Visit

We scheduled a visit with Martin's birthparents this weekend. I was pretty excited to see them again since they so enjoyed our November visit and are always thrilled to see new photos or videos of him. And he is at such a cute stage, always smiling and babbling and coming up with the most hilarious facial expressions. I so wanted to share that with them.

In order to have a more relaxed and (the plan was) longer visit, we decided to get a hotel room in their city (3 hours away from us) so we could arrive on Saturday and visit all afternoon in a place that did not require us to order food and keep kids from disturbing other patrons. It sounded like a great idea.

They were planning to arrive at 4:30, but were delayed. Olivia and I went to the pool until she was tired of it, and then we got cleaned up and waited in the lobby. At 6:30, they were finally on their way, so we went out to get sandwiches to share in our hotel room when they arrived.

They arrived shortly after 7:00 p.m., much later than any of us had hoped. We were optimistic, though, because Martin had just taken a nap and we figured that would buy us about 2 hours before he started demanding bedtime.

When they arrived in the lobby, I handed Martin off to his birthmother, C, who happily took him and cooed at him while he studied her. He seemed curious about these new faces (not new, but new to him for the moment). Then we headed for the elevator to go up to the room.

As soon as the elevator doors closed and Martin realized he was closed up in this strange, unfamiliar box with unfamiliar people holding him, he searched out my face and just started crying his little eyes out!

I was not expecting stranger anxiety. Martin has always been happy to be held by anyone, as long as he was held. But I suppose he is at that age, and it was the end of a long day in which he hadn't napped according to his regular schedule. And he was in an unfamiliar environment. It made sense.

I felt badly for his birthparents, who really looked forward to this visit and were welcomed by a crying baby. He lightened up a bit once we reached the room, but I could tell he was a bit apprehensive the whole time they were there. We did manage to get him to smile some and also coaxed a few giggles out of him. But, overall, he was not his normal self.

Next time, we will try meeting in the morning. This late afternoon/evening visit was poor planning on our part, I guess.

It was Martin's first ever hotel stay, and he did fabulously. Both he and Olivia slept soundly all night. That gives me hope that we might actually get adequate rest on our Spring Break trip in a few weeks!

Aren't they adorable?