Stomach Bugs, Ear Confections, Adoption and Waiting

The last few weeks have been very.....full, to put it gently.  One week we had a stomach flu bug, which seemed very unfair since I was just getting over having morning sickness and thought I was going to be done with nausea and vomiting.  No such luck. 

The following week we all had colds and I lost my voice for two days, which made being a stay at home mom just a little more challenging than usual. 

This week we started off with going to the doctor, where it was discovered that Simeon has a sinus infection and Israel has an ear infection, which he called an "itchy ear confection" and made me laugh. 

Now that we are all loaded up with antibiotics, cough medicine, tylenol, and/or ricola cough drops, I think we are getting better.  Hopefully we can put all this sickness behind us!

Other than that, this week Aaron and I also surprisingly found ourselves at an informational meeting about adoption at our church.  Adoption is not something I have really wanted to do in the past, but it seems like God has been doing something in my heart, and Aaron's, in the last year or so, even in the last month or so. 

At this point, Aaron is a little more enthusiastic than I am since I am pregnant, and my main thought is "One kid at a time please!"  It's hard to think about bringing home a child to adopt when I already know I'll be bringing home a newborn this May. 

In any case, it is something we're looking into and praying about.  We always knew that we wanted to have a big family, and up until now, I had always considered that I would be bringing all of those children into the world myself.  Now I am considering that God may have other plans for us. 

There are a lot of different routes to take when considering adoption, and it can be very expensive, so one thing that is absolutely certain is that we need God's guidance and direction on this, as well as His provision. 

Normally, I wouldn't blog about something like this.  When I feel God stirring us to something, I like to keep it close to my heart.  I might tell a few close friends, but not tell the entire world (so to speak).  However, in this particular case, I feel like this is the beginning of a journey and that maybe there are people who need to read about it along the way.

This may be something that happens a year from now, or it could be ten years from now.  I really don't know.  I do know that when it happens, it will be God's perfect timing, and I trust Him to show us exactly when that is. 

In the meantime, we will gather information, we will wait, and we will pray.  Most of the time, that seems like all you can do with any situation: wait, and pray. 

Name That Tree

This week has been very unusual so far.  Well, unusual is pretty usual for us, but this week has been extra-special in that department. 

I went to the bathroom and my two lovely oldest boys snuck out the front door.  It was almost as if they were waiting for their chance, and as soon as I closed the bathroom door they looked at each other and said, "Let's go!" 

At first when I went outside I couldn't see or hear them.  I even went to my neighbors house to see if they had gone over there.  Finally, I walked around the side of the house and found them, sitting on the hood of our van, picking berries off of the tree by our driveway.  I shooed them heartily into the house and tried to explain the dangers of eating unidentified berries.  Then I called Poison Control. 

They told me to try to identify the tree to see if it was poisonous.  They said to take a branch to a nursery and ask them what it was.  But I have three kids and I don't want to pack them up into the van to go find a nursery, so instead I tried the internet.  Let me tell you, there are a lot of websites dedicated to identifying trees.  However, not one of them was able to identify my tree. 

I spent a good hour and a half to two hours looking for the name of this tree, and it just was not there.  Upon further questioning, the boys said that they didn't actually eat the berries.  Whether they were telling the truth, I don't know, but they didn't get sick either way. 

Later that night, we went to Del Taco for dinner, and as we were sitting there, Simeon, with no pre-warning at all, opens his mouth and spews out everything he just ate and drank.  Then he just moved on, like it never happened.  He wasn't upset or fussy or anything.  Aaron was the unlucky person sitting next to him, so he got puked on.  It was so bizarre.  Here I have two kids who I thought ate strange, possibly poisonous berries, and they're fine, but the kid who didn't eat any berries gets sick?  Life just doesn't make any sense sometimes. 

We took the kid home, bathed him, gave him pedialyte (which he didn't like at first, but warmed up to in the end) and put him to bed.  I started to wonder, "What if he did somehow eat a berry?"  Back to my tree search, just in case.  Still no luck. 

The next day, I was stressed out trying to take care of Simeon--who woke up with diarrhea and had vomited again, so he needed another bath.  The boys, I think, could sense I was stressed and reacted to it by becoming very needy and whiny, which did not help at all.  As the day went on, Simeon was doing better, and eventually Aaron came home so the boys could focus their attention on him instead of me.  It already feels like a long week, and it's only Wednesday. 

In the midst of it all, I still cannot figure out what kind of tree we have next to our driveway.  It's driving me crazy.

A Toddler's Mind Works in Mysterious Ways

Yesterday I woke up not feeling so good. I felt tired (no surprise there) and achy (definitely not normal). Malachi was the only kid up, so I put on a movie and attempted to sleep in the papason chair we have in our movie room. Then I tried to sleep on the loveseat. Then I tried to lay on the floor. Nothing was working. I felt uncomfortable just being alive at that point, which is a pretty miserable way to feel. Finally, I took three ibuprofen and I was able to doze on the loveseat. Malachi was a good boy, and pretty much left me alone cuz he knew Mommy wasn’t feeling good.

It really would have been wonderful if I could have taken a sick day. But moms don’t get sick days, so I had to settle for being thankful that we have a backyard and that the boys were inclined to play outside.

They had been outside for a while, and I decided I should probably check on them and make sure they were having fun, but not too much fun, which might include killing each other. I peeked out the windows of our back porch to see Malachi throwing dirt in Izzy’s hair and pushing him. Izzy actually seemed fairly okay with this until I called out the window, “Malachi! Don’t throw dirt on Izzy, and don’t push him!” As soon as he heard my voice he came running and crying and he needed a drink and he wanted to watch a movie and he didn’t want to play outside. And I was thinking shoot! because I wanted them both to keep playing outside so I could rest. I got Izzy his drink, and then Chi came in and was upset because he wanted Izzy to come back outside and play with him. I began to try to explain to him that if he’s going to throw dirt at Izzy and push him, Izzy won’t want to play with him and that Izzy wanted to stay inside now because of that. He didn’t like that, and of course expected me to fix the situation. Ordinarily, I might have just let it go, but since I wasn’t feeling good and I too wanted Izzy to go back outside, I tried persuading him. That went something like this.

“Izzy, Malachi wants you to go out and play with him,” I say.
“No, I don’t want to,” he says in a whiny voice.
“Are you sure? Don’t you want to go play with him?”
“I don’t want to!” He’s a bit more adamant this time.
“Izzy, Malachi wants you to play with him, he misses you,” I tell him.
“I wanna watch a movie!” This is funny, because he doesn’t really watch movies, he just glances at them while he does other things.
“Izzy, Malachi will be sad if you don’t go outside.” How do I explain this in two year old terms? “You’ll give his heart an owie.”
To this, he replies, “But, I didn’t pinch him!”
I laughed and gave up trying to reason with him.

(After that, I did manage to get them both back outside using many tactical maneuvers, which included blankies and snacks.)