Hello everyone, I know many of you have been keeping up with my blog and wondering why I haven't posted anything substantial yet since getting home. So here is an attempt to catch up. First of all Annabel is doing amazing considering all she has been through. She has been pulled away from everything she has ever known and taken to a foreign country with people she never knew before. Wow..that would be scary for me, I can't imagine what she is thinking. She is doing great during the day. She has taken to the whole family and is actually starting to pet the dog. She was terrified of him at first. Poor puppy. He couldn't figure out why each time he came near her she would scream bloody murder. haha She is eating great and babbling like crazy. We hear some American words mixed in there amongst the jibber jabber. We took her to urgent care yesterday so we could get some medication for her eye (the doctor thought it was the start of pink eye). But after getting her home we felt it was probably just a cold in her eye because she caught a cold after flying. We couldn't get in yet with her Doctor because her paperwork was still processing to be put on our insurance so it was very nice of them to see her considering she wasn't even covered yet. They worked it out with us though because they knew we had been through so much in the days prior with travel and all. We ventured out today to the bank, church and a couple of stops on the base. She did great. She absolutely LOVES her car seat which shocked me. She loves just sitting there looking out as we drive. Thank You Lord for that one. I do have a prayer request for you all and that is that Annabel would fall madly in love with her porta crib, or her crib or even a sleeping bag on the floor. Anything that doesn't involve sleeping on my stomach. I think I have an invisible umbilical cord growing out of me. She only sleeps if she is attached to me. In China she slept all night in her crib with no problems. In fact she didn't want to be in bed with me at all at night. Here she wont go in her crib awake and if we move her she automatically wakes up. So the first two nights I slept either on the floor or on the recliner in my room with her. Last night I gave in and put her into bed with me. But she wiggles too much and doesn't sleep sound. Which means we have been taking a lot of little cat naps on the recliner during the day. Our sleep is all messed up to say the least. haha But she is still very happy when she is awake. My travel group has been emailing back and forth and it sounds like another family is experiencing the same thing which is very normal for these children. I would imagine she is scared that if she gets in that crib and falls asleep that we wont be there in the morning. Bless her heart. Other then the sleep issues I could not ask for a better situation. She loves us so much as we do her and we feel so very blessed to have her. God did an amazing job of matching her to us. As for us, feel free to call now. I know many of you have been so kind as to email asking for permission to call as you didn't want to disturb us. We would love to catch up and are even up to visitors. I do thank you for the privacy you have all given us the last couple of days though and the emails checking in on us. We are so grateful to be home. God Bless, Mark and Tamara
