The Adventure Begins

So how is Mason enjoying his new little brother? That is probably one of the questions we hear most often lately and something I wondered a lot about prior to Kellen joining our family.

When we found out baby #2 was joining our family, I began dreaming about the moment when Mason would get to meet his little brother or sister for the first time. I was of course super (no pun intended… ok maybe pun intended) excited about the prospect of being mommy to two little people, but I was also super excited that Mason would have a sibling. To have a buddy to stay up late at night laughing with, to race around the house with, to wear matching sweaters to church with, to get into trouble with, and to be his best friend. I wanted that for him so much. Spencer and I are very close with our siblings and we so hoped that Mason could have that kind of forever friendship someday.

When we came home from the hospital I could not wait for the boys to meet each other for the first time. Mason was actually really sick the day we got home, so my plans for a cuddly home coming had to be delayed since we didn’t want Mason getting Kellen sick. But the look on Mason’s face when he saw his little brother for the first time was priceless. He yelled, “Hi Buddy!” before running right up to the carseat, stretching out his arms, and chanting, “Cuddee Cuddee” (cuddle). Though he had to wait a few days to get in a good cuddle, Mason asked several times a day (still does actually) to “cuddee” with Kellen. We find it especially adorable that Mason gave Kellen a nickname all on his own. We’ve never called Kellen “Buddy,” so that Mason decided that that was what he was going to call Brother melts my heart

The same afternoon of our homecoming, my mom was holding Kellen and Mason ran up to him and planted a big kiss on the top of his head before we could stop him. It was so sweet I nearly died right then and there.

Mason has decided that his big brother duties include: offering Kellen stuffed animals (which we have to keep telling him Kellen can’t have, but it’s cute that he wants to share), telling us when Kellen is crying (he comes running up to us yelling, “Sad! Sad! Sad!” until we reassure him that Kellen will be ok), and running up to the side of his bassinet first thing every morning to shout, “Hi Buddy!” at the top of his lungs. He takes these responsibilities very seriously and does all of them quite well.

So to make a short answer long, I would say that Mason loves and enjoys his brother very much.

But of course, it’s been a time of transition in our house and there were a few particularly rough days at the beginning, which I think can be partially attributed to Mason’s sickness which made him terribly cranky. He is still adjusting to not having 100% of Mom and Dad’s attention all the time, and usually asks to be held and loved the moment we pick Kellen up to feed him. Overall, however, I think we are slowly, slowly getting into more of a routine and learning how to be a family of four.

In some ways this adjustment has been harder than I thought, in other ways it’s a little easier (It helps that Kellen’s such a mellow baby). If I’m being honest, sometimes I feel terribly inadequate for the task at hand; how will I raise these two perfect little boys in the way they deserve? I am learning how to divide my time between the two in the way that is best for both (but I have to admit that I feel guilty some of the time that I’m not doing it as well as I would like). But I am trying my hardest, and I know with all my heart that Heavenly Father meant for these little boys to be brothers. I know it.

And there’s those little moments along the way that make the hard parts worth it. Like tonight when Mason told Kellen all oh his own, “Uv Ooh” (love you). In those times, I can see a future for them of games of basketball in the driveway, hide and seek in the dark, campouts with daddy, and wrestling matches in the living room. I just know it’s going to be good.

Introducing Kellen

Meet Kellen, the newest addition to our little family! He’s such a sweetheart and we are terribly smitten with him.

I can’t wait to share some of his story; it’s a pretty special one. I started this post several days ago with the intention of telling a bit about how Kellen came to join our family, but I just haven’t had the time to finish it. So for now I’ll leave you with a myriad of photos I’ve taken of the little guy so far, and the knowledge that there will be more to come. Probably a lot more since I can’t seem to stop taking pictures of his darling little face (can you BLAME me?).

I’m off to kiss those chubby cheeks. More to come soon!

Book Review: Discovering Peace

When Jennifer asked me if I would be willing to do a book review for her, I jumped at the chance. Her first book, Delivering Hope, is one of my favorite books about adoption, so I knew that I was going to enjoy the sequel as well.

Discovering Peace explores what post-placement life looks like from the perspective of a birth mom and an adoptive mom. Post-placement is the part of adoption that you hear the least about. Just as many love stories end with a wedding and a happily ever after, so do many adoption stories draw the curtain with the placement of the baby. Placement is truly the beginning of many things including a family and an open adoption relationship, but these things are less often explored in fictional adoption literature. While adoption can be incredibly beautiful, it is also a hard thing for all parties involved. Discovering Peace delves into some of the more complex feelings that accompany an adoption story, while still maintaining a positive and hopeful tone.

Though fictional, the thoughts and feelings expressed by the characters in the book are realistic and I found I could relate to many sections of the book, I would endorse the book, not just because it was an enjoyable read (though it was that), but because it was meaningful. Because the story is told from two viewpoints, it quite literally directs the reader to look at adoption from a new perspective. The ability to consider adoption from another parties point of view is a most valuable skill to have in any adoption relationship. I like that this book encourages the reader to think about adoption in a different way.

You can purchase Delivering Peace here.

For more information about the author and her books, you can visit Jennifer’s website here. Jennifer will be doing a giveaway in conjunction with the blog tour, so you can stop by to enter to win your own copy of Delivering Peace.

I can’t wait for you all to read it so we can discuss.

Happy Valentine’s Day

I Have Some ‘Splaining To Do

I don’t even know the last time I’ve gone this long without blogging. There’s lots of reasons, but the main one is that things have kept breaking. Big things like cars and computers and lots of smaller things as well. It’s been kind of weird how many things have gone out of commission right in a row. As far as our computer goes, I had backed up most of the important stuff on our external hard drive as we’ve gone along but there were a couple weeks of current pictures that were lost. Spencer’s co-worker was able to recover them and I was going to post some of those, and then lo and behold the (brand new) external hard drive she saved them to stopped working. So I lost them again. Not to mention this computer is so old it doesn’t deal with the big pictures my camera takes and uploading takes forever if it’s able to do it at all. I don’t mean to sound like a whiner, it’s just stuff and not really a big deal. But by way of long, boring explanation, that’s the reason I’ve fallen so behind on documenting our recent adventures. At least on here anyway.

So, where to start…

We got a new (to us) car. For the first time in nearly six years of marriage we are technically a two-car family! I say technically because we’re not sure how long we’ll end up keeping our old car since it’s not very reliable. But Spencer has been using it to make the short drive to work and back, and though it’s not the kind of car we want to transport kiddos in, it gets him where he needs to go (and hasn’t actually given him much trouble since we got a second car). Some people have wondered how we’ve gone as long as we’ve had with just one car, but for the most part it hasn’t ever been all that difficult to share. In the past when M and I’ve needed the car we’ve just dropped Spencer off at work. And Spencer works such an odd schedule that even when he and I were both working, we could easily get where we needed to go with just one car between us. 

But I’m not gonna lie, though we didn’t anticipate having to buy another car at this time it’s been pretty convenient to each have our own means of transportation. And we really like our new car at lot. Maybe if I’m feeling really ambitious I’ll have to try to post some pictures of our new ride.

In other news, M seems to have developed into a full-on two year old overnight. Though he’s still my cheerful, sweet, little boy he has been working more and more on asserting his independence. He will frequently do things I JUST told him not to do (while looking my direction with a big smile on his face) just to see if he can get a reaction. Stinker. He has also developed a certain fondness for the word “no” and will often tell me no to things I KNOW he wants or would enjoy before eventually changing his answer. 

Just the other day he was doing something naughty (I can’t even remember what it was at this point) and I told him that he could either stop right now or go to time out and he calmly requested, “time out” with a big smile on his face. Aggg kiddo, you’re not supposed to LIKE time out!    

Even though he seems to enjoy testing the limits, in other ways he is less “two” than I would have expected given his current independent streak. He doesn’t throw a lot of tantrums. We can usually take things he shouldn’t have away from him or correct his behavior without a lot of hysterics on his part. He accepts when we tell him “no” pretty easily and moves forward without a lot of fuss. I know that this can and probably will change at any time, so we’re enjoying it while it lasts.

Overall, I know I’m really lucky to have such a happy kid. He’s such a sweetheart and I sure do enjoy spending my days with him.  

Some more funny stories about M:

I’ve been trying to help M sing the alphabet song with me. He does a good job recognizing a few short sequences of letters in the song, so we’ve been singing it lots lately. Last night we were singing in our usual way where I would say a letter and pause for M to parrot back, only instead of M repeating after me, he would yell “NANA’ instead. He did this over and over laughing hysterically. I was so surprised that he came up with that all on his own, that I started laughing too. Now he REFUSES to sing the correct way instead singing “nana” after every letter hoping to coax another laugh from me. He thought it was the greatest joke.

Every night when I go to check on M, I discover that he has slipped a whole pile of library books into bed with him. Usually several will be open and I’ll have to pull several more out from under the covers/a sleeping boy. It makes me so happy that he falls asleep reading. I love that he sneaks books to bed with him. I love being able to share something I love so much with my little boy.

Sorry this is such a word heavy update. I shall leave you with the few photos I managed to finagle onto this post.

I give you M and Mom’s matchy matchy day:

Big

Last night I watched my boys work on putting together M’s new big boy bed!

M was so cute carefully tapping each slat with his plastic hammer. He is so desperate to be just like his daddy. It’s just funny because M thinks he is SO big. He doesn’t know his toolkit isn’t Black & Decker; as far as he’s concerned he has the real deal.

It kind of reminds me of those memes that were floating around all over tarnation a few moths ago:

I kind of wondered how M would transition to his big boy bed, and his first night was great! He only popped out of bed and rattled the doorknob once. He was so excited to be able to have his own real bed. After it was all set up in his room he spent much of the remainder of the evening reading books in bed and tucking his stuffed animals in. I checked on him several times to make sure he hadn’t fallen out or anything, and he looked peaceful and content every time. Spencer said he found him on the floor before he went to work, but from what I could tell he had a pretty good night. I can’t believe it! First big boy undies, now big boy bed. What’s next?!   

Update on M (at 21 months)

I just love the age that M is at right now. He’s always been my little buddy, but he is so interactive and has such a cute personality that the time we spend together is especially fun. I mean, of course we’ve always enjoyed each other’s company, but I think it’s kind of a parallel play vs. cooperative play kind of thing. We are to the point where we can enjoy so many activities TOGETHER not just because we’re close in proximity, but because M is able to glean more and more each day from the experiences and adventures we share. 
Like going to the store for example. There are days when it’s definitely more work than when I toted him along in his wrap, but I love that he wants to walk through Target with his hand in mine, pointing out every Elmo that crosses his line of vision. He wants ME to notice the things he finds noteworthy. I love that. Or the times when he helps me bake and gets so excited to pour the ingredients in. He wants to copy just exactly what I am doing as he carefully stirs the batter. Or the other day we were sitting on the floor playing with his Noah’s ark and he was helping me match animals and laughing and laughing when the giraffes fell overboard. I’ve always loved playing with my little boy but it’s so fun for me that he is learning to play back, to understand and make little jokes, and actually communicate with words. I love seeing him turn into a little walking talking human! He amazes me every day with the things he picks up and figures out. We have such fun together. M’s vocabulary is improving so much each day. I love hearing the cute way he says words. He often adds an “ee” sound to the ends of words, which is funny because we don’t really speak that way to “cute-ify” words for him. He just adds it on his own. The exception to this is I do sometimes accidentally call water “watee” because M has called it that for so long that it just kind of pops out. Lately our favorite has been that M calls pajamas, “nammies.” I love that one. He loves to read and we enjoy making trips to the library together. Some of my favorite times of day are when I get to read to him because it is just the best when he will cuddle on my lap. M has been developing a longer attention span for books with more words which is fun for me because I have so many children’s books that I am excited to share with him. It’s so special to share something I love very much with my kiddo. I’m glad he likes reading too. 
(Oh dear, I realize it looks like he’s naked here, but I promise he isn’t)    

M is still a pretty cuddly kid, and will even request multiple times a day to cuddle on my lap. He does this cute thing where he wraps his arms around my neck and pats me gently on the back. He has surprised me in many ways with how gentle and sweet he is for a little boy. When I found out a boy was joining our family I pictured a little rough and tumble kiddo. He does like wrestling with his daddy (and his stuffed animals actually) and he has a good amount of energy for certain. But I never expected that my little boy would be such a cuddle bug. I had no idea he would be so affectionate, but I am soaking it all in before the day comes that he’s too big to want to smooch his mom.
M LOVES football. He has even pointed at the TV and asked, “football?” One time he started cheering in Walmart and it took us a second to realize he could see a football game being played on all of the screens in the electronics department. I think his love for the game mostly springs from his desire to see his daddy hoot and holler. However,he has asked for football on occasions when daddy wasn’t around so I don’t know what it is that appeals to him so much. I would think it would be boring viewing for a toddler, but he likes something about it.   

Big events of note:

Potty Training: We recently started potty training M and he is off to a really good start. It’s a little earlier than I would have expected to start him, but he was so obsessed with potties (and LOVES the Elmo potty song) and wanted to sit on the potty all the time anyway so we decided to just see how he would do. And he’s done great! The first day we started I wondered if we was really ready, but by the second day he had improved so much that I knew he was going to be fine. By the third day he pretty much had it figured out. It is so very, very strange to see him wearing big boy underwear instead of diapers and I kind of miss the way his pants looked all puffy with a diaper bum. But we are proud of him for being such a big boy!

Nursery: M was a little hesitant to start nursery, and we were in there a lot at first while he adjusted. But he loves nursery now! I think this has a lot to do with our family friend being called as a nursery leader. He really liked this friend even before she was his leader, and having her in there made things so much easier and happier for him. Now on the days we have church he is very excited for nursery and even starts asking “nursery?” before sacrament meeting is over. Last Sunday when we dropped him off he even waved to us and said, “bye bye.” Then we came to pick him up, he was running around with some other kids having such a good time that he didn’t want to leave. I’m so glad that he has a fun time in nursery.