apparently i don't play well with others

some of you are not surprised.
the other day karyssa wanted me to play drive-thru window with her. it's a strange game, especially since we hardly EVER eat from drive-thru windows. paul's work gave the kids this door toy for adoption day. i don't know how else to describe it. it's this...here's a picture of paul and karyssa building it...
somehow the little window next to the door that opens and closes has become her drive-thru window and she is not only the cashier and order taker but also the cook. i come up to the window and ask for coffee and donuts or a cheeseburger or whatever comes to mind and she scurries back there stacking blocks and coming up with different items that become my order. then i pretend the food is delicious and eat it up cookie monster style and then play it all over again. all the while asher is in the background laughing at the way the the blocks fly all over around me when i eat. so the other day she wanted me to be the cashier/cook and pulled up to my window and said "i would like a cheeseburger with extra pickles and a doctor pepper and salad....apple salad." i scurried around and handed her a stack of blocks for each item and she scooped each stack into her arms and pretended to pay me. takin' it up a notch. then she said "thank you, have a nice day." and i realized i say that to EVERY cashier i see. i never noticed that i do that. but she did. i say it at the grocery store, restaurants, the post office, the gas station. i just never noticed that i did. it's so funny the tiny body language she picks up on. and so scary the tiny body language she picks up on.

coup for two, please.

tonight paul and i walked out of a restaurant before we even ordered. it was the first time in my life i'd ever done it.
not that i'd been counting down the last 300 minutes until eating out or anything. you see, normally on saturdays we put the kids to bed and have some sort of restaurant lunch while they nap. but we're on a tight budget this month. my friend sarah is keeping me motivated. so today we decided instead of eating out for lunch AND dinner we'd be good and eat left overs for lunch and go out only for dinner. so when we sat down at the mexican restaurant and opened the menu we were both highly disappointed to see "american breakfast" and "burgers" on the menu. paul folded his menu closed only to realize their slogan was "homemade food". not that i'm a bad cook, i'm ok, but when we go out the last thing we want is something "homemade". not to mention the only burrito on the menu was handwritten in! the waitress came and asked if we were ready and i said we needed another minute. she walked away and i said "i just don't feel right ordering a burger from el sabor grande." and he said "let's just pay for our drinks and go." that's when i fell in love with him all over again. this boy knows how i love to eat out. so when he said to just pay for our drinks and go to 3 margaritas like aliens to the mother ship i knew he loved me. *sigh* i handed him the cash and no sooner had i done that i noticed a couple ladies at the next table (the only other occupied table) lean towards each other shaking their heads no saying "mine's not good either." *gasp* time to GO!
paul paid for our $4 soda's (hello!!! way too much!!) and we hustled the kids for the door. i had prepped karyssa "we are going to that restaurant that gives us chips and salsa." to which she gleefully headed out the door with out fuss. she loves to eat out as much as i do so i was afraid to leave with out her understanding there were greener pastures in our near future. i giggled all the way to the car as i watched asher climb back into his carseat. what kind of errand his 20 month old mind must have thought we were running to just have sodas and leave i don't know. (btw-happy 20 month birthday, buddy!!) we drove to another place on south main that we had been wanting to try but when we drove up and saw the menu glowing from the front of the restaurant we knew we still weren't at the mother ship. when i go out sometimes i just want to be served. i don't want my butt to move from my seat until dinner is done. if a drink is spilled i don't want to have to be the person to get up for napkins. we finally realized we needed to go where the craving is always put to rest. 3 margaritas. not just any 3 margaritas. there's a certain one that has a better chef, or better salsa maker, or better magic wand. i'm not sure what it is about this particular location but everything is better there. once we pulled in we knew we were in the right place. the mother ship 3 margaritas. mmmmmm. salsa and chips, spicy mexican food, not white people mexican food. no offense, i'm white...but it's not delicigrosso. that's what we call delicisoso. they actually have spinach and gravy on the menu. separate dishes. excUSE me?? i am not eating in no mexican restaurant with spinach or gravy on the menu.
it was so good we even had desert. 2 deserts. one for us, one for the kids. and gave the waiter a 20% tip. some things just call for splurging! *whew* i feel better tonight.

in totally unrelated good news; the other day my neighbor/new friend told me her daughter has been showing interest in potty training. since i'm still at the tail end of training karyssa the last thing on my mind was training asher so i didn't really take it to heart at all. besides, girls and boys develop at completely different rates and her daughter is a few months older than asher. i was excited for her but that was that. no other interest. but then i noticed every time i put asher in the tub he'd look down at his little manhood and pee. 3 times this last week i had to empty the tub and start all over with baby oil and water. then on wednesday karyssa peed on the potty and asher climbed up there. she gets 5 marshmellows for pooping. as soon as she was handed her dowry asher climbed up on the potty and squirted out a little squirt squirt. i said "yay!!! you get 2 marshmellows buddy!!" he climbed down, ate his marshmellows and climbed back up for a few more squirts. what the what?? so i got just as excited, gave him 2 more marshmellows and thought what a stinker he was that he really can control it. tonight was bath night again. i am done emptying the tub repeatedly so i put him on the potty and said "go potty on the potty, buddy." he squirted a half squirt then i put him in the tub, let him warm up for 5 seconds and stuck him back up on the potty and said it again "potty on the potty" and that little thing went POTTY!!! a full potty!!!! i know this is not exactly potty training but i'm gonna keep doing that for a while. when he realized more marshmellows were on the line he pushed and pushed until a little fart came out. i'll keep you posted what this means for my immediate future but let me tell you, if our diaper budget goes down our 3 margaritas budget is going right up!

i should get a free pass

today was the worst day on record for this momma. asher had a fever yesterday so i couldn't check him into childcare at the rec center when i went to take karyssa to swim lessons. he woke up SUPER late anyway so i brought his cereal in a little snack cup and figured he could just sit on my lap. we got there 5 minutes early and like always i let her play around in the water a little bit. unlike always i was not RIGHT by her side. i told her to stay close to me by the fountains. i kept an eye on her the whole time. i looked down at asher's snack cup, i looked up and she was WAY across the pool. she was bobbing...i thought for a half a second she was ok but then i realized her bobs were getting slower and she was not getting her full head out of water and she was not getting any closer to the edge of the pool. i RAN around the pool towards her. as i got a third of the way there i heard the lifeguard blow her whistle. we got there at the same time but when she lifted karyssa out of the water she was limp. this is when i broke into sobs. i couldn't speak before i got there. i couldn't think fast enough to leave asher with one of the other mom's i sit and talk to twice a week. all i could think was GET TO HER! accidents happen in seconds in the water but with karyssa they happen in nano-seconds. i looked down at asher, or the edge of the pool or something and when i looked up karyssa was fine again. she was alert and breathing. no cpr. i cried and cried. i wanted to take her and just go home but then i don't want to foster a fear of water in her. at this point the head life guard was at the side of the pool to take asher from me while i got a towel for karyssa and the lifeguard carried her back to the edge of the pool. then we had to fill out a form in the lifeguard room and after we were done the head lifeguard asked karyssa if she was ready for swim lessons and took her by the hand out into the water with the other kids. it's such a good thing she did because i still wanted to scoop her up and carry her home and never let her go. the other moms comforted me and told me stories that each one of them had of their kids' near-drowning incident. i know i'm not alone. i know it's not because i wasn't paying attention. the only thing i could have done differently is not let her enter the water to begin with but then, isn't that why we're there at swim lessons??
i'm pretty sure, since i had to deal with infertility, the least god could do is give me a free pass until their 18th birthdays. or give me a pass that says i'll never have to bury my children. when you work so hard for them and have to fight so long isn't that the least he could do? although i'm fairly certain every parent, no matter how you got here, feels the same way. but god, if you're reading...which you may be but you're not a follower *hint*hint*, i'll take my free pass anyway you want to send it. preferably in writing. xo *sigh*

yehdahday

karyssa has been figuring out yesterday, today, tomorrow, the other day, next week, etc.
so i take her to the calendar and i say "see this square? that's yesterday. yesterday we swam. see this square? it's today, today emily is coming" or whatever. so she's been testing it out. she said to paul "tatum got sick the other day." and i was a little shocked. tatum DID get sick and it WAS the other day. not yesterday. it's so hard to explain because i can't say "one sleep, two sleeps" etc because she still takes naps so when she said "the other day" and not just "yesterday" i was excited. she's finally getting it! and her words are coming out more and more. today paul was working on his new shed and was painting some pegboard. karyssa walked in and said "*gasp* you painted. it looks so nice!" HA! she says SO many things that are exactly what i would have said. i looooove that.
asher has figured out zippers. as of 7:30 this morning. i put him to bed in jammies that zipped all the way up and when i went to get him he had taken off his jammies, except for one foot that he couldn't get off, and his diaper. thank GOD it was not a poopy diaper. UGH! then tonight we could not get him to keep his jacket on because it had a zipper. i remember when karyssa figured out zippers and i realized how much freedom i had just lost in that moment. i could no longer just zip her bows, my makeup, backpacks, etc. away because now she could get into them. well, my friends, asher has now arrived at that moment as well. ha. we wait with anticipation for him to make strides towards growing up and then whamo he does and i can't take it back. he's been babbling in sentences and a couple weeks ago i asked karyssa's speech therapist if i could tell friend-emily something with out her telling therapist-emily and it was that i was concerned about his lack of words. well all of a sudden he's started mimicking sentences. it's sooo cute. today he said, clear as a bell, "up up up!" as he was trying to climb into a chair (that he's not supposed to climb but that's beside the point.)
i love getting to be their mommy but even better: i love that i get to stay home with them every day and see every teeny tiny development. it's worth every penny that i don't make.

my little soccer stud/cheerleader/flirt???

karyssa had another soccer game this morning and in weeks past i've heard other fields cheering for "asher" so i knew eventually we'd meet this "asher". well today was the day. and at first we couldn't get karyssa to get on the field...then she finally did and i noticed she was running up and down the field holding hands with this little boy. then i heard people calling for him and wouldn't you know, it's the other asher. and he did not object to holding hands with her up and down the field either so the feeling must be mutual. at one point she ran over to me on the sidelines and had me take off her gloves so she could get a better grip on asher's hand hold. WHAT IN THE WORLD?!? she's THREE!! the after the game she says "big asher got a haircut." um. what?? has she been noticing this other little boy for weeks now?? i've never known which kid it was, apparently she's already had her eyes set on him somehow. yikes. getting a teeny bit nervous about the next 15 years.

i hate when i cry. HATE IT!

today we spoke at the banquet for our local CASA group. we were the main attraction. us. our family. our story.
i wrote out my script weeks ago. i read it over and over. i got up there and said something completely different and cried. in front of almost 300 people. i HATE crying in front of other people. i don't mind public speaking. i love it. i love telling people what's on my mind. but ugh. i HATE crying. i would have done fine but i mentioned how karyssa would let us know when she was hungry when she first came to us. and a woman on the front table burst into tears. UGH! if someone else cries, i cry. no matter how much i can't stand them, i cry. my mother-in-law and husband say i did great. but i could tell my voice was shaking and then when i burst into tears i'm not sure i did ok. and i didn't say anything i wanted to say. UGH! is there a re-do button around here somewhere?
just had to get that off my chest.

another set of in-laws

i haven't posted in a while because i've been hiding.

when we were just weeks away from adoption day social services sent us an email that the grandparents had contacted them and were wanting to know when visits with the kids would start. uuuuum....a year and a half ago! where have they been??? i shook in my boots all the way to the courthouse just sure the adoptions wouldn't go through because they had re-entered the picture. we met with them and laid as low as possible until they were officially ours.

now it's almost a year later and i still don't know how to process this new set of in-laws. that's how it feels. they aren't quite my family, but they are related. i've been told i have to love them, but i have nothing in common with them. don't get me wrong, i love my real in-laws. but we've been working on this relationship for over 9 years now. and now all of a sudden i feel like social services handed me another set to break in. and i'm not really happy about it. paul and i met with them alone and then we met with them with the kids. it went well. their grandfather is a sweet sweet man that both paul and i would like to get to know better. but he speaks no english. which means, we have to have step-grandma come everywhere we go to translate and i know a teeny tiny bit of spanish...and it's enough to know she is not translating everything we say. and i want him to know some of these stories. and i want him in our lives. and i'm sure the kids will want him in their lives someday too but with out being able to talk to him we're stuck with this extra grandparent that honestly makes me unsettled. i don't know what it is that makes me unsettled about her. she tries, she really does. but there's just something that makes me want to stay quiet and not say anything when i'm around her. i don't like that feeling and i have spent enough time in my life with people that make me feel uneasy like that and i don't trust them. i'm quick to judge and very often wrong.

earlier this summer my case worker, who encouraged us to have this relationship, mentioned that one of her kids was terminally ill and i asked if it was one of her birth kids or adopted kids and she said "it doesn't matter...but it's one of my biological kids." and it took me a while to process why did i ask that? what did it matter? why did she respond that way? and then i realized...if karyssa were terminally ill the first thing i would want to do is get her birth dad back in her life. for him to have closure. she is his baby too. wouldn't it be fair to give him closure just like i would want if the tables were turned? and i realized this woman, our case worker, who guided us through this potentially torrential relationship chose to do the exact OPPOSITE that she encouraged us to do. and i feel wronged. i listened. i obeyed in a way because i didn't know what else to do. and i gotta be honest, my adopted family all encouraged me not to pursue this relationship and now i understand why they said that.

so. all of this to say...we're still muddling through this in-law thing and i've been hiding since i got an email from them 2 months ago that still remains unanswered. i know i need to respond but i don't know what to say other than to send a gift certificate for rosetta stone. *sigh*