Oliver loves building with blocks and when I asked him what he was building, he exclaimed/yelled, a housefly house! His house even came with a slide for the flies. The flies Oliver was trying to accommodate are the ones darting around our house. With contractors coming and going and the portions of our house still be open to the great outdoors, we have become a haven for flies. Enough that Oliver could consider building a tract development.
Other than the flies, week two of construction wasn't bad. But that's easy for me to say since I was away on business during last week's heat wave. Chris slept in the basement at night to escape both the heat and the dust since our temporary bedroom became a staging ground for punching a hole through the wall to make a doorway into our new master bedroom. When I arrived home late Friday night, I took my first peek at the new space (and without having to climb a ladder, which is how the contractors had accessed the second-story addition until they created the internal doorway). The space is still very unfinished, but the walls, plumbing and electrical were all framed and/or roughed in, and a new soaker tub sat in our bathroom. I haven't taken a bath since we've lived in this house (and honestly can't remember the last bath I took), so that tub upgrade was all for Chris. Despite the unfinished space, I could finally see how it was all going to come together.
Chris's other favorite part of the addition is the new windows. There was no question about what windows we were going to buy. They had to be Andersen. Chris drove to the Menomonie plant to pick them up as soon as they came off the line. Even after they were installed, he checked and rechecked all the mechanics of the windows and proudly explained all the improvements the windows have over the existing windows in our house.
We hope the inspectors make it this week as scheduled so the contractors can finish the walls. While everything is mostly moving along on schedule, our au pair arrives in two and a half weeks and his room still needs a new ceiling, coat of paint, refinished floors, and most important to him, a door.
Kiera, Matteo, Oliver and Soren
Monday, July 28, 2014
Tuesday, July 22, 2014
Thriving on Love
"All the children who are held and loved will know how to love others. Spread these virtues in the world. Nothing more needs to be done."
- Ming Zi, Chinese philosopher, circa 300 B.C.
So that's why I feel so sad when I wonder whether our children are experiencing attention, physical affection and love while we are not with them. And then I was relieved and feeling so fortunate when I learned that our children are benefiting from the work of two amazing organizations: Love Without Boundaries and Half the Sky. They do more than provide medical care and basic necessities for orphans in China - all so greatly needed - but their goal is to make sure each child in their care is loved. Because that's how children truly thrive. One organization sponsored not only a surgery for our son, but also his foster family, where I hope he continues to live until we are permitted to travel to him. The other organization has been providing training to the nannies in our daughter's orphanage, where the children receive loving, family-like care. Although she was recently placed with a host family, she still participates in programs with her peers at the orphanage.
Saturday, July 19, 2014
Our Family is Complete
We are so happy to share our news that we have finally been
matched! And not with one child, but two! Yes, we are about to be the parents of four children! And we couldn't be happier about that.
It was quite an emotional path that lead us to these precious children. We were quickly growing frustrated with the wait and were losing faith that our agency was going to be able to match us due their limited number of orphanage partnerships and the shrinking shared list. I sought the advice of the adoption community on Facebook, who counseled us what was involved with switching agencies to find our child. One woman pointed us towards her agency who I ended up really clicking with during a call with them to discuss our options. Although I had a really good feeling about them, we couldn't switch agencies unless we were switching to match with a specific child. We reviewed the files of a couple of boys on their Waiting Child list, but the children were either older than Oliver or had more needs than we thought we could handle. A week later the new agency called asking if I wanted to review the file of a little girl from southern China. I remember
thinking, a girl? A girl was never on my radar. I would have bet a
lot of money I was going to be a mom of all boys! But as soon as I read
her file, I knew she was our daughter. So Chris and I made the decision
to switch agencies. (And that was quite a drama-filled experience, but
that is a story for another day!)
Growing our family didn't end with being matched with our daughter. The new agency allows families to adopt two children, something that Chris and I had wanted to pursue, but hadn't been able to because our old agency didn't allow it. We talked to the new agency about adopting a second, but given that we had a short window to work with and our second child needed to be at least a year younger than Soren, the new agency couldn't guarantee they would be able to match us.
Only days after we said yes to our daughter, our agency called with another referral, this time for a little boy. The social worker was very surprised when a lone file arrived that morning from a partnership orphanage (files usually come in batches), and when she read the child's file, she immediately thought of our family. She quickly went through the file before e-mailing it to me, but I just knew before reading the file myself that this child was going to be our son. When I finally received the file, my heart just melted when I saw his picture and I could have cried from happiness because I knew that our family was complete. Throughout our relationship, Chris and I have talked about our dreams for our family and although we could never have predicted that our desire to have a family with four kids was going to look like this or be formed in this way, well, obviously life is full of surprises. Beautiful surprises.
We
don't know exactly when we'll travel to China, but we're shooting for
January. The adoption process is
unpredictable and we have yet many more hurdles to clear, including
official approval from China. We're basically sitting
on pins and needles waiting for this final approval. The best we can do at this point is keep
moving forward and hope for the best in our desire to adopt these two
beautiful children. We ask you to keep our children in your thoughts
and prayers. We're honored we'll eventually get to be their parents, but our hearts
are also in a precarious place when we are in love with children we
consider ours, but can't be with them and take care of them.
Friday, July 18, 2014
Renovation Week #1: Musical Bedrooms
Week one of our house renovation is complete. Whew! It was an exhausting week and I wasn't even the one doing the heavy-lifting.
Aside from the first day of the renovation when the contractors pulled our roof off and it rained inside the house, the rest of the week went as planned. It was quite amazing how quickly these guys can rip apart a house. My brother visited this past weekend and stayed through Monday. The bedroom he woke in just that morning had been completely gutted and roof removed by the time I arrived home from work in the late afternoon. By Tuesday night the back end of our house had a roof deck on, which provided a feeling of reassurance even though no rain was forecasted for the rest of the week. By the end of the day Wednesday our new second story was completely framed in. We could finally see in real life what we had until that point only seen in blueprints.
Our contractor called that night to tell us the sub-contractors were ready for the chimney demolition. Previous had owners removed the fireplace long ago, but kept the chimney, which runs through the center of our house. Because of the chimney placement, the wall between the kids' bedroom and ours jutted at an angle and used up precious square footage in already tiny bedrooms, so we wanted to remove it as part of the renovation. So the contractors would have space to work the next day, Chris and I hauled our bed out of our room after dinner. We had assumed we'd end up sleeping in the basement, but were delighted to learn that our queen-sized bed actually fit in Soren's old room. Soren's old room will now be our bedroom (well, until the contractors need to bust a hole through the back wall) and our current bedroom is now our dressing room.
We also learned that night that Soren was sick - again. The next morning I dropped Oliver off at daycare and took Soren to the doctor. By the time we returned from the doctor's office and pharmacy with a diagnosis of strep throat and an ear infection and a prescription of antibiotics in hand, the contractors had ripped down half the wall between our bedrooms and were about to start on taking down the chimney. The one day I was home with a sick kid and the whole second floor was off limits! The contractors had already sealed off the second floor, but halted demolition so I could slip upstairs to grab Soren's blanket, pillow, pacifier and stuffed polar bear. We set up camp in the living room basement and despite electricians traipsing through the room, bricks flying out my bedroom window into the dumpster that sat right outside the basement window and lots of drilling, sawing and hammering, Soren napped soundly for over three hours. A couple of times he woke up, rolled over and looked for me and then drifted back off to sleep. By the time he finished napping, the contractors had finished taking down the chimney and a hole in our bedroom wall was in place of where the door had once been. (Again, these guys are quick.)
After the impressive transformation this week, our contractor warned us that progress will slow down. HVAC contractors, electricians and plumbers all come next week - all important, but not as awe-inspiring as watching a new structure go up. Then it really slows down as little work can continue after that until the city inspectors pay a visit.
Aside from the first day of the renovation when the contractors pulled our roof off and it rained inside the house, the rest of the week went as planned. It was quite amazing how quickly these guys can rip apart a house. My brother visited this past weekend and stayed through Monday. The bedroom he woke in just that morning had been completely gutted and roof removed by the time I arrived home from work in the late afternoon. By Tuesday night the back end of our house had a roof deck on, which provided a feeling of reassurance even though no rain was forecasted for the rest of the week. By the end of the day Wednesday our new second story was completely framed in. We could finally see in real life what we had until that point only seen in blueprints.
Our contractor called that night to tell us the sub-contractors were ready for the chimney demolition. Previous had owners removed the fireplace long ago, but kept the chimney, which runs through the center of our house. Because of the chimney placement, the wall between the kids' bedroom and ours jutted at an angle and used up precious square footage in already tiny bedrooms, so we wanted to remove it as part of the renovation. So the contractors would have space to work the next day, Chris and I hauled our bed out of our room after dinner. We had assumed we'd end up sleeping in the basement, but were delighted to learn that our queen-sized bed actually fit in Soren's old room. Soren's old room will now be our bedroom (well, until the contractors need to bust a hole through the back wall) and our current bedroom is now our dressing room.
We also learned that night that Soren was sick - again. The next morning I dropped Oliver off at daycare and took Soren to the doctor. By the time we returned from the doctor's office and pharmacy with a diagnosis of strep throat and an ear infection and a prescription of antibiotics in hand, the contractors had ripped down half the wall between our bedrooms and were about to start on taking down the chimney. The one day I was home with a sick kid and the whole second floor was off limits! The contractors had already sealed off the second floor, but halted demolition so I could slip upstairs to grab Soren's blanket, pillow, pacifier and stuffed polar bear. We set up camp in the living room basement and despite electricians traipsing through the room, bricks flying out my bedroom window into the dumpster that sat right outside the basement window and lots of drilling, sawing and hammering, Soren napped soundly for over three hours. A couple of times he woke up, rolled over and looked for me and then drifted back off to sleep. By the time he finished napping, the contractors had finished taking down the chimney and a hole in our bedroom wall was in place of where the door had once been. (Again, these guys are quick.)
After the impressive transformation this week, our contractor warned us that progress will slow down. HVAC contractors, electricians and plumbers all come next week - all important, but not as awe-inspiring as watching a new structure go up. Then it really slows down as little work can continue after that until the city inspectors pay a visit.
Thursday, July 17, 2014
Roommates
Oliver and Soren are officially roommates. I hope they like sharing a room because they're pretty much stuck in the same jail cell-size bedroom for the next decade!
We've been talking about moving Soren into Oliver's room ever since we started the adoption process so we could turn Soren's room into the new sibling's bedroom. We bought a bunk bed ahead of the transition, but never actually followed through and Oliver ended up sleeping on the bottom bunk while the promises/threats of Soren moving in never materialized. It was too easy to keep them in separate rooms where we didn't have to worry about one waking up the other or trying to coordinate bedtimes. The few times the boys had begged for a "sleepover," no sleeping actually happened and we sent Soren back to his room for the rest of the night. We were finally in a good place with the kids and sleep and we were hesitant to mess up our progress.
The looming start to our house renovation finally pushed us to make the transition to the boys sharing a room. The contractors are going to end up punching a hole through the wall of Soren's room, so he (and all his stuff) needed to be out of there. Chris took the kids up to the cabin one weekend and my mother-in-law, brother-in-law and sister-in-law helped me move furniture, box up outgrown clothes, toys and books a future child will hopefully use some day, and find space for Soren's things in what is already a tiny bedroom.
While I was sentimental about Soren leaving his "baby room," he thankfully didn't seem to miss it. On their first night home from the cabin, he seemed perfectly happy with his new digs. We went about our usual bedtime routine read them books on the floor of their new shared room, then tucked Oliver into his top bunk and Soren into the bottom bunk and turned out the lights. The room was silent.
If only it had been as easy as that! Not long after lights out, I heard the pitter-patter of feet. Two-plus hours and about 37 trips upstairs later, both kids were finally asleep. The next night it only took a little over an hour for them to fall asleep and bedtime has generally gotten better with each night.
We've been talking about moving Soren into Oliver's room ever since we started the adoption process so we could turn Soren's room into the new sibling's bedroom. We bought a bunk bed ahead of the transition, but never actually followed through and Oliver ended up sleeping on the bottom bunk while the promises/threats of Soren moving in never materialized. It was too easy to keep them in separate rooms where we didn't have to worry about one waking up the other or trying to coordinate bedtimes. The few times the boys had begged for a "sleepover," no sleeping actually happened and we sent Soren back to his room for the rest of the night. We were finally in a good place with the kids and sleep and we were hesitant to mess up our progress.
The looming start to our house renovation finally pushed us to make the transition to the boys sharing a room. The contractors are going to end up punching a hole through the wall of Soren's room, so he (and all his stuff) needed to be out of there. Chris took the kids up to the cabin one weekend and my mother-in-law, brother-in-law and sister-in-law helped me move furniture, box up outgrown clothes, toys and books a future child will hopefully use some day, and find space for Soren's things in what is already a tiny bedroom.
While I was sentimental about Soren leaving his "baby room," he thankfully didn't seem to miss it. On their first night home from the cabin, he seemed perfectly happy with his new digs. We went about our usual bedtime routine read them books on the floor of their new shared room, then tucked Oliver into his top bunk and Soren into the bottom bunk and turned out the lights. The room was silent.
If only it had been as easy as that! Not long after lights out, I heard the pitter-patter of feet. Two-plus hours and about 37 trips upstairs later, both kids were finally asleep. The next night it only took a little over an hour for them to fall asleep and bedtime has generally gotten better with each night.
Monday, July 14, 2014
Never Start a Project on a Monday
Our contractor said he never starts a new project on a Monday. In his opinion, it's a recipe for disaster. He'll use Monday to set up and make sure all the logistics are in order, but he won't take that first swing with a sledge hammer and officially "start". Therefore, he scheduled our huge house renovation to start tomorrow, a Tuesday. But then one of his sub-contractors had a scheduling conflict and in order to keep our project on schedule, he agreed to start the project today, a Monday.
This morning started out beautifully. It was unseasonably cool, which was welcomed by the framers who had arrived at our house at 7:30 this morning, because they were going to spend the day in the sun ripping off the roof on the back end of our house. But even more important to a bunch of guys who were literally going to open up our house to the sky, the forecast called for only a 10% chance of shower later in the day. After double-checking the forecast, our contractor gave the go-ahead to start pulling off the roof. Despite being a Monday.
By the time I arrived home from work, the sun had been covered by clouds and we had already experienced a heavy shower. I was relieved to see a gigantic tarp over what used to be our roof. The kids and I sat down to dinner when it started to rain again. I didn't think anything of the weather until it sounded like it was raining inside the house. Uh oh. I peaked through the slit in the plastic sheet dividing the demolition zone from the untouched part of our house. Water was pouring through holes in the tarp onto what was now saturated fiber boards that our contractor had laid down to protect the hardwood floors.
The 10% chance of showered turned into hours of rain. Yet every time I looked out the window, I could see blue sky in the distance. It seemed like a rain cloud was sitting directly over our exposed house. In a last-ditch effort to try to contain the water, I put trash bag-lined buckets underneath the streams flowing through the tarp.
Never start a project on a Monday, I thought.
This morning started out beautifully. It was unseasonably cool, which was welcomed by the framers who had arrived at our house at 7:30 this morning, because they were going to spend the day in the sun ripping off the roof on the back end of our house. But even more important to a bunch of guys who were literally going to open up our house to the sky, the forecast called for only a 10% chance of shower later in the day. After double-checking the forecast, our contractor gave the go-ahead to start pulling off the roof. Despite being a Monday.
By the time I arrived home from work, the sun had been covered by clouds and we had already experienced a heavy shower. I was relieved to see a gigantic tarp over what used to be our roof. The kids and I sat down to dinner when it started to rain again. I didn't think anything of the weather until it sounded like it was raining inside the house. Uh oh. I peaked through the slit in the plastic sheet dividing the demolition zone from the untouched part of our house. Water was pouring through holes in the tarp onto what was now saturated fiber boards that our contractor had laid down to protect the hardwood floors.
The 10% chance of showered turned into hours of rain. Yet every time I looked out the window, I could see blue sky in the distance. It seemed like a rain cloud was sitting directly over our exposed house. In a last-ditch effort to try to contain the water, I put trash bag-lined buckets underneath the streams flowing through the tarp.
Never start a project on a Monday, I thought.
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