The Day My Heart is Most Conflicted

Happy Birthday to my Special Boy!

You are 4 today!

 

 

 

I know! I can't believe it either! Four!

 

 

You take the cake!

You're such a funny guy!

 

 

Mommy loves you VERY much!

 

 

So let's hold hands and walk....

 

through this big old world together. <3

 

 

 

 

Like the title of this post says, today is a day of conflicted feelings for me.  This is the day that my son entered the world! Yay!

 

But this is also the day that his birth mother found out he was "less than perfect" and made the heart breaking decision to leave him at the hospital. Oh what his little heart must have gone through.

Where was the voice that he heard while he was in the womb? Where were the warm arms to hold him and keep him safe? Thinking of him so alone breaks my heart. 

And yet....
If she hadn't left him behind I wouldn't ever have known the joy of being his mother.  The smiles and giggles. The kisses and (short) snuggles. The laugher as he crawls away from me and I chase him down.

Maybe one day his birthday will be 100% happy feelings but for now there is still a bit of sadness mixed in with the joy.....for me anyways. Looking at the pictures from today it's clear that he's feeling pretty happy with how his life is turning out.

100% J-O-Y

 

Updates on the happenings

So much has happened since I last posted.  The home study is done! Finito! It couldn't have gone any better than it did. I was wondering how I would convince the social worker that I could parent two special needs boys as a single parent. In the end the social worker I was assigned happened to be a single mother who had raised two adopted children! So she understood exactly where I was coming from and she said she had no hesitation in approving me to adopt a second child. :)  She also had some words of wisdom about having men in the boys' lives and about taking care of myself.

With the home study done and signed at the end of May I've been working on gathering all the documents for the dossier. I had to pass a medical exam and go for blood work. The only abnormality that showed up was anemia due to low iron. That seems to be something I've had all my life so I'll go back on the iron pills and see if that helps.

I'm just waiting for one last blood test result and then I can mail everything to the adoption agency. Then it will all be sent to the province for approval and then on to Bulgaria for translation! After that it will be logged in with the Minister of Justice and I'll (try) wait patiently for a referral. Once I get a referral I'll have a bit more of a time line. Until then I have no idea when I'll be bringing my son home.

It's hard not knowing who he is, how old he is, what he looks like and where he is. I think it's going to get a little bit harder every day. When I think about him I can't even conjure up a picture of him in my mind and yet he's a real boy who exists somewhere on the other side of the world! It's a weird feeling for sure.  I went through the same feelings before I got the referral for Silas and I survived so I imagine I will this time too. ;o)

May 8th was Gotcha Day and May 20th marked one year in Canada.
Photo on the left is at the airport last year and the photo on the right was taken at the Ds conference this year.

It is a bit different this time though. I have this wonderfully busy, almost 4 yr old, to keep my mind off things! He's such an amazing kid. In a year he's gone from eating only purees and not being able to sit up to eating only solids and walking! That's right! He's a walker now! He's getting braver and braver with walking the last few days.

We saw an ENT last month and she says he needs tubes in his ears because they are full of fluid. I'm hoping that once he gets those he'll be able to hear more and then maybe he'll start talking or at least start to communicate a bit better. No surgery date yet but I think it could be sometime this summer. It'll be the first time I've had to hand him over to a surgeon so I'm not sure how I'll handle it. Lots of prayer for starters!

We had such a busy month of May, holding the auction, preparing for the big yard sale, road trip to Edmonton for the Down syndrome conference and then another road trip to Winnipeg to see family and go to the ENT appointment.


Swinging with Uncle on our visit to the city for the ENT appointment.

The auction on facebook had some great items and some fun bidding wars. It raised over $3000! I'm so happy with how that turned out that I'm planning another one for the fall.

The Down syndrome conference was something I signed up to go to in January, before I started the adoption. Once I started the adoption I questioned whether I should have signed up to go. It was going to cost about $1000 to drive there, attend the conference and pay for the hotel. But as usual God always provides! I found out that the Manitoba DS society was reimbursing the conference registration for it's members so that was $370 back. Then I wrote a letter to the board of my weekend job (which has to do with special needs adults) offering to attend a session of their choice in exchange for some monetary support. I wasn't sure if I'd get anything but I thought it would be worth a shot. And it was! The amount from the board covered the hotel and most of the gas for travel. So I was able to attend the conference for almost free.

And what a blessing the conference turned out to be. I was able to meet friends I'd only been in contact with on facebook before. They were as normal in real life as they seemed to be on facebook. Not crazy at all! lol I learned so much from the sessions as well. And I made new friends! There were quite a few adoptive moms there. It was a great experience for both me and Silas. He did great during all the travel and sleeping in new places. I was so proud of him. :)

June hasn't been much slower....well maybe a tad. We had a very big and very successful yard sale the first weekend that raised over $1600! That's almost twice as much as each yard sale raised for Silas' adoption so I was very pleased.  I'm planning another one for later in the summer so I'll be accepting more items to sell again if you have anything you'd like to get rid of!

Oh and the bubble bath fundraiser went really well too! $210 was raised. That's a whole lotta bubble bath! Thanks to everyone who bought and thanks to Mae and Mom who organized that!

So that's about where things stand folks! Over $12000 raised and saved in just over two months! Wow! God has provided for this adoption just like He did for Silas'. I'm so thankful for everyone who has helped with the fundraisers and who has donated.  It's amazing to think that we're already 1/3rd of the way there. :oD

Stay tuned for some more fundraisers in the coming weeks and months!

Keep Calm I'm going to be a big brother!

Super Extravaganza Auction Fundraiser!

My next BIG fundraiser is going to be an online auction on facebook! I'm looking for items to auction off. If you have anything you'd like to donate it would be most appreciated. 

 

Here's the link to the auction

https://www.facebook.com/groups/959029977453957/

 

I'm still working on getting things listed and set up.

 

 

 

Silas and landmark recognition!

Well folks, it finally happened. The weather got warm enough for us to spend hours outside! Silas and I have had quite the active day.

First we went to the pool for a little more than an hour this morning. Silas is really starting to get the hang of moving in the water. He was kicking and trying to go forward. And I had him work on his walking in the kiddie pool.

Then we had lunch and Silas napped.

After nap we pulled out the bike and went for a bike ride then played outside.

Then we ate supper and went back outside for another long bike ride/walk all the way to the post office.

Then we played outside and Silas used his toy walker to walk.

 

And this is where it gets interesting! The whole point of this blog post.

 

As we were walking down the muddy back lane Silas made it clear that he wanted to go to the playground, which he could see from where we were. He tried to make a direct path there but the fence was in the way. He got so excited when he realized that I understood that he wanted to go to the playground and that my redirection to walk further down the lane (to get to the gate) would get us there.

 

Once we got there he wanted to take his walker up the stairs! haha Funny boy.  He was nearly successful too.



 

And now for part 2.

 

Silas and the daycare kids attend a weekly preschool program called Better Beginnings at the school. Silas really seems to enjoy it, especially the time we spend in the gym. We almost always use the same entrance. 

So tonight while we were at the playground I thought we should walk on the cement that is around the school. Nice and dry and no mud, easy to push his walker.

 

Well! We sure didn't get very far! As soon as we started walking Silas made a beeline for the Better Beginnings door. He was insistent that we go in that door and play with the toys. He was trying to open the door himself and was quite upset at my attempts to redirect him to walk some more. I tried explaining that BB was "all done" using words and signs. I showed him how all the lights were off in the room and no one was there. It took a good 5+ mins to convince him that we couldn't go to Better Beginnings. Finally he climbed up into my arms and let me take him home. He rested his tired little head on my shoulder most of the way home. Awwww!  

 So it's neat to see Silas remembering places we've been and wanting to go there again.

Another "first" tonight was keeping a hat/toque on that doesn't have a chin strap! Usually if it doesn't have a chin strap he whips it off and throws it away. I've been trying to get him to wear this toque for a week now. I'm not sure why tonight was different but I'll take it!

 

After a quick snack and a bath Silas went to bed and fell asleep within seconds. Zonked right out! I'm sure we'll have just as much fun playing tomorrow. :)

Exciting News!

I just got word from my homestudy agency that my homestudy could be complete and ready to sign by the end of May! That's a lot sooner than I thought it would be!

But that means I'm going to have to start paying the big fees soon. I think I'll need about $6000 by the end of May/beginning of June.  You can see by the thermometer that I'm several thousand dollars away from that still.  I've also created another tab up there ^^^ (Fee Breakdown) that lists all the various fees and expenses so you can see where the money goes to.

Right now I have this Avon Bubble Bath fundraiser going on.

 

 

 

Garage sale

I also am still looking for garage sale items. If you're doing some spring cleaning I'll gladly take anything you want to get rid of! I'm planning on having the first sale on the first weekend in June.

 

Online Auction

This is something I thought of doing for Silas' adoption but then ended up getting fully funded before I had a chance to set it up.

Basically it's an online auction in a facebook group. I'm looking for people to donate items that can be auctioned off.  These can be craft items, new items you bought and haven't used and direct sales products (Scentsy, Jamberry, etc). It would be really great to get as many items donated as possible to make it a successful auction.

I will give credit to each donator unless you wish to remain anonymous. If you have an etsy store or website I can link to that in the description of the item you've donated.  

In the next few days I'll get the facebook page set up and start adding items. I'm pretty excited about this auction! I hope it will raise several thousand dollars!

 



Going for a walk!

Silas has a little toy walker that he uses to help him walk. On Saturday I took it outside and got some video of him walking and RUNNING with it. We did it again today (sunday) and he did even better.  I hope we can soon leave the walker behind and have him walk without it. Right now he could do it I think but he's just not quite confident enough yet.

It's a bit long (4 mins) and yes I did let him walk into a tree at the end. Opps!

Letter Announcement

This is the letter I sent out to family and friends announcing the next adoption. If you didn't get a copy I'm sorry you were left out! You can read it all here.
I decided it would be nice to announce it with a letter first this time around.