Funny Sleepers

Our little kids make us laugh all the time, but it is often when they are sleeping they make us laugh the most!

Here is Luke about 10 minutes before the school bus came. He is not the best early morning person.
Mike found him sound asleep with his head hovering over his pancakes.

If you know Lilah you know she is crazy about "Super Heroes" She
insisted on wearing her mask all day, even when she was asleep.

 

Lilah has been found asleep in bed in any number of family member's clothes,
or in none at all. Here she is with her pj's off. She stripped the the pillow case 
and used it as a "sleeping bag". 

Luke is nothing if not stubborn. He was so intent on not letting his
sister get his favorite spot on the couch he sat there
keeping his spot way after he got Lilah's goat,
she finally stopped yelling at him to let her sit there and went on
 to something else. He still wouldn't move, even though he got so bored he fell asleep.

No, she didn't just have brain surgery.  Once again, Lilah the superhero is saving the world in her big brother's pants.  She says she put her Pull Up on her head to "protect her from loud noises."

We promise that they do spend lots of time awake, making
us laugh then too!

Apraxia Nervosa

If we can get one entry a month, I guess we're doing pretty well.

This post is all about Luke, our little trooper, the great question mark. Luke has been handed a great deal of challenges since birth. Whatever unknown trauma that impacted his brain at birth and  the malnutrion he suffered the first year of his life has had a global effect the degree to which, we just don't know yet, but continues to change for the better everyday.

We do know that he is still significantly delayed both speech and his large motor functioning.   He  still falls down quite a lot, and moves very deliberately. But his pediatrician shared last year that she didn't think he would crawl when he first came home, then she didn't think he would walk, but he did, so we continue to hope he will exceed everyone's expectations.

We have no idea if Luke will remain in special education or not. Although he is way, way way behind on speech, he knows the alphabet, and recognizes the sound of each letter and can write his name as well as most of the letters. Not too shabby for a pre K kid!  But we definitely have speech and therefore social delays.

We are concerned about how he will be able to make friends, how he will get along in the world and whether or not he will always need help.

But he is also cruising along with many aspects of his development; he loves to provoke his little sister and has gotten very good at it. He is spending more time in Time Out (a good thing, we think) and is constantly joking and teasing us as well.

The bottom line is this. Speech is behind, but getting better all the time. We have reason to worry, but also a great deal of reason to rejoice!

Take a listen to this...

http://youtu.be/JKTeXTlu9A4

Music to our ears!  Real music! For the longest time Luke knew the words to songs, and knew the tune to songs, but couldn't process the words quickly enought to actually sing with the tune!  We thank his crackerjack Speech Therapist Rebecca for all of her support and knowlege for helping Luke along in this language development!

Keep growing Lukey!  We love you so much!

Summer in a Flash

This is without a doubt the longest we've gone without blogging so I guess some quick (and not too boring) explaining is due...

1) I (Mike) broke our good camera. It's not as fun posting with a cheap little knock-off, and our picture quality has suffered (content is fine, though).

2) Some of our kids are at a very difficult stage. We will leave out the names so as to protect them, but let's just say most of the fab four have had trying times, and frankly, we didn't want to get on the blog and complain about how difficult life is when (insert child's name here) is at his or her crankiest.

3) There is no spare time. When one must choose between laundry or blogging, laundry wins.

4) Our blog needs a makeover. Pretty soon Lilah's going to notice that Three isn't such a magic number after all.


Today, the kids are back in school (save Casey who starts back in college in 2 weeks) and Dad is having the traditional stay at home for the first day of school. So it's back to the blogosphere.

What's happened since we last left you?

Our puppy Trinka has grown into a giant pony sized dog. She managed to graduate obedience school, but I can't help but think they passed her up so they wouldn't have to deal with here naughtiness. Here she is pretending to behave for the camera at her graduation...

The virtual twins have had a summer full of playing. However, those outside of Atlanta may not realize how oppressive the heat is here, hot and muggy for months at a time with frequent smog alerts, so we have pretty much exhausted all their indoor toys. We spend a lot of time at the pool where Lilah has taken to it like a duck, and Luke has taken to it like a cat. Just this week he has started not to cling to his designated adult like a lemur.

We managed to squeeze in one vacation to a Lake House on Lake Hartwell and to visit my beloved niece. This is my current favorite picture of Ross (at the Lake). Ross managed to get his Learner's permit this summer! He is now 6 feet tall, shaving daily (when told to) and is tolerating his little brother and sister as best he can right now.

Casey tried all summer in vain to get a job to help pay for school but found nothing!!! She did, however, manage to find a way cool boyfriend who gets the parental seal of approval (and Lilah christened him New Michael). He even got to go to the Lake House with us. No idea what their going to do when she has to go back to Illinois. It has been absolutely wonderful having her home and we will just pretend that August 16 is another 3 months away.

Luke's speech has gotten so much better. He talks all the time and is creating new and unexpected sentences alll the time. He will be going to school all day now in an effort to improve speech and increase social interactive skills. He is so much fun! He does have a few personality quirks, including strange obsessions, in this picture he is wearing what he calls the "all clean blue shirt" which (starting the last week of school) he wanted to wear every day and has only recently stopped talking about every minute of the day. I guess any talking should be looked at as a blessing.

And then there's Lilah, the fearless Energizer Bunny. She just turned 4 this week, and has probably been the most challenging. In all fairness, being trapped in the house most of the summer thanks to heat/smog brings boredom, which Lilah will not stand for. She will make her own fun, build wierd contraptions, draw on the TV, terrorize the dog and cat. When she has something to do, she is a go-getter and so much fun to be around. Here she is, at her element, in the water.

This probably won't go down in the books as our favorite summer, but we managed to make some great memories and each of our kids makes us so proud.

Our family may be unusual, uncoventional, and a little goofy (Lilah's birthday party, she wanted everyone to have a beard, Mom obliged) but we love eachother and somehow make 6 different personalities work as one.

Rites of Spring

Spring has come, the awful Yellow dusting of pollen we get every year is over, and school is almost out. We have doubly been blessed to have avoided the horrible Tornados our fellow southerners had to endure last week. Atlanta was spared, giving this Spring a Passover-type feel.

Casey was home for mini-Spring Break, she has one week off before she retruns for "May-mester." She came and went and we miss her already. What a relief knowing she'll be home in just 4 weeks.

Strawberries are ripening in our front yard. Lilah and I have made Strawberry muffins, Strawberry pancakes, Strawberry shortcakes and Strawberry sauce. Luke likes them best right out of the garden!

The pool is not open yet, but Lilah is getting prepared. Not afraid of cold water, our little mermaid!

It's been a banner school year for Luke, he is making huge gains in speech and in his writing. He's been working especially hard on the letters of his name (this is at home, he tends to wear a shirt at school)!

Easter came and went, the weather has been spectacular and we have spent as much time as possible on our back deck. Luke enjoyed what the Easter Bunny brought.

Lilah just enjoyed the Easter Egg hunting and the cool shades she got to wear.

Lots of time has been spent outside, before the horror of summer comes and forces us inside for the months of July and August. I love this picture, in my mind I hear Elvis and Ann-Margret singing Viva Las Vegas.

We have tried to spend our weekends enjoying eachother's company. Sometimes this goes well, sometimes having teens toddlers and a puppy can be be exhausting.

Everyone's growing up so fast. Wish they could stay puppies forever!

The Beauty, The Splendor, The Wonder

"A nest for birds, there ain't no words, for the beauty the splendor the wonder of my hair!" Our oldest's first year at college is coming to a close, and we are just itching for summer to be here. Then she will be home! For three glorious months, she will be home. Our house is not the same without her, and we have to wonder, will it be the same when she comes back? Is she different? Has she changed at all? The answer is yes and no. The most obvious change...her hair! Casey has always had a giant mop of hair, which was sort of her signature look. A huge wall of blonde curls. We don't know where or who it came from, we both are mostly straight haired, but then there's Casey, easy to spot in a crowd, hard to run a comb through. But it was part of who she was and we loved it about her. But, then there is a time to put aside childhood things and on her last trip home, baby-girl chopped it off without a single look back. Although she looks gorgeous, and has gotten nothing but compliments, part of me misses the mop. It feels like change...change is bad...change is the enemy! When she comes back, is she going to be different?

Nope, in typical Casey fashion, she made the decision to donate her hair to Locks of Love, to help cancer victims. Same Casey, different look (maybe it's okay if she grows up a little). And the hair will live on, on some other lucky person's head.

Hurry home, sweetheart!

Playing in the Pollen

Its that time in Atlanta. Pollen blows in yellow clouds like a dust cloud. Even if you don't have an allergy to it, just the mechanics of trying to breathe and see in the yellow storm makes the strongest people unable function, cough and have a persistent gritty powder in their mouth. If you don't live here, its hard to understand the totality of the dust EVERYWHERE. Of course the normal people stay inside and keep their doors and windows shut. Unfortunately, if you have toddlers, the show must go on. We have been outside sneezing and hacking, because that is better than having two toddlers stuck in the house. It really is. Just one day's accumulation.

So we played, stood still for approximately 1 second,

and rolled in the pollen.

Here is a photo of Luke that shows the persistent, golden glow of the pollen that is everywhere the sun shines!

America's Next Top Model

Some kids take being photographed seriously...and then there's Luke. Checkout the contrast between Luke and his almost shamefully photogenic sister.



Any opportunity to do something goofy when the camera comes out.

Then Lilah is completely at ease in front of the camera.

Even when she's being silly...

or sleeping...

but I have to tell you, the full body smile this kid gives you is to die for.

Hidden Treasure

Anne's internet surfing has paid off again. While seeing what's new in world of other adoptees (when Ross was 10, he used to call it "Mom's lookin for China babies.") Anne came across this video. Pay particularly close attention to the child at 148 seconds...





This is the first video we have ever seen of our Lilah, before we knew her, and we can't believe how lucky we are to have been given this amazing gift.

(We showed the video to Lilah who was less excited about seeing herself and far more interested in the fact that "Lilah has Candy!!!")

Our Thanks to Tony Nolan, and as always. our unying gratitude to the orphanage that took such great care of her.

Gotcha Times Three!!!

Who is this poor, frightened little baby!?!

It's our beautiful boy!!! Can't believe it's been three years, it feels like yesterday, and a lifetime ago. When we think of how far this sweet little boy has come in just three years it brings tears (mostly of joy) to our eyes. We are grateful everyday to have been blessed with such a wonderful, funny, loving, brilliant son. We can't wait to see what the next year has in store!

And a special shout out to our travel group, the parents of Kenzie, Jill, Sophie, Hudson, Abbey and Zhi (Elijah, too). Happy Anniversary and thanks for being there for one of our lives' greatest moments! We will never forget your support and will be forever grateful.

January

We seem to have a rhythm here, one blog a month, but make it a doozy!

How do you describe January this year!?!

The month began with the heartache of saying goodbye to Casey for far too long. You would think it would get easier when she leaves, but it doesn't. We miss her all the time and love every second when she comes home.

As for the rest of January? lets just say it came in like a lion (a frozen, slippery Lion) and is going out like a lamb. This was the year that the weather was so bad our kids missed a week of school and both grown ups lost a week of work. Not nice when the bills came this month. However, it was great to see a bunch of southern kids experience genuine winter weather for a change!

Luke, was not a fan of the snow. He wasn't up here for fun, he was up here so he wouldn't have to walk in it.






Lilah, on the other hand...






rolled around in it, made snow angels, snowmen, and rocked the sled.

Love the scene of Georgia kids desperately scrambling for something to use as a slide. These boys used planks for skis, while Ross had a sled and a recycling bin lid to use on our hill.

The first time he gets to use one, he is almost too big for it. No matter.



We know our blogger friends in Colorado and Boston are laughing to themselves, saying "Hey Atlanta, sorry about your 5 inches of snow!" To that, we respond with one word...ten. No, not ten inches of snow, ...ten plows. That's how many the city of Atlanta has. As a result, your laughable little snow brings our town to a screeching halt.

In other news, I got older. I now need elves to help me blow out the candles on my birthday pizza.

Lilah has had a big month. She got her new shoes. She's growing like a weed. Her story was selected to appear in Rainbowkids.com. We were thrilled to be able to share her story and her handicap with other prospective adoptive parents. If it helps to get homes for some of these amazing kids, we are all for it! Here she is at Atlanta Prosthetics and Orthotics where she got to meet some other amazing people with prosthetics.

Mia the office manager, Daniel a college student and pitcher, and Sherman the Intern

The big family news of the month is Trinka. We took our adopting down a notch and got ourselves a beautiful White German Shepard. Trinka (German for "cute") is a sweet girl. She is all puppy though, constantly biting, chasing, sleeping, pooping.
She's a beauty!


a pest...

a playmate...


a riot...





did I mention pest?

We are all smitten, with the exception of our long suffering cat, Kip,
who is spending a lot more time outside.