March Update

Hi all,

Well my goal is to post an update around the 11th each month since that's Haven's birthdate, so I'm about a week late. I spent the last few weeks getting ready for a kids consignment sale with every spare minute. This is really one of the first chances we've had to start clearing out from the plethora in the basement. Saturday evening was my drop-off appointment to check-in all my stuff. Well somehow earlier in the day I managed to totally mess up my back (probably lugging the Rubbermaids around) to the point where I couldn't stand up straight, barely could walk, no stairs, couldn't lift anything including Haven, etc. Mike did the drop-off appt. for me and helped with the kids through Tuesday by working from home. I went to the chiropractor Monday and will go again tonight. The chiropractor also said "absolutely no lifting" and that I really was in bad shape. Today I'm doing okay at least able to lift Haven again, but am still sore and stiff. Each day gets a little better. So we'd appreciate your prayers that I continue to heal and can get back into the swing of things around here.

Well onto Miss Haven. She's 9 months, 1 week old. Tomorrow she will have been with us for 5 months, she's been with us longer than she was in the orphanage, and we can't imagine life without her.

She's really saying Mama and Dada now and uses them appropriately, looks for us, and I think is about to start adding new words like "Ba ba" for bottle through Mom's coaching. (She said it once earlier this morning) She is fully army crawling now and getting quite speedy especially when she sees something she wants. Fortunately we can usually hear when she's headed for trouble as she giggles the whole way. She gets up on her knees in the usual crawling position but doesn't go anywhere with it. Her 3rd tooth, which is her first upper tooth is just now coming in. She sits really well now and doesn't just throw herself backward. She claps and is learning to wave "bye bye". She loves games like "this little piggy", peek-a-boo, and so big. She really is getting into reading books and playing with our huge Little People collection. I'd say that's her favorite toy right now. She'll crawl up to the bottom of the armoire in the living room and pat the bottom cupboard to ask for it. She loves getting the pieces out by herself and pushing the different buttons to hear the respective noises. She also loves anything the boys do or say, and loves to watch the dog. Both the boys and the dog make her giggle a lot, even just on sight. Haven is eating lots of Cheerios and a few Puffs still for dessert, lots of baby food, rice cereal, and still loves her bottle.

Haven had her 9 month appointment last Friday. She was 29 1/2 inches long which put her in the 97% for height even on our Western charts. They never even bother to pull out the Asian charts for our petite (hee, hee) princess. She weighed 20 lbs and about 5 ounces which put her at 76% for height so you can see that she's not slowing down in her growth and that she's quite a big baby. Her doctor was very happy with her health, progress, and development period. There were no caveats or allowances needed for her being adopted or having had spent 4 months in an institution. So we're also thrilled that she's doing so well. At 9 months she's wearing 12 months clothing and she has lots of black hair. Hopefully we'll get some pictures up so you can see that.

We're just so thankful that the Lord entrusted this precious little girl to us and are amazed by the miracle of our situation and that she successfully came home.