September 18th, 2016

Hello Everyone!  It is hard to believe we have been home almost 3 months.  I think it feels like much longer, but we are thankful to be together as a family of 5.  A lot has happened over the past month since I posted and I am not going to be honest it has been tough.  Grace had her first surgery on July 25th.  This surgery was step 1 to stretch out the skin on her lip for the final repair in a few months.  On day 3 after surgery the left side tore apart and on day 6 the right side tore apart.  To say we were devastated it an understatement.  Our doctor assured us that this would not set us back and we discussed what we were going to do next time to assure it would not happen again.  We felt good that we had a plan and focused on Grace healing from the first surgery.  

She LOVES the water!  Here is a sweet picture from her at the pool.  She loves splashing around and sticking her face in the water.  It is hard to believe that this is the same child who screamed like crazy on her first 2 baths because she was terrified of the water!

August 14th, 2016

Grace also had her first popsicle.  At first she was not sure about it because it was so cold, but once she got a good taste she LOVED it!!

August 17th, 2016

How can summer be over and school starting.  Today Sydney and Claire go back to school.  Sydney in 5th grade and Claire in 2nd grade.  Grace is going to miss her BIG amazing sisters like crazy.  How can my babies be getting so big.  

August 18th, 2016

Happy Birthday Grace!!  We cannot believe our sweet girl is 2!  We are so thankful that she is celebrating her birthday here with her family.  She is a tiny peanut, but she is so strong and brave.  This sweet little girl has been through so much, but her JOY touches everyone she meets.  We are so thankful God chose us to be her family.  Happy Birthday Grace Mei!!  We love you to the moon and back!!

Grace wore Claire's birthday dress that she wore for her 1st birthday!!  It is Grace's special dress for her 2nd birthday!!

We also decided to do a few pictures of her before her next surgery.  We LOVE her BIG smile and wanted to capture it before it was forever changed!!  She does not like getting her hands dirty so we were not sure what she was going to do.  With a little help from Mommy she realized she liked getting her hands dirty!!

Grace got her first bike for her birthday!!  Thank you Mimi and Mr. Jim.  I am sure she will be riding all over the house in no time!!

She also loves her Rody.  Thank you Reed family!!  

Grace had her first trip to the Zoo with Jude and Heather.  We had a great time.  She loved looking at all of the animals, playing on the playground, and of course riding on the carousal.  

Grace also had her first play date with her friend Kenzee.  We love you Paige and Kenzee.  We look forward to many more of these play dates!!  I think we can both agree adoption rocks!!

As I was getting ready one morning I walked in the closet and found Grace doing her stretches.  I thought it was too cute.  She has seen her big sisters do their stretches and she was going to do the same.  She is copying us a lot now and it is just too cute!!

September 8th, 2016

This is a day we have been dreading for a while now.  Surgery day.  I feel like not knowing what to expect is better than knowing.  After going through the last surgery we were not looking forward to this one.  We had to be at the hospital by 6:15 so it made for a very early morning.  Even this early in the morning Grace was a happy girl!!

We are sure going to miss this BIG smile, but know her cleft must be corrected.  Surgery lasted 2 1/2 hours.  The doctor reported that everything went great.  He even put in extra stitches to assure we stayed together this time.  When John and I saw her for the first time we could not believe what he had done.  It looked amazing.  We spent the night in the hospital and were home on friday afternoon.  Again this girl is crazy.  She was up and wanting to play the same day of surgery.  The hardest part is keeping her down.  Here is a picture a few days after surgery!!  Everything is still really swollen, but looking good.  

September 11th, 2016

Today started out a great day.  Everything was looking great and we were happy to be 3 days post-op.  Sunday afternoon John and I were both in the living room with Grace.  I was about 1 foot from her and John about 2 feet from her.  She was playing with her toys in front of me and Leia (dog) came around the corner and knocked her down.  She fell backwards onto the rug and went I went to pick her up I saw that the left side of her face had torn apart again.  There was so much blood and we were panicking.  We called the doctor and he did not answer so we started to make arrangements for the girls and were going to head to Baptist ER.  The doctor texted he was in a meeting to send a picture.  We did and he promptly responded to meet him at his office he was on his way.  We got the girls to the neighbors and met him at his office.  Once arriving at his office he said we needed to go back to surgery.  He called the hospital to start paperwork and got all of the needed on call surgical staff to the hospital.  We went in to the ER. The incident happened at our house at 7:30 and she was in the OR at 9:40.  Once the doctor opened it up to clean it out he noticed the start of an infection, which explains why it tore apart.  The infection had probably been there for a while.  Even with the fall it should not have torn apart.  He did an antibiotic wash and was able to reattach everything.  Grace ended up having another 2 hour surgery, but we were thankful he got everything back together.  We also found it a bit of a blessing that Leia had knocked her down, because it would not have healed with an infection.  We started a high powered antibiotic and started praying that the antibiotic would kill the infection in time for the surgery to be able to heal.  

This was one of the hardest nights of our lives.  I cried more and harder than I have in a long time.  Why does our sweet girl have to keep going through so much.  When is she going to catch a break.  Please God let it stay together this time.  Please God rid her body of this infection.  

Tuesday morning I noticed a little bit of something coming through the scab.  I thought it looked like puss so I called the NP into our room.  She agreed and we cultured it.  Still praying and hopeful it was going to stay together.  We were in the hospital until Tuesday afternoon and got home around 5:00.  We kept Grace in our bed with us to make sure she stays on her back and does mess with anything. She is also wearing arm braces to keep her arms straight at night so she cannot mess with it.  We kept these on since the first surgery because she got so upset wearing them the first surgery we wanted her to be use to them.  

Wednesday everything continued to look good.  Swelling was going down, which we thought was a good sign the infection was clearing.  Grace got some surprise balloons and loved them.  Thank you Toole family!!

Thursday the culture came back and we found out that Grace has a type of MRSA that is resistant to the antibiotic she was one.  We were devastated because she had been on an antibiotic for 4 days that was not fighting the infection.  We went and picked up the new antibiotic and started that at 1:00 Thursday.  By Thursday night I could see where the incision was starting to come apart and again we were hopeful it would stay and maybe need a few revisions, but still trusting it would remain together.  

Friday morning the right side had come apart in the night.  The infections ate through the sutures.  We are all in a state of shock that this is happening again.  Why does our sweet girl have to keep going through this.  We now will have to wait several months for everything to heal.  We all need a break from surgery and everything that goes along with it.  We are all completely exhausted because we are still not sleeping well at night and Grace continues to refuse naps.  We are upset, sad, heartbroken, and a bit angry.  I have been a wreck for a week now.  This is so hard.  We know this is the enemy fighting back because we rescued one of God's precious children.  We know Grace is beyond amazing and going to do BIG things one day.  We know it is going to be OK because we have the King of Kings, Creator of the Universe on our side, but this it still so hard.  We will keep fighting because we know our God will ultimately prevail in this fight.  He will see us through this and will do glorious things through it.  

Please pray for us for strength, healing, and rest for all of us.  For our hearts to be healed.  They are broken for her right now.   Thank you in advance for all of your prayers and support.  God has given us an army and right now we need you to FIGHT for us with prayers!  

Here is a quote from a sweet friend of mine (thank you Amber).  

The devil whispered in my ear, "You're not strong enough to withstand the storm."  Today I whispered in the devils's ear, "I am the storm."

August 13th, 2016

Hello Everyone!  I cannot believe that school is starting next week.  This summer has flown by!!  I am going to miss Sydney and Claire so much when school starts.  Surgery went as planned and the doctor was very pleased how the surgery went.  He said there was not any tension on the skin and everything went together great.  Here is a picture after surgery.  You can tell everything went together nicely!!

We found out our girl has a very high pain tolerance.  Within hours of surgery she was ready to eat.  She ate her entire lunch through a large syringe and was ready to head to the playroom after lunch.  We went several times that first afternoon.  Here is a picture from the playroom.

We had to spend the night in the hospital which was tough.  Grace was very restless all night and we did not get much sleep.  We were very happy to get to go home Tuesday mid-morning.  Although all of the staff were great at Baptist the hospital is just not a fun place.

I had to take a break from writing the last post because we had such a rough week after surgery.  We found out our sweet girl has a very high pain tolerance and did things that most kids would not do because of pain.  We put Grace down for a nap on Wednesday and we think she put her fingers in her mouth.  After waking up from her 30 minute nap we almost had a panic attack because she had pulled apart the entire left side of her mouth and never even cried.  I immediately called the doctor and he calmed us down and said we need to do everything we can to keep the right side attached.  We saw the doctor on Thursday and he sent us back to Baptist to get arm braces to put on her at night to keep her arms straight.  Grace puts her index and middle fingers in her mouth at night to calm/soothe herself when she sleeps.  It was just awful to put them on her after everything she has been through.  She would just scream and scream when we put them on her and she also started waking up multiple times a night again.  It was very tough to sit and listen to her scream.  Also when she screamed you could see the skin pulling apart and there was nothing we could do to stop her crying except remove the braces and we could not do that.  Saturday night was a very rough night and by Sunday she had pulled apart the right side as well and we are back to where we were before surgery.  The crazy thing is she had 3 layers of stitches on both sides with 12-14 stitches on each side.  Here are 2 pictures of her with the right side still attached.

Here she is with some of Sydney's school supplies.  She loved getting into their bags of stuff and pulling everything out!

We are keeping the braces on her so that hopefully she will be use to them by the next surgery.  We obviously have a lot of anxiety because of what happened with this one.  It is hard to keep a 2 year old from throwing a fit and we are going to have to find a way to keep her from doing that for 2 weeks!  The 2nd surgery was suppose to be 6-8 weeks after the first one.  We meet with Dr. Glade on the 18th to come up with a plan for the next surgery.  We spent most of the first week at home due to the exhaustion and no sleep.  

The second week after surgery was still a lot of healing, but we were able to get out at the end of the week a few times.  Grace had her first visit to Chuck-E-Cheese and had a great time.  She loved riding all of the rides!!

  

We also got out at the end of the week to celebrate my birthday!!  It was so wonderful to celebrate this year with all 3 of my babies.  We had a wonderful lunch with Lynnette, Harper and Henley and a wonderful family dinner at the lake.  I feel beyond blessed with an amazing family and wonderful friends!!  Here are a few pictures from the day!!

Grace had queso for the first time and she was so excited!!  She kept pointing at it for more.  John could barely give it to her fast enough!!

After dinner we went on a walk at the lake!  It was a beautiful night!!

Here is a picture of Grace playing with her daddy!  She is so happy!!

Starting week 3 after surgery we finally felt like we were getting back into a little bit of normal.  We started the week of with a trip to Main Event.  We have to do some fun stuff since it is our last full week off until school starts.  Sydney and Claire had a great time and Grace had fun hanging out mostly waiting on her big sisters.  She better get used to it because she is going to be doing that a lot over the next few years!!

That weekend we visited Mardel to get some gifts.  Grace had a great time playing around in the kids area.  She looked too cute in her dress!!

Grace also visited the playground at the mall!  She loved running around and playing on the toys.  She is getting more and more confident with everyday that she is with us!!  

We are all in awe that we have been home for 7 weeks.  We are so thankful that God showed off big and got us to China in June.  We could not have done it with school being in session.  John and I are so thankful that Grace got to spend so much time with her 2 big sisters.  They have been absolutely amazing with her and she is blessed to call them her big sisters.  They love her as much as she loves them.  Please keep us in your prayers.  That we can come up with a plan to make sure this next surgery is a success.  We do not want to see her go through another surgery without a positive outcome.  We know God has this and so again we are doing our best to trust him 100% with everything we have ahead of us!!  Thank you to everyone for the visits, calls, texts and most importantly prayers!!  

July 31st 2016

Hello Everyone!  I want to apologize for not posting sooner, but we have been in survival mode around here.  I cannot believe we have been home for 5 weeks this weekend.  It has been a wild roller coaster ride since coming home.  It has been a big adjustment for all 5 of us!  I am learning that this is definitely not a race, but a marathon.

We had our first doctors appointment with our primary care physician on July 11th.  Here is a picture in the waiting room before going back!

Luckily Grace had several shots in China and we were only missing 5 to be caught up.  We got 4 shots and will do the 5th one with her 2 year shots in August.  She did not like the doctor examining her, but everything checked out perfectly.  She only cried a few minutes after receiving the shots and she was back to her happy self!!  We also got a script for blood work, which we did the following week.  All of her blood work also came back good!  It is a relief to know that everything besides the bilateral cleft lip and palate is healthy!!  Here is a picture back at home with her first sucker!  It took a while for us to get her to put it in her mouth!  She did not like it as much as I thought she would.

We decided to get out and go to a Ladybug release at the Myriad Gardens.  The girls all had a great time and I got some good pictures.  Grace is unhappy in the first one because I sat her down and she did not want that.  She does not like getting her picture made.

We decided to release our ladybugs outside instead of in the greenhouse!!  Grace was much happier once we were outside!!

Grace is still not wanting to nap much.  We are continuing to work on that.  She gets grumpy when she does not get enough sleep.  Here is a cute picture of her playing around in her bed!

We had to go and run a few errands and pick out fabric for Sydney's quilt that she will be making at sewing camp.  Who would have thought that you could be so happy to be at Hobby Lobby.  You cannot help but smile when you see this face!!

The reality of surgery set in on about the Thursday before.  I felt like I had everything under control, but there is something about your baby having surgery that makes you feel a little sick.  The girls got invited to go to the lake the weekend before and were so excited to go!  Thank you Will and Tracy for loving on our girls.  They had the BEST time at the lake!!

We stayed home, played, and loved on her all weekend.  We did not get much sleep due to nerves, but were able to have a low key weekend with Grace before surgery.  Here is a picture of her playing with her Baba (Chinese for daddy).  She loves playing and being silly!!

She also found a fun July 4th headband in her big sisters closet and loves wearing it around!!

Surgery day was a bittersweet day.  We know the surgeries have to happen, but we felt like we were just starting to get a little bit adjusted and then we have to have surgery.  We were full of nerves and anxiety, but know we are in good hands with Dr. Glade.  Here are a few pictures before surgery.  We were a little sad knowing her smile would not be this big after surgery.  We LOVE her big smile!

They let me carry her back to the operating room and be with her until she was under anesthesia so she would not be traumatized about being taken away from us.  She is still very cautious of people and does not like anyone except her momma, baba and 2 big sisters to touch or hold her.  

This surgery is the shortest of the first 3 and will only be about an hour.  The doctor took both sides of her lip and attached them to the middle piece in order to stretch the skin so that everything will go together easier on the final repair of the lip.  The Dr. said that everything went together great and that there was not any tension on the skin.   He also placed tubes in her ears.  He said there was a lot of fluid on her ears so she should hear a lot better with that gone and the tubes.  He assured us that she would not remember anything for the first hour after coming out of anesthesia.  Shortly after the doctor left they came to get us to go back and see her.  She was crying hard when we walked back.  A nurse was holding her to try and calm her down.  The second she got into her mamas arms she stopped crying.  On a positive note it was good to know she knows her mama even coming out of anesthesia and on morphine.  We stayed in recovery for a short while and then got moved to a room on the floor.  

Once on the floor the nurse had to do vitals and re-tape her IV.  She did not like any of this so it was nice when it was all over.  Grace continued to be restless, but was able to have some water through a syringe and even eat some pureed food through a syringe for lunch.  We found out that she is a very tough little girl and has a very high pain tolerance.  The doctor could not believe she was already playing in the playroom by that afternoon.  He joked that Chinese kids are tougher than American ones (I have to agree with him) and it was not normal for her to be doing so good so soon after surgery.  We spent 1 night in the hospital and were able to go home Tuesday morning.  The hospital is not a fun place and we were so happy to be home!!  Thank you for your continued prayers.  After going through 1 surgery we are really dreading the next two.  Please pray that John and I can take 1 day at a time and not worry about the upcoming surgeries that she will be having.  We know God has a plan and we are doing our best to trust him in all things.  Grace is still so full of joy despite going through surgery.  Although we have been through some tough times she is beyond amazing and we are so blessed to be her family!!

July 10th, 2016

Hello Everyone!!  I cannot believe we have been home for 2 weeks.  Part of me feels like it has been a lot longer and part of me feels like it has flown by.  So much has happened over the past 2 weeks.  Everything is new to Grace.  I will list a few of her firsts:  first time to ride in a carseat, first time to ride in a shopping cart, first time to eat cheese and she loves cheese, grill cheese and mac-n-cheese are her favorites, first time to interact with a dog, first time to the pool, first time to Chick-fil-a, first ride in the golf cart, first time to a park, first time to swing are just a few of her firsts.  Her most important first was meeting her Big sisters.  She loves them and they love her.  We are very thankful for God preparing her heart for them.  We know that he did because the entire time we had Grace in China and at the airport she would not allow anyone to touch her except John and I.  (the only person she allowed was Naomi who was also being adopted).  The fact that she went to them so easily is nothing short of a miracle.  The biggest problem we have with the girls is that they fight over her!!  She is so full of joy and everyone just wants to love on her!!  Here is a picture of her with her big sisters!! 

 

 

The day after we got home we  headed to Fuzzy's Taco for lunch.  We had no food in the house and John and I were craving something good!!  She loved her chicken quesadilla and ate almost all of it!  She also had a cookies and cream churro which she loved!

 

The first week home was a lot of adjustments. She did not want to walk around the house and only wanted to be carried. She was also afraid of the dogs. We spent most of the week sitting in the living room playing with toys.  She had her first bath alone in her bathtub.  She did great and loved it!!

 



On Wednesday she patted Leia on her back, which was a big step for her!!  Leia has been very persistent sitting beside us while playing in the floor.  She has been gentle and seems to know she is a baby.

On Thursday we had our first appointment with the ENT.  He said everything looked as he thought it would.  We had shared a lot of picutres with him during our trip.  He has been wonderful and I encourage anyone that needs an ENT to see Dr. Robert Glade.  We will have 3 surgeries over the next 5-6 months.  Our first surgery will be on July 25th.  He will put tubes in her ears and do part of her lip.  6-8 weeks later he will finish her lip and 2 months after that he will do her palate.  Please be praying for Grace that everything will go as planned during surgery and that there will not be any complications.  We will have to be overnight in the hospital and she will have to be on liquids for 1 week.  She loves to eat so I think this is going to be really tough because she will not understand why she cannot eat.

Here she is finally walking a little bit in the kitchen mid-week of the first week!!  She is a tiny little peanut!!

 

Friday evening the girls and I went to the mall and had Chick-fil-a.  It was her first time and she was so excited and happy to be eating!  She even was doing a little cheer because she thougth it was so yummy!!  The girls and I told her we feel the same way when we eat it!!

 

 

 

 

After eating we visited the play area at the mall for a few minutes before heading home.  She had a great time playing.  It warms my heart how all 3 of my girls love each other!!

 

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We visited the pool for the first time Sunday and Grace was a little timid.  By day 2 she loved it!  She was splashing in the water and putting her face in.  She played with toys and was smiling and laughing!! 

 

The hardest part for Grace has been sleep. She will go to sleep, but wakes up mulitple times a night.  She also is refusing to take naps.  It breaks our heart because she wakes up in a panic and makes sure John and I are there. We think she is so afraid we will not be there so she wakes up muliple times to check. I have never slept with a baby and she flips and flops all night long. Needless to say we have not gotten much sleep in 3 weeks. We decided to move her crib in our room pushed up next to the bed and see how it would go.  She only cried a few minutes and fell asleep.  She only woke up twice and seemed to sleep much better!!  Praising God that we are finally going to get some sleep.

 

 

 

By the end of the second week she is walking around the house by herself, not afraid of the dogs, not screaming in her carseat, playing independently and still eating everything we give her.  She knows her people (mommy, baba, Sydney and Claire) and is such a snuggle bug with us.  We cannot believe how well she is doing with all of the change in her life.  She is even starting to use some of the signs we have been working on!  Everyday she is feeling a little more secure in this new life God has given her!!  Here are some pictures from this past friday.  I literally could eat her up she is so cute!!

 

 

 

I finally broke down and bought a 6-12 month outfit and it fits!!  Everything else we have is 12-18 and falls off of her.  At least we know she will grow into them!!  With all of the eating she is doing we know she will be growing soon. 

 

Since getting Grace she has wanted nothing to do with anything soft.  They do not have soft toys in the orphanage due to germs so she would only play with hard toys.  We have a lovie for her like her 2 big sisters and she has wanted nothing to do with it.  I have kept it with her when she sleeps hoping she would take to it.  She is going to need something for comfort with all of these surgeries coming up.  Last night she fell asleep with it in her arms!!  She is also now taking naps!!  It is usually only for 1-1 1/2 hours, but we will take it!!

 

 

 

The last month has been one of the most exciting, but hardest months of our lives.  It has been so emotional, but amazing!  We feel so blessed that God chose us to go on this journey.  We would not change 1 bit of the tough road we traveled to get our sweet girl.  There were many times we thought we could not handle one more thing and we did.  God has grown us and changed us in ways only he can while going through something you have no control over.  God's faithfullness and love has never left us.  He has sent us so many Angels on Earth to love and support us.  You know who you are.  Thank you for your time, generosity, prayers, love, and support.  We love each of you dearly.  John and I are still in awe that God did this.  We look at Grace and are so thankful to be her mommy and daddy.  The girls keep saying that it is like a dream!!  It truly is a dream!!   Thank you Jesus for loving us enough to trust us with one of your precious children.

 

This verse speaks to us right now!  Thank you again for being God's hands and feet on Earth.

 

Dear children, let's not merely say that we love each other, let us show the truth by our actions.

1 John 3:18