The hurricane has landed.

So yesterday was the first day of the rest of our lives together as a family.  Gulp!

We picked up Missy (she will hereafter be known as this on this blog) at 9.30am.  The idea is that the social workers get there a few minutes before us to make sure all ready to go and the foster carers are supposed to have said their goodbyes, so all we need to do is put all Missy's stuff in the car and her, collect paperwork and off we go.  Missy was excited to see us and all set to go.  Unfortunately the foster carer got tearful and opened the car door when Missy was in her car seat, and hugged and kissed her and said "Miss You" etc.  Not the way to do it and it upset Missy who within 10 seconds of us driving away said she wanted to live with the foster carer.  Oh dear.

The journey home was very subdued with minimal chatter and on arrival at home she still had tears so we left the unpacking and the three of us went into the lounge for a family hug, explaining that as her new mummy and daddy we were going to keep her safe and secure from now on and that we had so much to look forward to, all three of us together.  We kept stressing the togetherness and thankfully Missy soon cheered up.

The rest of day was mostly spent playing with lots of giggles from a game she was playing with Daddy although we had two of three times when she said she missed the foster carer.  It's understandable as she spent so long there and they did look after her very well, but it is hard to hear.  I'll be honest and say that a teeny tiny "oh god what have we done" thought went through my head.  That said, the day on the whole was good.  We received a lovely bouquet of flowers from one friend, another popped round with a card and I got a lovely message on FB from another, plus a very helpful text from another friend when I didnt have a clue what to do.

Dinner passed by with no issues and then it was on to bath and bed. I was dreading this time as it was a first for all of us.  But amazingly it all passed by beautifully.  Daddy and I both played at bathtime and Daddy sat on the bed whilst I read the bedtime story.  In five minutes she was out like a light and stayed that way until 7am this morning apart from a brief trip to the loo in the night.  Perfect!

This morning we had cuddles, we had breakfast, we had a wash and got dressed and still all good.  Missy didn't come with many winter clothes though and today was much cooler than of late so we definitely need to take a trip out very soon.

The walk to the park was cut short though as it was so flippin cold.  We did manage to finish our picnic though. So British.

The main issue with Missy is that she is controlling and wants to lead play the whole time.  It's exhausting, I'll admit, but we are very gradually helping her to understand and learn that she doesn't have to be in control the whole time. I'm guessing that in her early life she also did the looking after.  On a few occasions she's wanted to help me do things around the house but I've said "no, that's for mummys to do".  We've said no a few times when we don't agree with what she's doing and once or twice it's ended in brief tears but we've soon moved on. She also needs a huge amount of reassurance.  I guess she got very little at her birth home.  So we played the "round of applause" game at tea which started with me saying we should give Daddy a round of applause for making a fab tea and then led to all of us thinking of lots more 'rounds of applauses" for each of us, with of course lots for Missy.  She loved this game.

Talking of reassurance, the cats are needing lots too.  They're not too impressed at the moment but are gradually getting a little braver.  Poor things, they've had such a quiet life up til now.

So, it's the end of Day 2 and I think we're all beginning to feel a little better about things.  Missy went to bed perfectly (in fact earlier than we said she would have to, it being a Saturday night) and Daddy and I are just looking back on the day.  Daddy just told me that Missy put her arms around his neck this morning and said "Daddy I love you".  Awwwww. Bless.