Is it Spring Yet?

Yes I know it is almost May, but the Spring weather has not come to Oregon. We had the 5th wettest March in the history books and April hasn't been much better. There have been 3 glorious sunny filled days and the rest have been wet or a tease of sun and then WET.
But being a TRUE Oregonian means you do not let the weather keep you from doing things outside. So the kids and I went off to see the Wooden Shoe Tulip Festival. We had a wonderful time until the HAIL started and the torrential downpour came. But there was a time for a few pictures.

Easter came and went last weekend. Seems like time is flying by. The kids went with Daddy to an Easter Egg Hunt at Church on Sat. The weather was nice that day so they actually got to hunt outside.

Life has been a little challenging for me lately. Haven has had a little bit of a regression and she is getting very angry at something I wouldn't think would be important and we are having HUGE meltdowns. I was actually embarrassed to be with her yesterday at the store. She was sitting in the grocery cart screaming no at the top of her lungs and swinging to hit me. I still don't know what set her off.  Talk about being stared at!! Not that I'm not used to that already with the family we have. But usually we are noticed for my children's cuteness not appalling behavior. I pulled the cart through the store to get the few things I needed to make dinner, instead of pushing. She screamed the whole time to the point that strangers were telling her to be nice to her Mommy. The check out lady is the one that calmed her down and she actually apologized to me. Her sensory issues with clothes are getting more pronounced, makes getting dressed in the morning very stressful. I'm just cleaning out her clothes and selling them at the big second hand sale this weekend. Everything she won't wear is going away to stop the morning meltdown when she says she wants to wear it, but then freaks out because the pants are capris (she has a thing about having her ankles covered). Time to get the book about sensory issues that was recommended to me by our therapist.
What is so sad is she never acts this way with anyone else, not even her Dad. She does have some meltdowns with him, but not the huge blow ups she has with me. Makes me question my ability to parent her all over again. I know children act differently with their Mothers than Fathers, but still makes me sad. When she is doing well, she is such a joy to be with.

Alec on the other had has seem to come out of his brief period of really bad 2 year old behavior. He was embracing the terrible twos with arms wide open and I was missing my sweet boy, big time. But he has calmed down the last couple of weeks and is a joy to be with again. I am always amazed at his outgoing, friendly behavior. We we first came home he was so tiny, but would say hi to everyone. People thought it was Haven, because he was so small they didn't expect him to talk. He runs into church and shakes everyone's hand saying GOOD MORNING. He also is so outgoing and determined to make new friends. When he sees a new child, he goes over to meet them. He introduces the whole family; Alec, Haven, Mommy, Daddy. He doesn't take no for an answer when a child doesn't want to say hi, he just keeps talking and saying hi to them, until they finally talk back to him. I watch him in awe, as a child, if someone wasn't open to talking to me, it would have hurt my feelings and I would have stopped. Not Alec, he wants to be your friend, you will be his friend. I hope he never looses this trait and I can protect him somehow from having his feelings hurt.

This and That

I have been bad about blogging lately. No excuses just not getting it done. So much has happen since my last post. Haven's party, family pictures, some house projects getting finished, Alec's emergency visit to the Dentist, Haven's late night weekend emergency room visit for her ear, gymnastics classes for the kiddos, preschool acceptance and Dove Adoptions get together this weekend.
At the Dove potluck, I had someone come up to me and said they recognized our family from this blog. This is the second time that has happened to me. Kinda strange and flattering all in one. Originally we started this blog so our families in Canada and Texas could keep up on our adoption journey. Never happened, none of them that I know of read our blog. Oh well, but friends I have made through this journey do and when I look at our traffic we have a follower in Alaska. Kinda cool.
OK I'm done bragging about that, now back to the kids and life.

We had Haven's birthday party at a Gymnastics place in Hillsboro called the Gym-Nest. It was GREAT! She had so much fun and loved the challenging things they did so much that we started gymnastics at the local rec center last week. Alec got to join the class too, thanks to the instructor Jenny. They are loving it. They have to get this whole waiting in line for your turn thing down...but that will come with time (I hope). Since we had a few days of no rain (YES, AMEN, YEAH...it rained almost every day in March) we have been walking to the park to run and play. Haven has been practicing her sloth hanging that she learned in class.

We had family photos taken. I am always impressed how a professional photographer can get great pictures out of kids that won't hold still, don't always look at the camera and some time just won't cooperate. But Amanda did a great job and it was hard to choose what pictures to buy. So many wonderful pictures of our beaut,y Haven and our handsome Alec.

 
We bought some new appliances, ours are 20+ years old and on their last legs. Our new fridge arrived and we had friends and family over to help get it in the door. Our hallway is incredibly narrow, makes moving any furniture a nightmare. My brother-in-law, niece, co-worker and some families friends came over to help. It was so much fun to watch my kids interact on a new level with their 7 year old cousin and our friend's 6 year old sons. They were able to keep up with them and play at their level. They had a great time and keep asking to do it again. Haven called it a party our fridge party.

During spring-break, Alec's face and teeth lost a battle with the kid's cart at Trader Joe's. Still don't know exactly what happened, he was sharing a cart with his sister and I think she tried to turn and he tried to go straight. The cart tipped and tripped him and he hit his mouth hard on the cart. Blood everywhere and luckily no major damage. A chip to his front tooth and on of his teeth was pushed more into the gum. But after an emergency visit to the Dentist, his teeth will be OK. He has such beautiful teeth, I can' bear to see it chipped, but better than loosing a tooth at his age.

A few days later, Haven wakes up with her good ear bleeding. Freaked me out cuz that is the ear with the tube. Our ENT is on vacation for 2 months, so it was off to the ER. Well she charmed everyone on staff and had them eating out of her hand and fawning all over her. She walked out the ER with her hands full of stickers after getting to pick them out herself from the sticker draw. The girl can turn on the charm. She had another infection. Poor thing. But all is well for now.

So excited that Haven and Alec got into the preschool I wanted for them. Alec will be going one day a week and then Haven goes 2 days a week on different days. So they will each get one on one time with me and get time away from their sibling. I am hopeful Haven can handle this without sensory issues, because there is only 10 in the class. But I am also looking at this as an opportunity to see what type of challenges we maybe facing in kindergarten with her sensory issues and figuring out how to deal with them.

Naing and I are taking bets on when Alec will get his first stitches. The boy is a dare devil and is trying bigger and better things in his eyes. Haven and Alec like to hold hands and spin really fast then let go of each other and fall down. Well he took a big face plant and hit hard last week. He was all swollen and sporting a blackened eye. I caught him jumping off of their play kitchen. As I am telling him NOOOO he is so proud of himself that he is yelling " I did it " I did it". I just keep telling myself what my sister told me, active children get hurt, non-active children don't get hurt. And boy is my boy ACTIVE.

The kids helped me plant seeds for our veggies starters. They had a great time doing it and checking "their" seeds daily to see how much they have grown. I might have a gardener yet to help me:) I can always hope!

Today was the Dove Adoptions pot luck. It was a little bittersweet. Our social worker Ryan and his wonderful wife Krista are leaving Dove and moving to Roseburg. Krista is the reason we chose Dove and why we decided to adopt two at once. When we trying to decide what to do and who to go with, she gave me her home number and we talked a long time about the challenges she faced bringing home two non-related children at once. She was so honest and open that I felt like we could trust Dove and chose them.
I will so miss seeing them at the get together. Thank God for Facebook!!

One more thing in closing. I have talked a lot about the difficulty I have had with Haven. But I so love this girl. Now that we have gotten some tools to use with Haven and things have improved so much, I so enjoy her. Her new thing is to come up to me and say, "Mommy lets talk." and then she gives me a subject she wants to talk about. Usually it is about something we just did, like going to the zoo and what we saw while we were there. I am amazed at her intelligence, compassion and beauty daily. I just hope that by sharing our problems, more people that are having difficulty will seek help and talk about it. Rhonda Andrews our bonding therapist is a GOD SEND. She has helped our family so much. Life is good.