Thursday, July 30, 2009

Things are looking brighter! (Lots of Pictures!)

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Now that we have been home a full five days, things are starting to look a little brighter around here. We were up at 8:00am this morning as opposed to our usual 10 or 11am all week and our sweet girl has been sleeping much better at night too, which really helps with the tiredness. She has been a bit congested with a runny nose all week and is still having some tummy pains, but she has been amazingly content and happy despite all of that. She has a doctor's apt tomorrow too so that will be good to get her all checked out here.
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Randy & the boys headed off to San Francisco for a baseball game with the guys today.

Which meant Elliana and I had a sweet day all to ourselves. It consisted of us playing together, napping together, having a few different visitors over, and taking a walk together. We enjoyed ourselves and I look forward to many more "girl-days" to come.

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I am so in love with this little one. She has melted my heart and Randy's too. I love to just get down on the floor with her and talk to her and tell her she's a pretty girl and try to get her to kiss me. She usually just smiles or lets out a little giggle or waves her arms like crazy, but no kisses yet. She is now letting me feed her the bottle consistently, but still no other foods. She loves bathtime and story time right before bed. We are starting to get a routine going and I can tell that she enjoys it each evening. I love it because she smells so good when I snuggle up with her!

She is amazing. She has all of us just smitten- including the brothers. Yesterday we turned on a Baby Einstein video for the first time, which normally the boys would gripe about and they actually started to- but as soon as they saw how much their baby sister was smiling and dancing to the music, they actually chose to watch it with her!

She is such a ham!
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She has a very sweet personality and pretty much smiles at every person that will look at her. This is very cute but hard at times, because it's difficult for family and friends to understand that it is not healthy right now for her to be wanting to go to everyone and smiling and cuddling up to them. She has zero fear or apprehension of strangers. She now recognizes me I think, but I am still not mommy to her and so we will continue to stick close to home for awhile and work on knowing the difference between just our family members (the 6 of us) and then others. Thank you in advance for being so understanding and patient with us. We really are just as anxious to show her off as you are to meet her! It just takes time!
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Ok, so for now I will leave you with plenty of pictures from our first five days home with our beautiful baby girl Elliana.
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She's so funny- she wakes up from her naps and talks to her baby and laughs at it. She loves this baby!
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The morning face and hair!
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Helping daddy blow out his birthday candles!
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Oh how she has captured his heart already!
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Playing with her new baby doll
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Have I mentioned we're in love with this cutie??!!
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And oh how she can make me laugh!
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That's all for now!

13 comments:

Ally said...

What great news! I am so glad things are turning the corner:) She is just beautiful!

JoJo said...

I love the story of the boys giving in cuz it made Elliana happy.
She's a beaut!

Kim said...

Gorgeous, gorgeous, gorgeous!

Tina said...

Candace, I am so happy for you, and can see the joy in all of you. I remember the first couple weeks being rough with sleep. but Im happy to hear it seems to be getting better. I am also proud of you for sticking to what is best and that is for just your family to be doing the holding , feeding and changings. It truely is rewarding and so worth it. I know it is hard for some to understand, but people have to understand it is what is best for her! Our daughter too would at first to to anyone, we realized how seriously we had to stick to just us holding her and once we did the bonding really happened. Each day it became more and more. I remember only a few weeks or a month after having her home and friend ran into us at a store, she reached for Grace to take her ..and for the first time Grace turned away and hung on tight to me. I told my friend how wonderful that was. I was so happy. It gave me the opportunity to explain about attachment and bonding. ..and then my friend also was happy too. Now being home a little over 3 months we let others hold her "IF" she wants them to. She has to warm up to someone before she just lets them take her and hold her. It is a healthy bond with us, and Im so thankful we stuck to it, even if others seemed to "choose" to be offended by it.
You have a beautiful family!

Anonymous said...

So wise....I just wanted to affirm your wisdom in being just a family for several weeks. We got our daughter when she was 9 months old (a U.S. adoption even) and the caseworker suggested 10 weeks of just being held by us and absolutely no leaving her with anyone....at the time it seemed hard, especially with my hubby being a pastor, but it definately paid off in the end, so keep up what you feel God is calling you to do even if it is tough.

She is precious and thanks for the update.

MaryAnn (xanga friend :))

Rachel said...

She just melts my heart - so sweet! I so appreciate you sharing about how you are working on bonding with her - it is so helpful to read about other people going through what we are about to go through!

Shelly said...

Glad to see things are going so well!!! She's such a beautiful girl!

Tracie said...

So happy things are going better!

Dave and Beth said...

Happy to hear things are going well! Sounds like a wonderful Mommy Daughter Day together!! Absolutely wonderful pics!! Elliana is just precious!! We see how she lights up your faces!! Its great you guys are getting a bit of a routine going!! Many continued blessings!!

tyanna said...

Yay! I am so glad things are going smoother! Congrats for making it through a tough week!
Eliana is so sweet and beautiful. Isn't it amazing how they can endure so much and still be so strong and graceful?
Thanks for updating! I truly couldn't be happier for you all!

~Tyanna

Tracy said...

OMgoodness... how wonderful you have that beautiful baby girl home. Girls are such sweet gifts. (boys are too!!!) Love the pictures. I really need a good camera!

Enjoy your cuddle times at night. THey are wonderful.

Rach@In His Hands said...

Precious. SO very precious.

Leah said...

I am so, so glad I found your blog. I really appreciate your openness and honesty about the 'hard' stuff as well as you sharing all the amazing things the Lord is doing.

Blessings as you continue to settle in!

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