Every so often, I enjoy updating my blog on how little Erik is doing. Yes, I know I haven't blogged in AGES (though I have a very, very, very long blog post I've worked on about my illness but now I'm thinking I may not post it - I don't know if anyone is interested), but I loooove bragging on my little guy so here it is:

This is what I wrote a year ago about what Erik could and couldn't do when he first came home. I thought I might as well copy it so that memory wouldn't skew the facts:

When we first met him, at age 5:
• He couldn't walk one step without a death grip on both of our hands.
• He grunted a deep grunt, like a growl. He verbalized, but not much.
• He could not feed himself, nor did he want to.
• He drank out of a bottle.
• On one of our first visits, he grabbed a leaf off of a bush and ate it - something he wouldn't do today, and a story we still laugh about because it shocked us so much!
• If you sat him someplace, such as on a blanket on the floor, he would NOT move from that spot. You had to pick him up and place him somewhere else.
• He would not reach for a toy - he loved to LOOK at toys, but no touching or holding. And certainly no playing! He had no idea what toys were or that they were for fun.
• He would happily watch the heavy "snow" on the orphanage TV, even though images weren't very easily seen at all. (Why they even had that on, I have no idea.)
• He was happy to be alone, to sit or lie down and rock, rock, rock.
• He shook with fear with every new situation. For example, we gave him a little toy that played classical music, and though he loved listening to it, he would shake and quiver the whole time.
• He could only eat pureed food, or else it would get stuck going down and he'd scream and cough until he either swallowed it down the rest of the way, or he got it up.
• He had absolutely no clue about anything having to do with ADL's (dressing, bathing, etc.).

This is what he looked like, shortly before we adopted him, at age 4 3/4:
Two and a half years later at 7 1/2, he is THRIVING! He is clearly attached to his home and family and apparently really, really missed me when I was sick and hardly saw him for a couple of weeks. He acted out a LOT and gave my poor family and my mom a really hard time... Then, when I started joining the family at the dinner table again, not even really paying attention to him cause I still felt SO LOUSY, he got so happy and was happy ever since. :o) That did this mom's heart good. Okay--! Here are some bullet points as to how he is doing NOW:

• He still doesn't talk, but there are times when I think, "He's gonna say it...!! He's gonna say it...!!" He gets this look in his eye, but then it doesn't surface. Still waiting...

• He is still signing, though he only has a few more words. HOWEVER, just in the last week or two, he has shown a much greater interest in signing and, when motivated to say something, he learns it almost with only one or two prompts! I.e. the "bus". He simply LOVES the bus (he's all boy!) and likes to "talk about" the bus. I think we are on the verge of seeing lots more signing coming from him. Yay!
• He has this funny little run that he does in his low-tone sort of way - when he's excited (it doesn't take much!) he waggles his arms all crazy and does this "slap foot" sort of run and it is the funniest thing to watch! It makes me chuckle just sitting here writing about it.
  
• He follows directions SO much better than he used to, and LOVES to be a "helper"! He loves to put his dirty clothes in the basket, carry his socks to the table in the morning where I can help put them on, and put his spilled food back onto his plate at dinner. After pottying now, he can often do THREE things without ANY cueing - flush, put the lid down, turn out the light! YAY!
• He has also turned a corner in school - I went up there the other night for a conference and was ASTONISHED at what the teacher told me!! She said he could identify his written name (amongst other names), he could match letters 1 - 10 (even in different size and type!), and was beginning to sight read other words!! Whoo hooooo!!! I was VERY happy to hear this, as these are things we didn't necessarily see at home. He is in a VERY good classroom (albeit without practically ANY technology, which I think he would really respond to...) and has a GREAT teacher and GREAT aides!!
• He still has lots of "stimming" behaviors - pretty much the same ones: staring at his hands, chewing on things, tapping to hear the noise, etc. Oh, well...
• He apparently was having some problems with a bacterial infection awhile back (and probably ever since Ukraine...!) but some simple antibiotics have cleared it up! He hardly EVER "chokes" on his food anymore and he eats all kinds of textures of foods (except lettuce type foods - he doesn't like that). He eats almost ANY KIND OF FOOD you could think to give him, except lettuce or other leafies. He is a GOOOOOOD eater!!!! WOW!
• He's still not too crazy about the dogs, but they love him because he is a good provider of all things delicious.
• When we got him, he weighed 25 pounds if he weighed an ounce, and now he is almost 40 pounds. He's also gotten TALL!! He is still skinny, but nicely filled out. :o) Of course, sometimes his belly looks like he has swallowed a basketball, and it's perfect for poking. ;op
• I love you so much, Erik!!
  

Here is a current photo of him, that I think is particularly cute:

Now that Erik has been home for over 2 years, we can now say we have "traditions" with him. For example, this is his 3rd October with us, so it is now "tradition" that we visit the Methodist church's pumpkin patch and get pictures of Erik each year. Here he was on the very first October that he was here (he was home for just over a month at this time):

Fast forward to the next year - what progress!! Look! He's sitting by a pumpkin without screaming!! Yay, Erik!! And look - he has HAIR and is smiling!! :oD

Didn't sleep well last night, thinking about Mr. Pound Puppy! Up early this morning with my laptop and one eye open, looking at different dog sites. When we were looking into Newfoundlands, I found this site: K9 Carting and was really excited about getting a cart for the dog to pull Erik around. Great exercise for the dog, great fun for Erik, great bonding for both of them together! But when I thought about a lab pulling, I was sort of let down... Labs are waterdogs and retrievers, not working dogs... Can a lab pull a cart??

I e-mailed the manufacturer and asked.

In the meantime, I looked again at the photos, and sure enough, there were photos of labs pulling carts. Wouldn't that be COOL if it worked out?? What a fun thing! It would probably motivate me to get out there too and walk, as I'd have to walk the dog on lead while it pulled, as Erik would not be able to control it just yet - he wouldn't have a clue about that sort of thing for awhile. We could even put little Mary on the seat with him! What a riot!

If anyone has any knowledge of dog cart-pulling, would you please tell me your experience? Thanks!

Okay, for those of you expecting big news, sorry! But for those of you who know Erik and know how important each little thing is that he does, read on!!

Lately, Erik has been making HUGE strides. I give the credit to the gingko biloba that he gets everyday, now. Those of you who know him, know that for the first full year he was here, he really didn't progress too much. He DID start walking, and started feeding himself, but other than that, not too much. VERY small things. Well, lately, it's almost daily that he does something new!

Today, I was sitting in the computer room, and I heard a bunch of sloshing. Sure enough, he had found my big 44 oz. diet coke in the styrofoam cup in the kitchen that Mark had brought me, and instead of drinking from it, he actually brought it to me and signed, "please drink"!! But get this-- I then told him to go get his cup from the kitchen, and sort of gestured so, and he DID!!! He brought me the cup!! Now, I don't normally let him drink soft drinks, but I HAD to reward this behavior, so I filled his cup (that had about 1" of water already in it) and added another inch or so of diet coke to it (yuck!!). He took it, finished it and brought it back for more!

This is a big deal because 1) he brought me my big cup (without spilling or dropping it) rather than just helping himself and 2) he actually went back to the kitchen to get his sippy cup to bring it to me!

Like I said, if you don't know us, you might be expecting a lot, but if you do know us, you know why I'm so pleased! :o)



P.S. He handed his empty cup back to me again, and I told him no. I gave the cup to Nikolai to fill with water, which he did, then Erik came back AGAIN with the cup filled with water so I could pour more coke into it! He's THINKING!!! :oD

Remember the old days when folks went on vacation and invited their friends and neighbors over to watch 1500 slides of every single minute thing they did? Well, now we have BLOGGING!! The modern way to bore our friends and neighbors! The best part is, you don't have to look if you don't want to (I'll never know!), and it's such a chore uploading photos to this blog that there will be about .5% of the amount of pictures shown that were actually taken! :o) Do I hear any cheering out there??

Reese, Erik, Nikolai and I drove 24 hours over 2 days from FL to Reinbeck, IA, where my parents and grandparents and great-grandparents all are from and where both of my grandmothers and several aunts and uncles still live. When I was a kid, my brother Mike and I used to get sent up there most summers, and we spent many Christmases there, too. To us, Reinbeck and the surrounding areas were the best places to vacation in the world. As an adult, I lived there with my kids, but it didn't last too long (see post from July 4, or so) before we relocated to FL. Anyway, I hadn't visited IA for about 4 years at this point so the kids and I were very excited to go! As a bonus, my mom and stepdad were also going to be there (from Seattle)!!

Here's how we spent our time from July 3 - 9: