Month: November 2011

Waiting

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I feel like I should blog but I don’t have much to blog about right at this moment. This week is really busy and involves a lot of waiting for things.

1. We are still waiting for Sofie’s Care Card. It was supposed to be processed by Friday but wasn’t so we are still waiting. I’m going to try calling tomorrow.
2. Thursday I should be able to call and get an answer as to whether we qualify for some preschool subsidy for Livi this year. I kind of think that we won’t qualify, in which case Livi won’t be going to preschool until September. We decided we would save our money for when we have to put both girls in together. That is going to be a tight 10 months on our budget. We still really would like Livi in alone first but it may not work out that way.
3. We are waiting for the girls Christmas pictures that I’ll use for the Christmas cards this year! They were mailed out to us today and I can’t wait to see them! A fellow blogger and excellent photographer offered to give us some pictures as an adoption gift! They have a studio in their home so I thought Christmas pictures in matching dresses would be crazy adorable. You’ll have to wait until at least the first advent to see them though. Check out the Chapman’s photography in the mean time though…
http://gc-photography.blogspot.com/
4. Once we have Sofie’s Care Card I need to kick it in to high gear with a big round of paperwork and appointments. I need a doctor to sign off on a lot of funding applications I need to send in for her and even tax credits as well. Will the paperwork ever stop?
5. We also are waiting to check out an elementary school we are interested in sending the girls too. It is an integrated arts school across town but we aren’t sure how the special needs class is. I love the idea of integrated arts to foster Livi’s creativity and learning outside of the box. I also love the idea for Sofie to be able to be included in the academic parts of learning through art even if she doesn’t completely understand the lessons. We’ll have to wait and see.
6. I’m waiting and dreading getting a crown on Wednesday.
7. We are also waiting for Christmas! Livi asks everyday if it is Christmas yet and after we say not yet she responds with “I’ve been waiting for Christmas for SUCH a LONG time!”. December is filled with Christmas gatherings to keep her entertained. Each weekend we have at least two Christmas parties! One of those parties I am feeding my extended family. 35 people. Wish me luck!
7. I’m also waiting for Mexico! A family reunion at an all-inclusive over New Years! I’ve never been on that kind of a vacation and seriously can not wait!

3 Months

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Sofie has been home for 3 months now! I always think that the anniversary is the 15th because we got in so late on the 14th and the 15th was our first day at home together. Really our Gotchya Day is the 4th, so I’m really late! I try to remember the day were where first home together in Canada though. It all seemed more real and completed then.

So, a three month update on Sofie…

– She is talking so much more. She says ‘up’ and ‘Mama’ the clearest and most frequent. She can also say ‘Dada’, ‘Ney’ (‘No’ in Bulgarian), ‘Hi’, ‘Bye Bye’, ‘Hello’ and ‘Baby’. She mimics all of our signing really well but I can only tell that she has ‘more’, ‘all done’, ‘sorry’, ‘thank you’ and ‘Mama’ (which she signs more like ‘Daddy’) down really well.
– She is very good at getting her point across. You know when she is pleased or mad. She can throw quite the epic little tantrum but as soon as we pick her up she usually just melts.
– Just yesterday Sofie learned to push herself with her feet on her rolling ladybug toy. She is still quite cautious since she has had a few spills, she needs to remember to hold on, but she is getting it!

– We left her with my mom for a few hours for the first time on Nov 4 and she did great! (She happened to be sleeping the entire time and didn’t even know we were gone!
– Received her Canadian Passport!
– She went Trick-or-Treating for the first time!
– She is still LOVING music class and music in general. She will dance to anything. It can entertain her for hours and put her to sleep each day! She even knows how to turn the stereo on and off herself.

 
Grooving to the beat at Music Class
 
She LOVES Music Class 🙂

– She is learning to play with toys! I didn’t notice this development with Livi so much because it was so natural age related but I am loving watch it develop with Sofie. She will sit and play with farm animals and make them interact. She plays with blocks, dolls, papers and loves doing dress-up things with necklaces, hats, or basically anything you put on your head. The only thing with the hats and necklaces is that it is very interactive for her. She wants you to play it with her and do it exactly how she wants over and over and over and over again … even though I don’t always understand exactly how she wants it!
– She is developing her independence and always wants to be helpful… at least that is what I’m choosing to believe and ignoring the fact that she is just obsessed with opening and closing doors. She will close all the doors for me and it can be quite helpful, like the microwave or fridge. Sometimes she closes doors with her still inside them though and hasn’t yet figured out how to open them yet, like her bedroom.

-Sofie hasn’t gained any weight this month and is still sitting at 22 pounds. She may have even lost half a pound. I’m not really sure what a good weight gain should be but she is definitely still looking healthier every day. Her hair is thicker and shinier and her skin tone is so much improved. She got some really dry skin on her face and chin when the weather changed but that was taken care of with lots of lotion. But, all in all, she is pretty healthy. We have a follow up with her pediatrician in January, but he still hasn’t made any referrals to specialists yet. I keep calling and don’t get any where. I’m a little frustrated with that. It would be nice to know for sure that her heart murmur is really nothing.
-She had her first emergency visit and stitches due to an unfortunate altercation with her sister (see previous post).

I can’t believe it has only been three months with her home. She is settling in so well! She is flourishing and I can’t imagine life with out her now!

First Emergency Visit!

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For over three years we have managed to keep the inevitable emergency room visits at bay. 3 months after having our second child home we had to succumb to it. With dinner in the oven, cookies cooling on the counter and all of us still in our pajamas (it was a pajama day), we had to rush to the emergency room on Friday

Sofie had been after a pillow on top of Livi’s pillow pile, which led Livi to “jump” on top of her. Both of them when down and Sofie bit her own tongue when they hit the ground. At first I thought it was just a scratch on her chin, from her own razor nails that I hadn’t got around to cutting yet. I got mad at Livi for pushing/attacking her sister. Then I saw the blood. There was so much blood. Livi got scared and I felt terrible for sending her to timeout and leaving her there crying while I had to help Sofie. I had to prioritize in this case I guess but the mother’s guilt sneaked in awfully quick!

We decided we needed to get her checked out and jumped in to fast forward. We were all still in pajamas with out hair done or teeth brushed. I know it was dinner time but that’s how we roll. Livi was so confused and upset. Sofie was crying and bleeding. Jon and I were running around trying to catch the blood and get everyone dressed.

We ended up having to go to the ER because it was Remembrance Day and a stat. We registered and got through triage really fast. The admin staff and nurses kept asking questions in disbelief of our adoption. At first I was really annoyed because I was still feeling really anxious about getting Sofie looked at but then it just got funny. I figured if they weren’t concerned and had time to ask the questions I could probably relax. One ladies eyes actually bugged out when I told her we wanted to adopt a kid with DS and she emphatically said “You WANTED a kid with Downs?!” She thought we had adopted her and been surprised with her DS. People are so ignorant. I didn’t know how to react besides laughing.

We got called in really quickly and were seen really quickly. My mom stopped by and took Livi home for dinner and bed. She freaked on me a little bit for sending her a text asking to come to the hospital with out explaining. She was driving and wouldn’t stop to text me back because she HAD to get to the hospital. Oops. I did the same thing to a friend. I tried calling her to drop Livi off with her. I didn’t get through. She saw my facebook status about being “at the hospital on account of the blood” and freaked out on me too 🙂 There is a sick part of me that kind of enjoys doing that…

Not too sure about this thing on her toe.

The doctors advised a stitch and once they got it done they were glad they did. She ended up with three stitches. It took 5 hours to get her done because four doses of IV would still not knock her out! It was amazing. 3 doctors, a respiratory therapist and a nurse were all standing over her waiting for her to fall asleep. They had even tried two different meds. We had to go with Plan C… an IV. My poor baby was so doped up already but not asleep. She was pretty funny but did not enjoy the IV. It was so sad. They had to strap down her entire arm.

 Cuddles with Daddy.

 Flying high.

They finally got her to sleep and got her 3 stitches in her tongue. I was a little worried how she would do with eating. I thought the gash and stitches might set the progress she has made back a bit but she is managing really well. She still doesn’t chew with her teeth and only mushes things with her tongue but we are careful of what we are giving her. The next day after the stitches we only gave her really soft mush and lots of chocolate milk laced with baby formula. By 5 pm she kept yelling at us and signing for food. She survived though and I’m hoping we managed to even keep her weight up! Her stitches don’t seem to bother her too much. She was eating smaller meals at first, probably due to the irritation on her tongue but today she’s been almost back to normal!

  Poor Baby 😦