Kids have been sick

The kids have been sick here. Each caught something that caused very high fevers and lots of sleepless nights for me. It seemed to be a 3 day bug with fevers in the 104-105 range! I have never seen anything like it and it was pretty scary to me. The lesson from it though was that all kids do not have fevers in their hands and feet. Funny, huh? Both of my boys get red hot ears and hot hands/feet. While the boys had the fever first, I kept checking Jana's hands and feet. Finally I noticed her forehead was warmish, but expected a 100-101 fever... nope it was 105.4! I don't know where she was keeping all that heat, but several attempts at getting her temperature revealed the same temp. She is on day 2 of the fevers and I expect tomorrow to be a big improvement. These pictures were from this morning. She and Brayden were smiling at the table and after the rough last few days, it was a very nice thing to see.

Jana's favorite hiding spot

This past week we have been working on house repairs and one of the things that had to be done was to replace a door on our cabinet where someone ran a big dump truck into the cabinet door and dented it. We removed the door to find a match for it and Jana has discovered a whole new world of hiding inside the cabinet. She can spend 30 minutes getting in and out of the cabinet and throwing everything that was in it... out. It is really cute, until she starts banging the plastic kids bowls on the floor. Wow, she has an arm!!!

Jana & Brayden

Jana & Brayden were playing really cute today. I managed to snap this picture of them sitting together. Brayden even decided to pose for it.

Jana is doing really well. She has 2 teeth coming in and is drooling, but it hasn't affected her happy-go-lucky mood. She really started walking over this past weekend. I have some video that I will post as soon as I can. She is already getting into more stuff. Yesterday she managed to empty a little trash can in a manner of seconds. The dog water bowl is still her favorite though. I have to keep it picked up of she will quickly be sitting in a puddle on the kitchen floor. :)

Xinhui Videos & Pictures

I wanted to post these for anyone who might like to catch a glimpse of the orphanage that Jana came from in Xinhui. I obviously was chasing 2 cuties around for their future Mommas. :) If you are adopting from Xinhui, take a look and see if you see your little one here.

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These are the Pictures we took while visiting.

And these are the Pictures that they were so nice to take for us while Jana was still there.

You can see how loved these babies are and how well taken care of. We are so grateful that Xinhui took such wonderful care of Jana. It has made her transition into our family a very easy one.

Jana's DocBand

On January 3rd we picked up Jana's DocBand. It will help correct the flat spot on the back right corner of her head. Today I took her DocBand to an artist and they decorated it for us. It turned out so cute with the bunny and flowers on it. She wears this band for 23 hours a day and should end up wearing it for 4 months. A short time in the grand scheme of things. :) She doesn't mind the DocBand at all, which is amazing because she won't leave a bow in her hair for more than 2 seconds.

The place we are taking her for it did a mold of her head and used that to make her DocBand and also to make a replica of her head. We will be able to use it to watch the changes. Although the cosmetics of it were not important to us, the severity of her flat spot prevented her from a wide range of sleeping positions and we were concerned that this would cause neck and back problems later if she was only able to sleep with her head turned severely to the right. Unfortunately we had to make this decision quickly. Babies heads stop growing quickly and by 18 months old, most places won't even bother trying to band them. Jana turns 14 months on the 20th of January.

Certificate of Citizenship Arrived

Jana's Certificate of Citizenship for the United States has arrived. Now the baby moon is over... I have to get back to work and finish up all of the paperwork and finalize stuff here in the United States. She is officially adopted and ours, but we have to get her social security number, a United States Birth Certificate (by readopting her in Texas), and go through the post-adoption social worker visits. It is harder to accomplish all of this when she is already in our arms.... not as much motivation to finish it quickly!!!

Jana's new shirt

Isn't this shirt adorable? We received it today from our friends in Maryland! It says "I Love My Country THIS MUCH". So cute!!! Thank you so much Carol, Bruce, Anthony, & Hayden!