On the Edge of a Cliff and Ready to Fly

Donald and his brother, Drew, talk about Halloween all the time.

Every time Donald comes home from spending time with his brother, he’s come up with some new theme that Joshua and Jaxon (Drew’s son) can dress up for Halloween. Most of them are Star Wars Themed.

What are the ideas I’ve heard so far? I’ve heard so many my head is swimming. Yoda, C3-PO, the Hulk, Ewoks….. They have been hatching up schemes since Joshua was 2 days old. Halloween is two months away.

I suggested that we dress up Joshua like a pumpkin. What was Donald’s response? “No. It’s his first Halloween.” Donald has been asking me when Children’s Orchard is having their costume sale. Good gravy.

Donald wants to make Joshua a Star Wars themed room. I was hoping Donald would carry the Truck/Train/Airplane theme, but apparently I have been outvoted. Donald, ever since we were dating, told me he wanted to be a daddy. He has always wanted kids, even more than I did. So, I am not going to tell Donald no. I understand he’s been dreaming of his son carrying on his Star Wars fandom (or obsession??), and I am going to be happy for him and let him do it.

When we have a girl, though, her room is going to be decorated in My Little Ponies and Breyer Horses. End of story.

Since becoming a “working mom,” my life certainly has changed. I have a mentor at work, M., with whom I go to lunch 1 a month to talk about work and home life things. She is in a good place to mentor me because she is the main breadwinner of her family as well and she’s worked on balancing home and life.

Since Joshua, work isn’t as consuming for me as it was. I think I threw myself into work a lot more to keep my mind off of the infertility battle. It actually turned out to be a good thing, because I worked my way up to make enough so we could afford to adopt and raise our family. My life used to be either 1) Working, 2) Studying for some exam for work 3) Doing some type of extra activity for work to add to my resume. Now, I am trying to get things back into balance, and put more home into my life. Having a baby and having to pay for babysitting doesn’t lend itself well to working lots of extra hours. I’ve had to really prioritize what is important and I’ve said “no” to a lot of activities and committees that I normally would have jumped on. I am just focusing on the Bilingual Committee and Toastmasters at work, in addition to getting my team to where they need to be.

I’ve started a new routine. Mornings are so hectic trying to get Joshua up and ready to go to his uncle’s (or just get him ready for the day), so I’ve started showering every night rather than in the morning. We are not eating out as much (due to cost and it’s actually more inconvenient sometimes with a little one) so I am doing a lot of the cooking. Every weekend I pick a meal (last week it was dirty rice, this week it was meatloaf and mashed taters) and I put it into individual containers and freeze. It’s something I did occasionally before Joshua, but now it is a must. I don’t have time to cook during the week. I come home (sometimes carrying a baby, diaper bag, purse, & laptop bag), tired already from a long day, trying to get Joshua fed, there is just no way that I have time to cook dinner.

Additionally, Donald and I each take turns being a “single parent” it feels like. The one time I usually have Donald here to help watch Josh while I cook is Saturday mornings, so I have Donald watch Joshua while I get up early Saturday and get things cooked and the kitchen cleaned afterwards. I’ve done this for about a month, and it’s working well. I understand now why parents of young children really crave schedules and don’t want to go out of town as much. If my only time to prep food is Saturday morning, it’s such a pain to reschedule that to do something else! Isn’t that strange?
If I have to do something different one weekend, it can throw the whole schedule off.

I was thinking today, Luna has escaped our fence at least 6 times. Even after Donald fixed it, she somehow got out today. A very nice neighbor brought her back. Our neighbors are a lot nicer than our old house; our old neighbors would call the cops on us for keeping our car in the street too long. It’s nice to be back into a “small” town, things don’t seem as uptight. I think we’ve met most of our neighbors from our silly puppy running around the neighborhood.

Well, Joshua is napping, I’m going to try to catch a nap, too!

Things are good, overall. Donald and I have to redo our budget and figure out what to do about the leaky basement. We think we’ve pinned it down to being from the sink. I think we forgot how much work a house is – we had done so much work on our old house (painting, windows, remodeling) that we got it in tip top shape, and now we’re starting over with all the remodeling and revamping! I think Donald and I have decided we aren’t going to move again….we’ll just add on.

Joshua is starting to pick his head up while being on his tummy! It’s so nuts….it was like he couldn’t do it one day, then all of a sudden he started doing it! He’s a fun baby.

Donald did some honey-do’s today – he fixed our fence (yeah!) so hopefully Luna can frolick in the yard again without running away!

I starting bawling when I saw this tonight on Biography – it caught my attention due to the name, Lois Jurgens.

Lois Jurgens was an adoptive mother whose own son testified against her in the murder trial of his brother, Dennis Jurgens.
This is especially poignant because the birth mother was forced to give up her son for adoption because she was in state custody. Years later when she was trying to locate her son, she found out he had died. The birth mother, Jerry Sherwood, was convinced that he had been beaten to death. Due to Sherry’s efforts, the case was reopened and Lois Jurgens was convicted of murder.

While I was crying and holding Joshua I kept saying, “You’re giving all of us adoptive parents a bad name.” Yes, giving us a bad name, indeed.

What a heartbreak, on so many levels.