myadoptionwebsite.com - International adoption web sites and announcements

Monday, January 15, 2010
HOME FOR 14 MONTHS!

Over the past two months, Maili has continued to amaze us with her ability to overcome the deficits with which she began the first four years of her life. In the 14 months since we met her, she has far exceeded our expectations for where she would be at this point, and for where we would be as a family. Not that we had low expectations for her, we simply had no idea that it would be possible for her to change so completely in such a short period of time. Watching her learn and experience new things since she has become part of our family has given us at least as much joy as it has given her, if not more. She never seems to tire of learning new things and simply experiencing life, and her enthusiasm is contagious.

She has blended so seamlessly into our family that is hard to believe she hasn’t been here from the beginning. Her language skills are finally beginning to develop to the point where she is able to share with us bits and pieces of her life in China. She loves looking at the lifebook we created for her with photos of her as a baby and toddler in China, and she is particularly fascinated by the ones of the day we met her at the orphanage. The other day she sat and stared at that page for an unusually long time and I began to wonder what she might be thinking. I pointed to the photo of our first meeting and asked her how she was feeling that day, wondering if she would even be able to tell me, given her somewhat limited vocabulary. She was silent for a long while and eventually said “Maili scared right dere.” I assured her that it was ok for her to have been scared since she didn’t know Mommy and Daddy and Holt then. Then I asked her how she was feeling now and she didn’t hesitate whatsoever. “I love Mommy Daddy Holt. I love my FAMILY. Mommy Daddy come get me China. Maili YIKE it home.” We “yike” it too, sweetheart, more than you know.

In addition to her recent fascination with her lifebook and her own website (yes, she herself is actually the biggest fan of this site, she looks at it almost daily and will click on each day of the “in china” link so that she can see each and every picture from our trip) she has become quite preoccupied with looking at other people’s China adoption sites. Her favorite, of course, is the site for her foster brother who was recently united with his own forever family (Two more E’s on myadoptionwebsite.com). Elijah, as he is now called, was in almost all of the photos of Maili that we received from the foster family. They were obviously very close and we were overjoyed to learn that he was being adopted by a family from our agency. Maili followed their journey to China every step of the way, and every afternoon she would come home from school and ask to see “Yijah”. Seeing what Yijah and Enick were up to became a daily ritual in our house for the two weeks the family was in China, and Maili didn’t seem to understand when the updates stopped coming. Until, that is, she saw a photo of Elijah with his entire new family (all 8 of them!). Then she got a big smile on her face and exclaimed, “Yijah happy. Yijah FAMILY now”. She definitely gets it.

As our one year “familyversary” drew to a close in November, I was undecided as to whether or not to continue posting monthly updates to this site or simply update annually, as many families have chosen to do. However, due to an overwhelming positive response from family, friends, and the adoption community, I have decided to post updates every couple of months. Thank you to all of you who have followed us and supported us on this amazing journey. Angela

Sibling rivalry

Presents are such fun!

Ready for Christmas

At Meme and Pa's house

Before she lost two more teeth

Sassy girl	Snowy Day
Hanging out in Savannah	Partners in crime
Joy to the World!

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