Home 3 weeks - update

Ok, so we’ve been home 3 weeks and the long-awaited blog entry is here! We are all adjusting to having another girl in our home. Maya is doing very well, is speaking more English each day – she picks up a couple key phrases like “What ..you doing?” and “Just a minute.” She is driving Joel nuts by saying “thank you” every time someone gives something to her and wanting them to reply with “Your welcome.” This means few other words are used at dinner!! Speaking of dinner, she eats basically everything we give her – sometimes (like the mushrooms) even when you can tell she doesn’t like it. Interestingly enough, the one food she did not eat much of was the chicken masala (this is an Indian dish) Ronda made the other day.

She loves her daddy and he has never received quite the welcome she gives him when he comes home! She is very compliant with her Dad and even brushed her teeth a second time the other day when he said she had missed one tooth! This is scary as you never know what her Dad will ask her to do. She and Mommy are getting along well –though we don’t know what “Mommy do lay” means and maybe don’t want to and Mommy is waiting for the night when she will give her a hug at bedtime. She did make a card for Mommy at AWANA the other night and according to the teacher there was no prompting!

The boys are doing a great job helping her – they have been teaching her and Danielle baseball as both girls are going to play t-ball this spring (pray for the coach!) – they play well with her and at other times tolerate her well. She and Danielle play school together, the girls had a tea party with Mom the other day, Danielle helps Maya on the computer, and there have been some precious moments when they’ve been giggling together. Danielle has found the adjustment the hardest with sharing her room and her things and observing Maya getting a lot of attention. But she too is adjusting and does enjoy the times they play together – especially bath time. Maya loves the bath – the first time she had a bath here she was like a fish out of water – in the water. She just kept wiggling around and getting up and splashing down and dumping water with the cups, giggling and was just beside herself with excitement! Fortunately she has calmed down quite a bit but she and Danielle still like to dump water on each other.

She is very energetic and likes attention – I think this explains why she was burping at AWANA last Wednesday. She loves AWANA and Sunday School and does a pretty good job sitting in class. The first night at AWANA I’m not sure how many times they walked her up to the water fountain – she thinks that is pretty cool. Now they fill a pitcher of water for in the classroom! This week she will start attending preschool 3 half days a week. It was clear this past week after the other kids started back to school after a long Easter break that she wanted to go to school. Since she saw her classroom and teacher on Thursday she keeps asking when she will go to school. Tomorrow (Monday) may be a tough day as she does not go to school until Tuesday.

Maya has already attended two gymnastics classes and tomorrow evening will be her third. She is very flexible (we were surprised when she easily put both feet behind her head) and is doing very well. Most of the time, she has no problem following the instructions.

Maya’s first Sunday at church was Palm Sunday and the children were singing in the evening so Maya stood on stage as they practiced in the morning and went on stage with them in the evening! We had a wonderful Easter with Grandma and Granddaddy Shepherd visiting the few days before. Maya was very comfortable with them and gave them both big hugs upon their arrival. Maya also really enjoyed getting an Easter card from her Grandma and Grandpa Gene. For whatever reason (maybe she had never received mail before?) that seemed better than any gift she has received. We had a nice Easter sunrise service at our new church property and wonderful 11am service, also. For dinner we went to our friends and neighbors, the Harkins, and enjoyed a delicious meal and great conversation. Well the kids enjoyed the meal and running around outside – the adults enjoyed the conversation! Monday after Easter Maya met her first cousins and Aunt and Uncle as we visited the Perrys in Johnstown. Everyone enjoyed the day.

We’ve made our first doctor visit (she did not like getting a shot), and Ronda was glad when the lab visit was over this past week. Even though we never changed dirty diapers Ronda is sure collecting stool samples made up for at least some of them!! For days we were following her to the toilet to see if she was having a BM so we could put plastic wrap over it! Anyway, that’s behind us – now we are awaiting the test results. At the lab they took 11 vials of blood! She did not like this (quite a few tears) but fortunately did not fight us either.