What a week!!!

It has been quite some time since my last post. Maddie has been doing quite well and is picking up English pretty quickly now. Over the last couple of weeks we have noticed that she is saying English words unprompted and still repeating everything we say. She is such a happy little girl and is very loving.

We have had quite a week last week. Keith father fell ill and was in the hospital last week. My mother had gone to Fort Lauderdale, Florida to a treatment center for Depression and other things on our advice and once there fell ill and had to be rushed to the Hospital. It was discovered that she had a large benign tumor on her brain that had grown (over the past 15-20 years) to a size larger than a grapefruit with tentacles down into her eye sockets. Needless to say this required emergency brain surgery. I flew down to Fort Lauderdale, FL to be with my mom and dad - leaving Maddie behind with Keith and kids. This was the first time I had been apart from her since our GOTCHA day. Matters only got worse when Keith's father passed away while I was still in Florida. Lizzy really stepped up to the plate and into my role in my absence. She was a great motherly figure to Maddie and cared for her very well considering all of the drama effecting her life as well. I was able to make it home to attend my father-in-laws funeral services. Maddie missed me so much and I missed her more. We hugged several times - it was like she couldn't believe it was me and from that moment on she didn't let go of me all day.

Things are getting back to normal slowly here. My mother will be coming home today and will require only outpatient therapy. The arrangements that we had previously made for Maddie to be cared for by my father, of course were tabled and we needed to go in a different direction. Lizzy's school has PK2-8th grade classes, so I inquired about putting her there starting next week. We went and had an hour visit this morning. I dropped her off in the classroom and she never missed me. She was so excited with all of the toys, kids and stuff to do, she didn't give me a second thought. I returned in 1 hour to find her playing on the playground with all of the other kids. After a few minutes she noticed me standing there watching and made her way to me to give me a quick hug and then it was back to the playground. I had to make her leave. We went back into the classroom to gather her things and the other kids were returning to the room and she decided that she wasn't ready to go home and politely sat down at the table with the other kids. She reluctantly left with me and will return on Monday when I start work again part -time for a few weeks. I can't imagine that she will have a problem with school. She appears very ready to start interacting with other children. I would imagine her language skills will improve tremendously being with other children. I am very excited for her and am completely at ease with putting her in school.

We received her Certificate of Citizenship, which we have been waiting for since we entered the country with her. We also, unexpectedly received her passport, which I thought was delayed waiting for her COC. I did write a letter to the passport office and this must have helped explain the documents that we did submit with her application that also met the issuance requirements. We are over that hump and are looking forward to Finalization of our Adoption and getting her a social security card.

Thanks to all of my friends and family who offered prayers, support and made themselves available during this difficult time for our family.