Been a Long time!!

Hello Friends!
Wow!  It's been a long time since we posted! Sorry!  Not that I think anyone really reads this too much or sits on the edge of their seats waiting to see what we have to say.  BUT, here goes.

We have been home with Claire for almost 4 months!  Holy Cow!!!!  These last four months have been wonderful!  Lets start by saying that God is faithful and daily showing us that He alone is on the throne and writing Claire's story.  We brought home a 19 pound, 30.5 inch four year old, that could not crawl, walk, stand unassisted, talk,  or much else.  Well, now we have a 25.5 pound, 32 inch little girl that can crawl, walk, climb the stairs, climb onto the couch and chairs, with a head full of hair!!! She eats table food, and no more formula!  She is a miracle!!!!  She is happy, healthy, and blossoming right in front of our eyes!  She had tubes placed and her tongue "clipped" along with a sedated hearing test.  She was not hearing much.  BUT, after two weeks, and one amazing prayer meeting, we took her back to have her hearing re-assesed, and she can hear just fine!!  Oh, God is good!  So, now she babbles and laughs all the time.  She knows her name, will respond by looking at us when we call her, and is going to start communication therapy soon.  She also has sugery scheduled for the 16 of January to close two large fistulas and possibly remove some of the thickness of her upper lip, and pierce her ears!  Yay!!  Our doctors are amazed by her growth and change.  Both of them love her dearly!  And......so do the rest of us!! We are in love!!  Evan is wrapped so tightly around her little finger!  He totes her around and plays with her, and HAS to see her first thing when he gets home from school or work.  He calls her his "doodle".  Pretty sweet. Grace is wonderful with her!  She is my right hand for sure!!  Cate continues to be Jack's favorite person, so she has been so sweet to share her time and attention.She is great with Claire, too, but totally understands that she can't jump ship, or Jack will be devestated.  And Jack....he loves Claire and being a big brother so much!  He kisses her and tries to play with her and gives her his toys, it melts this moms heart!  Can I just say, again, that we are all madly in love!!!

Now, the sad stuff.....the stuff that's hard to admit.....Claire is severly delayed.  When we had her to the doctor the first time on 9-19, our pediatrician said we brought home the equivelent of a 9 month old...so, today, she functions about like a 9 or ten month old. Less than that in some ways. We had her eyes checked out with Opthalmology at Mercy, and they are great, but they still don't always track well.  Why?  Because the brain and muscles involved weren't properly nourished.  So they have to get stronger.  We give her salmon once a week for brain development.  She still doesn't speak at all.  Sometimes she babbles and says mama, but it's not purposeful, it's just babbling.  She was very confused over the holidays when we traveled as to if we were going to leave her at family's homes that we were visiting.  She would scream and rock.  She still rocks herself sometimes.  She still grinds her teeth pretty bad. The fact that she survived what she did is wonderful, and we thank God for that.  But, the effects are very very deep.  They are never far from the surface.  They are lingering and deep.  What she endured I will never know.  Part of me wants to know every detail.  Part of me thanks God that I will never know, for I don't know if my heart and mind can handle it. We are working hard to meet her needs, and will have her evaluated for OT and PT at Children's Mercy on the 10. This child is technically kindergarten eligible in August......yeah, not so much!!!  She still wears diapers!  She is a baby in every way.  BUT, we see the most precious baby ever!  And we are working on getting her birthday changed to 2010 instead of 2008.  We have talked to our pediatrician, surgeon, and all three social workers.  We all agree that this is in her best interest in all areas of her life longterm.  Now to get the $1000.00 is takes to get it done!  BUT, we will!

Friends, this is a long road for our sweet girl.  She has been damaged at the hands of those who did NOT have her best interest at heart.  BUT that is no longer!!!  We know that daily God is restoring what the locusts have taken away!  Daily, He is creating her anew!  Oh, taste and see that the Lord is good!  His mercies endure forever!  If we ever have the financial and spacial ability to adopt again, I think I want to go back to that orphanage and save another sweet, beautiful, precious treasure of God.  Claire's story is shocking, sad, and even sickening, but sadly, it is NOT unique!  Many little girls are leaving there in similar condition, with similar damage.  PRAY!  Pray that the director will either be romoved or have a total heart change!  There is money, they have resources, really great medical resources, and he just WON'T take care of these children.  I feel that this is CRIMINAL!  Please make a note somewhere in your homes to remind you to pray for this situation.  Only God and those of us committed to change and helping can solve this immense crisis. 

Happy 2013 to all of you!  May health, prosperity, blessing, and joy be showered on each and every one of you.  Thank you, again, for every call, text, prayer, financial blessing, toy,meal, piece of clothing, help with the other kids, and other endless kindness that you have bestowed to our family.  Please know that each of you are special to us in a unique way.  We love you all, near and far, stranger and close friend. 

In Him,
Leslie

Homecoming pics 9-15-12

Guangzhou - Day 6

 Day 6 was kind of a low key day. Not a whole lot that we had to do. By now, you know the routine...breakfast with the Pellegrino's and Ellis'. It was our last breakfast with the Ellis' as they will be heading home later today which gets a  :-(  and a  :-) . Then we decided to take a taxi to the mall with the Pellegrino's. It was nice. Unlike our malls which are typically 2 floors and spread out, this one 7 floors and not spread out at all. Here is the real shocker...it's much cheaper to shop in the US malls than the China malls. That was kind of a surprise to us. Anyway, there wasn't much buying going on and little Tony Z was getting a little impatient, so we caught a taxi back to the hotel. Side note...can't you picture the first day of school when the teacher is calling role and she calls out Anothony "Tony" Z. Pellegrino and a little Asian boy raised his hand. Love it! Back to our day...When we got back, the Ellis' were finishing their packing and had about an hour wait in the lobby, so we hung out with them and get to send them off back to Minnisota with their new little guy Walter. He has three sisters at home waiting to meet him. Then we headed up to the room and changed Claire into her traditional Chinese dress as we were getting ready to take a group photo with all the Holt families (The Ellis' were with another agency, so they did not miss out on our group photo). The kids all looked so cute and Claire looked like an absolute doll in her dress. Then we changed and finished up our souveneer shopping, came back and Claire said goodbye to her little friend who is going home to North Carolina. By this time, we were starving and we met the Pellegrino's in the hotel restaurant. To this point, we had only eaten breakfast here as it is kind of expensive, but we had a great meal. We each had a burger and fries and shared an appetizer of calamari. It was all delicious! We also got to see Tony Z practice his Italian skills with some spaghetti.

 

Not sure if we mentioned it on the blog yet, but little Claire now officially weighs 19 pounds!!! The little doodle has put on 4 pounds since we got her! We are so excited! That means that almost 1/5th of her body weight has been added since we got her. Just wait until her mommy gets her home! Watch out! Can't wait to see this little flower bloom! It's going to be amazing!

Guangzhou - Day 5

Woa! We are getting behind on the blogging. We have stayed pretty busy and this dreadfully slow laptop does not help. I had to sit and write out the days and the activities on each day as I am starting to lose track. On to day 5...

 

The first part of our day was a free day. We did breakfast with the Pellegrino's and Ellis' as usual. Then we decided to head to the park close to the hotel. It was very big and had a nice big lake in it. We strolled along paths and saw some people doing Tai Chi together and we watched them for a while. As we made our way deeper into the park, we came across two Chinese men playing badmitten on a makeshift court. Eric stood and watched them while Kim took Anthony to the bathroom and we grabbed a bench in the shade. The one gentlemen asked Eric to play, so that was fun. We walked deeper yet and found badmitten courts and ping-pong tables full of people playing. Right behind that was a big area of exercise equipment which is standard in China. A lot of people were putting the equipment to use...it almost seemed like a play ground for adults. Then on a little further yet, was a huge play area for kids, which was ultimately our destination all along. You had to pay to get in and Claire isn't ready for any of the things in there...add in the fact that it felt like 150 in the shade...and we left the Pellegrino's and started back towards the hotel. We got Claire into her swimsuit and her Jamaican cover-up that Gracie bought on her mission trip and headed to the pool. We pretty much had the place to ourselves and the water felt great. Claire liked it. We spent a lot of time just holding her in the water, bouncing her in the water, and  showing her how to splash. She doesn't get too geeked up over things yet, so all we really know is that she didn't hate it, and seemed pretty comfortable in the water. Julie came down to visit with Leslie for a little bit. We then had our exit meeting as some families were going to begin leaving. After the meeting, we were off to the Pearl River Cruise. We ordered Papa John's and had it delivered to the boat instead of eating the food on the boat. Delicious! You eat below deck in the AC and can then head up on deck for the scenery. It was a beautiful evening and with the boat moving, it wasn't too hot at all. The Chinese really like to light up there city. A lot of color in the city scape on both sides and a lot of the buildings changed color. The high light building of the cruise is the tallest building in Guangzhou and maybe the talles in China (can't remember for sure). It is really neat and can be seen in the attached photos.

Reflective moment

I made a statement on Facebook a few days before our trip and we repeated it in one of our early blog posts. I would like to revise that statement. The statement was "adoption is not for the faint of heart". I am sitting here this morning in a dark hotel room and Leslie is off on a Starbuck's run. There is just enough sunlight sneaking through the heavy curtains that I can watch our precious beautiful new daughter sleep. She has stolen my heart. I think back to our meeting on that first day and how heartbreaking that was. Then I think about how far she has come in the 9-10 days that we have had her. God is truly answering prayers and being faithful. We see progress every day and she has put on 4, yes I said four, pounds already. A little heartache and a ton of joy and blessing with this little one. Then it hits me. Something that I've already known, and needed to realize with this adoption. She is no different than our other kids...biological or adopted. We were not guaranteed a healthy child with our 3 biological child births, although God blessed us with 3 healthy children. That is not everyone's reality. So the revision to the previously mentioned statement is..."parenting is not for the faint of heart"...but is definitely worth the investment. The good far outweighs the bad. All of my kids are blessings. People tell us how good we are for adopting etc...but the truth is that we are just answering God's call on our lives and these children are as much a blessing to us as we are to them. They are a wonderful addition to our lives. As Christians, we are all called to defend the weak and the fatherless. If you feel the slightest twinge of interest in adopting children, pray about it. There are children all over the world that need mommy's and daddy's. Yes, it is a sacrifice, but a sacrifice that I will never regret making.

 

Chris

Guangzhou - Day 4 (2 of 2)

 

Guangzhou - Day 4 (1 of 2)

Well, mommy got a little too hot the day before, so today ended up being a daddy and Claire day. We all did the normal breakfast routine with our friends as usual. Next on the agenda was a trip back to the clinic to check the TB test and from there we were headed to the Safari. It is so hot, that Leslie just didn't figure she could handle being in that heat for 4 hours. So, she stayed back and finished breakfast with Tim & Julie, who are not with our agency and were not part of the activities. While waiting for everyone to meet up in the lobbie, little miss Claire started throwing a big fit. I tried to go call Leslie to have her come to the clinic with us, but she hadn't gone back to the room and we didn't have time to go find her (didn't know at the time that she stayed at breakfast). So we go on the bus, Claire still crying, clawing at my face and neck, pretty much unconsoleable. She hacked up a big chunck of banana on my and then I spilled a bunch of water on myself while trying to get her another bottle ready. I was beginning to get a little frazzled. I had determined that I only need to get through the quick TB test and then I could catch a taxi back to the hotel. I took her shoes off which seemed to be irritating her little feet and her head band which she typically rips off herself...just trying anything to calm her down. Just before we got to the clinic, she turned the corner and mellowed out. Whew...what a relief. She was great all through the clinic and seemed to be doing just fine. So I decided to roll the dice and head to the Safari with the rest of the group (I really wanted to do this trip as we missed it with Jack as well and we've heard a lot of good things). She couldn't have been any better the rest of the day and it was sooo hot. I'm pretty sure I was melting. Even sitting still in the shade, sweat was just rolling down my face and well...pretty much from every sweat pore on my body. After 4 hours, I was completely soaked. But we drank a lot of water and little Claire just kicked back in the stroller and enjoyed the ride. I guess this was really for me as she didn't pay much attention to the animals. The place was pretty incredible. You can get up close and personal with most of the animals. We started out on the walking section and saw a lot of neat animals hilighted by the pandas. I think they have 10 now. I could have paid to pet a Kuala, or hold a big bird. There was an orangutan out hanging above the croud doing tricks etc... We then headed over towards the safari section in which you ride through on a trolley. We had a little time before the next on left so, we walked through their new Jurassic Park. They did a great job with this. It was life sized animated dinosaure robots with sound effects. They had fog rolling across the path pretty much the entire way. It was really cool. Then back to the safari. Wow. Alot of the animals had the ability to walk right up to the trolley. There were a lot of each type of animal and typically babies too. The trame usually stopped so you could observe the different animals along the way and trainers would throw food to them so that they would gather up or do tricks. Literally...lions & tigers & bears...oh my! Bengal tigers, white tigers, plus too many other to name. It was really, really cool! On the bus ride home, little doddle finally gave up the fight and fell asleep sitting in my lap with her head laying on my chest. Be still my heart. She had her little hands crossed under her head. It was precious. We we got back, re-united with mommy and took showers and baths, boy did that feel good. Then our group of friends (3 couples) took taxies to this English restaraunt that Tim had seen while he was out during the day. We had some concerns once inside, but for the most part, everyone really enjoyed their food and we all had a great time. Have we mentioned that we love our friends that we have made here. They have been a real blessing. Time for bed!!!