Little Mary Poppins

We took Alice to a pediatric surgeon this morning.  I had Erin come along because it is better for me to have a second set of ears when talking to doctors about my children.  The office wanted a copy of our court decree and her birth certificate.  Ok, I said, but they're not in English.  So, they made a copy of them.  Whatever.

The doctor was quite impressed with our little one.  He said she doesn't have a hernia, just a weak spot that will heal on it's own!  And that whatever we've been doing since we got her has cleared up some bowel issues and to keep it up. (insert happy dance and a bit of pride)  He just delighted in her and told us how glad he was that we have her.

He said she was like Mary Poppins...practically perfect in every way.  I couldn't agree more.

Homecoming Queen

We arrived to about 50 people waiting for us.  It was wonderful!  We had a professional photographer (and dear family friend) come to take pictures.  I wanted to enjoy the people and family and not have to worry about remembering to take pictures.  She also came back to the house, trying to capture pictures of the children meeting Alice for the first time.  Alice was so impressed with it all, she fell sound asleep and slept the rest of the evening until 4 am.  Here are a few of what she captured at the airport.

All of our Houston family in the elevator...they all fit!

Our awaiting public...look at all those signs!

When we got out of immigration, our children ran up and met us.  They were so excited to see us, they gave us all their posters and took Alice from me.  I didn't see her again until we left the airport!

Meeting Grandma for the first time...see Charlotte's hand?  She followed Alice every where.  Charlotte is in almost every picture...at least part of her!

Alice was exhausted.  She just let everyone hold her and kiss on her.  Never made a sound.  And she was passed around and around and around.  Bless her heart.  Everyone had prayed so hard for her and helped us through the whole process.  It was like she belonged to all of us.

My father-in-law gathered us all together for a time a prayer and praise.

We have had such a wonderful time since being home.  Alice has really enjoyed all the attention she's gotten with 3 older sisters and 2 older brothers.  Erin and I have to schedule time to hold her! 

I took her to our pediatrician on Thursday (the day after we came home.)  The doctor asked for her medical history.  Um, she had heart surgery....yeah, that's all I know.  She ordered a ton of tests...blood, urine, and a stool sample (still haven't figured out how to get that one!)  Alice also has a good sized hernia.  We meet with the pediatric surgeon on Thursday morning.  And the pediatric cardiologist  in March.  And physical therapy sometime in there.  

She sleeps great.  She fusses sometimes, but not very much.  Some of that is due to the orphanage.  She learned that no one would answer her cries...so why bother?  We are training her that we will be there for her.

I can't believe we've had her for 2 weeks now!  She's starting to fill out, praise the Lord!  Where her stomach used to fall in, it now is wonderfully round.  Her hair is growing and shining.  Her face is starting to fill out and she smiles now when we reach for her.  She's such a delight to us all!

It's amazing to me what love and care can do for a child.  2 weeks.  I can't wait to see how much she'll blossom and grow from here.  

I love to be able to tell strangers what the Lord has allowed us to here.  I haven't taken her out much.  But, when I do, I tell everyone that stands still long enough to hear Alice's tale.  It is such a beautiful story.  It is our story, the story of our redemption. 

How we are in 7 sentences...

We made it home safe and sound.

She did great.  What a sweet girl.

Over 50 family and friends welcomed us at the airport...pictures to come.

My daughters have a new doll and take turns choosing her clothes, dressing her, giving her a bottle, etc.

Erin is shopping for a bigger van.

We all are in love.

Ahhhhhhhhh.........

It's done.  Official.  Final.  Over.  Complete.

We have her visa.  We've done everything that we were required to do to adopt sweet, spunky Alice.  She was so impressed she slept the entire appointment.

We will begin our flight home tomorrow morning at 5:35.

And, as if you haven't already figured it out by now, songs will get stuck in my head at certain moments.  It's like my life is one big musical.

Here's today's musical number... it's just the song, not a video.  Still enjoyable and pretty much what I've been singing since the US embassy.

One more thing on the to do list

Alice has been sleeping in bed with us since we got her out of the orphanage last week.  (Small side note...tomorrow we will have had Alice for a week!)  It's been working just fine.  We've all been sleeping ok.  I wake up a lot to check on her.  We have no other place for her to sleep since she's still so little and rolls around...a lot.  But, last night Erin had a "light bulb."  He took everything out of his suitcase and...

Yep, that's my baby sleeping in a suitcase!  We put down a fluffy blanket then one of our blankets.  She slept for a few hours then woke herself up with a dirty diaper.  After a change, bath (it was one of those dirty diapers), and a bottle, out she went.  She slept great and has been in a delightful mood all morning.  I slept great, too.  That was nice.

Alice's new hat

Today we have her medical exam.  Not sure what that means or what to expect really.  I may to an update to this post when we get back to the apartment.  *Update*We made it through medicals.  It seems that America and 3 other countries require a medical exam before giving out visas.  When our driver picked us up he had another family in the car.  A dad named David and his newly adopted daughter, Madeline.  This girl's smile could light up a city!  She's beautiful.  Click here to go to his blog.  Then we went to another apartment and picked up another dad with his newly adopted daughter, Olivia.  Click here to go to his blog.  Good thing we didn't car seats.  Because in this Land Rover were 3 parents and 3 girls in the back seat!  The medicals were simple.  She gave Alice a quick and general exam and then told us to wait 20  minutes.  Then 20 minutes later she came out and told us to wait 20 minutes.  About an hour later we were done.  They work on a different time than we do.  We came back to the apartment and ate lunch.  Miss Alice took a nap in her fancy new bed.  One more thing checked off the list.  One more to go.  Tomorrow we go to the embassy for her visa...then we're outta here!

Almost able to sit up

Running the hurdles

Yesterday was my daughter, Charlotte's 9th birthday.  We were able to talk with the kids via a web chat.  It did my mama heart good to see their faces and hear their voices.  We were able to sing happy birthday to  Charlotte.   Our family gave her a sweet little birthday party.  I'm so thankful they are there to stand in for us.  Charlotte is such a neat kid.  She's a deep thinker and a little mama.  I know she's going to be such a great helper with Alice.  When she turned 7, she told me she thought she was old enough to start changing diapers.  I agreed.  Now, at 9, I wonder what else she can do?  Run errands for me?  Read to Henry and Alice while I do phonics with Thomas, give Alice one of her bottles, change diapers, and cuddle with me.  Rest up, Charlotte, mama's got a long list of to-do's for ya.

I miss the children so much it's difficult to talk about without getting teary.  I keep going over and over in my head what we have left to do hoping that will make the time go faster.  I don't think it is.  I know that the time will soon arrive that we're all together.  

What a sweet day that will be!

4 more wake-ups until we're home...

We got Alice's local passport today and headed out.  If I haven't made it clear enough...I dislike the drive!  I have been dreading it ever since the first one...the day we met Alice for the first time.  I usually sleep the whole way, but how was I going to do that with a baby?  Well, today we found out.  Alice and I slept for about an hour and a half of it.  Then, I made her a little nook on the seat next to me.  I laid her down and gave her a toy.  She played for about 45 minutes or so.  Then I held her and we did that for about 45 minutes.  Then bottle, then sleep, the nook...you get the idea.  Other than being what seemed like forever long, we did just great!

Our apartment here in the capital is a bit on the scary side.  The outside of the building and the stairwell...um...scary.  The inside, not so bad.  It's super tiny.  An entry way, tiny bathroom, little bedroom, small kitchen.  That's it.  Our last place had 2 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms.  Yep, we were spoiled and now we're paying for it.

BUT, we are in the middle of downtown.  Tonight we loaded up and walked to TGIFridays.  I put Alice in the Ergo and zipped my coat up around her.  I looked like a strange pregnant woman (my baby bump was WAY high.)  She fell asleep.  When we got to the restaurant, I unzipped and there was a baby in there!  The looks on the customers faces was priceless!  We ate an American-ish dinner.  We ordered chips and salsa as an appetizer.  No joke, they brought out the smallest bowl of salsa I've ever seen.  We're from Texas ya'll.  We give the baby that size of bowl of salsa...for himself.  But, it was good.  We miss spice.

We are tucking little one into bed now.  We bought her a pacifier thinking she would like it...and she does...as a chew toy and let's see how far I can spit toy.  We may not bring it out to play on the airplane.

You'll have to use a little bit of Imagination...

*UPDATE**I found the camera charger and was able to upload the pictures...you no longer need your imagination...thank you for your cooperation. 

We went to a real life castle yesterday.  We had wanted to do it last time we were here, but didn't want to miss a visit with Alice, so we didn't go.  We were able to this time, though.  We loaded Alice into the Ergo, packed a "diaper bag" and off we went.  It took about 2.5 hours to get there which Alice and I slept most of the way.  The roads here are full of holes and the drivers must swerve to miss them.  Yep.  It makes me nauseous just thinking about it, too.

We took great pictures and then ran out of battery.  I'm not sure where the charger for that is.  Hopefully not on my bed at home...in the states.  Anyway, when we find it, I will post them.  One thing I decided about castle living is...I wouldn't like it.  It was cold and wet.  But, Erin was very impressed and had us go into every touret and dungeon.  He loves that sort of thing!

                  

                     

                     

    

From there we went to a cathedral that was over 500 years old. Erin was fascinated.  It was very pretty.  We talked in quiet, hushed tones.  For that reason, I was ready to go outside fairly quickly into the tour.

The views from both the cathedral and the castle were amazing.

                        

We went from there to lunch.  It was yummy...borscht.  At least that's what I had.  I loved it.  The owner asked if we had brought Alice with us from America.  We told her, through our driver, that no we had adopted her here.  She told us thank you for doing such a thing; that here she would have no future and the orphanages don't care about them.  We agreed.  She asked if we had other children.  When we told her 5 she was surprised.  Large families aren't really the norm around here...ahhh, just like home.

Today we were hoping to pick up Alice's local passport and head back to the capital city.  Nope.  The passport will be ready tomorrow morning at 10.  Good thing we can get it on a Saturday.  We were also told that the embassy in the capital city won't be open on Monday because of Martin Luther King, Jr. day.  A moment of panic as it takes 2 days to get through the embassy.  We have our flights booked for Wednesday morning.  But, since they already have taken her picture for her visa the facilitators dropped off the paperwork today, counting today as day 1.  We will be able to do her medical appointment on Monday, finish at the embassy on Tuesday and head home on Wednesday.  So, we pick up her passport and head out tomorrow...4 hours on those rough roads.  I'm hoping for a long nap from both Alice and I.

She's eating well.  And sleeping well.  Tonight, she cried and cried.  We couldn't make her happy.  I'm not sure what the issue was.  But, after crying, a bottle, and a bath, she was worn out.  She feel asleep soundly.  Who knows?

We are loving watching her come out of herself a bit.  She will crack herself up and just start laughing at who  knows what.  But, it makes Erin and I laugh too.  She will army crawl over to Erin and cries when he walks past her without picking her up.  He has no problem with that!

I am counting the days until we get home.  I'm so ready to start our lives with her!  I'm ready for her to meet the neatest sisters and brothers in the world.  They are such great kids.  They were patient when I was knee deep in dossier.  They worked hard at both garage sales.  They have handled our 2 trips with grace.  They wanted her as much as we did.  They are really amazing kids.  We are blessed to have them.  And so is Alice.