Congratulations, Ryan!

On May 27th, we packed up the family and headed down to Columbus to watch Ryan graduate from Fort Hayes Career Center. Here's a little snippet of him walking across the stage!


You heard that right... Ryan received the Award of Distinction for his Automotive Specialists class. The plaque says, "Has demonstrated outstanding personal qualities, commendable participation and cooperation and the development of a high degree of skill and proficiency." We're very proud of you, Ryan!

Ryan and Emily

Ryan and his mom, Angie

Ryan and his Dad

Ryan's friend, Dylan, and Ryan -- many, many moons ago...

And a smattering of senior pictures and pictures from this year...

CONGRATULATIONS, RYAN! WE LOVE YOU!

Bonding Time

Mid-May:  Shortly after getting back from Tennessee we were able to get together with Ryan for Emily's birthday.  Emily was thrilled to get to sit next to her brother and he's so patient at listening to her stories and talking with her.  It was a fun night for all of us and a we had a good time catching up.



It's late... there will be more to come later!

More Blogs from Kazakhstan!

In looking at my blog stats this morning, I found that quite a few of you are coming from a site called "Kazakhstan Adoption Blogs". I had no idea this site was out there or that I was connected to it.

Love it! Thanks for including us!

My favorite part is that the most recently updated sites are shown at the top of each category. It tells you the name of the blog, the title of the most recent post and when it was last updated. Right now, I'm #10 of over 145 blogs listed in my category. But as soon as I click "Publish Post" I'll be moved up to #1!

Check it out! Go to Kazakhstan Adoption Blogs!

Help us help them!

Our church, The Shepherd's Fellowship, is going to be giving away 100 backpacks full of school supplies to local children who are in financial need on July 24th. This is a great way to show the love of Christ in a practical way and we invite you to help out!

The following is a list of supplies that we need....

• Erasers
• Yellow, #2 pencils
• Black and blue pens
• Glue or glue sticks
• Packs of 24 crayons
• Round-tipped scissors
• Boxes of tissues
• Two-pocket folders
• Notebooks

Not included in the above list is book bags. We are able to purchase a bulk amount of book bags through a website for about $4.50/book bag.

You can purchase these items and drop them off at The Shepherd's Fellowship or you can donate towards this project at our web-site. Please just mark the donation for School Supplies and we will do the shopping for you or put it towards the books bags!

Thank you for considering being part of this great event!

For more info, contact Josh Kramp at josh@theshepherdsfellowship.org

Let Me Call You Sweetheart!

This morning on our drive to Grandma and Papa's house Em was telling me that yesterday her friend at the babysitter's said, "I'm sorry, Emily." The point that Emily was trying to convey was that her friend called her "Emily" yesterday and not "Emaliya" which is her real name and how they usually refer to her there.

We expanded on that conversation and I started asking her what her other family members and friends called her.

Me: What does Daddy call you?
E: Emily

Me: What does Grandma call you?
E: Emily

Me: What does Papa call you?
E: Sweeeeetheart

Hot Tamale

Aunt Laura rode in the Hot Tamalé Bicycle Tour on June 5.  Afterwards, the whole family came to our house for lunch and Emily helped Aunt Laura take a nap.  Way to go, Aunt Laura!

Kiss this!

So I hear this wailing from the living room tonight while I'm trying to get supper ready (okay, I was dishing out pizza onto paper plates) and Tom comes in carrying Em with big tears running down her face. Although there was no loud thump, bump, or bam, I was sure from the way she was crying that she had really injured herself. We finally get her to calm down long enough to tell me that she hurt her lip "a long, long time ago".

Wipe the tears. Wipe the nose. Check out the lip.

No blood. No cuts. No bumps, lumps or gashes.

All is well with the world after a few hugs.

Fast forward about 15 minutes and in the middle of a bite, the wailing started again. Sorry, this mom had no sympathy because Little Miss Em was acting beyond tired and I wasn't going to give any sympathy. I know, I'm harsh like that. :-) However, Super Daddy was quick to the rescue with his calm conversation and quick solution to the problem.

Em was certain she needed a band-aid for her lip. Super Daddy said he was sure her lip hurt... "but Honey, band-aids don't stick to our lips very well... maybe a kiss would help it feel better?"

Here's the best part... from her chair at the table, Em tries to kiss her lip with her own lips. There is no way to describe what this looked like that would do it justice, but believe me, it was too funny. I stifled my laughter as Super Daddy told her that he could kiss her lip for her.

"My lip needs kissed on the inside."

Um, no. Super Daddy only kisses lips on the outside.

This appeared to be a suitable resolution to the problem at hand. Tender, loving kiss was issued and supper commenced.

Phew.... another crisis averted! Super Daddy to the rescue!

Fwippers

Emily's vocabulary has greatly improved over the past year and I am still working with her on enunciation and correct pronoun usage.

Tonight, Emily was talking about wearing her pink fwippers before bedtime. I corrected her by clearly saying "slippers" back to her in the sentence she was using. Then, I repeated just the word "slippers" with an extra emphasis on the "sssss...".

She very clearly repeated back to me, "Sssssss-fwippers".

I'm so proud.

Of weddings and vacations!

It's been a busy couple of weeks for the family. Here's the story of our lives.


CHAPTER 1: THE WEDDING

Emily was the flower girl for my cousin Matt's wedding. She was pumped. She made several new friends over the course of a couple of days and still talks about the wedding. Here is a video of the beginning and the end of the evening.

CHAPTER 2: VACATION

We took some time off the week after Mother's Day. With the store closing and lots of other changes going on in our lives right now, it was a good time to get away. We went down to Tennessee and took some time refocusing and hanging out as a family and with some friends that live down there.

We spent a little extra time in Pigeon Forge and Gatlinburg this trip. One of our first days there, we stopped at the Applewood Farmhouse Restaurant... or as Tom calls it, The Apple Barn. :-) Tom and I are both on Twitter (@tsfGodGuy and @jennihypes) and we tweeted a lot during our trip. Tom sent out a few posts while we were waiting on our yummy food!


We also killed a little bit of time while waiting for our food by playing with my camera. Check out the close-up of Snickerdoodle's beautiful eyeball!


At some point during the week (I can't remember if it was after lunch or an entirely different day -- but does it really matter in the whole scheme of things?) we went to Ripley's Aquarium. It's become another one of our standard stops when we're in the area. Here's a picture of Em looking into an aquarium tube from underneath it... or if you don't believe that, she might also be listening to angels announcing the virgin birth, or trapped in a Steven Spielberg movie.


The Ripley's Aqaurium has quite a few exhibits to be proud of.

There's the giant, Emily-sized catfish that apparently likes to have it's belly tickled.


There's a ginormous tank that you can see from above....


...that has sharks....


... and old people swimming and scootering about in it!


Then, there are the giant tubes with moving sidewalks that take you underneath the ginormous tanks so you can get an up-close-and-personal view of the sharks, turtles, stingray and other creatures lurking about in the deep water.


There are also creatures that make us want to go, "Oooooooo!"


At the end of the moving sidewalk are several other exhibits and rooms to explore. Here's another giant tank that would make a fabulous addition to our living room. Any volunteers to buy it, set it up, clean it and maintain it for us?


One of my favorite exhibits at ANY aquarium are the jellyfish. We saw these first when we went to the Monterey Bay Aquarium. I made these guys sit still for this picture and it took about 6 takes before the smaller of the two stopped grumping it up... it was WAAAAY past nap time at this point.


Once we made it out of the darker, more peaceful part of the aquarium, someone caught their second wind and was ready to start checking out the domes that were built into the smaller aquariums.


On our way back past the giant aquarium (remember the one we wanted for our living room?), we were lucky enough to find a diver that was just finishing up feeding the fish some lettuce. That's Em's silhouette on the bottom-right working her charm to get the diver to wave at her.


There's a new penguin exhibit in the aquarium this year. It opened just a little over a month before we got there. It was pretty sweet. Here's a picture of Emily laying on the glass floor watching penguins swim back and forth between the indoor and outdoor parts of the exhibit. They also had tubes to crawl into so you could reach a dome that popped up in the middle of the penguin exhibit. Up close and personal folks. Up close and personal.


It was a good day. A long day. But a good day to snuggle up to a penguin.

Asleep at the Wheel

It must have been a long day at the office...

Sensitivity to Infertility

I have been thinking about reposting this entry recently and a recent question from a new Facebook friend has prompted me to follow through.

- - - - - - - - - - Reposted from April 2007 - - - - - - - - - - - -

I didn't write the summary below. It appeared on a Yahoo Group that I'm on. If you've followed my blog from the get-go you'll remember that I discussed some of my feelings as we were going through the adoption process and the things that were difficult for me. I've heard from several people that followed my blog that they appreciated my honesty online because it helped them know better how to handle situations with family and friends going through similar things. Today's post is along a similar line, but describes what a person dealing with infertility issues might be going through. Yes, some of these things also describe what I went through as we were trying to adopt. I had no real overwhelming desire to become pregnant and we did not have a desire to go through infertility treatments. Please read with an open heart and tuck some of these thoughts away for the next time you offer helpful advice to someone dealing with infertility/adoption issues. ;-)

- - - - - - - - - - - -

"SOME FACTS ABOUT INFERTILITY
It may surprise you to know that one out of six women who wants to have a baby cannot conceive. There are many possible reasons for this dismal statistic: blocked fallopian tubes, ovarian failure, hormonal imbalances, husband's low sperm count, to name just a few. Moreover, after a woman turns thirty-five, it becomes difficult to have a baby primarily because many of the eggs she has left are defective and old. All these barriers to pregnancy are physical or physiological, not psychological. Tubes don't become blocked because a woman is "trying too hard" to get pregnant. Antibodies that kill sperm will not disappear if a woman simply relaxes. And a man cannot make his sperm swim faster by developing a more optimistic outlook.

Medical Intervention:
After every medical attempt at making her pregnant, she must play a waiting game that is peppered with spurts of optimism and pessimism. It is an emotional roller coaster. She doesn't know if her swollen breasts are a sign of pregnancy or a side effect of the fertility drugs. If she sees a spot of blood on her underwear, she doesn't know if an embryo is trying to implant or her period is about to begin. If she is not pregnant after an IVF procedure, she may feel as though her baby died.
How can a person grieve for a life that existed only in her mind? While trying to cope with this emotional turmoil, she gets invited to a baby shower or christening, learns that a friend or colleague is pregnant, or she reads about a one-day-old infant found abandoned in a dumpster. Can you try to imagine her envy, her rage over the inequities in life? Given that infertility permeates practically every facet of her existence, is it any wonder why she is obsessed with her quest? Every month, she wonders whether this will finally be her month. If it isn't, she wonders if she can muster the energy to try again. Will she be able to afford another procedure? How much longer will her husband continue to be supportive? Will she be forced to give up her dream? So when you speak with her, try to empathize with the burdens on her mind and on her heart. She knows you care about her, and she may need to talk with you about her ordeal. But she knows that there is nothing you can say or do to make her pregnant. And she fears that you will offer a suggestion that will trigger even more despair.

PROBLEM SITUATIONS
Just as an ordinary room can be an obstacle course to a blind person, so can the everyday world be full of hazards for an infertile woman --- hazards that do not exist for women with children. She goes to her sister-in-law' s house for Thanksgiving. Her cousin is breast-feeding. The men are watching the football game while the women talk about problems with their kids. She feels left out, to say the least. Thanksgiving is an example of the many holidays that are particularly
difficult for her. They mark the passage of time. She remembers what came to mind last Thanksgiving --- that the next year, she would have a new son or daughter to show off to her family. Each holiday presents its own unique burden to the infertile woman. Valentine's Day reminds her of her romance, love, marriage - and the family she may never be able to create. Mother's Day and Father's Day? Their difficulties are obvious. Mundane activities like a walk down the street or going to the
shopping mall are packed with land mines. Seeing women pushing baby carriages and strollers strikes a raw nerve. While watching TV, she is bombarded by commercials for diapers, baby food, and early pregnancy tests. At a party, someone asks how long she's been married and whether she has any kids. She feels like running out of the room, but she can't. If she talks about being infertile, she's likely to get well-intentioned advice -- just the thing she doesn't need: "Just relax. Don't worry. It will happen soon." Or, "You're lucky. I've had it with my kids. I wish I had your freedom." These are the kinds of comments that make her want to crawl under the nearest sofa and die.

THE BOTTOM LINE
Because she is infertile, life is extremely stressful for her. She's doing her best to cope. Please be understanding. Sometimes she will be depressed. Sometimes she will be angry. Sometimes she will be physically and emotionally exhausted. She's not going to be the "same old" girl she used to be. She won't want to do many of the things she used to do. She has no idea when, or if, her problem will be solved. She's engaged in an emotionally and financially taxing venture with a low probability of success. The longer she perseveres, however, the greater her chances of pregnancy become. Maybe someday she will be successful. Maybe someday she will give up and turn to adoption, or come to terms with living a childfree life. At present, though, she has no idea what will happen. It's all she can do to keep going from one day to the next. She does not know why this is her lot. Nobody does. All she knows is the horrible anguish that she lives with every day. Please care about her. Please be sensitive to her situation. Give her your support -- she needs and wants it. "

Slip me some skin..

While we were in Townsend, TN, we stopped by Cade's Cove for our regular visit.  After making a quick potty break stop at the visitor's center, we walked around and spotted a park ranger with some animal skins that she was talking about.  Emily was fascinated with the bear and skunk skins.

I'm Getting Married!

I started to post this entry over a week ago and.... oh, look... shin-ey.....

Yeah, I got distracted. So what hasn't that ever happ... pretty!

Okay, I'm back. Phew.

POSTED ON 5/19/10 just so you know I'm a little behind schedule....

Emily was slated to be the flower girl for my cousin's wedding in early May. The dress I made her for Easter was a practice dress for the flower girl dress I was going to make her. Let me just say this... this girl loves to wear dresses and especially dresses that twirl. The higher the twirl factor, the more requests we have for her to wear that particular dress.

The Easter dress had a VERY high twirl factor and is requested every time we open the closet. With this in mind, Emily knew her "wedding dress" was going to be just like her Easter dress but ALL white. She couldn't wait for me to finish it so she could try out it twirlability. (Like that? I just made that word up.)

I had finished her dress a couple of days before the wedding and somewhere in between the two, Emily had a physical therapy appointment. While we were walking through the hall during therapy, I asked Em to tell her PT what she was going to be doing on Saturday. With an exuberance galore and arms thrust wide open, Emily shouted for all to hear, "I'M GETTING MARRIED!"

Oi vey! Does your Daddy know?

The Shepherd's Nook is Now Closed

(I'm stealing Tom's post that he put on his blog earlier this week. After 8 years, this past Saturday was the last day for our store to be open.)

The Shepherd’s Nook is Now Closed

April 10, 2010 by tsfgodguy

Dear Friend of the Nook,

After two years of financial struggling with less community support and higher costs of moving to our new location…. and with a great deal of prayer….. we have been led to close The Shepherd’s Nook. We wish to thank all for their support of our ministry over the last 8 years.

For your immediate needs, please contact the Living Word bookstore in Edison at 419-946-5000. They are just 15 minutes from our store on State Route 95 in the Edison Depot building.

Long term, we are working with a local person who is hoping to open a new Christian bookstore in Marion soon. When this happens, please support them in your prayers and with your spending dollars. Invest in the Kingdom and not just where you can save a dollar.

Again, we thank you for standing by us and ask you continue to keep us in prayer as we focus more on our church ministry. If we can pray for you, please contact us at prayer@theshepherdsfellowship.org.

Blessings,

Tom and Jenni Hypes
www.theshepherdsfellowship.org

Botox Follow-up

(NOTE: there are 2 new posts today... there's another one right after this that covers the last couple of months and has lots of pictures!)

Last month, on St. Patty's Day nonetheless, Emily received another series of botox injections in her calves. For those of you new to the blog, Emily has been getting these every 3 months for the past year or so. Emily is almost 4 years old and has cerebral palsy. Her version of cerebral palsy causes her to leg muscles to tighten up and she walks on her tiptoes as a result. The botox is used to weaken the tight muscles and she wears leg braces (DAFOs and AFOs) on her calves and feet to keep her from going up on her tiptoes and to help retrain her muscles. She also wears a similar brace that we call a "night brace" on her left leg. It is more padded and able to be adjusted so she can get more stretch in her heel cord while she sleeps and her leg is relaxed. There are pictures of these and a better description in this old post from last July.

Sooo... Em's been wearing her braces every day for the most part since the end of September '09.

We are always scheduled to go back to Children's Hospital 3 weeks after her botox injections because that is when the results will peak and we can see how well it's working. Our doctor was very excited by our last visit a few months ago and was very excited again today to see how well Em is doing.

As I've mentioned before, Emily's doctor is in a wheelchair and has an assist dog, named Travis. It works out great because at each visit, Emily gets to walk down the hall to the doctor's office to get Travis and then gets to take him for a walk down the hall a few times. She's more focused on the dog than working her runway walk so we get a better idea of how she's really walking when she's not thinking about it.

Today, I opted to let Em wear her dress shoes and bring her braces in a bag instead of having her wear them. She stayed flat-footed nearly the whole time and popped up on her toes only a little bit when she was excited to see Travis. When we took her shoes and socks off, it also looked like she was starting to use the muscles in her feet correctly.

Dr. Kaitz is happy with the results and has given us good news for the next several months. Emily has grown quite a bit since she was initially fitted for her braces and Dr. Kaitz is worried that they are starting to get tight on her. Instead of getting fitted for new braces right away, Dr. Kaitz would like us to stop using them for the next 3 months AND skip the next botox injection and see how she does. She feels that as long as we keep stretching and flexing Em's legs and ankles that we might not need shots or braces any more. She also mentioned that we need to make sure we're getting a really good stretch on her heel cords because she's starting to get the beginnings of a bunion on one foot which I believe she said is the result of an arch falling and a tight heel cord.

Only time will tell! When I asked about continuing PT twice a week, she smiled again said that was overkill and that we could drop back to once a week. We will check with our physical therapist for her opinion as well since she is also working on getting her whole body working smoothly together (trunk rotation, spinal mobility, shoulders, wrists, etc.)

Needless to say, we are really pumped about this news and Emily is pumped about no more shots! We're going to keep working hard and our hope is that in 3 months we still have the same, if not even better news.


(Don't forget... there's another post after this one... with pictures!)

Catch Up (Ketchup?) Time!

As I did last year, I gave up "leisure internet use" again this year for Lent. It may sound odd to give up internet because most people give up certain types of food or drink, but I find it more meaningful. My mistake this year was that I forgot to let people know I was going to "disappear" for a while. Sorry about that!

Here's what you've missed out on!


At the end of January, we attended a Bridal Shower for my cousin, Matt and his fiancé, Stefanie. Emily is going to be the flower girl for this wedding so it was extra fun!



Later that evening, we got to surprise Ryan at his 18th birthday party. Emily was pumped to be able to surprise him and on top of that she got to play with some new friends at the party. Ryan is such a great big brother. He had a lot of family and school buddies at his party and still spent extra time with Emily which made her feel so special. They really do have a special brother-sister bond considering there is 15 years difference between them. It's very heartwarming to watch them together.



We had more cold weather and snow than normal. So, to help fight the winter blahs, we broke out the play-doh a few times.




Emily spent a little more time working on phone etiquette this winter. This particular night she wanted to talk to Nannie before bedtime. We happened to buy some curlers earlier that same day... who could resist taking a picture of this?




Now that Ryan is still going to high school full-time and working a part-time job on top of that, we haven't been able to spend as much time with him this school year. We spent an evening at Dave & Buster's with Ryan. Emily was intrigued by the air hockey table. She had a blast playing against another girl her age while Ryan and I looked on.














Fast forward to Easter. As I mentioned earlier, Emily is going to be the flower girl in my cousin's wedding. I thought it would be fun to make her dress for the wedding and since it's been a while since I've sewn a formal (my own wedding dress - almost 10 years ago!?!) I thought it might be wise to make a practice dress using the same pattern. Enter: Easter Dress. It's not made of any fancy material, just plain ol' cotton. But I wanted to be familiar with the pattern and instructions before I sewed on white satin. Emily was very patient with me and after about 4 evenings we had a dress.

A few days before Easter, I realized we didn't have shoes or tights to go with the Easter or flower girl dress. We went shoe shopping together and found a pair of strappy sandals that would work but have been a little tight on her toes. Just as we were getting ready to leave, I spotted another pair that would work much better. Em tried them on and said, "LOOK! Mommy, they have hips!" "Sorry, what did you say?" "Hips! Mommy, they have hips!" "Can you say that again? I don't understand."

At this point in her life, she's used to my ignorance. She's gotten very good at finding other ways to describe or even pantomime what she's talking about. Being ever so brilliant, she points directly at the heels. "See Mommy? Hips!" "Oooooh. Baby, those are called heels."

Here's my girl on Easter morning with her new dress and her "hips".




After our Easter service at church, we spent the early part of our afternoon at Uncle Chuck and Aunt Connie's house with our extended family. The food and family were fabulous and the weather was spectacular. When everyone was done eating, we got to take the kids outside for an Easter egg hunt.


I think this was the first year that I could just turn Em loose and let her run on her own. It was great to sit back and watch their excitement.








Well, maybe I should have supervised a little closer. Emily found a stash of golf balls that were filling a hole in the yard. Eggs! Hmmmm, I wonder how those got there? I'm pretty sure she realized they weren't eggs, but she kept reaching into the hole and finding more and more golf balls. There might have been 6 or 8 balls in that hole! Surprise!




This one was set up to be a great picture... but you know... kids and sun in the eyes... doesn't always work like you hope it will! ...well that, and her cousin in the blue dress behind her had previously been pulling the hem of her dress up to her eyebrows and I was laughing too hard to snap the "good" picture.



After the fun at the Easter egg hunt, we ventured to Utica to hang out with the other side of our family. Em loves getting to play with her cousins, Jeffrey and Rachel. (On a side note: The crowns were part of Em's Easter basket and she took them to each party to share with her cousins.) Again, I think this was one of the first family functions that I was able to let Emily play on her own most of the time and just check in on her occasionally. She did great and Tom and I got to enjoy grown-up conversations with our families!


Easter's over now and Emily has initiated a LOT of conversations (almost daily) about Heaven, Jesus and God. She's been asking things like:

"Where's Heaven?"

"Can we go to Heaven now?"

"Can I see God?"

"Is that Heaven?" (while pointing to a field with a pretty sunset)

"Maybe there's popsicles in Heaven! Maybe there's jumping beds in Heaven! Maybe... MAYbe..... MAYBE..... (and then in a whisper) there's CAKE in Heaven!"

"Why did Jesus die?"

"I don't want Jesus to die."

"Can we be with Jesus all day in Heaven?"

We do our best to answer her questions. She gets a lot of it... but it's hard to phrase things for a 3-year old to understand. Well... a 3-year old that still thinks Shrek, Sleeping Beauty, Snow White and other stories are found in her Bible.

Time Warp

What the heck? Time warp? I just put Emily in her room, covered her up, you know - the whole routine. I came out to check for email and she runs out to me with eyes wide open and says, "I slept 2 hours Mom!" I don't think so. Back to bed with you!

A few updates all wrapped into one!

I just realized I've been posting to Twitter and Facebook the past week or so and haven't added any fun Emily stories here. It's time to fix that!

Sunday, Feb. 7 - I'm impressed that Emily (remembered) and just told me the story of Daniel in the Lion's Den that she learned about 2 weeks ago at church.

Monday, Feb. 8 - Tonight at supper, Em started telling me about the part in Mary Poppins where the kids "aren't tired" but M.P. sings a lullaby and they fall asleep. I started humming the song and Emily's eyes got big and she asked if I was Mary Poppins. I put on my "teasing" face and nodded. She IMMEDIATELY started sobbing big sobs w/ BIG tears and said she didn't want me to be Mary Poppins and that she wanted me to be Mommy and she wanted her D-A-A-A-D-D-Y. (Who knew Mary Poppins could be so traumatizing?)

...and NO, I didn't show her THIS version!


Tuesday, Feb. 9 - And finally, today's Emilyism: We were supposed to have had an appointment this evening to get our taxes done. However, due to the snow, we rescheduled for next week. When I informed Emily on the way home that we weren't going to do our taxes tonight, she started crying (similar to last night's Mary Poppins debacle) and in between heavy sobs finally managed to say, "But I WANNA get my taxes done!" Seriously?!?

Happy 3rd Gotcha Day!

Today is yet another important day to remember in the life of Miss Emily. On January 29, 2007, (which also happens to be Ryan's birthday!) a baby girl named Nadezhda, lovingly called Nadya by her caregivers, became an official member of the Hypes Family!

Today (and this weekend) we celebrate our 3rd year of having Emily as part of our family. We LOVE you, Em!

You can read more about the details of our first Gotcha day here!

As I write this journal entry, I'm enjoying Ohio noon-time temperatures of 12°F which are very similar to our daily temps in Kazakhstan 3 years ago. Oh, how I wish I could return to Uralsk for a few days for some of the things I miss:

• Visit with our drivers, coordinators and translators.
• The smell of lunches being cooked in the babyhouse while we visited.
• Eat pizza at MacJohn's.
• Shop for yummy bread in the grocery story where I can't understand anyone.
• Brush my teeth with bottled water.
• Walk up the smelly stairway to our apartment.
• Pay $500 for excessive internet use so we don't miss our shows at home. (That was an accident!)
• Watch packs stray dogs and cats walk around the city like they own the place.
• Ride in a car through car-sized potholes and drive within inches of the cars beside us.
• Shop in the outdoor markets.
• Lose another 12 lbs. due to jet lag and strange foods.
• Drinking the freshest tasting fruit nectar/juices and eating really tasty carrots and cheese.
• The exhilarating feeling of discovering peanut butter my last day there.
• Watching people.
• Walking through the Russian Orthodox churches and cemetaries.
• Learning about cultures and customs of our daughter's homeland.
• Feeling my heart break as I watched children begging in the streets and (for our safety) I was supposed to simply ignore them.
• ....I could go on and on. Oh, I miss it.

What?!?! Mommy's Naked?

(Emily's cousin, Brooke, colored this blanket for her for Christmas!)

The following story won't be a surprise to my sister after tonight's occurrence...

Tonight, our little cherub and I had a video chat with Aunt Shell and Aunt Laura. Before we signed off, we had a conversation about Emily being a flower girl for a wedding in May. When asked about her dress, she told Aunt Shell that Mommy was makin' it... which somehow came out on the other sounding like Mommy's naked. They laughed. Emily laughed.

Shortly after that, it was time to sign off and get our darling to bed. I asked her if she wanted to read Aunt Shell and Aunt Laura a story before we signed off and she trotted away to her room for her Bible. She came back, flipped through the pages and started with a little prayer of her own, "God help us -- Mommy's naked."

Oi vey.

Sleeping Beauty in the OT

If you remember a post from a few weeks ago, Emily has been reading her Bible lately.

Tonight she read to me from the Old Testament book of Nahum. Sleeping Beauty, nonetheless!

Emily's Singing

Emily (the girl who sings all the time) stopped mid-song tonight to tell us that she didn't sing very good. Tom and I were baffled. Who would have the gall to tell a toddler that? Being ready to beat up whoever said it, her daddy asked, "Emily who said that you don't sing very well?" To which she very matter of factly responded, "God." Ouch!

Within about 15 minutes, she had moved on. She placed a "Let's Go Krogering" sticker over her entire eye and told me, "Look Mommy, I'm a pirate. Arrrrrrgh!"

Maybe it's just the pirates who don't sing well? After all, they do sort of have gravelly voices!

Cold, Dreary Day = Warm Feelings

In the most beautiful, sentimental way, this morning's fresh layer of powdery snow, ankle deep muddy slush in the parking lots, 19° temps, brisk winds and gray skies for days on end remind me of Kazakhstan, where we lived for approximately 4 weeks almost 3 years ago. We bonded with a previous little baby that to this day teaches us to laugh, show compassion to others, cry when we're hurting and dance on our tippy-toes when we're excited. Who knew that such cold, dreary days could consistently elicit such happy memories and warm feelings. I love these kinds of days and I'm homesick for my daughter's homeland.

Another Botox Follow-Up

We ventured down to Children's Hospital again yesterday afternoon for Emily's botox follow-up appointment and I am happy to say that we finally had a VERY encouraging visit with the doctor. This appointment was with our "new" doctor, Dr. K. We've usually had very good experiences with our visits to Children's but this is the first time that any of Em's doctors have been really pumped (almost giddy) at the progress she's seen.

Dr. K watched Em take her (Dr. K's) assistance dog, Travis, for a walk, we took the braces off, she flexed Em's feet/ankles and had her walk again. It was nice to finally see a doctor's face light up with excitement at how well the treatment was working. I was told that her left foot is finally within normal range and her right foot is better than normal range. Dr. K said that if we can stay on this track the future could look very good.

We also talked about a few other things like how to make the injection appointments a little more tolerable for Em and how to get a little more stretch in her hamstrings since she's not able to get a restful sleep with her knee immobilizer (knee brace) on.

We are going to try sticking to the regular AFO's (day braces) and adding the knee immobilizer at nap time and then having her wear her DAFO (night brace) at night time.

Emily has major issues with being confined (i.e., being held down for shots, getting caught in blankets while sleeping, getting hung up in shirts while getting dressed) and she immediately panics and starts fussing and screaming. Needless to say (but I'm going to say it anyway) I'm looking forward to being able to sleep a little better at night now that we don't have to wake up to her crying for us to take her knee brace off. (We've only been able to make it 1-2 hours any given night when we've tried to get her to wear it.)

Dr. K was thrilled with Em's progress and as a parent, it was great to hear Dr. K say that she loved ending her day with Em since she was so much fun and kept her laughing. Not all of her patients are so amiable. She said that just by observing Em she could tell that she's very intelligent and watching her made her want to adopt.

We left with a very good feeling... and then spent a little over 2 hours (during rush hour and snow/ice) making the 45 minute drive home.... but I digress. ;-)

Ok, folks (and that means you!) I've used enough "( )" (parentheses) and improper grammar today and my editor friends and family are ready to strangle me. Have a great day! (Bye!)

New Stories in the Bible

Emily read to me from her bible this afternoon. Is anyone else aware that the story of Snow White can be found in the Old Testament book of Nehemiah?

It's New Years' Eve!

Emily just asked the toilet paper at church if it was afraid of the dark. She listened to it and translated for me that it was indeed a little bit afraid... Thus ends 2009.

The Tree is Down

I didn't realize a 3-year old would act like her leg was getting cut off when the Christmas tree was put away... not that I REALLY know what it sounds like when she gets her leg cut off...