Tuesday, October 21, 2008

Got any fava beans??

     The girls sat Emme at the piano bench the other day and when I took her away, one would have thought we were headed back to China.  So, since I don't have time to hold her there all day, I moved her high chair in front of the piano.  That problem solved!  Next!
     What??  You put me here. I'm allowed!
      Flipping through her music.  You laugh, but she may be my retirement.  Child prodigy??
     Shelby took these pictures like these scarecrows were one of the family.  The pictures were on my phone.  I thought maybe they'd help you feel festive.

     I guess since this is supposed to be a blog about my adopted daughter I should write about her periodically.  So, I am going to tell you how she's doing in just a second.  Before that,  I want to tell you that I am starting a new blog.  I can't stand miles and miles to mylei!!   I don't even have a child with that name.  Besides, I don't want to write about Emme all the time.  I love her so much I want to squeeze her to death,  but she's not really doing anything all that exciting right now. 

      I just want to talk about life.  Sometimes, I focus so hard on the destination, what's next in life, that I forget to enjoy the journey.  Destinations are really short lived and sometimes not all they're cracked up to be.  My journey through life has been anything but boring.  The things that happen to me... if you didn't know me, you'd think I was lying sometimes.  One of these days, I know the crew of Candid Camera is going to pop out and reveal themselves.  Or, maybe it's just true, God does have a sense of humor.  It's an adventure to travel with Him.  I try really hard to allow God to be the pilot who flies me through life, sometimes I grab the wheel away from him. (Does an airplane have a steering wheel?)  But, he's proven to be a much better pilot.  He's has flown me over strange lands and he has taken me places I never in a million years thought I would go.  (CHINA!!  For crying out loud, it still cracks me up that I went to China!!)  He has provided for my family in ways you only hear about in books or on tv.  Life with God is never boring!  Hopefully, you'll hang around with me.  I think you'll be entertained.  
     Until then....
      Just  keeping checking back here.  I'll tell you where to go when the new site is up and running!

    Onto Emme....

     She's doing great!  She has gained 1 pound in a month.  She now weighs 13.4 pounds.  Whoo hoo!!  I think that's pretty good!  At least she's keeping some pants on now.  Who cares if they are 3-6 month size.  We'll take what we can get!
     She is also getting around.  She mostly rolls.  Sometimes, she flops around like a fish out of water. I think I'll call her Nemo or Dori.   It cracks me up.  She throws up her little butt up and somehow turns as she does it.  She gets where she want to go... let's just put it that way.  She has made some progress in the crawling department too.  It's mostly backwards but we have also seen her do the official crawl but then she face-plants and quits.   Above all, she still prefers holding our hands and walking, but we all prefer NOT to go to the chiropractor!!  It hurts all our backs, even the kids.

     We can't afford the chiropractor.  When we came home from China, we had to take her to the Cincinnati Hospital's International Adoption Clinic.  When I hear the word clinic, I think cheap.  We'll, let me tell you that is not a cheap clinic.   $4100 is NOT cheap.  I kid you not, that was the bill.  $4100!!! The verdict is still out on how much we will have to pay.  $4100 was for the labs only.  The doctor, occupational therapist, social worker, nurse practitioner, secretary, janitor, etc.. is probably an additional $4000  Our insurance isn't the greatest, to put in nicely.

     So, when the nurse practitioner called today to tell me they needed to do a little more blood work, I wanted to tell her a few things.  I held my tongue.

     They apparently, for $4100, performed every test know to man's blood on her blood.  All came back clear except for one test.  One test indicated she may be missing an enzyme that breaks down the fava bean.  And, since I don't even know what the heck a fava bean is, I told her the test would not be necessary.  Ok, not really.  (It does have to do with the fava bean, but it has some mile long name that I can't say or spell.)

     She also called it favism (I am certain that spelling in incorrect but don't really care enough to fix it right now.)  The first test they ran indicated she was missing this particular enzyme.  However, they performed a quantatative test and that test indicated she was NOT missing that enzyme.  SO, LET'S JUST RUN THE TEST AGAIN BECAUSE MONEY GROWS ON TREES!  NOT!!

     I told her we'd do it in January when our insurance restores our health fund.  She said that was fine.  In the meantime, we are supposed to steer clear of all legumes including but not limited to (I have always wanted to say that... the including but not limited to part) peanuts, kidney beans, pinto beans, black beans, navy beans....  I am sure you get the point.  Also, any drugs that have sulfa-something in them.

     Avoiding food is not a problem considering it takes her a couple of hours to eat a Cheerio.  Will she ever get teeth???

     Emme is still getting up to eat.  She's lightened up on me and only wakes up twice instead of three times.  She eats what she wants, rolls over and goes back to sleep.  I wish I could do that sometime.  Wake up, scream, have someone bring me a piece of pizza, roll over and go back to sleep.  Oh, the life of a baby!
     
    Emme is also a jealous little soul.  She does not like the other kids sitting on my lap or Paul's lap.  She screams at Jackson every time he comes near here. She's part terradactyl.  I think she can't stand him.  I tell him she loves him so much that she can't control herself when he's around.  It's working for now!  She thinks Gracie is her mom.  If Emme is mad at me because, I did something horrible, like give her a bath.  She looks for Gracie and reaches out her arms, begging for Gracie to get her to safety.  Mean ol' mom!

     The mean ol' mom should probably go get the computer cord out of Emme's mouth......
     

8 comments:

The Gang's Momma! said...

Adorable shots of her at the piano - I love her little face :)

With ya on the bloodwork - we're waiting for our summary report, but preliminary results are that a few levels are elevated and she'll have to have retests. Oh joy. Another 20 minutes crying in the lounge while three nurses hold her down to draw a gazillion vials. Joy.

The lifesaver of it all? Our insurance is awesome and the clinic is at the hospital where The Boss works, so they are all REALLY nice to us when he's with us :)

Sharla M. said...

Hi April!

I'm so excited about your new blog! You're as funny as BooMama and I can't wait to keep following!

Sounds like Emme is doing great and you sound like you're doing much better too!

Hugs,
Sharla

Anonymous said...

you're funnier than boomama, big mama and baby mama combined!

Tony and Rett said...

You are NOT one who just focuses on the destination. If you did, we wouldn't have a reason to come to your blog every day. We (your fan club) love hearing about HOW you got to your destination, and your thoughts once you got there! You, my friend, are ALL ABOUT THE JOURNEY!

Looking forward to your new blog.

P.S. Emme is still so stinkin' cute!

Unknown said...

Love seeing her grow!! Was it beans that was making her so stinky? Yeah, good idea not to give her more!
Your blogging has inspired me to journal on my blog, I can see how theraputic it is.
So have you thought of the name of your new blog? Party of 6...that's my 2 cents :)

Anonymous said...

I may have to try sophia on the piano. Maybe they could practice for a duet.

Nina said...

April, your daughter is soooo cute!!

Thanks for responding to my post on RQ about The Majestic. I'm going to look at your Nanning posts, but first I had to tell you how adorable Emme is.

Congratulations!

Lisa said...

April! I don't have lots of time right this sec to read your blog..but I'm loving it so far! So funny...Gracie has Favism too...also diagnosed at Cincy Intl Adoption Clinic...I'm anxious to email with you! You can get me at maillode@yahoo.com...love to talk with you or meet for coffee...your kids are lovely! I've got a Guangxi girl too and boy, is your Emme gorgeous.