Waiting on Peanut: One Month

This past Thursday, we celebrated Miriam being with our family for one month. It is hard for me to believe it is just a month ago that Joey and I walked up the hill, rounded the corner and walked through the metal gate of the orphanage to meet our daughter. The little girl that met us at the gate is not the same girl that fills our home with laughter, chatter, and tears. When we first held Miriam in our arms, she did not know how to be held. Her legs stuck out straight, so we had to hold her in a kind of cradle hold with her legs sticking out to the side. Now, the girl knows how to melt her body into ours and loves to be held and carried around the house.

When we first met Miriam, she was shy and reluctant to speak. We had to coax her to talk with us and to smile. Now, Miriam loves to sing, talk, and tease all of us. She is a big fan of poop jokes…which she tells mostly on Caleb. Her English improves every day and the phrase of the day makes us laugh and celebrate with her…yesterday was, “If you give a moof (moose) a muffin”…today was, “Hello, howa (how are) you again.” We also had a little breakthrough today when Miriam was willing to say why she was upset…she forgot her sunglasses and then again when she wanted to read one more book before bed. Usually, she just shuts down and either cries or won’t talk. When we first met Miriam, we were strangers to her…and now we are just strange. HAHAHA! Really, now she is fitting into our family. She is attaching well to her Mama and Papa…giving big hugs and lots of kisses…and an occasional zerbert. She loves to tease and play with Caleb and Helen…and occasionally fight, talk back, and beat up.

A ton has happened in the weeks that we have been home. I think about blog posts every day, but by the time a spare minute rolls around, I am so tired that all I want to do is go to bed…or watch Duck Dynasty. Here are a few things that have happened…or thoughts that I have had:

We went to the doctor…twice. The first visit was just a visit to check her out and see how she was doing. Dr. Jackson wanted the first visit to be a painless one. We think that Miriam is older than 4…or perhaps she’s a genius…so we had a bone scan of her hand to see how old she might be. The results came back this week and said she is 5. We are also going to take her to the dentist to have them look at her teeth and give us a guess on her age. Her second visit came with shots and a blood draw. Apparently she has had shots before because when she saw them, the wailing began. For some reason, the blood draw was less traumatic for her, but more for me…I wondered if she had any blood left in her little body.

Another thing we did was attempt to have some family photos taken. As we looked around our house, we decided we needed to quickly get up some photos of all of us together. These went pretty well. We made a trip to Gymboree to pick out an outfit for the photos. Miriam is very particular about her clothes…which I think goes back to what they wore at the orphanage. She picked out a jean skirt that she loved, so she was pretty happy to get dressed for the pictures.

Miriam is adjusting well to our family…BUT that doesn’t mean that it is easy. We are all getting used to having a little one in the house again after having independent teenagers. Bonding and attachment takes a lot of time and even more energy. Expectations of how things should be have to be laid aside and replaced with how things are. It can be tricky helping all the kids navigate the sibling relationship and giving them the attention that each one needs. I am cooking enormous quantities of rice…because the girl LOVES her rice and will eat most anything else I cook if I pair it with rice. My house is a disaster and there is stuff everywhere and I think my brain has shut down…complete thoughts are rare. Despite all these difficult things, we are exactly where God wants us to be. It just feels right. We know that we were meant for each other, and can daily see the way that God is knitting our family together.

Here are a few things that I am loving right now:

Miriam loves to pray (cosumbella) and demands that no one eats before we pray at mealtime. She also prays before bed and then again whenever she feels like it. At first, she recited a prayer in Lingala but now she talks to God in English and mostly thanks Him for whatever is on her mind.

Miriam loves to read books when she first gets up in the morning and then again at bedtime. She has memorized Brown Bear, Brown Bear and it is so cute to hear her recite it in her Congolese accent. I LOVE IT! Her other favorite right now is The Runaway Bunny.

Miriam loves to sing and is learning lots of songs. Her favorite right now is Jesus loves me. She asks for it every time we get in the car. Her eyes get big and she does this funny little dance. Then she sings along with the CD really loudly.

I know this post is disjointed...but it just represents the way my brain is working lately. Here are a few final photos of the things we have been doing lately: