at the Civil Affairs Office, there were babies in walkers
everywhere. Jon said "There's Natalie!" The next
thing I knew, we were walking over to our daughter, she was in my arms
and time stood still!
I cannot say how
long we stared at each other, but she acted as though she had known us
all her life. (We had sent a photo album to her orphanage that we
hoped the nannies would show to Natalie.) By her response to us,
we believe that they must have shown her our pictures often, because
she seemed to have recognized us. Natalie did not cry or act
scared, she smiled, laughed and plays silly baby games with us while we
waited for her paperwork to be processed. When we left, in the
eyes of the Chinese government, we were a family!
I will continue
with our journey later, we need to get some sleep while the baby
sleeps or not sleep at all. So have patience with me.....more to
follow soon.
4/11/06
My experiences
in China (or what the agency doesn't tell you)........ When you receive
your new child, who has already formed definite opinions on her likes
and dislikes, DO NOT try to impose your will on her! If she is
eating, and enjoying fish-flavored rice cereal, do not try to make
her eat apple-banana rice cereal and get frustrated when she screams!
RULE #1 - When you
find something she likes......buy tons of it. Fish-flavored
cereal must be a local Chongqing taste sensation because when I ran out
in Guangzhou I could not find it anywhere!
The term 'Spicy
Girl' doesn't mean she likes spicy foods (though we don't know that for
sure). It means that when our little angel is unhappy, she can
turn into a one red-hot chili pepper who will LOUDLY let you know her
displeasure.
......................................................................
No matter how
long you have dreamed of this wonderful event, there will
soon be a day when you question your sanity and wonder what
pre-menopausal senility possessed you to think that you could EVER want
a baby. For me it was Day #2! Day #1 went so smoothly,
with nothing but a happy, giggling baby that slept whenever I wanted
her to. But on Day #2 the Spicy Girl reared her very vocal
head. For some reason, I did not understand what Natalie was
trying to tell me. She would fling her tiny head back, scrunch up
her sweet face and yowl as though I had dipped her in acid! She
did not want to be held, yet she did not want to be laid down. No
position was the correct one. This continued for what seemed like
an eternity (really only about 30 minutes) until Daddy walked in the
room to have this she-creature handed to him. OF COURSE ... she calmed
down and went to sleep! I, on the other hand, was in the bathroom
in the fetal position, sobbing and feeling like a total failure as a
mother. "How could I have thought I could do this? I
am too old for this! How could I take this child from her
homeland and force her to accept me? Why did I go to the other
side of the planet? I miss my home! I miss food that I can
identify! How could I possibly be a good mommy if I feel like
this?"
OK, they do not
tell you that you can expect a total meltdown.
You are told that the baby will have
"attachment/grieving issues", but not the mommy! I was
fine the next morning and have been ever since. But I was totally
unprepared for mommy overload!
So, RULE
#2 - Prepare yourself for the inevitable meltdown. You
are human and it is normal.
..............................................................................
People are
people no matter where they live. In Chongqing, we met some of
the friendliest people in the world. They would come up to us and
want to know all about us and our babies! Our guide, Rui, gave
each family a lanyard with an explanation of why we were in China with
this little baby girl. We would show this note, and the people’s
faces would light up, they would give us thumbs up and pat the baby's
face. On dear old woman, when she read the words, began to
cry. She made us promise to take care of Natalie and to love her
always. We told her that we would encourage our daughter to learn
as much about her heritage as she could when she gets older. That
we wanted her to always remember the land of her birth. Through
her tears, she smiled and then with a very sad look, turned and walked
away. It nearly broke our hearts to see this woman, a complete
stranger, so broken up. She was not angry with us, she was sad
about the whole idea of all the abandoned children in her
country.
RULE #3 - People
are wonderful the whole world over.
..............................................................................
Air travel is
not for the faint-of-heart and going 'Carry-On Only' is fine on the way
over but once you get the baby......it's not only impossible
- it's insane! Every flight we took (all 7 of them!) were
fully booked. And 'economy' class really means
'CATTLE'. Try to navigate down the narrow aisles of a crowded
plane with an over-stuffed diaper bag/backpack and a carry-on
suitcase. It's funny only in hindsight! I traveled to the
other side of the world and back with the backpack wedged between
my feet. Once down there, you had better not need anything from
it unless you are made of rubber and can twist your body into a
pretzel. We ended up having to buy 2 additional suitcases (another
carry-on size and a HUGE wheelie one. Cost about $15 each) Because
of the additional luggage and a baby walker, we were forced to check
our bags! Oh my GOD!!!! I felt like skipping down the
aisles. Even with the baby, it was like heaven. OK, not
really, but you get the idea.
RULE #4 - When
travelling with a baby, Business or First Class is a sanity MUST!
But since it is not financially possible, travel lightly and check
everything! If it's bigger than a breadbox, LEAVE IT HOME!
..............................................................................
The last thing I
learned is.......Jetlag really does exist and it will knock you loopy
for at least 3 days! Since we are on Day #4 at home, I may only
think that I am making sense!
This was the
trip of a lifetime and I will cherish these memories always! I
met many new and interesting people and shared some of the most
important moments in my life with a group of families that I truly feel
blessed to know and love. Jon and I expanded our family, not only
by one little girl, but by all the wonderful people that we shared this
adventure with.
5/23/06
Life has changed
so much for us. We cannot remember what life was like before we
got Natalie. She seems as though she has always been a part of
us.
The past few
weeks have flown by. Natalie, Daddy and Mommy are settling in and
adjusting to the changes that come with being a family. No more
sleeping until 10am on the weekends. But it is so wonderful to
wake up and see such a sweet face smiling up at us!
Natalie turned
one on May 17th and I can honestly say that I am not ready to have my
'Baby' grow up. Natalie is just about ready to begin
walking, she has been cruising around the furniture for weeks and
once she gets up the courage to let go....she'll be off and running!
Sunday, May
21st, we had Natalie baptized at St. Isidore's Catholic Church.
It was so beautiful. She was squirmy during Mass but while we
were waiting for the priest to get ready for the christening, she fell
asleep. Natalie slept through the entire Baptism - even when he
poured the Holy Water over her forehead! Fr. Pamment said that he
had never had a baby sleep through the entire ceremony. Her
Godmother is Nancy (Clark) Koluder, my best friend since high school and
her Godfather is Mark Ragsdale, Jon's best friend. After the
ceremony we went back to Grandma's house for lunch and cake. It
was a great day!
6/12/06
Sorry that it
has been so long since my last post. Seems like I just did an
update - the time is just flying by. I will try to summarize the
last few weeks.
Natalie had to
see a pediatric eye doctor to evaluate her eyes - they turn in at
times. We were referred to a specialist and had the appointment
on June 5th. The doctor said that Natalie's vision in perfect but
since the eyes turn in intermittently and not both at the same time;
she does not think that patches or glasses will correct the
problem. She says that she suggests eye surgery to tighten the
muscles that hold the eyes in place. There is no hurry on this at
this time and she said that at this point it would be elective.
We are hesitant to subject Natalie this because the surgery would be
done under general anesthesia, we are thinking about waiting until she
is a little older but we have another appointment in 6 weeks and we
will discuss this further with the dr. We were also told that
Natalie has no depth perception, hasn't had any since birth but that it
would not affect her since her brain is compensating for the loss of
depth perception. We do not know, if she has the surgery, whether
she will regain this.
On a positive
note, Natalie took her first steps to Mommy, with coaxing on May
31st and on June 6th, took steps on her own. Lately she has been
a little reticent about walking, it's like she gets a little scared to
take that first step. Right now she is up to about 5 steps without
help, though she did walk across the living room, about 10 steps, but
only once! I am happy that she is learning but I get a little sad
that I am losing my little baby.
She has adjusted
to us so much that people cannot believe that we have had her less than
3 months. She gives hugs and kisses to Jon and I, in the mornings
when we get her up she greets us with a great big smile, and when Jon
come home from work, Natalie's face lights up and she crawls as fast as
her little body can take her over to him. We have a really
Daddy's girl on our hands. It's so cute!!!!!
Tonight, Natalie
was cruising around the furniture and she was getting into stuff that
she wasn't supposed to and I told her no and tried to move her
away. She stepped back and stomped her feet and began to
yell! We had our very first temper tantrum!!!! Sorry to
say, Mommy and Daddy had to hide the chuckles behind their
hands. The first time was cute but I know that any following
tantrums won't be so cute.
We had 2 baby
showers, one given by co-workers of Grandma's and one given by Jon's
co-workers. They were really nice to do that for us. We got
a lot of really nice things for Natalie. One of the doctors that
Jon works with brought white fabric squares and fabric markers and the
guests drew pictures on the squares. Dr. Lucy is going to put
them into a quilt for Natalie. I can't wait to see the finished
quilt - it will be so cute. I will post a photo of it when it is
done.
I will add some
more photos soon. I got some of Natalie trying to walk.
6/26/06
Guess who's
walking!!! Yup! Actually, she is trying to run but isn't that coordinated
yet. We went to grandma's house yesterday and Natalie played
in a pool for the first time. She loved it! I put some new
pictures in the Photo Link on the home page. Be sure to check
them out.
Natalie went to
the doctor's for her one year check-up. She weighed 18 lbs. 6 oz.
and was 28 1/2 " long. Everything is right on
target for a little peanut like her.
8/23/06
Where does the
time go? I cannot believe that fall is almost
here. Natalie is
growing like a weed. She weighs 20 lbs and is nicely into 12
month clothes. (Well, she can still wear 3-6 months
if they are separates!) The pediatrician says that she
is going to be a very petite little girl. In our family....go
figure! Ha-Ha! She is running all over the place, climbing
over and crawling around anything that gets in her way. She will
eat just about anything you put in front of her.....well, except green
olives. Guess Mommy's olive burgers are safe. Someone has
decided that baby food is for babies, and since she's not a baby, it's
on to grown-up, big girl food. The spicier - the
better!
We scheduled
Natalie's eye surgery for Friday, Sept. 8th. The dr. said that
the procedure will take about 1 1/2 hours. They are going to
straighten both eyes (2 muscles on one eye and 1 muscle on the
other). She said that this type of surgery has an 80% success
rate. Let's hope and pray that we don't have to go through
this again - Mommy's nerves can't take it.
We had a cool
experience. Through work, Jon was invited to an after-hours,
behind-the-scenes evening event at the local zoo. We got to go
inside some of the animal buildings and see what goes on there.
Inside the tiger house, we got to see up-close, a huge tiger perform
tricks. We could almost touch him. Natalie was fascinated
with the tiger. She didn't want to leave. Then we walked
through the penguin enclosure. It was so neat to have them walk
through a cubbyhole out on to a ledge by us. They were so
cute! We left there and walked to the vet center. Natalie
saw 2 foxes (or 'kitties' as she called them) and wanted to go inside
and pet them. Lucky for the foxes, the door was locked.
Next, we went by a fenced-in area that had some kind of yak in it.
He came over to the fence to see if we had anything for him. I
thought Natalie might get scared, but she just stared up at him - maybe
trying to figure out why he smelled so bad. The highlight for
Natalie was climbing out of her stroller and chasing a peacock.
Thank Heavens, the bird moved faster than she could. But she was
able to feed a mama peacock and her babies. The daddy just walked
around, checking things out. Natalie had a blast! She loves
animals so much.
As all
"Red-Blooded American" kids will agree, we took Natalie to
Ceasarland to experience 'Playland'. At first, she was a little
hesitant, but once she got her courage up.....she was off and
running. She like watching all the other kids and didn't get
nervous when they ran past her. I could tell that she was
planning the day when she could keep up with them. I can see that
we will be spending a lot of time there.
Well, that's
about it. Be sure a check out our photo section (the link is on
the Home Page), I added new pictures.
9/8/06
We are back home
after Natalie's surgery this morning. It went well and
Natalie is doing good. The doctors came for her and she
walked happily off with them into surgery. But coming out was
another story all together. The surgical staff nicknamed her
"Hurricane Natalie" and they weren't kidding. We were
told that the surgeon would come and talk to us as soon as she was
done, and that it would be about another 20-30 minutes before we could
go back to Natalie. Well, while we were talking to the surgeon,
the nurses came to us and said that we could go back to recovery
now. As we stepped through the doors to the back, we could hear
Natalie letting them know just what she thought of them. She was
not very happy!!!! And she let everyone within earshot know
it. The poor nurse was trying to hold her and calm her down - HA!
Natalie was bucking and twisting so bad the nurse could hardly hold
on. She gave Natalie to me and it took about 20 minutes for her
to begin to settle down. This was even after Demerol. It
wasn't so much the pain as it was that she was PISSED OFF!!!!!!!
Well, now we are
home and resting (us, not her). Natalie is playing and, as long
as she doesn't rub her eyes, she is doing good. She is being
'Velcro Baby' but that's fine with me......I'm kind of being 'Velcro
Mommy'.
Thank you,
everyone, for all the prayers and good thoughts today. I know
that they helped. I could feel everyone's presence with us
and it was a great comfort. Well, got to go hold my baby.
She needs me and I need her.
12/06/06
I want to
apologize for not posting in a long time. Things are busy,
busy, busy here. Natalie is such a joy. She never
stops. This kid has more energy in her little finger than I do in
my whole body! She had her first real cold and is just starting
to feel better. It was so sad to see her looking so miserable and
not be able to do much to make her feel better. Thank God she is
finally eating and drinking again, it was touch and go for a
while.
Thanksgiving was
nice; we had dinner with Jon's family in Kalamazoo. Natalie
enjoyed all the good food. She has no idea what is in store for
her for Christmas! We tried to have her picture taken with the
mall Santa. HA! She was nervous about him but when he reached out
and touched her hand.....she came un-glued. She was
terrified! You could tell that he was a grandpa cuz he was so
nice and sweet to her. But Natalie was not having anything to do
with him. She did not settle down until we were far, far away
from him. We did try again a week later, but still no luck.
Oh well, who needs a Santa picture anyway. Christmas is about
Jesus, not Santa. And Natalie likes Jesus! We did get
Natalie Christmas picture taken and, other than her being sick, I think
they will turn out really good. I will be
mailing pictures out in our cards after they come in on
the 15th.
Jon and I are so
excited for Christmas this year. Last year, we had thought that
Natalie would be home by the holidays. We were devastated when we
did not at least have our referral. Christmas came and went but
our hearts were somewhere in China. Funny the difference a
year can make. We are almost giddy with anticipation. I got
non-breakable ornaments for the tree, so Natalie can touch if she needs
to. We got her a special dress, which she wore for her
picture. And, we were asked if she could play Baby Jesus in the
living nativity at church. I said yes, but told them that the
really needed to find a younger Jesus, since I do not think Natalie
will be quiet or co-operative for the play. She too much of a
wiggler.
Well, that's all
the time I have for right now. L'il Miss is needing me.
3/28/07
Oh my goodness ~
could a year have possible gone by? Where did the time fly?
Natalie has grown so very much in the past year, it's so hard to
imagine her as we received her one year ago today. She is a
little whirlwind, running and laughing, singing and dancing! She
is the light of our lives. Though still a peanut, don't let that
fool you. So can bring you to your knees with a well-placed shoe,
a belly laugh, or a sweet "I ya you". She continues to
surprise us daily. This morning, I asked her what her name was
and without batting an eye, she replied "Natalie". Smart
or what? She knows her shapes (square, circle and
triangle), can count to 3, and A-B-C. What seems like babble
to the untrained parent, is really a vast vocabulary. It just
takes some cyphering on Mommy & Daddy's part.
Natalie loves
all her pets and can be found playing with or laying on any one of them
at any given time. We were so afraid that she would be scared of
the animals but, in reality, they helped her with her transition into
our family. They were safe, when her world was upside down.
They offered unconditional love and did not ask anything in
return. She could hug them, kiss them or just
snuggle. They were her rock until she figured out that Jon
and I were ok. Now, we get the hugs, kisses and snuggles, too!
Our world is a
much brighter place with her in it.
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