It's been 6 months...

Oh my goodness, time seems to be going by so fast! Hannah has been home for 6 months and is 19 months old. Crazy. We are so thankful to the Giver of life for many things that have happened around here in the last few months. Hannah's surgery went well and she is fully recovered and healed. I looked in her mouth the other day and her palate looks great, like most people probably wouldn't be able to tell it was surgically repaired. The recovery process was ROUGH the first 2 weeks due to pain and discomfort, which interfered with her eating. And she loves to eat. She would put a bite in her mouth and tears would stream down her face, so she'd spit it out then repeat. It was so hard to watch. It also caused a setback with her sleeping at night and we had a few weeks of lots of waking up during the night. But that has started to get better again, thank goodness. Now that her palate is closed she is able to suck from straws and use sippy cups that have the valves in them. She is also making all sorts of sounds she couldn't before, like smacking he and buzzing her lips. She makes the s and sh sounds now, which I totally didn't expect. We are working on p and b sounds with her private speech therapist, a.k.a. mama. She likes to point out if I have a zit and tries to say "bump", which is great practice for our target sounds : )
Throughout her recovery I often thought of Psalm 139 and how fearfully and wonderfully made we are, especially when I watched Hannah basically relearn how to drink and eat in like 4 hours. And then I listened to David Platt preach on this passage in a sermon about unborn children and abortion. I was listening driving in my car as he talked about the Creator "knitting us together in our mother's womb", and being "intricately woven together by Him". As I listened I caught a glimpse in my rear view mirror of my beautiful, happy daughter dancing to yo gabba gabba and was just overwhelmed with tears and thanksgiving. Oh how I wish I could hug tight her birth mother for choosing life for this girl! And when I think about God knitting her together I love that He made her cleft lip and palate. Because to many this is an imperfection, it is her "special need", but to God it is part of a perfect plan "written in His book the days that were formed for us when yet there were none of them "(v. 16) You see, Jason and I checked the box that cleft lip and palate was a need we were open to on our application. We both knew in our hearts the daughter we adopted would have cleft lip and palate.  When we saw her picture and description just a little over a year ago, her "special need" is one of the reasons we pursued adopting her and because of our backgrounds also part of why we were chosen to be her family. And so in my tiny, finite mind I imagine God forming her and as He left those muscles in her mouth and lip unjoined He knew the role her little "imperfection" would play in creating our family as He had ordained. Looking back at all the details and steps that God ordained to create our family reminds me of the sovereignty of God when sometimes my faith is weak.
One of the most awesome things that has happened in the last 6 months is that we have experienced our daughter go from moody and just tolerant of us, to trusting that we would care for her, to liking us, to truly loving us. Yes, I can tell that she loves us now and it is a wonderful feeling. I can tell by the way she looks at us, the way she hugs and kisses us, the way she lets me hold her and just rests her head on my shoulder, the way her eyes light up when daddy comes home, the way she yells "MAMA" when she can't find me. I finally got to finish the new Greys just a few minutes ago and while I don't usually relate to much on that show, the final quote from Meredith actually spoke quite loudly to me. She said "you think that true love is the only thing that can crush your heart, the thing that will take your life and light it up, or destroy it. Then, you become a mother." So true!
Another praise is that I have been cancer free for 2 years! I had an MRI a month or so ago and it came back normal. Yay! And lastly, if you read my last post about some prayer requests in the adoption world, lots of families got news in the last month. Korea approved some families for EP. The Comptons have heard that their case is being worked on, the Hepinstals received their travel call, and the Bices are coming home from Korea with their daughter tonight. It will be our first airport party and we our pumped!! Welcome home Daria!
Random pictures:

Decided last week that she needed a paci. Has never wanted it before, maybe its because of her new mouth situation. But she is serious about it!

After a morning at gymboree class.

On the one year anniversary of being matched as family. She's holding her referral picture.

Roll Tide!

Daddy took Hannah to meet Yo Gabba at ToysRus

Loves bathrobes. For me and her.



Flipped the Kai Lan car. First wreck, no injuries.



 Love,
Liz