Quality

In the hustle and bustle of the day to day tasks, I'm finding it way too easy to not spend quality time with my family.  At times, I feel as though we're pulled in several ways at once.  I even think good things can add up to the point of making it "bad".  How do we make quality time for family?  I was joking to a dear friend today that I was going to put "down time" on my calendar.  Then I kept thinking about it, and I really like the idea!  Our calendar looks.... FULL! HA!

Saturday morning wasn't planned out, and it was so nice!  Libby spent the night with Dodie Friday night which was great even though I missed her like crazy.  I was able to sleep in (WHAT?!) and take a shower until the hot water ran out (WHAT?!).  Mama came over and she, Libby, and I ran errands.  Nothing fancy at all, but I loved every minute of it!  The day continued with quality time when Charlie got home, and the three of us had a blast!!!

I'm going to share a picture of my calendar with y'all.  It may not make any sense, but here it is.   I'm going to talk with Charlie tonight and add some "Leo Quality Time" for November!

Expectations

Is it okay to have high expectations for my special needs daughter?  You bet!  I'm a firm believer in setting the "bar" high.  It may be the teacher in me or the crazy planner, but it's part of who I am.  I feel like aiming high helps Libby so much.  

She exceeds my expectations at times! The amount of new words and phrases Libby is using amaze us!  Libby told me earlier today, "Mama, I want Daddy come home."  I asked her "WHAT?!" twice just to see if she would repeat it, and she did!  By the third time, she was pretty much screaming!  HA!  She's also exceeded my expectations by following commands from understanding what I'm saying.  She'll go get her shoes when asked or hand you the toy car when asked.  This amazes me because she's been exposed to the English language for ONLY 15 months.  It proves to me that she's a little sponge and is soaking up everything!  I'm constantly talking to her even while driving down the road to expose her to new words, sights, sounds.  "Libby look at the little blue car.  It says zoom zoom!" "Oh Libby look a car who turned without using a blinker... shame shame."

There are also times when expectations aren't met like I thought they would be.  I don't count these as failures.  We had hoped Libby would be walking on her own by the end of the summer.  She's not quite there, but man oh man has she progressed with walking!  10 or so steps at a time (when she focuses) and we're working on using the cane.  I know she'll walk independently someday.  That may mean using a cane or maybe on her own.  Either way is awesome!  We're working even harder on strengthening her trunk muscles, stretching her tight muscles, using essential oils to help her relax the muscles, and trying to make walking fun!  She throws fits at times when she'd rather be carried, and I rarely give in.  I know it looks HORRIBLE when I'm making her walk in Wal*Mart and she's throwing a hissy fit.  On a good day, I'll smile at the people who stare at us, and on a bad day I get out of the store as fast as possible!  She's learning that practicing walking holding my hand helps her get stronger and stronger.  She'll get there; I know she will!

I'll end with a picture of the girl who I expect to continue trying her best each day!!!

Fifteen

My sweet girl may be 4, but I've only been an "active" mama for 15 months so I'm still rather new at mothering.  I say "active" because I feel as though I've been a mother for longer than 15 months.  Very few people know I've had a miscarriage because, well, I just don't like to talk about it.  I miscarried in February of 2012.  We were heartbroken that we had lost our child, but we were excited that we were pregnant ON OUR OWN!  We had undergone quite a bit of fertility treatments and were told we wouldn't be able to conceive on our own. HA!  We had been praying about switching from domestic adoption to international adoption during this same month.  We met with our super supportive adoption caseworker and went over the countries we qualified for.  God kept bringing us back to a specific profile, our precious Rose.  While we still had the heartache from the miscarriage, we knew God had created Libby Rose just for us!

We began the process to adopt Libby in February of 2012, and we traveled to Hong Kong in July of 2013!!!  It was quite the journey itself, but our girl was so worth the wait!  When things are hard, I remind myself that my arms were empty just a little over a year ago.  It helps to ease to stress of being a mama.

Our sweet girl has special needs, and we wouldn't trade them for anything in the world!  In 2008 when we started trying to grow our family, we prayed for a healthy baby that was perfect in every way.  God gave us just what we asked.  No, we didn't pray for a child with special needs, but He worked on us through the journey and led us to international adoption, specifically special needs.  We were scared and still are sometimes.  We're human and we fear the unknown.  We do however, know God is in control and leading our journey.  Our little miracle has several diagnosis; Cerebral Palsy, Microcephaly, Bilateral Hearing Loss, Optic Nerve Atrophy, Thalassemia to name a few.   The doctors are amazed at the progress our girl has made, and so are we!  I'm a planner, but having Libby Rose has taught me that it's okay not to have every little thing planned out.  We still make plans, but they're altered a good bit.

Even though I'm still new to mothering, I'm not a fan of "free advice".  I'm not ashamed to ask for help or advice when I need it.  It baffles me when people tell me how I could help Libby walk, talk more, not be stressed, etc. because I'm doing good to make it through the many appointments and therapies we already do.  This journey has made me think about the words I say to others.  I try to think about if they'll be hurtful or taken the wrong way because words do hurt.  They hurt badly.  I'm not perfect; I still unintentionally hurt feelings and say things the wrong way.  Most of the time people who give me "advice" are trying to be helpful, but I've shed tears and called them buttfaces under my breath for their "advice".

Let's end on a happy note.  A then and now.  Then in July of 2013 and now October 2014.

Then	Now
1 Cantonese word	Over 200 English words and progressing a lot with sentences
Could only sit up and wobbly	Walking about 10 steps at a time and freestanding more
Attention span 1 page in a book	She will listen to "help" read an entire book
Had no sense of ownership	She'll let you know what's hers by saying, "MINE"
Couldn't see well	She now has adorable glasses and wears a patch daily
Couldn't hear well	She now has an amazing hearing aid
0 therapies	6 therapies a week
Couldn't use her left hand	She uses it more and more! WOOHOO Botox