One Month Today

Amelia,
Today is our one month anniversary of becoming a family. What a month it has been! Sister girl, we have laughed and cried........... and laughed and cried some more. You are proof that miracles happen. You are my dream baby. About a month before they called me about you, I started having the sweetest baby dreams…..totally different than the ones of the past. The new dreams were filled with cuddles, and smiles, and the sweetest, most precious baby girl! And it may sound crazy, but I believe I was dreaming of you. When I felt so discouraged about waiting and waiting, and waiting for you, I prayed for God to send me a vision; a feeling; a premonition; something to give me hope that we would find each other soon. And then the dreams began; and then came the call that changed our lives. I’ll never forget the first words that Deniece Hess said about you; “ OH, SHE IS A LITTLE PRINCESS!” and you are!
I’ll never forget the moment, that the nanny walked into a hot, muggy room in the city of Guangzhou, carrying this little smiling baby………..and hearing our guide, Kathy, say : “Theres your baby!”. Oh, I felt like my heart would pound out of my chest, and I said “Let me hold my baby” and crossed the whole room in about 3 steps. I took you into my arms, and closed my eyes, and the room swirled, and we all cried. ...even Kathy, and she does this every day! You seemed amazed to see us! You kept touching our faces and smiling and cooing. Aunt Sonia was in China adoping Kailee, and came along to take pictures of our special day. You smiled at us and touched and patted our faces on the bus, all the way back to the hotel.
Several hours later, you started to become a little concerned. You cried some, and chewed on your fingers because you were teething. Now that I know you so much better, I can see that you weren’t just crying because your gums were hurting; you were a little alarmed to realize all the familiar people were gone. I think you were wondering if we would take good care of you. You would put your little hands on each side of my face and look right into my eyes. I think you were trying to tell me that you were a little worried, and needed some reassurance. So I would hold you close, and whisper in your ear, and comfort you the best that I could.
Over the next weeks, you would put your hands on my face and look at me with that very worried look from time to time. But you also played more and more, although at first, pretty quietly. It was a good three weeks before we knew you could be so loud! You like to screech and babble and laugh and yell! We see it more every day. And you are funny! We can see your sense of humor already! You love the cat and dog, and reach out to touch them whenever they are near. You still look around your nursery and just smile! Almost like you’re saying “good job mom!”.
Sometimes, I’m afraid I’ll forget some of the tiniest moments of our first month together, and I go through them in my mind, trying to make sure that I remember every little thing forever!
These are a few of my favorite things: when I hear you in the mornings, I walk softly into your room, and peer into your crib to watch you wake up. You roll around a little bit, and twist and stretch, and when you open your eyes and see me there, you break out into the biggest smile. Then you and kick and wave your arms, and grin from ear to ear, and look so excited to start the day!
We love your bath time, which we do after dinner. When I squeeze warm water down your back, you hunch your shoulders and giggle out loud. it’s the sweetest thing. Then we lotion you up, put on your jammies, and you sit on the sofa between me and daddy, and we turn down the lights, and just snuggle and play until you get very sleepy.
You have cut a new tooth--and now have a grand total of 3! You can sit up and play for long periods without falling over; you can roll over both ways, and look as if you will crawl any day. You take 2 naps during the day and sleep about 11 hours at night, usually going to bed around 9 p.m. and get up around 8 a.m. You love your bottles, but don’t really like to eat from a spoon. You love Seseme Street! I put you in your exersaucer for about 30 minutes in the mornings and you alternately play and watch. I heard you laugh out loud at some singing and dancing puppets! We read one or two books a day, and play on a blanket on the floor. Daddy likes to fly you like an airplane, and thinks you’ll like roller coasters, because you love to be tossed in the air. You also love to play gidiup horsey and want to do the fall down part over and over and over and over!
You know the word bottle--and if I ask you if you want a bottle, you grin and bounce. You know the word “no” but sometimes choose to ignore it. The other day, you were spitting out your food and I said “no”. so you looked at me for a moment and then very softly and verrry quietly spit the food out just a little; and then smiled the most mischievous little grin. I couldn’t help but laugh.
We loved you from the start; we felt like you belonged with us from the start; but sometimes in the beginning, it felt almost too good to be true! I felt like I had been given the most adorable baby in the world to take care of; almost like we were acting in a play. But then one morning I picked you up and you were so incredibly hot. I knew right away you had a fever, and I checked it with the thermometer and gave you some medicine before calling the doctor. You felt so bad that day. You cried a lot, and I and checked your temperature pretty often, and gave you medicine and sponged you off, and just held you all day. I was very worried; and we just snuggled the whole day until you felt better. I didn’t feel like I was playing pretend that day. I knew to the bottom of my heart, that I was your mother; and I really believe that you started to know it too.

Sometimes, Daddy and I just look at each other and say "can you believe it?" "can you believe how much you love her?" "isnt she the sweetest thing ever?"

Sometimes we go into your room 2 or 3 times in the night, just to watch you sleep.

We feel like the luckiest parents in the world; and we are thankful for you every day.

Happy One Month Anniversary, Amelia Rose