Many of you already know that Emma was born with a Cleft Lip and Palate and I often discuss what is going on in her world. Well, last Wednesday, Emma had her 10th procedure and in preparing for her surgery my husband and I made plans and sacrificed to get Emma the 2018 American Girl Doll of the Year Luciana.
Last month, our family took a day trip to Columbus, OH to surprise Emma with Luciana! She literally started screaming when we pulled up in front of the Easton Town Center, American Girl store.
If you aren’t familiar with Luciana Vega, she loves science and wants to become an Astronaut! She believes with creativity, confidence, and a serious science streak, she can achieve her ultimate dream of landing on Mars. What I loved about the Luciana doll is that she has big dreams and she’s not letting anything stand in her way (website).
Much like Emma, although she has been born with a Cleft Lip and Palate and has some developmental delays, she still overcomes all obstacles that are placed before her. It may take some time and extra work but she never gives up, and not to mention she never lets these procedures stop her! She was 3-days out of surgery on Saturday and she still got up played with her little brother and worked hard on her numbers.
Kindergarten starts in the fall, and at her last IEP Meeting one of her areas that needed work was her recognization of numbers and learning quantity…well I put it on my calendar to learn, however, she got up today determined to work on her numbers and matching the actual numbers with the number of items on the picture.
Since we knew from Emma’s procedure last summer that she was able to take her favorite toy with her into the Operating Room we made sure she had Luciana before the big day this year. Since the day we got Luciana, she has literally been EVERYWHERE with us, she even sleeps with her.
So I knew the day of surgery we had to make sure Luciana was surgery ready…
I found the scrubs on Amazon…
The nurses immediately fell in love with her and talked about how pretty she was, and how they LOVED the scrubs and it was perfect to help make Emma feel comfortable during this procedure! They even played along and taped Luciana’s nose like Emma’s when we met back up with Emma in Recovery.
Overall, I love investing in the American Girl brand for Emma! She truly loves it and all I wanted if I invested the money into the doll is for her to play with it regularly, well Luciana hasn’t left her side her side since we purchased her. Even during Emma’s recovery process, she keeps her close! We have changed Luciana out of her scrubs, but Emma decided to keep her steri-strips on her face, maybe we will take Luciana’s strips off once we are cleared to take Emma’s off.
