Final Pictures

Kariana

Kaleb showing Kariana how its done.

Her pouty lip.



Karian and Grandpa Melcher hanging out.

Grandma Melcher's turn in this one.

4 generations of Drabek women.

She loved this ball. She could even palm it!

Great Grandma Edith meeting Kariana.

Final Post

With a heavy heart I am starting my final post. Have I really been writing this for more than 5 months already?? I have enjoyed recording our journey through this process and from all the comments I have heard, it sounds like many people enjoyed following it. We are fully settling into our new life as a family of 5 and the everyday living is more time consuming that I would have imagined. Its amazing how you adjust and take it all in stride. I was thinking that the other night as I fed Kariana some baby food in the high chair and was helping Kaleb do homework at the kitchen table while overseeing Cohen practise writing his name.

Tomorrow I go back to work for 1/2 days for the next 2 weeks so my maternity leave is officially over today. I cannot believe how my time at home has just flown by. I suppose that is to be expected given how much of my leave was spent in Colombia.

We are back into the mode of diaper bags and baby gear again. When the kids get older, you forget how much stuff you have to take with you to take out a baby! There is baby equipment in every room of the house now and I finally got all the girl clothes donated to us organized and boxed up. Everyone has been so generous once they found out she was coming. I don't think I will have to buy a stitch of clothing for her until she is a teenager!

The boys are still doing great and still lovin' their little sister. We keep waiting for the jealousy to show but so far nothing (knock on wood). I think they are so happy just to have us home again after being apart for so long that they are just to happy to be jealous. Plus, they waited for her to join our family as long as we did so they have been primed for a long time for a little sister. They love seeing her do new things and really like making her smile. They are really proud of her too. They are always telling someone about their new sister from Colombia. Its so cute!

We took Kariana to her doctor's appointment last Friday. Everything went really well although its never fun to see a baby get shots. She got caught up on her 6 month shots that we hadn't gotten in Colombia but the rest of them were all fine (we brought back her immunization chart that showed she had received all the same shots she would have in the states). Since we got her at just over 5 months and didn't get any more shots while we were down there, she hadn't gotten her 6 month shots yet so she got them a few weeks late. They also made a appointment for next week to take a blood draw and get a stool sample to run a series of test to verify that she is truly healthy. They are going to run the newborn screening tests and some other tests just to make sure. I'm going to hate to see my baby in pain from the blood drawn but I know its for the best. She weighed in at 15 lbs, 6 oz (16th percentile), just over 26 inches long (32nd percentile) and she is in the 72nd percentile for head circumference! So I guess she really is a Melcher and she fits right into the rest of the family with her big head! The doctor wasn't worried about any of those stats and is happy with her progress. We discussed her acid reflux and she confirmed it is very common for babies to grow out of that so we are keeping our fingers crossed that is the case and it doesn't rear its head again. We haven't given her medicine in weeks and she is doing great although we do have her on sensitive formula just in case. She finally poked through 2 teeth this week. Of course, I have been thinking they were coming for the last 2 months so I am happy they finally showed up. She may have been a little more fussy than normal but nothing we couldn't handle or even really noticed much so she handled it like a champ. This past week she has really gotten the sitting up thing down really good. She isn't showing any interest in crawling yet but the doctor isn't worried about that so we are enjoying a little more time of immobility. She really seems to be settling in nicely and adjusting well. We are so relieved about that!

Once again, Kerry and I want to thank everyone for their support. We really felt the thoughts and prayers directed towards us and we look forward towards the coming years now that the adoption process is complete.

Thank you!

Signing off,
The Melcher's

Kariana in the Johnny Jump Up-Video

Check out Kariana doing a jig!

Home update - Monday

My first watermelon!

My Aunt Kristine loves me!

Hey! I was here first!

Check out my new hat. Aren't I cute??

Hanging out with Aunt Lynnette this weekend.

Dad is very excited. Kariana is already loving the (plastic) tools!

I am finding it really hard to find time to blog since we got home. I wonder why?? Kariana is meeting new people almost everyday and doing pretty well about it. She isn’t as smiley lately as she was so I think she is becoming a little more cautious about new people. I think my friends thing I was lying about how smiley she was since she is more serious here with them. She is still pretty smiley with us though! She had a good time meeting Grandma and Grandpa Melcher this weekend though. Lots of smiles for her aunts too.

The good news is that she is allowing me to put her down on the floor or in the high chair for up to 15 minutes at a time so that is much improved over that first day. My theory is that we had just gotten home from a long day of traveling and then all the new surroundings were just too much for her that first day. She is doing much better now.

Some things we have noticed about her include her fascination with both the dog and ceiling fans. She just stares at Buster whenever he comes near and follows him around the room with her eyes whenever he is visible. Since she hasn’t been around dogs before, I didn’t think about how she would react to him. Buster has been doing really good around her and I haven’t seen him lick her yet but he has to inspect her and sniff her out whenever she is put on the floor. She of course thinks this is very funny.

She is also fascinated with ceiling fans. Both my boys were taken with them too but she has never seen one before since they don’t have them in Colombia (to cold most of the time). She stares at them even if they aren’t moving! She is totally mesmerized if they are going so we are able to get some stuff done by putting her under one with it on low. The way she holds perfectly still to watch it is just hilarious.

The boys have been awesome big brothers since we got home. In Colombia, they were often right in her face trying to make her smile even though we told them repeatedly they had to back up. Since we got home they are much better about staying back some but they are always talking to her. If I ask one of them to go talk to her so I can make supper, they always agree and they are having a great time ‘teaching’ her how to jump in the Johnny jump up. I think she does more swinging than jumping when they are around but she squeals and giggles so she must love that too. She is really starting to get the hang of it now that she had been in a few days. I had forgotten had they have to kind of learn how to jump in it.

We have her first doctor’s appointment on Friday so we are anxious to see how that goes. She has rarely spit up since we got home and put her on sensitive formula. I have been giving her medicine to her less and less and it isn’t bothering her at all so I am thinking she may have grown out of it some.

I think that is about it for now. She is adjusting as well as we had hoped and we feel so lucky to have her in our lives. Kerry and I want to thank everyone for their thoughts and prayers during this process. Although it could have gone a little smoother, she was totally worth the wait and I know every little bit helped bring her home. Thank you!!

The Melcher’s

Finally home!

Papa and Kariana enjoying some down time in Kansas.

The Melcher and the Hutching kids showing off thier Colombia soccer jerserys.

Proud cousin Austin holding Kariana.

Another shot of the Melchers and the Hutchings.

We got to Kansas about 8:30 pm on Friday and Kariana instantly cuddelled right up to great grandpa Leo. She really knows how to wrap them around her little finger!

Our first time in the Johnny-Jump-Up!

The family reunion at the MSP airport.

Sorry this post is late in coming but it was a whirlwind couple of days after we landed on Wednesday evening and then we left for the Priebe Labor Day events in Kansas so I haven’t had much time to do anything.

Kariana travelled like a champ on Wednesday. We got through all the lines at the Bogota airport in record time since I had a baby. One of the things that Colombia does really well is give priority to people with children. There are separate lines for those people at the airport and other places they are given priority. We flew through everything and Kariana was great. My only problem all day was trying to make her bottles while in the middle seat (both flights), with one hand, and very little room. I guess the other problem I had was Kariana filling her diaper and the guy beside me sawing logs so I couldn’t get out. I finally had to wake the poor guy since she was smelling up the area only to discover that the plane didn’t have a diaper changing station. Although the flight attendants tried to help, I ended up having to change her on the floor in the back of the plane. At least Kariana thought it was funny because she kept squealing the whole time.

After we arrived in Atlanta, we got sent to ‘the room’ for immigrants where all the workers proceeded to fuss over her, smiling and cooing. We were in and out of there in no time with no problems. I confirmed she was a U.S. citizen when we touched down in the states and her citizenship card would be sent to us in a few weeks. Yeah!!!

We finally touched down in Minneapolis and hurried to the baggage claim area where we finally got to see our guys for the first time in over 4 weeks. The reunion was awesome. It was so great. The boys were just over the moon at seeing me and wanting to hold Kariana immediately and seeing Kerry was worth the wait. None of us could stop smiling, Kariana included.

Thursday the boys begged to stay home with me so I caved and let them even though I had a ton of stuff to do before the weekend. However, Kariana was having a little problem adjusting to her new surroundings and refused to let me set her down for more than 3 minutes or she started screaming. Hopefully that doesn’t last long! So Thursday didn’t go quite as I had planned but we still took off on Friday for Kansas where we had a great time showing off our new addition and watching her charm everyone just like she did in Colombia. Even though she was passed around for 3 days straight, she hardly fussed and smiled through it all.

We are so blessed!!!!
The Melcher’s