Spring 2007; A Family of Four
So life begins as a family of four. Alex adored Austin...calling him “Ossin” since he couldn’t quite pronounce the “T” sound yet. More often he calls him “Ossin baby brudder”. He loved to hold Austin on his lap, asking “Alex hold Ossin, peez?” He would pet him, kiss him, talk to him, cuddle him and burp him. He loved to watch Austin get his diaper changed, explaining to me, “Mommy! Ossin doo-doo diaper!” Loved to help with Austin’s bubble bath, and let us know everything Austin did: “Ossin eyes open!”, “Ossin goin’ night-night”, “Ossin burp!”, “Ossin crying!”. He made sure to point out all of Austin’s body parts: “Ossin fingers”, “Ossin toes”, “Ossin mouf [mouth]”, “Ossin ears”. And as soon as Alex would wake up in the morning, his first question, every time, was “Where Ossin?” and “What Ossin doin’?”. We were truly blessed for the acceptance and affection Alex had (and still has) for his baby brother, especially since we had no real time to prepare Alex for Austin’s arrival.
So began a very exciting and busy time in our lives. We had visitors galore, family and friends stopping by to meet the new baby and bring him something. My dear friend Wendy threw a baby shower for me and it was, again, the loveliest, best time a mommy could have. We took Austin to his first church serve when he was only 5 days old. Everyone at church was stunned and thrilled for us, and just adored Austin. Alex was so proud to be the big brother, showing Austin off to the child care workers in the nursery where he used to stay when he was a newborn.
We (finally) made our much-planned trip to SeaWorld on St. Patrick’s day weekend. With a 2 year old, and a three week old. It was such a fun visit. Alex got to see ducks, horses, donkeys, flamingos, birds, dolphins, turtles, you name it. We also received our first dirty look, being an interracial family. I was posed near the ducks holding Austin, with Alex next to me, and Pete taking the picture. A old, old couple walked past us, shooting us a hateful look. I did not catch it at first, Pete did. He mentioned it to me when the photo was snapped, and I turned around and caught the hateful expression. I briefly considered going after the couple and addressing them, but I let it go. Had they said something, I definitely would have gone after them, but my thought was, “well, this is the first of what could me many comments, looks, stares and racism we’ll face throughout life, and I’m not going to let someone else’s small mindedness ruin a beautiful day for my family.” So I let it slide......that time.....
We did a number of things for Easter that year. First, there was the Easter party/egg hunt with our adoption support group, where a friend dressed as the Easter bunny to visit the kids and hand out eggs and gifts and candy....and where Alex refused (again) to go anywhere near the furry beast. Then, there was the egg hunt/cook out at our church on the day before Easter, where we listened to the story of Easter, sang songs, played games and, of course, hunted for eggs, all while freezing our bunny butts off. And then, the big day, with church services that morning, and a scrumptious brunch buffet at Banyan’s Restaurant with the family and some friends. It was a perfect weekend.
With two boys in tow, we decided to take the plunge and....bought a van. That meant no more driving the POS bomb for mommy. It had been Pete’s truck, which got handed down to me when Alex came along, so Pete could drive my nice Buick with the car seat in it. I hated that truck....dirty, smelly, dented, dinged, yucky...and gave me so much trouble that one time (well, OK, you got me..more than one time) I screamed at it: “You piece of S#%T”! And horribly, Alex overheard me once and asked what I had just said....I was so fuming mad at the truck at the time, I could not trust myself to answer, so Pete answered for me and explained to Alex that Mommy was mad at the truck and called it a piece of doo-doo. From that point on, the old green truck was lovingly or hatedly (depending on who was referring to it: Alex or mommy) called the doo-doo truck.Well, the doo-doo truck brought us a measly $500.00 closer to our down payment on our new Nissan Quest. I loved it! Although I hardly drove, since it was now Pete’s dad van, it meant I got to go back to driving my nice Buick. Aaaahhhh, happy mommy!
So we settled into Spring of 2007...still-working Mommy, still staying-at-home-with-the boys Daddy, and the Double A Team: Alex and Austin. We were enjoying life so very much and counting our blessings every day. Alex was healthy and growing, and talking up a storm, repeating everything anyone said. His favorite expressions were: “Mommy doin’?” or “Daddy doin’?”; “Mommy sit down”, “Up, Daddy”, “What dis?” and our favorite, “Juice honey” (because whenever his grandma asks him if he wants juice, she asks, “do you want more juice, honey?” so Alex thinks juice is juice honey. Actually, he began to put honey on the end of every food word he knew, so asking him what he would like for breakfast or lunch or dinner was an earful: “eggs honey”, “saus-is [for sausage] honey”, “cer-we-wal [for cereal] honey”, “hot dog honey”, “mac-roni honey” and “popsicle honey” were some of his favorites. And he got into an odd habit of naming random objects he either saw or came in contact with throughout the day when he said his prayers at night: after the usual “Now I lay me....” we’d go through everyone in the family asking that they be blessed “Mommy, Daddy”, etc. But then Alex would add in “God bess the van, God bess Daddy’s hammer, God bess Mommy’s vacuum cleaner”, etc. He also began to get really good about his manners, most times saying “peas” and “fank ooo”. Funny, and endearing....he began growing up so fast.So life was great and we were doing very, very well, if tired a lot of the time. Both boys were happy, well-adjusted and healthy. Alex couldn’t wait for Austin to get big enough to play bull dozers and dumptrucks with him. I could tell they were going to be great brothers and most of all...great friends. It was already such a thrill and such a blessing to watch them together. We had the fair-haired, blue-eyed, beach bum surfer looking boy, and our dark skinned, dreamy-eyed, exotic islander boy! The perfect pair! Life was good....and was only going to get better!
So began a very exciting and busy time in our lives. We had visitors galore, family and friends stopping by to meet the new baby and bring him something. My dear friend Wendy threw a baby shower for me and it was, again, the loveliest, best time a mommy could have. We took Austin to his first church serve when he was only 5 days old. Everyone at church was stunned and thrilled for us, and just adored Austin. Alex was so proud to be the big brother, showing Austin off to the child care workers in the nursery where he used to stay when he was a newborn.
We (finally) made our much-planned trip to SeaWorld on St. Patrick’s day weekend. With a 2 year old, and a three week old. It was such a fun visit. Alex got to see ducks, horses, donkeys, flamingos, birds, dolphins, turtles, you name it. We also received our first dirty look, being an interracial family. I was posed near the ducks holding Austin, with Alex next to me, and Pete taking the picture. A old, old couple walked past us, shooting us a hateful look. I did not catch it at first, Pete did. He mentioned it to me when the photo was snapped, and I turned around and caught the hateful expression. I briefly considered going after the couple and addressing them, but I let it go. Had they said something, I definitely would have gone after them, but my thought was, “well, this is the first of what could me many comments, looks, stares and racism we’ll face throughout life, and I’m not going to let someone else’s small mindedness ruin a beautiful day for my family.” So I let it slide......that time.....
We did a number of things for Easter that year. First, there was the Easter party/egg hunt with our adoption support group, where a friend dressed as the Easter bunny to visit the kids and hand out eggs and gifts and candy....and where Alex refused (again) to go anywhere near the furry beast. Then, there was the egg hunt/cook out at our church on the day before Easter, where we listened to the story of Easter, sang songs, played games and, of course, hunted for eggs, all while freezing our bunny butts off. And then, the big day, with church services that morning, and a scrumptious brunch buffet at Banyan’s Restaurant with the family and some friends. It was a perfect weekend.
With two boys in tow, we decided to take the plunge and....bought a van. That meant no more driving the POS bomb for mommy. It had been Pete’s truck, which got handed down to me when Alex came along, so Pete could drive my nice Buick with the car seat in it. I hated that truck....dirty, smelly, dented, dinged, yucky...and gave me so much trouble that one time (well, OK, you got me..more than one time) I screamed at it: “You piece of S#%T”! And horribly, Alex overheard me once and asked what I had just said....I was so fuming mad at the truck at the time, I could not trust myself to answer, so Pete answered for me and explained to Alex that Mommy was mad at the truck and called it a piece of doo-doo. From that point on, the old green truck was lovingly or hatedly (depending on who was referring to it: Alex or mommy) called the doo-doo truck.Well, the doo-doo truck brought us a measly $500.00 closer to our down payment on our new Nissan Quest. I loved it! Although I hardly drove, since it was now Pete’s dad van, it meant I got to go back to driving my nice Buick. Aaaahhhh, happy mommy!
So we settled into Spring of 2007...still-working Mommy, still staying-at-home-with-the boys Daddy, and the Double A Team: Alex and Austin. We were enjoying life so very much and counting our blessings every day. Alex was healthy and growing, and talking up a storm, repeating everything anyone said. His favorite expressions were: “Mommy doin’?” or “Daddy doin’?”; “Mommy sit down”, “Up, Daddy”, “What dis?” and our favorite, “Juice honey” (because whenever his grandma asks him if he wants juice, she asks, “do you want more juice, honey?” so Alex thinks juice is juice honey. Actually, he began to put honey on the end of every food word he knew, so asking him what he would like for breakfast or lunch or dinner was an earful: “eggs honey”, “saus-is [for sausage] honey”, “cer-we-wal [for cereal] honey”, “hot dog honey”, “mac-roni honey” and “popsicle honey” were some of his favorites. And he got into an odd habit of naming random objects he either saw or came in contact with throughout the day when he said his prayers at night: after the usual “Now I lay me....” we’d go through everyone in the family asking that they be blessed “Mommy, Daddy”, etc. But then Alex would add in “God bess the van, God bess Daddy’s hammer, God bess Mommy’s vacuum cleaner”, etc. He also began to get really good about his manners, most times saying “peas” and “fank ooo”. Funny, and endearing....he began growing up so fast.So life was great and we were doing very, very well, if tired a lot of the time. Both boys were happy, well-adjusted and healthy. Alex couldn’t wait for Austin to get big enough to play bull dozers and dumptrucks with him. I could tell they were going to be great brothers and most of all...great friends. It was already such a thrill and such a blessing to watch them together. We had the fair-haired, blue-eyed, beach bum surfer looking boy, and our dark skinned, dreamy-eyed, exotic islander boy! The perfect pair! Life was good....and was only going to get better!
Comments