Normalcy

I realize it's been a few weeks since I've sat down to blog.  In two days, we will have been home for one month already.  Hard to believe it's only been one month because it seems much longer than that.  I suppose we've been busy enough that it feels longer than reality.

Things have continued to go well.  We have had some melt downs here and there and by we I mean Jordy and occasionally Melina.  Jordy is figuring out that he has to share and that he doesn't always get his way. That's been a huge thing.  He thinks that whining equals getting his own way.  Melina LOVES Jordy.  She wants to be in his space all the time.  He's not terribly thrilled about it all the time but at least half of the time all is well.  We are all figuring it out and finding our new normalcy.

We are hitting our stride in the midst of all the craziness and appointments which is great timing because I head back to work next week.  We've got our home school groove and having Jordy has helped keep Melina more entertained during school time.  The down side is that my house looks like it is being run by a 3 and 4 year old.  A daily tornado passes through the house leaving great amounts of destruction in it's path.  A word of warning, unannounced visitors during the week will doubt my ability to clean.  Please know that I try and my two mess makers are worth my inability to keep a tidy house (at least this is what I tell myself during my "breath in, breath out" exercises ;) ).

I'll let the pictures do the speaking now:

Sharing a regular snack of apples.

Sharing birthday make-up with Melina.

At least she knew to put it on her eyes.

This make-up session was followed by a carpet cleaning session!

Jordy caught on that all the big kids were folding and putting away their clothes.  He's getting used to having his own stuff and insisted on helping to put it away.  Of course, I gladly allowed it!!

I <3 these moments!

Jordy fell asleep before he could unwrap his gift from Grandma Canada.  So this one is for you, mom.  He loves the cars.

Yep, he's a clown.  With or without the hair.  He's doing a belly dance here in this pic.

Someone caught on that Jordy likes to play dress up and knowing that doctors are ever so present in Jordy's life right now, decided to help make light of a sort of scary time.  If you can't beat 'em, join 'em!

He was very enthusiastic about giving shots after getting six in the past month. :(

Excuse the half loaded picture.  I'm too lazy to load it again.  Besides, check out the cuteness in that face.  It's all that matters anyways.

Someone asked to sleep in his own bed.  After sleeping with mom and dad and Melina for the past almost month, Jordy decided he was ready for his own bed.  We've told him that it is his bed but we've never actually put him in it.  Smart kiddo decided it was time and specifically asked to go to his bed.  I'll be honest, I was sort of heart broken at first.  But for him, he loves being a part of the night time routine like the big kids.  He gives hugs and kisses and says "good night" about fifty million times and smiles the whole time.  I know he's four already but to me, it's like he's growing up too fast in my presence.  It's better that he did it on his own terms and I'm incredibly thankful for that but I will still selfishly grieve not having him close at night.

Shriner's Hospital, trip 2.  We visited again to see a ortho specialist for Jordy's upper extremities.  It was another long day of travel leaving at 10am and getting home at 8pm but he did awesome.  Only one more trip before surgery.  Unfortunately, it's next week already. :(

Big sis Caydra came with us this round.  We finally have a surgery date.  During our appointment, they agreed to put us on the calendar.  Jordy will have left hip reconstruction surgery on November 13 with a chance that they may also do his right hip.  Mark your calendars and keep him in your prayers!!!

Guess who started swim lessons last week?  Doesn't get much cuter than this folks.

As you can tell, she hates it!

Chilling at the pool watching sis.

After sitting still for about a year not doing much outside of the house, we've finally become stir crazy.  Time to get out and experience life again.  I know other adoptive families understand what it is like to sit still for long periods of time trying to save money, pinch pennies, etc.  It's hard but well worth it when you get to the other side and get to finally experience everything with the newest member!!!

So, here we go to the orchard to pick some apples.  They always taste better when picked by five of the cutest kids!

Jordy was the bag holder for dad.  And he did an awesome job until the bag got too heavy.  It's funny how quickly Jordy is picking up English.  He doesn't actually call Dustin baba much anymore.  He's favoring calling him "daddy" as well as calling me "mommy."

I loved that some of the trees had apples so low that Miss Melina was able to pick without a special picking stick.

Mom's turn to carry our 30 pounder on the back.  Whew!

Stupid car photo bombing this priceless pic.  Car was there first but still!

This is Jordy's lifting face.

So, what do you do with the left over dough from your apple pie crust?

Give it to your four year old and let him play with it like play dough.  Duh!!  This piece of dough used up at least 15 minutes of Jordy's day.

Super proud of this kiddo.  He helped me make apple pie and he read the ingredients to me.  Way to go!  He is such a reluctant reader.  It does not come easy for him but it made me proud when he read what we needed to me today.  Yay!

Our reward after supper tonight!  Big hit with honey crisp apples.  Last weekend before I'm back to work.  Made an apple cheesecake dessert, too.  After all, one can never go over board when celebrating the last weekend of full freedom.

Celebration

What a hard week but with an excellent ending.  It's been busy but that isn't unusual for our household anyways.  We had our first visit with the pediatrician this week.  I LOVE our pediatrician so much.  Dr. Camille Smith with Fort Wayne Pediatrics has been incredible for our family and I'm so thankful to have her. Our visit with her went well.  She and I talked a lot about Jordy and the mystery blood disorder and she has some very good guesses.  After reviewing his file and previous lab work, we came up with a game plan to get Jordy caught up on his vaccinations and do lab work.  Unfortunately, this game plan involved lots of needle pokes.  We started off with three vaccinations at the pediatricians office and then headed to the hospital for blood work which required another three pokes to accomplish.  Because Jordy is under 30 pounds, they were only able to do some of the fourteen ordered tests . . . yep 14!  We had to go back two days later to complete the remaining tests but on the plus side, it only required one poke to get it the second day.  I will say that while Jordy hated being poked and cried instantly when he saw the tubes and needles, he was so brave and didn't move even though he was in pain.  It's times like these I wish so much that I could speak to him and explain to him why all this stuff is important.  I HATE springing this sort of stuff on him.  It just doesn't seem fair.  It's necessary but completely unfair.  We will hear next week what the labs reveal.

We also headed back to the dentist for the remaining two fillings this week and I cannot even begin to tell you how proud I was of him.  There was no fear.  He sat down in the chair, let them put on his mask, and when the doctor walked in, he literally opened his mouth wide ready for the doctor to do his job without prompting from anyone.  It took less than 20 minutes and we were done.  Kudos to Summit Dental off of Engle Road for doing an excellent job!

Today, we get to end this week with the celebration of life of two of our children.  God has blessed us with the most incredible family and today we celebrated the birth of our Melina who turned three and Jordy who turned four yesterday.  There are so many emotions I feel today.  I'm so incredibly grateful for the prayers that God answered for us to spend Jordy's birthday with him!!!!  When it has come to the children in our lives, God has always answered my prayers.  My prayers to have children, my prayers to be a foster parent, my prayers to adopt, and my prayers to fulfill His will which led us to Jordy.

I'm also sad.  I'm sad that in a lot of ways, this whole birthday thing in our house today was sort of confusing and at times overwhelming, although he didn't seem to show anxiety per se.  Jordy has definitely celebrated his birthday in the past but I wonder what happened to the toys he got. When you live in a house with 30-40 other children, I can only imagine where his toys have gone.  Needless to say, I've been very protective of Jordy's stuff today.  It's his day, it's his stuff, so everyone back off.  I'm not usually materialistic because I know that relationships are more important than any single "thing" on Earth.  Relationship with God, family, and friends, those are what really count but today, it's different.  Jordy gets to take ownership of something and this stuff is just the beginning of him taking ownership of a lifetime of stuff, ideas, and relationships.

So, as I sit and watch Jordy and Melina play with their many treasures of the day, I feel joy.  I look forward to each and every future holiday with Jordy in our lives and I'm so very thankful for the blessing of having Melina for the past three joyful years.  Life is most certainly never dull in our house and even on the worse day, I couldn't imagine a life without a single one of my five children.  Okay, I'm starting to get a little sappy and the tears are starting to well up so I will leave it there.

I love my life and here are a few reasons why:

My bean snappers.  Thanks to friends for dropping off a harvest of beans for us to enjoy. 

Labor Day fun!

We are set up and ready to make a mess!

Balloons are always a big hit in our house.

Notice the crown.  One thing we learned about our little guy in China is that he associated crowns with birthdays.  We've seen many a picture of a Chinese birthday child with crown.  So of course, we had to make sure he had one.  When we put his crown on, I think he fully understood that we were celebrating him.

She totally has this smile for the picture thing all figured out.

What a big hit!  This kid loves to dress up in costumes.

Okay, so Jordy wasn't as excited that ALL the grandkids were together in one spot as we were.  We tried.  Maybe next time we will forge a blank stare as opposed to tears.