3 Months ago today we were pacing in our room at the Dolton Hotel in Changsha China. We had been waiting for 3 days for the Orphanage Director to bring our daughter. Each day we were told to stay close to the phone and they would let us know when she had arrived. At the end of the day they would tell us that they were still waiting for one more piece of paperwork to come in. Finally... after a very dizzy rollercoaster ride that we had been on for 2 weeks, the kind Orphanage Director drove our daughter to Changsha and brought her right to our hotel room. It was 7 pm and Bryan and I felt like 2 little kids on Christmas morning. We knew it would be great but we had no idea the magnitude of this greatness. I took my baby in my arms and just melted. She looked me in the eyes and immediately realized she had never seen anyone quite like me??? She examined my hair and touched my face. I fed her Happy Baby Green puffs and she accepted them. She was smiling that very first night and we sang songs and danced until the wee hours of the night. She slept between Bryan and I that night and kept one hand on each of us until morning. She sucked her index finger all the time. We had no idea at the time how much fear and anxiety she was having. She seemed to have adjusted so quickly and took to us amazingly but inside, inside she was so confused, so scared. She began to attach and as that began she became mama's girl. As I look back at photos, her little finger was always in her mouth. She was using it for comfort as she grieved leaving the oly life she had ever known. Now she never sucks her finger. She is trusting us and she knows we are mommy and daddy and sisters and brother. What she does not know is for how long? She was moved so many times. As a 4 month old being abandoned by mom, then after 4 months in the SWI she was put in foster care, after 1 month in foster care she went back to the SWI, and 3 months later she was ours. I see the fear in her at night. She gets clingy in the evening and wants me to put her in the bjorn or just carry her around. She is waking only once now to check up on us at night. She is so brave and such a little warrior. 3 months ago she struggled to roll over, had no ab muscles or leg strength. She had been tied in her crib so much she just never got a chance to work the muscles. She is now strong and healthy. She is a fast little crawler and she can pull herself up on anything. She has begun walking along the furniture and walking while pushing her shopping cart. She loves noodles and will eat them any time of day. She loves her formula and the doctors are keeping her on that while she catches up in growth. She is almost 17 pounds. She has grown a ton of hair and it is as soft as silk. Her skin has gotten darker and it is absolutely gorgeous! It is a creamy tan and it is soooo stinkin soft! We love to kiss on her, do it all day long. The kids take over at 3 when they get home and then Daddy jumps in when he gets home from work. She has to be getting sick of us kissing on her but those cheeks... oh they are just delicious! She is a smart cookie, she loves repetition so if you read the book the wrong way once (you know some of these books are kind of long and wordy) you better plan on reading it wrong every time because she will call you on it! She loves to watch her sisters dance, her brother play with his nerf swords and Quincie do homework on her laptop. She has the sweetest laugh, sounds different than any laugh I have heard, kind of like a toy. It's pretty silly sounding. She loves to go outside and she loves a cold breeze. I think it's because that is the weather we had when we first met and we made some fun little games out of going out in the cold. She delights in books, goes crazy batting her arms like she is about to take off flying, and then is too excited to get to the next book so we can't even get through 3 pages on the one we started with :) She also loves to get the mail, again batting her arms when she see's the treasure in the box. She loves paper and holds her mail like a prize all the way back to the house. She loves fuzzy animals and says ahh every time she see's one. Stuffed or real she loves them all. She pretends to be helpless when her sibblings sit down to play with her. She will put her hand over her toy and pretend that she can not push the button hard enough and gestures for help. She still dances with her whole body to music and sways her head to the beat. She loves music just as she has since we met. She is amazing and we all love her so much. Happy 3 Months Forever Family Day Baby. We can't imagine life without you!
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