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Published: October 10th 2010
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Greetings and thanks one last time to all our friends and family that have followed along with us on this amazing journey to find Baby Julia in China and bring her home!
We couldn’t have done it without your support! We are happy to report that despite some recent minor illness with fevers and ear infections, Baby Julia overall continues to do quite well with great weight gain and developmental progress. She has a joyful attitude toward life and a ready smile for her family and anyone she gets to know.
In addition to all this, we have great news about her heart! Many of you know that her medical ‘special need’ as designated by the Chinese orphanage system was a diagnosis of congenital heart disease, specifically a peri-membranous ventricular septal defect (VSD). Upon receiving her, neither my dad nor I could hear anything on her cardiac exam suggestive of a persistent cardiac shunt. (Her heart sounded great so we figured her prior heart problem probably closed up and solved itself without any surgeries or other outside interventions.)
A formal pediatric cardiology consult at the Denver Children’s Hospital just a couple days ago showed that Julia’s heart
has indeed solved its own problems and is now considered ‘perfect’.
We knew her ‘heart’ was perfect in so many ways beyond that of the anatomical, but an echocardiogram confirming flawless blood flow through the physical confines of her little ticker was great news!
She proceeds to make daily strides forward in gross and fine motor abilities, emotional attachment, and in just plain figuring out her new life here in Colorado. She can now pick up small bits of food and feed herself, hold on to the crib railing in a standing position, and clap to amuse herself. She is a joyful little person!
Emma and Joshua continue to be wonderful older siblings to Baby Julia, eager to engage her, excited to see her after school, guiding her play, feeding her at times, but they have wisely and carefully avoided acquiring the skill set for diapering.
Ignorance is bliss. Willful ignorance is clever.
We have tried to settle back into our normal lives this past week as the kids went back to school. If truth be told though, even now we are still working on getting everyone back to a vaguely normal sleep schedule. I
will return to the office on Monday.
As I looked out our kitchen window yesterday, I could see the first dusting of real snow up on the continental divide. There is a morning chill in the air this week and I think we are ready to settle in for cold winter nights under warm blankets in front of the fire with Baby and kids. No more 13 hour plane flights or jet lag.
No matter what though, it is plain to see that our lives will never return to the old normal. The new normal is here to stay and we are so happy to move into our future with the companionship of this wonderful new little person sitting at the center of our family now.
To that end, we celebrate Julia's first birthday tomorrow! With the many transitions and changes of the past month, we are looking forward to a low profile celebration with close family and a chance to sit back and appreciate just how far Baby Julia has journeyed in only her first year of life!
We are blessed beyond measure and we Thank God for all things Good in our lives, most
especially this little sparkling jewel of a human being!
So as we move forward joyfully into our new lives, we will be thinking of you all. Please consider contacting us to visit if you’re in our area. We have so many to thank! Please know our deep sense of gratitude to all those among our family and friends, workmates and colleagues, and all who provided such a wonderful foundation of support to us during the many years of this journey.
I’ll leave you with a few pictures to see Julia’s transformation, comparing her life in the foster care/orphanage system vs. the present now that we’ve had the honor having her in her new forever family for the last 3 weeks.
We will always be grateful to those who played their part in delivering her to us, whether it was the policeman who found her in the train station, the orphanage nannies and staff, or her foster mother. Most especially though, we will
always be indebted to Julia's birth mother who not only brought her into this world but found a way to keep her alive and put her on a path which led this beautiful little girl
Infant Julia in orphanage.
Age: ~3 months.
Photo taken by orphanage staff. Julia is clothed here in traditional over-bundled Chinese baby fashion. This is how all the babies are dressed in the Chinese orphanages, especially during cold winters in the drafty buildings. to our eager home.
JC
PS: Even though this is the 'last' blog entry, I promise to post a few birthday pictures if I can manage to take a couple worthy ones tomorrow!
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Creason Family
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Unsatiable
Love to your beautiful family from the Creasons! Your blog is simply delightful and fantastic! We eagerly await to read more and see more! The pictures are delicious! When you do end up signing off, we may just have to start again at the very beginning ~ like watching your favorite movie over and over. We are overwhelmed with happiness for each of you! Hope Julia's birthday celebration went well and will be eager to hear how Halloween turned out. My, oh my, aren't I envious that it looks as if you already have many, many fantastic options for your Christmas photo!! The Campbells are going to have theirs out and sent much sooner than the Creasons this year! Maybe we need to fly us all to China to get everyone to look at the camera at the same time! Think of you all soo often as our family talks about and constantly remembers you in our prayers as you transition to your new normal and what a blessed one at that! Thank you for sharing the details of your adventure with us and for taking us with you. "Love is in the details" and we're loving reading about each of them. ~ and we love you guys! Love, The Creasons P.S. I smiled when I spotted the EXACT same music toy strapped to Julia's crib that currently is hanging from Tate's crib. All four of our kids LOVE that toy! I think I noticed that you even have the little toy remote tucked in its little fancy back pocket, too. This sneaky back pocket has also doubled as a pouch to protect one's pacifier stash in our house : ) Gotta love the toys that span the time and keep on giving!