I'm very happy to report that R has begun the process to educate her pallet.. she has started eating rice cereal. For those of you that don't know, rice cereal is essentially rice that has been pulverized to a fine, flat, dust. You mix it with formula and it forms a sort of white paste. In fact, I'm fairly certain that in a bind you could use it as a glue.
Riley was initially a little bit apprehensive about eating anything other than formula. After all, formula has been her sole form of sustenance, and if your lucky enough to have watched her eyes light up as the bottle approaches you'd realize that her pension for formula is nothing less than a hard core addiction (her eyes glaze over, and if for any reason you don't get the bottle to her mouth in short order she will actually start to shake!). Her introduction to rice cereal was also compounded by the fact that it was also her first introduction to a spoon. Luckily, she believes that everything should go into her mouth so getting her to take a spoon full of rice cereal was easy. What wasn't easy, was getting her to keep the rice cereal in her mouth and than swallow it. For most of the first rice meal she would just take the cereal in her mouth, smack her lips a couple of times and than slowly spit it out of her mouth so that it would dribble down her chin. John or I would scrape it off her chin, and then put it back in her mouth... then she would spit it out again. Repeat this cycle for about 20 minutes and that was her first cereal meal.
Although she did manage (by mistake I'm sure) to ingest a little bit of her first cereal, it wasn't until her second attempt that she really understood that this wasn't a game and that this is actually a way for her to eat. Halfway through round two she started swallowing and before we knew it she was begging for more. As you'd expect she still spits up quite a bit of it - I'd guess about half, but she's making progress. She's been at it for a couple of weeks, so relatively soon we'll be adding oatmeal cereal to her diet.
On a not quite so happy note, Riley has her first cold. More specifically she has her first ear infection. It's minor, but all the congestion that's accompanied it has kept her fathers fairly anxious. A couple of our friend's children (that have never met Riley) have had
RSV recently, so with that in our minds we've been watching her like a hawk. The doctor prescribed her an antibiotic, and says that we don't have much to worry about. Riley, on the other hand, is basically unfazed by the entire thing. She's her regular, smiley, happy self (with a fairly constant runny nose, and an occasional cough). So - we'll continue watching her like a hawk, and hopefully she'll be 100% healthy in a few days.
It's with great pleasure that I announce that we've got a date to finalize R's adoption! Time certainly does fly. It's amazing that after all this time (4+ years) the adoption process is coming to an end for us. That isn't to suggest that "adoption" is leaving our lives - it's not, and that's a good thing. Adoption, specifically open adoption, is the miracle by which R and R's birth family came into our lives. Adoption is a daily discussion in our household, and I don't see that coming to an end any time soon - or for that matter, ever. What I do see coming to an end is the piles of paperwork, and visitors to our household to confirm that we were, at first, going to be good parents, and most recently are good parents. They were great folks - and hopefully some of them will stay in touch - but it will be nice not to have to "report" to them anymore.
I don't usually use this blog or our other blog to talk about politics or - more specifically - gay rights. So, some of you might wonder why it is that I'm now writing (or rather ranting) this blog about my thoughts on the US military's policy of Don't Ask, Don't Tell. First, if your not familiar with DADT you can read about it HERE. Although DADT is a LGBT issue of equality, as a parent I find it a deplorable policy for another reason. DADT teaches shame... to everyone. I think most parents want their children to grow up being strong, confident people. I think most parents want their children to be individuals, who think for themselves and stand up for what they believe in. So, my dear blog friends, what kind of message does it send to the children of our great country when one of it's largest institutions has a policy that tells people that they have to hide who they are or they will be fired??? Don't be different then the majority - it's bad. Is that really the message we want to send to our children? Don't get me wrong, I know that there are potential challenges (both legal and emotional) with having out men and women serving in our armed forces. But, do we really want to teach our children that instead of excepting people for who they are, we should just tell them to hide their uniqueness so that it doesn't interfere? Should we suggest that when faced with the challenge of integrating "different" people, we shouldn't face that challenge and instead we should just tell them to hide or get out? When the going get's tough, the tough run away?
I'm very happy to report that R has begun the process to educate her pallet.. she has started eating rice cereal. For those of you that don't know, rice cereal is essentially rice that has been pulverized to a fine, flat, dust. You mix it with formula and it forms a sort of white paste. In fact, I'm fairly certain that in a bind you could use it as a glue. 
On a not quite so happy note, Riley has her first cold. More specifically she has her first ear infection. It's minor, but all the congestion that's accompanied it has kept her fathers fairly anxious. A couple of our friend's children (that have never met Riley) have had RSV recently, so with that in our minds we've been watching her like a hawk. The doctor prescribed her an antibiotic, and says that we don't have much to worry about. Riley, on the other hand, is basically unfazed by the entire thing. She's her regular, smiley, happy self (with a fairly constant runny nose, and an occasional cough). So - we'll continue watching her like a hawk, and hopefully she'll be 100% healthy in a few days.
