Three months home...

This week we will pass the three-month mark since our return home from China.  Thought I'd post a brief update on Ellie, and some pictures of fun fall stuff...

We recently had our first appointment with the cleft team at Children's Healthcare of Atlanta.  Ellie's new surgeon, Dr. Williams, said that her lip and palate look very good.  (We knew her lip repair was awesome, so it was nice to hear that the palate repair seems to have been done well, too, as they were repaired in China by different surgeons.)  She will likely need a surgical revision to her nose and lip around the time she starts kindergarten - one of several she will have before she goes to college.  Her speech development seems good at this point, but with Ellie being so young and having had limited exposure to English, it's hard to say for sure.  The speech pathologist gave us some suggestions, and we'll have a follow-up in six months.  Ellie's dentist, Dr. Thomas, noticed some tooth decay that will need to be addressed with surgery.  We've scheduled that for early January.  Since Ellie's cleft went through the gumline, Dr. Thomas will need to do a bone graft when Ellie is six or seven in order to support her adult teeth.  Orthodontics will begin around the same time.  Ellie also had an audiology exam, which indicated some mild hearing loss in both ears and the likely presence of fluid behind the eardrums.  This was confirmed by Ellie's ENT, who recommended ear tubes (very common for children born with clefts).  That surgery is scheduled for next Monday, then we will do a follow-up with the audiologist to re-test Ellie's hearing.

Very grateful for good insurance.  :)

Now the fun stuff... Here are some pictures of the things we've been up to the past month or two.

Samuel started preschool, sporting a black eye from a run-in with our playset ladder. 

Patrick participated in his school's Boosterthon Fun Run - here he is getting squirted by the principal. 

We celebrated Patrick's birthday with a party at the kids' gymnastics studio.  Samuel in the germ - I mean, ball - pit.

In addition to outsourcing the party (a first for us, and probably a last), I let Publix make the Lightning McQueen cake.  It was yummy.

Birthday boy!  He looks especially tall to me in this picture. 

Part monkey, I'm sure of it.

Ellie on the rings - we call her Mighty Mouse.

He'll kill me for this someday.

Octoberfest at Patrick's school.  Now that we have three children, the odds of getting all of them to A) look at the camera and B) smile have diminished significantly.  I love this picture, though. 

What's a fall festival without jumpy things?  We did 'em all, and Ellie loved them.

Pumpkin painting.

Parish fall festival - more jumpy things.

Mmmmm.... meat on a stick.  Authentic Brazilian BBQ, courtesy of our parish's fabulous Brazilian community.

Brotherly love.