Giving Thanks! and a long overdue update...

I love this time of year...I have so much to be grateful for.  Faith is just an amazing little girl.  When I read other family blogs about their adoption experience I realize how fortunate Faith was to be in such a wonderful environment before she came into our family.  She is smart as a whip, and spicy...she has a sense of humor and can tease with the best of us.  She has bonded easily with all of us,  but still comes to me for all her owies and big cries as it should be.  When Spencer came home 6 months after Faith I was worried about their bonding; all unnecessary worry because it's like they never missed a beat.

We have a wonderful special needs/education program for preschoolers in our school district.  Faith was extensively evaluated over a 4 month period.  She met with 4 different specialists and after all those evaluation Faith was deemed a normal 3 year old.  I was in shock!  I thought for sure she would qualify for the preschool simply because of her medical diagnosis...that was good news.  I still worry that they don't fully understand her diagnosis, and that her difficulties will more likely affect her in her teen years.  But they can't intervene unless they see a present need, and Faith seems at this time to be very typical.  The bad news is because I had fully expected her to be part of that program I completely missed all the open enrollments for regular preschool.  Poor Faith has been stuck with me and Nick Jr. Preschool.  On the plus side she can count to 10 in 3 languages.  Chinese, English and Spanish!  Her language is still a mix of Chinese and English.  She still watches videos in Chinese and understands them.  Most everything she says we understand and she completely understands everything we say.  The other day we were shopping and she pointed and said, "Christmas Tree!"  We had not taught her this and were pleasantly surprised.  Her memory is fantastic.  She will remember words we seldom say and use them months later.  When she doesn't know what something is, she will just simply ask, "What is it?"  Or our favorite is instead of how come? ...she says, "How WHY?"  Now we all say how why?  She knows all her colors, and we are working on the alphabet. 

Faith had a little adjustment when the kids all started back in school,  she really misses them.  Fortunately Spencer is still home and Kylee is doing the running start program at the college and her classes are done by 10 am.  The three of us have a gym membership and have enjoyed going to work out together each day.  Our gym also has a child care facility and the first day I dropped off Faith she went without issue.  Goodness this little girl is so easy!  She enjoys going to play for an hour and then we usually end up running errands and eating lunch.  I am really enjoying "the moment" because Spencer leaves for college in 8 weeks and Kylee won't be far behind him next fall. 

Faith has made so much progress in the 10 months she has been home.  When she first arrived she was a constant thumb sucker; to the point that she had open sores on both thumbs, was not completely potty trained, and had some behavior issues like biting and hitting...mostly her brothers who deserved it...but none the less still an issue.  Today she is fully potty trained, even nights...gave up her thumbs and a pacifier and rarely bites or hits.  She does get this angry face, and you can tell she really wants to lash out, but we have been able to teach her , "mean face and nice face and we always say "a-oh, does Faith have a mean or a nice face?"  And she usually will recognize it and say, " mean."  Then we follow up with the question, " Does Faith want to be mean or nice?"  She will then say, "Nice."   With the exception of the thumbs, we feel Faith is on target with our other children when they were her age, we see no difference.  WHAT A BLESSING!  We were prepared for so much more, and have had it so easy!

Faith is also very attached and affecionate.  She loves her siblings and parents, and I have posted before that she has complete ownership of us...we are hers and she is ours!  That knowledge is such a safety net.  We are all happy and secure and feel so blessed this Thanksgiving.  We are grateful for a loving Father in Heaven who knew our family dynamics and place this sweet little girl in our home.  May you all have a wonderful and happy Thanksgiving!