Just a little update

Not a whole lot here. We are starting to settle into a routine of sorts though so that's a relief. Igor is now napping at least briefly daily and bedtime has become much easier. He still wakes in the night several times for no apparent reason. The only conclusion we've come up with is nightmares as he's usually very upset and sometime wringing wet with sweat. I hope the dreaming starts settling down as getting up several times a night is wearing on both of us. Luckily Sonny Boy sleeps like a log and never wakes up, but Igor does wake the dog on occasion.

Sitting at the kitchen table and bribing, begging and making airplane sounds has become my new pass time. ANYTHING to get him to eat. We have figured out he'll do anything for a banana so we make him take a bite of food then give him a little chunk of banana. It works sometimes. We do have some issues with texture as they must have never given him anything with chunks of any kind in the orphanage. Currently we have him mostly eating the 3rd foods baby foods, a few of the toddler foods and maybe sometimes a spoonful of whatever we eat. What I don't understand though is even the table food that we feed him that's soft is often refused. I've also seen him gag on chunky applesauce. Thankfully the speech therapy starts next week. I hope she has some ideas and a plan. I did find on the internet a product called Benecalorie that's low volume/ high calorie supplement that you ad to food. It's pretty oily looking but one little container 1.5 oz has 330 calories so we try to get one of those down him a day. We've also been keeping a diary and totalling his calorie intake daily. It's anal but he's so skinny you can see every rib and every knot on his backbone. There's so little body fat there he get's seriously chilled when taken out of the bathtub. Hopefully we can pack a few pounds on him quickly, our bathroom scale says he's gained a pound but it's not the most accurate. I do know his little belly sticks out like he drinks a six pack of beer or so daily now.

This week I made the hard decision not to send Sonny Boy on to kindergarten in the fall. His birthday is in July so it puts him on the young side of his classmates, not to mention I think he needs more time to mature on the social level. I do worry though as I think when he does enter K he'll be bored and be a trouble maker as he's smart as a whip, knows all the letters, counting etc and has even started trying to sound out words. I've discussed it with his preschool teachers and a girl I met this last weekend that is a kindergarten teacher and all seem to think it prudent. Hubby was also pressing for it as well. Sonny Boy wasn't too heartbroken about the whole thing which I'm glad because I thought he was really looking forward to going to big school. I think I'm the only upset as I wanted the free time while he was at school.

Hubby and I are hanging on and exhaustion is our middle names now. Along with not having a full nights sleep in weeks we've taken on our first house project in months and worked the memorial weekend event our civic group puts on. At least one of us was at the fest all weekend and the other with the boys. The house project is now in full swing as I finally convinced Hubby to purchase new bedroom furniture. Since we are finally getting new furniture we are going to put some wiring in our bedroom ( it's an old house with not enough plug ins) hang a ceiling fan, paint etc. Hopefully all before the new furniture is delivered. So today we empytied our dressers and started hauling down the old furniture. It's so pitiful we won't even donate it and have just busted it up for the garbage man to haul away. I'm excited to get a grown up bedroom finally, however I wish one of those designing shows would show up and finish the work. In the meantime we living out of cardboard boxes and will sleep in the guest bedroom. The bad part to the guest room thing is that it's downstairs and Igor is upstairs. Nothing like a groggy climb of stairs a few times a night too.

Well I've rambled enough. Hubby is watching Lost which is my favorite show, however I got LOST when we went to Ukraine and never watched the back episodes and now I don't want to spoil it. I guess I'll either watch it on the net ( yeah like I'll find time for that) or hope the reruns are played in order this summer.

Thanks for the posts!
Winnie

Home One Month Now!!

Wow! I can't believe we've been home a month now. Time has flown, I wish it had gone by this quickly while we were in Ukraine.

Igor is adjusting pretty smoothly though he has some separation anxiety that gets pretty annoying at times - like when I have to go to the bathroom. Generally he's a happy little guy. As you can see from the picture he now sports some cool new glasses. On the rounds of MD's we've been doing the last month, one was to the opthamologist, because we thought a round of surgery was going to be needed for crossed/lazy eyes. However all the crossing was just his best effort at trying to focus his eyes since it appears the poor guy was seriously nearsighted. Since getting the glasses I haven't seen his eyes look crossed yet. Generally he seems to like them however they are the first things flying when he has a temper tantrum. I'm glad they are made out of super heavy duty plastic and are super tough even if they don't rank on the style meter at all. The funniest is the reactions from people when we are out, you'd think he had horns growing out of his head. Kids usually say " Look at that baby with the glasses" and adults ask if they are "real" glasses. Come on, do you really think a toddler would think those glasses with a strap around your head are cool. They are seriously lacking sparkles, Dora, Diego, Teletubbies or Elmo, of course they are real.

Pinning down a routine around here has been difficult to say the least. Naps are either way too short after a lot of begging to go to sleep or non-existent. The last couple of days have been better though so hopefully it's the start of a trend.

After some lab work and experimenting we've come to the conclusion that Igor is lactose intolerant. It does make trying to pack on the pounds somewhat difficult as all the good for you to gain lots of weight foods are full of milk. He also seems to have this built in calorie counter during the day, Igor will eat well up until around 4:00 pm or so and then absolutely refuse to eat any supper. I've tried no afternoon snack, light snacks etc nothing seems to keep him eating in the evening. I pretty sure he hasn't actually eaten what we've eaten for dinner yet. Hopefully this trend will turn around soon as well as it's difficult to watch him not eat a bite of supper at all.

I suppose that's all there is to tell. We are settling in now and starting to adjust. I know my post have been sparse lately. If anyone is even still reading this! I'll try to do better in the future.

Winnie