Halloween 2012!

Introducing......

 Minnie Mouse!

 And flower baby!

 She's already perfecting the art of bugging her sister :) 

 "Mom I feel kinda silly in this thing!"

 "Please pick me up!"

 "Oh this sun is lovely!"

 Smiling Girl!

 Trading her tickets for a treat! 

 Zoo Boo is so much fun :) 

 Seeing the awe and wonder and excitement on her face will never get old! 

 Even though I chopped off a quarter of her face, I love this pic! 

 Here is Zoya saying "Scary!" 

 Bustin' a move in the middle of the zoo...because....well, why not? 

 Zoya has been such a Daddy's girl lately <3 p="p">

 She found the music and the stage.....

 Poor baby only has one eye to see out of! 

 There, that's better! 

 "Mom, go ahead and take more pictures, I'm just going to make some silly faces to pass the time."

 More dancing....

 Oh how I love this sweet girl! 

Mila's turn! 

 Mama's girl :) 

 Minnie Mouse smiling pretty! 

This is the first year Zoya was excited and talking a lot about Halloween. It was so cool to see! She chose her own costume out of the three choices I gave her (Minnie Mouse, a cupcake, or a zebra-some of her favorite things!) These pictures are from the Halloween even our local Zoo puts on (I will have to upload the few I have of her from her school party). Hurricane Sandy got trick or treating cancelled and rescheduled over the weekend, but we opted out. I'm struggling with the idea of trick or treating for our girls....I don't want to be a grumpy old lady, but there's just something I don't like about showing them it's okay to go door to door asking people for candy LOL....plus they don't eat that much candy anyways and are both gluten free, so it'd go to waste! Most kids can differentiate that Halloween is different and that's the only time it's okay to go to people's doors and ask for candy.....but I worry about Zoya especially...she is over the top friendly with most people she meets and would walk into any stranger's house without thinking twice...so I don't want to do anything that would encourage a whole bunch of encounters where we're purposely talking to strangers asking them for things! Maybe it sounds silly but it's just my gut instinct! I think in the future we'll take them to houses where we know the people :) 

Happy Halloween!

Tubes....Take 3!

This morning Zoya has her third set of ear tubes placed. She's never had issues with infection, but she has very tiny canals (typical of kids with DS) and when we brought her home from Ukraine her ears were so entirely filled with fluid that her hearing was 40% blocked in at least one ear. Her first set of tubes lasted almost a year which is great! With the 2nd set, one of the tubes was out in under 4 months if I remember correctly, and the other one just recently fell out as well. The ENT gave us a choice of "wait and see" or just place another set of tubes before winter. Already having speech delays related to Down Syndrome, we decided we wanted to be proactive and just have another set of tubes placed as a preventative measure to make sure fluid isn't accumulating and that her hearing continues to be crisp and clear.

Here is Zoya right before her procedure experiencing "Happy Juice." 

The third time around the doctor decided to do t-tubes instead of regular tubes because they are longer-lasting (hopefully). They could last a couple of years (hopefully). The good news is that when he put the tubes in today he said both ears showed no signs of fluid, which is encouraging, because one of the tubes has been out for almost 4 months! So I'm hoping this will be her last set of tubes!

Zoya does NOT come out of anesthesia well AT ALL. You all remember that 200 pound drunk college kid acting really belligerent going from hysterical crying one minute to just fine the next minute, falling all over the place, trying to walk although you tell them not to, fighting with the strength of 3 grown men, requesting things one minute and refusing them the next, slurred speech....yada yada yada....yah, well that is Zoya for several hours after anesthesia :( She cries inconsolably and then stops, and then cries, then stops....over and over....the length of time in between crying episodes slowly gets longer and longer. Her last crying episode was at about 5:00 pm (her surgery was at 7:30 am). Even though I'm only posting a few hapy pictures, believe me when I say it was a rough day. I'm just not one to snap a picture of my crying baby LOL!

Shawn had to run to work as soon as we got home, but Uncle Mike stuck around for a bit and helped wrangle Zoya. His training as a fire fighter lugging around dead weight came in handy! It was quite entertaining to watch him jump to his feet with a "woah woah woah" every single time Zoya decided to try and walk against my best advice!

Here is Mike with Zoya in a happy moment! 

And here is Miss Mila supervising Zoya's bath. Mila was given strict instructions not to let Zoya get any water in her ears and I was finally able to take a nap since Mila was in charge! (totally kidding, I'd never leave her alone in the tub...or really anywhere for that matter HAHA). 

Zoya is snuggled in bed dreaming right now! Her right ear has some bloody drainage which they say can be normal, but a little alarming to see since she never had that before with her other surgeries :( She is cleared to go back to school tomorrow as long as she passes the mama test in the morning :) 

Fall Learning Fun!

We are staying dry and warm inside! School was cancelled because of Hurricane Sandy. This is definitely the first time school has ever been cancelled here for a hurricane HAHA! 

I've been meaning to post these pictures of a fun learning activity I did with the girls (mostly Zoya). 

I made my own lightbox with inspiration from THIS BLOG. The girls love it and there are so many different activities you can do with a light box!

This time, we used transparent pumpkins and leaves that I found in the dollar section of Target. First I just let Zoya play and explore (always a must with new materials....if I don't give her this time to play and explore new materials, the lesson is usually a bust!) Mila loved watching Zoya! Unfortunately these pieces were too small for Mila to play with (choking hazard). After Zoya played a bit, we read a couple of stories....one about Leaves and one about Pumpkins. 

 Zoya was practicing counting. She picked a number card and then placed that number of items under the card. She needed more help at the beginning but eventually caught on to this idea. 

 I did it!

 She decided to read through the leaf book on her own. I love watching Zoya read a book after I've read it to her. Typically she uses the pictures to retell the story and usually hits some main ideas with her retell. 

 She thought that page was funny I guess! 

 We worked on sorting by color. Zoya has this skill down, but it was a good review and also good practice to increase her time on task (which is one of her IEP goals at school too). 

 We've just started working on basic patterns. This concept (even alternating between two colors) is tough for Zoya. I think next time I will cut out color squares and make a paper pattern and have her put the correct color on the correct square. We need to back that concept up a bit! 

 The next morning we went outside and collected leaves and read our Leaves story again! 

I love making learning fun for my girls! 

Happy Metcha Day Mila!

This Time Last Year.....

It was 4am Ukarine time and we were about half way through the super long 16 hour overnight train to Mila's region. So many thoughts and emotions were running through our heads (Surely I can tell you not one of them had anything to do with ever thinking we'd be embarking on another adoption journey a year later!). We knew our baby girl was sick, but we had no idea just how sick she really was. We knew she desperately needed surgery. We knew we were in the exact right time and moment. We knew we had followed the Lord through the brutal twists and turns our adoption journey took. We knew our lives were about to be forever changed. We had no idea how much Mila would teach us about HOPE and STRENGTH and MIRACLES. And we certainly had no idea just how much we would come to love that tiny 7 pound frail baby girl that God had sent us to. We were so unprepared...

We were unprepared to witness first hand your stiff weak body....

We were unprepared for the way you'd grab on and never let go!

We were unprepared for the way you'd stare so deeply into our souls as if we'd known one another forever already...

We were unprepared for the way you'd snuggle right up to your Daddy as if you'd been waiting for him your whole life....

We were unprepared for you to learn to trust so quickly after rarely having ever been held...

We were unprepared for your amazing fighting spirit

We were unprepared for those soulful eyes that shouted "I'm in here and I'm fighting and I've been waiting for you"

We were unprepared for your ability to hold on so long....

We were unprepared for our hearts to grow three sizes in one moment

We were so unprepared to be so completely blessed by you! 

Of all the ways we were unprepared, we were most unprepared to feel so completely in love despite our fears of losing you. We were unprepared to feel the Lord's peace surrounding us, knowing He promised HOPE for your life. 

Mila-bean, 

I can't believe it was a year ago. Sometimes when I think about it, I can put myself right back in that tiny room, holding that tiny baby who is only a shadow of the daughter you are today. Sometimes I can close my eyes and remember that first day with crisp clear details as if it happened yesterday. Then, sometimes, I look at the beautiful child you are today, and I feel so far away from that day a year ago. Over the last year you have changed me, my beautiful daughter. You have shown me that one's heart can be so broken and yet so hopeful at the same time. You have taught me that human touch and love is essential to this life. You have opened my eyes even wider to remind me that all children, even those who've been written off, deserve  to be loved so completely and so entirely. You have changed my heart forever from that first moment I held your fighting little shell of a body. When I look back on our time with you in Ukraine, I see it through a thin veil separating reality from dreams, separating this earth from heaven. Never have I felt so close to heaven than the days we spent in Ukraine with you. There was something so magical about feeling so peaceful despite understanding the gravity of your condition. You have blessed me more than you'll ever understand. I can't wait to wake up to your beautiful face for a million more days, remembering where you came from, where you've been, and dreaming of where you're going in this one and only beautiful life! 

Love, 
Mama