9 Months Home!

Yesterday we celebrated 9 months home for Mila! We celebrated by having her last baba :( She has been down to one bottle a day for a while now and it was really more for me than it was for her. I loved snuggling her and watching her fall asleep drinking her bottle before her nap, but she was clearly losing interest in the baba. She knows bigger and better things are ahead I guess!

Having a bedtime snack and watching Mickey Mouse!

Beautiful Blue Eyes!

I love her little chin!

Smiling so big you can't even see her eyes!

The "look"

Smiling at Mickey Mouse!

Love this face!

Big Girl Milk-drinking!

Relaxin' in her pink chair!

Blowing Raspberries back at Mama!

Silly Girl!

Mila's new do after her haircut today!

Signing more (for more snacks) while mama keeps taking pictures

Continuing to sign "more" while Mama ignores her

Okay when that doesn't work just cry! That seems to get Mama's attention every time!!

Mila's first haircut today! She happily sat there and listened to me sing Baby Beluga! 

The past 9 months have been full of ups and downs and lots of growth, on Mila's part, and our ours as parents. She is teaching us so much and proving that love heals! We thank God for allowing us to be her parents! Happy 9 Months Home Mila!

Mila On the Move!

Mila has been working hard in Physical Therapy to strengthen her muscles. Her goal right now is crawling. We know crawling is so important to develop not only core, shoulder, arm and hip muscles, but it is also important for brain development. I asked Mila's physical therapist if it's common for kids with Down Syndrome to walk before they crawl because Mila seems closer to walking than crawling. She said it is very common for kids with low muscle tone and that we'll just keep trying to get her to work on both crawling and walking. Zoya crawled first but very soon after she learned to crawl she was walking so she didn't crawl for that long.

Mila is starting to scoot around and try to figure out how to get her body to move when she is on her belly. She seems to have a technique unlike any other I've seen!

Here is the "lunge"

This is my favorite....she digs her right toe in and flings her left leg to lurch herself forward!

Trying to get her knees under her and pull with her arms...

A face also works as a third arm at times

Love that smile!

Working hard!

The "bear" pose that she hasn't quite figured out how to move forward in yet (only backward)

Extra points for creativity but not so much for form!

"How many push ups did you say I have to do?"

So close! 

Her funny face! 

And Mila has been standing and finally holding on with only her arms and not using her body to support herself! She even took the teeniest tiniest baby step using her toy walker during PT!!! She loves being upright. After about 3-5 minutes of standing her body starts shaking because she is working so hard so I help her to sit down and she gets mad and tries to pull right back up to standing! My frail little baby is getting so strong!

This picture reminds me of a little old lady with her dress, sneakers, and walker :)

Go, Mila, Go! We are so proud of your determined attitude! You have been a fighter from the beginning and we're seeing that more and more every single day!

Sensory Learning

Sensory play is so important for all kids, but especially important for kids who lacked those experiences early on in life (orphans) and for children with Down Syndrome (as many children with DS have some sensory needs). Zoya and Mila are polar opposites in so many ways. One of those ways is how different they are with their sensory profiles. When Zoya came home she was very sensory defensive in most areas. She freaked out with loud and sudden noises. She got easily overwhelmed in large crowds. We had to leave worship at church because the music was too loud. She couldn't stand to be spun around or even tipped back ever so slightly. She hated swinging in the baby swing. She was scared of a lot. A lot of things helped her become less sensory defensive, including Therapeutic Listening, and a healthy sensory "diet" of sorts. Mila on the other hand is such a huge sensory seeker and dare devil when it comes to sound and movement! She however, has a harder time using her hands to explore her environment so these activities will be great for Mila when she is a little older too!

 One common sensory activity is shaving cream play. We took it up a notch and had an hour of "sensory learning" experience. 

First we practiced some letters in the shaving cream. We focused a lot on "Z" and "o" getting her ready to write her name. 

Zoya wrote these letters by herself and told me what they were. Now, if I said "write a letter 'p' she probably couldn't do it, but she likes to doodle and then tell me what letters or numbers her doodles look like. It's a good start!

She is starting her big "Z"

First line across...

Slant to the left...

Pull back across!

"I did it!"

Just playing :)

I'm getting better at tolerating messes...clearly I have my own sensory issues!

Another activity we did was drawing horizontal lines to practice our pre-writing skills. She had to connect the correct colored bears. 

We sorted our bears by color

To "up" the sensory experience we added rice...here was Zoya's initial thought. She got over it easily and thought it was cool!

I told her "hands up and don't move" while I pushed her over to the sink to clean up!

We finished our sensory play by playing in soapy water for another 20 minutes!

"Yes, mom?"

Here is an example of how we carried over the sensory learning to "paper/pencil" skills. I'll post more on this another time! This is her letter Z done all by herself on a small sentence strip. We used the stickers as guides for her to know where to draw her lines to make the Z! 

Mended Little Heart

Mila had her 6 month cardiology follow up appointment today. I was nervous, as always, right before cardiology appointments. She weighed in at almost 23 pounds and sprouted to just over 30 inches!

Here she is getting her EKG....
a mouth full of snacks typically keeps her pretty happy....imagine that ;)
I know you'd never guess based on her size!

The cardiologist came into the room and looked over her records and asked how she was doing. I blurted out "fabulous, really really good." Then I thought to myself, "Ugh now since I said that out loud something will be wrong...stupid stupid stupid." I talked myself into calming down and realized I was being ridiculous thinking that! He was just as excited as I was that I didn't have to check any of the "other health conditions" on the checklist they give us at each appointment. Last time quite a few of those boxes were checked with symptoms and other health conditions and this time I read through them all twice because I couldn't believe I didn't have to check ANYTHING. I was so thrilled in fact, that I wrote in big letters right across it "NONE" with one of my best 2nd-grade-teacher smiley faces! Maybe that's why he was just as excited as I was...it was that smiley face ;)

Anyways, we chatted a bit about orphans as we always do, and then he checked her over.  Last time he decided to keep her on the Lasix because her liver was still low and palpable and there was just the smallest indication of extra fluid. This time her liver was exactly where it was supposed to be and no indication of issues with extra fluid. So we get to stop the Lasix, which means Mila is completely MED-FREE!! I think she gets a diploma for that or something! He listened to her heart and looked rather confused. Immediately my heart jumped to my throat and I asked what was wrong. He said something to the effect of "I could have sworn she had leak from her VSD patch last time she was here. And I told him he was right, that she did. He said "I don't hear anything at all. Usually leaks don't go away" He even double checked her records. I loved seeing that confused look on his face and thought "That's MY God!" When he finally got to the echo he saw just the teeniest tiniest (definitely smaller than before) lead from her patch. We were told this happens after patching ASDs and VSDs sometimes if it's a big hole and she would just probably have it for life as it was in a place where there really isn't much ability to grow new muscle/tissue to close on it's own and it shouldn't cause her any problems. It doesn't much indicate anything medically that it's smaller, except that God is healing her heart in ways that can't be explained by medicine :) And I think that's pretty cool! He took new measurements for pulmonary hypertension and her numbers showed no pulmonary hypertension any more!!! We were hopeful that the surgery would solve the problem of the pulmonary hypertension but it was a "wait and see" kind of deal. Once he finished the echo, he smiled and said "see you in two years!" I was definitely not expecting TWO years! But I'll take it! Praising God tonight for healing our jelly bean and shining through her!

The "look"

Getting so big!

Love that smile!

Father's Day (A Little Late)

So I'm only about 2 months late with this post...but better late than never.

If you remember, for Shawn's first father's day, we got him a "Zoya tree." You can read about it HERE. Oh Zoya was so tiny and so was that tree!

Last year I didn't take a picture of Zoya and Shawn with the tree because it appeared to be dying :( It made me so sad I couldn't even stand to take a picture. At the end of last summer, we pruned the tree, cutting out the dead pieces and the tree has made a beautiful comeback! In many ways this is symbolic of Zoya's journey with us. We had to peel back the layers of hurt and neglect and orphanage life and slowly we are revealing a child who is bigger and better and more beautiful with each passing year! It is a flowering tree, but we have only seen tiny buds for the first time this past spring. Just like Zoya, the tree needs tender loving care and attention but with those things the buds will multiply and bloom one day soon! They may not have bloomed when all the other Eastern Redbud's were blooming, but just like Zoya, in their own time, they're blossoming! It brings tears to my eyes to look at this picture from two years ago and see the changes that have happened since then, both in the tree and in our beautiful Zoya girl!

So this year for father's day we just had to gift Shawn with a "Mila tree." (Now if we have any more children we will need a bigger yard). The tree we chose for Mila is a Japanese Weeping Cherry Tree. Just like Mila, when the tree blooms, others can't help but stand in awe and take notice of it's beautiful blossoms. The growth rate of its many weeping stems is quite fast. This reminds me a lot of Mila because Mila grew physically SO fast since coming home. The cherry tree, for many in Japan, symbolizes “the transience of life” because they bloom so quickly and it's only a matter of days before the flowers fall to the ground.  This tree reminds me of Mila because of this. It is a reminder that although all life is short and passes so quickly (just like the blossoms on the tree), one's life can inspire others with it's beauty while impacting those who are simply passing by. Our Mila girl has made such an impact on so many people. Just as the beautiful blossoms on the Japanese weeping cherry tree, Mila's spirit draws others in and those who meet her can't help but see the beauty and magnificence of her life! I will have to remember to take a picture with Mila and Daddy when the tree blooms!

If you notice, Mila is wearing the same dress Zoya wore in her first father's day tree picture :)