LOST A SOCK

Merry Christmas

May your holiday be sweet and simple,

and a little wild and crazy for good measure. 

And Florida

This was apparently our year for travel.  (Love that.)  We had no plans on traveling to Florida this year, and in fact had recently been talking about how great it would be to spend some time with the kids at Disney next holiday season, just before they get their new brother or sister. 

Our plans changed pretty quickly when, two weeks ago, Kevin's granny called to tell us that she's been diagnosed with stage four cancer.  It had already spread throughout her intestines, liver and colon and such, and doctors are allowing her to decide what treatment, if any, should happen.  As if that isn't a difficult enough conversation to have across eleven hundred miles, she reminded us, at the end of the phone call, to tell our babies how much she loves them. 

We did what anyone with a heart and half a savings account would do, and we booked airline tickets to go spend time with her.

 
Terror in the skies. 

(Who, me?)

 
We were able to spend several hours each day with Granny, until we completely exhausted her she needed to rest, and then we'd head out to explore places both new and familiar to us, until our return the next day. 

 
Having spent the majority of our Floridian time in the Orlando and Cocoa Beach areas, and driving up and down A1A on the East Coast, we decided on a whim one afternoon (most importantly, with a sleeping back seat) to explore St. Petersburg and the Gulf of Mexico.  It was just wonderful, and an afternoon with my young family that I hope to always remember.   

 
We hit the beach just as the sun was setting on that chilly evening, and simultaneously began running as fast as our legs would carry us, to the salty waves.  We hopped around on the shore, cuffing our pantlegs and breathing in the ocean air as deeply as possible, loving every minute of it.

 
Genuine happiness.

 
Here, too. 

 
That's how it is when you pay a visit to the happiest place on Earth. 

...And your parents treat you to a lollipop the size of your entire head.

 
Our parents are Idiots!

 
Cinderella, showing off to the neighborhood with her Mad Strandz.  Merry, beautiful Christmas in Disneyworld. 

 
We've now been down to Florida quite a bit since our honeymoon back in 2000, and every time, especially this one, we wonder why it is we're always leaving-- returning home to twenty-eight degrees and snow.  Maybe one day we will just stay.  Wouldn't that be incredible?

(Come on, friends, dream a little dream with me...)

 
Or at least, we should visit again, very soon.

Telling them, herself, how much she loves them.

In the interest of sooner, rather than later

The other night I tried to write about our African adoption.  (It's true! You win!)  I had a million worries and scenarios swirling in my head, and every paragraph ended up sounding all wrong to me.  I must have deleted five or six entire posts, until at last I was still typing at well past midnight and decided to call it a night.  I kept the title, posted a recent homeschool picture of Jack and a favorite Rumi quote that says much for where Kevin and I are at the moment.  I labeled it Adoption, because I hoped several months from now I would remember the night I tried and tried to write about our new baby, and couldn't get it right.

Thankfully, just a couple days later Kevin and I have made progress with some of our details, and I think I have my footing in this entry. 

I suppose I should share with you the fact that I am an obsessive planner (heh, my husband loves this about me) but we're less than great with timelines.  We talked about a wedding date, and moved it forward almost immediately.  We planned to have children five years into our marriage, and had been trying for KJ for three months by our first anniversary.  When we think about moving, or buying a new car or going on vacation, we always end up scrapping the original far-off date for something much closer.  We always overshoot on the big stuff. 

So this past July we decided that we would adopt a baby. 

We thought going out a year and some change would give us lots of time for thinking, saving and planning.  We slowly shared our news with friends and family, some of whom have been very excited and a few others who have surprised us with their lack of support.  I shared the news with all of you, and we've spent months having small conversations with our children about their sibling, growing him or her into their hearts and into our little family. 

We think about and talk about our new baby all the time, by now.  I read blogs and family journals, and often plug into search engines or YouTube so I can look at pictures and watch videos of loving families who have brought babies home.  Without fail, I always cry.

African adoption is something I've always recognized as my own.  There was never a moment where I suddenly declared it The Perfect Idea, or something I should do.  Africa has always lived in me, even in times I squelched it with thoughts of too expensive, too far away, too impossible.  As a sophomore in college I was once invited to travel to Tanzania and I loved the idea to my core, but in the end, two thousand dollars might as well have been a million to an elementary ed undergrad slash pizza waitress who was forever trying to afford next semester's books. 

Hello Africa, my old friend.  I'm making my way to you now.

The thing about meditating, and forever pondering your life's purpose, is that eventually you become more in-tune with the tiny voice deep within yourself.  (A process without end, might I add.)  I love what Martha Beck says about not needing to know exactly what your perfect life should look like, but instead make yourself aware of what feels better to you, and what feels worse.  It all comes together in that way.  Long behind me are the days where I chastised myself for not being more interested in Friday night at the bar, and even for finding a way to balance a nine-to-five career with motherhood.  Those things-- every thing is perfect for someone, and many someones (whom I have respect and admiration for) at different times.  I spent far too much time of my early adult life trying to figure that out, where my plans fit in if not with many of my immediate friends' interests and paths.  It was such a struggle for me, but I found my happiness somewhere else, and in this case, across a very large pond.  I think it vitally important for all of us to figure out what feels comfortable and what is most honest for our individual selves-- and to find a way to pursue that.

The more I learn to follow my gut, the happier I am to embrace and investigate my deep draw to spirituality, my dedication to my growing family, our choice to homeschool, and our quest to adopt from a place that I've never been to, but feel I know so well.  Anything worth doing comes with its risks and its challenges, and even its criticisms.  But to return to a place, again and again that is so uniquely your own, and altogether perfect for the time, is worth everything.

So now that we have had almost half of the year to think and talk, Kevin and I really feel that this is the right time for us to start our adoption for our new baby.  Sooner than later is definitely better.  Of course that means figuring out the financial aspect of the process, and quick, as well as making sure we don't end up in Africa during Sant and Leslie's September wedding!  We originally imagined next fall as a good time, but the call to go get our baby has become so apparent that we don't feel the need to drag things out any further.  I've been eating, sleeping and breathing my fourth child lately (friends, we've chosen names!) and the time is right.  We've started comparing agencies and narrowing ourselves down to one country, and I've got rubbermaid containers of boy and girl clothes alike stored in the garage, ready to go. 

She's going to make a marvelous big sister. 

Just before

For years, copying other people, I tried to know myself.  From within, I couldn't decide what to do.  Unable to see, I heard my name being called.  Then I walked outside.   ---Rumi

 

When tradition comes to town

Back on a chilly November afternoon in 2006 when I decided to sit my young children on a white sheet for Christmas pictures, I never imagined it would become what it is now two years later: multiple sets of white sheeted pictures. 

Okay so it isn't that big of a deal.  But fun, nonetheless.  No?

Heh.

So in the interest of this gem from last year, all about the golden bell wreath, which somehow becomes Jackson's only happiness--

 
I give you this.

Totally on our Christmas card.

 
Totally not on our Christmas card.

Hates the Holiday picture tradition, for the record.  And is so NOT ashamed to say so. 

Therefore, I bring you?

 
Bribery!  Yet another Holiday photo tradition!

 
It's a Christmas Picture Tootsie Roll Party!

 
Baby's first Tootsie Roll, for the record. 

Also being the third child, is totally cool with eating through the wrapper first.

 
So now we return to our very natural state

 
and slow down just for a second to finally wish our family and friends a Merry Christmas.

 
You people drive me to drink.

 
But keep those Tootsie Rolls comin, eh?