I think we might have a little animal lover on our hands.
Okay, I know I am a little late with this, but on Saturday Emilia was five weeks home with us.
The last two weeks with Emilia have been great in terms of attachment. She is more interested now in being held and kissed and cuddled. She also loves tickles and makes amazing eye contact. She’s not staying as much to the sidelines, but spending more time close to Craig, Rex and me. During our Christmas get-away Emilia fell asleep in my arms for the first time and that same day, she chose me over a toy. She picked up the toy, then looked at me, then the toy, dropped the toy and walked into my arms. It was magical considering how much this child is content to sit in a corner with a piece of string and play her own little games. We realize that bonding and the formation of trust are essential as they will be the motivators for Emilia to learn. Right now, she is still very reluctant to perform any new developmental tasks for either of us because I think she does not expect anything positive to come from her efforts.
As you know, the challenge of the last two weeks has been Emilia’s eating, but we are making progress. The feeding team wanted me to give her 24 ounces a day of a soy nutritional supplement, but I realized quickly that this was way too much for her and that if served after lunch, the supplement makes her reflux. So, I am giving Emilia 8 ounces of the supplement each morning which is basically her breakfast. Sometimes she eats a little something extra, sometimes not. I also discovered she likes foods that pack a huge caloric punch with little volume, so almond butter, olive oil, and walnut oil have been my allies. I can mix them into her fruit and vegetable purees and even her soy yogurt and she doesn’t even blink. Her daily caloric intake is about 750 now which makes me very happy. If we get another 100 calories per day into her soon, she will hopefully start to grow. Emilia is also beginning to drink fruit juice thickened with pureed fruit and just yesterday she took four small bites of French toast off a fork. Yes folks, you heard it here first, she showed interest in solids and gave them a try.
Emilia had a rough go with bath time at first, but we soon figured out that she loves to hear the water run into the tub and will then sit or stand in it with no crying and allow herself to be washed. This behavior had a positive effect on Rex because he decided he could handle standing in the water, too. Both kids love to play in the dry tub now as well. Unlike Rex, Emilia does like to watch TV with her favorite being Baby Einstein selections.
My virtual twins are beginning to be a bit more interactive with each other. I have seen them make attempts at sharing toys and at engaging the other one. While we visited friends over Christmas, we all bunked on an air mattress and the kids would cuddle up to each other in their sleep. Such a sweet sight for Craig and me to behold.
The following referrals were issued in IAC Session 201 which was held on 11/18/11:
1) U.S. dossier from December 2008 referred a female child aged 2 years and 2 months, lags behind in PMR
2) Great Britain/Northern Ireland dossier from January 2009 referred a male child aged 1 year and 7 months with peculiarities in health status, including family history
3) German dossier from March 2009 referred a male child aged 4 years and 8 months
4) Dutch dossier from June 2009 referred male twins, aged 4 years and 6 months
5) Italian dossier from June 2009 referred a male child aged 6 years and 3 months with peculiarities in health status in terms of mental development
6) U.S. dossier from December 2009 referred a female child aged 2 years and 6 months with peculiarities in health status in terms of physical and NDP
7) U.S dossier from March 2010 referred a female child aged 1 year and 8 months with peculiarities in health status, physical, NDP and infectious disease
8) Italian dossier from June 2010 referred a male child aged 8 years and 3 months
9) U.S. dossier from July 2010 referred a waiting child (#591) with a profile on the MOJ site
10) Italian dossier from October 2010 referred a male child aged 9 years and 3 months
11) Italian dossier from May 2011 referred a waiting child (#1656) with a profile on the MOJ site
12) Italian dossier from June 2011 referred a female child aged 9 years and 10 months
13) Italian dossier from July 2011 referred a brother and sister, aged 4 years and 9 months and 6 years and 5 months with peculiarities in health status, lag in FF and NDP
14) Italian dossier from November 2011 referred a waiting child (#1509) with a profile on the MOJ site
15) U.S. dossier from November 2011 referred a waiting child (#1024) with a profile on the MOJ site
16) U.S. dossier from November 2011 referred a waiting child (#1328) with a profile on the MOJ site
17) U.S. dossier from November 2011 referred a waiting child (#994) with a profile on the MOJ site
18) U.S. dossier from November 2011 referred a waiting child (#115) with a profile on the MOJ site
(Again, my blog is formatting at will and cutting this entry off at the beginning of each paragraph. Argh! If anyone knows how to fix this, please let me know.)
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Emilia had a great time exploring this holiday season. She found things like this tiny entry space with lights and fabric around the bottom of a Christmas tree:
Someone left a guitar out for her to examine:
And the brand new puppy's (not ours) brand new cage seemed like a fine place to play to her:
Then the Christmas tree finally caught her attention:
P.S. I don't know why my blog is deciding to do its own text formatting lately. I can't seem to fix it, but hope it stops soon. I'm sorry for how silly this entry looks.
Happy first Christmas, little one. You're a treasured gift.
