One more pic

One more shot of the two two year olds.

The Crud

So Lilly has had a pretty significant fever for 1 week now and it appears Abel is now comming down with thatever it is, She has fevers and hives all over her body, Even her face is puffing up. The pediatrician ordered some blood work so i will wait to see what come of it. Now tonight Abel has a low grade fever and was not interested in lunch or dinner. He is now napping so i'll try a light snack in an hour or so. We did get all the kids pictures done by a photographer last Friday and they turned out pretty well considering Abel was pretty freaked out as well. I had them do the "school pics " for the older girls as well as I refuse to order any more pics through the school picture day ever again. The last few years I have seen their prices go up significantly (more than a photo session where we went) and the quality shall we say sucks. So I'm much happier with a pose we have some say in as well as different backgrounds. i'll try and post them

updates

Well its been awhile since a post but believe me I'm one busy lady. So we got back Abels medicals and he is healthy minus some malnutrition issues which we are aggressively treating. he also had bone age assessment done since we were very doubtful this kid was 3.5 years old. And they put him somewhere between 2 and 2.5 years old. We will have this changed legally when we do his readoption in our County. He is a happier little guy and is thriving in a very ridgid schedule. Nap times. eating its all very predictable and I can see he is relaxing with all this. He loves his sisters and really loves to play with them as well. We are just loving have him in this family. Here are a few pics of our first few weeks at home.

The funniest things about Abel

Well he's warming up everyone. Yeah!!! We went for a walk today and on the final stretch Lilly and Abel got out of the stroller and held hands as they walked the rest of the way home. Very cute indeed. I will be taking my camera on the next walk. The kid loves to pour water over his head and I don't mean a trickle of a shower I mean dumps a big cup in the tub and laughs as he does it. he should be a natural at swimming and putting his face in the water. He eats with both fists no utensils needed or accepted by this boy. Ethiopians typically eat with their hands so this isn't that surprising. He tries to sneak in the bathroom to pee by himself but as he holds the baby potty up he does this shake thing and gets pee all over the place. i am trying to discourage this. He is trying out some English but still insists we say the word in Amharic first. We oblige this because he had made a big deal to our driver that America was going to learn his language he wasn't going to learn English. We know by looking in his eyes and on his body that he has seen alot of sorrow in his very short life which makes him a fighter. he would not have survived this long had he not had the spirit he has.

Attachment issues?

So I have a few books on order about attachment and I am anxiously awaiting them. I know Abel can attach cause he has picked my husband as his best friend in the world. I am fine with this but he looks at me with an almost resentment and I'm not sure how "normal" this is. Right now I tried to rock him to sleep and he screamed bloody murder untill Frank came in and instantly he went to him and he is now rocking him to sleep. What is the answer and how do we approach this, I don't know. If I 'm suppose to sit back and let him come to me I'm ok with that but it makes the weekdays hard since I am the stay at home mom. I'm at a loss as to what is the right thing to do. Although occassionally i get a smile from him and I did get to feed him a cookie tonight it's just baby steps as well.

A better Day

Well Abel is adjusting to us slowly, he wants to cuddle with me at times, he lets me sling him and rock him to sleep. We are going to change his age to 2 instead of 3. 3 does not make any sense. And we can see he missed so much of his baby time as well. He regresses to about 12 month old skills alot but that is ok with us too. I firmly believe to let these guys regress back to meet the needs they miss and eventually they get over that stage and don't miss out for later in life. I am certainly not a child psychologist but this is what we did with lilly and it just felt right to us. My sister in law is comming soon from FL. to visit and we can't wait to see her again. Now that we are getting a routine on board we can start having visitors again.

Adjusting

So we are all adjusting here to having our newest member. Lilly is picking on him alot andhe throws some bad tantrums but Frank and I are surviving, barely. HAha. We are definitly collapsing into bed exhausted at night. Next week Abel will go to the Doctors to get checked over as well. I'll post some pics from our trip.