Mother of 2

It is Thursday which means I have survived my first 4 days with 2 kiddos all by myself! It has definitely been logistically challenging of course but overall not too bad. I just have to rethink everything to accommodate holding a 2 year old's hand with a carseat in the other.  We made it to the dentist on Monday, and both of them did great! Natalie was so brave and didn't cry. The staff was amazing, making it overall a great experience for her.  Tuesday and Wednesday were home alone days with the exception of a wonderful evening with precious friends!

They surprised me with this amazing cake!

And these wonderful gifts.....check out that Razorback stuff!

I feel so blessed to call these ladies (and so many more) friends. Thank you for making Joaquin and I feel special. 

Thursday was spent at the doctor for both kids. A regular check-up for Joaquin, and a strep swap for Natalie(negative, thank goodness).  Joaquin's 2 week stats are as follows:

head: 13 3/4, 25th percentile

height: 21 inches, 90th percentile * this may be the one time in his little life he will be tall=)

weight: 8.25, 75th percentile

After an hour and a half at the doctor getting them both checked out, we dropped off Nat's prescription for her breathing treatments, drove to Chi-fil-A to eat and kill time, then back to the pharmacy where I had to get out to go get it, and finally back home. A busy morning but NJ and JZ did great! They were good to me.

Here are some sweet snapshots of our moments this week. I love how much Natalie loves her brother. When she hasnt seen him for a few minutes her question is always, "Where's my brother?"

Our lazy (so thankful to have) mornings,

ready for naptime,

 and his favorite sleeping position. It took us about 5 days to discover his hatred for being swaddled, so the arms are out buddy!

**We have also been SO blessed this week and next with meals 3 days a week from our Sunday School class. This is such a blessing to not have to think about for a few days each week.  Thank you!

The Puzzle revealed

Words cannot express the gratitude we feel to each and every one of you that contributed to our adoption fundraiser. This was truly a blessing beyond measure.  We are in awe of your selfless giving and we feel so loved.  So here it is!

I am working to get it framed where we can see both sides.  Then it will proudly hang over Joaquin's crib! I can't wait to display it for all to see how much this baby is loved.   Thanks again to my friend, Maria, for snapping these photos so we could make this happen. Hop on over to Holland Creations Photography to check out more of her work.

What's in a Name?

Sometimes nothing...... like Natalie Jade. This was simply a name that wasn't extrememly common that we loved. Jade came from a character's name in a book I was reading. We put the two together and loved it! This sweet little boy's name was a little different.

 

When we found out we were chosen by a birthmom carrying a little boy that was full Hispanic, we immediately Googled Hispanic names and began reading through a long list of boy names. Out of a very long list, 3 stood out the most that we both agreed on: Joaquin, Diego, & Cruz.  The more we tossed them around, the more we liked Joaquin. *Now for a funny side story regarding this name.  Several years ago my goofy dad told the family that he decided to change his name, and that we would have to start calling him by this name. Joaquin he said!  We asked him where in the world this came from and I think he mentioned something about it being a power name.  We laughed, but he held on to it for awhile=)  So, when Brian and I decided on using that name I knew my dad would be excited; we'd be naming him after my dad.....ha!

On to the middle name.  Since we only agreed on 2 other names we had to choose from these!  Brian has a friend with a little boy named Diego, so we moved away from that and towards Cruz. We liked the way it sounded and thought the initials JC would be cute with NJ!  Wait a minute you say. His middle name is not Cruz, right?!  RIGHT!  A couple of weeks after meeting our birth mom and learning more about her, Brian and I talked and decided we would like to offer her the opportunity to give him his middle name.  We felt this would be special for him one day, not knowing how much communication we would have with his birth mom after placement.  She was excited about the idea.  We did not learn of his middle name until the day he was born=) Kind of suspenseful and fun!  She was deciding between two names, one of which her mom was trying to convince her to use because it was a family name. She went with her own choice, Zavien. Where did she get it? She just came up with it because she wanted it to be unique! We LOVED it! Now we have NJ and JZ!

Proud Big Sister!

A Look Back

What a whirlwind past 4 days.  As many of you know, we welcomed home our son via domestic adoption on Saturday.  He was born on January 17th at 5:49 a.m., weighing in at 7lbs 13 oz, and was 20 1/4 inches long. He is a healthy boy!

Introducing Joaquin Zavien Weir!

 Big sister Natalie is proud to finally have her little brother home. And so are we! 

We are thankful he is here, and that he is ours, but it didn't come easily.

Many think adoption is an easy choice, a popular or cool option even.  Adoption does not come without a roller coaster of emotions.  And ours was no different. Its very emotionally draining which is arguably worse than physical exhaustion.  The following entails our journey....

Thursday, January 17th

1 am- call from agency saying birth mom is at the hospital; began packing and called friend to come to the house so NJ could continue sleeping

3:30 left the house with Nat sleeping

4:00 stopped in Rockwall for gas and breakfast number 1 (donuts and soda!)

5:50 Arrived in Waco at the hospital (notice the time here....we arrived as our son was born)

6:00 met family member of birth mom in waiting room who told us he was here and healthy

8:45 Met hospital case workers who told us Joaquin's body temp was cold so he was warming up. Could be an hour or two before we could see him

8:50 left hospital to eat breakfast 2 at McDonalds

9:45 Returned to hospital hoping to see Joaquin

10:30ish met with hospital case workers for about 45 minutes on how birth mom and Joaquin were doing and how she was feeling about visiting us; Joaquin’s body temperature was still low so he needed to be warmed up under the warmer for a little longer. (this is killing us at this point as it's already been 4 1/2 hours of waiting)

Noonish decided to check into hotel, shower, and go eat lunch

2:00 Tres Mexican; ordered food and was eating chips and salsa when case worker text asking if we could meet at 2:30 with birth mom. Quickly asked for food to go! *side note: we never got to eat this meal =/

2:45-4:00 Saw Joaquin for the first time as birth mom held him; we each got to hold him for a bit while we visited; case worker was with us

4:00-5:30 Went back to hotel to rest and recoup

6-8 Dinner with a fellow adoptive family from Generations

9:30 Crashed until 8 the next morning; a VERY LONG day of waiting and being in limbo

Day 2

8:00 Woke up and began to dress for the day, waiting to hear when we could go back to the hospital

10:00 Left for a late lunch to Leal’s for breakfast tacos

11:00 Word from case worker said we could visit birth mom at 2pm

Killed 3 hours at the mall

2:00 visited birth mom and Joaquin for about an hour and a half

4:30 went to the movies to try and distract ourselves (received a message from director or agency checking on us and letting us know they were praying for us. How cool is that?)

7:00 Dinner at Double Dave’s pizza

8:15 Face time with my girl! She said, "I want to see my brother."

10:10 Got a message from director of our agency to be praying for birth mom. She was really struggling this last evening with him.

*Another LONG day of waiting and hoping to only see him once.  We were glad the birth mom decided to see him and spend time with him. We just never imagined it would be so much.  Our agency reminded us that they often have to say 'Hello' to the baby before they can ever say 'Goodbye.'

Day 3

7:00  Wake up and began to dress for a very big, emotional day

8:00 Breakfast at the hotel

8:15 Message from agency said we were still on and we were to be there at 9

8:39 Message from agency said birth mom was struggling again and was talking to case worker. We were told not to come until 9:30 now

We sat in our car, cried, prayed, and prayed for peace in her decision whatever it was, and to give us strength to deal with whatever the decision was, good or bad.

9:05 Drove to hospital parking lot to sit and wait for word and to continue to pray (trying to keep our emotions under control; wasn't so easy for me)

9:26 Text message came saying "she signed"

Relief

We entered the waiting room and continued to wait on birth mom and baby to be discharged.  We signed papers with our agency and paid our last big fee.  They took us to the nursery to talk to the doctor and nurse and to sign more papers for discharge. Finally, we got to see our boy!  We immediately changed his clothes, tucked him safely in the car seat and were ready to jet.  One more stop.  Birth mom. Yes, this would be hard. But these are moments we will get to share with Joaquin as he grows to learn his story.
The pain of watching her stroke his face and say goodbye was heart-breaking and very real.  Even as I write these words, tears stream. She loves him. SO much, in fact, that she chose a life for him that she couldn't give.  We told her we love her, and we do. We told her we would be praying for her, and we will.

12:30 Headed home!

Christmas Part 2

Our Christmas journey took us 3 hours further North to Ft. Smith for the Weir side of Christmas! We drove in late Christmas Eve to Grandma'as house, and the boys had to get right to work when NJ went to bed.  As you can see, it was intense=)

They were so proud of themselves. In true Natalie fashion she was stoic the next morning when she walked in to see what she got for Christmas! However, she did finally get in and play with it a little. She's always so overwhelmed, I guess.

Natalie got in some good reading time with Aunt Michelle and Uncle Lance. This is by far her favorite pasttime so if you want her to love you........read her a book!

About 1ish that afternoon, it began to snow so we headed to Grandpa's house 30 minutes down the road into the woods.  We spent the next couple of days here enjoying the bitter cold and snow.

Natalie was not so much impressed with the snow. I couldn't decide if she was annoyed by walking in it, or if it was too cold (I mean she had enough layers on so I don't think it was the cold), or if she just didn't know what to do with it!

Grandpa had a beautiful place to show off all the snow.  The only thing we were missing was a sled. He had a perfect hill but nothing to slide on!

She got a Rapunzel Barbie with another play set with Rapunzel, Eugene, Max, and Paschal for the wedding! She loved it!

 Here are the Great White Hunters!

Handsome lads, aren't they?!

We spent our last day back at Grandmas eating at my favorite restaurant, Fujis and a night out at a local park. There was supposed to be a train running that would take you around the park to see all the lights but the snow ruined that. We still had fun walking it out=)

We had a great Christmas with Brian's side of the family as well. We are so blessed! Now if we could just make this trip from TX to AR a little shorter......

Christmas Part 1-Finally

With all this baby excitement I haven't even posted our whirlwind Christmas journey.  This year we packed and unpacked a total of 14 times. That's no joke, folks! 14 flippin' times...whew. That just can't happen with 2 kiddos! Until then here's our journey in more pictures than words=)

We began our journey in Branson, MO with Mimi and Poppi. The weather was cool, but bearable. It was actually perfect.  Natalie was not fond of the rides she went on, responding with  "All done!"

Once my sister and her family arrived the Sunday before Christmas, we quickly took some photos to capture the moment.  Then the kids were sent on a scavenger hunt. Mimi had several clues that sent them to find small gifts around the yard. They each ended up with a large coloring book, markers, and a new set of Christmas pjs!  This was too fun!

And then there were gifts the next morning! As you can see from the picture Natalie really loved her new big girl panties. She wore them over her clothes for the longest time! Then added my fuzzy socks. Silly girl.

After all that fun we headed outside for the big unexpected gifts...

They had so much fun with these! Natalie's tractor was passed down from Evan and Audrey and they got an upgrade!

Christmas Eve was spent with Granny and the crew. Love this sweet picture

It was a Merry Christmas with my side of the family. Stay tuned for Part 2 of our journey when we headed to the Fort!

A Renewed Spirit

As you know, Brian and I along with 3 other couples from our church began an Adoption Ministry in our church a few months ago. We were gung-ho at the start trying to get ready for our kick-off, and we were very pleased with our turn out and the number of interested people.  What began quickly fizzled as a number of road blocks seemed to be popping up.  We were frustrated with how things were run in some ways or how other things were handled.

Last night we met with the church staff member who will now be head of our ministry.  Not all of our team members were able to be there, but he wanted to meet everyone and lay everything out on the table so we could move forward from here.  We left with a renewed spirit for this ministry moving forward.  He listened, asked questions about our short and long term goals for the ministry, asked what our frustrations were, and gave us an immediate starting point of where to go from here.  We are so thankful he took the time to talk with us and explain so much that we didn't understand.  Now we feel like we can work on that vision for MOSAIC.  A vision of awareness for the need to care for orphans!

Thank you, Lord for sending us this man to be the leader of our mninistry!



*A random side note: Having some trouble with blogger letting me upload any pictures. It's like the button to upload has just disappeared. It's driving me nuts because I can't post my Christmas pictures!

This, that, and the call

I wanted to take a minute to give a heartfelt 'THANK YOU' to each and every family that has donated to our fundraiser. We have been so humbled by every donation. As I said on FB, every 'little bit' DOES help. No donation is too small!  If you were thinking, "Oh man! I really wanted to donate, but forgot," there's still about 30 pieces left. I can't wait to share the whole picture. I am more excited about getting it framed and on the wall above the crib! It will be beautiful. On another thank you note, my friend, Kimberly has graciously offered to give 100% of her Valentine photo mini session procedes towards our fundraiser! Wow! Head on over to Eden Grace Photography to find out more. She will also be doing our newborn pictures which I am so excited about because of that precious little crown I mentioned in the last post!  She is a fellow adoptive mom and I am always thankful for this connection with others.

After much anticipation we finally got a call from our caseworker. Not the birthmom is delivering call, but an update nonetheless.  Birthmom is doing well and has dialated to a 3.  As soon as she goes into labor, the caseworker will call us and we will head to the hospital as quickly as we can. Thanks to several friends we have a plan A, B, and C for Natalie depending on the time of day when we receive the call.  She will stay with one of them until family can get here to hang with Natalie and wait on us to come home.  Wait time will be 48 hours after delivery plus drive time with a newborn!  Without sharing too many details the best part of the phone call today was about the name we have chosen: Joaquin. When the caseworker shared our chosen name with our birthmom, she told her that the name had a special meaning for her so she really liked it. Wow. That's God's hand at work. Out of all the names we could have chosen, for that one to be special to her gave me chills. God is real and alive friends!

Our situation this time around is a little different in that I won't get to be in the delivery room, and we won't be staying at the hospital like we did with Natalie (which means hotel and food costs).  I am ok with this because God already gave me that gift. Now my gift is experiencing pregnancy. Well not really, but we get to wait on the excitement with bags packed by the door for that "moment" when we frantically grab those bags and head to the hospital. We get to anticipate that moment at any time! Kind of exciting=)  God is good.

However, we also have to remind ourselves in this excitement for us, others are hurting.  This is not an easy decision or process for the birthmom.  If she commits to this placement, she will experience loss.  She will grieve.  And we will grieve for her. Please join us in praying for her emotions and stability. I am thankful she has a support system that will be there for her during her ups and downs.

Thank you for praying with us and for us.

Getting ready for Baby

We have about a week or two left before baby arrives and our last payment is due! Crazy!  The puzzle is still incomplete though. There are 59 pieces left and I just know we can get them filled in a week if everyone we know donates $10 for one piece. That's all......just $10 and your name is forever etched onto the puzzle that will be hanging above our sweet little boy's crib!  Click HERE to read more about how to donate.  It's very easy!

We are frantically trying to make all the changes needed to prepare for this little one......

Bottles washed and ready with new nipples sanitized.....check!

 

Two carseats strapped in and ready to go for both vehicles. Wow, that looks weird!

 

 

 

 

Diaper bag ready with clothes, burp cloths, socks, hats, blankets, etc.

 

The last thing left is getting the cradle out of the attic and cleaned up. We are ready for baby!

Which brings me to a flashback of our precious Natalie just hours after birth 2 short years ago.

How can this sweet little one be the same 2 year old that now counts to 12, sings her ABC's, "reads" books, talks nonstop, prays before her meals, and melts my heart every day? I can't imagine what this little boy will do to me=)

 

Especially when I find things like this!

Totally ordered this precious little hat for our newborn pictures. The seller was sweet enough to send it to me in less than a week since we were adopting so soon!  So thankful!

 

Until that call comes.....