Today marks four months that Anna has been home with us. It has gone so quickly in lots of ways, but it also feels like she has been a part of our family for a long time. Today we had our six month post-placement meeting with our social worker (yes 2 months early in order to get it written, notarized, apostilled, translated and to Russia on time). As we sat and reflected on her first weeks home, I was reminded of how far she has come in such a short amount of time. She was taken from the only building she had ever known, quickly flown across the world and then entered a new family where everything was completely and totally different. As much as we tried to slow down our lives for her, just living in America requires many car trips, busy stores, new food, lots of faces, etc. It is so much for a little one to take in! Looking back we realize how much fear she had. Her many sleepless nights, her constant need to be held, fear of the carseat, fear of her crib, jealousy of her brothers, fear of people, etc. All of that was her trying to deal with the very scary new things that were now part of her every day life. I think I would have been crying and upset too!! Now that we are here at our 4 month mark, she is a completely different little girl. She now loves her crib, sleeps through the night, will say HI to strangers but prefers mommy and daddy and loves her brothers immensely. She has the most adorable giggle and can light up our world with her smile! She truly has come so far from the scared little baby who had a death grip on me as we flew to America. We love our precious Anna and thank the Lord every day that from the beginning of time he knew she would be ours, and then moved mountains to make it so.
This is pretty much what our flight consisted of for 11 hours, Anna crying and me trying to console her. Poor little thing.
Arriving home to our welcome committee!
Now look at our silly girl!
Learning all about dress up from her friend Faith! Hanging out with her buddy Yosef (also adopted just 6 weeks before Anna)!
This is all her brothers doing...Brooks is Luke Skywalker, Bradey is a clone, and yes Anna is Princess Leah!
