Beautiful Girl!

It has been an incredible couple of days here in China.  Leah could not be any cuter.  She is such a sweet baby, and we love her so much.  Everyone who commented on the picture with Jer is right...he's totally smitten and she's got him wrapped around her little finger already.  The boys could not get enough of her on skype.  Luke just kept saying over and over how cute she was.  We taught the boys "I love you" in Chinese which sounds like wall-eye-knee.  They kept telling her and Seth would tack on a "Ni Hao" for good measure.  They are so excited to see her and her cuteness definitely will not disappoint.  It's amazing that just a little over 48 hours ago we were basically handed a 16-month-old infant.  The changes in her already are truly remarkable.  

In terms of size we were right on about Leah.  We haven't been able to weigh her, but I'm guessing maybe 17 or 18 lbs.  Surprisingly she actually has a little buddha belly but her arms and legs are really skinny.  Her fingers are so delicate, and she has the tiniest feet--even the size 3 shoes I brought are big on her.  Her 9 months clothes fit snug, so I think she can graduate to 12 months soon!  She could maybe pass for a very tiny one year old in terms of size.  Everything about her is petite from her body to her little facial features.  When she smiles her eyes get so squinty, and it's so stinkin' cute!  She has 6 teeth, and her front two are surprisingly big for her tiny mouth.

Jer and I feel like based on her development and some of her behaviors we are kind of piecing together what Leah's life was like up to this point.  Between her start as a very tiny, weak baby whether due to prematurity or failure to grow in the womb and then lack of individual attention since then she is very behind.  Surprisingly I'm not too freaked out about it.  It's obvious to us that Leah is a smart, happy baby that is so able to learn and just needs some love and TLC.  One of the first things we realized is that she had never fed herself anything.  We have also discovered that despite the report about her eating solid foods she has never chewed before!  We have basically remedied that.  Tonight looking at my sweet girl chomping Ritz crackers on the bed like a pro it was a far cry from the baby that looked at us blankly just two days ago when we put Cheerios on her tray.  She is now eating finger foods and chewing well, and she seems to like to eat.  I'm not sure she's done much of that in the past.  French fries and Ritz are two her favorites.  She seems willing to try lots of different foods.  We are also feeding her formula with a bottle.  We got a little information sheet from the orphanage on Sunday when we got here that supposedly told us about her daily habits.  It said she ate 5 oz of formula at 5 different times throughout the day.  Two of those feedings were during the night.  I was totally prepared to feed her at night, but she hasn't woke up once.  I am really skeptical that they were waking up at night to feed her.  She actually sleeps like a champ for both naps and nighttime.  She chats and talks herself to sleep even with us in the room...although as she get more spunky we're seeing her personality more.  Tonight before she fell asleep she kept lifting up the towel that we draped over the side of the crib to keep her from seeing  us up and then laughing.  That's not something she would have done Monday!  Based on what we read about feedings in China orphanges we knew that babies take their bottles quite warm with a big slit in the nipple (we cut an X in it with a knife) to give fast flow.  They also eat rice cereal mixed in with it.  We  have been trying that and it's worked great.  Yesterday she spit up a bit, and I think it's because we were overfeeding her and she has eaten a lot of new foods.  This schedule also said she had a bowel movement each day at 5 p.m.  Seriously?  We haven't found her to be quite that clockwork!

When we put Leah on her tummy for the first time it was obvious she had not done that much and didn't like it.  We have continued and been right there on the floor playing with her, and she is already so much stronger.  Even though one of the reports we had indicated she might be able to roll over I'm honestly not sure she could.  The first night she was here she slept on her back the entire time even though it looked so uncomfortable.  Now she is rolling all over the place and flips over to sleep on her tummy at night (the schedule said she slept only on her back).  She is also working on her own version of an army crawl and is very persistent and creative with the methods she comes up with to get to toys.  Based on all the pictures we have seen of her in the last 6 months we're pretty convinced that once she learned how to sit that's basically what she did all the time.  Today she went from her bum to her stomach to get a cracker, and I'm pretty sure she had never done that before!  She is also spending more time on her feet and getting much better at standing holding on to stuff.  The other big change for her has been use of her little arm.  In the orphanage pictures she was always completely bundled with her little arm up inside her sleeve.  She has basically been completely one armed her entire life up to this point. She loves having her arm out.  She uses it in unison with her other arm just like any other kid would.  She even takes something in her hand and then transfers it over under her little arm to grab it and hold it.  Very smart girl!  Watching her come out of her shell...smiling, laughing, teasing, waving, pointing to her nose, learning to blow kisses has been so fun.  I guess I can just feel privileged that I get to experience some of these milestones with her that I otherwise wouldn't have based on her chronological age.  I don't mind where she's supposed to be.  We are just enjoying where she's at and continue to be amazed with her ability to learn and love.  This honestly has been kind of like being first time parents all over again.  We are here with only Leah to take care of, and both of us are hanging on her every little move.  Maybe we can make up just a little for the lack of attention she's had so far.  We can tell she's starting to feel comfortable with us.  She is so happy and likes us both (lots of the kids in our group will only go to one parent or the other).  We thinks she's perfect and are so grateful she's ours.  

Being out and about with Leah in China has been quite the adventure, but I need to save that for another post.  I've rambled for long enough.  Hopefully the pictures come through okay.  Have I mentioned she's really cute?