Shortt Stories: Riley at Home

Many of you have asked how Riley is adjusting. Well, I truely cannot say enough here about the goodness and faithfulness of God. As many of you know, our visits with her in the orphanage did not go well. We went to Russia hoping to make a heart to heart connection with this little girl. Needless to say, she touched our hearts but it didn't seem as if we got anywhere with her. She seemed to not want to be around us and showed no positive emotions at all. Our visits were also discouraging because we were never able to evaluate where she was developmentally. We were told that she couldn't crawl or walk and we knew she was very small for her age. =(
My last visit with her was the first time I was able to even get her to play with me( and her tape measure, of course.) There were also some medical issues that we had to hound the powers that be in Russia to keep us updated on. We ended up never getting a definite answer to those questions. We look back now and know we weren't supposed to get those answers. Some things in life are just leaps of faith. You just close your eyes ......and jump.

I say all that to explain where we were mentally when we went to pick her up from the orphanage. We only knew 3 things for sure...1) We knew that God had called us to adoption and 2) No matter what medical or developmental issues this little girl may or may not have...SHE WAS THE ONE!!!!! 3) We loved her from the moment we first saw her. We just prayed that whatever God was calling us to with this precious little one, that he would make us equal to the task.

Now fast forward one month and my, oh my, she is doing just great!! She is walking everywhere and getting into everything! She weighed 16 pounds when we left Russia and now she is over 18lbs. She sleeps all night....in her own bed! (Great hours too, 10 pm until 9 am.) She likes to eat all kinds of foods. She laughs and plays all day long. She loves people, is very outgoing and is curious about everything around her. Her IA pediatrician keeps giving us good news. Wow! I'll say it again, God is so good!

Here are a few pics of Riley's day to day life here in at the Shortt house. I will tell you that although our days with Riley have been wonderful...they haven't been without a bit of drama....more about bath time tomorrow!