We're home: One month!

I can't believe that we have had Lightening Hope in our life for a whole month, and yet it is weird to see the video and pictures from Gotcha Day. That day seems like ages ago! Time is weird that way.

Thank you all for respecting our request to keep your distance. She is doing so well and continues to sleep better each night. Tonight she went to bed in her crib at 8pm. AMAZING! not even a peep. It is sinking in that we will come for her in the morning and she can rest her body, mind and heart. Praise the Lord! I was preparing for a year of restless nights. (Not like there won't be more like before but the "every night waking every 45 minutes to 2 hours is hard on us and her!)

My back is a little better everyday! Thank you all for your prayers and help!

Here is a picture from our first day with her and one from a month later.

We had our first visit from our social worker today. We just love her and were excited to introduce baby girl to her! It has been about 4 years since we started with her and the adoption process. The last 20 months have been in China portion. China requires 6 visits by our social worker over 5 years. She writes reports and sends them to our agency who forwards them to China.

(They go as follows: after coming home...1 month, 6 months, 1 year, 2 years, 3 years and 5 years)

Here are some pictures from our last week!

We received the Show Hope grant, as I have mentioned before. Steven Curtis Chapman and his wife Mary Beth Chapman came to town to do a Show Hope concert and fundraising event last Friday. We were honored to share our story with their team at a lunch and later that evening at the concert. We are so thankful for their ministry and in helping us bring home this girl!

 (The evening concert)

 After we received the grant our kids starting adding their "GIVE" money to this envelope. They presented it to the Chapmans that evening. They were so gracious and said that they would let us know which grant-family it went towards.

Amazing!

It's so fun to walk every step of this with our kiddos!

After the concert with some friends!

As many of you also know I threw out my back the night before the concert...bad timing! We had some sweet helpers this week come over! Thanks guys!

 A visit from Jason and Molly!

 One of the quirks about our girl is that she gets hot and sweaty really easily.

This is her hair after a bunch of playing and sweating ;)

 She sure loves her daddy! and she loves to go up-side-down!

She also doesn't want to be left out when it's time for playing piano.

School has been rough this week. Lots of transitioning here with schooling our big kids at home while having a super fun and super cute baby in the midst. :/  and to boot my back was bad ALL week. (Painful all day!) Let's just say it was not my best homeschooling week. But we survived.

 When she doesn't want to be put down she lets you know by her leg-death-grip. Funny girl!

After seeing me ice my back all week baby girl thought she would give it a try.

Very sympathetic girl :)

More school with a baby crawling on them, sitting on them, turing their pages for them...

She's such a doll!

Lots of new things to try with our littlest. On this night we busted out the old trike that was Fashion Faith's first trike (now almost 10 years old, yikes!) and Lightening Hope LOVED it! Before we knew it she was pursing her little self in and out of the garage forward and backward. 

We also got out C-dub's first helmet.

Baby girls loves to brush her teeth. She must have done this at her foster center cause she knows just what to do.

A tired day during stations...

Molly came to help last Thursday! AMAZING!

Swept, mopped, cooked, played, "mathed" ;), payed attention to...

This morning the girls made me breakfast. So sweet!

This afternoon after our social worker left we had a visit from some family. (My Aunt Ann and cousin Joan from down south and my Aunt Kathy.)

So great to see them and introduce them to our girl!

This ice cream truck man always comes by late and drives pretty fast. Even if I did want to let the kids get ice cream he is always gone before we would be able to catch him. With the weather cooling off so nicely we had the windows open in the house tonight and I heard him coming around the block. Anyhow, I always say, "No." Tonight it was a "YES!" Gotta throw in some fun here and there right?

We're home: post 2 (days 7-13)

{Gotcha Day video and post coming.

I was having trouble getting the video onto Youtube.}

Some of this will be redundant for those of you on fb...but not everyone is so here goes.

Home: Day 7

We've been home 7 days by now...it's check up day! Her weight was 22.1 lb. and length 31.5 inches (if I remember correctly, can't find the paper they wrote it on. lol) She is so healthy and we are looking forward to getting to Shriner's Hospital in Sac to see what we can see about her hands and feet. I found myself and find myself already bragging on our girl...such a mom right? It's a funny thing because the five of us don't even notice her hands and feet being any different than our own anymore. She is so determined that we just carry on. She seems to be right on target with the exception of walking of course.

A friend said to me yesterday, after watching her eat," It's amazing how special needs kids adapt." My immediate thought to myself was,"Yea, they sure do. I wonder why she just said that? Oh yeah, she's talking about my kid. LOL!" I guess that's what mamas do, we see what our kids can do,

not what they cannot. :)

It was fun that all five of us got to go to the appointment. They love her so much!

Home: Day 8

It has been a great transition over all but harder on some of us than others. With Jumping Joy being the youngest for so long  (7.5 years) it has been a little rough sharing mom. This morning just the two of us went on a bike ride to 7-11 and picked up some Corn Nuts, cranapple juice and a Red Box to share with everyone when we got home. It was a great break for us both! Love this girl. She has so much to offer and loves her family so deeply! She is trying to make sense of this whole adoption thing too. What a great big sister!

Later this day I caught a sweet pic of our youngest two. It makes my heart sing that Jumping Joy gets to experience begin an older sister and that Lightning Hope gets so much love...every.single.minute.of.every.single.day ;)

Home: Day 9

I am trying to get sleep when baby sleeps but also spend time with my big kids...just the thought of it is exhausting. C-dub and I got in a game of the Star Trek version of Catan in today. He won by one point. I will blame my fuzzy-sleep deprived mind ;)

Keeping baby busy. This light up toy was given to her by a shop owner in China that we purchased quite a few souvenirs from. They loved her. Very sweet!

We made it to church for the first time today. I was surprised that we were all doing so well. The big kids missed everyone at church so much. I am glad that we made it!
Baby girl slept through the entire thing.

Home: Day 10

We officially started back to school today. Although it is MUCH EARLIER than I thought the big kids are going stir crazy...and so am I! Let's see how it goes...

Lightening Hope is a new station for our homeschooling adventures. I did 10 minute intervals with 5-10 minutes between each session in the morning before our "put her to sleep" walk around the block.(This was after our opening Bible time.) We do many things in age-order. For this I started in reverse age-order so that Jumping Joy would have a chance to pick first. Trying all sorts of things to make her feel special. :) I chose three activities and JJ got to choose first, then FF, then CD.

JJ chose books

FF chose shapes and little pom-pom balls

That left CD with mega blocks

After this short/long first day back at school we chilled and watched I Love Lucy.

LH woke up in a bad mood. She was grumpy and clingy. I am sure that her little mind is still trying to figure out just what has happened to her. I held her most of the rest of the day. That evening we walked to our friend's house and picked up their crib. They are going to missionary school for 6 months and lent us their crib. It worked out perfectly. I think baby girl will be much more comfy and have much more room. She moves around A TON when she sleeps. Thanks Jones family!

Home: Day 11

FF also known as Kiki picked out baby girl's outfit today. They (both older sistas) love to dress "their baby", as they say.

On this day, like most, I was in absolute need of a nap. My dad had picked the big kids up for gym so it was just baby and me for the "walk a baby to sleep". I promptly laid myself down too with the stroller in arms reach so if she peeped, which she does, I could rock her back to sleep and catch some more zzzzs. It worked and we got a 2.5 hour nap! Yay us!

 An afternoon of getting school finished and staying sane. CD and FF not loving their writing homework for a class they are taking, baby being introduced to Lego Duplo blocks while being hot and grumpy and JJ trying to remake a Lego sculpture that CD broke by accident and in this pic she was complaining about not finding the piece she needs. (Keepin it real.)

 

 After all of that we are off to the pool. Baby LOVES the pool and it is a way to keep her awake in the afternoon and gives us all something else to do as we get tired of each other inside all day. ;)

After swim baby wants to get back out. Thanks to big brother locking the door she stays in.

When daddy got home from work he was on a phone call. This is what baby did when she saw him. Funny girl.

Home: Day 12

Trying to get a big girl's hair straightened before class while baby girl just wants to be held.

Tricky-tricky!

(JJ picked her outfit this day;)

We braved Target for the first time with LH.

She did great but I did need to keep saying "Let's go guys before she melts." She didn't fuss at all.

Home: Day 13

Our second day of "baby is a station" was fun. It has been fun to keep some toys just for this "school time" for LH. I love getting out toys that will challenge her and stretch her as well as keep her attention. Everyday is an adventure. It is so helpful for me to be able to help the big kids with math and LA and gives them one on one time with "their baby" ;) Today was tea pot with FF,

stacking rings (such a classic toy) with CD,

and counting bears & stacking cups with JJ.