Happy Birthday to G-Ma

There's someone very special in my family with a birthday today!  For decades she was known as Mom, and of course I've only known her as Grandmother Partenheimer.  With the birth of her great-grandson a few years ago, she earned a new title, G-Ma.  Whatever name she answers to, she's the best one could ask for.

She's been a wonderful grandmother to me and one of the most beautiful things about our relationship is to witness the unconditional love she has for me extended to my sons.  She thinks they're the neatest little kids and can honestly do no wrong in her eyes.  I'm blessed to have a family that spans four generations.

 

From your sons, grandchildren and great-grandchildren, we send you all our love on your birthday!



Happy Halloween

The kids got really into trick-or-treating this year!  I wasn't sure what to expect since we went out after dinner - prime melt-down time - and Soren is so afraid of costumed people and spooky Halloween decorations that one run-in with a mask-clad kid could have ended trick-or-treating on the spot.  Instead, we were able to visit most of the houses on our block and the neighbors loved seeing the kids.  Chris's brother and girlfriend joined us too, so Soren always had his uncle's arms to retreat to if the scene got too overwhelming.  We still had to coach them through saying trick-or-treat and thank-you, but Oliver otherwise understood what to do and Soren got bolder about approaching houses with the other kids. 

Oliver went as the much-anticipated chicken.

 Soren recycled Oliver's old Charlie Brown costume. 

 

Uncle Andy dressed as Burt Macklin, the alter ego of Parks and Rec character Andy Dwyer.

Oliver's Chicken Costume

Oliver is at an age where he could pick his own Halloween costume.  For weeks we've been asking him what he wants to dress up as.  At first he said a "scary moose."  I researched moose costumes and had figured out a basic, but doable, moose costume I could make for him.  I was just about to start collecting the pieces to his costume when he suddenly changed his mind.  He wanted to be a chicken.  I have no idea where that idea came from! 

Nothing was going to change his mind, because trust me, I tried.  I had suggested ideas that were more practical for him to wear, cheaper to make (given he was going to wear it for a max of an hour), and easier for me, a person with no sewing skills, to construct. But he stuck to his dream to go as a chicken, so I spent the next weeks stalking blogs on Google for directions on how to make a chicken costume and worrying that I wasn't going to pull it off.  The costume design I thought was the most doable involved what I learned was going to be about $30 in boas.  And the investment in the boas wasn't even going to guarantee that Oliver would actually look like a chicken and not, well, a kid with a bunch of boas wrapped around him. 

Meanwhile, I still hung to hope that Oliver would change his mind and suddenly Halloween was a week and a half away and I hadn't even started on his costume.

A co-worker with a son a year older than Oliver heard about the chicken costume dilemma and had two pieces of advice for me.  First, make the chicken costume happen, she told me.  Second, forget the DIY.  Just buy the costume and pay for the express shipping if I have to. Her reasoning was that there are only so many years where kids get so excited about Halloween, so if Oliver wants to be a chicken, make it happen for him. 

A half an hour later, I ordered the costume, and yes, even paid for the express shipping.  Oliver was one happy little chicken and I learned my lesson.  Next year there'll be no second-guessing about a store-bought costume. 

USCIS Clearance

We received our appointment notices from the U.S. Citizenship & Immigration Services (USCIS) to have our "biometrics" taken on November 4.  While I have no idea what to expect for a timeframe for Immigration approval, the fact that we have our biometric appointment scheduled for less than a month after I submitted our I-800A feels quick.  It gives me hope that approval, which is critical for the completion of our dossier, might happen in a timely manner. 

But Immigration approval isn't all we need for the dossier.  We have a bunch of paperwork nearly ready to go, but a lot of missing pieces still.   

Paperwork

Oliver loves coloring and making creations from his collection of supplies he stores in what we refer to as his "art cabinet," which sits in our dining room.  Last weekend he pulled markers and construction paper out of there and happily announced he needed to do paperwork.  When pressed, he clarified he was doing paperwork for the party.  And he had to label them so we knew in which order they needed to go. 

Sigh.  It's totally normal for kids this age to play pretend.  Then there's my kid who plays pretend paperwork.  But can you blame him?  That's what he sees his parents (well, his mom) doing.  Paperwork has been and will continue to be a fixture in our lives.  It comes with the territory with adoption.  The "paper chase" is officially on as we work towards completing our dossier. 

Hopefully Oliver doesn't grow up thinking everything good in life requires paperwork, even birthday parties. 

Wellness Visit Updates

Oliver and Soren really love me right now.  They had back-to-back doctor's and dentist's appointments.  But they survived and came home with clean bills of health. 

Oliver was a lot more comfortable at the dentist than last year.  He cried about having to sit in the special chair, but settled down, let the hygienist take x-rays and then didn't freak out when I left the room to take Soren to have his teeth cleaned.  When I came back in to check on Oliver, he was following the hygienist's instructions - and gripping the arms of the chair with dear life.  He cried again when the dentist came in to inspect his teeth and apply fluoride, but his mood took a 180 when he was finally allowed to climb down from the chair.  With tears still staining his cheeks, he happily proclaimed, "It's Soren's turn!"

I reconfirmed that Soren does NOT like having his teeth cleaned.  I'll just leave it at that.  He has 15 teeth now and the only fun fact that came out of his visit is that he'll probably only end up with 19 of 20 baby teeth.  He's missing a lateral incisor and those usually erupt before age two and they're one of those most common baby teeth a kid could be missing, so the dentist's hunch for now is that he won't get one. 

The next morning the kids visited the doctor for the respective four-year and two-year wellness visits.  They were happy as could be in the waiting room, but as soon as the nurse called their names, Soren started to cry and that prompted Oliver to be clingy and anxious.  We hadn't even made it to the exam room and, let's just say, my kids had already announced their presence!  The nurses just chuckle when they see us coming.

Oliver is in the 25th percentile for both height and weight, at 39 inches tall and 32 pounds, 8 ounces. 

Soren is supposedly in the 25th percentile for height at 33 3/4 inches, but I was confident in the nurse's quick measurement on a kid who wasn't lying still, so I think he's more like 33 inches.  At 24 pounds and 2 ounces, he's in the 5th percentile for weight. 

I asked the doctor about Soren's monthly fevers.  He was in again last week and the doctor he saw it's normal for kids over the age of six months to catch a virus on average once a month.  I followed up with Soren's pediatrician at his wellness visit, because while I understand young kids can seem like they're constantly sick, like they have a running nose or unsettling cough that seems to last all winter, Soren's illnesses come at regular intervals of three to four weeks.  He has a high fever for about three days, with few other symptoms, and then it's gone.  The doctor says for kids experiencing what I described, there might be something more serious going on than just catching another virus.  But he ruled out anything too concerning given that Soren is following his growth curves perfectly and he rebounds quickly and well from each episode.  So instead of putting him through extensive test for something he'll probably grow out of, his doctor and I decided we'd take a wait-and-see approach. 

Balancing Birthdays

How do you make birthdays for kids meaningful?  It's a delicate balance between making the day special and not over-indulging or over-whelming them.  And our family has an extra challenge of celebrating three birthdays (and one anniversary!) in one month's time.  That's a lot of cake!  We want to celebrate each individual in the family without experiencing birthday fatigue.  So how do you find the balance?  I think the answer is going to evolve from year to year depending upon what's going on in our lives and what the kids (and we) want.  Some years we'll get it better than others - and that's okay. 

When we asked Oliver what he wanted to do this year for his birthday, he chose to spend an afternoon at an amusement park over having a birthday party.  At first I was a little disappointed.  My Pinterest board was full of four-year-old-birthday party ideas and I wasn't going to get to use them.  Eventually disappointment gave way to relief.  Oliver had just given me a birthday gift - I wasn't going to have to plan a party!  Because, honestly, Pinterest-worthy birthday parties are not my forte.  More importantly, Oliver should get to celebrate his birthday the way he wants to. 

And he did.  We went to Como Town with his best buddy, the little guy he used to see daily, but now only gets to see when his mom and I manage to arrange a playdate.  He got to request what he wanted for breakfast (waffles!) and ate them off a special birthday plate.  He finished his day off at a Twins game, where his dad let him eat every possible bad-for-you kind of food his heart desired. 

With Oliver content to have a birthday outing instead of a party and Soren not old enough to provide much input, (his wants were simple - cake - that much I was sure of) we opted for a family party.  I did what I thought I wouldn't do for kids whose birthdays are so close together and that's hold a joint party and have, gasp, one cake!  But it worked out.  Really, the kids are at an age where it doesn't matter to them.  They were both happy to have family come over, open a couple gifts and eat cake.  They didn't care that it was the same cake and they weren't counting who got more presents.  This is one where I was finally going to let myself relax and truly "enjoy it while it lasts."