Four Years of Curly

Four years ago, this little one...

turned me into... (and yes, that is a belly very near birth)

a Mommy.

How she turned into this:

I'm not sure, but I enjoyed almost every second of it. I'm so proud of her for her heart, the incredible way she REALLY thinks things through and understands deep concepts, and the amazing big sister that she is. Four is going to be a great year! (It is one of my most favorite ages you know...)

I love you my firstborn daughter! Thank you for making me a Mommy.

Side note: If you aren't friends with me on Facebook, you will have missed her comment to me this afternoon when I said something about her turning me into a Mommy because she was my first baby. She said, "Well, God helped me Mom. I SURE couldn't put a BABY in your tummy!"

Conversations with Curly Daddy

As Handsome and I were preparing dinner on Sunday, Curly looked out the window and said quite shocked and concerned, "The birds are eating mushrooms!" This because we have told the children not to eat the mushrooms that they might find in the backyard.

Handsome: "It's okay, birds can eat whatever they want."

Curly: "WELL, they CAN'T eat people!"

Handsome: "Most birds wouldn't eat people, but if you were dead there are some birds that might. Like a buzzard. But only if you were already dead."

Curly: Sitting on the stool confused and shocked...

Me: If you were dead....really?!? Did my husband seriously just tell my daughter that birds would eat her if she was dead? He did NOT just say that...I'm just dreaming.

Gumby Here...

Do you want to know something? This family has....(sneaks closer to wispser in your ear)...chores!

SHHHH! Don't tell mom that I told you. Do you know what those are? Well, let me tell you all about them.

Mom says that she thinks all members of a family should help out with the things that need to get done, even when they are little. She said that it's best to start learning to help out when you are little...I've never heard such things.

Smiles and I are in charge of picking up our toys, and helping with laundry. This is the laundry cleaning machine. I like to do the buttons best!

Here's me with my brother and sister pulling dry clothes out of this thingy and into the basket. When we get to the end, Curly has to do it. She has really long arms. Almost like an adult!

We all help carry clothes from the laundry sorter to be put in the cleaning machine.

Curly is really good at it because she has had lots of practice.

I can carry a LOT just like my big sister. (Do you see me wearing her boots? I'm going to be just like her when I get bigger.)


Sometimes Smiles gets in the way and I have to wait for him to move. Mom says we have to be patient with him while he is learning too. He is little, so he doesn't understand the rules as well and me and Curly yet.

I show him how though. This is my strong face.

Smiles pushes the clothes into the back for us. Mom thinks he is trying to get as close to climbing in as he can. She might be right.

Curly has other chores. She folds the washcloths, and sorts laundry into piles. She makes a pile for each person in the family. Then Mom folds the clothes and puts them away. Sometimes Curly likes to help with that too, but she doesn't have to.

Curly's last job is feeding the animals. She fills the cat's food...Daddy does the water.

Smiles can't wait until he can feed the animals! But Mom says he likes to eat their food too much just yet and he has to wait. He just helps Curly by picking up what she doesn't get in the dish. Mom doesn't seem to like when he helps with that though...

Anyway, I've never heard of such a thing! What kind of chores do your kids do when they are little?

Giant Bib in Action

I told you I would share pictures of the bibs on a child. Here is Gumby before her meal made it messy.

And these are after she ate. To her credit she actually kept pretty clean at this meal. Smiles had a bib that was not so lucky, but his photos didn't tun out very well due to excessive moving and non-participation.

Proof

When you are always the one behind the lens, people tend to question your existence. So, here is your proof that #4 and I do, in fact, reside on the face of this planet.

(I'm not a huge fan of belly shots, but I took a couple anyway...just for you.)

And this Mommy proves that she is not just an imaginary person that some weirdo made up.

May I also mention two things? Well, I guess that's true. Of course I can! It's my blog.

First, it is tiresome to hold a camera up over your head or out to the side. To hold the camera out far enough to fit baby #4 into the frame was not an easy task. Second, the piles of clothing...that would be the bins of outgrown clothes that are waiting to be sorted through and put back in the garage. I've been lazy, what can I say =).

My First Non-born

Non-born being adopted of course. My second little girl. This little one has also taught me more than I imagined that she could. Truly placed in our family by the hand of God, she was meant to be right where she is.

Gumby has given me new understanding of my relationship with the Lord. A new appreciation for the love and patience He has for us when we are adopted into His family. I wish I had patience like that, though I know that I can't because I am not God. Oh how amazing it is that He loves us fully from the moment we are adopted. And He knows who we are.

There are levels of understanding this that I can't even explain. Just thoughts that come to my mind here and there. Thoughts of how I understand God's love just a little bit more.

Gumby is so free. She is herself and is not hindered by much. She watches the other children and tries to play like them, hanging on every move that Curly makes some days. Even the things I would have her NOT pay attention to. But it's not to fit in. The social desires seem different. It's not because she wants to be accepted, because she knows she is accepted. It's more that she admires and mimics just out of desire to be like those that she admires.

It's so easy to get a smile out of my second girl. She loves to be girly and knows that the camera means bring out the smile.

And her favorite thing? Babies! She loves dolls. Most often you will find my little Gumby with a doll in her hand. She is made for mothering...as Smiles will tell you she practices on him all the time. I'm sure she will be a great big sister to our #4.

...right after she learns how to be a little more gentle. She and Smiles will get to work on that a little.

Oh, and did I mention that she isn't just a one baby kind of girl? She often has six or so all around her. I guess she is preparing to go back to her roots when she gets older. Maybe she will serve children in an orphanage somewhere =).

Okay...or maybe not. We will just let Gumby and God determine what her life entails. No matter how she keeps her arms full of God's children.

I told you she watches. She wants to be like the ones she loves. Here she watches Curly and learns how to pose for Mommy when the camera is out.

Silly faces are perhaps not so much her thing all the time =). Gumby is quiet sometimes too. She sits and watches, or will focus on something she is trying to learn.

(Of course, this means with a baby doll in hand.)

Silly faces aren't always out of the question though. She makes this one all the time. She thinks it's funny to make a surprised face when you aren't really surprised...does it all the time and follows up with a giggle.

We love having you in our family Gumby, and we are excited to watch you grow. I'm glad that you were our child of God's promise. We wouldn't have it any other way.

My Firstborn- Curly

No matter how our family grows, no matter who God adds....

this sweet little girl, with her sparkling curls of gold...

will always be my firstborn.

The first to ever speak the name Mommy in reference to this forever changed heart. The first to show me what it means to be all the many things that Mommy means. The first to teach me the ropes of being the one to fill so many of one person's needs.

And she is a special girl indeed. God picked just the right girl for the job. He picked the perfect little one to train me up in the way of motherhood. The perfect big sister to lead this family's young brood from the sibling side. She was made perfectly for her place in the birth order.

This little girl who is so much like her mommy, in so many different ways. She even carries my special gift of being a lovely willing photography subject...

Curly, my love, thank you for making me a Mother. Thank you for showing me my calling in life and for being the one that started it all. You have taught me patience, how to listen, and how important it is to loosen up instead of being worried about perfection all the time (as you are a perfectionist yourself). Most of all, you taught me to love in a way that I couldn't possibly understand. Until there was you.

I don't know exactly what I am saying, but I know it needs to come out. I have to share it NOW.

I know my Lord woke me tonight in the way He does when it's something of importance. But this time was a little different. I found no peace as I went through the "routine" of praying for what came to mind. Utter nerves and unease overcame still. So, I said to Him- I give up on the normal. Lord, pray what needs to be prayed.

And so I lay there in my bed. My heart finally at peace, knowing that He was speaking on behalf of me- who was found wordless. And then...then I was given words. Beckon His people to rise up from their sleep in this land and to call on the name of their Lord. Pray for us, friends. Pray for your fellow believers in this country. Pray that we would all rise up and listen to the promptings of His Holiness. Pray for us, that we would wake up and speak the truth boldly.

And then I felt unworthy. As if I am not worthy to bare this word. As if there is more than I know at stake, and I don't know what to do with it.

And I lay in bed wondering if I really wanted to get up this time and speak the words I was given because they make sense, but then they don't. Why does this feel SO important RIGHT NOW, Lord? I didn't get up for a minute. I tried to push away, like I always want to do. I tried to tell Him that I would do it in the morning, but He said no. Do it now. The feelings and words are fresh, so I will speak now.

What does this mean? I don't know. Just pray. The instruction isn't for the rising up though, so we don't have to know at this moment. The instruction is to PRAY that HIS PEOPLE would wake, rise, and be bold.

I wish that I could better stress to you how important I feel that this praying is. So, I pray right now that whatever of this word is from the Lord, that His Spirit would confirm that in you, who bare His Name. That He would speak of the importance to your heart and would give you words to pray like you have never prayed in your life.

And I pray that He would give you understanding of the importance and allow you to feel the unworthiness of the words to come off of your lips as you implore Him to overcome this people and wake our country's sleeping believers. Not because I want you to feel like dirt, because that's not what I am meaning. It's a level of reverence that I've actually never really felt before now (but have prayed that I would feel). And because when we feel that sense of reverence for Him, it helps with really understanding how blessed I am just to have the gift of calling on His name.

Just an Update

What's life been like here lately?

We've been sick. A lot. And we are finally feeling better and hoping it stays that way...but today Handsome decided to start feeling sick. He has skipped out on a lot of our illnesses, so hopefully he will get well quickly and not spread germs to the rest of the family.

We've been getting ready for spring. And we are EXCITED! Handsome and I built a raised vegetable bed and are waiting to get the soil to fill it. I had wanted to build it myself, but it turns out I had some issues with lack of strength due to pregnancy...and my husband put limitations on me that stated he was not cool with his growing wife using a sledge hammer with our incredibly rocky ground. I will not go into detail about the fun partner I was in making said raised bed. He may have wanted to shoot me at one point. (But it's okay, he didn't do it.) I'll have to share once we plant our little garden in all the areas of our yard...after things warm up a little bit.

Curly and I have been working on her school work again. She loves to learn and we hadn't been doing much since we got home with Gumby. We were just too busy with all kinds of things and getting a routine down. She is learning to count to 100 (with a chart), finally learning to write her name (which apparently the other kids at church know and she wished that she knew how too), and then just normal stuff like rhyming, same and different, shapes, and matching similar objects. She would do "schoolwork" all day at this point if I let her. BUT, we just do the morning so that we both don't get too worn out.

Gumby is learning to say all her letter sounds. She can repeat all of the sounds other than Q and X with ease, those are her two problem sounds. We are not at the point of knowing the letter sounds in association with the image, which I totally DON'T expect her to know yet. That's just our goal with the letters at this point. She enjoys watching Leap Frog's Letter Factory, so I let her watch it daily. That's how Curly learned all of her letter sounds in association with the letter by 18 months old. It's a great video that we have thanks to Vicky =).

Gumby and Smiles are great buddies. While Curly and Gumby like to play sometimes and are the two to share a room, Smiles and Gumby love to hang out together. Their language is at a very similar stage and they get along great...most of the time. I will say, however, that Gumby's favorite "sentence" is "Smiles, NO!", which she must have learned from my consistent saying of the phrase. She even points the finger at him when she says it...then she laughs.

Which brings us to the fact that those two really keep me on my toes with parenting. Smiles has really got me working in my mind right now to be creative. He's at that age where he is just a bit too young to really grasp some of the things that I would normally use. And he learns different than Curly ever did...so different parenting techniques are required for him to learn best. I can't tell you for sure what those techniques are yet, but I'll get back to you after the "experimentation phase" is complete. =D We are in a sort of trial and error phase to see what works for him. Right now he is learning to deal with his emotions, and he isn't doing so well. He thinks that a good way to respond when angry is to find the nearest person and hit them, even if they had nothing to do with the frustration. Also, fit throwing is in full swing. Curly learned quickly that her audience was not going to be anyone but herself if she threw a fit. That was enough for her. Being in her room while she threw it was plenty. Smiles....not so much. He will stop when he gets put in his room to throw the fit, but he is still just as likely to throw another one later. Perhaps he is just a little slower to learn this concept, we will see. He has also been short on sleep, which doesn't help.

Gumby...well, she is just going through her phases so quickly that as soon as I have something figured out, she moves on to the next thing. It's normal for her to go through all the stages that were either stunted or missed living in an institution, so this is to be expected. I just wasn't prepared for how quickly we would move from one "problem" to the next. Usually things last a week or two and each new thing surfaces within a week or so of the previous. She is a quick learner for some things, but others are not even conscious. Like things going in her mouth...this is something that happens all the time, but it's not even something she thinks about that much. And sometimes the things are gross...like a shopping cart. Can you say EWWWW!!! She just puts things in her mouth without thinking about it and I have to remind her constantly NOT to do it. This is more like a new thing that goes into our mouth every week. Like thumbs one week. We got that mostly down after two weeks or so (not doing it) and then we are doing hair. She is still doing the hair and loves to reach over with her tongue and grab a piece of hair to chew on. And when I say chew- I mean CHEW the heck out of it. (I was worried she was going to injure her thumbs.) There are other things too, but the mouth is the hardest thing we are working on with her.

Smiles is also learning good emotions. He has been dealing with anger, but also has been very loving and cuddly. I love that part. He wants snuggle time and shares kisses with me often. He is loving his baby sister too. He likes to lift my shirt and snuggle with her. I'm not sure he really understands, but he enjoys whatever he is thinking and understanding. For some reason he likes to put his feet on her, but he is VERY gentle about it, which is not like his normal little boy self. It's a little weird to be honest. But hey, we are a strange family!

I've been keeping the house mostly clean and organized. This takes most of my energy, so I haven't been spending much time with adults other than Handsome, but it works. The stress produced from a dirty house wears on me in a huge way right now, and as those who have known me through a pregnancy are aware, I get kind of hermity when I am in the later stages anyway. The focus on the little family is sharp, and everything else gets passed up for awhile. I think this has been good for Gumby too. We have all been able to bond and get a good routine that isn't messed with too much, and she seems to do really well with that. Perhaps that's another reason that I haven't been blogging as much. I just don't spend much time being social right now. (That doesn't mean I don't like you anymore. And I'm sure that I'll enjoy blogging more regularly again at some point.)

That's a good update for now. We'll have to do this again sometime soon *wink*.

Oh...and did I forget to mention my little tragedy that nobody else cares about at all? We lost Photoshop in the great computer fiasco of last month. Handsome couldn't get it to install again because of issues with the disk...so I will no longer be a Photoshop owner =(. So sad for me. I'm sure you are all weeping profusely on my behalf...or something like that...

I'm going to pout about that one for a little while longer. It's hard to overcome an addiction.

I'm a Partial Mother

I'll tell you ahead of time, this post may not flow very well. The writing may not be my best. The thoughts shared might be scattered.

But I've been holding back feelings and I realized that someone else might have those feelings too. Someone in a situation like ours. Or someone who might later experience these feelings.

It's just that sometimes I feel like a partial mother. Like I don't have the same rights as those that were blessed with their special needs children through birth. Like my thoughts and feelings aren't weighted the same. This is not something that I get from those parents, I fully recognize that these are feelings that I put on myself. None the less, they are still there...and I still feel them.

I'm sure that someday that will go away, when I've had Gumby long enough to feel confident enough that, were I to encounter criticism, I could defend myself...even if just to myself. But right now I don't have that.

I don't have the common bond over when we found out that Gumby has Down Syndrome. We didn't go through any feelings of anxiety, worry, sadness, loss of what we had imagined her life to be like before we knew. I don't have the experience of her first four years of life. I don't know when she hit her milestones and I didn't help her achieve them. I've done nothing so far to help her become the child that she is today. She is the person that she is because of someone else. Not because of our family.

This might be a petty thing to think about, I know. But I still feel it.

Sometimes I just want to say that I don't care about all the research and finding out all that I can about Down Syndrome. I know the things that are important to know for Gumby, but I don't spend that much time trying to figure out more. And quite frankly, I don't want to know what is typical for other kids and what her abilities might or might not be based on experiences of other people. All I want to know is what Gumby can do. Gumby will do what Gumby can do and it doesn't matter what people expect of her. It does however matter what I expect of her. If Handsome and I expect less of her than she is capable of, that will effect her greatly.

I want to say those things, but I don't. I don't say them because I'm afraid of offending someone that has been a parent in this different arena longer than I have. I'm afraid of someone being appalled by my statements and getting upset. I'm afraid of someone saying that I should do things a certain way or I shouldn't have adopted a little girl with DS, because obviously I'm clueless. Because I don't want to make anyone angry, and I don't want to hurt anyone's feelings if my opinion is different than theirs.

So, I don't say much. I don't say much about how I feel in parenting Gumby because I'm a sort of outsider. Or so I feel.

I do figure that my feelings are the same as most parents in that I never want to limit Gumby by what people think can be her future. My thoughts don't ever dwell on things that limit her, only on the infinite possibilities and the amazement I feel in how quickly she is changing...and how smart she is.

So, while I am feeling brave against the normal limiting feelings I will say:

You don't know my daughter, just like I don't know your children. Don't assume she will not be able to catch up with kids her age in school because of her institutional background or her diagnosis. Don't assume that she will not live on her own as an adult. Don't assume she will not have a job just like your kid. Don't assume she will never get married. Don't assume that if she does, that person will fit into this category or that. Don't assume that she will never be a parent. Don't assume that she will not live a long and healthy life. Don't assume anything, just like you wouldn't assume anything about Curly's future.

Curly's future, Gumby's future, and Smile's future....they all belong to God. He, and He alone knows what that future holds. So please don't think you know anything that hasn't been shared personally with you about her, just because of a little test run on her blood that showed an extra chromosome.

(I would venture to say that those last feelings are ones that I am learning to feel that other parents have felt from the time their children were little.)

And if you are a parent working on adopting a child with special needs and you don't already have a child with special needs, just know that IF you feel like an outsider sometimes, I totally understand where you are coming from.