Our First Holidays Christmas as a family!

I have been so busy with Thanksgiving and Christmas that I haven't had time to update our blog in a while. I can't believe we have had Kayti for 7 months (almost 8 months on January 7). It has gone by so fast. It's the same amount of time we waited between trips which at the time seemed like an eternity. Kayti had her first big family holiday on Thanksgiving. She enjoyed it a lot and we had a wonderful day. We also drug her out of bed at 4:30 AM on Black Friday to go shopping with us. She was a little trooper and never fussed a bit. We are still wanting to go back for another one and this whole Russian adoption ban makes me want to get started sooner. Kayti is learning more English every day. She can say small sentences now such as sit down and pat the seat, drink milk, drink juice, drink water, ouch when hurt, do you have to go potty (when SHE has to go potty), love you too, don't do that, one more time, and now when you ask her what's your name she will say I Kayti. We are catching on more every day. I have been looking forward to Christmas for quite some time. I kept telling her about Santa of course and that we celebrate Christmas because it is Jesus birthday. We went to see Santa at the mall, and she was very happy to see him. I am not sure if she has seen a Santa before at the orphanage, but she sure was excited about it. Then we had our annual Christmas party at church and Santa came to that too. As soon as she saw him her face lit up and he said who wants to come and sit on my lap and she jumped off and was the first in line! So glad she is not afraid of him. In

Long overdue update.

I have been long overdue to update this blog. I have not written an update since right after Kayti's birthday in October. She has come so far in almost 8 months. We have our second post placement set up for this week so it can get to Bulgaria by the end of March. Can not believe it has been that long already. It will soon be a year. In a way it's like she has always been with us. I can't image life without her now. God totally knew that he was doing when he put us together! She is so much fun! I had to get her medical report from our Dr for this post placement and found out she has grown 5 inches and gained almost 13 pounds! Wow. Amazing what food and love can do! When we came home 24 month pants fell off. Now she is in a 4T. They still sometimes have to be tucked, because she is still thin, but they are right on lengthwise. The holidays kept us very busy, starting with Kayti's first Thanksgiving. She enjoyed every minute! We also drug her out of bed at 4:30 am on Black Friday to go Christmas shopping with us! I know bad mama, right:) She was very good and we had a nice day. Then mom and I decided to take her to see Santa one Saturday in early December. She LOVED him and could not wait to sit on his lap.  Quite a diffrence from Lianna who we could not even bribe to sit on his lap. She would only wave at him from a safe distance. But Kayti was excited about him! It was almost as if she knew who he was. I find this almost impossible though, because I can not really believe they had Santa visit her small orphanage. Then a week or so later, we had our annual Christmas party/dinner at church and Santa came there too, and guess who was the first in line? Yep, my girl! She was excited around Christmas with all the lights, but I know she had no idea what was coming. We went a little overboard with the presents, but we were as excited (or probably more) than she was! We had her picture taken at Wal-Mart portrait studios around this time. What a disaster. They turned out nice, in the end but suffienct to say I wont use them again! We had our Christmas with Grammy, Papa, Uncle Mike, and Aunt Lianna. She was a little overwhelmed with all the presents and wanted to rip into them. We gave her one and she opened it and started singing Happy Birthday...(as in her mind I guess the last time she got presents was her birthday). So we went with it and sang Happy Birthday to Jesus. She loved all of her presents and had a wonderful night. The next day was Christmas eve and we went to our candlelight service at church. I was worried she would be to excited to sleep, but honestly in 7 almost 8 months, I have never had her fall asleep faster than Christmas Eve. We woke her up about 7 so we could get things opened and start preparing for our family dinner. She was excited about everything and played with each and everything she got. Our first Christmas as a family could not have gone better!  Unfortunately 3 days fter Christmas, Mama, Daddy, and Kayti got very sick with bronchitis. We had first fever and we all had on and off fevers for 3-4 days. 3 rounds of antibiotics later for each of us and we were finally better. She had a fever of 102.9 which made us quite nervous, but Childrens Motrin brought it down fairly quickly. Dr. Stabile saw her twice for this. What a nasty bug! We are trying to plan a trip to Disneyworld the last week of October if all goes as planned. We have an appt with our IEU to get Kayti evaluated and get some help catching her up. She really is doing amazing, and come so far from the extremely thin, timid, quiet little girl we picked up in May. Her personality develops more all the time. She is so funny and has a wonderful sense of humor. She loves to laugh. She has started to talk in small sentences, such as do you have to go potty (which means SHE does), apple/orange juce please, dont do that, ouch when something hurts, thank you, please, love you too, say I Kayti when asked her name and I 5 when asked how old she is. The other day we were driving home and she says Did you see that? I said did I see what and she said it again, but I know she saw something she wanted me to see, and just didnt know how to say what it was. She also will go to the potty on her own occasionally which is real progress. She loves to have stories read to her every night. We are working on learing our abcs and how to write our name. She is getting closer on the abcs, but writing her name not so much. Oh, she now likes noodles and they are almost one of her favorite foods now. She also loves all fruits and vegetables including cucumbers, carrots, brocolli, tomatoes, peppers, etc. This mommy is very glad of that. I will leave you with some pictures and promise to update sooner!

Here is a short video of Kayti the day before her birthday!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YbmC_erwbk4

Home 5 months, BIrthdays and other firsts.

I have been long overdue to update our Blog,  but I wanted to wait till we had another milestone and we had one this week. We had a birthday in the house. Her first one with her family! Kayti turned 5 on October 5. I wonder if her birth mother was thinking of her or wondering about her on this day. My hope is that she could someday know how very much Kayti is loved and cared for now. Dale and I are so blessed and proud to be her parents. We could not love her any more! She fits in with our family so well and every one loves her to pieces! We had a wonderful summer and are sad to see it end, but I love fall. We really enjoyed being at the fairs and Kayti loved it as much as I knew she would. We are going to try and get our own camper next year and have the spot next to Mom and Dads. She loved riding all the rides at Stoneboro. Most of you have seen them on FB but I will put a couple of them here too. We also had a wonderful end of summer party/haunted hayride last weekend. It was so much fun. Really missed my Grandma Peggy for this though. She always had so much fun. Kayti is now working on learning the alphabet song and almost has it down. She has also learned Jesus Loves Me. We say our prayers every night and she now does this on her own when she gets in bed. Yes she is still sleeping with us and I hear you all yelling at me know. But we are (at  least I am) enjoying having her close to us right now. Her bedroom is pretty far from ours and I am afraid to have her that far away right now. She has started to play with her toys now. For the past 5 months she would play with them if you got one out, but now she will go to her room and look for a particular toy. She has also started becoming very possessive of her things. We will work on this, but right now I am letting her go with it as she has NEVER had anything of her very own her whole life. Everything is shared at the orphanage. I know she will remember how to share when the time comes. I am just happy she feels that this is her home and these are her things now. For example, she has a Dora doll at mom's and Dale put her sweatshirt on it and she comes over and says NO, take it off and pulls it off. Then she has a little car and I sat down on it and she yells no mama get off and pulls me off. We are still a potty training work in progress. Sometimes she remembers and even goes in and sits down on her own and sometimes we completely forget. Oh, we still do not like pasta. Last Saturday I had to work and Dale made her hot dogs and macoroni and cheese for lunch and she ate the hot dogs, but not the mac and cheese. I came home and ate some of it and gave her a bite which she did eat, but said All Gone. I said all gone, do you mean no thank you and she said Yes no thank you! Too funny. Not really sure why she dislikes it but there is no question she does! Hoping maybe she outgrows it. She is also more of a salty snack girl than sweets, which is ok with me. Lianna says she can not possibly be related to her because she loves pasta and sweets! LOL! She has started to learn to tell me instead of just drink now she will say which one, water, milk, or juice. We also have another special day this week. On Wednesday we will have been home 5 months. One month short of half a year. We have made great strides and are doing super. We have grown 4 inches and gained about 12 pounds since being home. So happy about that! We still have a lot of catching up to do, but she is doing awesome so far and I have no doubt she is going to do fine! She is also learning to feed herself with a fork and spoon. She could a little when we got her, but it was pretty messy and just easier for me to do it, but now she is getting good at it and loves to be a big girl and feed herself. And now for our birthday. We started practicing blowing out the candles this week. She thinks that is great fun. Daddy took off Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, and I took of a half day Thursday and all of Friday. On Thursday, we went to the Erie Zoo. It was a beautiful day weather wise. Sunny and low 70s. Perfect! Kayti really enjoyed all the animals and just being outside.  For those not from the area, the Erie Zoo is a rather small zoo, but very nice. Then we went to the mall and to Toys R Us for the first time. I think we were more excited in the toy store than she was though. LOL. We topped the afternoon with a nice dinner at Outback Steakhouse.  On Friday her actual birthday, we stayed home and had a quiet day inside as it was raining. Actually we did venture to Wal-Mart and also got our hair cut. Kayti opened her presents from Mommy and Daddy and loved them. She only focuses on one toy at a time though, so I will have to remember not to overwhelm her at Christmas. Uncle Mike got her a Cozy Coupe car and he wanted her to have it today, so we went to Moms and she LOVES her car. Had a hard time convincing her to get out of it to do anything else. She even sits in it to watch TV. Too cute!! It looks like she is at a drive in movie!! Boy mommy is showing her age with that analogy. How many of you actually remember drive in movies? Then we had a nice supper and a DQ cupcake with a candle for her to blow out. Today is Saturday and we had her family party today.  We had chicken and sandwiches,  from Giant Eagle and grammies baked beans, macaroni and cheese, angel fruit salad, chips, and lots more. And of course, cake and ice cream! Kaytis guests included Grammie, Papa, Aunt Lianna, Uncle Mike, Uncle Daryl, Aunt Heather, Dane, Naomi, Uncle Bill, Aunt Marty, Aunt Mabel, Kathy, and Tom. Grandma and Grandpa Buchanan and Aunt Carla were sick with colds and could not come. She got lots of nice gifts and was a little overwhelmed with all of the gifts at first but since everyone has gone home, she is playing with all of them now a little at a time. Again, I will say that Dale and I are ready to go back for another one. The only question is when. We have already made an inquiry about a waiting child and although we are not ready to start over financially, I know that God will provide. I will try and keep you all updated on that front. I can not believe I am saying this, but I actually miss the crazy emotional adoption roller coaster. At least the good parts!! LOL. Please everyone remind me of that when we are in the middle of another one and I am complaining of the crazy paperwork and awful wait! I will say Kayti was so worth every single second of heartache we went through and every penny we spent. We are a VERY happy family!! I can only pray that the second one goes half as smooth. She has had 0 issues adjusting and is just the best, sweetest child. Of course she has her moments, but for the most part, she is a sweet, obedient, and loving child. We can not wait to see what the next few months will bring with Christmas. So looking forward to her seeing Christmas lights!! God is so good! I thank Him everyday for blessing us with this beautiful sweet child! And now for some pictures:

Home 3 months today! :))

So Kayti has been home officially 3 months yesterday and I thought I would give everyone an update. The time has flown and it feels like she has always been with us! I can not begin to imagine WHY she was not chose before we saw her almost a year ago. I guess God must have been saving her for us...She is doing so well. We had our first post placement and it went great. At least I know what to expect for the next one. We're waiting to get it from the caseworker so we can get it apostiled and send it back to BG. Dale and I REALLY really want to go back for another one. The only issue is coming up with the money to start again:(  But we hope to find a way soon. So we will keep you updated on that. We know how long the process can take...but Kayti needs a siblng!! Hope we can count on you all for the same support we had during our first journey. Lets see, she has learned to count now and can count to 10 with you. The other day we were at Moms and Dale left to go home and without anyone telling her she turned toward him and waved and said Bye Daddy! So cute! She is becoming more and more affectionate and loves to give kisses and hugs to her family. She has attached well to all of us. I do have a confession. Right now she is sleeping with us. I know I am going to hear from a lot of you how bad this is, but right now we are enjoying every second of having her in bed with us. (With the exception of the couple times she was singing if your happy and you know it at 12:30 in the morning and the other time of yelling Oh Toodles like they do on Mickey Mouse clubhouse after midnight...LOL!) She really loves being with us and gets excited when she gets in bed. I think we FINALLY got her birthdate figured out and fixed thanks to Patricia Hickey at the Dept of State and a supervisor at USCIS. Now maybe we can get her SS card. We enjoyed a day at Waldameer with Aunt Lianna and some friends. She was in awe of it all. She especially liked the lazy river ride, the merry go round, and the Frog Jumper ride. Over the next couple weeks we will be staying in mom and dads camper with them at the Crawford county and Stoneboro fairs and showing moms miniature horses and Aunt Liannas horse Cruise. I think she is really going to enjoy it. Her vocabulary is growing to let us know when she wants certain things, particularly a drink. She will point to a glass or cup and say drink. She will also go to the bathroom and point and say potty occasionally. We are working hard on this! :)  She can aslo go to the cupbord and say snack, which is what we call everything right now from cookies, chips, crackers, etc. The other day Mom, Lianna, Kayti and I went to the mall in Sharon and drove thru McDonalds on the way home for coffee for my brother and we got her some frys. Mom didnt hand them back to her right away like she usually does and with a few minutes, she was pointing and gesturing and yelling in her Bulgarian babble until we gave them to her. She totally knows what is supposed to happen when you drive thru McDonalds. Food is supposed to come:) Too funny. She  is always able to make us understand what she wants. Oh, when we were shopping the other day, she would point to a particular piece of clothes she liked and say pretty. I am very pleased with her progress. She has so much catching up to do still, but she has come a LONG way from the timid, quiet child we picked up on May 7. Her personality is really beginning to develop. She has really enjoyed watching the Olympics, which surprised me because I thought she would get bored but she will sit and watch them intentlly with me for at least an hour. I let her try popcorn last night. This was the only the second time we have made it since shes been home. She ate 2 bowls and wanted more. She is also now drinking from her own Dora sippy cup which is a good thing. Here are some pics you may not have seen...

Welcome home party, first post placement scheduled, and more...

I can't believe Kayti will have been with us 3 months on August 7. Such small daily changes. We have our first post placement scheduled for Thursday. We are a little early, but my agent wants us to have plenty of time to get it to Bulgaria before it is due. She is such a sweet, pleasant, happy, funny little girl. We are enjoying every minute of being her parents. God has truly blessed our family:)  She loves to eat now and is eating very well. By my scales we have gained at least 5 pounds. I have only found one food she will still spit out and that is any kind of pasta including macoroni and cheese. Not sure why she doesn't like it, but we have tried several times and several different kinds and all have the same reaction. She still loves to sing twinkle twinkle little star and almost has the words down. She loves to sing anything actually! She also likes to dance now and will dance the hotdog dance with Mickey Mouse Clubhouse. It's very cute! Still loves Mickey and Dora. We are exited to be planning to take her to Disney World in the next year. She will repeat ANYTHING you say or at least attempt it. Now she is actually starting to understand concepts of what words mean like more, again, stand up, hi, bye, see you later, please, and thank you and will say them appropriately. She is still more of a night owl than mommy would like. We ususally don't go to sleep till between 10-11 and mommy and daddy get up at 4:30. She, of course, goes back to sleep at Grammys while we go to work! Speaking of Grammy, our parents had a WONDERFUL welcome home party for us at Roche Park in Meadville. We had so many family and friends show up to welcome Kayti to the family! We are so truly blessed and are so fortunate to have such awesome support and love from so many people. She got many nice gifts and had a lot of fun opening them. I only wish my Grandma Peggy would have been able to be there. I know she was with me though because I found a nickle. Only some of you probably know the significance of that. The party wore her out. I have not seen her that tired:) She had so much fun. We are looking forward to fair season coming up in a few weeks. We are sure she will love all the fair activities, rides, animals, food, and staying in the camper! Mommy is also taking her and Aunt Lianna and some of her friends to Waldameer (a local amusement park) on July 31. Hoping she will enjoy that. Hard to believe it is almost August. Summer is going fast! Saying prayers as I am writing this for a safe flight home for my friend Amanda Unroe who is bringing home 5 Bulgarian blessings. Love this big family!! Also for my friend Aimee and Roger Medlin who are bringing home 3. It warms my heart to know these sweet babies are orphans no more! We love you all!!! Dale, Lori, and Kayti

Officially a baptized member of Adamsville Presby Church and of the Family of God:)

Thought I should post today as this is a milestone day! Kayti was baptized today by our pastor Harry Johns in a beautiful ceremony! Had lots of family and friends there for support which we so appreciated:) Made my day! Sang one of my all time favorite Gaither hymns The Family of God, which there is a line in it that says "From the doors of an orphanage to the house of a King, no longer an outcast, a new song I sing, from rags unto riches, from the weak to the stong, I'm not worthy to be here, but praise God I belong. Mom and I were both crying singing that verse! She looked so amazing in her new dress! Had a wonderful dinner afterwards as well. I love my church family! We were also honored at a shower given by my coworkers. It was so nice and we got so many nice new things. We also got her new swingset up this weekend which she loves. Mom and Dales mom are planning a welcome home party for us which will be at Roche Park in Meadville on July 21. Invitations will be coming for that. We have been home 43 days today. We have gained around 2 pounds. We are doing well with learning words and how to use them appropriately. She will repeat anything now. She can say small sentences. She loves to eat and loves all foods. She loves fruit and vegetables which Mommy is very happy to see. She especially likes apples and watermelon and corn and peas. But unless she is full, no food is spit out or thrown on the ground. We had our first booboo this week. We were picking Lianna up from VBS and she let go of my hand and ran ahead of me and fell face first into the gravel. Got a skinned up knee, hand, and ate a mouthful of dirt. She listens to us well for the most part, but she does test her limits and wants to see what she can get away with. We have had two busy weekends in a row. Last weekend, we went out for dinner for mamas birthday, then to see the hot air balloon races. Also stopped and had Hanks! Yum! Then had lunch at Applebees so Kayti could meet her only remaining Great Grandma Ethel. Monday Mommy, Kayti, Grammie, and Aunt Lianna went to Grove City outlets shopping. Then Tuesday, we went to Pymatuming Deer Park and Riverside park in Greenville with my friend Karen Olivo who has a son Assen from Bulgaria. Her and her husband adopted him when he was almost 4 too. He is now 10. (Same age as Lianna!) Then they have a 4 year old daughter they adopted from China! We try to get together every time they are home. The kids get along well! This weekend, Friday night was Liannas bible school program. Saturday we went to the Amish benefit auction, then to our shower, then today we were baptized and had dinner after church. Next weekend I work, and am glad we have no plans right now! In the meantime, here are some pics from our two busy weekends! Enjoy! As always, much love to you all for all of your support, Lori, Dale, and Kayti.