Home 4.5 years

The posts are getting farther and farther apart.  Mostly because Josh is doing rather well  :-).  And because of the seemingly escalating busy-ness of our lives!

Medically... Josh is doing SO much better!  And I credit much of that to our being introduced to therapeutic level essential oils.  With them... we prevent most bouts of strep (only one case in 16 months).  We keep the swelling down on his KTS arm even better than any compression wrap did AND it "erases", temporarily most likely, most of the hundreds of vericose veins on Josh's arm!!  Wounds and bruises heal easily and super fast with Helichrysum.  Pain levels seem to be down, as well as with the baby aspirin trials. with Frankincense and Balance.  An added benefit of having an essential oil alternative to aspirin is... no more nose bleeds!  :-)

Josh grew 1.5 inches just in the first 6 weeks of 2014 alone!  He now weighs 54#.

Josh did extensive visual testing in 12/2013.  His vision in his left. affected eye, cuts on and off  :-(.  Josh got some seriously poor scores in visual processing  :-(.  But now that better accommodations are being made, he's really taking off in reading  :-).

He's now a Cub Scout, and has been enjoying the classes/meetings and getting to see some other boys outside of class.

Math and technology are Josh's best subjects in 2nd grade.  It's fun to watch him grow, and speculate as to which directions life will take him in the future  :-).

Home Three Years Now!

Wow, time does fly quickly when you have a busy, and LOUD, household :-). Josh is almost 8 years old, and we celebrated his 3 year Adoption Day on 12/8/12.

Josh is now 47" tall, and 49#. He easily eats 5-6 times a day, but burns all of it off very quickly. He is a VERY busy young man... who still explores his world full speed ahead :-). After the gift of an iPad to our family for Rob and Josh to use, Josh has become very adept at it, through sheer persistence. His experience has made him the unofficial classroom "techie" in his first grade... he's the one the kids call when they get stuck on their computer math lessons!

We've had a couple of "former" doctors of ours observe him briefly (and not ask questions) who suggested Josh could use some Ritalin to slow him down! :-O He is a very busy guy, bordering on hyperactive (or likely full blown hyperactive to others not used to ADHD kiddos, LOL). But he can focus for hours when he wants to :-), and proves hard to distract at such times. His teachers have wisely given him a "wiggle cushion" to sit on at school, and he does very well with that.

Josh's 14 yr old brother, Rob, is hard of hearing, and thus loud. Josh is louder! I'm still guessing he has a form of auditory processing difficulty yet to be diagnosed? But interestingly enough, Josh has become less tone deaf every month, and is learning to sing on key! :-) His english vocabulary is astounding. Where he has big, puzzling problems is in categorization. It took over 2 years for him to learn the alphabet correctly by phonetic name. But once he had the phonetic names right... the school went back and started teaching him the names of the letters. And guess what? He's losing his memory of the phonetic names. :-( Josh wants SO badly to be able to read, but it's a major issue for him. A team of specialists will be meeting in January to try to puzzle out what's going on. Praying they can!

Josh and I flew to the 2012 Vascular Birthmarks Conference the weekend of 11/11/12 in NYC (or "big bad New York" as Josh called it). Zounds... it proved a tense trip as first Hurricane Sandy, and then winter storm Athena hit NYC! We flew out at the front of winter storm Brutus, in increasing snow, and were one of the first planes to land at LaGuardia once Athena had passed. The taxi rides were even more "interesting" ;-D. We learned more at the Conference... mainly that we have a very rare jewel in Josh! His jaw and teeth issues are so rare, we got totally conflicting opinions from 2 of the top teams in Vascular Anomalies in one afternoon! :-O They only agreed on two things... Josh will need jaw surgery in the next 3 years, and he needs to start skin laser treatments where the Port Wine Stain is thickening on his face before it gets too thick for laser. We are still praying for God's guidance as to WHO will do the jaw surgery. And Josh is scheduled for his first laser treatment at UCLA, Irvine, CA on 1/11/13. At least we don't have to fly all the way back to NYC again! :-)

And it has taken us until now to learn how to best treat wounds in Joshua's Port Wine Stain. Apparently, his is thinner skinned, harder to heal than many? A consult with a Seattle Dermatologist had him say "You've likely never heard of a very rare skin disease called Epidermolysis Bullosa, or the bandage that works best on it, Mepitel, but...". LOL!! Phil and I fostered sweet Julia Grace in 2001... and Mepitel was one of the products we used on her bigger wounds from her Epidermolysis Bullosa! Our pediatrician was in awe, saying it was like an aligning of cosmic forces that we had this coincidence. No...it's just another God planned coincidence we experience with our incredible kiddos :-)). Those are indeed the highlights of our adoption roller coaster lives!

Happy Adoption Day, Josh!

Home for 25 months now

Updates are getting fewer and farther between, LOL. Busy kids and busy parents!

Josh doesn't seem to have grown much in height or weight this past year, but he sure has matured emotionally :-). He now attends full-time Kindergarten... so he can firmly learn those all important letters, numbers, colors and shapes! And he fits right in with his classmates :-).

March of 2011, Josh needed an emergency tooth extraction due to an abscessed molar he hadn't even told us about :-O. Blessedly, we were already on our way to Seattle for a 6-teeth extraction in Robert's poor mouth!! So two VERY grumpy boys were in our van on the way back home. YIKES it was a long trip back!

Summer of 2011, Josh and Mom flew to Peoria, IL so he could meet Cindy's family there (hadn't yet met her 3 sisters or their families). He had a great time.

A diagnosis was surprisingly given when Josh and Mom flew, just the tow of them again, to Irvine, CA for the 2011 Vascular Birthmarks Conference... to try to learn what to best do for Joshua's ever overgrowing upper left jaw (due to the Port Wine Stain). Five of the 6 doctors in attendance said "well of course he has Klippel-Trenauney Syndrome" aka KTS! What a shock! We had previously been told he did not have that. KTS is when vascular anomalies affect one or more limbs so extensively, that it affects capillary, lymphatic and venous systems. Josh has that in his right arm, hand and shoulder. Most KTS patients (almost 90% I believe) are affected in a leg! Some sources say the KTS can also appear in the head, neck and trunk. Likely that's what's going on with Joshua's jaw.

What to do about it?? Sigh. It's so incredibly rare to find ANY surgeon that has ANY experience with this, that over 3 months later, I have yet to find one. We have placed lower orthotics in his mouth to keep the left lower jaw from turning in any further due to the pressure of the upper... but we have yet to locate an orthodontist either who has experience in this! We're praying for God's very clear guidance for all of us. This overgrowth means Josh can no longer chew on his left side of his mouth, and his speech is being impacted. He currently receives 45 minutes/week speech therapy for this.

But despite the mouth issues, Josh remains a very cheerful, mischievous young man most of the time :-). He lOVES to go hiking with Mom, and he retains his curiosity for EVERYTHING. His fave sandwich for lunch is cheese and banana peppers... hold the cheese works for him too. ;-D He's a precious, delightful boy who has fit into our family very well! :-)

"Home" for one year now :-)

We've passed the one year mark since Joshua first came "home".... on 12/19/09. And in that one year:

He has grown 3 full inches
He has gained 1.5 pounds
He has learned to print his name!
He can count to 10
He has gone from scribbling to coloring in the lines
He is adoring school (part-time K)
He seems securely attached to mom and dad
His English vocabulary has exploded
He is healthy and happy and loving life
He adores Sunday School and weekly church
He has added LOTS of life and laughter to our home :-).

We often are amazed that out of some 140 million orphans in the world, God chose our family for this "one". We wonder what his future will bring.... :-).

Happy Adoption Day, December 8

Today I finally update about Joshua's Adoption 1 year ago on December 8th in China (when he was legally declared our forever son in both countries).... and it's our oldest child's Adoption Day TODAY! Happy Adoption Day, Ryan!!!! :-) Nineteen years ago, we finalized your adoption... our first child. Wow.

December is a crazy busy time for most families, and ours is no exception. Between schools (3 kids in 3 schools this year), doctor and therapy appts, running a small farm, Phil's intensive harvest and planting season finally wrapped up for 2010, and Christmas coming.... it's hard to stop and take a deep breath! And yet we did on December 8th :-) as we celebrated Joshua with a Chinese meal, party cupcakes with a "1" candle, and a toy gift.

One year ago. Wow. After 14 long months of working towards Joshua's adoption, and wondering if it would EVER happen, we met Joshua for the very first time on 12/7 in Guangzhou, China. We were total strangers to each other, and yet we knew each other. We already loved the small boy we had prayed over for so very long. And he recognized US as the people in his photo book! He was telling perfect strangers in China "This is my new mama and baba and they're taking me to live in a foreign country!!". :-) Precocious, vocal, stubborn, opinionated, what were we getting into! ;-D We hadn't even known if he was verbal or not until we met him!!

China has one meet the child one day, and then sign all of the adoption paperwork the very next day in front of a Chinese Notary. He asks each parent "Are you happy with your choice?" My heart broke for those (hopefully extremely few!) whose potential adoptive parents have said no and returned the child! Phil and I both said "Yes, we are very happy" and I leaned over and kissed Joshua on his birthmark in case there was any doubt in the translation. :-) With a tear in his eye, the Notary mumbled "thank you for doing this" and signed the papers.

The Chinese love and adore children. Joshua was treated very well by many of the locals, and he chattered away with many of them. He was shunned by some of the local professionals we encountered, at which point he'd freeze and stare at the ground and refuse to move or look up until such person left the area. :-( Why is it that a people that seems to adore ALL of the kids, still refuse (for the most part) to parent special needs children, those with ANY blemish, or throw a label of "bad luck" on them?? I don't understand the culture enough to answer that. I do know that many that were happy Josh was going to the US were under the false assumption that we were going to "remove" all of his birthmarks, and give him a fresh start in life. Um no...that is not physically possible, currently. We love and adore our very colorful son just as God made him!! :-) I know that even in the US, there are too many people who fail to look beyond a person's surface looks, and see the REAL person inside. I thank God often that Phil and I HAVE that ability... and I pray it develops even more within me.

God looks at each of us, and doesn't see a "perfect" outer body, NOR a "perfect" inner soul. If HE can still love and adore us despite our many, many imperfections and sins... how can we not strive to learn to do the same for others?

THANK YOU Ryan, Toshia, Robert and Joshua... for the many life lessons you have been teaching us. :-) We love and adore all of you... even if we don't always show it like we should...

First Thanksgiving

It hadn't really occurred to me until just now that Joshua just celebrated his FIRST American Thanksgiving! We didn't celebrate at Auntie Mona's house as we had first planned :-(. The severe cold artic air combined with lots of snow and wind changed our plans. Instead, we celebrated with friends and family at a big church meal at 1:30pm. And then we celebrated at home with the 6 of us and 2 friends.

You know what we were thankful for :-). Soooo many things including a new son!

Joshua has now been home 11 months and has grown 3 FULL INCHES in height!! But he has only gained 1#, LOL... it's getting harder all the time keeping those jeans up :-). He has gone from scribbling when coloring to doing beautiful inside-the-lines coloring. His use of a scissors and glue is improving, as is his vocabulary. Letter recognition seems slow... but he now has J-O-S from his name.

Joshua's #1 request for a Christmas gift this year? A toy kitchen! The kid LOVES to eat!!

Joshua's oldest brother, Ryan, moved into an apartment with friends 4 weeks ago... "CHANGE" is the one constant in our family and in life! Joshua sure misses seeing him daily... as do we all! But we are also thankful Ryan has this opportunity to grow. :-)

Starting Kindergarten at Long Last!

Joshua has GREATLY been looking forward to attending "big" school! Two weeks ago when I had him help me pack his school supplies into his brand new backpack, he said "Thank You, Mommy, Thank You!". :-) Then he said it dozens MORE times for the following 3 hours! Why?

We recently learned that orphans are considered bad luck in many of the schools in China. Children with facial disfigurements are also considered bad luck. :-( Parents there don't really want their child sitting next to a bad luck child in school! Somehow Joshua seems to know that?

I had toyed with the idea of homeschooling him this first year, both to keep working on attachment, and to get to know his learning style better. But nooo.... this is a child who wants too much to be able to attend a real school! ;-D How humbled we are that WE have the opportunity to do this small thing for him.

Joshua did successfully have minor surgery on 8/26. And outside of 2 scrapes that tried to go into skin breakdown in his Port Wine Stain area, he has been VERY healthy the 8 months he has been in the US so far :-). We're waiting to hear on a second opinion on his Port Wine Stain complications later this month, but are VERY thankful that he is doing so very well right now :-). He is delayed in fine and gross motor skills, but then most orphanage kids seem to be.

And so hubby and I wind down for a much needed 3 day weekend after a longggg 5 days of getting 2-3 kids up and off to school on time, and 1 up and off to work a couple of those days. This year, we have a child graduated from HS 3 months ago, one just starting HS, one in 5th grade, and Joshua in K. We're never bored here! ;-D