Dr. appointment

Yesterday Tabitha had an appointment with an Embassy approved pediatrician. They weighed her, but she had on all of her clothes and her shoes, so I am not sure what her actual weight is. This pediatrician spoke English very well. He said that she was healthy. Tabitha had to have a shot this time. She didn't like that at all! Our facilitator also gave us our Embassy Day paperwork packet. She said that she was going to come today to review it with us---she never showed up! I am not really surprised, because this isn't the first time we've been told something that wasn't actual truth. Que sera sera. We will be back home in less than a week!

What color is e-mail? We'll still call it PINK!!

We received the most wonderful e-mail today! The DHS CIS sent us our notice of what used to be called pink, our Embassy appointment time. We have an appointment on Dec 3rd, get to pick up the visa on Dec 4th and come home forever with Tabitha on Dec 5th. The journey to bring her home has been long and seemingly torturous over the past few days (due to our illness), but the light at the end of the tunnel is shining brightly! We've loved our time in Guatemala, but are more than ready to return to the States. There is no place like home! God answers prayer to those who ask; our journey has definitely been God directed!

Under the weather

Sorry, I haven't posted in a few days. We've been feeling a little under the weather. Tim was the first one to get sick last Friday (the first Friday we were here). Tabitha started on Tuesday, we ended up taking her to the pediatrician on Wednesday, he said that she had an ear infection....started her on oral Rocephin. Boy did that mess her GI system up! I spent Thanksgiving day either in bed or the bathroom! Not a pretty sight. Tim did great though with his new "mother" duties of making bottles, changing diapers and consoling a sick baby. Things are back to normal for Tim, Tabitha and I are still coming around. We went to the History Museum today. It was very nice, but the museums here aren't exactly the way they are in the States. Tim works in a museum, so he could tell you what they needed to do. The trip to the museum actually exhausted me, I'm still not over this "bug" completely, so I took a nap when we got back to the room.
Tonight for dinner we met another blogger family, Sharon, Bill and Olivia. They have Embassy day tomorrow! Lucky them! I'm hoping (praying)pink comes tomorrow and we can finally plan for our trip home! I am very homesick; I miss my mother, our dogs, being able to do laundry, cook, drive, and the English language!

The Match Game

We received an e-mail as promised from Pat at Lab Corp. Of course as we knew it would, the DNA test matched the first one. The results are on the way to the consolate now! They should be there by tomorrow afternoon. Too bad that Thursday is a holiday, otherwise, we'd probably get pink by Thursday. Now I'm sure we will have to wait at least until Friday for pink. My agency has suggested that I go to the Embassy and beg for compassion since Tim is sick and now the baby is too. I'm not sure what is wrong with her, but I can no longer complain that she is "constipated"! She has thrown up a couple of times too. Thing is, she still wants to play! I purchased some Pedialyte for her, she drank that and it has stayed down so far! Praying for compassion....I am not sure that I'm up to waiting in line, it has been suggested that I e-mail the Embassy since my DNA results are not there yet. I'll keep you posted!

Antigua

We took a day trip to Antigua today. It is a beautiful old city that was once the capital of Guatemala. The capital was moved to Guatemala City after and earthquake destroyed most of Antigua. We toured the Jade Factory first, Jade is only found in a few areas of the world; Guatemala is one of those areas.
We then went to a coffee plantation. They are able to grow coffee in the rich volcanic soil. Coffee trees only produce enough coffee to make 40 cups of coffee a year. They do not tolerate hot direct sunlight so the coffee trees are planted in the shade of larger trees. The beans turn red when they are ripe.
After the coffee plantation we toured an old convent. It is now a museum as the nuns no longer live there.

Sunday, Sunday

Today is Sunday. It is a much better day for Tim. Poor thing had some bout of GI problems starting Friday night and lasting through the day yesterday. I'm fine as is Tabitha. We're not sure if it was a virus, food poisoning, or what. Whatever it was it's good that it is gone! I had a funny time yesterday at the pharmacy trying to get something for him for nausea. They spoke no English and my Spanish is limited----VERY limited! I could tell them though that I was a nurse. I ended up coming back across the street and asking the hotel if someone could help me with translation. They were very glad to do it.
Today, we walked to the mall again. I wanted to find a pair of shoes for Tabitha to wear when we go to the Embassy; mind you I don't know when that will be. I'm hoping for pink sometime next week. We did find a cute little pair of shoes. They are slightly too big, but she will have them for a while. The ones that I bought at home are too small! I had seen that she was still wearing the shoes that we took on our visit trip when we received her last medical and figured she was still in that size. Her foster mom actually had those on her when she brought her to us. They are really too small for her though. So, we had to get a pair of shoes. I did buy some other shoes at home that do fit, but not for long!
Well Tabitha is calling, more later!

Anna's party

Today we went to Anna's birthday party. Anna is Scott and Andrea's little girl. Another child, Luisa who was with her Mom who was visiting also turned one year old today. Anna's Mom and Dad had a special cake for Anna, she really enjoyed it! The guys at the pool also got cakes for Luisa and Anna's birthday. Because Anna already had a cake of her own, Anna's parents asked if Tabitha could have one. Of course I wasn't going to stop her. She totally got into it! She truly is a Taylor--chocolate is her favorite word!

Moving along

We received an e-mail from Pat at labcorp today. Tabitha's DNA came in today. She said that she would e-mail us when it was finished and give it a tracking number so that we know when it arrives at the Embassy. We found out yesterday that the Embassy in Guatemala will no longer issue hard copy pink slips. They will be notifying the adoptive parents via e-mail of their "pink" and their Embassy date. My guess is that a lot of parents have complained that they did not receive adequate notification (time wise) of their pink status and have had to ask for their Embassy appointment dates to be changed so that they could arrange for travel. The parents in turn then have to notify their representatives/facilitators when they receive "pink". Somehow, I don't see parents delaying in the notification of the facilitators. I think this system will be much more time effective. I've often wondered why they didn't e-mail the parents since that is the way that they notify of PA. SO, our case is moving along!

The Zoo

As I said yesterday, no pictures--no ability to post them.(Pictures were added after returning home.) I will however give you details of how our trip is going.

We went to the zoo today. It actually was nicer than I expected. The highlight for many other zoo goers today (not me) was watching them feed the moniters.....yes, they feed them live rats! YUK!!! I did not watch needless to say...Tim did though!
We spent about 3 hours at the zoo. Our hotel van driver was nice enough to drop us off and pick us up at the zoo when he was out making his airport runs. Tabitha wasn't really impressed with the animals or anything, she was just content being carried around by Dad!
The zoo must have tired her out, because she was a little crab tonight! She went to bed between 8 and 8:30pm! She's back to the "I don't want to eat!" thing today...I think she has a belly ache! She's a regular little gas factory! Sorry, TMI!

Smiles

Well, folks, I am so sorry, but I won't be able to post any pictures to this blog until we get back home. Our laptop doesn't have a high speed USB port that is necessary to download the pictures/video to the computer. Tim has been complaining about this laptop for awhile, now I completely understand! You all will just have to use your imaginations as I describe how things are going for all of us.

Things are much better today. Tabitha does know how to smile! She is Daddy's little girl, he's the fun one. She is very good at giving raspberries. It's kind of cute that this loud raspberry comes out of this tiny little girl. We will definitely have to share video of this.

She is not a great eater, although we are getting to eat some. I think that she hates going to sleep so much and knows when her belly gets full, she gets sleepy. We will continue to work on this, I know that it won't happen overnight.

We're here!

I cannot believe that this day has finally come! We are finally in Guatemala to bring our Tabitha home. The foster mother arrived promptly at 5pm as did Stephany. We had met Stephany on our visit trip. She is a nice young lady, a cousin I believe to the fascilitator of our case. She currently is attending the university to become an attorney. She had told us back in May what was going to happen with the adoption scene here in Guatemala. At the time we considered it purely speculation, but what she said has been pretty accurate. We did receive good news yesterday, Tabitha had her 2nd DNA test done! Hopefully the test will get to North Carolina within a couple of days! It usually takes about 8 days to get the results back. The 2nd DNA results is what the US Embassy needs to issue pink. However, we learned that the Embassy is booked solid and they are now issuing appointments for the week after Thanksgiving! Hopefully though, because we are already here, they will have "no shows" and we can get an earlier appointment! We came prepared to stay for awhile and understand that this can be very unpredictable. Please pray that we get an earlier appointment from the Embassy! I'm going to e-mail our Senator and see if he can help in this matter.
Tabitha is a beautiful petite girl. She will be 10 months old on Thursday, but she is only the size of about a 6 month old American baby. Her foster mom seems to have taken good care of her, Tabitha was pretty attached to her. Although Tabitha didn't cry initially, she did spend quite a bit of yesterday evening crying off and on. She would look at me, get that pouty lip and begin to wail! Not how I pictured the first evening with my daughter! I do understand though that she will be grieving for her foster mother. It will take a little time, but I do believe that she will be fine.
I think I may have figured out why she is so tiny. She only eats 2 meals a day, and then only gets about 6 ounces of formula at night. Her foster mom said that Tabitha usually eats cereal and fruit at breakfast, chicken and vegetables at lunch time. When we asked how much formula she drank, she told Stephany that she takes about 5 or 6 bottles a day and the most that she usually drinks is 6 ounces! The most that I've been able to get her to drink is 4 ounces. She is not a big eater--not typical of a Taylor!
According to the foster mother, she does not like to go to bed and fights sleep. I have to agree with that statement! She wants us to hold her continuously and screamed every time that we put her down into the crib. Finally, Tim and I were to tired. I put her in the crib, of course she was trying to stand up and persisted in screaming. I patted her back and she did go to sleep after about 5 minutes.....and she's still asleep. I'm up early because I have not adjusted to the time change and well, I'm still nervous. I think that I might be hungry too! I'll try to post some pictures later today since I know that is what all of you really want to see.

Packing

We leave for Guatemala in 3 days. There is so much to do! Given the fact that we really don't know how long we will be down there, deciding how much to take has been really difficult for me. I've always been an "over packer". But honestly, how much do you take? Tim is set on the idea that we will be doing laundry while we are down there, I prefer to take plenty and not have to worry about doing laundry. However, we are only allowed 2 suitcases a piece and they can't weigh over 50 lbs. Tabitha's suitcase is packed and ready to go. It is amazing how many clothes that little girl has and she isn't even home yet! I had taken most of her 6-9 month sized clothes with us when we went to visit in May and left them there with Tabitha's foster mom thinking that Tabitha would grow and need them. I'm sure the little pant sets that I took have never been worn, as Tabitha is still a tiny little thing. I doubt that I will get any of the things that I left back. So, I went shopping last night at my favorite consignment shop and bought several new things to take. Now, if we do get the clothes back, I'm not sure how I'm going to get them home! Oh well, we'll worry about that later. Back to work!

She's a Taylor officially!

We had been contemplating here recently the possibility of going to Guatemala and waiting out pink. We miss our little girl so much and just want to be with her. However, we both decided that we couldn't/shouldn't go down to Guatemala until we knew that Tabitha was officially ours, no turning back. We didn't want to go until there was a new birth certificate with us listed as her parents. The agency director actually had suggested to our case manager as well that we wait possibly until we have pink or at least until DNA authorization had been done so that we wouldn't be down there forever racking up expenses. Well God had heard our prayers and knows of our pain, because TODAY we received word that there IS a new birth certificate and passport. We are being submitted to the Embassy tomorrow for the 2nd DNA "orange". We couldn't be more excited! We are heading down to Guatemala City this coming Tuesday, November 13th! It won't be long until we are all together as a family forever! To God be the Glory Great Things He Hath Done!

Tears

Yesterday we received a new medical report and pictures of Tabitha. Normally I am elated to receive pictures of our precious little girl, but yesterday I cried. These were not tears of joy, they were tears of worry. You see the medical report stated that she had had poor weight gain. She also has a productive cough and it is obvious that her little nose is plugged and she can't breath through it because her little mouth is open. Thankfully, the pediatrician is going to prescribe something to thin her mucus and it does say that she is healthy. She only gained 5 ounces since her last medical report. She now weighs 14 lb, 12 ounces. She is 9 months, 24 days old! She weighed 14 lb, 7 ounces when she was 7 months, 25 days old! I know that her having a cold could be a reason for poor weight gain, but she is so tiny! I want to so badly just run to Guatemala so that I can take care of her. I've always been a "fixer", I think that's why I became a nurse, so I could "fix" people. I just worry about our baby girl. She's so far away and I can't just go and "fix" her. It is really out of my control, just like everything else throughout this entire adoption process has been. God please watch over her, heal her, enable her to grow and gain weight, keep her safe. I pray that pink is going to come soon!