B-B-B-B Bunny

Here is more of a lighter post. Just some updated pictures and progress that is being made in the Penner home.

Jason thought it would be fun to put Lucy back in her "Gotcha Day" attire to see if it still fits. I think it is actually a little loose now versus the day we first met her. She is stretching out.
 

 There have been a few bunnies that come to visit our backyard recently. One morning Lucy spotted this little bunny. She ran to me and said "unny". (Yes, we will talk speech therapy later in this post.) At first I didn't understand what she was saying and when this happens I tell her to show me. She took me to the back door and showed me.

"Unny"

GREAT NEWS!: I think I can officially say Lucy is potty trained. Of course today she had two accidents, which is so unlike her, but for the most part she is wearing undies. We even bought new undies at the store to celebrate. :) This progress alone makes this mama ecstatic!

Now for speech therapy talk: Well, we had quite a hard time getting a regular routine started with speech therapists between bad weather and juggling multiple schedules. I feel like we are finally getting somewhere. Right now we have a speech pathologist coming twice a month working with Lucy and we also have a speech teacher coming once a week. Thankfully, at this point they come to our house for therapy. That will change this fall when Lucy will start going to ECSE (early childhood special education) classes in Mountain Lake. It is hard for me to think I will be sending off a 3 year old to school, but I am realizing more and more how far behind Lucy is in speaking and I know this will be the best for her. People ask me if she is talking or if she has any "words" yet. I don't always know how to answer that question. As the speech teacher said today, "she really imitates a lot of words, doesn't she." Yes, any word you say to her, she will try her best at repeating. It just does not sound like the words we say. She is missing beginning sounds, as in bunny. So, the teacher gives me an activity or focus for the week to work on with Lucy. This week we are working on "B", "P", and "M" sounds. We are also teaching her some sign language. I've been told that if a child sees an action done with a word, somehow the brain can correlate the two and they speak better because of it. So we have worked on "help me" and "want" along with some of the sign language we taught her when we first met her. I understand a lot of what Lucy is saying, but if a stranger off the street would hear her, they would have no clue. We are also working on colors which seems to be a little more difficult for her. She shows a lot of perseverance during speech lessons. It takes a looooooong time before she accepts help from anyone. I see a lot of independence in her. Today she made an Easter craft during speech and she peeled the backs of stickers for about 10 minutes.

cutting with scissors. eeek!

The finished product

I so appreciate every idea that these teachers bring to each session. I am not the best at thinking of activities to do with my kids to help with their vocabulary. I guess it has never been an issue with my other kids. :) I am learning so much about language development thanks to these ladies.

Ian has been involved with a 4H Lego Robotics team that was meeting every Monday evening since September or October (I can't remember). At the end of February they had their first Robotics tournament. It was a full Saturday with several different schools, home school groups, and other 4H groups competing with the robot each team designed. Now, I was thinking this was not going to be at all interesting. In fact, I brought my book to read just in case. Well, guess what.....it was so interesting I read only a couple pages in my book. I was impressed with the whole thing. The group was judged on several different categories including design of the robot, how well the team worked together on projects, a presentation they had to give on how robots can help senior citizens, among other things. I was impressed with the judges, most of whom were engineers or teachers. They asked the kids questions to make them think through the building of the robot. In fact, Ian's team received 1st place in the design of the robot. The judges were impressed with the design this group thought of. They had never seen a robot built like theirs before. I could go on and on about the day. I came away from it very impressed with the whole thing and excited that Ian was involved with such an experience. One that he can use in the future.

Ian's group in the green cheer on a team member while they run the robot through it's tasks.

Isabelle wanted to take a picture of all the family members wearing purple. So, here we are!

Battles and Healing

"Never before have the spiritual forces of good and evil been so real and active in our home as when we followed God's heart to care for the least of these. Since beginning our first adoption in 2008 up until present day, I am more convinced than ever of God's love and devotion to the marginalized in our world. I feel God's comforting arms wrapped around our home and hear God's still voice reassuring us, "I am with you". I am equally convinced of Satan's hatred and disdain toward God's children working to live a life of Christian purpose, fulfilling our call to care for those neglected by the world. I have never before felt these kind of spiritual forces armed with hatred, attempting to throw us off course as every turn, seeking to turn us against one another, trying to instill fear and worry and all kinds of nasty, Satan-like vices in our home". (from this blog post)
 

Over the last month or so I have heard the Lord repeatedly say to me REPENT. It started specifically while watching Henry Blackaby, the author of the famous Experiencing God bible study, talk about revival in churches he has been involved with. He quoted Matthew 3:2 and said once people start repenting, (repenting being more than just forgiving one another, but completely turning from their wrong ways) that is when we see changes in hearts and therefore changes in churches. Since hearing Blackaby talk, the word repent continued to be brought to my attention.

There are areas in my life, specifically bitterness, anger, and resentment, that has crept up into my heart. When I searched inward and asked, where is this all coming from, I remembered an article I had read a few months ago about the spiritual battle that can enter into your home when you bring a child that was from a dark place (abandoned, abused, unwanted, you name it, etc.) into your home. Spiritual attack will follow. Satan does not like when God's children are walking in the light and bringing darkness into the light. This is essentially what happens when people adopt a child, among other things. (Unfortunately, I cannot remember where that article is, but the one quoted above is essentially the same idea.) Let me tell you, when I read that, it actually put a strange peace of mind to me. I finally had a reason for why I was struggling with emotions that I had never experienced before bringing Lucy home. I had resentment toward a child that could not possibly understand what her actions were causing inside me and it even affected other relationships outside our home. I recently had a few days that for some reason seemed to bring that resentment and bitterness to a head again. That is when I heard the word repent whispered in my ear again and I realized now is the time to turn from this bitterness and resentment. So, as weird as it may sound, I held my daughter in my arms and looked into her eyes and said, "I forgive you for the hurt you have caused me. I understand that you have no idea that you have caused any hurt to me, but today I am choosing to forgive you. I love you and will continue to love you everyday of your life." I am turning from my bitterness and hurt and am choosing to love her. Can I tell you what overwhelming healing that comes when you physically say these words out loud to a person. True healing. (Side note: when I said this to Lucy she just looked at me and nodded her head in agreement. :))

I think Lucy has been brought into my life to heal brokenness from within me. I continue to be in awe of the ways God works. It is not what I thought would happen nor did I know of these areas of brokenness, but He knows me better than I know myself. He knows what I need to be completely healed. Thank you Jesus! Lucy and I are being healed together as we work on our relationship. Two broken lives, healing! Notice I use the word healing (with the -ing at the end), meaning I am still in process. We still have our bad days, but I know a little more of what is going on spiritually, and I can fight that battle more equipped with the knowledge that this is what is going on.....a war!

The Year of the Snake - 2013

Feb. 10. 2013 - Chinese New Year!

Lucy made it through her dental procedure just fine. She now has some silver/black teeth in the back and two bright white teeth in the front. All in all everything went just fine.

Getting a little "happy juice" before going back for her procedure

  Now that is behind us. Hopefully she will not need any more anesthesia until she is about 5 or 6 when her cleft specialist will see how her mouth is growing and if revisions will be needed on her cleft and probably some orthodontic work will need to be done.
So with her procedure done it was time to start thinking about how we were going to celebrate The Chinese New Year. This is one way we can continue to celebrate Lucy's birth culture. We started our celebration on Saturday evening with supper at a local Chinese restaurant.

It was fun eating with chopsticks again. In China I was a little too proud to ask for a fork everytime we ate at a restaurant, so I had to work on my chopstick skills.

We came home and read this book:

Jason and I put the kids to bed and laid out the kid's New Year envelopes with a bowl of oranges (well in our case, we put out clementines).

When the kid's woke up, they found their envelopes filled with some money. Funny story, when I put Aiden's money in, I found money in there from last year. Ha! So he got double the money since he forgot about it last year. Ha! We found out church was cancelled due to bad weather so we just had a relaxing day at home as a family.

Donuts and oranges for breakfast to celebrate

I was disappointed that the girls could not wear their Chinese dresses to church today, but that didn't stop them from wearing them around the house. :) During our morning devotions we prayed for the people of China, the persecuted church in China (a great book to learn about an amazing man that went through a lot of persecution in China is The Heavenly Man), and we prayed for Lucy's birth parents. This holiday is not only a reason to celebrate Lucy's culture, but it also causes us to pause and remember the people of China in our prayers.
I want to leave this post with a little Chinese culture for you. This is a story I read in Ian and Aiden's class last year because they were studying China and wanted me to come in and share a little about China. It is a legend of the zodiac calendar:

There are several legends about how the animals were chosen for the Chinese zodiac. This is one of them. The Jade Emperor is the name of the Emperor of Heaven.
Long ago, in China, the Jade Emperor decided there should be a way of measuring time. On his birthday he told the animals that there was to be a swimming race. The first twelve animals across the fast flowing river would be the winners and they would each have a year of the zodiac named after them.
All the animals lined up along the river bank. The rat and the cat, who were good friends, were worried because they were poor swimmers. Being clever they asked the strong ox if he would carry them across the river.
'Of course' said the kind ox. 'Just climb on my back and I will take you across.'

The rat and the cat quickly jumped up and were very excited when the ox soon took the lead in the race. They had almost reached the other bank when the rat pushed the cat into the river leaving him to struggle in the water. Then just before the ox was about to win the race the rat leaped on his head and on to the bank to finish first.
'Well done,' said the Jade Emperor to the proud rat. 'The first year of the zodiac will be named after you.'
The poor ox had been tricked into second place and the second year of the zodiac was named after him. Shortly after the exhausted tiger clawed his way to the river bank to claim third place. Swimming across the river had been an enormous struggle for him against the strong currents. The Emperor was so delighted with his efforts that he named the third year after him.
Next to arrive was the rabbit, who hadn't swum across at all. He hopped across on some stepping stones and then found a floating log which carried him to the shore.

'I shall be very happy to call the fourth year after you,' the surprised Jade Emperor explained.

Just then a kind dragon swooped down to take fifth place.
'Why didn’t you win the race, as you can fly as well as swim?' the Jade Emperor asked.
'I was held up because some people and animals needed water to drink. I needed to make some rain,' the dragon explained. 'Then when I was nearly here I saw a poor little rabbit on a log in the water and I blew a puff of wind so that the log would float to the river bank.'
'Well that was very kind of you and now you are here you will have the fifth year of the zodiac named after you.'

The next thing the Jade Emperor heard was the sound of the horse’s hooves. Just as he was thinking the horse would be the next animal to arrive, a sneaky snake wriggled out from around one of the horse’s hooves. The horse was so surprised that he jumped backwards giving the snake a chance to take the sixth place in the race. The poor horse had to be satisfied with seventh place.

Not long afterwards a raft arrived carrying the goat, the monkey and the rooster. They explained to the Emperor how they had shared the raft that the rooster had found. The goat and monkey had cleared weeds and pushed the raft to the shore. The Emperor was very pleased that the animals had worked together. He said the goat would be the eighth zodiac animal, the monkey the ninth and the rooster the tenth.
The next animal to finish was the dog.
'Why are you so late when you are one of the best swimmers?' asked the Jade Emperor.
'The water in the river was so clean that I had to have a bath on the way,' explained the dog.
His reward was to have the eleventh year named after him.
Now there was one place left in the zodiac and the Emperor wondered when the last winner would come. He had nearly given up when he heard a grunt from the boar.
'You took a long time to cross the river,' said the Emperor to the boar.
'I was hungry and stopped to eat,' explained the boar. 'After the meal I felt so tired that I fell asleep.'
'You have still done well,' said the Jade Emperor. 'The last year of the zodiac will be named after you.'
As for the cat who had been pushed into the water by the rat, he finally crawled out of the water but was too late to have a year named after him. He felt very cross with the rat and since then cats have never been friends with rats.
From that day to this the Chinese Zodiac has followed this cycle of years named after these twelve animals.

-Taken from the website: http://www.topmarks.co.uk






Happy Chinese New Year!

Was It Worth It?

Driving home from the eye doctor today, I was thinking of conversations I have had with my dear husband over the past few weeks. Most of the conversations deal with money and some hard decisions we are being forced to make in the very near future. As the kids were listening to a book on CD during the drive home, my mind wandered to these conversations and I asked myself (or maybe it was a little whisper in my ear), "Was it worth it?" Was listening and obeying to what God was asking of our family worth it? Have the sacrifices we made, and will continue to make, worth bringing our daughter home? Have the sleepless nights of wrestling with God due to my selfish heart and life been worth it? I am like a 2 year old when God asks me to give up something. I want to throw a fit and say, MINE! Have all the lessons learned throughout our bringing Lucy home been worth it.....The unexpected dislike she felt toward me initially which taught me unconditional love. Having to say no to certain gatherings with friends (which is so hard for me as a extrovert, although I think I am getting more and more into the introvert arena everyday) in order to create and nurture a home where my children know they belong and enjoy just being a family. I am learning the lesson of the importance of just being a family in our home versus being busy busy busy and having no time to foster and care for family life. Somehow, bringing Lucy home taught me that, I don't know why. I have learned so much more about myself and things that have needed to change in my own thinking, my relationships, and my walk with Jesus.

Was it worth it?? Absolutely! When a little girl looks to me with arms stretched out to hold her, I am reminded how it is most definitely worth loving her even when she could not love me back. When my sons get into deep conversations and ask questions with their dad about the truth of the bible..... How do we really know the bible is true when there are some pretty far fetched stories in it? How do we know Jesus really was real?.... Is it worth being home as a family to answer these questions? Absolutely! (By the way, these questions were brought up thanks to Phil Vischer's DVDs called "What's in the Bible?" Check them out if you are looking for some great children's videos.)

Do I know it is worth listening and obeying what God has called me to do even during the hard times? When God is taking relationships, things, stuff away from me, is it worth it? I see a discontented heart within myself when I look around at other people's lives and wonder why they get such a "better calling" or wonder why they don't struggle with certain issues that I do. I am learning more and more that I am the problem and wrestling with God is exactly where I need to be in order to be who he created me to be.  He is refining me through these struggles and it is every bit worth it to me!  Of course I have a song to share. This has been the cry of my heart lately:

Jesus gave up EVERYTHING (His own life) for me......He is most definitely worth following and obeying. Our family life is worth the small sacrifices, though sometimes my sinful flesh thinks these are huge sacrifices....yep, worth it! Even when I am worn out and my heart is heavy from the weight of this world, following Jesus is so worth it to me!


On the home front.....Lucy and Izzy are getting over the high fever junk and Lucy had quite a croupy cough to go with it. The poor girl felt miserable for a few days and just wanted to be held (insert happy face on this mama). There were a lot of bonding moments happening while she was sick, although at times it was a bit draining and I was relieved when I saw reinforcement come home from work. :) Aiden is getting over a stomach bug but as of right now, everyone  appears to be back to health. Lucy is scheduled to have a bunch of dental work done under anesthesia next Thursday. Yes, another dose of anesthesia for this little girl. Prayers are always welcomed, especially for this nurse mom. I know it is no big deal, but as I have said before, sometimes being a nurse (in surgery of all places) can be a curse as a mom. We know too many of the "bad things that can happen during anesthesia". I am just happy she appears to be getting over her croup.

2012 Favorites

January 1, 2013 - Happy New Year! Since we did not send out Christmas cards and letters this year for various reasons, I have decided to give you a little 2012 year in review here by telling you our "favorite things" of 2012. I will start with the youngest and newest member of the Penner home....

Lucy: favorite books: Olivia books (to be honest, Lucy reminds me alot of Olivia) Favorite movie: Well, she isn't much for sitting still long enough to watch a full movie. Favorite activities: playing with baby dolls, looking at books, playing outside (without snow), and imitating all her siblings....both the good and the bad activities. :) Favorite food: ice cream

Isabelle: Favorite books: Berenstein Bears books and Look and Find books. Favorite movie: Curious George. Favorite activites: dressing up!!!!!, riding on a big girl bike, and swimming. Favorite food: "mac 'n cheese and grapes, hamburgers with only ketchp on it". Favorite lesson learned this year: "letters".

Aiden: Favorite book: Huckleberry Finn. Favorite movies: Tin Tin and What's In the Bible. Favorite activities: reading and swimming, skiing in the winter. Favorite food: hamburgers and sloppy joes. Favorite lesson learned this year: "learning about artists like Vincent Van Gough and the weather and plants."

Ian: Favorite book: Tom Sawyer. Favorite movies: Brave and Miracle at Midnight. Favorite activities: Legos, swimming in the summer, and working with his electronic snap circuits. Favorite food: mac 'n cheese recipe (baked beans, mac 'n cheese, hot dogs, and cheese on top......Blech!) Favorite lessons learned this year: "different forms of energy and cells".

Laura: Favorite book: It is too hard to narrow down to just one book, so since I do the blogging, I get to put more than one: Kisses from Katie, 7: An Experimental Mutiny Against Excess, and The Heavenly Man. Favorite movies: October Baby and Les Miserables. Favorite Activites from 2012: trip to China and finally having Lucy in our home, taking the family to Waterpark of America, weekend away with Jason for our 11th Anniversary, Okoboji Bible Conference in August to hear Skye Jethani and Gracia Burnham and running my third half marathon. Favorite lessons learned in 2012: Lesson 1: I am not always called to an easy and comfortable life. I am called to follow Jesus. Challenges will come my way and there is so much joy to be found in those challenges if my focus will remain on the ultimate goal.......following Jesus with my entire life. Lesson 2: True and genuine and unconditional LOVE comes from something beyond myself. It comes from the Holy Spirit. Even if the love is not returned to me, I am still called to love. (O.k. I am still on lessons learned....I have a lot of lessons I have learned this year, let me tell ya!). And last, but certainly not least.....a third lesson learned in 2012.....waiting is hard, but so worth every minute for everything learned in the waiting. What joy it brought me to finally bring our Lucy home after so much waiting and what joy it was to learn many lessons in the waiting. To God ALONE be the Glory!

Jason: (written by himself.....this may finally be the blog post I have been begging him to do. :)) Favorite book: Phil Vischer's book Me, Myself, and Bob: A True Story about Dreams, God, and Talking Vegetables. Favorite movie: Hunger Games and The Help. Favorite activities in 2012: skiing with the boys, going to China, a shockingly bountiful harvest despite the drought. Favorite food: donuts. Favorite lesson learned (or more accurately "lesson being learned"): Having God plus anything is no more or better than having God alone. That is to say having a wonderful family or good health or all our physical needs met and then some, or even a dream and ministry for some great thing I can do for God's kingdom plus having God himself is no more or better than having just God.  He is life, hope, love and all that we need.  Nothing on this earth can add to Him.  He may or may not give me those other things, but if he does they will not fulfill me and in fact I may very well make them my idols if I seek my identity and purpose in them.  Instead, whatever I do have must be given back to God and used for his purposes only. 

Our year was filled with so many other memories, but this post would get too long to read. We have been blessed with family and friends that challenge us and love us at the same time, overall healthy bodies that allow us to serve God, and a God who is faithful and loving whom we can call Abba Father!

Happy New Year from the Penners!

 

My Aiden

Dec. 13, 2012 - Happy Birthday to our Aiden Christopher! I was looking back at old pictures of Aiden trying to find this one. It cracks me up and I think it may be one of my all time favorites!

I came across quite a few pictures of Aiden over the years and I was brought back to the memory of his birth. Aiden was only 24 hours old when the doctor stormed into my hospital room early in the morning to tell me he was not doing well and he needed to be airlifted to Sioux Falls immediately. I was in a panic. What just happened!? I called Jason who was at home with our 18 month old and made my way down the hall to the hospital nursery to find out what was going on. All I could see were a lot of nurses and our doctor hovering over this little baby who was struggling to breath. The doctor asked the staff to close the door to the nursery when she saw that I was outside watching. (Uh, yes, we now go to a different doctor. I was not impressed.) A kind nurse's aid asked me if she could take me back to my room and help me call anyone and get my things together. Next thing I know the flight team had come in with Aiden in a huge incubator for me to say goodbye before they took him.

 Jason came to the hospital and after I was discharged we drove to Sioux Falls to be with our son. When we arrived we talked to the pediatric intensive care doctor who informed us that Aiden had a collapsed lung and gave us some statistic about this only happening in 2% of full term births. There was no explanation for his lung collapse and to this day we do not know why. So Aiden spent about 10 days in the NICU in Sioux Falls.

After only 2 days of being in the NICU, Aiden was breathing on his own and his chest tube was taken out. He was monitored closely for a few days and then he had to finish out his antibiotics before we could go home. The NICU nurses said he was probably the biggest baby in the NICU. They had to find bigger diapers for him because they were so used to preemies. :) He is still a big boy!

Finally holding my baby boy!

 We came home Dec. 23rd. Aiden seemed to have a lot of breathing problems during his first year. He was in the hospital again when he was about 5 months old for pneumonia, but after seeing a specialist and doing multiple breathing treatments and as he grew, he had less problems. Today he does not seem to have any residual effects from his traumatic first few days except a cool scar on the side of his chest. His dad tells him "chicks dig scars!" Ha!

Home at last

I think back also to the fact that I was not even very excited when I found out I was pregnant with him. Shame on me, I know! I was more in a panic than excited. Ian was only 10 months old when I found out I was pregnant and thoughts raced through my head like, how am I going to carry two infants at the same time. We need a double stroller. We need another crib. How am I going to do all this????? These were my panicky thoughts right after taking a pregnancy test and I verbalized my panic to Jason. He calmly reminded me that this baby was not going to be coming for another 7-8 months. Ian will grow in that time and we have time to get ready. It will be o.k.! He is so good for me. Now, I cannot imagine life without Aiden. He is a good buddy to all his siblings. He is my sensitive one. He likes hugs and cuddling. He loves little children. He has a God given talent of memorization and reading and is able to retain it all. He will give us random facts about something because he read it somewhere and remembered it. He needs to be pushed to work at certain things if it is challenging for him. He also thinks.....deeply. Some of the questions he asks about spiritual issues blow me away. I do not always have an answer for him and he makes me think beyond just "because the bible tells me so." Oh and he has inherited the Herman gene in me.....he is LOUD! He does not do too many things quietly. Sorry buddy, but you got it honestly from your mother.

I am going to close this post with my favorite story about Aiden from this year. This makes my heart happy as a mom because there are days with Aiden that I don't know how this boy is going to turn out. Then I think back on this story and I am filled with tears of joy because there is hope.

 Our kids get Focus on the Family's Clubhouse and Clubhouse Jr. magazines. We started their subscription when we left for China in hopes that it would give them something to look forward to in the mail while we were gone. In the December Clubhouse Jr. magazine there was a story about a little girl named Lily who is writing out her Christmas letter to God. She writes to God to tell him what she wants for Christmas and the reasons why. Lily's dad calls everyone together for family devotions and he says they are going to talk about gifts. Lily's parents tell everyone that they have decided to take a family vacation to Jamaica for Christmas.....to an orphanage where David, the boy on their refrigerator, lived. Lily was upset. She didn't want to go there. She wanted a soccer ball for Christmas and to go to Grandpa and Grandma's house. Lily's parents explained that they wanted to do more this Christmas than just send money and that no one was going to be getting gifts this year. Lily was not happy. They went to the orphanage and met David. Lily and David played soccer together. Then Lily's dad handed Lily a card to give to David. Lily thought that was a pretty dumb gift until David opened it and read:

"Dear David, Would you like to come live with us? We would love to be your new parents! And you could play a lot of soccer with Lily.
Merry Christmas,
Mr. and Mrs. Solm"

 Lily was thrilled and said, "this is the biggest and best Christmas ever!"

After Aiden read this story, he told me and Jason to read it. Then he said, I think we should do that. :) :) :)  This makes my heart swell.

Aiden is such a blessing in our lives. We cannot imagine our lives without him. Happy 8th Birthday to our Aiden!

 

Catch Up

As I sit here finally catching up on this blog, the wind is blowing and snow is falling. When those two combine it results in cancellations. Tonight I should be watching our four children in their Christmas program, but that will have to wait until next Sunday. :) So, with a snowstorm blowing outside, I have time to catch up.
Life has been busy crazy ever since Thanksgiving hit. The day after Thanksgiving we put our Christmas trees up and decorated them. While decorating the "kids" tree, I realized there will be even more "firsts" for Lucy. I am guessing this is the first time she has seen a Christmas tree. While decorating the tree Lucy jumped right in and helped put ornaments on each branch, following the other three's lead. At first she wasn't so sure what all the excitement was about. I still do not think she understands all this yet.

The star for the "kids tree"

Other firsts she may be experiencing now is snow. I am pretty sure she has seen snow. Today in Jiaozuo it is 23 degrees and hazy, so their weather is very similar to ours. We are just not sure she has actually played in the snow. Unfortunately, she has not been out to play in it yet. Nap times and shorter daylight makes it hard to get out, but we will see. When she is out in the cold she seems to freeze up and doesn't want to walk or do much of anything. Living in Minnesota, she is going to have to get used to that. Sorry sweetie!

 Jason has been working long days at MinnTex (hence, the earlier comment about life being crazy since after Thanksgiving). So, the kids were pretty excited when he came home Saturday evening and wrestled with them. We all just hang on until busy season is over and Daddy is home again. Lucy misses her daddy while he is gone. It has been difficult for me to hear her yell "aaadddyyy" when I have to discipline her. Yep, she wants her daddy when mommy is teaching her what she cannot do.

We had two speech teachers come to the house last Monday for evaluations on Lucy's speech. They are supposed to come back for day 2 of speech evaluations tomorrow (Monday), but with this weather, I don't know if they will make it. They are evaluating what exactly is the problem with her speech so they know how to work with her. They can continue to come to our house for 6 more months, until she is 3, and then revaluate her at that time. At that time she would need to go to preschool and they will work with her there. We will see what happens in the next 6 months. It has been over 6 months now that we have been home with Lucy.  Jason and I will talk about how at times we cannot believe she is really home with us. We have seen SO MUCH growth and healing from her the past 6 months. I hear comments from people frequently about how much Lucy smiles and looks happy with us. That is so encouraging to hear. We see it too. I would say we all have grown and healed in the past 6 months.