A busy month

It's amazing how much Alisha has changed in the past 7 weeks. I was looking at the picture of our first day and looked at her today. She still is a little peanut but her hair has grown a bit, her face has filled out. But it is so nice to see that the scared look in her eyes is gone. She knows she is home and loved very very much!


We are having so much fun learning new things with Alisha. Here are a few:

• Alisha is so active. She is crawling and climbing constantly. She really wants to walk but we are just not there yet. I think we have a few more weeks before that happens.


• She loves playing with all her blocks. She's not really putting them together but loves dumping them out and banging them together.


• She has the ear for music. She loves all of her musical toys. In the restaurant yesterday, she started shaking to the music. Too cute!


• Alisha loves the swing in the playground. She just swings and giggles. The sandbox was pretty good too until she started eating it.
  

We went to our first pediatrician visit and the doctor thought Alisha was doing great. However, since we are not sure about her vaccinations, we have to redo them all here. Poor girl had 4 shots. Unfortunately, the next day was hard on her. I hope the next visit (4 more shots next month) she does better.

Alisha and I are keeping ourselves busy.... we've been to the playground (during the nice weather last week), shopping at the mall, having lunch dates, going to Music Class and looking at day cares. Good news, we finally found a day care we loved. Miss Melanie is really nice and all the kids seemed really happy. I think Alisha will have lots of fun and be happy there when I return to work.

Meet Alisha Li

One Month a Family

We have been a family for one amazing month. Its hard to remember a life before Alisha. She has adapted so well to her new life. Each day she is making great strides and enjoying all the new things she is seeing and doing.

Alisha is flourishing. She is doing a ton better using her legs. I think she may have crawled a step or two and even pulled herself up from a sitting position. I am so proud of our little girl.

Unfortunately, she has really started teething today and was not a happy girl. We are doing our best to keep her comfortable, but there is not much we can do. Let's hope this goes by quickly.

Alisha went to her first New Years Eve party and had a great time. Thanks so much to Rob & Melanie for throwing another great party. Since we had to get our little one home to bed, Jerry and I then celebrated the New Year with Dick Clark.

2007 will always be a very special year for our family. We are so thankful that she is with us and we can't wait to see what the next year brings for our family.

Wishing all of our friends and family a great 2008!

Happy Holidays

It's been a great week with Alisha. She is such a JOY and we are having the best time getting to know more and more about her. Its been a busy week with a bunch of our family and friends stopping by to meet Alisha. She enjoyed all the visits and has made a few new friends (aren't they cute!).

Christmas was very special this year and our best ever. We started off the holiday by sharing Christmas Eve dinner with Pete, Annie, Melanie and Rob. Alisha attended her first dinner party and really had a good time eating her potato and making everyone laugh. We woke up Christmas morning and Jerry made a big breakfast (YUMM... Pancakes) and then we opened gifts. Alisha has received so many gifts since she has been home that she has become a pro at pulling off the wrapping paper. Later in the day, we went to Grandma Pat's for Christmas dinner. Dinner was great, especially the banana pudding and Alisha really liked meeting her aunts, uncles and cousins.

UPDATE: we took Alisha to the doctors for our post adoption evaluation. She did great and he doctor was really happy with her progress. Good news is that her finger was never broken....her tendons are restricted. We did her x-ray after the doctor visit, so we will find out more on how to treat it at our next visit early in January. Before the x-ray, we had to go to the lab for some blood work. Since, we can not be sure of her past medical information, the doctor requested alot of tests. They took about 6 viles from our little one, YIKES!

Every day is a wonderful blessing. We are enjoying every minute and are looking forward to a lifetime of smile, giggles and love with our little girl.

Home at Last

We are FINALLY home. Our trip was rather easy but lengthy almost 24 hours of traveling. When we arrrived in DC, I felt such a relief come over me. We were HOME! We did as instructed by the US consulate and went in the non-US customs line. We were toward the end since we took our time getting off the plane and stopped for a bathroom run. We were not in a hurray as we had plenty of time to make our connection. When we finally got to the Officer, he told us we were on the wrong line. Whatever, he still took our paperwork. It was exciting to realize that not only was Alisha our daughter, turned one but also a US citizen (something we all take for granted). After a slight delay in DC, we finally landed in Philly where Lance and Cathy were waiting for us. It was so wonderful having our friends finally meet Alisha. After getting home and showing Alisha her home, we all were so happy to get into bed together as a family and slept in the next morning.

Unfortunately, the last few days have been hard on her. She is getting over jet lag, time change a new house (that looks and smells different) and I think she started teething. So much to take in for such a little girl. Thankfully, she seemed back to our happy little girl today. If you visited before today, please come back and meet the "real" Alisha.




Grandma Joan arrived the day after we got home to help out and spend some time getting to know her new granddaughter. Mom has been great helping around the house but understands that Jerry and I have to be her sole providers right now. Alisha needs to understand that we are now her parents and will always be here for her. The bonding process will take a while but we are in no rush. We will continue each day to show her all the love we have in our hearts for her.



Since we traveled on Alisha's birthday, we celebrated with a nice dinner with both of her grandmas on Saturday night. Grandma Pat prepared a great dinner and made Alisha a beautiful birthday cake. Alisha really enjoyed it (Can't you tell!)!! She is still confused on presents but loved the gift wrapping paper and tissue paper.



We are having sleep issues. Alisha goes down pretty easy and sleeps well during nap times. But at night, she has been sleeping about 4-5 hours and then wakes up crying. Unfortunately, no matter what we do, she will not go back in her crib. Jerry and I really want to avoid her sleeping with us, but there is no other way to get her back to sleep. We are hoping its just an adjustment thing and she will be back to sleeping all night like she did in China. Wish us luck!




I was going to stop the blog after our trip to China, but have decided to keep it up, so everyone can keep up with Alisha. No promises but keep stopping by for updates.

Happy Birthday Our Darling Daughter

What an exciting day for Alisha.... she turns 1 today and also will become a US citizen.

HAPPY 1st BIRTHDAY ALISHA!!!

Love,

Mommy and Daddy

We're Coming Home

We had a nice last day in Guangzhou. After spending the morning having a leisurely breakfast, we hit our after breakfast treat ...... Starbucks. We walked over to the park next to the hotel for a morning stroll on the River and were surprised to see it full of people. Groups of people doing Chinese dance, ballroom dance, yoga (or some form of it) and hackisack game . It was hard getting Alisha's stroller around all the groups.

We gave Alisha a long late morning nap and then got her ready for the Swearing in Ceremony at the US Consulate. Our hotel arranges for all the families to go over by bus. There had to be 100 of us. Upon entering the Consulate, you have to hand in any electronic equipment including your camera. Then everyone gets in line and a gentlemen verified that the copies of our passport picture matched who was in the room. Our coordinator then gets our Visa package while a gentlemen stands in the middle of the room and goes over what is taking place. At the end all of the families stand together with our right hand raised and swear that all of the information we gave during this process was true and accurate. And then its done.... we can now bring Alisha into the US. YAHOO!!!

After the ceremony, we met up with a couple we met in Wuhan, Paul and Vicky who were adopting their 3rd child from China after raising 4 of their own. The are a great couple and their kids were so sweet. There daughter Kate was having the best time playing with Alisha and she was laughing and smiling the whole time.

Today, was another wonderful day of getting to know Alisha. She loves to laugh and giggle and especially loves to laugh at something she just has done. She is so funny! We are enjoying every second of her. Even her "moments" are getting fewer and shorter. What a relief!

I just finished packing for our long trip home. We are going to miss China and it will always be special in our hearts. It is Alisha's home country, her history and the place she lived for a year. We look forward to returning here with her as a young adult and let her see her home country together as a family.

Jerry, Alisha and I are so looking forward to seeing everyone. We miss all of our family and friends. We are truly blessed to have such wonderful people in our lives and we want to thank everyone for sharing this wonderful journey with us. We look forward to you all getting to know our little girl.

See ya in the US!!!