Introducing....our girl

Oh boy, what a day! It was a day full of emotion-both amazing and not so. The "not so" will be shared at a much later date. The amazing .... well, see for yourself.

She is beautiful and ROUND! R is quite little but so heavy. It only took her a few minutes to warm up to us and from that point on loved hanging out. Her director and "teachers" seem to love her very much. They wanted to show her off for us, so they brought in the speech therapist (yes, there is a speech therapist at this orphanage) to perform a song with her. She was very cute and followed directions quite well. We have several videos that I'd love to share but it will take some time for us to learn how to do that.

I'll be honest here- we had no idea what to expect. We didn't know how high or low functioning R would be. Is she "behind"? Yes. She is not walking unassisted and seems very much still like a toddler- she'll be 5 in January. But, at the same time, she is more advanced than we thought she'd be. After us showing her once, she tried to color alone on the magna doodle we brought.

She tried over and over to unzip and zip the zipper on the book I brought (with buttons, zippers, pockets). R loved the book with animals and fur to feel and kept flipping back to the cover to feel the chick. With the love of a family we have no doubt that the sky is the limit.

Here she is doing the famous Down syndrome split. She can go from her stomach to a sitting position without ever moving her legs....it's amazing and freaked our facilitator out a bit.

See what I mean about round!:)

We are URGENTLY seeking prayers. I cannot share the details at this moment but understand that we need prayers now. There is a spiritual battle occuring all around us and we are in the very midst of it. Satan has shown his ugly face time and time again. We cannot let him win.

I will share more later. For now, it's off to eat, look for a new apartment and go see our girl.

In Him,

E