A Year Ago

Well, it hasn't quite been a year, but on Friday it will be a year since I wrote this post. I can remember waiting for that call, it was excruciating... knowing that we had a child out there and not knowing who she was or where she was. What a relief it was to get her file and her pictures, but then the wait started again as we had to wait until May 5th to hold her in our arms. We knew nothing about her except that she was tiny and was a sound sleeper. She is still a sound sleeper- in fact at 6:45 every night she asks to go to bed and then skips happily to her crib!! She usually wakes 12-13 hours later. But now, we know her pretty well.

1. She loves chocolate, actually all sweets, but she is particularly fond of chocolate. Here is a picture from when I told her she could have no more chocolate. She was going to do whatever it took to get more chocolate. Now, I wouldn't normally take a picture of a crying child, but she was definitely "faker" crying, it may look like she was upset, but the minute I said, "Do you want to play?" she was done.. Note the chocolate dripping from the sides of her mouth.

2. She really likes band-aids. Whenever she asks for a band-aid I give her one, but she has caught on to the fact that the other two kids do not always get a band-aid when they ask. Here was our conversation yesterday: Lia: Band-aid? Me: Why do you need a band-aid? You are not hurt. Lia: Owie. Bleeding. Ok, so I gave her one.

3. She is still very attached to her bottle, though at the suggestion of our pediatrician who thought that 3/4 of a gallon of milk was too much for a child, we started mixing her bottles half with water. We still can't leave the house without a bottle, but she is drinking much less now.

4. She has to do everything that Garrett is doing. It is pretty funny as he has always been sort of a loner and isn't thrilled when other kids enter his personal space. She has to sit next to him thigh to thigh, plates touching.. I was trying to video her scooting closer to Garrett, while he kept scooting away. Ignore her slapping me- we are running around chasing each other moments earlier and she was still trying to play.


5. Again, she goes to bed without any complaints and loves her crib, but sometimes she doesn't fall asleep right away. The girls' bedroom is attached to a main living room, and sometimes if I am walking by (we keep the door open when it is cold because there are no heat ducts in the kids' bedrooms), Lia will yell out "Mom, doing?" Meaning "Mom, what are you doing?" It cracks me up every time.

6. She likes wearing the least amount of clothes that she comfortably can. I don't know how many times during nap time I have gone into her bedroom and found her naked and bouncing around in her crib. She also wants to wear PJ's all day long. I usually let her when all we have to do is drop off and pick up Caelan from school, but it is a fight on the other days to get her dressed.