Full of Surprises

This little boy has surprised me from day one.

We expected screaming and terror.  We got a little bit of that, but mostly we got a happy, mellow baby who adjusted really quickly.

We kept waiting for the "honeymoon" phase to end, but it never did.

He really is just happy and mellow.

We decided this week to move him from his crib to a toddler bed.  Pretty soon an awesome train table will be making its way into his bedroom and we thought we'd try to get him settled in his bed before then.  Plus, we wanted to make the move while he was healthy and sleeping well...and after a full year, we finally have both of those things happening at the same time! 

I expected it to go pretty well, considering how well he goes to sleep and how easygoing he is.  But part of me still wondered - would this be our first battle?  Would we see a new side of him, a stubborn side perhaps?

Nope!  I thought the first time night might have been a fluke, but it's been four nights and four naps in his toddler bed with no fussing, no escape attempts - he's only sat up in bed twice!  

That's just him.  As long as he's not sick or teething, he's happy.

Here's to hoping he stays that way!!!!

Wordless Wednesday {Trampoline Fun}

New Friends

Last week I was so blessed to meet some new friends.  I met three wonderful ladies who I had previously only known through blogs (which, don't worry, is not as creepy as it sounds!!!).  All three also have little boys from South Korea so we already had a common bond.  I was so happy to start some new friendships and to find some more South Korean buddies for Matthew!  

We were thrilled to meet Josiah and Rachel on Wednesday (and blessed to share the time with another dear friend, Wendi).  Matthew and Josiah were so adorable together and we had a great time chatting and getting to know each other.  We probably should have done picture time with some less interesting props!  I could not get Matthew to look at the camera for anything!

And if I thought it was hard getting two little boys

to look at the camera,

I soon learned that it is virtually impossible

to get four boys

all under the age of 3

to all look at the camera

at the same time!!!!

Oh well, I suppose 2 out of 4 looking is pretty good :)

Matthew and I took a little trip on Friday to a beautiful park (one that we will most definitely be visiting again) to meet Abby and Sara and their adorable kids.

I am so thankful for my new friends Rachel, Abby, and Sara!

"And Stay In There!"

That's kind of what it looks like I said to him, doesn't it?

Actually, only moments before he was climbing

in and out

with great excitement and smiles

having a blast.

And then out comes the camera

and this is the expression I get!

Oh, and don't forget

the arm crossing attitude :)

Just a little boy who hates the camera?

Or perhaps this almost two year old

is giving us a little glimpse of what is to come?

I shudder at the thought.

Baby Steps

The adoption has taken a turn from "abstract" to "concrete".

In my mind, before we knew who our child would be, the paperwork was tedious and mildly annoying. I always knew it would be worth it in the end, but being we knew it would be so long until we'd be matched with a child that it was hard for me to be that excited about it.

Until Nathan, that is.

Until we saw his sweet face, his amazing hair (seriously, you will not believe it!), his beautiful eyes. And once we knew we wanted him to be ours, my perspective changed.

We received our formal application from our placement agency yesterday. I must admit I've been stalking the mailman! The mail becomes oh so exciting when you're adopting :)

I opened it up, realized we had quite a bit more paperwork to do, and felt...excitement!

Because now, every piece of paper we fill out, every form we sign, every minute of training we do, it's all done with that little boy in mind.

He's changed everything :)

That old familiar "waiting ache" is back, and yet it's so different this time. It's different because I have seen the ending, and I know that it will come. It may not feel like it sometimes, but the day will come and he will be ours. So for today, I'm content to fill out paperwork, take our baby steps, and dream of the day when two little boys will call me Mama.

{Simple Things}

It's the simple things that have me smiling today.

Simple things, like homemade biscuits that are safe for Matthew.

And using my rolling pin for the first time since I bought it...

5 years ago.

Don't judge.

Simple things like seeing him enjoy the biscuits...just delightful!

Simple things like a boy and his Daddy playing with a new train from Grandpa

that Daddy just fixed last night.

Simple things like a trip to the park

with my sister and my boy

to play in the leaves

and the wood chips which are, apparently, awesome fun!

To be with people I love

Yep, that makes it a good day!

Mission Accomplished!

We had two missions today:

Find safe food

and

Conquer the fear.

We left town today searching for safe food for Matthew. The goal - have food to feed the child. Mealtimes have become frustrating, overwhelming....annoying. I am not a "from scratch" kind of cook. I am an "open the bag and heat it up" kind of cook. Sadly, this seems pretty impossible when dealing with food allergies. Slowly I am learning, but unfortunately we've had to sample many not so great meals to find just a handful of delicious ones.

Brad is mastering the art of the fake smile when dinner is placed before him.  Love that man and the way he can laugh with me at an awful dinner :-)

We're getting there, though, and today was a big step on the way to a greater variety of foods for Matthew. Did you know there was such a thing as soy yogurt? How about dairy-free mac and cheese?  I must admit, neither sounds particularly appealing to me, but we'll see what Matthew thinks.  I am pretty excited about the dairy-free chocolate chips - cookies here we come!

The second mission today was to conquer the fear about eating out.  Well, just my fear I guess.  Brad was not overly-worried about it (that's just him) but after Matthew's reaction I kind of felt like I would never want to eat out with him ever again (that's just me!).  If he could have a reaction like that at home, the chances of him having one at a restaurant are so much higher (cross contamination, people not following the restaurant's guidelines...so many things could go wrong).  But we know of one restaurant chain that seems to take allergies very seriously and that has a great plan in place, and we feel confident that they do all they can to make sure the food is safe.  We had a lovely meal (oh so thankful I didn't have to cook!!!) and Matthew did great.  

I think maybe he was glad I didn't cook, too! :)

What We've Been Up To

This week:

We had our last home study meeting and everything went great!  We signed papers, filled out forms, talked and asked questions.  It was very different this time knowing we are working towards bringing Nathan home!

We filled out our I-600A and it is ready to go to immigration as soon as our home study is written and approved.  We are hoping to be able to send it away at the beginning of November.  This is the first step on the US side to bringing home our boy :)

We sent away forms to our placement agency so that they can ask Korea for permission to adopt Nathan (since we do not live in the same state as our placement agency they have to ask special permission for us to adopt him). We hope to hear back about this soon (maybe next week???).

This week, Matthew had the CRAZIEST bed-head ever!

This week we enjoyed the beautiful fall weather so much!

We played at the park and watched the ducks swimming...

We played out in the yard and gave Daisie sticks to chew on...

We read books in the sunroom

(correction, we read one particular train book over and over again!)

We played on the picnic table...

And we had fun inside, too!

Lots of puzzles...too many puzzles to count!

All in all, I'd say a pretty great week!

Thinking About My Boys

I am so blessed.

I am blessed to be the mama of this little boy.

It's hard to believe that just over a year ago

he was far across the world

and my arms were empty

and my heart was aching.


Now my arms are full

and my heart sings with joy

to have this little boy

filling up my life

with laughter

and fun

and drool

(because we're teething again!)

and slobbery kisses.

My heart is full of love

for this little boy

and for another little boy

I have yet to hold,

yet to kiss,

yet to snuggle.

Tonight I kissed my boy goodnight

And thought of my other sweet boy

So far away...

yet so near to my heart.

I can't wait till I can kiss him goodnight, too!

What God Has Been Up To...Our BIG News (Part 2)

So where was I? Oh yes, leaving you hanging... :)

Our adoption worker started the wheels turning by telling us that it might be possible to use our home study with our current agency to adopt a waiting child who was listed with a different agency. From my understanding, our agency only does home studies for families adopting from their agency.

Something within me got so excited at that moment. We walked out of that meeting, and Brad started laughing when he looked at me and he said, "I know what you're thinking!" I asked him if he wanted to pursue this, and he said yes! I got in the car, called a friend to get me the number of the other adoption agency, called them and felt my heart pounding as I asked if Nathan had been matched with a family yet. They said he had not, and that they could send us some updates and a video if we wanted. I tried not to get too excited as I said that would be great.

So here we are, a week and a half later, and I am thrilled and amazed to announce that

It's a boy!!!!!!!!

Brad and I have decided to pursue Nathan's adoption and we are overjoyed at what the Lord has done for us! It has been a crazy week, which is why I couldn't blog :) I just knew I would not be able to keep from saying anything about it. But we have told the agency that we want to move forward with adopting Nathan, and we have now told our friends and family the wonderful news, so I feel free to share it here!

We are going to keep his name Nathan (which means, "God has given"), and we have not decided on a middle name just yet. This has all been such a whirlwind and I think I'm still in shock! We have not "officially" accepted his referral as that will take a bit of time and paperwork, so sadly I cannot share a picture yet of our adorable son! We still have to finish our homestudy, and the agency Nathan is listed with has to get permission to place him in our state (apparently this is just a formality). I cannot believe I am going to be the mother of two little boys!!!!

But here's what you need to know about our little man. He is adorable to the max! We look at his picture all the time and cannot wait to get our hands on him! We have been blessed to have a video of him, and we hope to have another one in just a few weeks time!

Nathan is now 9 months old, which makes him 13 months younger than Matthew. I am so thrilled that Matthew will have a little brother! I know the age difference may be challenging at times (oh who am I kidding, I have no idea what it will be like!), but we hope and pray that they will be best buds. We do not know how long it will be until he is home, but we are anticipating about a year long wait. Sigh. That sounds so long right now. We are praying that it is sooner for sure!!!! Nathan was a waiting child because he was born with malformed ears and has some pretty significant hearing loss. We know that there will be many new things for us to learn and challenges that may be ahead, but we are confident that the Lord will give us the strength and the grace to handle each and every challenge that will arise. We are so blessed to be able to be this little boy's mom and dad and we cannot wait to have him home with us!!!!

So....it's been a crazy week :) And God is so good!!!!!

What God Has Been Up To...Our BIG News (Part 1)

Buckle in, this might be a long one!

Where to start.  Well, I guess this all started months ago.  We knew we wanted to adopt again.  There was no doubt about it, and we felt fairly certain that we would love a sibling for Matthew from South Korea.  So it was settled, and we started the process...but something in my heart was not settled.  I could not pinpoint what it was exactly, but it just wasn't right.  

We were working with our agency, we knew them and had a wonderful experience working with them for Matthew's adoption.  Any time we talked about switching agencies, we always came back to the same conclusion - we didn't feel like we were supposed to be with another agency.  Time and time again I came to Brad trying to explain what I felt, but I just couldn't.  My nights were spent looking at waiting children on websites and my heart was broken for all the children who need a mommy and daddy.  God was at work in my heart and was placing a strong desire there to adopt a waiting child, and Brad heard about this desire over and over and over again.  He too was open to adopting a waiting child, but all of these children were listed with other agencies, and we had already paid money to our agency and spent many hours on paperwork...we continued to go back and forth many times about what to do, making lists of pros and cons and talking and praying about it over and over again.  But each and every time, we came to the same conclusion: we both felt we should stick with our current agency.  Even though the wait times being quoted to us were so long they made me cry.  Literally.

Almost three months ago, a little boy on a waiting child list caught my eye.  He was absolutely adorable - squishy and round with hair that made me laugh out loud (because it was that awesome).  He was in South Korea, and he was waiting for his forever family.  The agency he was with had named him "Nathan", which caught my attention as well since that is the name we almost gave to Matthew.  We requested his file and looked it over, but knew at that time we were not financially in a position to move forward with an adoption.  We also just felt that we wanted to keep working with our agency.  So we let them know that we did not believe we were the right family for him.  I thought that was the end of it, but little did I know that God was at work even then...

I printed off Nathan's picture and put it on our fridge.  I decided that since we couldn't adopt him, I would pray that another family would be able to.  I looked at his little face every day and prayed for him often.  I continued to see him on Rainbow Kids (the website where I had first seen this little guy) and knew he was still waiting for a family.  

Fast forward to a week and a half ago.  It was late afternoon, and Brad had just gotten home.  I hopped online to check out the adoption forum I frequently read.  Someone had posted a message about this little boy to say that he was still waiting for a family.  I began to wonder once again why we could not be his family.  I talked to Brad about it for ages that night, but we didn't know what to do.  We had already had one of our meetings with our agency to complete our home study.  We were invested, financially and with our time.  We didn't know what to do as our second home study meeting was scheduled for the next day.  

Thursday came along, and we went to meet with our social worker.  I prayed so much on the way there, asking God why I felt so unsettled about everything, telling Him I was willing to wait if that was what He wanted, asking Him for peace about the whole thing.  

When we arrived and began talking with our social worker, we somehow got talking about other agencies and how much shorter their wait times are compared to the agency we've been working with.  She asked if we were sure, and said she'd understand if we wanted to work with another agency.  We told her we really did not want to switch agencies...and then out of the blue I found myself telling her about this little boy, Nathan.  I expected her to be sympathetic, or to tell us that we should consider switching agencies to pursue his adoption.  I did not expect what she said.

"It might be possible for us to use our home study for this adoption.  It is different for waiting children."

With those words, our week got much more interesting :)

Tune in tomorrow to hear the rest of the story...

Weekend Fun With My Family

It has been a crazy week and I have been a terrible blogger...but I'm back with lots to share!  My family is here this weekend and we had so much fun today at the apple orchard.  Matthew is enjoying time with Nana, Papa, Aunt Sarah and Aunt Jo.  It was almost 80 degrees here which seemed so strange - last year I remember bundling Matthew up and borrowing a hat from Matthew's Aunt Amanda :)  

Matthew and my Dad are great buds!

Matthew loves his Aunt Sarah, too!

He was so interested in the grass...we could not get him to look at the camera for anything!

This is actually not from the apple orchard...I uploaded it by mistake but it sure is cute!  I'm pretty sure he just kissed that rock.  The boy loves rocks!

Okay, back to the apple orchard!  Me and my mom...I am so blessed.

There was a little area with goats and chickens...Matthew kept saying "buck buck" over and over again at the chickens!  He was also pretty interested in the baby piglets (they were so cute!).

So thankful for family and all the wonderful memories made today :)

Catching Up

I'm back!  I took a bit of a bloggy break by accident...life got busy, and after Matthew's reaction last week I just needed to process a bit.  We are doing so well, and Matthew is looking (and I think feeling) amazing!  His skin has been clear and silky smooth for over two weeks now!  This is the best he has ever looked (even when he arrived his skin was never soft) and we truly think that taking milk, tomatoes, and citrus fruits out of his diet has made all the difference.  Praise the Lord!  We will probably wait until January when he has another allergist appointment to consider adding back in any of these foods.  So for now...cooking is a challenge :)  I must say, though, that seeing him feeling better is all the motivation I need to stick with it.  I am slowly figuring out new recipes (some good, some....not so good!) and I know we'll get there in the end.

In the meantime, Matthew has been eating a lot of plain foods - vegetables, fruits, meats, beans.  Lots of these!  Thankfully he loves all of these!

Before we made these changes to his diet, Matthew frequently woke up looking like he had been in a fist fight :(  It made us so sad and we just didn't know what to do.  

I am so happy to say that he has not looked like this at all in the last two weeks!  Poor sweet boy.  It is amazing to see him now and to realize that he probably was not feeling good at all for a long time.  But now...oh, what a change!

I thought I'd just share a few random pictures from the last couple of weeks.  Enjoy!