Faith: Adoption 40 to Louisiana

For those of you who have ever done a remodeling project on a house, you will have some empathy for my frustration.  It is a long arduous project that requires a lot of patience.  Josh is leaving in a week or so and we are not finished yet.  He is doing as much as he can and from his photos from a week ago we are not moving anytime soon. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zc7xzX5JBws

I got a call from the Big O in October 2008 because they had a baby with a hemangioma.  I went to get her and I remember right from the beginning how small she was. She was a very fierce little thing and from the very beginning had this high pitched screech. You could tell immediately when Faith was crying because she has such a distinctive cry and for the next few months I woke up often to that sound.  It turned out that Faith did not have a hemangioma, a vascular growth like Rose had.  On Faith's face was a port wine stain and did not require intervention like some hemangioma's do. The port wine stain could be removed by laser and it was not life threatening, nor did she show signs of the two syndromes that can be associated with it.

For the first few months Faith would let any one hold her and then for the next year she would not let any one touch her but Xiao Liu. She was so intensely scared of strangers and if any one just looked at her she screamed.  So many people made comments about that.  One fine day she came over and sat down on my lap.  I was so surprised that she wanted me and we all laughed about it.  From then onwards she would allow a limited amount of people to come into her world.  When she started to walk she sometimes looked like a cowgirl who had lost her horse.  Since she remained very petite it was so cute to see her gait.  There were times we laughed at her because she would pull this face with her eyes pulled half closed looking at you.

Once her adoption dossier was done we waited for a short while and then heard that she was matched with a family in Louisiana.  She was going to be the princess of a family with five children, grown up kids and teenage kids.  She was exactly where she needed to be.  The center of attention as the youngest and the baby of the family.

All the kids at Starfish teach me a tremendous amount.  In their own way they bring such a special story and I tell the nannies all the time.  Not one of them are the same.  They have different  ideas even at that young age and want to be loved in difference ways. It is up to us to find out what that difference is and then to heal their bodies and their hearts. I hope we healed your heart, Faith Hu Sheng.

Life, love and laughter,
Amanda

At Starfish, we have taken care of 124 children to date, arranged more than 100 surgeries and had 48 international adoptions, so our little starfishes live all over the globe: the US, Netherlands, Norway, France, Spain, Denmark, Sweden, Canada and in China.  Our latest adoption is Stella to New Mexico and she now has three siblings.  We currently have 46 babies under the age of 3 and three foster homes.  Little Bella is in Shanghai and she will have spina bifida surgery on November 24 and will also have a shunt put in for her hydrocephlus

Starfish Children's Services
US Tax Number:  20-4682916
Xian China

www.thestarfishfosterhome.org
http://chinesestarfish.blogspot.com
http://chinesestarfishcleft.blogspot.com
Email: throwingstarfish0913@gmail.com
Cell: 86.1348.812.4847

Six Months Home with Karine (Antonia) in Ottawa, Canada

Dear Amanda,
 
I hope everything is well with you and everyone at Starfish.  I'm sure you are still very busy with all the little ones!  
 
It is hard to believe that we have been home for 6 months with Karine (Antonia)!  Time has just flown by!  She is doing amazing and we're in awe at how fast she is learning her new language.  She understands everything we say to her and is now beginning to say words.  They're not always clear but we're seeing the speech pathologist next week so we'll see what she says.  She's grown 5 centimetres since May.  I realized how much she had grown when I saw her looking through the front window.  Before, you could only see the top of her head.
 
She had so much fun on Halloween!  The week before, I explained to her what she was going to do on Halloween night.  Well, the girl didn't want to wait for Halloween.  She was ready to go door to door.  All week, she would show me how she would ring the door bells and would act out how the people would "throw" her the candy in her bucket.  
 
She's been adjusting really well to her brothers and them to her.  When we're at the bus stop and she hears the bus coming, she gets so excited.  She jumps up and down.  When the boys get off the bus, she goes off running to them with her arms open.  It is so cute to watch.  She loves to imitate others.  When her brothers sit down to do their homework, she goes and gets her "homework" book too.  It's a little activity book that she loves to scribble in as if she's doing her homework like them.  We had our first snowfall the day before Halloween.  She had lots of fun playing in it that she didn't want to come in.  The snow only lasted a couple of days but I'm sure we'll be getting more soon as the weather is getting colder.  At first, she wasn't too happy wearing boots but when she realized that they lit up, well, she changed her mind.
 
This past Sunday, we had her Baptism.  She looked beautiful in her chinese dress that we got her in China.  She thought so too! ;-)  She had to go to every mirror in the house and have a look at herself.  She loves girly things and anything to do with princesses.  She was very happy when I told her that she looked like a princess.  :-)  As we're getting closer to Christmas, we're seeing a lot of Christmas decorations when we're out doing errands.  She LOVES to look at decorated Christmas trees.  It's going to be such a wonderful Christmas this year!  What a gift she is to us!
 
I've been keeping her and I busy while the boys are at school.  We go swimming every week, museums, the farm, the park.  She really enjoys going to the children's museum as it's hands on play but her favourite as to be the farm.  Every day she'll "talk" about the animals she sees at the farm.  She loves the outdoors.  We'll often go for walks.  We took her a few times to the dog park (Place where people bring their dogs and leave them off-leash to run) and was excited to see all the dogs running.  I wouldn't have brought her there when we first arrived from China as she was terrified of our little 15 pounds dog.
 
We feel so blessed to have her part of our family.  It is so much fun to watch her explore her new surroundings.  I'm enjoying every moment that I spend with her at home.  I've decided to only return back to work once she starts school in September of 2012.  I am looking forward to see what the next 6 months will bring!  I will keep you updated on her progress.
 
Sending my love to you and the nannies, and of course all of the Starfish babies!
 
God Bless,
 
Nicole  

 
        
 

Starfish 2011 Calendar

At Starfish, we take so many pictures each year of the babies.  This year we thought of sharing some of the pictures by making a calendar. The second reason is that we want to use this to fund raise for our medical fund in order to help more babies with medical cost for their surgeries.  If you are interested to take a look at what this calendar looks like please click on the following link. My most grateful thanks to Michelle for putting this together so fast and for sharing her talents to help the babies.

 1)   http://www.heritagemakers.com/projectBrowserStandAlone.cfm?projectID=1545143&productId=31

 

2)  The calendars cost $30 each retail.   International shipping rates:  $13.00     US shipping rates  $5.00 Please note that this is an American Holiday format.  We will try some other countries next year.

 

50% of the cost of the calendars will be donated to to Starfish Children's Services (EIN number 20-4682916) and goes directly to our medical fund which pays for life altering surgeries such as heart, spina bifida and shunts for babies with hydrocephalus and other general surgeries.

 

3)  Pay pal account information.  michelle@bindandremember.com

 

To order your calendar, go to www.paypal.com

 

It is easy to quickly set up an account with paypal and use a credit card to purchase immediately.

 

If you have your paypal account linked to a bank account, it takes 3-5 days to create the account

 

Once your account is set up, log in and follow prompts to send money to michelle@bindandremember.com

 

IMPORTANT Select "Personal" & "Gift" or "Other" to avoid paypal fees to Starfish Include in the message box your complete address

 

For questions and discounts on orders of 3 or more calendars, contact Michelle at michelle@bindandremember.com   801-529-6850

Life, love and laughter,
Amanda

Adoption 17: Rebecca, Our Beauty in Kentucky

Hi Amanda -

 

I meant to send you an update on Rebecca back in September when we celebrated her birthday, but time just has a way of getting away from me it seems.

 

It's hard to believe that in a few months we will be celebrating being home with Rebecca for two years now.  Goodness the time has flown!

 

As far as Miss Rebecca, she is doing amazingly well Amanda - she is such a sweetie pie, but I know I've told you that many times.  She turned 5 in September and we celebrated with a pool party again this year.  She loves the water!!!  Maybe it's the 'Starfish' in her :-)  She was very, very excited about turning 5. 

 

We decided to keep her in preschool one more year even though she was technically old enough to start school.  It was really hard on her not getting to ride the bus with her sister but we both think it's best for her in the long run.  Thankfully she is doing really well in preschool and by being one of the older ones now it has put her in the position of being a good example and helper at the same time.  This should help tremendously when she does start school.  She's such a little caretaker and loves her little friends.  She still likes to wrap all of her baby dolls up in blankets too and the other day she and Emma were pretending they were taking all of the babies to get their 'hearts fixed' and to get hair cuts.  I thought I was going to cry watching them, it was so sweet.  Can't imagine where they got the idea of getting the babies hearts fixed :-)

 

Her favorite things are her babies, horses, singing and her brother & sister.  I've attached some pictures from the past few months, it really tickles me how they hug and love on one another.  She says she wants to live on a 'fahhmm' when she grows up but yet she tells me it stinks when we are around a barn.  Silly girl!  We're going to Oklahoma to visit family soon so hopefully she will get her fill of horses and 'fahhmms'! 

 

As I've told you before many times, she is such a loving and giving little soul.  Of course she can be pesky with her sister at times too, but most times she is more than willing to give in to Emma anything she wants.  The kids were playing last night and somewhere along the way they started racing one another.  Emma was winning every time and so her brother held her back so that Rebecca would win which of course made little miss britches mad and she stomped her foot.  Rebecca went over and patted her on the back and said "It's okay Emma.  You can win if you want to".  Blessed are the peace keepers ...

 

She also likes to love on me by patting me on the back or rubbing my arm and kissing me.  She lays her little head on my shoulder and says "I love you so much".  You had told me so many times that Rebecca loves passionately and I'll have to say that I agree with you totally.  When she gives her heart, she gives her all.

 

Again, many many thanks for all the love and care you give the babies - it's so evident that the love that was given to her was tucked snuggly in her little heart.

 

Blessings to you & yours,

Carolin 

Adoption 39: Nick (Jacob) New York State

As the long term followers of Starfish might already know and others have forgotten or never knew, I was called by the director of the Big O on February 1st, 2009 to ask if I could take on 12 babies. I frantically started looking for a way to help these children because I knew what the alternative was and I could not live with myself unless I made a concerted effort to have those babies transferred to my house.  I send out a plea to the followers of Starfish and soon I had the monthly donations covered. Nine out of the 12 babies arrived and a few weeks later, I knew why the other three did not come with them. They got Chicken Pox at the orphanage and the ones who did come to Starfish were exposed, and so they brought chicken pox with them.  You can just guess what happened: Chicken pox went through the whole foster home.  To say that time was intense would be an understatement.

Nick was one of the nine babies.  In the beginning he was 3.3kg (7 1/4 pounds).  Looking at him you would never have believed that he would become one of the members of the brute squad.  He could eat and did eat often, and soon he caught up. He had a cleft lip and not a cleft palate so he only needed one surgery for his lip and it healed beautifully. On his growth chart you can see him steadily climb from below average to over the 97% mark in one steep arch.  Then he started walking and you can see the arch turn into a hump, to just below the 97% mark.  My favorite time is when he started walking.  Children have different ways of doing this.  Nick thought he could walk already and so he could get up and run and the result was he felt down.  He was undeterred and tried again.  The bad thing was that he fell on the same stop all the time......his right forehead. During the rest of his time here that was his favorite stop to fall on.  As a result he now has a big bump there, which I guess could be there for life.  He made friends easily and hung out with Tim, Bryan and Antonia often until they were adopted.  He turned out to be be such a typical boy with a love for cars, playing outside and going fast down the slide. He turned out to be an expert climber, on to things over things and into other people's cribs.

After a long haul we managed to get his adoption papers together and they went off to the orphanage and then to the CCAA.  We got no word from any families and I thought that the file was in Europe but I was wrong.  Nick was adopted by a family from New York State and they changed his name to Jacob. He now has a big sister Emily and from what I hear he is true to form and eating lots.  He went Trick 'n Treating as Tigger this past Halloween. 

I would gratefully like to acknowledge Gayly and Shawn and their family, who so generously supported Nick's care right from the beginning.

Life, love and laughter,
Amanda

At Starfish, we have taken care of 124 children to date, arranged more than 100 surgeries and had 47 international adoptions, so our little starfishes live all over the globe: the US, Netherlands, Norway, France, Spain, Denmark, Sweden, Canada and in China.  Our last adoption was to Baton Rouge, Louisiana.  We are preparing for adoption number 48, Stella on November 22 to New Mexico and number 49 Callum to near Atlanta, Georgia.  We currently have 47 babies under the age of 3 and three foster homes.  Caroline and Charlotte are still in the hospital but recovering well from their surgeries.  Operation Smile will be in town this week, November 17 to 22 and we will be doing some cleft lip surgeries.

Starfish Children's Services
US Tax Number:  20-4682916
Xian China

www.thestarfishfosterhome.org
http://chinesestarfish.blogspot.com
http://chinesestarfishcleft.blogspot.com
Email: throwingstarfish0913@gmail.com
Cell: 86.1348.812.4847

Thank You ELISE!

It is not often that I write about a volunteer but I cannot let this pass and not say a BIG THANK YOU you to a volunteer who has been coming to Starfish weekly for the past five years.  I met Elise a few weeks after I got to China in 2004. She was supposed to stay for two years with her family and I had plans to leave after one year.  Little did we know what would happen to us.  Elise was there from the time in May 2005 when I got the okay to start the foster home to the time the first six babies were first carried into my life on September 13.  She was the one I called like a mom, when I did not know what to do when a baby was sick.  Elise and her husband Ed had 7 biological kids and adopted two and at one time worked as a nurse.  She had lots of experience and wisdom to impart. 

In the beginning, we could not even find a scale and I had no idea how much the babies weighed.  Once we found a scale, the old style mechanical kind she came to weigh the babies every week and once a month she would measure them and carefully write down the number is the charts. Her "footprint" is all over the babies' records.  After a while we got really fancy and now we have an electronic scale and a measuring box which makes life so much easier.  In later years, she even plotted a growth chart.

She mentioned recently that her husband had gone to Xiamen for an interview but she doubted it would come to much.  Well it was a big deal.  They offered Ed a new position and with in 10 days they had to move.  Ed is already in Xiamen and next Monday the rest of the family will be moving.  The only one remaining is Bethany who has been coming with her mother for many years and has turned out to be a perfect replacement for her. Bethany is a student at a local university and has been learning from her mom for many years. Everything is in good hands.  What a tender mercy.

I am so grateful for the many years of service that Elise has given.  The hours she spent on the bus coming to Starfish in rain, shine and snow.  Surprisingly, the bus she needed to get to my house, stopped just outside her house. I am so grateful for keeping records of this vital aspect of the babies lives. But more so I am so grateful for all the babies lives she touched and for all the love she has given.  Her favorites were always the weaker ones and I remember her holding Sarah for hours.  She was one of the first really preemie cleft lip and palate babies we accepted in April 2006.  Sarah could throw up without any notice and we really struggled with her.  Elise was like a grandmother and who rocked her with lots of patience. She was also the best burper around and could coax the burps out of the cleft babies before we used Woodwards gripe water (Nothing else will do in case you are interested to know!).

So we come to the end of an era.  I wish Elise and her family well in their new home.  I am so grateful for your steadying hand and all the advice you gave and for the concerns you have had for the babies.  I will miss you very much.

I may not have gone where I

 intended

 to go, 

but I think I have ended up 

where I intended to be.

                                                                                                               ~Douglas
Life, love and laughter,
Amanda

At Starfish, we have taken care of 124 children to date, arranged more than 100 surgeries and had 47 international adoptions, so our little starfishes live all over the globe: the US, Netherlands, Norway, France, Spain, Denmark, Sweden, Canada and in China.  We are preparing for two adoptions to the US in the new 10 days.  We currently have 47 babies under the age of 3 and three foster homes.  Preparing to move to our new "castle" hopefully around December 1st, but it is a castle no more because the castle has lost its minarets (is that the word?) The top square things on a castle.

Starfish Children's Services
US Tax Number:  20-4682916
Xian China

www.thestarfishfosterhome.org
http://chinesestarfish.blogspot.com
http://chinesestarfishcleft.blogspot.com
Email: throwingstarfish0913@gmail.com
Cell: 86.1348.812.4847

Adoption 38: Sophia (Lia) to Washington State

I am sorry to say that I am behind with the blogging, but I am trying to catch up.

Today, I am going going to tell you the story of Xiao Hui, who was named by another Hui whose English name is Sophia, which has the same meaning:  Wisdom.

I was looking for a heart baby and we went to the orphanage in November 2009.  I went with Hui,  an American Chinese woman, who lives in Arizona and was volunteering at Starfish. While in the orphanage new arrival room we found Sophia.  The workers at the orphanage said to not to bother with her because she was so weak and had just come out of the hospital and that she was too dark and ugly. Not only did she have jaundice, but she was premature and weighted  a whopping 2.1kg (4 1/2 pounds).  Of course my instinct to help reared its beautiful head and I assured them that I could take care of her and wanted to take her home.

After we got home we bathed her and found her name and to our amazement she had the same name as Hui whose English name is Sophia.  So it was easy to pick an English name.  On day one, I realized that she was not keeping her body temperature up and that she would probably need to do to the NICU for a few days and off she went to the hospital to spend time in the incubator under the lights.  By the time she came back, the jaundice had been treated and she slept in my room for a while.  She became downright pudgy with all the milk and looked like she was going to burst out of her skin.  She also got fitted for a NAM by Dr Niu, a dentist who studied in New York.  This is an dental appliance that aligns their gums and closes the cleft palate gap. We traveled to Beijing with a huge group of babies and Dr Lisa Buckmiller did her lip surgery. She grew to have the most beautiful eyes and longest eyelashes and she crawled sitting and scooted on her hands forward. Once she started walking she ate less and became so petite again.  You could tell that she had been a preemie baby.  She walked very daintily and it was so cute to see.  She was very careful before she stepped any where and held on to the furniture in the beginning.  Her nanny, an older woman, was so right for her and soon Sophia was so attached to her. 

Soon we got the news that she had been matched to Julie and that she was going to living in Washington State.  Julie had been waiting for her for a long time.  On August 15, 2009 Sophia became Lia. As always it is sad to see them go, but a family can offer the babies so much more than we can.  From what we hear Lia is doing very well and Julie has her on a diet we can only envy.  She is on butter, cream cheese, oil, and all sorts of calories to help her gain weight.  Julie says her favorite food is Mexican. Recently she was a lady bug for Halloween.  She also had her palate surgery and have added pumpkin and princess to her vocabulary.  If you would like to follow Lia's blog here is the address:  http://www.wishingforlia.blogspot.com/

I would love to take her day one picture and her gotcha day pictures and go and show the workers at the orphanage but I cannot do that.  We do not have the right to say that a baby is  worth every effort to save a life. You have no idea what potential that child has.  I love that children have the chance to be given every it of help that Starfish can give. It reminds me of the quote:

You can count the seeds in an apple 

but you cannot 

count the apples in a seed.

Life, love and laughter,
Amanda

At Starfish, we have taken care of 124 children to date, arranged more than 100 surgeries and had 47 international adoptions, so our little starfishes live all over the globe: the US, Netherlands, Norway, France, Spain, Denmark, Sweden, Canada and in China.  Our latest adoption is to Baton Rouge, Louisiana.  We are getting ready for another two adoptions before the end of November.  Caroline is in the hospital at the moment and just had successful heart and lung surgery and Charlotte is with her and just had two bi-directional shunts put in her heart. They should both be home next week.  We currently have 47 babies under the age of 3 and three foster homes.  

Starfish Children's Services
US Tax Number:  20-4682916
Xian China

www.thestarfishfosterhome.org
http://chinesestarfish.blogspot.com
http://chinesestarfishcleft.blogspot.com
Email: throwingstarfish0913@gmail.com
Cell: 86.1348.812.4847

Adoption 36: Zoey (Virginia) in West Virginia

Dear Amanda,

       Wow I can't believe we have been home with Zoey (Virginia) almost 3 months. There are no words to describe the joy she has brought our family. She loves life!!!  Her personailty and how well she has done since she has been home is a true reflection of the awesome job that you all do at Starfish!!!

       She has two brothers Duran 18 and Shane 13. She had this amazing sense from the beginning that they were her brothers. She is learning what American Football is all about, Shane plays and she has been to several games this fall. She traveled with us to move Duran into his college dorm the end of August. She walked into the dormitory like she was the one going to college, it was so cute.

         A few things we have learnt about Zoey, she LOVES to dance and has a natural ability, I had a lady in town ask me the other day if she went to dance lessons. (I thought this was very funny, at 2 years old.) She likes to WATCH dogs, notice I said watch, she doesn't like them to get too close. She might eat something today like she really likes it and tomorrow she may not like it at all. And yes she does love chocolate, just like I was told. She never gets tired of playing hide and seek with Shane. He hides she finds. She loves to imitate people. She laughs alot and always has a smile. Our babysitter (which is my niece) says she is the perfect little girl to watch, she is so good. I know I sound like a doting Mother and I am, but she is perfect for us in everyway.

         She went to her cardiologist appointment a few weeks ago and got a really good report. Everything looks great!!! Thank you to everyone who made this possible!! We will forever be grateful. Her pediatrician told me that she was a very confident little girl and a very happy one. She said that she acted very different from what she was use to seeing in a similar situation. And of course I told her why. About this awesome place in China called Starfish!!!

       Zoey and I had the privilege of having Page Lewis come to our house last week. She is one of the wonderful volunteers who puts together the Starfish Scrapbooks for the babies. Page only lives about 1 1/2 to 2 hours from us. I am attaching a picture of the two together. We have also been in contact with Steve and Elva Orton. They plan to visit us sometime. We can't wait to meet them and be able to personally thank them for sponsoring Zoey's heart surgery. We have been so blessed by so many people. 

       I truly wish we could be there to help with the new Starfish house. It will be an awesome place, but I am convinced that even more than that you have been blessed with awesome nannies. We didn't get to meet you while we were in China but we hope to one day when you come to the states. We wish we could put into words Amanda the difference that you are making in these childrens lives. I tell anyone who will listen about Starfish.....Zoey is the light of our life and we can not imagine life without her. I better go for now. 

Best Wishes and Lots of Love, 

Angela