ER

Saturday was intended to be packed full of getting the house ready to sell. I went to put Decs down for a nap and did a quick diaper change. I was reaching for some shorts (holding on to his leg) and he flipped off the changing table and fell face forward on to the hard wood floor. He cried so hard and had blood coming out of his nose. We headed to the ER and spent the next couple of hours checking him out. It was a scary experience but, fortunately, he's fine. 

My mom guilt meter was ranking pretty high but I know accidents do happen. It was a hard lesson to learn, but my little man will no longer be changed on a changing table. We did a little rearranging and here's our new set up:

It was about that time...

We hadn't ever gotten any family pictures! Yikes...can't believe we waited so long. Anywho, here's a link to our photographer's blog of our new family pics!

Mark. Ashley. Declan. 2009

10 months old!!

Declan is...

-so full of personality...every day he has a cute new quirk.

-recently very fond of bath time. This means mom is soaked at the end but it's worth it.

-still sleeping through the night 8:30-7:30 (except last week when a cold + 3rd bottom tooth interrupted everything).

-a picky eater. We're working on it but his main favorites are pureed fruits, waffles, toast and puffs. On occasion, he'll eat pulled pork or small pieces of chicken. He hates tofu.

-on the verge of walking! He likes to climb, cruise, fall then cry. Repeat.

-enjoying overnight stays at Nana & Papa's (2 this month)! We like them too. :)

-A D O R A B L E

Geesh- seems I need to start planning a FIRST birthday party. Craziness.

Wordless Wednesday

It's H-O-T !!!!

We are roasting here in Nebraska. Today was seriously the hottest day I can remember in a long time. The humidity is outrageous and made the heat index over 110 degrees today. So, what is there to do for survival??

The Splash Pad!!

playing with cousin Asher

Declan drinking water off the ground- adorable. 

Instead of stopping him, I ran and got my camera. :)

Father's Day .09

We had a packed full weekend of baby showers (yes, 2), a BBQ, working on the house to sell, and 2 father's day celebrations. I'm just now catching my breath and uploading pictures. This is my husband's I-hate-pictures face:

I don't say enough how thankful I am to have such a great husband. More than anything, he's a great father. He gets to spend a lot of time with Declan when I'm working nights and weekends and they have a special bond.  I'm a very lucky gal to have such an involved hubby- he does it all especially when it comes to caring for our little man. When we were getting in the car yesterday he strapped Declan in and I heard him kiss him and say "love you, bud". Oh my goodness--my heart melted. Happy father's day, babe.

My plate is overflowing...

My plate is not just full but overflowing. Why, you ask? Because of this:

Hmm...all you see is my serene and cozy front porch. Deceiving because all I see is WORK. We have decided that we're 99.2% sure we're going to sell our house. I'm a realtor and have been experiencing homes in my price range fly off the market (thank you $8000 stimulus). Our home itself is fabulous. We've spent nearly 4 years fixing it up from the sad state it was in when we bought. There are just a couple of problems. We have no yard unless you count a concrete slab and a patch of grass that the dogs pee on as a backyard. Boo. Also, though we love the charm that a home built in 1922 possesses, we've dropped a lot of cash on problem after problem. 

Declan has most certainly changed every aspect of our life and this is no exception. Mark and I are "old house people" and I love woodwork as far as the eye can see, little nooks, high ceilings, etc etc but for now it's just not practical. We're looking for something newer with a backyard. 

Ok, back to the stress. We have lots of stuff to do before we list and I'm wanting to list in the next week or two. It will be a miracle if we hit that time frame. All our touch ups and repairs to list seem to be taking twice as long as I anticipated. My fingers are crossed for our survival while on the market (a baby and 2 dogs makes showings a little more complicated) and a quick sale. The bright side? I know a good realtor. ;)

So, yeah, I totally just posted my SUPER cheesy realtor picture. You've got to be able to laugh at yourself, right?

Wordless Wednesday

...besties and their boys...

C O L D P L A Y

Have I mentioned that I luuurve Cold.play?? They put on an extraordinary show and spare no expense to wow the crowd.  The very first picture looks like they were awful close, eh? Well...they left stage and hiked to the back of the venue to perform a few songs in the crowd- it just so happened to be 3 rows from our "so so" seats. Woot! 

Wordless Wednesday

cousin Shuan . Declan lovie. cousin Ella

Looking back...

I'm so thankful to Production, Not Reproduction for organizing us open adoption bloggy mommies to talk about our lives in this world of OA. She started a round table and here's the assignment:

As with so many things in life, thinking about open adoption without having experienced it and actually living it out are two very different things. What do you know now that you wish you knew then? Has the reality of open adoption as it's looked in your life matched your expectations? What one thing about open adoption would you tell your past self, if you could?

If I could sit down and have coffee with my past self I would tell myself that there is no way to know what to expect, so quite contemplating. ;) How's that for a vague answer?! Seriously, though, things I worried about are now non-issues. 

I wondered if I would feel like I'm competing with another mom and I never do. I'm Declan's mama...I wipe his butt, kiss his neck, make eyes with him for a guaranteed smile, cut his stubborn big toe nail just right, know his exact clothing sizes and brands that fit his string bean body, etc etc.  When we're with his birth mom it's great. She gushes over him and loves to hear every cheesy story and milestone. Sometimes I'm caught off guard when I see her screen saver is his picture or hear that she's talking to her girlfriends about his latest teething episode. But, regardless...I'm mom and I don't feel threatened...at all. Hopefully his b-mom is always in Decs life to shower love on our sweet little boy.

I also wondered if I could love Declan like he was biologically my own and I do- a million percent. It's absolutely impossible to explain the love I have for him. When he was only days old I had a friend ask if I felt like I was baby sitting and I didn't. I knew he was ours-chosen for us-perfect. As he's gotten older, our bond is so strong and my heart melts at his screeches when I walk in the room. (Yes, screeches...you'd have to know him). The love that I have for Declan has completely banished my desire to ever do infertility treatments again. Before adopting I mourned the idea of not having a little baby with my eyes and my husband's lips. We didn't take the idea of IVF off the table because the likelihood of a pregnancy through IVF with my condition, PCOS, is pretty good (we never tried but have been told this).  Now, I can honestly say if I'm never pregnant that's totally okay. In fact, on our adoption finalization video you can hear me tell my attorney "see you in 2 years." 

It's hard to know what OA will be like before it's experienced but I have a feeling I'll continue to learn and have "wish I would've known" moments, but isn't that parenthood in general?!

*you can read other roundtable responses by clicking on the blog link above...

Do you love this little boy?

A gift of life for one, a gift of motherhood for another.

I was not prepared for how emotional and special Declan's court hearing was going to be. Our son's been our son from day 1 so I thought that court was just a technicality in our adoption journey. Little did we know, it was a highly intense and amazing 10 minutes. 

After we were sworn in and up on the witness stand, the judge asked "do you love this little boy"? Cue tears. He also asked "are you committed to bestow all the rights and privileges to Declan as your child as if he was born to you" and "are you committed to be a role model and mother figure to Declan"? These are just a few of the deep questions we were asked. It was amazing. When he said he was signing the adoption decree and wished us congratulations, we felt pure elation. It was the punctuation to a very long journey that brought us joy, fear, excitement, frustration and unadulterated love. 

We were blessed to be surrounded by family (also known as our paparazzi). The judge made an exception and allowed them to take pictures and videotape the hearing so we'll have these memories to show Declan some day.

The rest of the day we continued to feel loads of love as we celebrated our sweet son over lunch with family and followed up by a big party at our place in the evening. 

It's hard to explain how special I believe Declan to be. He was chosen by God to be our son. I didn't grow a belly and feel his kicking and bring him in to this world. I did labor- not in the physical sense (though infertility most definitely has it's physically painful moments) but I labored emotionally. If I'm completely honest there were times of spiritual labor as well. As we sat in that court room yesterday I felt that every single moment until then was worth it. Every penny spent at the doctor trying to get pregnant, every negative pregnancy test, every tense moment during our match, every day of those 7 days we waited to hear if Decs would be our son. It's all worth it. I would wait forever to feel what I felt yesterday. 

"Do you love this little boy?" With every shred of my being.

My heart overflows. Happy Adoption Day, little man.