Learning

Learning what Rebecca wants and needs can be trying. She is so much more patient with us these days though. I don't know if she came up with her own sign language or if someone taught her, but when she wants a bottle she pounds her chest with her fist or flicks her fingers on her mouth. At first she would go from really happy to all of a sudden screaming and pounding her chest and flicking her mouth. Now she does her signs, but doesn't scream as long as we get the bottle fairly quickly. We are also trying to learn what she needs when she wakes in the middle of the night. I was thinking that putting her in bed with me and allowing her put herself back to sleep without me rocking and holding her is what she would want. My thought process there was that she has been putting her self back to sleep for two years now so if I start messing with her it might rouse her and then she won't fall back to sleep...WRONG that baby girl wants to be held and rocked. After nearly two hours of her "trying" to put herself back to sleep, (she wasn't crying, just jibber jabber and rocking herself) I finally picked her up and rocked her and she was sound asleep withing 30 minutes. You live and learn! Again, let me make it clear here that she was NOT screaming herself to sleep, the minute we hear even a wimper we pick her up. We are also trying to expand her diet. Drinking yogurt is really popular hear (and it is really runny so that you can drink it) so yesterday we stopped by a small grocery store and picked some up. We put it in her bottle and she drank most of it. Of course, we are using that as kind of a snack option since she doesn't tolerate solid foods well yet, her formula must remain the main source of nutrition. We brought along baby food from America and she ate the bananas ok but she did not like the apples with cherry. So, we are going to try a few other things today. I know many cleft palate babies can tolerate most solid foods, but she wasn't exposed to them in her orphanage so we are taking it really slow  And she has texture issues because she has only had liquid for two years of her life. She will likely need some Occupational Therapy to overcome her mouth sensitivities. 

We are staying on the island in Guangzhou and it is beautiful here. We are going to take pictures and have someone post them on Facebook. It is very peaceful here, the island is quiet and clean. I would love to live here!

Rebecca made it through her medical appointment yesterday. She knew the moment the scope slid in her ear what was going to happen and her little lips puckered and quivered. I almost cried with her. One of the reports that we received while we were waiting for our travel approval to adopt Rebecca said that she is "a dead pan" for strangers and boy were they right. She would NOT perform at the doctor's office yesterday. For example, we know that she hears because she jumps everytime Bucky coughs, but she would not respond to the squeaky toy the doctor had. The doctor finally asked us, "is she lively at home?". She is stubborn with strangers. We were able to get her exempt from having all of her immunizations redone while we are hear and I am so thankful.

Today is going to be a quiet day for us. We are going to have some of our laundry cleaned and just relax. We will likely do more walking around and sightseeing because the scenery is just majestic hear. We also have to find a supermarket so that we can purchase more diapers and formula. Then, I think we are going to end the day having dinner with another family who is hear that also used Nightlight to adopt.