Saturday, May 28, 2011

YIPPEEEEE....

I don't know what happened but my Blogger Blog is working properly again!!!! Yay!

Today was a great day!  My nephew and his 4 beautiful children and my sisters charge, came to visit my boys and I for the afternoon.
What a joy it was to sit outside on the patio, enjoy a cup of coffee or 3 and watch and listen to the children play and have fun together.

My branch of the family tree isn't the only branch built by including adoption.  There's only a few branches on our tree that don't include at least one adopted family member.  Some of them were here today.

One of the reasons that I never feared how my family would react or accept my children coming to us through adoption is because of this.  Most of our branches include adoption in one form or another.

I live in a family that embraces each other no matter what our differences are.

I am truly blessed!

PS.  Yes today's post is all about me and how I feel. :p

Happy Saturday All!

Is Anybody Else...

Having issues with their blog?  All of a sudden last night I discovered that I couldn't post a comment to a friend's blog and I can't log in to my own (the links are missing) when I'm on Google Chrome.

I pulled up my Internet Explorer and low and behold I can log in and blog!

Just wondering if anyone else is experiencing the same issue?  If you are do you know how to report it? And to whom?

Talk to you soon....

Thursday, May 26, 2011

Where Has The Time Gone?...

So today is May 26th, 2011.  In one month less a day our beautiful baby boy will be 3 years old!  Where has the time gone?

He was only 8 days old when he officially came into our lives and 13 days old when he came home forever from the hospital.  Those are 5 days of my life I will never forget.  (Although I do have them fully documented in a diary I'm keeping.)

So in these past 3 years our sons have grown and changed so much.  Our eldest was only 4 years old not quite 5 and very, very excited to meet his new baby brother!  Our baby was only a newborn and going through withdrawals (mildly at first, then horribly) within 6 months of his homecoming.  He was quite premature so it took a while for the true withdrawals to set in.  When they did, boy oh boy, our family all felt it.  The compassion that surfaced in our eldest was unbelievable.  Prior to that we hadn't seen too much, but knowing his brother was in pain that no one could help, drove him around the bend.  There wasn't anything he wouldn't do for that baby!  I thought I loved my eldest as much as I possibly could until that first true bout of withdrawals!  Boy was I wrong!

So baby grew and developed better than anyone dared hope for a newborn born with the addictions he had, and big brother grew and developed in ways no one could have predicted.

My eldest is my pride and joy.  He is the polar opposite of his little brother.  S. is serious and sober.  At 7 and half years old he's finally developing a sense of humour.  He is extremely literal.  He is old.  Everyone who meets him says they've never met such an old soul.  He is 7 and half years old with the attitude of a 17 year old!  Now I know every parent says that but it's true.  Meet my son and you'll look at me and say, "Wow you weren't kidding!"  Everyone does.

I'm homeschooling my eldest this year.  When we started grade 2 he was reading and comprehending at a grade 4 level.  He's now at a grade 9 level.  No, I'm not joking.  Occasionally I get asked what a word means and then he re-reads the sentence with the new definition of the specific word and I hear, " Oh OK, that makes sense now."  You know that show Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader?  Well I'm not.  I thought I was, but I'm having issues with the Grade 2 work!  But we're getting there.

So, we're less than 3 weeks away from our term deadline and 2 weeks ago, I discovered an English book that we didn't realize was there.  It's a whole term of work we have to complete.  Which wouldn't have been so bad but I've been under the weather with a bit of a diabetic issue (which is completely resolved now) and we're working like mad-persons to get caught up!  And we will.  I'm so proud of my above average intelligence son!

Then we have the almost 3 year old.  Well I said my boys are polar opposites and they're even biological brothers.  S. is serious and sober, and G. was born laughing I swear!  There is very little that doesn't tickle his funny bone.  All this boy does is laugh.  Or try to make others laugh.  His speech is a little delayed, but everything else in his development is right on track or exceeding his age group.  All of his assessors have been amazed at the way he's developed being so premature.  Right from the get go we didn't have muscle tone issues, or failure to thrive issues or eating issues.  The doctor thought he had an eating issue but we explained about his big brother being a lazy eater (2 hours or more to eat a bit of yogurt) and they removed the feeding tube and let us take over.  We proved to them that we could get him to eat properly and they discharged him.

G. is a child that melts your heart the second he enters a room.  His eyes and his curls just get you.  Yes I know I'm biased as his Mum, but I swear I'm not exaggerating.  He has his issues too.  He has a temper.  His temper is worse than any ginger kid you'll ever meet.  When this child doesn't get his own way we get treated to a throw myself on the floor-kicking-and-screaming temper tantrum.  The only thing one can do is walk away and ignore it.  Stay out of the child's line of sight (but so that you can still see him for safety's sake) and give him NO attention.  Most children would stop within a few moments.  Not mine!  He can go on forever.  But eventually it stops and then he comes to find you and asks for cuddles.  It's OK to give it to him then.  He's forgotten why he was so upset!  But most of the time he's just a joy to be around.

Now that G. is almost 3, we're sitting here waiting for a call from our social worker to tell us we have new children coming.  We're praying we'll be able to adopt another sibling group.  Seeing how important it was/is for our eldest when he understood that G. was his biological brother, not just his adopted brother, showed us that we could give that same connection for another biological sibling group.  Then our family we built through adoption would have more than one connection for their lives.

So here I sit praying for that phone to ring.  Please Lord, we're ready....

Monday, May 9, 2011

Mother's Day....

Yay!  The one day of the year that society sets aside to appreciate mother's.  Personally I try to appreciate my mother EVERYDAY.  I'm also trying to teach my children that it's right and appropriate to show appreciation to the people in our lives everyday.  So how did my family do on Mother's Day?  FANTASTIC!!!

I was overjoyed!  I had a fantastic day and it had very little to do with the material gifts I received.  My wonderful hubby did take me down to my favorite store at our Quay and my oldest son helped me pick out a very pretty ring and pendant that I will be able to wear at his Nana's wedding this summer.  (I'm the matron of honour and I needed jewelry to go with my dress.)  So it served double purpose. But the best gift I received was having my family sit down to a really fancy, homemade dinner with me.  It was awesome!  My hubby made the best hamburgers and hot dogs around! Especially because none of it was homemade!  It was all prefab, and good.  But it wasn't the food...it was the company.

My beautiful Mum and her fiancee, my new stepbrother and his gorgeous lady, my doting hubby, and my two phenomenal sons!  Having these people with me on this day, all of us appreciating each other, was the best gift ever!

I can't wait until the next family gathering where I can have EVERYBODY here.  I'm thinking it's my hubby's birthday and my nephew's birthday.  Hmmmm time to give my sister a break from throwing all the parties I think.  Better get planning it's less than a month away!

Hope you all had a wonderful mother's day!  I know I did!

Friday, May 6, 2011

Mother's Day is Coming Up...

So Sunday May 8th is Mother's Day.  This (as in Mother's Day) is a day I looked forward to my whole life.
From the time I was 16 years old I was told that I would never be able to have children.  It broke my heart.  All I ever dreamed of being was a house wife and mother.

When I was 12 years old I met my best friend and found out she was adopted and I decided there and then that whether I had biological children or not I would be adopting.  So while finding out that having birth children wasn't going to be an option, I consoled myself knowing that one day I WOULD be a Mum!

Here we are in 2011.  I am the mother of 2 of the most beautiful boys in the world.  They are biological brothers, and born of mine and my husband's hearts.  Biological to us they are not, but you can't tell.  To see us together is to see a family.  No one questions us (based on appearance) whether or not we're foster parents, or caregivers.  They just see a family.  In the emergency room however, we get asked if we're foster parents because of our boys diagnoses of FASD, and NAS.  We quietly explain that we are their parents.  Adoptive not temporary.

So Mother's Day is upon us once again and I can't wait.  My family keeps asking me what I would like for my day.  I want my next children.  But...that's not going to happen this year.  So what I really want is a day with my family that I can share without upset, drama or fights.  I want a day to make beautiful memories together and then in the evening have dinner together with my Mum and her fiancĂ©e, and my new stepbrother and his beautiful lady who unfortunately can't be with her children and grand-babies.  So my Mother's Day is going to be spent making beautiful memories with my family and helping to ease the pain of another Mum who can't be with her babies.  Who could ask for more?

I suppose if my beautiful family wanted to get me something material, a trip to my favorite store down at our local Quay might be nice.  I could pick out a shiny new ring or necklace....

Happy Mother's Day to all those Mum's out there and pre-adoptive Mum's to be!!!