Happy New Year!

Baby Hef hopes your celebration was filled with style and fruity cheerios: the two main ingredients for a good time.

Christmas

Here's a little peek at how Sam's Christmas morning went down..

He came downstairs bright and early, a little confused by the piles of wrapped packages scattered about the floor. He crawled around, having a look at it all. 



But he didn't show any interest in doing anything with any of them (he's heard "no touch!" on too many occassions, I think!) until Grammy led the charge. Then he tentatively started ripping off paper.

 

He paused to thoroughly investigate each thing he opened which really paid off at Grammy cookie/paint marker fun box. Cookies for breakfast, why not? It's Christmas!



There was Play-doh in there too. That got eaten as well but not until later. :) (Nice face, Dad!)



This is the awesome Little People nativity that Mom and Dad got for Sam. The stable plays "Away in the Manger" when you put the angel on top and press down. Sam figured out that you can also put a bunch of other things in the angel's place so we've had a cat, Joseph and the innkeeper up there too. Everyone gets a turn!



This is Sam crawling through the tunnel/tent combo. Along with the toy vacuum we got him, I think this is the favorite toy. That Grandpa knows what's fun!

Playing hopscotch, or "dancing" as we call it.



Me reading the Christmas story to Sam.



Sammy with Grammy at his new art table, playing with his new paint markers.



This picture pretty much sums up Sam's feelings about my parents. :)



There's more to see on video but I'll save that for another post. I hope you all had a happy Christmas!

Getting into practice :)

Last night I finished knitting my very first sweater! I need to sew a button on the front and block it but I didn't worry about minor details like that when I asked Jeff to take my picture.



As you can see, I was so excited about the whole thing that I didn't notice I'd put my sweater on inside out. Sigh. Nobody home up there!



Here's what it looks like the right way out.



Sam decided to help mommy out.



In fact, Sam has become a great helper around here. This morning we vacuumed the kitchen floor and then he proceeded to Swiffer the whole thing for me, just to make sure it was clean before I mopped.



After dinner I decided that everyone had worked hard today and declared it a Smoothie Night. I whipped up some fruit and yogurt in the blender and by the time I got into the living room with my cup, this is what I found. My two men, just hanging out, drinking their smoothies. Could I ask for anything more?

Starting over

I think it's time to acknowledge that I am not a very good blogger. :( It's been brought to my attention by several people that I have neglected my public (GASP!) which wouldn't be so awful if that didn't include neglecting to update all of you concerning Samster the Hamster. Mea culpa! I promise to make it up to you. How, you might ask? Starting January 1st, I'll be (gulp) making my best attempt at Blog 365. For those of you unfamiliar with this little endeavor, that means that I will try to post every single day for the entire year. I don't have anything fancy like a phone that accesses the internet so I'm not sure how this is going to go if we leave for vacation. But you'll get my best attempt. (Sara, you totally inspired me!)

In the mean time, I'm putting the rest of Sam's adoption story on hold. I think you know how it ends. :) It was exhausting to write the first part and I'm finding that writing the second part is stonewalling all my other attempts at updating you. Look for Part II sometime in the New Year. When I have more energy.  And while you wait, here's a picture to tide you over:

National Adoption Month

Unless you are my BFF on Facebook, you probably don't know that November is National Adoption Month. I realize that I have been a TERRIBLE blogger (the guilt! aaagh, the guilt!) but I couldn't let this November go by without writing something. On Facebook I asked if anyone had any questions about adoption and I'd like to do that here. Is there anything you're curious about? Leave your questions in the comments section and I'll leave a respone to you there so that everyone can see the answer.

I also wanted to share the story of our adoption. It's a long one (because I don't understand the concept of brevity) so it might come in installments. What follows here is the story of our journey toward Sam.

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Jeff and I were agreed upon our desire to have children when we got married. His illness delayed that dream for us and that was very painful for me. When we were finally ready to think about a family, I was ecstatic. I couldn't wait to be a mother. We didn't expect to have any trouble concieving though I'd been pushing nagging doubts about my body's wellness out of my head for the past ten years. I gave us a few months at best before we were pregnant. A few months became six, then a year. Initial tests showed not much wrong with me but deeper investigation revealed that we'd need some assistance to achieve a pregnancy. No problem, I thought. I could take some drugs and we'd be fine. But we weren't. The drugs made me sick and they didn't work. It looked like we needed massive help and that was something we just couldn't afford. I spent months crying as yet another dream folded in front of me. We had already been through so much...why this too? Ultimately we managed to become pregnant only twice in five years. Both times I miscarried very early. It looked very much like we would never be parents. To say that I was hurting and bitter would be an understatement.

Well-meaning friends (and strangers) gave us advice. They told us to relax, to go on vacation, to stop trying so hard, that if it was meant to be, it would be. My heart resounded with hurt; apparently it was not "meant to be." Relaxing has never gotten anyone pregnant, despite the rumors, and neither had our numerous vacations. Vacations are for people who ovulate, something I don't do. But mostly we were asked why we didn't "just adopt!"

We had investigated adoption early on in our troubles. Jeff and I had agreed that adoption was a possibility for us even before we were married and found out that we were unable to produce children. However, we were told by a social worker that because of Jeff's illness we would be unable to adopt. Together we are kind of a health disaster and we would be disqualified from adoption. It was the opinion of this agency that we were not fit for parenthood, despite our desire.

One day, in a fit of desperation, I decided to call Bethany Christian Services. It had been a few years since we'd talked to anyone, Jeff was better than he had been, and I could not stand the thought that perhaps I had left a stone unturned. I will never forget the day that Christyn called back and told me: "You would not be allowed to adopt from another country because of the strict out of country rules. There is no way they would understand that Jeff is being treated and is capable of being a parent. But you could most likely adopt domestically. I can't give you a 100% yes without doing a homestudy and talking to our director but I don't see why not." I sat on the couch and cried tears of relief.

995 days ago, we recieved the homestudy packet from BCS in the mail. We meticulously filled out every form and sent it back to them as quickly as possible, anxiously awaiting the next step. For some reason our paperwork was delayed and we didn't hear anything for three weeks. We bit our nails to the quick until Christyn called at the end of March 2007, asking to meet with both of us. That began the long process of paperwork and legalities. We were excited to start with; there was so much to do! We felt proactive, like we were making actual, physical strides toward our future child. It made the intrusive homestudy questions about our bank accounts, sex life, past relationships, etc., more bearable. We had to get written references from people we knew stating that we were stable and would be good parents. Because of Jeff's illness, BCS called each and every one of our references to talk with them personally, including Jeff's doctor at the VA. We had more meetings than normal for a homestudy because of our health. We took great pains to disclose everything that had happened to us; if we were going to be rejected for some reason we wanted it to be now, not later on when we finally had a baby in our arms. We could not take any more heartbreak. We also felt strongly that it would be unethical to hold anything back. If a birthmother was going to choose to place her child in our arms, she should do so with all the facts. Anything less was coercion--baby stealing.

We put together a profile with a "Dear Birthmother" letter telling about us and our hobbies. We included photos of ourselves, our families and our home. In the letter we stated that we were very much interested in an open adoption; one in which contact is maintained with the birthfamily. Although we had started the process believing we wanted a closed adoption, we had done a lot of reading and our hearts had completely changed. We believed it would be best for our baby if he had access to his birth family throughout his life. We didn't plan to stifle the fact that he was adopted and we knew that he would naturally have questions. We wanted him to have the best answers possible.  Also, it seemed to us that the more people in the world who could love our baby, the better. What a special child, to have two families instead of one! He would never need to question whether he was loved or wanted.

Throughout the process of paperwork and waiting, Jeff and I became more and more compassionate toward our birthmother and her family, whoever she might turn out to be. We prayed for her, that she would be safe, that the child inside of her would be safe and healthy, and that she would have peace with her decision. We prayed that if it came to it and she felt the decision to place her child for adoption was wrong, that she would have the strength to keep him and the support she needed to raise him. We came to understand that adoption is a broken world solution that leaves a wound, no matter how loving a situation the child is placed int. So in my secret heart, and partly from unbelieving despair that I would ever be a mother, I prayed that the mothers looking at our profile would find a way to keep their children. My heart was already broken from losing two children I desperately wanted; I wished very much to keep another woman from that pain. Lord, I prayed, if adoption is the right decision, help me to give this birthmother what she needs. And help me to give my child what he needs. And heal us all.

There came a point when paperwork was finished, the FBI declared that we had not comitted any felonies, and our profile was on BCS's website and in three local branches waiting for birthmothers to look it over. So we waited. And waited. And waited. We filed our profile in November. In the beginning of December we recieved a call from BCS. Christyn sounded hesistant over the phone; this was not the joyous news we expected. She explained that they had a child on the way, due to be born in just a few days, with a sever heart defect called hypoplastic left heart syndrome. Would we be interested in having our profile shown to the family? We needed to let her know by 5PM that day. It was just before noon when she called. We hung up and wept over the impossibility of the situation. If anyone knew the ins and outs of hospitals, it was us. We could be good parents to a sick baby. Jeff in particular empathized with the little one, feeling that his brokenness called to hers. We called our pastor and a pediatrician who is a good friend and asked their opinion. Our pediatrician told us that the outcome for this heart defect varies but almost always requires a transplant by the time the child is a teen. If we brought the child home, we'd be looking at many, many surgeries, medications...likely this child would not lead an average life. We asked our families what they thought and weighed our own health concerns. It was with broken hearts that we called Christyn and told her that we could not consider parenting this child. When we hung up the phone, we felt miserable. It would be three more months before we heard anything from BCS.

Je me souvien.

I wrote this on 9/11/08 and thought I might make it public this year.

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Lux et Tenebris

That was the slogan sewn on Jeff's unit badge September 11th, 2001. Light in darkness.

I was a senior at Rutger's University that day and I skipped class because I was too lazy to get up for an 8 AM discussion of feminism. It was the end of the summer, it was going to be a beautiful day and I was not wasting it inside. Jeff had left the day before after spending two weeks of leave with me. We'd spent our last day together in New York City, visiting the World Trade Center, walking all over. We'd even contemplated spending the night but decided to return home so he could make his flight the morning of the 10th. I missed him but I was going to see him again soon. He had tentative plans to return in March, if the Air Force and his particular position allowed him more leave.

I didn't know anything was wrong when I finally climbed out of bed at 9 AM because I didn't have the radio or TV on. I was on my way to get into the shower when my roomate, a reliable med student who never skipped class, slammed open the door to our apartment shouting my name hysterically. "We've been attacked!" she yelled, crying. I thought she meant the med school. I couldn't understand. When she finally told me, when it finally got through, I sat down hard on the toilet and began to cry. All the people I knew in NYC, what had happened to them? Faith? Had she made it home to Queens? Kapps and her dad, what about them? The larger implications began to hit me; what about Jeff and my brother? What would happen to them if a war started? One was Army, the other Air Force. Would I lose them both? I felt like someone had poured ice into my lungs. What if I never saw Jeff again?

He wasn't reachable by phone; I had no idea where in the world he was. I knew he hadn't made it back to Japan yet and the phones were locked up busy in any case. My brother Josh just managed to get through to me, to ask if I was okay, to tell me to be strong and that Jeff would be alright. Josh was at the ROTC house on campus, he'd be there if I needed him. Just hearing his voice steadied me.

Jeff called at noon, all too briefly. "I love you, remember that." he said. He sounded alert in a way he didn't normally. I could feel his mind clicking away, analyzing a thousand different variables. I call it his military mode and he was in it, full force. "I won't be able to call you for a while" he told me. "Just know wherever I am, I'm thinking of you."

I didn't hear from him for weeks. And eight short months later our whole lives changed as his brain was permanently, life-alteringly damaged in the war that began that bright and beautiful September morning I was playing hooky. The last day I was truly carefree.

Moonlight

This. This moment when the last of summer is blowing through my twilit house, this moment when my baby is slumbering peacefully upstairs, when my husband is kissing me and telling me again how he loves me, this moment when the voices of children echo down the street, chasing each other toward home, this moment when the moon is just beginning to shine through our living room window, this moment is what I dreamed my grown-up life would be when I was still a little girl.

I breathe it in and smile at the shadow of my smaller self. My life is rich with fulfilled dreams.