Spooky

Sunday was the last day that Local Theme Park was open for the season. The last four weeks have been Halloween-themed, complete with hayrides, corn mazes and trick-or-treat trails.

While we'll miss our regular visits to Local Theme Park for the next six months (until they open again), I'm not at all sad to see Halloween go. I'm a little Halloweened-out.

We will not be going trick-or-treating this year. Call me cruel, but between Local Theme Park, campground events with the grandparents and the school's walking tour of local businesses tomorrow, Olivia will have been trick-or-treating more than six times already this season. In three different costumes.

Yeah. I think we're done with that. It was fun while it lasted, but it's time to move on.

Spooky

Our one and only family photo for the entire month of October.

Bring on Thankgiving!

Three Months!

Dear Martin,

My sweet little man! I cannot believe that you are three months old already. As I type this, you are lying on the floor talking to the toys dangling above you as if you are having an actual conversation. You are so serious! You do this a lot, sometimes with inanimate objects, sometimes talking to yourself, but often talking to other people...your sister, me and your Daddy, strangers on the sidewalk. You love it when people talk to you, and you usually reward them by talking back, regaling them with your animated stories in a language only you understand.

You are still my little snuggle-man, happy to snuggle up with anyone who wants to hold you. You are often ready with a smile that lights up your whole face, and you seem to save the best smiles for Mommy.

I love you, my little man. More than words can adequately express. Happy 3-months!

You want me to do what, now?

Oh, you want me to smile! Well, why didn't you say so?

This sister-person, she seems to like me.

My little boy

Marty slept straight through the night last Thursday...10 hours! I actually woke him up at 7:30 on Friday morning. I don't know why...I just felt like maybe ten hours was enough and he needed to eat. He didn't even fuss like he was starving, just smiled at me a lot while I was changing his diaper. And he has not slept through the night since. Figures.

I am baffled by how un-stressed I am by babyhood this time around. Marty is just such an easy baby. He sleeps a lot when we are at home during the week...long morning and afternoon naps and fairly decent night sleep as well. He doesn't sleep much when we are out at church or shopping or visiting people because he wants to look around too much. But even when his schedule is disrupted, he rolls with it.

Olivia SO did not roll with it at that age. If you dared to screw with her nap schedule, there were dire consequences. Like a baby who would not stop crying, would not sleep, would not eat, refused to be held and refused to be put down. Yeah. That.

When Olivia was born, I fell in love immediately with this squalling, needy infant. Maybe it was because I was in the delivery room for her birth, or maybe it was because she made herself known (by crying) from the beginning, but for whatever reason, I felt a strong connection. I would have been absolutely devastated if things hadn't panned out after that.

It wasn't the same for me when Martin was born. For one, we missed his birth entirely and met him for the first time when he was about 12 hours old. And then he was just such a laid-back, sleepy baby that we didn't hear him cry...well, at all, I don't think. Not until we left the hospital. There's something about comforting a tiny crying baby that makes you want to hold him/her forever. But Martin was just snuggly and didn't care who he was snuggling as long as he was being held.

So, for whatever reason, I didn't have that instant connection. I was still terrified that our adoption plans would be interrupted, but that had more to do with how long we'd waited than anything else.

But now...oh, yes. I am in love with this little guy. He snuggled his way right into my heart. Or maybe smiled his way. He's a good smiler.

No one mentioned to me how fun it would be to have a little boy. But oh, it is so fun! He is so sweet and cuddly, and he talks to me like he has something to say. He gives me his best smiles! He just looks at me with that look that says, "Mommy, you are my favorite girl forever!" Melt my heart!

I know it won't always be this way. I know that someday he might take up Olivia's current favorite phrase. ("I don't like you, Mommy!") But for now, I am really, really enjoying my little boy.

Interview Project coming up!

We have a cold. It is the mean, nasty kind that immediately fills your head with muck and your chest with a rattling cough, and then it sets up camp for a couple of weeks. I am exhausted, the baby is snotty and pathetic, and Olivia is being a challenge. So there's not much I really want to say here about our life. However, there is this:

 
This little project is sponsored by Heather. I participated last year and will again this year. If you blog about adoption in any way (adoptive parent, prospective adoptive parent, adoptee, etc), you are welcome and invited to sign up. It's a good way to learn about other perspectives on adoption from many different kinds of people.

I will say this: Heather and I do not agree on many things. I have followed her blog for many years, and I know from reading her that we have a very different philosophy on some certain foundational things. (We won't be voting for the same candidates this election.)

However, when it comes to open adoption and adoption ethics, I have learned a lot from her.  She has challenged me to think long and hard about how agencies, attorneys and adoptive parents treat birth/first parents. Her perspective has helped shape my relationship with our children's birth families. She has inspired me to think of them as an extended part of our family, for their sakes but also for the sake of our children. I have "met" people through her blog who have opened my eyes to all kinds of perspectives on adoption.

As an adoptive parent who is not also an adoptee, I think it is incredibly valuable to read about others' experiences. It can only help us as our own kids grow. So, to those affected by adoption...go, sign up for the interview project! You just might make a new friend or two.

The easiest baby on the block

Marty slept through the night last night. He coughed a lot but kept falling back asleep (thank you, preschool germs and croupy daycare kids for the nasty cold, btw). He woke up for the day at 5:50 a.m. I could get used to that.

Unfortunately, I did not get to fully enjoy the all-night sleepfest. Cramps. Even after painkillers, I still had this annoying dull ache that persisted in keeping me semi-conscious pretty much all night. And now I have a dull headache as a result of my crappy night of sleep.

Dang you, crappy diseased reproductive organs! Can't you just be satisfied with infertility? Do you have to ruin my sleep cycles too? I may be a little grumpy.

 Of course, even though he slept through the night, Marty was greeted by a bleary-eyed Mommy to feed him his breakfast. He's usually ravenous after sleeping more than 5 hours. But this morning, he took a few sips of his bottle, pushed it away and then grinned at me before taking it back.

Not an actual photo from this morning, but you get the idea.

Little stinker. He knew I was having a bad morning, and he was determined to pull me out of my funk.

Sometimes, I wonder how we ever lived without this sweet little guy in our lives.