We have been blessed with two special daughters and two sons from Eastern Europe. We welcome you to follow our journey as a family of five, waiting to travel and pick up #6, with the ins and outs of family, education, farm life, and love!

Friday, June 19, 2009

Lazy Daisy (day 9)

Oh, do we have a lazy girl on our hands. She is going to need lots of motivation when we get home.

This morning we started on the back playground and got some good vocalizations out of Mila. Doug would bounce her on his knee and sing a little song, then stop. We were trying to encourage Mila to use the sign for "more" or some representation of the sign. One time, she put her hands together and gave us a big smile, and one other time, she made a vocalization, so we took that as a request. All the other times (6-10 times) she was quiet and I would help her put her hands together to sign "more". Then, a group of children arrived, and "Lazy Daisy" returned. I joked with Doug we should name Mila Daisy Rose, instead of Mila Rose because we have termed her 'Lazy Daisy and Nosy Rosie". Once the environment has outside influences (children playing, people working, people talking, cars going past), Mila just sits and watches and nothing we do (with the exception of tickling her) gets her attention. I keep reminding myself that there is so much that she has not has the chance to experience that when there is so much sensory input, she is taking it all in. Hopefully as these noises become common to her, she will be able to be more attentive. Once the kids came to the back, we moved to the front of the playground (with other kids playing and men working on a ramp at the front of the building), so then we moved into the lobby of the building. I worked on having Mila sit and prop herself up. If I put her in the position (criss-cross apple sauce/pretzel sit/indian style) she can prop herself up using her hands (hands on the floor) for a good 10 minutes--if nothing behind her sparks her interest (b/c then she falls over).

We took her back upstairs and fed her lunch. She ate much better today than she did on Wednesday.

We returned for visit #2 around 3:00pm to be sure she was awake. When we arrived, we didn't see any adults in the hall, so Doug went in to pick her up out of her crib. (The cribs here remind me of hospital cribs--the sit higher up than ours do and are painted metal). About the time Doug was picking her up, a caretaker came down the hall. We are very thankful that every time we have gone to the orphanage, there is at least one caretaker on staff that speaks english, so it is nice to be able to communicate and say thank you to. (The staff typically sees us and yells at the person on staff that can speak English to go get Mila.)
We took Mila to the little room indoors because it was so hot outside. We had a good time playing with the foam letters, listening to music, throwing a ball, and listening to her babble. We are truly enjoying the atmosphere of the Serbian orphanage--they allow you to come and go when you like (within reason) as long as you don't interfere with meals. When we took Mila back after our visit, all the caretakers were in other rooms with other children. I picked Mila up out of her stroller and walked her back into her room and put her in her crib. When I layed her down, she looked SO sad. I really thought she was going to cry, but she didn't. I was the one tearing up because she seemed so sad we were leaving (I felt horrible for walking away from her) but somewhere I think she knows tears don't get her anywhere when she is one of many, so she doesn't cry. So today, I left the orphanage with a heavy heart....
Thankfully, we know that very soon, we will leave the orphanage, together--all three of us and start our lives as a family of four.

Seems our adoption ceremony will be Tuesday rather than Monday. Bummer. Oh well, in adoption, expect the unexpected!

We are going on an excursion with Jasmina and her sister and brother in-law. We won't get to see Mila tomorrow, but we will get to see more of Belgrade. Sunday we hope to go to church with Stacy and Devin, visit Mila twice on Monday, and then travel for our adoption ceremony on Tuesday morning!

(And a picture of yummy cheesecake....at least Doug said it was yummy!)

2 comments:

Mike & Kim said...

Well, good thing that there won't be any distractions when Mila gets home...like her sister and cousins. :) Maybe they will motivate her to want to play with them!

We can't wait to have you all back home!

Megan said...

It warms my heart every time you talk about how nice the atmosphere is in the orphanage. I'm glad things are going so well for you guys. I'll be praying for a SMOOTH Tuesday as well. :) Love you so much!!