We are tired :l

So I have been meaning to blog.  I have had lots of excuses involving no new pictures to show you....so here are some older pictures.  But I will give you the current update.

I have titled this post we are tired because we are, Simon is sleeping great but we as a family are ready for bed at 9:30 nightly.  This is very unusual for Jon and I and tonight we asked ourselves, is this still jet lag or is this having 2 kids.  We don't have an answer on that yet.

On Monday Simon saw the pediatrician, that appointment went about how we expected it.  We have a lot of specialist to see, eventually. :)  On Tuesday we went to the heart doctor.  I was so impressed with their office.  I could tell that they read my letter that I wrote to prepare them for Simon's size and condition.  They were so respectful and loving to our whole family.  Simon impressed us all with his ability to let them do their tests.  He laid on the table very nicely for a really long time.  The doctor explained his condition of tetralogy of fallot in very understandable language and told us that the repair that was done in Bulgaria was GOOD :)  YEAH!!!  We had heard that before but hearing it in our own mother tongue helped!  Eventually Simon might need some work on his heart but he doesn't need anything right now, and that is good news!

We already have an appointment with an eye doctor set up, since Simon had corrective surgery on one of his eyes in Bulgaria.  We look forward to that appointment because it seems as though his other eye is now cloudy, we think he might need that eye operated on as well.  Since we think that might be an operation I was hoping to get his teeth checked before that appointment because I expect they will want to put him under for dental work.  I was very surprised to be able to get into the dentist of my choice next Friday, so we look forward to that appointment.  Everyday I am scraping new layers off of his teeth, yet the bad breath remains, and oddly it smells like someone who has been smoking weed. (very odd).

Simon has, up until today, been eating very well for us.  Today however, he became picky.  We are still working through this issue but he still got over 1,000 calories in today so we aren't too worried yet.  We have become master puree people, although we still have some work to do.  Simon has been getting mostly fresh fruit mixed with protein powder, SP complete (a meal replacement powder full of nutrition), water and coconut oil.  We LOVE thick-it, it is an amazing product.  I can make any liquid into a pudding and add 30 calories.

Well, there is the brief update. We will try to keep updating you all along the way, and for goodness sake, take some pictures and video!!!!

Thanks friends. Keep praying for us and for the children left behind....they need families....could you adopt?????  (I tend to think you could!)

super dad, has Simon in a sling.  This photo was taken in Bulgaria, the last day we walked around with Simon.

We stopped at this resturante for desert, but they didn't have any.  We asked for water and got club soda, but hey at least we got to feed Simon. AND get some great colorful photos.

His first ice cream experience.....very graphic :)

gotta love this face.

his eye lashes get all the compliments. 

Sofia Tourism

If you are looking for a Simon update....sorry, this post is to document our amazing Sunday in Sofia.  (this was our second day of toursim, the day before we picked up Simon!)  I must say, we took full advantage of our tourism days, thanks to our new friends in Sofia, Jennifer and Cameron!!!  We set off that morning around 11:30 I believe.  We are slow to rise people and we were still resting up from the travel.  Breakfast ends a little later on the weekend so we took full advantage of the free coffee, and had leisurely chats about our plans.

We decided to take a taxi to the museum, while we waited for Cameron to get home from church.  Then he was going to take us up the mountain.  There is a mountain in Sofia called mt Vitosha, we had heard it was beautfil and Cameron offered to take us up.  So we said, YES!  The cab from the hotel cost about 13 leva. Then we paid 10 leva a piece to get into to the museum.  It was worth EVERY penny. :)

So our first thought about the outside?  Well, it looks like a prison. :)  We were dropped at the bottom outside the gate.  We bought our tickets and started our walk up.  The view of the mountain from here was beautiful.  All along the sides were stone artifacts. Like a piece of a temple from Corinth.  I kept thinking, if this is what they keep outside, what the heck do they keep inside?  ;)1

We walked in the entryway and through miming, broken English and some experience, we found that in order to take pictures you have to pay 10 leva per camera...and we were glad that we did.  She told us to walk up the stairs and this is what we found.

WOW, what a place.  So we remembered part way through that our tour guide, Cameron, had told us the day before that this museum, was built by the communist dictator as his PALACE.  So this whole place seemed really irrie to me.  History can be very haunting at times...and this was one of those times.  These rooms were HUGE and amazing....but while this man ruled from his BEAUTIFUL PALACE, people were starving.....

 Above is a side view, meaning we walked up those stairs on the left from the front door.  Straight ahead you see one of the rooms with an exhibit.  They were divided by time period mostly. And there were huge doors into each side.

Here is a bigger view.  The ceiling was crazy.

Yet not quite as intense as this ceiling.  GOOD GRIEF, check out the size of that chandelier and those curtains.  This room was centered, overlooking his courtyard, with HUGE fountains (unfortunately they wren't turned on. 

these uniforms really creeped me out.  I just kept thinking, these are from the days when people really killed each other, like kinda face to face like.  No planes, or grenades, just one shot guns and spears.

Ruins....there are places to go in this country to see some amazing history.  This caption was in Bulgarian only...so...we aren't sure what this is.

me and a large chair.  We recognized this from the inside of churches, those churches that we whose insides we were unable to photo document :)

Pretty flowers outside the museum.  We had a bite there...it was kind of a sausagey thing on a bun and then a big water, 2 bags of processed snacks for about 10 leva, very cheap lunch for 3 people!

Here is the view from the back of the museum...there were steps up to more beauty.

Lots of places have playground equipment for the kiddos.  Gas stations, restaurants and this museum!  So Rachel and I took a swing for this photo!

Here is the back of the museum.  Can you imagine this being your house??? 

this was really old...stone something.  Sorry my history isn't so great!

check out this mask!

those doors are HUGE!

Costumes were on display upstairs.  

this map showed regional costumes based on what that region did for a living/exports.

For all those unfamiliar with the eastern orthodox church...these types of alters were inside of all the churches as well.  They would be in-front of the "holy of hollies".  Only the priest would be walking back there.  Those are icons of saints all over it.  Inside of the churches, there is a special place for the saint the church is named after.  I am not an expert, of course, this one looks a bit different...could be a special one.

Outside was a helicopter...we didn't get a close look.  

Next we went to Mt. Vitosha...it was very pretty.

Here we are by a stone river...very cool...very big.

Big rocks!

my on the rock pose.

pretty view from up the mountain.

So we drove up the mountain, stopped at the stone creek, and then got back in the car.  There was a parking lot by a restaurant and a bunch of people recreating.  It was pretty cool.

Here we are walking along the hiking paths on the mountain.

A quick picture on our walk.  Jonathan, Cameron and Rachael.

This was a cute waterfall by a little bridge.  A "senior picture" moment.  :)

YES!  

We found a little look out to see the city.  It makes me want to yell, "SERDICA!!!"

Loving my hubby's new camera and his photography "fixation".

Pose for the camera, Anna.

Us and Sofia.  What a great trip!

A view of the top from where we stood.

These siblings remembering their childhood in the mossy Northwest of the states.

Cameron's son and another missionaries son, they loved hanging out with Rachel.  They also loved picking up sticks.

car ride

We learned a lot of culture, especially about Gypsys/Roma people from our friends.  This is the top of a dumpster.  If someone is throwing out food that is fairly good, they will leave it on top so when Roma people come by to dig in the trash, they don't have to...it is right on top.  

On our way to dinner with our friends we stopped for a picture of this building.  It was built as a daycare, but something happened and it couldn't be opened as a daycare.  Now it is just a really cool apartment building.

We were a little fried out at this point.  So I tried my hand at night photography...it didn't work.  Anyway, the restaurant we went to had a very very big and nice play area for the kids, with beautiful outdoor patio seating for the parents.  It was super cool.  We need more of these in the states.  When I tried to describe this restaurant to our translator, she said, yes all restaurants have those....and I said, really?


Okay well that catches you up on our Sunday in Sofia.  It isn't likely that I will get to blog more before we fly home tomorrow.  Sorry, but you can check back for more updates once we get Simon home.  Please pray for our flight....it is a long one.

All the surprises

It is amazing to me that just yesterday we picked Simon up from Pleven.  So much has happened in such a short period of time!  First off, I would like to say that your prayers must be working because everything is going wonderfully.  While things are going really well, I still find myself very very tired.  It is hard to not really know what Simon is thinking or really how to fully take care of him.  I find it very challenging to always be asking myself what it means when he makes a certain face, or whether or not we should feed him more or if we should do something about the fact he has not yet had a bowel movement in our presence.  It is hard to not know your child.  It is not unlike when the midwife handed me Ishmael--my first thought was you are going to trust me with him?  Then, wait you are leaving?  You are leaving him with me?

Jon and I talked today about how glad we are that this is our second time at parenthood.  We aren't freaked out by our urges to make sure he is still breathing at night. :)  We aren't thinking when we take him out of the hotel that someone is going to run us down. (we remembered when we drove Ishmael in the car for the first time how freaked out we were that someone was going to hit us!  Suddenly my petal-to-the-metal hubby was going 25 all over town!)

Anyway, enough of my rambling, you want to know how Simon is doing!  Well, he is doing great!  He is eating like a champ! We do think that sometimes he eats more slowly if he doesn't like what we are giving him.  Too bad we really want to give him the specialized formula we brought for him because he doesn't seem to like it a whole lot :)  (It is SO WEIRD to be feeding a child baby food again :))  We gave him a bath last night and he smells so much better.  I stopped at a pharmacy and bought q-tips and I was able to clean out his belly button and he was laughing today while I tried to brush his teeth.  LAUGHING. He thought I was playing with him. It was still a struggle to get him to open his mouth and then he would bite down on the tooth brush to stop me from brushing.  But I was able to rinse out a few things out of there....and his breath smells SLIGHTLY better.    

We have been feeding him in the stroller because we know that is what he is used to and we think we have figured out that he shows a lot of ticks when he wants us to move him into a new position.  He likes to lay on the bed in the hotel room and Jon has been cuddling with him in bed a lot.  Jon has also been doing daddy kinds of things, like throwing a blanket in his face, and tousling his hair roughly and honking his noise.  Simon has LOVED all of these things and has been laughing and smiling a lot.  I think he also likes laying on Jon's chest and feeling it rumble when he talks or laughs.  They seem to be bonding really well, I think Simon likes having a dad!

Today I was amazed when we decided to take him on a walk.  I wanted to put him in the Boba carrier, but I also wanted to bring the stroller along because I figured he wouldn't let me carry him for long.  Jon wanted to get some more pictures of the Nevski church at sunset and then at night.  So we set off in that direction.  We walked for 30-45 minutes.  Simon LOVED being in the carrier.  He relaxed and cuddled up to me and smiled and smiled.  After the sunset photos, we had dinner at a restaurant right by the church and then I put him back in the sling while we watched Jon get the night time photos.  When we got into the taxi I unclipped the back of the carrier and he stayed right against me for the entire ride to the hotel.  I think he would have fallen asleep on me!  AMAZING.  I am starting to think that sometimes he ticks a lot because he WANTS to be touched and WANTS attention.  We had prepared ourselves that he might need lots of space and push us away, but he seems to want us next to him... A LOT. :)  So thank you for the prayers and God bless his baba!!

So....we do have a couple of things that you could pray for him.  While we gave him his bath, he just let us...he kind of stiffened up and let us give him a bath.  So the bath was difficult only because it is hard to not feel like you might break him....this feeling is much more than just caring for a baby...Simon is so SMALL.  If you know the Keyzers you know that we joke about them having no butt....Simon takes that to a new level.  :(  After we got him out, I tried to snuggle with him in the towel, but he didn't seem to like it; then I went to put on his diaper and he was LOCKED up.  He wouldn't move or put his legs down, it was really hard to get that diaper on.  Speaking of diapers, we bought the wrong size.  Simon is 9 kg.  So I bought 7-14 kg diapers and they keep falling off of his butt (again, the no butt problem).  Today I bought some 3-6 month diapers. They fit really well.  I hope they don't leak--they aren't made for an 8 year old's urine.

I also feel blessed because he slept through the night last night.  He hasn't been taking naps, but we still lay him down to give him a break if he needs it.  We really messed around his sleep "schedule" which the orphanage gave us, but we figure, we are going to be flipping his whole life around soon, so what the hey. Last night he went to sleep at 11pm and woke up around 9am.  Tonight we laid him down at 1030. 

Secondly, he has not had a BM in our presence.  We aren't sure how long we should wait before we act.  So wisdom in that area would be wonderful.   Okay, and keep praying for that flight home!

Thanks again for following our journey and praying for us!!!
 Here are the pictures from our walk...I still need to do a post on all of our tourism!!  (we have so many awesome photos to show you!  And so many amazing stories to tell!)

St. Sofia!  

So we ended up walking right into the protesters.  If you were worried at all about the demonstrations, don't, the only thing that was a bother was the noise, but one guy put down his whistle and helped me cross the street!!!

pray for the people here...they are not happy with the government ;(

a stranger on the street pointed this out to us to take a photo...what a cool building!  It is across from a church that was built to thank the Russians for freeing Bulgaria from the Ottoman Empire.

Alexander Nevsky Cathedral...man it is big and lovely!

another kind stranger told us we should take a picture of the full moon!  People are so helpful when you have a camera!

;

One guy stopped and asked me if Jon was a professional photographer (when I told Jon this he stated adamantly that he  has no idea what he is doing).  This man's English was not great: I believe he left thinking Simon was a "daughter" (instead of adopted) and that my oldest son wasn't there because he had a different father. :)  Then he asked if I was Protestant...then he had to go. He was a very nice old man.

A woman spoke German to me while we were taking this photo...which I thought was cool.  I also found it fun when someone started asking me where something was in the grocery store in Bulgarian!