A Wonderful Week...

Selina is doing so well. It has been a week now that she has been home but to see her, people would guess she has been with us longer. She is such a happy girl and seems so comfortable with all of us. We are so blessed to have her in our family! Here is some info on the questions I have been asked the most over the past week...

The family- Selina took to daddy within the first day. She will easily go to him. Sometimes she prefers me but will go to dad. He is able to bathe her, feed her, change her and lay down with her and she is great with it. It was funny as on the second day Selina was home, all of a sudden TR yelled for me. I thought there was a problem and started racing across the house when TR said, "she kissed me!"

Kman and Cater: Selina loves her brother and sister. Sometimes they want to hug on her and she is not up for it but she will sit with them and watch a movie or watch them play. She loves to roll around on the floor with them and laugh and she loves to squeeze their noses to hear them say "honk"! Kman loves her to pieces and Cater thinks it is a good idea to have a new sister about 90% of the time. It is funny though as sometimes it seems she wants to be mad about losing her status as the youngest child and only girl but it is at that moment that Selina will do something funny or smile at her and you can see Cater melt. Selina really loves her sister and their personalities seem to be a good match for eachother as they are each independent and strong girls (heaven help the parents!! :-))







Going out: We have tried to keep Selina in more and not go out as much but she really seems to love to go places. When she realizes we are leaving, she perks up and holds her hands up for me to carry her. In the car, she looks around with interest and points at things we pass and will even babble happily.

Here she is at Costco (AKA- Sampleland). She sat so nicely in the cart and enjoyed most of the things offered to her. If she doesn't like something, she makes a face and we know we have to get her a napkin or our hand quickly because it is being returned to us!



The doctor: Selina went for her first doctor visit. Every thing looks good so far in that he did not notice anything that caused him concern immediately. Her chest and ears look better thankfully! We took her for blood work and turned in stool samples as she will repeat some of the medical tests done in Africa. It was hard to do the blood draw as she has little veins and they had a tough time getting her blood. Thankfully we got it on the second poke by the fourth person to come into the room to look at her veins! I just pray they got enough as they took as much as they could for her weight but based on the tests the doctor ordered, it will be cutting it close! Please let that blood go far!! She was a trooper and perked right up after it was over but I felt so bad for her!

I know she is behind in speech and so she will be given a comprehensive evaluation in all developmental areas in the next few weeks. My only other concern is her walking and how her feet are positioned when she walks so it will be helpful to have someone take a look at that. I know she will pick speech up quickly as when I met her she had no words and already we have five words consistantly. She also has learned how to produce several sounds with cues so I am so excited to watch her progress! Being a special education trainer and having a degree in speech therapy, I know the importance of early intervention and so we will check and see what she may need and start working on those areas immediately. The therapies and such are done in ways that they are fun for the kids and she seems to be doing so well with people that I don't anticipate it being a problem to get started in the next month or so.

Dad and Selina reading a book as they wait for the doctor to come in...





Swimming- One of the first things we did was to take Selina to the pool (as soon as her ears were okay). I don't think she had ever been in a body of water (even her bath is a sponge bath while she stood) and so I did not know what she would think about the big pools. Well, after about five minutes she was splashing around! Instead of wanting to be held close, she wants to reach out her hands and lay her head back in the water and see what everyone else in the pool is doing! It is so fun to watch her laugh and to be so joyful. I had anticipated starting swim lessons in a few months but I had to call the swim coach and ask her to put Selina on the cancellation list as she is a fish! She is a "no fear" girl in the water and so we need to get her some instruction!



Here she is with her Godmother Mary...




Sleep- she sleeps great. She goes down very easily about 80% of the time. TR or I just lay down with her and she falls asleep usually within a few minutes. If she is a little overtired or didn't want to go to bed, it might take up to 15 minutes or so and will include some crying but nothing big. She is adorable as right before she falls asleep as she settles in, she will snuggle into you and bury her head in your neck. She likes to wake up at about 5:30 am but at least we slept all night!!



Foods- She is eating although not as much as she did in Africa. She is hard to predict as I will have things that I am sure she will like and she won't eat them and then she will eat something I think she will hate. For example, we were out and had just finished getting her blood drawn and I knew she needed to eat as she didn't eat much breakfast and so I take her to PeiWei a yummy place that has rice and chicken- somthing she loved in Ghana. Will she eat it? No. So then at the pool the other day, I order the kids a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and have Selina take a bite to see if she likes it. Not only does she like it, she proceeds to eat all of Cater's bread crust with the pb&j on it! A child who will eat the bread crust? WOW! So now for tonight I have made spaghetti with meat sauce. She has eaten this in Ghana and we had some at the hotel. She seemed to really like it. She just may decide not to eat it though as she loves to stump me!

So that is our first week in a nutshell! Tomorrow is her birthday and so we are just having a very informal get together with a few family and friends at the pool since it seems to be her favorite activity so far. I figure it will not be as overwhelming to meet new people in the pool as you have fun!

We really are so thankful for how wonderful things are going and how well the transition has been so far. The one word I keep using to describe her is "delightful". She is seriously so fun! She has such a good disposition and is such a little ham. She loves to be cute and to make people laugh. She seems to love a new adventure and to see what is next! We are having so much fun with her and watching her experience all of these "firsts"!

Thank you to all our family and friends that have called or sent emails checking in with us and for all those who have kept up with us on the blog and have been praying for us! I know it has meant a world of difference to us!




Jennine