Introducing... Maella Svetlana Eisenga!!!!

June 20, 2009 - GOTCHA Day!

How do I describe the joy that is in my heart right now? This beautiful child, this angel, our sweetheart...is finally, ours!! We got her already this morning and were back to the apartment by 11am. When we got to the orphanage she was already down for her morning nap, it was about 10:40. They had to wake her up, then they took our going home clothes and put her in them for us. When they brought her down her cheeks were rosy, she looked so precious, a pure angel. She did amazing for our goodbyes and the drive back.

We played for a bit here at the apartment and then I made lunch. I boiled some potatoes and mashed them for her, she also had a beef/tomato base/noodle baby food (I added water so it'd be more like soup... she ate soup daily at the orphanage) and some rye bread. Yep, rye. She ate very good, liked her potatoes best. After lunch we took turns cleaning up and watching her and then she got antsy. We still haven't figured out what it is she needs/wants when she acts that way. For the time being... we thought a change of environment would help. Wow, she liked the grocery store - so many colors and people and food! It was amazing seeing it through her eyes for the first time.

When we came back we had a snack and then watched a little Praise Baby. Our boys loved those DVD's. She sat so sweet on my lap taking it all in. After a bit of that I changed her diaper and then we closed the curtains and I said nap time. You think she understands English for nap? I didn't think so either. So I laid her in the playpen and rubbed her back a bit and then showed her that I was going to lay on the bed too. She played a game for awhile, lay down, stand up and peek over the edge at mom, lay down, kick around and jabber. She did that for about twenty minutes and then her jabbers started to sound a bit less playful. I reached into her playpen from the bed, she rolled onto her tummy, I patted and rubbed her back and twenty seconds later she was sucking her precious fingers, eyes closed, off to dreamland. :o)

We just came in from playing outside and hadn't taken her hat off yet... it was warm and soft!

We're excited that we're finally able to share with you our daughter's birth name, Svetlana. It will be her middle name. I caught myself many times as I wrote these blog entries, having to delete Sveta and retype Maella. Right now we call her Maella here and there, but to get her attention we say Sveta. I have come to love the name Sveta (well I pretty much fell in love with it the second I heard it)! I plan to still call her Sveta at home, it will be something special for her and I. And Ethan to this point has said he likes calling her Sveta, too. :o) Her name Maella comes from two special great grammas, Cora Mae and Ella.

Someone was just begging Daddy to keep playing a tickle game!