My Oh My...how life has changed....

We have been home more than 2 months and life with Elizabeth in our family is great! She is such a joy and a good natured little girl! She continues to be a good sleeper....goes to bed around 8pm and usually sleeps until 7am (or earlier if we have to wake her up to go to Day Care).

Speaking of Day Care...she continues to do well there. She may cry when I leave her, but soon she is playing and having fun with the other children, especially a little girl Kayara (?sp) who has taken her under her wing. Some days when she cries, I just want to scoop her up and take her back home, but I know she loves to play with the other children and I love being back to work.

Speaking of work...I am working full time for the first time in a year. I was able to go to clinical at the hospital on Friday and when I logged on, it said the last time I had used the computer was January 21, 2005. Wow! It was a reminder of what I was going through last year at this time (being diagnosed with, fighting, and surviving breast cancer) and boy....am I glad that chapter of my life is behind me and boy...do I love this new chapter "Life with Elizabeth!"

Elizabeth went through a period of a few weeks when she wouldn't eat much, but now...she eats great and she is growing. It won't be long before she will be in 24 month clothes (She'll be 2 on March 7th). She loves spicy foods like tacos. Tonight we had Chilli for supper and she was eating it with a spoon in each hand :-)

She is talking a lot....SHE SAID MOMMY last week for the first time!!! Wow! I had been waiting for that word for a long time :-) She says: daddy, papa, mama, tractor, kitty-cat, bubbles, baby, turch (for church), bye, hi, kerfer (for Christopher, isn't that cute?), oooohh (for moo), meow, woof-woof, yeah, and more. She will mock our movements (like if we raise our eyebrows, she will raise hers, too). Daddy tries to get her to rub her belly and pat her head, which is pretty comical, but she does try to do it. She loves to tease...if I hold out my hands like I want to pick her up...she shakes her head no...so then I stick out my lower lip to pout, and she'll laugh and come running :-) She also will mock the pouting, by sticking out her little lip....too cute! She is really becoming a daddy's girl and loves to play with him.

She will bow her head and put her hands together to pray for every meal (which is so precious) and she will do that most of the time at church, too. She does very well in church and will usually play quietly. Today, she had fun when Meredith came to sit with her in church. Meredith had a cute book that you put raisins on, and Elizabeth was smiling so big and they were having fun playing with and eating the raisins.

She is becoming very social and it doesn't take her long to warm up to new people and she will give out smiles, blow kisses, and wave bye-bye very freely now.

She loves her new family...she loves her brother Chris to carry her upstairs to his room, she loves playing with her Papa Joe (he can entertain her for hours with only a few kernels of corn, lol!). She spoke to Mama on the phone the other night and even said "Mama" for the first time. She got to spend the day with GrandMary and Papa on Thursday while I went to my class in Columbia and she loved all the attention she got. She spent last Monday with her Aunt Holly, (because I had to work, but Holly was off for Martin Luther King Day) and she loved playing with Holly, her toys, and her cat, TT. Aunt Machelle has already spoke up to keep her on President's Day. I could go on and on about each family member she has made a special friendship with, but with the size of our family, it would take ages...but anyway...you get the idea. She is now a member of a large family and she fits right in!

So, how has life changed? I noticed every commercial on TV that has a cat on it....because Elizabeth gets so excited with every cat food commercial! (She loves kitties!)

I notice the lights in Wal-Mart because Elizabeth points them out to me. Elizabeth notices every balloon or decoration in stores...things that I have just blocked out because I am so wrapped up in shopping.

I get to listen to children's songs to and from work and find myself humming "The Muffin Man" quite often, ha! (BTW - Tom says he doesn't know the muffin man, but if he meets him, he's going to kill him because he hates that song, LOL!).

I work less and laugh much more now that Elizabeth is in my life. When I'm at work, I find myself counting the hours until I get to pick her up. When it's time to leave, I can't get to Day Care quick enough, and I'm almost giddy because I'm so excited to see her (Like I would get when visiting her in the orphanage).

I spend more time on the floor playing with her (and I've found that I'm not as limber as I was when Chris was a baby, lol!)

I enjoy seeing my husband getting down on the floor to play with Elizabeth, taking her for a 4-wheeler ride, reading her a book, throwing her in the air, carrying her around on his back, tickling her, etc.

I thought surviving cancer would make me appreciate life more than anything....but really.... having this beautiful little girl in our lives makes me appreciate each day I'm alive to enjoy her presence. I love the changes in my life and Thank God for them daily :-)