02/14/2008 10:00am Kramatorsk

Today the Ficken family is going to be a family of FIVE! Dave and Beverly will welcome little Lillia as the newest member of their family, and Lillia is getting two of the sweetest people as her new parents! Lillia is 3 Ѕ yrs old and is VERY talkative. I can’t wait to see her in about 6 months when all those words are in English and we can know what she’s saying! The Fickens used to live in Tampa and would come to Titusville to watch the shuttle and to Daytona races, so it has been funny talking about home. They actually know a little about where we live! Also, their oldest daughter had heart issues (TOF) and had her surgeries at St. Joseph’s hospital in Tampa. Brianna’s surgery was supposed to be there until the last minute when she was moved to All Children’s Hospital in St. Petersburg. Just one more “small world” circumstance!
We have had a pretty low-key time the last few days with the kids. Emma is wearing out really quickly. Yesterday morning she was really sweaty (so was I) but in the evening she seemed fine. She LOVES the swing, especially when it spins a little. She sits in there and just GIGGLES! On the floor she hasn’t been getting around much except for rolling the last few visits but we’ve also had to stay in the special needs area several times lately, so she hasn’t had as much time on the floor to play. She definitely has MUCH better head control than she did just a week and a half ago and her trunk control is improving as well. If only we could get those legs and hips stronger just as fast! All in time… Emma loves clapping games and singing. She let me rock her and sing to her yesterday. Sometimes she ‘hummms’ along, but she’ll also just listen. She learned to clap during one of our first visits and likes to use our hands to clap as well. Yesterday we did “trot trot to Boston”- which is a little poem where the child bounces on your knees, facing you, then at the end dips back or falls in between your legs- and she LOVED it. She likes to put her head backward and see things from a different perspective. She’s actually pretty goofy about it and we generally try to keep her from doing it because we don’t want her flopping backward when we’re carrying her.
Little Micah is still a little love. He likes to cuddle and be held, but he’ll roll around a little to see what he wants to see when he’s on the floor too. He loves to watch people. If there’s anything going on in the room his eyes are on it. You can tell he’s taking everything in! He is ticklish under his chin if you just touch him gently we almost always get a tiny smile. But then his little smile instead of turning to a laugh it usually scrunches up and he looks like he’s about to wail. I wonder why this is, but I guess we’ll find out in time. I know he’s not hurting in any way, but he does this a lot. I’ve yet to hear him REALLY cry. He’s scrunched up his little face and squeaked out some noise, but no real noises. He’s smiled longer and gotten a little giggle out without the sour face a time or two but not often. I think Micah christened me as “his” yesterday when he returned his entire feeding to my shirt. You know you’re a mommy when your kid throws up on you and you remember only when you are getting together with company and you realize you still smell like spit-up a few hours later. Oh well…
Yesterday we found 3 little toy stores that are nearby. Two have strollers, so we finally found somewhere we can buy one. They also had mobiles for cribs so we bought two and asked the caretakers last night to put them up on Emma and Micah’s cribs. They seemed ok with that idea so I’m hoping to find that they did today. If I can find a way to ask I want to find out how many other kids they have there right now so we can get a few more. Emma and Micah loved them when they were watching me put them together! The other older kids in the playroom enjoyed winding them up for us too .
We’re off to visit with the kids, I hope everyone has a wonderful Valentine’s day!