Mitchell : March 2013

How is he already a month old? Oh RIGHT, we were stuck in Florida for the first 3 weeks of his life. Time flies when you have a wee one!

March was just ass exciting as February. When we got home, the lovely ladies of my Bible Study group (WOW, Women of the Word) threw me a diaper and book shower. They all brought packages of diapers, wipes and their favorite children's book. I  was so excited to be able to send the great news of Mitchell to these ladies while in Florida. Without their love and support through all the trials and tribulations of our journey, I am not sure I would have made it. Their prayers and friendships, hugs and shared tears were more than I could have hoped for. They were with me EVERY SINGLE STEP of the way. From the first attempt, when trying to adopt from Ukraine, to changing agencies twice, through a failed adoption and then bringing Mitchell home. They were all there. I am so grateful to my friend Krissy (Kristalyn) Chandler Gleason for telling me about this group and helping us find our church home with Central United Methodist Church!!



Mitchell and I flew home to Texas for Spring Break too. Originally I was going to fly down and help my mom take care of the 4 nieces and nephews while my brother, Mitch, and my sistah-in-love-, Natalie, took a vacation in Hawaii.  Now that we had Mitchell, the whole trip was somewhat different than we had all planned and pictured. But it was great getting to introduce him to family so soon after he was born!

Natalie also threw me a baby shower while I was there. Really, she did what she could before heading to Hawaii (and with such short notice) and my mom took over and made sure it all happened and went off without a hitch. The only thing that was a little off was poor Mitchell. The shower was right in the middle of what we referred to as his "witching hour". Poor babe was colic-y and unhappy from about 6-9 pm and that was right in the middle of the shower. None the less, we were showered with love and gifts. I think someone counted and at one point we had over 54 people in my brothers house. All there to help celebrate Mitchell and him being a part of our family now. Friends and family from all over came, some I had known since I was knee high to a duck, and others I hadn't seen in years. Some drove in from Dallas and others from San Antonio. They came from near and far  dropping everything for us. The love was immeasurable, it was so abundant!

 

Ready to see our Texas peeps

 

First stop, Chuy's. The kids were fighting over who got to sit next to and feed Mitchell first

 

GG's turn

 

oh the love and joy

Sweet cousin Blythe

 

Cousin Michael

 



 

Aunt Chelle always has a craft project for the kiddos. This time, Salt dough ornaments

 

Sugar cookies, with TONS of sugar, sprinkles, cinnamon hearts and more

 

A family trip to Sam's

 

How many kids can you fit into a shopping cart?

 

Aunt Kathy gives good cuddles, and has a magic touch

 

Midnight feeding pic for Aunt Nat Nat while she is waiting to board her plane to come meet the man of the hour

 

My little Houdini

 

Uncle Mitch getting his chance to hold his newest nephew

 

Michael's turn at feeding time

Aunt Nat Nat is silly!

 



 

1 month old

First great big smile, had to send this one to Daddy at work

 



 Two of the best looking Super men!

Mitchell : February 2013

Now that we are home, we are settling into an ever changing "routine" with our little guy.

Rich exhausted all of his permissive (paternity) leave while we were in Florida. So we returned home on Friday and he was back at work the following Monday, sleep deprived and all.

The little man and I had to figure out what to do with ourselves.  There was a lot of sleeping, eating, and diaper changing for Mitchell. There was a lot of bottle making, phone calls and visits to be made on my end.

It was so much fun getting out and showing my little guy off. Such a long wait for such a precious little gift! Still hard to believe he was all ours. So incredibly blessed to call him ours and be believed in and trusted enough to be selected as his parents. Blessed doesn't even begin to describe how we feel.

 

This was taken just for Aunt Mandy...we lovingly call this "drunk baby". one of many!
 

 

Drunk baby, continued

 

I could get used to this!

 

so warm, cute and cuddly!

 

Baby "thinker" pose

 

Its tough being little. Mitchell still wasn't a fan of his bath time yet

Our Adoption Story: WE ARE HOME!

Finally back in Albuquerque, we could now settle in as a family. First things first, we had to introduce our four legged kiddos to our new two legged kiddo. We were not sure how Comet and Ajax would handle the new addition to our home, and what would become the new "normal"

They both had to check him out and both Ajax and Comet tried to sit on Mitchell and declare our laps as theirs. From then on Ajax pretty much ignored him.

Neither cat was showing excitement towards the newest addition to our family. Over time they started to show some tolerance though. I guess that would have to do, for the time being.

Our Adoption Story: Let's blow this joint!

With a 7a flight, including returning the rental car and getting shuttled from there to the airport, we had a 4a wake up call.

While Mitchell slept we packed. We decided to get him dressed and in his car seat at his 2am (or was it 3am?) feeding. We had to have time to break down the rock and play he had been sleeping in, and make sure we could fit it in our luggage. We were the proud parents of a newborn, severely lacking in sleep anyway, what's a little engineering project at that time of day!?

Thankfully Mitchell was fine, and slept perfectly, in his car seat. We were able to get everything done and packed and get out the door on time, as planned.

Once at the airport, we were in line to be checked in. Everything was great, until we made our way to the security check point. They would not let us through because our tickets didn't say "with lap child". So I sat down with all our junk (I looked like a bag lady) while Rich took Mitchell ALL THE WAY back to the ticket counter and had him added to our tickets. We weren't sure if they would need to see him, since they already had, to add him to our tickets or not. So poor Rich had quite the arm workout carrying him to and from the ticket counter, for the second time.

I used my schmooze powers and finagled us a new row of seats where the gate agent blocked off the third seat in the row so that we were able to have Mitchell in his car seat for take off and landing, and anytime he wasn't eating. It was great, we didn't have to worry about our wee one bothering anyone or anyone bothering our wee one.

As soon as we start taxiing to the runway for take off, we smell what could only be the innards of a little ones belly exploding and polluting our air supply.  After we take off, I hand Mitchell to Rich.  the fasten seatbelt sign is still lit up, and my husband being the rule follower that he is stays seated. Rich is now turning green. He is holding his breath and trying to breathe through his mouth as much as possible. Now, if you know my husband you know he is not capable of his "inside voice" when he is excited or passionate or worked up about something. This would be one of those times...he is making all kinds of noise about the smell. I couldn't smell it like he could. But then, he handed me Mitchell. OH MY WORD. HOW can something so small smell so so bad????

Finally the seatbelt sign is turned off and Rich collects all he needs for a diaper change and heads to the airplane cubby hole of a bathroom. He was gone a long time. I almost sent out a search party. Finally I saw him walking back up the center aisle. I notice he has the baggie with the dirty diaper in his hand, WHY?! I asked, he said he didn't know why. I also notice that my son is missing his sock, and is naked (in only his diaper). The outfit could not be saved. It had suffered a death from an EPIC blowout, one that would never be matched. Luckily I was smart enough, no rookie mistake here, to pack a couple extra changes of clothes into the bag we were using as our temporary "diaper bag". 

Fortunately the remainder of the flight was much less exciting than the beginning. Mitchell did splendidly. He was a trooper, at 3 weeks old he was already a pro!

Waiting for mommy and daddy to finish packing for the early morning flight
 

a little pre-flight meal/ pre-blow out

 



back up outfit