a year later...

We've been thinking quite a bit about our time in Ukraine a year ago. We tried to read our blog entries every day a year later in order to relive the experiences a bit. With a bit of distance, it still amazes us how well things went. As we predicted when in Ukraine, we are now pretty nostalgic about much of it. And how could we not be? It now feels like a marvelous adventure where we got to know our daughter a bit before bringing her home. Although I (Darren) am occasionally accused of living more in the past than in the present, these days it is pretty easy to be in the now. Frankly, life is pretty good.
Shona here now. Ivanna has continued to grow (she's 6 inches taller than a year ago), learn and blossom into an even more delightful little girl. We continue to just revel in the fact that she is our daughter. What a gift she is to us and we continue to be so grateful and thankful. We have spent the last few months doing much of the same. It's amazing how little time there is between breakfasts, playing, snack, playing, lunch, nap, reading books, snack, playing, walking to pick up Daddy at work, supper, and bedtime. We've had many playdates and suppers with friends and more playdates. We went as a family with Ivanna's buddy, Natalie and her family to Fairmont for week in March. 4 adults and 3 children under 3 in a 7 seater minivan, and all went surprisingly well. The kids did marvelously with the long drives and we all had a relaxing time there. I (Shona) did about 2 months of working 2 days a week, to help out at my workplace and Ivanna did well with being away from her Mama - getting to spend time with her nana, papa, and daddy helped. Ivanna and I accompanied Darren on a work trip to Waskesiu in June and we stayed for a brief family vacation overnight (we would have stayed longer, but the weather was cold and rainy). We've also just come back from a weekend up in Nipawin visiting Ivanna's Great Grandma and Grandpa (Darren's Grandparents) and discovered just how light sensitive our daughter is for sleeping as it doesn't get dark up there until after 10PM...not good...but a great visit nonetheless. Our plans for the summer are to spend as much time outside in the parks as possible, go to family camp at Oshkidee and try some camping (likely later in the summer when it gets dark sooner!)
We've just celebrated Ivanna's 3rd birthday. Wow. We have a 3 year old! We had her party at a local indoor pool (the weather was too threatening to have a pool party, as planned, at Nana and Grandpa's) and true to Ivanna's interests, when it came time for her to blow out her candles, she threw a little fit, and said 'no cake' and promptly jumped back into the pool...not caring that neither parent was near. She loves the water and would much rather play than eat sweets! Eventually we convinced her to come out and blow out the candles and at least the other kids got some cake! Anyway, that's our update...we'll post pictures soon :)

Some more pics...

Ivanna loves chocolate like her mom!

'Helping' to decorate the Christmas tree

Out for a walk on the riverbank

First time skating

Talking on the phone (or calculator)

Holding baby 'Seal' (Theo)

Winter fun

So much for updating each month...

What is new?

Ivanna has two new cousins (Theo - born to Tanis and Jonathan Jan31, and Jonathan - born to Val and Jason Feb8). We are thankful for good health all around. She is quite entranced with the new babies and likes to hold and kiss them. Although her attention span for them is still short and she quickly moves on to other interests! She has been playing alot more with her 'baby' (doll) since they have come along. Her own baby seems to be called 'baby Theo' but we'll have to see if that sticks now that baby Jonathan is also around. Initially she had trouble with Theo's name and when she talked about him, she'd say 'baby seal...arf, arf arf - with the hand motions and everything. It was pretty cute. After Jonathan's arrival, we told her she had another new baby cousin and that we were going to meet him. We told her his name was 'baby Jonathan'. She has since deduced that he is 'baby uncle' (as she has an uncle Jonathan!). It's been pretty consistent so far and makes us giggle. Oh how the mind of a toddler works!

Other than the new arrivals, there is not much new or exciting around here. Christmas was alot of fun - overwhelming at times...but fun. It was really quite a special time for us - especially when we thought about last Christmas (we had heard just before Christmas that we had to redo most of our dossier and were feeling pretty discouraged, frustrated and sad). This year, Darren had the time off work and only did a little work on final revisions of his dissertation (which he defended before Christmas), so we spent lots of time together and with family and friends.

It will be a year at the end of February since we heard of our appoinment date. It is really hard to believe that we have been home as long as we have and that Ivanna has done so well. She has grown a full 3 inches since June and seems to be feeding up for another growth spurt. While she continues to have moments (and sometimes entire days) that are trying for her parents as she behaves like any two year old - most of the time she is a truly delightful little girl. Regardless of her behaviour, we love her very much and feel very blessed. Her language is coming along and she continues to display alot of physical gifts and skills. She's beginning to be more interested in story books (as opposed to picture dictionary-type books which she loves), but still hasn't shown much interest in TV (OK with us!). We are doing both her music and gymnastics classes again this term and she continues to love both. We've gone swimming fairly regularly with Val, Jason and their kids and she really ought to have gills. She still has no fear and thinks she can swim (not a great combo right now - we have to watch her closely!)

Shona is starting to look at return-to-work options and we are thinking about childcare options. Crazy. Darren submitted his dissertation last month and is waiting on bound copies (yay.). He has settled into his work pretty well. We are really glad to have our Fridays together (he's working 80%).

We are looking forward to somewhat more temperate weather in the spring and summer as the last few weeks have been extra frigid and make it impossible for us to get outside even to play for a few minutes (-45C with the windchill is just too cold!!!) and Ivanna really does love to be outside. We've managed to get her out skating once (she lasted about 10 minutes!) and shovelled out her swing set so she could swing on one of the nicer days (yes, she still loves to swing!) but other than that it's mostly 'run, run run' (to and from house/car) and 'leave your mitts on...it's too cold to take them off ' (do all toddlers ALWAYS take off their mitts?)! Her love of wearing skirts and dresses are also a challenge when it's this cold!

We do plan to continue updating periodically, but have obviously failed miserably with the monthly updates! Reminders do help to get us going!