For my mom

            Isn’t it funny how we celebrate birthdays in terms of the person who was born, instead of the person who actually got them here? I just showed up all those years ago- my mom is the one who actually did all of the work. This one is for you, mom.

As a child, all I really wanted was to be in her close proximity. Being the youngest child to a stay-at-home mom afforded me some pretty special memories. Even now I can close my eyes & see us dancing around the living room listening to Stevie Wonder sing “Isn’t She Lovely”… Mom was dancing away with a dish towel thrown over her shoulder while I laughed, keeping my eyes on her. I always had my eyes on her.

The first day of kindergarten was the first time I ever remember seeing her cry. She is as unemotional as I am emotional, which caused quite a problem that day. Having spent the first 5 years of my life at home with mom or with a member of our extended family, I literally had never been left with someone I had not known my entire short life. This fact & the tears in my mother’s eyes as she left convinced me that she was not coming back. Certainly she mentioned at some point she would be back shortly or maybe she thought I would relate my school experience to that of my older sister, but it did not happen. I will never forget sitting in that classroom with the salty tears stinging the back of my eyelids thinking, “I can’t believe she left me here, I don’t know these people.” That afternoon my feet barely touched the ground as I threw myself at her. It was the very best feeling in the world- I was safe once again, right where I belonged.

I could write a book on how brave she was as she became our only parent, about how she took care of Pop as his illness progressed while raising 2 little girls & trying to keep our life as normal as possible. I could point out how she never referred to herself as a single parent, or how I found her calmly splitting firewood at some point when she was in her early 40’s. It needed to be done & there was no one else to do it that day so she took care of it herself. She never complained. It was only as an adult that I realized how hard she worked.

I could write about how my sister & I were both athletes & she never once missed an athletic or school function. Basketball, track, cheerleading, cross country… she was always there. There was a state cross country meet that was held during early winter, in the mountains of Arkansas- I literally could not feel my hands or my face & I was actually running. Imagine how cold it must have been standing at that finish line… Mom could tell you because she was there- wrapped in a blanket & cheering me on.

 I could write about how Mom somehow managed to convince both Laura & I that we would, in fact, be going to college & we would do so by earning scholarships. Having been a secretary since the autumn after Pop died she was happy to assist with typing papers, but she instilled in us very early that an education was very important & it was our responsibility to make it happen. My sister & I both have Master’s degrees, thanks in large part to our Mother’s determination.

           

            I could write about all of those things, but it would likely embarrass her so I won’t.

So Mom, thank you for doing all the hard work all those years ago, for calling me this morning at 6 a.m. to sing me happy birthday & for the 40 years in between.

I love you more.

Love & stuffed animal bodyguards

spotted on the country highway we walked along to meet our boys at a DHS picnic last October.

 One year ago this weekend, the boys came home. That’s how I refer to them moving in. They came home. As if they left briefly & returned, rather than the more unfortunate truth of their beginnings. So one year ago, the boys came home. It is hard to remember a time when they weren’t here, until I see a toddler & am reminded that we did not know them when they were toddlers. We have never even seen photos. None may exist. I remember sitting in the floor the day we received paperwork including their birth dates. Sitting there with all of my old calendars, I planned to figure out where I was & what I was doing when my boys were born. Then I started wondering where I was & what I was doing the first time one of them was scared or hungry or hurt & needed help & no one came. I put the calendars away.

For the boys, their past- at least the good bits of it, seem to be bleeding into the present. Our youngest, thankfully spent his entire two years in foster care with two of the most amazing human beings on earth.  He seems certain that we were with him for many of the good times he had with them. Memories that were made before we knew him.

“Remember mom? Don’t you remember?” he will say in the middle of a story, confusion on his face as his voice trails off.

“No baby, we weren’t there. That was before we met you, remember?”

Sometimes he refuses to believe me.

I can’t help but wonder if some of these memories from long ago, memories that now conveniently include us in his seven-year-old mind happened during the moments that we were sitting in our then childless house, waiting on a call about kids available for placement & wondering where our children were. What they were doing. If they were safe. If they were loved. While we were wondering about children we had yet to find, he was apparently holding a space in his memories for the parents he had yet to meet.

This time last year was hard. The hardest thing we have ever done. And you really can’t be prepared for it, anymore that you could train enough for a marathon & expect that to mean it will be easy. You just have to be willing to keep pushing through the hard part & celebrate the tiny victories. (a bit of advice, don’t celebrate by fake fainting.) The first few months with three foster children who have already had a failed adoptive placement is no joke. Trying to learn to be a parent in the midst of it had me feeling pretty broken for a while. It’s hard to find your footing & even when you do, you still slip & fall sometimes. We didn’t even really know them when they moved in. When you adopt children from the state, you go through a long process to qualify, then you wait for a long time, but once they match you with children, you have a few visits & then they move in (or at least that is what happened in our case).

Because we didn’t know them, we didn’t know that when they are scared, they don’t act frightened. They act out. Now we know. And they were clearly afraid the first few months. Most likely of being rejected & cast aside, yet again. We also didn’t know who would eat what, who was afraid of the dark & who preferred showers or baths. It didn’t help that the answers to these questions seemed to change on a daily basis.

I remember vividly sitting on the couch one night next to a giant pile of their clean laundry & bursting into tears because it was MY children’s laundry, yet I literally had no idea what belonged to whom. It was tangible evidence of how little I knew these three little humans that we would be raising. And I was terrified.

Slowly they learned to trust us & we eventually started to trust ourselves, checking in with each other frequently to figure out what we were doing right & what we were doing wrong. I don’t know how people do this alone & I can’t imagine doing it with anyone else. As the boys began to trust us, we got a little more eye contact. More interest on their part to be around us for no reason, just to be close. They would bring us a favorite toy.

“You can play with this one…”  our now eight-year old would say as he backed up & pushed his glasses up on his nose, eying me expectantly.

The younger two still bring me bits of string or broken beads they find in the floor at school. Our eldest brings me change. Pennies. Nickels. All of these things are pulled from pockets gleefully.

“MOM, just look what I found for you today!”

I fell asleep alone in bed & awoke to a staring contest with a zoo, brought in quietly, one at a time by our eight-year-old. 

I love going to visit them during the school day. After the older two boys were in about 10 different schools in two years, they have all three now been in the same school for a year. I see such confidence in their faces & they are so relaxed as they walk around the school building. I have taken to pretending I don’t know where I am going so they can lead me.

I hear them talking at the dinner table at home about what happened on the playground that afternoon, or trying to figure out which child has a friend’s brother in his classroom. I hear them talk about teachers & friends & schoolwork. I see them get up & know precisely which drawer or cabinet to go to in order to find something. I think about a year ago, then I look at them now.

We have come a long way. All of us. We are a family.

We made it through the first year.

Did you hear that?

We made it.

Confessions of a New Parent: the one about my purse

Are you familiar with the oversized posters located at security check points in U.S. airports? The posters include photos and text outlining what sort of items are prohibited on aircraft. Some are things that could be considered dangerous, but useful. Things you might forget to remove from your bag before going on a trip. In my mind, that is the purpose of the sign- to remind you to take these useful, yet dangerous items out of your purse.

For instance, I have an incredibly calm friend with no criminal history who also happens to have an affinity for Swiss army knives. You know, the little kits that look like a pocket knife, but in fact hold enough teeny tools to build a submarine? I could see how it might be useful to see a photo of your teeny submarine-building knife on a poster with a big circle around it & line through it in order to remember to take it out of your bag.

There are, however, many items on the poster that make no sense. I can’t tell you the number of times B.C. (before children) that I stood in the security line at an airport rolling my eyes & snorting at these posters as I asked myself, “who has to be reminded to take a BRICK out of their purse for heaven sakes?” More on that later.

Recently, after fishing in my purse for a pen at the post office while a line of customers waited behind me, I found myself standing at the counter holding a Holstein cow hand puppet.  The cow & an oversized yellow plastic whistle had been confiscated from my seven-year-old’s backpack while in the drop-off line at school earlier in the week. (You’re welcome, second grade teacher, you’re welcome.) Of course I didn’t have a child handy to blame for the puppet, which is especially frustrating since I usually can’t move six inches without stepping on at least one of them. Nope, I was standing in line at the post office by myself clutching a hand puppet.

The postal clerk looked me calmly in the eye, slowly lowered his gaze in what attempted to be an effort to make eye contact with the cow, then looked me pointedly in the eye again. It reminded me of that safety session in college where you are told to look strangers in the eye if you are walking on campus at night, as if eye contact will somehow cause them to reconsider their plan to murder you & chop you up into bits. I can only assume the post office has a similar presentation based on the assumption that this whole “eye contact” trick also applies to crazy people.

Nobody uttered a word. He sold me my stamps, took my money & made change without ever breaking eye contact, which I found admirable. As I walked out the door, I noticed a car barreling down on a woman crossing the street to the post office. I toyed with the idea of pulling out my handy oversized whistle to help her out until I saw the way she was looking at me. Only then did I realize that in my relief of being free from the staring contest with the postal clerk, I was still clutching the Holstein cow hand puppet- although at this point I had changed hands & I was now holding the helpless cow tightly by the throat. The only thing that might have made this worse would have been if I was actually wearing it on my hand & carrying on a conversation with it. Good thing I didn’t have any additional stops to make. No, I was headed straight home where I would likely spend the rest of the day stepping on children each time I moved.

So back to the security posters in airports & my ongoing judgment about the unnecessary inclusion of many household items that would never be carried in a purse by a sane person. On my first trip to the pediatric dentist with all three boys, after reaching in my purse for some paperwork, I found myself standing at the checkout counter holding a hammer. Not a little tack hammer (as if that would have been better), it was a big hammer. The kind you might use to build something, like a deck. Or maybe a submarine. I silently congratulated myself on inadvertently solving the mystery of why my purse had been so heavy lately while admiring the fact that motherhood had clearly turned my tiny purse into some sort of bottomless Mary Poppins bag. I rested my elbow on the counter (the hammer was getting heavy) as I peered into my bag. How did that giant hammer fit in there? Never mind why. I wasn’t even going to waste my energy wondering why. The “why” ship sailed about 6 weeks into parenthood & I haven’t seen it since.

Once I finished these vaguely connected thoughts, I looked up to find myself in a staring contest with a woman in scrubs. By now I knew how this game worked, having been to the post office a few short weeks ago. I waited patiently as she made eye contact with me, slowly lowered her gaze to the hammer & turned white as a sheet as she glanced at the giant glass window between us on her way back up to make eye contact with me. I calmly put the hammer back into my purse as the boys stood by patiently, not even bothering to ask & I signed our paperwork & left. Honestly I’m not sure what was more perplexing to her, the hammer-wielding stranger or the children who were clearly unfazed by the whole incident. This happens with kids who spent two years in foster care… they are unfazed by crazy things but freak out over completely normal occurrences, like being picked up 10 minutes early without days of advance warning.

As we walked into the parking lot, the airport security poster flashed in my head & I could clearly see the outline of a hammer, with a circle around it & a line drawn through it. I imagined my pre-child years of eye-rolling & snorting while I stood in the security line (likely well-rested & with eye make-up on both eyes). No wonder that sign had never made sense to me before. I had not been to the airport since becoming a mom. 

Feature Art Friday: To the moon...

More art inspired by my boys. prints available on Etsy.

Best of August 2013

The 'Best of August' could have included lots of other things. All of the trips to the pool. Almost every weekend really. Good weather- a little cooler a few days so everyone could spend some time in the yard. Buying school supplies. All of these things were fun. But the "Best of" list this month is being devoted to one big thing.

School started and for the very first time, the boys were able to go back to the same school after summer break. During the period of time they were in state care, in addition to never all being at the same school, the inconsistency of foster care and living situations had them changing schools frequently. Not having much opportunity to make friends and even less opportunity to tell them goodbye.

So on a Sunday afternoon a few weeks ago, we took the boys to open house at school to see their new classrooms and meet their new teachers. They initially seemed shocked to see many of the same kids they knew from last year. The boys were visibly pleased with themselves when another kid or a teacher would speak to them in the hallway. They beamed, elbowing each other and smiling. I never want to forget these things.

Can you imagine this thing we all took for granted as children, that most of us felt from before we could remember? Feeling it for the first time when you are old enough to realize the difference?

The feeling of being recognized. 

Being cared for.

Being known. 

Being remembered.

My boys got to feel that at school this year. No moving. No newness, unless you count the backpacks and lunch boxes that they each picked out with painstaking care. Returning to the same school... one more little proof for them that they are finally home. That was the best of August.

I love you more than all the waves in the ocean

Art inspired by my handsome brave boys...

after our first ever family trip to the beach.

A year ago I didn't know them... and now,

I love them more than all the waves in the ocean.

Prints available here.

Once upon a time

This is the story of my fairy tale. It was not the one I was raised to believe in, but it is real and it is true. And it is mine. It is a fairy tale, because it has a happy ending.

Once upon a time, there were three little boys. Three little superheroes, who did not even recognize this amazing fact about themselves. They had no idea that they were superheroes because they had been brave their whole life. In the same way that the sun can’t know how not to shine, because it is the sun- and that is what the sun does, these three little boys were brave. They did not know how not to be. Superheroes usually don’t.

After years of being brave, because there really was no other choice, they were rescued. I would love to report that everything was wonderful at this point, but this is a fairy tale, which means that there were bad guys and good guys…witches and dragons… and a knight in shining armor who taught them to ride bicycles and a princess who baked them the best cupcakes.  So the wee superheroes were rescued and after more challenges, they were finally safe. They were told that they did not have to be so brave. Because it was all they knew, letting it go seemed to be an impossible task. After all, one may learn how to become brave, but when have you ever heard of someone learning how not to be?

So after what seemed like an unending wait, with piles of paperwork and lots of pushing and epic battles for these boys we did not even know yet, we found out that we would be the lucky ones. We would be the family that would get not one, not two, but three boys…and superheroes, at that. We didn’t even check that box on the many forms we filled out.

In the early days, they showed us many other superpowers besides the amazing bravery. Not all superpowers are good… but who could blame them for showing us the worst? They knew that we were outnumbered and they had no reason to trust us. There was an extended battle over turf and ownership and laws of the kingdom.  Finally, slowly, they decided to give in. Give us a chance. Let us show them that these two new adults could be brave enough for everyone.

It became clear that we were getting somewhere the first time we took them to the park that they actually occasionally turned to look for us- to be sure they could still see us. I would catch one of them looking at me from the top of the playground equipment, and I would smile and wave. A slow, unsure smile would creep across his face as he disappeared into the turret. King of the castle, indeed.

Eventually, hugs were returned warmly, even bestowed on us, unannounced. There was laughter and joking and games. Random “I love yous” thrown at us when we least expected it. We caught every single one of them, turning them over in our hands with wonder and tending to them carefully before throwing them back.

They may always circle back around, more briefly each time, to making us prove that we love them. Prove that we will never leave them. Prove that we won’t let them go. And that’s just fine with us… because we have a few superpowers of our own.

So that is how our family came to be.  It wasn’t easy. And our family most likely looks much different from yours. It was not the fairy tale that I was raised to believe in. But it’s mine and I wouldn’t trade it for anything. This is what happily ever after looks like.

The Art Wall. I think that's what this post is about.

This is the way my dining room wall looked before the boys came home to us. I never realized anything was missing.

Until our boys came home, trailing bits of art projects & pipe cleaners & random inexplicable bits of things. Rocks. Lots of rocks. All sorts of things that I didn't realize I needed in my life.

Now the wall is full. When I didn't even know that anything was missing from it just a few short months ago.

We are still talking about the wall, right?

Just checking.

Confessions of a New Parent: The one about fake fainting

It began innocently enough. Like most other ill-fated ideas; with absolutely no thought wasted on possible long term implications. In the early weeks of suddenly parenting three children with fully-formed personalities, when one of the boys did something well, one of us would fake fainting. Soap opera style.  Back of hand across the forehead, swoon, fall out on the floor. The complete & utter chaos that descended upon our house the moment the boys arrived spontaneously rendered us incapable of foresight. Or maybe things were just so bad in the beginning we couldn’t imagine enough good choices being made to cause multiple fake fainting spells in a week more or less a day.

I can’t blame the entirety of the problem on the boys; it is exacerbated by the fact that they have a parent with an underutilized degree in theatre. I’m assuming they devote entire semesters to the art of fainting, although not much time is spent on how to avoid injury. Trust me, I have seen the bruises.

Seven months into this adventure the behavior issues have dissipated to the point that recently there were four adult fainting spells in one night. One of the boys does something great & looks our way expectantly. We eye each other wearily. “Are you going to take this one?” Flop. Off the couch, onto the floor.

Honestly, things were so difficult in the beginning that I might have considered setting myself on fire while tap dancing & singing the star spangled banner if it had elicited the desired behavior. However, in hindsight (stupid, stupid know-it-all hindsight) we should have considered a few things prior to the first swoon.

Fake fainting is tiring. More specifically, the getting up part is tiring. I’m middle-aged. I wake up before the sun comes up. If I fall down, I want to stay there. But you can’t, not with three little boys. There is some genetic predisposition I have noticed with boys, something that makes an otherwise normal adult suddenly look like a trampoline when found napping on the floor. Or maybe they just realize that you are suddenly vulnerable in one of those “separate the weak one from the herd” wild kingdom situations.

Fake fainting can be inconvenient. Like when I am walking up the stairs in the front door & down the two stairs into the living room with my arms full of groceries & my nine year old runs up to me waving a social studies test in my face shouting “YOU ARE GOING TO PASS OUT WHEN YOU SEE THIS!!” And I did. And it hurt.  You try to fake faint off a landing while holding a gallon of milk in each hand. Go on, I’ll wait. And by the way, who builds a house with stairs up into the house & then immediately back down into the living room? A masochistic builder with a chip on his shoulder & no kids, that’s who.

Also, how much longer do we have before one of them do something amazing & faint-worthy in public? It’s honestly a ticking time bomb when you think about it. Will it happen at my office? At the gas station? The post office? How long until I end up flat on my back staring at the fluorescent lights in Target?

And finally, what if one of us ever actually really faints? Will the ambulance driver find it odd that there are three little boys squealing with delight while hopping around an unconscious adult & trying to decide who gets the first turn on the trampoline?

Think like a baby

During a training seminar on child development years ago, I was surprised to hear that babies are born with only two natural fears: fear of falling & fear of loud noises. Let that soak in for a minute. Every other fear or worry that they are saddled with come from us, from the environment in which they grow and from their peers. Babies come to us with two perfectly reasonable fears. We give them the rest.

Meet Cash and Turner, the newest babies I know. Their parents are wonderful people, who were expecting their arrival in approximately 3 months. The boys had other plans & showed up last Thursday. Cash weighs 2 lbs 4 oz. and Turner is tipping the scale at 1 lb. 14 oz.

Cash & Turner are currently hanging out in state-of-the-art bassinets in the Neonatal ICU of an amazing hospital, so I’m thinking that they feel pretty secure, as far as the whole possibility of falling thing goes. Sure, they don’t know that they are in the NICU, but they know that they are still. And secure. One fear checked off the list.

With regard to the fear of loud noises… from what I understand, it takes a certain blend of militant-drill-sergeant-meets-nurturing-motherly-type to be a NICU nurse, so those boys probably have no worry of hearing a loud noise. Until their big sister can finally get her hands on them & then there are worse things to deal with than a happy squealing big sister, aren’t there? (Maybe not to a little boy.) Fear number two taken care of- courtesy of nurses who aren't scared of anything, even humans the size of a couple of iphones.

Everything these boys need has been given to them, even before they knew they needed it. First by their mom & dad & now by an army of floating heads in medical attire, who randomly appear over their safe little beds. Things that they will need in the future are being gathered & given, by people who already love them because they love their parents. People are working right at this moment to ensure their parents will have as much time as possible to worry about nothing but holding them & whispering for them to grow, whispering how much they are loved, whispering to them about all of the wonderful things they want to teach the boys.

But right now Cash & Turner, as you are merely days old & fearful of almost nothing in this whole big world, I am learning from you. Learning to think like a baby, and not be afraid. Welcome to the world you sweet wee miracle babies. I can’t wait to know you.

My first Mother's Day as a mom

On my first Mother's Day as a parent, we enjoyed homemade cards & promises of a car wash. Then we all went to the river for a bike ride. Maisy & I walked, dragging up the rear in case of stragglers. One of the boys, who doesn't have much stamina & tires very easily, stops frequently when his "heart starts beeping fast". Each time he would get ready to start up again, he would take off, wobbling precariously, eyes locked on the path in front of him, saying "Mom? Are you behind me? Are you back there?". 

"Yeah honey. I'm here. You won't get rid of me that easily."

This same child, who was mad at the world when he moved in six months ago, gave me a stick of chewing gum Friday afternoon. He said his teacher gave it to him but he decided to save it for me because it was almost Mother's Day. Melted my heart. I wonder if he understands that he will still be with us next Mother's Day? It's sometimes difficult to know what he does & does not understand. His brothers say they know we are their family, but they have been told that by others before & it didn't happen. So they say they believe us but still appear a little skeptical sometimes.

A few weeks ago, when I casually mentioned something about when they start back to school in the fall, they were shocked to discover that they would be returning to the same school. Apparently this has never happened before. There were cheers & high-fives all around in the back seat as I sat at a stoplight shaking my head. The things most of us take for granted.

Oddly, I hope at some point they take things for granted. Like the fact that they will be in the same school. And in the same home. With us. I'm okay with them taking it for granted. Because that will mean that they know that we really are their parents. They will know what family really means. And they are welcome to take it for granted, although we never will.

Confessions of a new parent: The one about the dryer

The fact that I took a photo of the washer, when the blog post is about the dryer only supports my point about the similarities between dementia & being a new parent.

This one is still a mystery to me. Honestly this must be what it feels like to be on the front end of dementia, which is, I suppose similar to the front end of parenting. Both bring some pretty bewildering circumstances in which you find yourself unsure of the hows & whys.

I ran the dryer for an hour with no clothes in it. This is not an exaggeration, or an implication that I was a few socks shy of a full load (although even six months into this process I can use that visual to describe my mental acuity. or lack thereof.) So the dryer ran for about an hour, completely empty.

It may not seem like much to you, but our dryer has approximately 50 buttons on it, which makes it quite a commitment to turn on. It also makes noises like a slot machine. Thanks to our 3 boys overestimating the value of change, underestimating the size of their pants pockets & my inability to wait for the cycle to end, it will occasionally throw quarters at me. Searing hot quarters. Brings a new & dangerous meaning to the term loose change. 

It was also 45 degrees in the garage when this mystery occurred. How tired do you have to be to leave the comfort of your home & walk into a freezing cold garage to start an empty dryer? I don't like to be cold. Wait, the hot quarters. How's that for positive thinking?

Another somewhat literal hurdle that had to be crossed to turn on the dryer for absolutely no reason is the war zone formerly used as a garage. The only reason there isn't a literal hurdle to cross out there is that they simply do not come on wheels. As soon as they do, I'm sure we will buy one. Or three. Our garage is now the home of every type of wheeled paraphernalia known to man. Or little boys. More on that here. The garage was organized B.C. Before Children. Now it is a disorganized veritable deathtrap of rolling things & white hot flying quarters.

Which makes it even more inexplicable that last winter I went on a suicide mission... braved the freezing temperatures, walked 20 feet across a mine field of potentially neck-breaking skateboards/scooters & risked having President Washington's profile seared into my face... for no reason.

See? I told you it was a mystery.

Confessions of a new parent: the one about the tail light

One of the unexpected things that happens when you adopt 3 children at once is that people begin to look at you differently; some as if you should be fitted with a halo & others as if you should be fitted with a straightjacket.

When the former happens, we turn to look behind us to see who it is they are looking at with the awe-filled expression on their faces. In the case of the latter, we recognize that the look is directed at us & respond appropriately. The definition of appropriate is, in this case, relative based on how tired we are.

Since you do not get the opportunity to look at me with either the “what is the circumference of your forehead” or “how quickly can we get you in this nice jacket with the really long sleeves” look, perhaps we could occasionally provide you with a little evidence & let you decide how you should be peering at me through your monitor. Welcome to ‘True Confessions of a New Parent’.

During our first days of flailing about in the deep end of the parenting pool, I forgot that we were only parking one car in the garage & the other in the driveway due to the enormous influx of bicycles, scooters, skateboards & other wheeled paraphernalia that comes with 3 children. I got in the car in the garage & promptly backed it into the car in the driveway. Good thing I pay the car insurance, right?

After surveying the damage, I found myself standing outside of the bathroom door holding a piece of a tail light that should never be away from the car. Certainly not being fondled by a nervous new mother while standing outside a bathroom listening to a shower & having the following conversation through the door:

“Remember how you were saying you wanted to get a bigger car?”

“I can’t hear you over the shower.”

(of course you can’t, because the only thing that makes a silly mistake more fun to talk about is to have to shout about it.)

“REMEMBER HOW YOU WERE SAYING YOU WANTED A BIGGER CAR? BECAUSE WE ARE GETTING 3 KIDS?”

“YEAH…”

“I THINK THAT WOULD BE A GREAT IDEA… BECAUSE IF YOU HAD A BIGGER CAR I COULD SEE IT IN THE DRIVEWAY WHEN I BACK UP…”

Three things happened the following week:

Our boys moved in permanently. 

We got a bigger car.

I started parking in the driveway.

A word.

It's posted on my monitor so I don't forget.

'Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler.'

                                                                                                      -Albert Einstein

Who can argue with Einstein? Not me- with 3 new children, I have no energy to argue with anyone.

Rather than choosing a resolution for 2012, I decided to choose a word. A word takes up less room in my head than an entire resolution would, so maybe that extra bit of space will provide the energy to argue, should it become necessary when it becomes necessary.

Simplicity. That is the word that has taken up residency in my head for the last month & I must admit, it has already brought some peace. As stress appears or commitments begin to multiply, I ask myself how I can simplify whatever it is & still accomplish what is necessary. I know... it sounds, well... simple.

For some people it is. For the rest of us, who are somehow genetically predisposed to make things more difficult, more involved & be very suspicious of anything requiring less than 18 steps, simplifying things feels odd at first. But after a few weeks of practice, I am getting the hang of it.

Coming up on the blog this month... a few featured pet portraits, some new art inspired by Flora Bowley's 'Bloom True' ecourse, an update on the '38 things to do before I turn 39' list & something new... 'confessions of a new parent'... in which I make shameful fun of myself as I learn to swim in the deep end of the parenting pool.

It's good to be back. Thanks for sticking around.

                                                               

Newest Ornament on the Tree

Do you remember this? Please notice the perfectly decorated Christmas tree with all of the ornaments placed so carefully... That was our tree pre-children. This is our tree post-children. 

Do you see it? The newest ornament on my Christmas tree? I'll give you a hint... it's most likely to be mistaken for a billboard. A giant cardboard billboard. And you know what? It's my favorite one... because it came into the house (sort of) hidden behind the back of a very excited giggling seven-year-old. Our Christmas tree has never looked better.

As a side note, please notice that Mr. Burgundy has continued his love affair with the tree.

Ornament art 2012 continued

More of these... I'm not very wordy lately. I'm going to blame that on the fact that I now say more words in the morning while getting the boys ready for school prior to work than I used to say in an entire day. So I'm running low on words. At least I still have the photos, right?

An emotion sandwich

Over the last month I have felt more emotion than at any other point in my 38 years. Just ask anyone who has spent more than an hour with me early on in the adoption process; I developed this strange habit of randomly bursting into tears without warning... in the middle of laughter, standing in line at the post office, or on the phone with a stranger. It is an odd thing to feel so many different overly intense emotions all at the same time about the same thing. Happiness. Excitement. Nervousness. Fear. But more of each emotion than ever seemed possible. Emotion sandwich anyone?

It has been both the best & the hardest thing. We are finding our way, one day at a time... sometimes one moment at a time. Slowly but surely inching towards some sort of new normal. 

On Saturday, something happened that made me feel a little more like myself. For the first time in what seemed like forever, I realized that there was some sort of peace that had fallen on our home. Everyone was okay. For the first time in two weeks I could feel that everyone was, even temporarily, feeling the first bits of acceptance about this new normal. So I sat down at the table & picked up a paint brush for the first time in a month... and then I started to feel normal too.

What to expect

The flash cards are the closest I have come to making art over the last couple of weeks. Oddly, I am okay with this. Not forever, but for now. Priority number one has been getting three little boys on a schedule so that they can know what to expect, which is especially important if you have been shuffled to 7 or 8 schools in your short little life. If you have lived with different families with different rules. Knowing what to expect is important, but also confusing. Yes- you read it correctly. If you are used to moving and changing and being told one thing while another thing happens, and suddenly that stops... it is confusing.

After a little while, it will become something comfortable, this knowing what to expect. It will become something to reach for. Life feels a little less "out of control" when you know that you get a bedtime story every night. You know your clothes are clean and in the drawers. You know who will wake you in the morning and how you are getting to school. You start anticipating things and appearing to be very pleased with yourself because you knew what to expect. We are having moments of this pleased-with-yourself business and I love the slow smile that comes along with it. We also have moments of not-very-pretty-angry-at-the-world mutiny, but let's not focus on that... let's just think of the smiles for now.

At the conclusion of the days of trying to follow through with absolutely every word that has come from my mouth, I am still too mentally exhausted to paint... although this won't always be the case. But for now, I'll stick to the flash cards. Because there is a six-year-old expecting them.

Where I've been

I realize that I have some explaining to do & I'm not really sure where to start. We have been jumping thought the proverbial hoops with the state for about 18 months & recently found out that we would get to be the lucky adoptive parents of 3 little boys. Once things started happening it was like holding on to the wing of an airplane as it goes down the runway... there has just been a crazy, happy, hard whirlwind of activity for the last few weeks. Not one day has passed that I haven't ended up in a puddle of tears over how happy & scary it all is... & I am astounded & completely humbled by the kindness & support we have received. 

You might wonder why you haven't heard about this before- it's because there needed to be a space where I could come & not think about it, or be asked about it or wonder if it would actually ever happen. So I came here & talked about art & painting & other things that I love.

I'll still be talking about those things- once everything settles down. Right now I just want to be with my new family. Adoption is a crazy thing. Especially when you are willing to adopt older children & have no idea how old they will be or if they will be boys or girls... or any of the other million things parents wonder about. We made ourselves a little crazy sometimes wondering where they were, who there were & if they were in a good foster home. Was someone reading to them at night before bed? Did they feel loved? Luckily we now know that the answers were yes... at least for the last while. We have received more than kids, we have also received their foster parents who are now part of our family as well.

Sometimes I would silently say to myself "we are here...we are here..." because as much as I wondered where the children were, I couldn't help but think they might be wondering the same thing about us.

I will talk about them... eventually. It's important that you know that I will not talk about how they ended up needing parents or even their names... because how they ended up in foster care is their story to tell. Not mine. It is also not my place to tell you their names because once I put things out here on the Internet they can't be taken back... & they have had enough of their little lives discussed by adults who don't know them. 

So for now, I just wanted to explain where I have been. And that I will be back. But not today- because it's almost time to pick up my kids from school.