Home...Busy...and Loving Life as a family of 4

We landed in New York on Friday April 2nd at about 1:40pm and went through customs where our little Samara became an American citizen, she actually has dual citizenship until she is 18 and if she wants to continue to have citizenship in Russia she will just need to keep up with it. We will leave that up to her. I have neglected the blog so bad and I am sorry for that. These last 4 days home have been nothing but busy!

In New York I got Samara cleaned up from our 10 hour flight and into her "coming home outfit", See pic...At least she looked good. Justin and I needed sleep and showers. LOL

She slept 6 out of the 10 hours on the flight. What a trooper. She did so good.

We met a couple while waiting at the airport to leave Moscow who were bringing their beautiful forever son home and on our flight. They took this pic for us. They were the nicest couple. We wish them all the best with their little Elijah!

When we arrived to CVG at about 7:35 we were greeted with so many wonderful family and friends. It was an emotional reunion and first time meeting of our new addition. There were banners, gifts and oh so many tears, but good ones.

Ethan just absolutely loves his new little sister. He calls her his best friend. So cute, it's only been 4 days so I know it won't last forever but right now it just melts my heart. He wants to be the big helper, he is doing so good with her.

When leaving the airport I was really worried about our drive home since this would be the first time Samara would have ever been in a car seat, wow she is such a trooper. No fussing...just rides like a champ. This is not to say that she has liked it every time since then but she does really good. The drive home was surreal, All four of us in the car, one big family. I was so happy at that moment. It was the best feeling.

At home I was hoping she would sleep through the night but her schedule was flipped upside down. I got her to sleep about 9:45 and then was ready to get up at 3:30am..So I didn't get much sleep. We were up till about 7 am and then I woke Justin up for him to take her so I could get just a couple more hours of rest. At 9:ooam Ethan came to wake me up so I would make him pancakes, so of course I did. All in all not as bad of night as it could have been.

Saturday we took Ethan to Jump Zone for Nolan's Birthday Party, even though Justin and I were too exhausted, I know it was a good thing for Ethan. With us being gone for over a week and then bringing home Samara his world has been rocked so we wanted him to get to do something all by himself. He had fun, then we had to go to the grocery store to stock the fridge. It was very empty. Made several stops to get some last minute things for Easter. Then went home to try and get some rest.....we were so exhausted. This time Samara slept through the night or until about 5:30.

Sunday we all got up and had muffins for Breakfast and went to church for the first time as a family of 4. Samara did ok for part of the service but then had about enough. We then went to my parents for Easter Lunch and spent time with my family. It was wonderful.....everybody is smitten with her. Then we left my mom's and went to Justin's Moms and spent the evening with all of his family and had Easter Dinner. It was great to spend time with everyone and they gave us so many nice gifts. We have the best families, very loving and supportive. We were gone all day, got home about 9:30pm and went straight to bed. Samara slept great, got up a little after 6 am.

Monday was Samara's Dr's Appointment at Cincinnati Children's Hospital International Adoption center. Her appointment was at 10am and lasted 4 hrs (we knew it would be this long) She was seen by a round of Dr's on psycho social, occupational therapy and infectious diseases. We also saw a social worker on attachment and bonding. It was long but very informative appointment. First most of you know from my previous posts that she has been sick. We found out she has an ear infection and a bad cold so she was put on a strong antibiotic. It seems to already be working. Our little peanut is below the 3rd percentile on all measurements, head, weight and height. In IA (international Adoption) terms that means "Failure to Thrive" Sounds horrible doesn't it? She is just malnourished and too tiny for her age. She is technically 17 months old but because she was born 2 months premature her gestational age is 15 months. So when they charted her on all of her motor skills she charted at about 12months...not bad only 3 months delayed. That is really good. On her speech she is charting at about 8-9 months. This is the big delay, but we are working with her and can already see a difference in the way she is babbling and communicating with us. So many little quirks that she does, we were unsure of what they meant and some worried us but we were told that those are normal for an institutionalized child and are all sensory things. This was such a relief to hear. To be honest we got such a good report, they are concerned about her size and want her to have a big growth spurt so she has been put on a high fat diet. The social worker was amazed at how well she was trusting us and attaching. We have been praying and God is really working here because this was something I was really concerned about. The social worker said she had NO concerns for her attachment but still wanted us to continue our "only Justin and I are the care takers ".

We were so happy with the report, we still will not know about any of the infectious disease results for awhile...They took 10 viles of blood from our little girl. I was worried this was going to hurt her and I cannot believe they can take that much from such a tiny person. It was painful for me to watch. :(

Today was the first day with No appointments but No less busy. I will try and update more frequently and definitely post more pic's..sorry for the long book...I just had alot to update on.