New Pic!

This made my week!

Great Neo-Natal Follow Up

Today was Nina's 4 year follow up visit with the Chop Neo- Natal Follow Up folks.
Since she is 4 they made me wait outside while they toook her back to test. First they evaled her on cognitive skills and she is above average in all areas!
AMAZING!
Next was the physical exam. She grew and is now 37 1/8 inches and 32.7 pounds.
She is obviously mini, but who cares since she is at least following a curve which we were worried about last year when she seemed to leveled off.
She still toe walks on occasion and has mild resistance at heel cords so they gave us some stretches.

We discussed her feelings abot Georgia and Livia and they told me to hold them in a positive light which we try to. It sometimes is hard sinch Nina is such a verbal kid, I forget she is so young and tend to overexplain things to her. We need to keep it simple and take her cues.

I wish I had more to report. She did excellent. We do not have to go back until she is 6. We are super proud.

waiting game

so we have been waiting for 1 month.
we have no idea how long it will take. There is no list for us...no timeframe...just hopeful waiting for a birthfamily to lingle over our profile and maybe wanna meet us and then maybe want us to be the adoptive family.

In other news Nina has her 4 year old neo-natal followup visit tomorrow. So I will post about that this week!

Happy 4th Birthday!

Nina, you are nothing short of amazing!

Birthday Month!

WOW! 4! Insane!
Nina is doing awesome! We will find out more from the Neo-natal Followup team and her Ped at the end of the month but we, her mommy and daddy think she is kicking ass!
So Here are the updates thus far of our almost 4 year old kid who was born way too early and if you meet her you would never know it!

Nina wants to be a mom and a teacher when she grows up
She loves coloring and drawing and she is proud that she stays in the lines.
She is a lefty.
Her likes Lady Ga Ga, Katy Perry and Laurie Berkner (in no order)
Loves princess stuff, but lately it has been all about BATGIRL!
She can ride her 12 inch bike with trainers( think they will be off this summer)
She can spell her first and last name.
She counts to 20.
She is playing with the difference of boys and girls-says things like only the boys get this color plate and girls this color etc...


We have been telling her about Georgia and Livia since... well, always... she asks about them and wants to know when she will see them. I tell her they are in heaven and she said when will see get to see them..
Yesterday at Target she got really quiet and saddened look on her face, I asked what;s the matter and she said she misses Georgia and Livia.
I honestly do not know the right thing to say to her without screwing her up so I just say that I miss them too.

Almost ready to wait.

So tomorrow we are going to the agency to drop off our 15 copies of our lovely adoption profile!!! So exciting!!
We thought we would drop it off then go to a nice V-day lunch!
We have been preparing for 5.5 months I think to get to this point of being a waiting family. I think we are ready to see what happens and we are ready for nothing to happen for a while.
We are on no wait list. The birthfamily will pick us so who knows what the wait will be. We did our beast with the profile and it screams us so there is no sugar coating of anything.

updates

She learned to ride her bike last month! Her princess 12 inch bike from Santa! She told us she wants the training wheels off so she can go faster. She has been riding in the house around and around(she basically taught herself how to ride) We are so impressed as is she! Can't wait to take it outside!

She'll be 4 next month. AUGH!
Thought I would have her out of night pullups at bedtime but looks like we are months away from that.
She is doing excellent in nursey school. I have a conference end of month which should prove to be interesting.

In adoption news, we are homestudy approved which means we can legally adopt, now we need to complete our profile so we can get in our agency's book!

First Family Drawing

Nina's first family drawing!
Here we are! Abbycat, mommy, daddy and Nina.

Happy New Year!

So we were talking about what word may define 2011...I said Hope...Jason said Joy..
Nina is still thinking on it.
We will begin this year eating pork since it's for good luck and welcome the new year with hope and the idea that good things will come our way.

Merry Christmas!

Nina made the nice list this year! She received a brand new bike!
She has become quite the little ham and loves to sing and dance for us!
She was in her first nursery school play and did awesome! She was not shy at all in front of the large crowd! We were so proud!!

This kid has talent!

Things are going well. We are in the middle of preparing our Adoption Homestudy.
It's very time consuming and very involved! We are on schedule to be in the books by January which feels like a million years from now!

Nina continues to do well in nursery school. She is making friends and loves her teacher. She is going to be Snow White for Halloween. She was reeval by PT last week so we'll see what comes out of that. They D/C her in July but I did not aggree and wanted her looked at so that's that.

The baby we lost in June was going to be due around this time so of course that is on my mind. My mom just went to see Jersy Boys over the weekend and I remember when she got the tickets months and months ago she told me not to have the baby until after the show! Yep... make plans and God shits on them...

Since we lost the baby in June, I have been gettng back in shape and running a lot which is great! My Avon is doing pretty well. We are using all the money made from selling for this Adoption so if you want some Avon, get it from me!!!
(Shameless Plug)

Check out my Nina beautiful Nina (her pose) in her new boots (still size 7!!)
Love it! She's a handful!

The changing table

So we have been clearing out stuff and put out the old changing table at the curb tonight. Nina wanted it back in the garage. She said that we still needed it, that Georgia and Livia will sleep in it.
I had to explain that they are in heaven.We talk about them a lot, but sometimes she'll bring them up in the most sweetest, most innocent way...

First Day of Dance Class!

Nina did great at her first dance class. It's 15 min ballet and 15 min of tap! It's really cute...
They let the parents watch the first class so I could take many pics and videos.
I am glad they do not let us stay b/c towards the end of class she started to want me and cry. Poor thing!

When the kids all lined up and the music started playing, I had to choke back tears. My itty bitty baby was taking dance! It was an overwhelming experience!

Open for business! Foxy's Avon!!!

Guys, just wanted to let you all know that I started selling Avon! Yep! If you have not checked this stuff out in a while, I invite you to check out my online store!
Shipping is free for orders over 30 bucks. They have the cutest little kid stuff and awesome skin care and makeup. Love Love Love it!

www.youravon.com/judithfox

Can't wait to see you there!

Holy Moly!

Wow I did not think people even check this blog anymore! I just wanted to get all that stuff of my chest b/c I needed to "feel it" and typing it out helped that happen, if that makes sense, and then I saw the comments. You guys are so wonderful and caring! So Thanks.

What's the word...

So I wanted to tell you guys that once again we had some bad shit happen over here trying to build our family.
I found out I was pregnant in March and we were super excited. My first trimester screening came back 1/8 for Downs so I got an amino. When Doc did the scan before the amino he noticed bright spots on the heart. So went went to CHOP a couple days later for a fetal echo cardiogram. There we found out that our son had hypoplastic left heart syndrome. (The babe did not have downs by the way) In addition to that the right ventricle was leaking so the odds were not in his favor. So we made the decision/or the decision was the best for the baby and ended the pregnancy at 16 weeks. This was on June 11. You know I read all these blogs and hear people put their fate/faith in God and blah blah...I just do not get it anymore. But anyway that's a whole other post.

So at this point we are finished shaking our heads (how can this shit keep happening to us)and throwing up our arms(instead we held on tighter to Nina). I think after what happened last year, we can get through any fire walk.

We have opened our hearts and minds to domestic infant adoption. This is something we have talked about on and off through the years and we are going forward with this. We have hooked up with an agency and the paperwork is beginning to process!!

Classes

So I have been looking more and more into sending Nina to karate lessons are East West Karate in our town. They have a free trial class. She would be with the 3.5 to 5 age range kids called Tiny Tigers. She would be the youngest in the class in age and size and I am sure ability but from what I read thy section off into smaller groups which she would surely benefit from.

She has expressed a desire to attend dance class this fall. So I need to get the ball rolling on this too. Her BFF Ava wants to take class so it would be nice for her to already have a buddy.

This is her last month at Children of America. She has been at the same school since April 2009. She has done well there and we have nothing but great things to say. She will be going to a smaller Lutheran nursery school come mid Sept. I am hoping with a smaller class size and more experienced teacher she would do awesome! The only huge change is class is only 2.5 hours where now she is there 7 with lunch and a nap. so this will be an adjustment to us both.

Hanging Around

Summer is flying by so fast. Yesterday we went back to that little zoo in NJ that you can feed the animals. This year Nina got the treat to feed a giraffe. It was super cool!! This zoo has 9 giraffes where the Philly zoo only has 2. Aug is shaping up to be a busy month with 2 trips to the shore and Maine vaca.

Nina is doing good. She has many cuts and scrapes on her knees from her runs. She was D/C from PT so I am looking forward to seeing this final report. They said she can keep up with her peers so they d/ced her.

We are enrolling her in dance and maybe karate in the fall.

It's been 3 years since (6/21/07) Nina came home from her long long stay in the hospital.

It's just amazing looking at her now and how she has grown into this awesome, smart, fun kid!

I come across blogs where moms are going through the beginning of life in the NICU. It's just heartbreaking and sometimes I cannot believe I was once in their footsteps. But we get through it, we put one foot in front of the other and drive ourselves to the hospital and be with our baby.

We do it because that's our job.

It's true, we do not know how strong we are until we have to be.