Three Years.

 

  I’ve not blogged in a bit.  Thank you for all of the kind e-mails checking to make sure that we’re all alright and that the adoption is progressing.  We’ve been buried-under-busy since moving in January, but I’d like to get back to posting.

 

  I’ve wanted to start blogging again for a while, but today I felt like I had the proper motivation.  Our sweet Bella has been with us for three years now.  Three years. 

 

Bella,

  I cannot remember life without you.  Although I can remember the day you came to us down to the smallest details – the nausea in my stomach on the way to the hospital, the fear and despair written over every inch of your cancer ravaged little body, the panic that set in when I realized that your illness was much more than the intake worker had implied, the sadness that overtook your being as you realized you were going home with us, strangers.
 
  Yes.  I remember it all.  How is it that I can remember it so well, but simultaneously I cannot remember life without you?  I think it is grace – God had begun to prepare my heart for you before you came – I think I cannot remember life without you because you were there in my heart long before I ever knew it.

 

  We’ve been through the ringer these last three years, eh?  The darkest night of your soul.  Your agony.  Cancer.  Food issues.  Sleep issues.  Rage.  More cancer.  Then pinpricks of light – when I think you began to feel like even though it had been completely taken apart, the puzzle of your life was beginning to come back together – in a different way.
  We are not in the light just yet.  There is still pain, fear, challenges.  But now we work through them together instead of them dividing us.

 

  You, Bella, are my daughter.  I love you.

I am not your first Mama.  I will never, ever be your only Mama.  But God has knitted us together in a way that only adoption can produce – in a way you can only experience by watching God heal brokenness and create family from nothing.

 

  Soon you will be seven.  Before we know it you will be 16.  In the blink of an eye your Daddy will be walking you down the aisle.  And I feel so blessed to get to experience it all with you.

 

  Right now you and your sisters are singing your own rendition of “Let It Go” and we are getting ready to eat dinner which will assuredly be a chaotic, loud, and incredibly messy event.  Yes, event.  I will cherish each minute of it – when you are so helpful with your sisters, when you complain because I put veggies in the sauce, and when your eyes light up because your Daddy decides to make cookies with you tonight. 

  I praise God for you, little one. 

 

Love you, love you, love you,

                    Mama

Fall!

 

The girls had a ton of fun playing in the leaves with Brian this weekend.

 

Ugh.  Getting so tired of having to pixilate their little faces.  Maybe someday I won’t.  But their smiles are so beautiful.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is the part where Sylvia got leaves down her pants and decided she’s just go sans clothing.

 

 

Fall!

 

Although at this point, the girls are pretty much just obsessed with when it’s going to start snowing.

3.

 

My sweet, sweet Sylvie girl, you are THree.  (You make sure to really pronounce that TH at the beginning, you are very proud of pronouncing it correctly.)  Of course, most of the time when we ask you how old you are, you are four or seven, or ten.  Not just yet sweet girl.  One year at a time.

 

 

As a birthday surprise your Nana and Grandpa came in town.  I didn’t tell you they were coming, and when they showed up you were over the moon.

Other than that, my goal for your birthday was to have LOTS of purple.  Purple is absolutely your favorite color, and you love anything that happens to be purple.  It’s a part of your three-year-old self.

 

We went to IHOP for a special birthday breakfast, and hung out with your Nana and Grandpa all day.

 

I decorated the kitchen in purple balloons and streamers, but your sisters got very excited and decided they wanted to help decorate for you too. 

So…it wasn’t the most put together decorating job, but it was very unique, and chock full of love for you.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

From Daddy and I you got a purple Ukulele. (A guitar, as far as you’re concerned)  You love playing Daddy’s guitar with him at night during our family devotions, so we thought you’d enjoy getting to play along with him.

 

In your new veterinarian dress up costume from Nana and Grandpa.

 

 

 

Playing with your pink and purple princess Duplo set from Nana and Grandpa.  By far the favorite present.  Because while you love purple, pink and princesses, you also absolutely have an engineer’s mind.  Lego was happy to oblige both.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Happy Birthday sweet girl.  You are getting so big.  It’s so much fun to talk with you now and to hear what is going on in your little mind.  You are so clever.  You are quite the negotiator – so much so that I think by the time your are 7 or 8 you might be able to out-reason me.  Makes me a little nervous. 

You love your sisters so much and you play together constantly.  Not without bickering and annoying each other – but that’s part of being sisters.  Most of the time, in the morning when Naomi wakes up, before I can get in there you are out of bed and talking to her at the edge of her crib.  You are so sweet – “It’s ok Naomi, sissy is here, I won’t leave you.”  You try to give her things to make her happy and you love it when it works.  You and Tootaw play together all day as if you never spent a day of your lives apart. 

 

I would definitely say that if there is something that defines your personality it is joy.  I have said that since you were born, and it has endured.

You are an optimist, and you are happy in almost any circumstance (as long as your sisters aren’t stealing things from you.).  I could say, “Alright girls, we’re going to the doctor to get shots now.” And I’m confident you would reply, “Oooooohhh, yeah!  I bet that we’ll get stickers at the end!!!”  You can search out the joy in anything.  I hope that you can hold on to that as you get older.  It is beautiful.

 

You are a little bit of a home-body, which has surprised me as you’ve gotten older.  You love playing with friends, or going to their houses, but you’d really rather just be here with me and Daddy.  It’s not that you aren’t social.  Anyone who has met you knows that your are, by all means, social.  But, when I take you to a friend’s house for a couple of hours, you are always concerned as to when I will pick you up, and most often you tell me you’d rather just play with me.  I love it.  I love that you love home and our family.  In fact, when I asked you if you’d like to have friends over for your birthday, or have it just be our family you said you’d rather it just be us. 

 

At night you want me to lay down with you while you fall asleep – a pretty new phase.  I figure it won’t be much longer that you’ll want me to do that, so I oblige.  You have me tell you a story, and then you tell me a story.  Back and forth until my imagination has run out.  Then you roll over and squeeze my face and whisper, “I love you Mommy!”

And that is the best part of my day.

I love you more than you know.  I pray for you always, and I only hope that I can teach you the meaning of grace, and what it truly means to love other people, and Jesus. 

I am so, so blessed to be your Mommy.  Here’s to 3, and hoping that it goes by slowly enough that I can always remember what a joy you are.

Tootaw’s Birthday.

Tootaw turned the big 0-3 on the 7th!  This extends the streak of our kids having birthdays within a week of moving in with us.  That always makes it difficult to feel like we have a well thought out celebration, or to figure out what it is that would make them feel super special.

I knew that Tootaw really enjoyed bowling at Horn Creek (she talked about it more than anything else we did.) so I thought it would be fun for us all to go bowling together.

Sisters.

Of course, most of the game of bowling was spent anticipating opening the presents…

Earlier in the day we went to the grocery store, and I asked Tootaw if she’d like to pick out what kind of cake we could make together for her birthday.  She said “No!” indignantly, as if it were the worst idea ever.  Puzzled, I asked why not.  “Because I want tuptakes!”

Mmmmmm.

I wish I could post more pictures, but most of them have the girls’ faces in them!

Our friends, the Ketters, joined us to celebrate – which made for lots of little girls enjoying cupcakes!

Happy Birthday, sweet girl.  We love you, and are so blessed to have gotten to help you celebrate your third birthday.  I hope you know how much you are loved, and that you are a cherished part of our family.  I hope you loved the “bowding” and the “tuptakes”.  I pray for you everyday, that God would capture your heart and lead you into the little girl, and someday big girl, and someday woman, that he created you to be. 

Love you, love you, love you,

  Mama Maggie

Challenges.

 

We knew that a few would rear their heads sooner or later.  It’s taken from the book, “When You Add a Fourth Child to Your Family Through Foster Care.”

That’s a book.  You haven’t read it?  Arg.  Me either.  You should write it.  It would be helpful.

 

 

 

Tootaw is really doing well transition-wise.  No huge behaviors, no vomit (praise the good Lord.), not really even any hysterics.  This leaves a lot to be thankful for.

The challenges thus far have surfaced in other ways, though. 

I’m getting a hold of our Infant Toddler Services program today to have some assessments done.  There are more than a handful of things that I have noticed since she’s been with us that make me think that we might have some issues to hurdle.

Developmental?  Sensory Processing?  Drug exposure related? 

I’m not sure.  But I sure as heck am not comfortable pretending like it’s nothing.

 

I couldn’t list all the things I’ve noticed.  It would probably look more like a pamphlet than a blog post.  Examples?

 

Tootaw turns three tomorrow.  She doesn’t know her colors, her shapes, ANIMALS, animal noises, how to dress herself, and her speech is almost impossible to decipher most of the time.  This wouldn’t concern me as much if she were moving here straight from home – then I would just chock it up to being behind, lack of exposure – but she’s been in a foster home for over a year and hasn’t caught up.

 

Concerning.

 

Recall seems to be very challenging.  Today we did a big art project centered around the color yellow – yellow paint, yellow puff balls, yellow popsicle sticks, yellow balloons, etc. – everything was yellow.  We talked about different things that are yellow (although she couldn’t come up with any) and, in general, obsessed over the color yellow.

Two minutes later (literally) we were in the living room and I held up a yellow hair bow and said, “Tootaw, what color is this!?!?!” 

Blank stare.  No recollection.  She really. didn’t. know.

 

Concerning.

 

We read through a book of animals approximately 500 times a day (probably not really.) because animals and their noises are what Naomi (at 16 months) is learning right now. 

I can point to a horse and ask Tootaw what it is, and she doesn’t know.  So we talk about it being a horse, how she rode one at Horn Creek, and what sound it makes.

Two pages later, I can turn back in the book and ask her what the horse is or what sound it makes – blank stare.  She doesn’t know. 

 

Concerning.

 

Hard to say what the culprit is.  Drug exposure is a possibility.  She’s also experienced a lot of trauma in the last year and half, which has had unknown effects on her brain.  Also, clearly no one in her last foster home was paying enough attention to notice that she is seriously behind developmentally.  Lots of factors.

 

 

I’m hoping to get some assessments for services started sooner than later.  It will help me know how to help her, and it will help me to have more patience with it all.  Cause you know, life wasn’t already insane.

 

Thoughts from anyone who has experienced this?