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DearAlicia,

Willyoupleasetellmewhereyouputthespacebar??Thankyouverymuch!

Love,Mom

New Pics

For those in blogland who are still checking in on Alicia, even with my very sporadic posting history, I just wanted to let you know that Alicia is healthy and continues to grow very well by God's grace. Thanks for checking in!

Thanksgiving

The night before Thanksgiving, we dropped by Disneyland and hopped on some rides. I rode the carousel with Alicia. I don't even remember the last time I rode on a carousel horse. It was so fun. Being crazy like I am, I had diaper wipes with me and I wiped down some of the horse before we hopped on. I do that on most of the rides we go on.
Alicia watched my mom sweep their backyard and wanted to sweep a little too. What a sweet little helper.

Alicia loves loves loves my sister and enjoyed being able to spend some extra time with her. If Mike, my sister, and I are together, she will pick to be with my sister a lot of the time and won't leave her side. I think it is so cute and wonderful. Whenever she sees my sister, she gets the hugest smile on her face and runs towards her. Her auntie is in France on business for a week, and oh how she'll be missed!! I love this picture (I just wish it was better lit and clearer) of Alicia and my sister.
My parents have a persimmon tree. Alicia wanted to pick the persimmons off the tree. My mom had her pick one and she immediately tried to take a bite of it. We peeled it first, and she liked the taste of it.

Alicia enjoyed the mashed potatoes and turkey (esp the dark meat and skin) from Thanksgiving dinner.

I hope that everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving. We had a great Thanksgiving. Mike brined and baked a very delicious turkey that my parents couldn't stop raving about. It was a relaxing and fun weekend. We are thankful to God for so many things.

Tourists

We basically did touristy things all weekend. We took a mini-vacation and visited kid-friendly places around southern CA. It was a lot of fun.

I already posted the pictures from our aquarium visit. We also went to the San Diego Zoo. I thought that this mother and child were just so precious!

Alicia especially enjoyed the petting zoo, and of course this was my least favorite part of the zoo because I was thinking about all of the germs. Afterward, I immediately cleaned her hands with diaper wipes, then I washed her hands thoroughly with soap and water. Then I wiped her hands with diaper wipes again. Alicia really enjoyed the petting zoo. She likes washing her hands, so that was just a bonus :).

We made an impromptu visit to Disneyland. We originally planned on walking around Downtown Disney (which is next to Disneyland), but Mike suggested that we just go to Disneyland. We purchased annual passes so we could visit as often as we liked (minus blackout days). Alicia really enjoyed Toontown. She even made some "friends" in a play yard there.

She followed this little boy around. He even gave her a hug and they sat down together and played, and by played I mean they looked at each other and played side by side :).

A lot of the kiddos (and Alicia) really liked this giant hose that "leaked" water. At one point, a bigger boy, probably three years old or so, started to push Alicia aside to get to another part of the hose, so I asked him to watch it (I said it nicely of course). If it was someone in her ball park weight wise, I would have just let it go. However, this kid was aggressive (he was even grunting), plus he was older and much bigger. Thankfully the kid moved on. This is a picture of a different boy and Alicia having fun with the water.
While a parade was going on, we quickly got on the Pirates of the Caribbean ride. At first Alicia was in my lap. After the first fast dip on the ride, she turned around and clung and clutched on to me very tightly. We also went on Small World, which was much more to her liking. This is Mike and Alicia on the boat toward the end of the Small World ride.
This is me and Alicia after the Small World ride. It was so pretty with all the lights and decorations.It was such a fun weekend. I got teary eyed as the Small World ride was ending. That ride held great memories for me as a child, and now I was making new memories with Alicia and Mike. I was thinking of how wonderful it was just to hold her and walk around together as a family.

RSV and the Aquarium

RSV Talk
Alicia got her first set of RSV shots. The doc said she just barely qualified to receive them this year. It really does give us a little more peace of mind. This year she received two shots. These were not quick little vaccination-like shots. These needles seemed huge and it took several seconds per shot, instead of just a quick jab. As you can imagine, Alicia was not happy at all.

We've been trying to get out and about as much as possible, especially before RSV season starts hitting full steam. The doc at the local children's hospital said that there was only one case of RSV there so far. RSV can still hit Alicia very hard so he warned me to stay away from crowds as much as possible, esp from young kids who are germ factories. This will be difficult to do when we go to church or meet up with friends with young children. The doc also said that it's a risk/benefit type of thing. He said that this year, she is a totally different girl lung-wise than last year, but we still need to be very cautious. I can't bear the thought of Alicia getting terribly sick and ending up in the ER, but I also can't bear to keep her shut in like last year. She gets so excited if I mention going outside. She brings me her shoes or rushes to the door and tries to turn the doorknob. Alicia loves being outdoors, or basically just going somewhere new.

Aquarium of the Pacific

Dad took the day off so we went to the Aquarium of the Pacific. We had a great time. The area around there is nice to stroll about in, so afterward, we walked around by the ocean, enjoyed a relaxing dinner, and breathed the nice sea air.

There were stingrays, fish, sharks, and other sea creatures in these pools but people weren't supposed to touch the fish or one of the sharks, which made me wonder why they were in there because that's the point of these particular pools. Dad and Alicia enjoyed petting the creatures, but I wouldn't touch the things.
The stingrays in this pool were really friendly (maybe bc there were no sharks in these pools) and kept coming up to the sides where we were standing. All the kiddos around us were having a fun time too.

Alicia got a chance to see the shark feeding exhibit.

Alicia really enjoyed watching these clownfish, maybe because they were so brightly colored.

See ya, we'll be hanging around here and there. Take care!

Regular Things

Well, there isn't too much to report, it's just nice to be doing regular things like...

taking a stroll at the park


going on the slides

eating soft serve

and going to the grocery store

I hope everything is going well with you all! God bless!

Our Little Pocahontas

Alicia is the tiniest bit Native American somewhere back in the line on dad's side. Look how much hair she has with the costume :)! It almost looks real in the second picture.

Long Update

Alicia is doing very well and is blossoming more and more each day. To God alone be the glory; we are truly thankful for His work in our lives.

Horsey Time
*Alicia LOVES horsey/piggy back rides. She especially loves it when you bounce up and down and whinny. In both of these pictures, Alicia climbed on dad because she wanted him to give her a horsey ride. She does this all day. She climbs on or stands at one of our backs, holds on tight, flashes a huge grin or laughs, sometimes bounces up and down, and waits for a ride :). If the words "piggy back ride" are mentioned around her, she may smile and then dart off toward one of our backs. If my sister is visiting, Alicia will usually go to her for the ride since auntie gives her very fun piggy back rides.*This was Alicia's first time on the merry-go-round. She loved it!

*We got Alicia this horse (at Costco), since she seems to enjoy "horse back riding" so much. It whinnies, makes other horse sounds, and even moves its mouth and tail. As you can tell in these pics, she loves it!

Random Acts of Mischief :)
*See the mischievous look on Alicia's face? The newspaper was neatly stacked on the coffee table while dad was taking a nap. Alicia got her hands on the paper, and then there you go, dad gets a newspaper blanket (that's dad's arm peaking out from underneath the newspaper). She has been making this face a lot lately :).

*Costanza Moment-I threw some left over udon noodles in the trash can bc I thought Alicia didn't want them anymore. Well, I turned away for a moment and the next thing I knew, she took some noodles from the top of the trash, and ate some. It was so gross and yet so funny too. It's a good thing that the noodles were on top of the paper towels I had just thrown away from wiping her mouth.

*Alicia's First (and Hopefully Last) Playing-with-the-Toilet-Water Moment-I was at the bathroom sink. I thought Alicia was with my sister. Well Alicia quietly snuck in the bathroom after me. I heard a splash splash splash. I turned my head to see Alicia giggling and happily playing with the toilet water (she loves playing with water). I was mortified but I was cracking up too.

*Wipee Moments-I want to laugh at all of the things she gets into and does, but I know I shouldn't because it will encourage her. A lot of times she knows she's doing something naughty. She suddenly starts acting secretive (or turns around and darts off quickly) when it's something I've told her not to do many times before. I want to laugh and say no at the same time. I have to place the wipes in a place where she can't reach them or she will do this:

Pumpkin Patch
*We didn't get to go to a pumpkin patch last year so we were happy to be able to go this year. Our good friends let us tag along with them. I didn't even realize that this cool pumpkin patch was just minutes from where we live. We had a lot of fun. There were so many things to do there.

*Horses again! Alicia really wanted to pet the ponies and horses at the pumpkin patch. She is a bit too young to ride any of the ponies, though I'm sure she would have loved it. I think there was a height requirement or something, but I didn't even check because farm animals aren't exactly the cleanest things!

Eating
*Alicia's eating is still going well. She basically eats everything, so when we go out, we don't have to worry about taking something specifically for her, except for snacks. I'm happy she's eating so well. Some of her favorites are - cheese puffs, crackers, fruit (cantaloupe, papaya, mango, kiwi, blueberries, watermelon, banana, etc etc), pizza, grandma's soup (chicken broth with bits of chicken, rice, zucchini, carrot, potato, broccoli, and peas), Fage greek yogurt mixed with fresh fruit, mac & cheese, gnocchi, french fries, and peas. Yum!
*Mmm Bop, Gim Bop...Alicia always wants to eat what we're eating. It might be because she has discovered some tasty food this way :). She kept picking up our Gim Bop and taking bites. My mom tried to take it away and offer her something else to eat, but she just shooed my mom away. The other day, Alicia wanted to try our nachos so we let her eat some soggy bits piled with cheese sauce, refried beans, sour cream and ground beef. She loved it.

Drinking
Alicia's drinking has been going well too. There was a short period when her milk consumption was up and down. Since then, Alicia has done well with her milk intake. We recently got the go ahead to try whole milk. Alicia really likes it. I finally stopped pumping breast milk about two weeks ago. I pumped for a little over 18 months. Alicia actually learned to breast feed pretty well while in the NICU, but we quit a long time ago for various reasons. I continued to pump. I actually felt torn about stopping because it became such a habit and breast milk is so good for the kiddos. I had to stop at some point though, so Mike and I both agreed that since Alicia was starting whole milk, it would be a good time to stop. It actually took a while to slow everything down and finally stop. I got down to pumping twice a day, once a day, and then once every other day before I stopped for good. I was in a little pain for several days. We were renting the hospital grade Medela pump that whole time and we finally turned it in. It was like an old friend! I could have purchased three or four consumer grade pumps with all of the money we spent on renting the hospital grade one, but I didn't know when I would stop so I just stuck with the rental.

I was a little bummed when we finally threw out a bunch of old frozen breast milk. Alicia never needed any of the frozen milk because I always had more than enough fresh milk for her. I chose not to freeze any more breast milk when Alicia came home from the NICU; I decided I was just going to continue to give her fresh breast milk as long as she was drinking breast milk. I dumped any fresh milk Alicia didn't drink. I was able to donate some of my frozen milk so I'm glad all of it didn't go to waste. It was just strange to see all those bottles - I realized that those bottles represented hours upon hours of pumping (literally) down the drain. But, the main point of pumping was for Alicia to get breast milk until at least 12 months adjusted age, so it's okay if a lot of it had to be tossed.

Walking

Alicia has been walking all over the place. She took her first steps about 3 or so months ago and has been gradually walking more and more. I'm surprised how fast she can move now; she even runs sometimes. When we go out, she doesn't want to sit in a shopping cart or stroller. She just wants to walk around everywhere. Also, she has been looking at me, pointing at the door, and jibber jabbering because she wants to go outside all the time. What a blessing.

Talking
Alicia has been saying some words :). She says some more than others, especially daddy (da-dee) and auntie (sounds like ant-teh). She does say mama but not as often as daddy and auntie. Other words she has either repeated a couple of times or may have used on more than one occasion - kiss, this, duck, hat, b-bye, hi, ahn-deh (Korean for you can't do that/no), aigoo (Korean for something like oh my/oh no) and some others I don't recall at this moment. My parents speak to me and Alicia in Korean. Alicia sees my parents fairly regularly, so that's when she repeated the Korean words. Receptively, Alicia seems to know a fair amount of language. She can follow a lot of directions even if we don't gesture or give clues as to what we want her to do. She also surprises us sometimes because we'll be talking about something, and she'll show us that she knows what we're talking about. She is pretty expressive with her tones and voice (frustration, happiness, etc) and basically "talks" all day long. She will talk to you like you should really understand what she's trying to say. Since she can't communicate everything she wants with words yet, she either whines, or she jibber jabbers and points/gestures towards what she wants. You know you've hit the jackpot if she smiles at what you say. For instance she grabs the remote and/or points at the tv, jibber jabbers, and hands the remote to one of us. Then we say "Teletubbies?" (the only tv show she watches) and she will smile. She loves the Teletubbies. She brings us her Teletubbies books throughout the day so we can read them to her.

EDAC (Cognitive, Speech, Gross Motor, Fine Motor, etc) Evaluation-
We recently had her EDAC appt (they monitor the global development of high-risk infants/NICU graduates about every 6-8 months until age 2) and she did very well. She was evaluated as normal for her adjusted age in all different aspects and they didn't recommend any additional therapies (part of the reason they evaluate is to ensure that parents get any services their kids need). She still gets weekly Physical Therapy for now. All the professionals who saw/assessed her commented how wonderful she was doing in general, and especially for a 24 weeker. One evaluator mentioned that (since she was a micro-preemie) this wasn't a guarantee that she wouldn't have future learning disabilities, behavioral problems, and whatnot. Well this was something we knew from the beginning. We are just thankful she is doing well now and pray that she continues to do well.

Other Tidbits
*"Give (mommy, daddy, auntie, me, etc) kisses" was one of the first verbal commands Alicia learned a long time ago, and it never gets old! Her kisses are a little slobbery and just great! She will also give us impromptu kisses without us having to ask for them. I love it when I'm just sitting there and she turns around and gives me a kiss. It just melts my heart. She gives her dolls, stuffed animals, and her reflection in the mirror kisses too. Aww, we love Alicia-kisses!

*Alicia got her first cold (I got a cold at the same time). I was actually relieved in a way bc I knew it wasn't good for her to never get sick. I just didn't want her to get too sick, but she needs to build up her immunities. It wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. We sucked out snot with a nasal aspirator and used a humidifier every night. She seemed to be bear the cold pretty well. Her symptoms dissipated after about a week and few days.
*Alicia loves to feed us. She thinks it's such a hoot. A lot of times she'll feed me whatever she's eating. Of course, I don't need the extra calories, but how can I refuse? It's just so cute.
*In addition to horses, Alicia loves dogs. Now that she's walking and is at eye level with them, she gets to interact with them a bit more. It's cute to see how much she adores them. The other day Alicia got to pet and play with four dogs around our neighborhood. When one of the dogs had to go off with its owner, Alicia started crying and chased after it. Sooo cute.
*Alicia loves to cling to me like this, esp when I'm in the kitchen.

*Alicia and I got to meet another blogland family in person. We had lunch with Sonia, Jong, and Isaac while they were in CA several weeks ago. They currently reside in Japan. It was so wonderful to meet them. Isaac is even more adorable in person. They are a really nice family. Sonia announced that she is pregnant again on their blog. I will be praying for a healthy pregnancy/delivery.
*We live pretty close to the Santiago Canyon fire so the air quality has been very poor here. My lungs hurt so I can just imagine how the air is affecting Alicia's lungs. We have not taken Alicia outside since the fire started. We closed all the windows and doors, purchased an air purifier, and began breathing treatments again. We are going a bit stir crazy as Alicia loves to be outside. I hope that the fires stop and the air clears up soon. My prayers are with the firefighters and with all the people who have been displaced from their homes.
*I just found out that we were approved for at least two synagis shots this RSV season, and hopefully more. I am so happy because the doctors warned me that insurance companies can be very selective about who is eligible for shots. We still have to be very very careful around others, but I won't be as worried about letting Alicia be around other kids when we get the shots. She really enjoys being around other kids and we would hate to isolate her again if we can help it.

Thanks for checking in even though the posts have been sporadic.

Stay Tuned for an Update

I'm finally working on an update. It should be up in a day or two. I apologize for the long delay between posts. Alicia is doing very well.