mumblerrr observations

Ya know, sometimes you notice little things in life that you just feel the need to comment on. Here are some of mine:

1. Why do people troll the parking lot at the YMCA looking for a good parking place? Aren't you there to exercise?

2. In our previous life, we used to wash a load of whites, a load of darks, and a load of lights and jeans. We now have a whites, darks, grays, browns, girly pink-purple-aqua-fuschias and jeans. And it NEVER ends.

3. The more you want spring, the more it snows.

4. Just when the little one is falling asleep, the cat has to announce his presence with a big ol' MEOW!

5. The way to get someone to come for a visit is to turn the futon back into a couch.

6. Once you get attached to a product they discontinue it.

7. Minivans have a lot of compartments and gadgets. Some you don't discover until 3 months after you get it.

8. Don't answer the phone. It's just a politician you disagree with -- a recorded one at that.

9. It's amazing how much children always want something they cannot have. Hmm, I know adults who never outgrew that.

10. Finally, just wondering, are people actually going to vote for the next president based on lapel pins and middle names? Don't answer that. I'd rather keep drinking the kool-aid.

challenge #3: a little sleep here, please!

Those who know me know that I like my sleep. In college, my roommate and I were often ridiculed for choosing naps over typical tomfoolery often exhibited by those of that age. I am now an adult with 3 kids. Two of them are sometimes difficult to get into bed and asleep at nighttime, but generally they go willingly and without too much fussing. Then, they sleep soundly through the night and often struggle to face the morning. Let's just say, morning people, not so much!

Then, there is E. Our youngest at 19 months. We try to to head upstairs to read books and rock-a-bye baby by 7:30. He usually goes down fairly easily. It's the staying there that is the problem. E may wake up 1, 2 or even 3 times in a night. Wouldn't be so bad if he were the kind of kid that you could go in and pat his back and whisper words of love and have him go right back to dreamland. Uh, yeah, again, not so much. The child stands up in his crib and cries for one of us to rescue him. He then demands to be picked up, held, and rocked until he falls into a deep sleep. Don't try to put him back down! No, no, no! Oh, and don't be fooled by the dozing with closed eyes. Just move a tad and watch those peepers fly open. You know, it wouldn't be so bad if this process only took 10, 15 or even 20 minutes, but it often takes him an hour or longer to actually fall completely back to sleep. And then get this: He wakes up anywhere between 5 and 7 in the morning all happy and giggly and full of energy. Not like we could sleep in anyway -- got a 2nd grader who needs to be up and at the bus stop by 8. It would just be nice if he woke up kind of slowly and quietly. Instead, it's more like having a lovable puppy wake you up when all you want to do is sleep -- lot's of wet sloppy kisses, running around, and cries of "mama, mama, mama!"

When J was a baby and had sleep issues -- he HATED his crib -- we put him in bed with us. Worked fine. E, however, thinks it is play time if he comes in with us. I've tried laying down on the floor by his crib (oh, now that's comfortable) but that wasn't good enough. He shares a room with S, who is in a twin bed, and there is no room for a recliner or other piece of comfy furniture. Sharing a room also means that we need to reduce the amount of vocal expression so that he doesn't wake up his sister.

The ironic part of all this is that back before E became attached to us he didn't want our help going back to sleep. In fact, he used to scoot into the corner of his crib and pretend we didn't exist. (Hey, maybe if I don't look at them, they will go away!) Well, now he is very well-attached and can't seem to do without mama or daddy when attempting to snooze. So, this really is a good thing even though it is creating bags under my eyes and making me quite cranky.

The big question is: How do I make it better? Shorten nap time during the day? Wear him out more so that he is just dog-tired? Encourage self-soothing even though it may keep the house awake for hours but possibly work in the long run? Just wait it out and it will get better with time?

Ok, help me out here and give me your solutions. How can we (ok, me, M and E) sleep better without jeopardizing attachment? (In other words, don't suggest Ferberizing. Not gonna do it. Also, moving his crib to our room really won't work as M gets up in the middle of the night to get ready for work. Besides, I don't think that will solve the pick-me-up problem.) Come on my cyber friends, help me get some sleep!
:)

on burritos, momentitos, and calling arizona

Came home from a meeting the other night to find J and S having a blast in the family room. What was the their object of fun? An old bedsheet. We gave them a few sheets so that they could build forts and tents, etc. They get thrown behind the big purple chair where the kids like to hide out. But here was J rolling S up in the sheet and calling her a burrito. Of course, J needed his turn as a burrito, too. Then, he started doing the classic gym class parachute games. Hey, let's toss it in the air and you run under it! Hey, let's toss it up and pull it down while we sit inside! Oh, the joy of an ugly old sheet!

Then, J proceeded to make S giggle and say things like, "rock bottom" -- ?? -- yeah, I have no idea.

Scenes like this are becoming more common. (Thank you, God!) J is still struggling and we seem to have to constantly reassure him. We've started a new "game" with him to help encourage him to make progress, and if it is successful, we will share it. If it fails miserably, well, we'll just keep it to ourselves. So far this week, he is doing great with it. Instead of taking his frustrations out on the kids, he is bringing them to mom and dad -- the frustrations, not the kids. Are we on the right track? Let's hope.

Another neato thing from this week: S got to speak with one of her friends from the House of Hope! This sweet, sweet girl came home not too long ago and now lives in Arizona. (Not easy to explain "Arizona" to S. ) Listening to these two little girls who used to speak only in Amharic now chit chat with each other in English was something else. The conversation didn't last long. When you are 3.5 and 5, I don't think you really have much to say -- especially in limited language.

Speaking of language, E is starting to have a ton of sounds that represent words -- our challenge is to interpret those sounds. For example, is "Bah" bye? ball? butt? balloon? Well, in addition to all these one-syllable English expressions, he also has a multi-syllable Spanish word that comes out pretty well: momentito. It comes out something like, mah-mah-teet-toe, but it is very cute. Oh, and he also says "purple" and knows what it is. He's a genius!

Ok, gotta finish the cheesecake that M brought home from work. (Yeah, had to throw that out there.)
:)

what we don't have

Hey, it's been awhile since I've been on here! Is anyone still out there? Are those crickets I hear?

I have a number of things swimming around in my head that I want to write about -- all of which I am sure the world will find incredibly fascinating and, therefore, must be shared. So where to begin? How about with a realization. . .

So, I'm rocking E to sleep last night and it dawns on me that it has been 5 months since we first learned of him. He was 14 months when we saw his picture back in September, and he is now 19 months. What a big boy he is becoming! As I gazed at his beautiful, precious face (made more precious by the fact that he was sleeping and not yelling) I suddenly thought of S and wondered what she looked like as a baby. We have no idea what she looked like before the age of 3 and we never will. No baby pictures.

But there is more than that. For neither child do we have memories of first steps, first teeth, first haircuts or other typical baby firsts. E is still babyish enough that we can get a sense of what he looked like in his infancy. Not so for S. Our 3.5 yo girl is so capable and independent that it is hard to imagine her as a helpless baby, and I'm finding it hard to develop a mental picture of her as a tiny tot.

So what happens down the road? The day will come when she will realize that we have no pictures of her as a baby. We have no stories of her as a baby. We have no things of hers from when she was a baby. We have . . . nothing of her as a baby. That's going to be a tough one.

All along I've been lamenting the fact that we have more background info on the little ones than we have for our big kid. I had completely overlooked that we have something for him that we don't have for S or even somewhat for E: Knowledge of his babyhood. Just as we have had to deal with some tough issues of loss with J, I know that we will do the same for S and E. It just may be that the issues will be a tad different.

As always, something to think about.

So you want more than one?

You tell people you are adopting, and they are so excited for you. You tell people that you are requesting siblings, and they think you are losing your mind. Oh, they won't tell you that to your face (ok, maybe some will); instead, you get that look of shock and something like, "Wow!" or "Really?!" or some other non-committal word or phrase that tells you that they just can't process what you have said and give a positive response.

It is a big decision and should be thoroughly considered and researched. Only being home now about 2.5 months, we are far from being experts on the matter, but we can at least give our perspective for others to mull over.

Let's go way back. All they way back to those dreamy, romantic days before marriage. My friends and spouse will all tell you that I wanted a lot of kids. Five was my magic number, but I would go for four. M was more in the 3-4 range. You see, we are both from large families. Both of my parents come from very large families -- I have so many aunts, uncles and cousins that I still have to ask my mom who is who, and I could never identify them all. I always considered it an accomplishment if I could name my mom's 10 brothers and sisters, and I've never been able to name all of my dad's. I happen to be the baby of 4, and Mark is the 4th of 5 kids. So, for us, the idea of having 1 or 2 kids seemed all wrong.

Well, you know what they say about the best-laid plans. When the whole pregnancy thing didn't happen, we turned to adoption and became parents to our beloved J. We couldn't imagine that he would be an only child, but we also knew how difficult and expensive adoption can be. Then, there were job changes, moves, and issues cropping up in Guatemalan adoption. It took us until he was 5 to feel ready to begin the process again. As we began, we knew that it would probably be our last shot. Time and money would not be on our side. We felt blessed to have J and blessed at the chance for one more. No, two children didn't fit into the life scenario I had concocted in my head, but I knew we were lucky to have any children at all. We would be thankful for our two and move on.

Then, as most of you know, China adoption became extremely slow and frustrating. We often evaluated our options only to think that by the time we did anything that our China referral would come. At the 14 month mark, three things happened: China issued 2 days worth of referrals, our immigration paperwork needed renewal, and our agency became licensed in Ethiopia. Time again to re-evaluate. We realized that by switching we could request a sib set, have either gender, and expand our age range.

When adopting sibs, you are generally doing one homestudy, one dossier, and one CIS approval request. That also means one set of fees. Our agency has an additional child fee that it charges to help cover in-country costs, like visas, medical exams, etc. It is a small fraction of the cost of a complete adoption. So, one big advantage of adopting sibs is doing one set of paperwork and not paying for two complete and separate adoptions.

Another advantage when adopting sibs is that you are able to assure that you have children from the same country. International adoption is always changing, and just because you easily adopt from one country today does not mean you will be able to tomorrow.

Now, to the question that everyone wonders about: Is it hard? Here is how we look at it. Right now, yes, it can be hard. We went from one child to three, and there is no way that that is an easy thing to do. I am sure it is much easier to add one at a time. However, rather than look at just the difficulty of adjustment in the first 6 months to a year, we looked at a whole lifetime.
But that's not what you want to know. You want to know what makes it hard RIGHT NOW. Well here ya go:
--both children needing attachment attention at the same time.
--figuring out logistics of how to do simple things. For example, who gets their bath first?? Who gets strapped into their carseat first??
--needing a minivan.
--laundry, laundry, laundry (including the new load of girly pink clothes) and more laundry.
--sibling rivalry.
--food, toilet paper, paper towels, soap, lotion, detergent, etc., etc., etc. In other words, you need more of everything.
--sleep. It is tough enough to handle the sleep issues of one child. Even tougher dealing with two -- especially if they share a room and one wakes the other.

It's a lot of adjustment, and this doesn't take into account having other children in the home. (J has had his own adjustment issues that have spiced things up a bit.) However, with some planning, patience, and time, a new norm takes hold. Be sure of what you and your family can handle and prepare as much as possible. Also, be willing to accept help when you come home -- something that is often hard for me to do, but I'm very glad I did. Finally, put expectations (yours and others) aside and take things slowly. Live at the pace that best fits the adjustment of the children and don't force things you are not ready for. Eventually you will feel like you can turn things up a notch, but don't do it if you are not there yet.

Finally, I want to say that it was a great decision for us. I honestly can't imagine a smoother transition for our two kiddos. Did it help them to have each other? I think so. In many ways, I think the adjustment has been harder for us than for them, but I would prefer it that way. They've been through enough, don't you think?

So, if you are considering sibs, get yourself ready for extra work, extra exhaustion, extra fun, and extra hugs and kisses. Oh, and come up with a response for all those people who will think you are nuts.
:)
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mumblerrr update

News you can use. Well, not really. But, hey, maybe it will entertain you and help you feel better about your own existence in this world.

1. It's still potty time -- sort of. E has lost some of his enthusiasm for sitting on the potty. He still does it, and he still goes, but we're not getting informed of the need. That's ok. Having been through the trials of potty training a very reluctant child, I am THRILLED that he already knows what a potty is, how to use it, and isn't scared of it. Once the desire for big-boy undies hits, we're good.

2. S is in a tough spot being our "medium" child. (J came up with "medium" and I kind of like it. There tends to be such negativity connected to "middle" child, so we're going to say she's "medium".) You see, it is hard to know whether it is better to be like the cool big brother who gets to ride on a school bus or to be like the little brother who gets so much attention because he's the baby. During the day, I catch her saying things to E like, "Stop copying me!" and "E is a crybaby!" Hmmm. . . wonder where she learned that??? Then, the next thing I know she is babbling baby talk and showing me the food in her mouth. I guess when you are the rose between two sunflowers, it is hard to find the place where you can blossom in the light. Fortunately, since she is the only rose, I'm sure she will bloom into her own despite being medium.

3. We cleared up the, um, intestinal ickies that, um caused, um, such a poopin' problem. Apparently we were lucky -- only took one round of meds and they didn't share it. Can't tell you how much this has improved all of our lives. And by the way, have to say, Luvs diapers hold their own (and a whole lot more!) when compared to the industry leaders, Pampers and Huggies. Any diaper that can hold in what E required it to hold in while dealing with those ickies gets a ringing endorsement from the Mumblerrr. Pampers and Huggies did a great job too, but Luvs tend to be cheaper.

4. When we came home 2.5 months ago, we knew that the kids would want to touch everything. It was constant with the tv and the remotes. Well, S got over all that a long time ago, and she knows not to touch. E, however, cannot keep his little fingers off the buttons in the house. The tv is his favorite, along with the vcr and dvd player. When he can, he will run into the laundry room and hit the button on the washing machine. (It makes such a wonderful chiming sound!) Clock radios are another favorite, and do remember to keep all cell phones and remote controls out of his reach.

5. J requested another little brother. Yeah. Me thinks not.

6. Sleep. Yeah, I would like some of that. S is sleeping through the night as long as E doesn't wake her up. E generally tends to wake up once a night, and I have had a heck of a time getting him to sleep deep enough to lay him back down in his crib. Fortunately, he is now willing to sleep in our bed, so we are getting more sleep. Except for last night. He's got a horrendous cough, and he felt the need to toss and turn -- on me. Eventually, though, he conked out. Oh, and then he fell out of the bed. (M had already left for work.) Don't worry -- he landed on a pillow and barely woke up. (E, not M.) No harm, no foul. Hey, at least he didn't fall out of a bunkbed or have a top bunk fall on him. (Ask M about that childhood story!)

I'm sure there are more tidbits to share, but my sleep-deprived brain has run out of tales.

Upcoming program note: I plan to do a post on adopting sibs and one on adopting toddlers/preschoolers. I know that there are people out there wanting/needing the scoop on such endeavors.

Have a Super Tuesday!
:)