Friday, July 10, 2009

Waves and Kisses!

Hope with Christy!
Hope with Daddy and Great Grandmother

Hope after first spaghetti dinner
Hope with her first sitter, Emily Cheek
Hope loved the water immediately

Hope enjoyed celebrating her first 4th of July at the lake with friends and family. She loves the water now and is fearless. She will play forever just splashing. While she didn’t eat any BBQ, she ate strawberries all day long. She wasn’t even scared of the fireworks. She kept pointing at them and say “ook, ook.”

Hope had her very first sitter other than Dow and Beth. Her name is Emily and she is so good with Hope. Her family is waiting on a referral from China. Emily has sat with Hope three times so far and Hope has done well every time - thanks Emily!

We returned to the International Adoption Clinic this past Wednesday. Hope was given a developmental evaluation and did very well except for speech. I just have to brag a little. The therapist wanted Hope to stack four blocks, but Hope stacked eight blocks!!! We were so proud.

All of her lab work was good. Even the immunizations she had in Moldova were good. This saves her a lot of shots. We will be retesting for the parasite that was discovered earlier, but the doctor feels sure that the antibiotic took care of it. We sure hope so, because Hope absolutely hated that medicine. We had to hold her down three times a day and force it down her. Plus it lowered her appetite considerably. The bad news is that Hope has not gained an ounce since being home. She still weighs 16 and 1/2 lbs. The doctor is concerned about this and gave us weight goals. Hope is very selective in what she eats, so it will not be very easy to reach these goals. Hope also met her great grandmother on Andy’s side (Gigi) today. Hope has two great-grandmothers!

She is saying more words such as apple, ball, and Bet (Beth). However, she understands what we are saying so well. WE can’t believe she has learned so much in such a short time. We are so excited that she has learned to give us a kiss. She still has some work to do in this area, but she has come a long way. She has also learned to wave good-bye. Of course like other two year olds, she will never do it when asked. Yesterday, she experienced butterfly kisses from her Mom and she loved them.

Tonight, we just returned from meeting Phillip Cameron, his wife, and about 14 young ladies from Stella House in Moldova. We were so impressed with all the girls, and they loved meeting Hope. Phillip was so surprised and pleased to discover we adopted from Moldova. He said he could empty the orphanages in Moldova if he could get the government to cooperate. His first words to us were, “how did you do it?” Of course our response was “God!”