To Tell of His GRACE: Three Months With Kaylee Grace!!!

How can it be that we have only had Kaylee Grace for 3 months??? It seems as if she's been with us all along...and just to think of all that Jesus has done in such a short amount of time!!!

We were reflecting on all that He has done over the last few months as a family the other day. Kolson was remembering back to China and how she just screamed/cried or was completely shut down. We laughed as we remembered how she didn't play with toys there at all (only food and a ball a time or two!) Now you would never know that she missed out on playing for the first 2 1/2 years of her life...thank goodness for 3 siblings that LOVE to play with her!

Sis and I were watching her play with her baby the other day ~ she uses the play coffee maker in her little kitchen as a bottle warmer. Ha! It's hilarious!!! She watches me heat up her bottles in the bottle warmer on our counter 4x's per day so I can see how she would play that way. It's the cutest thing ever...she warms it, makes the beeping noise, takes it out and says, "haw, haw" for hot! Then she gets her baby and ever-so-carefully places the bottle to its mouth...after a few seconds she makes the sound for "all done" (with her mouth closed)...and she does this over and over. Then she holds her baby close and rocks her back and forth and then lays her down on a blanket and tells us "shhh" (by putting her finger pretty much up her nose) :)

When I'm making Kaylee's bottle and take her bottle out of the warmer, I always use a paper towel because the steam really is warm. Well, the other day Kaylee was playing with her baby and while the bottle was "heating" in her play coffee pot, she ran into the bathroom and got some toilet paper and then ran back and used it to pull the bottle out saying "haw!!!, haw!!!"

It's amazing to think that a little girl who had zero play and zero stimulation just 3 months ago can now play like this! Our God is an AWESOME God....He cares for the least, the last and the lost and we have felt His favor go before us in the most beautiful ways imaginable.

Sometimes I think about Kaylee's birth mom and the JOY of this sweet girl that she is missing. I wonder if she thinks about Kaylee. Mostly I pray for her and Kaylee's birth father. I truly believe that this is the best gift we will ever be able to give Kaylee...praying that her birth parents will somehow be told about Christ and that they will make the decision to follow Him so that they can live eternally in Heaven with Him; and so that they can meet their precious girl.

I wish somehow I could tell her mom all about her...

how smart she is

how funny she is

how filled with JOY she is

how beautiful she is

how her giggle is the most beautiful noise we've ever heard

how she has a family who loves her and will teach her all about Jesus

how her surgeries went well and she can see better and hear better and she is starting to try to talk and her hands are functioning wonderfully!

But all I can do is pray that her birth mom will encounter the ONE TRUE GOD, JESUS, and say YES to His Love and YES to following Him. Nothing is too difficult for our God and I truly believe that as we persist in prayer, He will send someone to her birth parents to tell them of His Love...whether they choose to follow will be up to them, but I pray that He will open their hearts as only He can and that they will say yes :)

Here's some more about our Kaylee Grace at 3 months with her (2 1/2 months home):

She LOVES her Sissy and Brothers!!!

She LOVES to play outside

She really seems to be bonding amazingly well

She is doing MUCH better with Brodie - she is fine with him doing pretty much everything except for putting her to bed and a bottle (unless I'm not home - she took a bottle once from him when I was gone)

She is beginning to sleep better this last week or so (still in her crib next to our bed but falls asleep laying in there, rubbing my arm or with me rubbing her back -rather than needing to fall asleep on me ;) Sleeps pretty soundly most nights from about 10pm-4am...wakes up, takes a bottle and then falls back asleep for about another hour or two---takes us a while to get her down still but we're heading in the right direction ;)

She is beginning to say words: hiiii (Hi), hoe (home), ha-eee (happy), uh (up), ahh (out), maw-ma (mama - only said a few times), eye, heh (help), aww (off)

Still no solid foods or even water but still in OT working on it ;)

LOVES music and dancing...and if you're in the room while she's dancing, she will call you out by pointing to you to get you to dance :)

Tantrums are MUCH better...LOTS of hitting and pulling hair instead (while "yelling"/grunting loudly at us) ...this is so much better than the tantrums that would last so long...now we just tell her "no hit" or "no pull hair" and put her in a "time-in" (where Brodie or I take her away and sit with her until she is "ready to be nice"...which she can indicate to us by using the sign for nice). No time-outs with children from backgrounds where they've been pretty much isolated their whole life, sitting with them keeps them from being left alone but helps them to gain self-control...this seems to be working well and hitting/pulling hair seems to be getting a little better ;) After she tells us she is ready to be nice, she goes and nicely touches the person she hit/pulled hair (usually Sis or Keeg) ;)

Attention span is slowly increasing...will sit in high chair for about 5-10 minutes while we eat (with food to play with) and occasionally plays with something (like her baby) for 5-10 minutes :)...she could play outside for hours!

Walking steadily now and running well, too!

Still cannot stand for us to brush teeth (this has been put on hold with all the eye/ear meds she has had) or let us clip nails, but if I ask her to bring me the nail clippers she will run and get them for me...then she hands them to me an starts to cry :(

The biggest change we have seen in the last couple of months since we've been home has been Kaylee Grace feeling comfortable and peaceful...she was so terrified, overstimulated and confused at first. Now she runs around this house like she is the one in charge ;)

We LOVE seeing her growing into who her Heavenly Father created her to be!!!