Office Deco

I feel so important, I have a drawing from Will on my board at work! (well, he was practicing his name and drawing lines) Funny I never thought about it, but you always see drawings from kids at people's offices. It makes me smile every time I look at it.

Valentines Day at School

I was able to go to Wills preschool and be a part of his first Valentines day school party. It was pretty cute although the kids didn't really understand what valentines day really is, but they sure were excited to give and receive candy!! It was fun and they had a few different activities planned. They broke up into groups and did a "heart buried treasure hunt," they ran relay races, put together heart puzzles and practiced lacing. They got lots of goodies, and then went about normal day things like: singing songs, practicing counting and recognizing numbers and letters. Worked on colors and shapes, speaking in front of the class, talking about the weather and books. We also went to chapel. It was so much fun to see what he does at school and be a part of his day. Plus, Pamala watched Dane for me so I got to focus all on Will.

We were at the mall the other day and Nana said she wanted to take Will on the trampoline jumpy thing where they strap you to bungee cords and you bounce and flip. He loved it, was easily jumping 15+ feet up in the air. We encouraged him to do a flip. I wasn't even sure he knew what to do so we told him to throw his feet up over his head. Sure enough, he did it and flipped right over! When he bounced down and completed his flip he had this hilarious look of pure terror and I'm so happy look on his face. I think it really did terrify him, but he did it again after that. Brave boy :). And was so proud of himself.

Pee Oh My

This is where we've been spending large chunks of our time lately. Going potty a little, cheering, going potty a little, cheering. Some more of both. He is so proud and doing a great job! I'm not pushing it though, we only go when he asks. At 15-20 minutes a pop, however many times a day we would need to try, who has the time!? When the novelty wears off and he can do his business in a reasonable amount of time, then we'll revisit.

My little angel.

Found this guy (and a friend!) out behind our house a few days ago. I assumed they were coyotes, but after looking up close at this picture I'm wondering if they were foxes. The few people I've asked seem to be confused as well. I told Luke I thought it was a Foxoyte, but he is sure that's not the case. I don't know why it couldn't happen, but he's pretty sure. Whatever they were, Will was excited to see some brothers from the pack.

The boys are growing so fast. I wish I could pause little Dane right where he is. It is unbelievable how big he is getting. He is running around and doing EVERYTHING his big brother does. His speech is blowing my mind. Even more, his communication. He will say "I do it Momma", lots of times he can tell me what he wants and he will even ask "Where going Momma?" when we are in the car. He also tells me "I poop Momma" which speaking of, he is going pee on the potty about once a day! He will sit there for 20 minutes every time. :) The last picture I took the other morning after both boys had just gotten up. Will had woken up first and was watching cartoons. When Dane got up and I brought him upstairs, he saw Will, smiled really big and said "Hi Bru-er!" They can be so sweet with each other. Notice I said CAN. :)

Confession

I picked up Will from school today and asked him if he had fun and what he did today. He asked to see his folder in his backpack. I told him there was nothing in it that he made from school, just some papers for Momma. He said he still wanted to see it. I handed it back to him, he opened up his folder, took out a paper and pointed to some writing on it. He said "Does this say bad?"

Interesting turn of events.

I said "noooooo....... Why, did you get in trouble today?" No, he said. I don't want to talk about it. After some gentle coaxing from me he was still holding strong that he didn't want to talk about it. I promised him I wouldn't get mad, I tried every angle I could think of to get it out of him but he was a steel trap. I even waited about 30 minutes and tried again over lunch. One of the most frustrating things about being a parent is when you want your child to do or say something and they absolutely refuse. I wanted to physically force him to speak the words, but Nope. Finally I whipped out my no-fail method that I'm sure would make all the child rearing experts gasp in horror....

Me: "If you tell me I'll give you a marshmallow."
Will: "How many?"
Me: "Two"
Will: "Three"
Me: "Fine. Three marshmallows, what happened."

He finally confessed. The other day he had colored on Danielle's glasses with a crayon. He missed out on a portion of Free Time that day. Mrs Simmerman had been able to wipe it off. It must have been last week. I wonder if he's been carrying around guilt about it this whole time. I find it a bit sad and funny at the same time. We had a talk about how that wasn't very nice and probably made Danielle sad while we snacked on our marshmallows.

So a friend of mine and her husband have been trying to adopt a baby. I know it's been an emotional struggle for them - she can't get pregnant. When I was in Arizona in November I found out that a tenant of ours, who I know and have talked to numerous times and knew she was pregnant, was talking about giving her baby up for adoption. WHAT!? I had no idea. I immediately emailed my friend and told her what I knew - not much. That this girl was pregnant, but I had no idea how flaky she was, no idea what her prenatal care had been, but that she may be giving her baby up for adoption. Did she want me to try to put the two of them in touch? Yes, she said - absolutely. I was nervous about the situation - what if they promised my friend a baby and at the 11th hour changed their mind? She promised me that no matter what happened it would not affect us. So I called the birth mother (BM we'll call her) and told her about my friend (AM - adoptive mother - we'll call her). She said she liked what she heard - that they weren't able to have their own children, and that they were both teachers, and Christians. I gave AM the BM's info. Apparently she called her, left her (in her own words) the most awkward message ever. ...and didn't hear back. A few days later I talked to BM. She said that of the couples that were interested in her baby, she was most interested in AM. I immediately called AM and said "Call her NOW!" So she did, and they talked. BM was very emotional, cried. She has children already, so knew this would be hard, but knew that she wouldn't be able to give this new baby the life she wanted and didn't really want any more kids. But she had gotten pregnant for a reason, thought that God wanted her to have the baby and give it to someone who couldn't have her own. So over the next couple of months AM and BM spoke every so often and talked about the plans. The birth father was proving to be a cause of stress. He wasn't on board. Wild card. Needless to say it was stressful for everyone.

On January 2nd BM went into labor earlier than thought, went to a different hospital than planned. AM made it to the hospital in time and was able to be there in the delivery room with them. She cut the cord and named the baby boy (Wyatt:). The BM was moved to a different floor and AM and her new baby boy got their own room until he could be released. A couple of days later they all went home. With adoption, papers are filed after the birth. Apparently for the first 30 days the birth parents can legally change their mind. Well, today the final process began and baby Wyatt is officially theirs. Big sigh of relief!

A-MA-ZING. I can not believe that I was able to play a role in this incredible adoption. I honestly feel like a proud Aunt. I know that I will hold this precious baby boy and his parents in a special place in my heart forever. How incredible. I have gotten to know BM a little bit and I saw in her the pain that any mother would feel giving her baby away. She has had some post partum depression, shed many tears, but in the end knows that she made the right choice. I have shed tears. For her. For AM. The whole thing is emotional. And incredible. I can't wait to see this baby boy grow up in his loving home. And this is definitely going on my list of coolest things I've ever been a part of. LOVE.

I don't know what my problem has been lately but all I have been able to muster is a few pics from my phone onto the blog. I haven't written much, but it hasn't been from lack of material. It's been lack of motivation. Lack of priorities. It's been weird lately here at the Payton house. Lots of adjustments. This fall we went from me working two full days only, to adding the following things - all falling on different days: an extra 1/2 day of work, and two mornings of preschool. This doesn't seem like much, but when you're doing it all by yourself, it's a lot. And just when I got used to it, Luke began working in Bloomington. (yay!) We were so happy when he got word that he would be working only 30 minutes away, home at night - instead of 4 hours away, gone all week long. As wonderful as it's been having him home, it's also been an adjustment. For him and for me. Probably more for him. I just get extra help - yay me! Tonight he told me that it's possible he may be in Blgtn until early March. I said that's the only hard thing about him working "at home." Just when I get used to having him here he leaves and it's so hard all over again. A week or a few weeks here and there isn't long enough for us to form routines and for me to really get used to having him home. But when it's 3 months, yes that's long enough. I'm dreading him leaving again. And the boys - well, I don't even want to think about it.