And we're going to add another one???

So the past week was like the downward fall from a fun high.... Sonshine had surgery on Dec. 26th to remove his tonsils & adenoids.  This was expected.  In fact, we had to change our fingerprinting appointment with USCIS to fit in this surgery (which was such a bummer, but God gave a peace that it was the right decision & we are currently awaiting our new appointment time.)
      Anyway, we knew this surgery was coming.  We got back from Christmas with Ryan's family on Christmas Eve just to have time on Christmas Day to be together & get used to the idea of surgery the next day (Sonshine tends to be my worrier.... don't ask where he got that....).  Of course the surgery day itself was a long day (would love to find one surgeon that actually starts on time...), but the recovery for this is what's longer.  He can't play actively for 2 full weeks  - can you imagine?  A boy not being able to play for 2 weeks??? This is a big struggle for my boy who since birth has been extremely active & is very sports oriented.  Plus we have worked hard to not make him "video-game" oriented which overall is great, but for the first time in our lives, I have wished that he had a DS or something like that to play with so he could pass the time!!  Anyway, beyond that restriction, he is on a semi-liquid diet for this week AND I have to sleep in with him for this week to monitor his breathing, pain, any bleeding, etc.  (plus make sure that he doesn't keep flopping over on his stomach with his neck stuck up on his pillow at some crazy angle....I'm sure they just forgot to mention that in the post-op instructions.)
And this is where the story gets a bit unbelievable.... After weeks of getting healthy & past walking pneumonia, strep throat & ear infections earlier in the month, we were there - or so I thought.... Enter Thursday.... Day 1 post-op.... My mom came to watch my older 2 so I could take Baby Girl to the doctor, & low & behold, a double-ear infection.  Again, no surprise really.... By Kid #3 (older 2 with tubes by 12 months), we have the ear infections symptoms of our kiddos down flat (because you know they don't follow "textbook ear infection symptoms" - that would be WAY too easy!)  In the meantime, I was fending off a sinus infection brought on by allergies (again, fairly typical for me).  But so far this is all expected stuff, so enter.... SURPRISE!!!
At 11:30pm that night, my Precious Girl is screaming for mommy in the hallway, so I run out of the twin bed that I'm sleeping on in Sonshine's room & she tells me she "spit up" in her room.... As I take a moment to process what that means & then start the walk to her room, she pukes right between her & I, blocking my way to her room.  "Okay," I think, "Just stay calm & try to get her to a bathroom."  So I reach over the puke (I'm in my bare feet & there is NO WAY I am going to step in that chunky stuff...) & I turn her towards our bathroom, which apparently stimulates her gag reflex again & she proceeds to vomit a circle, yes, a whole circle, around her body. And then she looks at me in one of those, "What are you going to do now Mommy?" looks, which of course means that I look back at her in my "I have no idea..." look.  (Don't you love those looks??  It's like this defeating, "You thought I had all the answers but I don't" feeling & it is so. incredibly. helpless...)  So I do the only thing I could think of in the moment - I start screaming for Ryan (who is sleeping down on the coach because he fell asleep to ESPN - I told him last night that this week of me sleeping with Sonshine means it's like his bachelor days!)  He comes running, but you know, what is he going to do??  There is puke in a circle around my daughter & he starts gagging before he even makes it up to the 2nd floor.  So that's it, decision time, & I just walk in it a bit, lift her up & over the circle so she can head to the bathroom & then proceed to gag my way through cleaning up puke in the hallway, then disinfecting the hallway twice, then making it to her bedroom where we find she has somehow managed to puke on both twin beds & even under one of the beds, so we clean that up & disinfect everything twice in there (with a trip to the cleaners for all her bedding), then I go back to the hallway to disinfect a 3rd time, not to mention disinfect myself somewhere along the way....  So after we cleaned it all up, Ryan gets one pukey kid, with a bucket, on the main floor....I have another with a cut-up throat & a bucket, in our twin beds... and there is a baby girl in her room alternating between coughs & cries & fending for herself.  And then I lay down in my "snug" twin bed & think "Really???  I can do this???  I'm not going to be overwhelmed by this?? ........And I'm going to add to this???"
Hmmmmmmm......
Yep.  I am.... And the truth is, I can't wait....  Bring it on!  (And if You don't mind sending a little more immunity our way in the meantime, that would be an added bonus.....)

My one regret this Christmas......

Merry Christmas from our family to yours!!
Every year I try to get a Christmas Card out.... I usually alternate years with pictures of just the kids & pictures of our whole family.  This year was a "whole family" year.  This meant 2 things:  First, I would have to get in the picture (not my favorite thing to do, especially when I have yet to really lose the weight I gained from my last pregnancy which is Resolution Number 1 for 2013!).  Second, we had to try to get everyone looking at the camera & smiling (we got pretty close as you can see but there again something about going beyond 2 children that makes this A LOT harder!!). 
Thankfully, we are blessed to have a really good photographer in the family (my sister whom I dearly love!!).  She always worries that I'm going to be disappointed, but the truth is, I couldn't be disappointed because she just has "it" - the ability to look into her camera & make amazing shots happen.  With digital cameras, it feels like everyone can be a photographer these days, but Jaime is able to see things differently than "everyone" & her pictures are always fantastic!  For example, she found our background this year downtown on the side of an old building & then knew just how to pose us to make it work.  Quite a talented sister I have!  If I could fly her to Ghana with us to document our journey down there, I totally would (but sorry sis, I wouldn't count on it!!)
But the truth is I have one regret about our card - it's not the picture, but more the card in general.  In previous posts I've mentioned that not a day goes by that Ryan & I aren't thinking of "him"  - our little son who is already in our hearts, but yet to be in our arms...
Well, the day we took our picture, I couldn't get him out of my mind.  Yeah, I smiled when she said to "Smile" but I kept thinking how I wished he was there.  I would wish it when I was telling all the kids to just keep looking at the camera & to just keep smiling no matter what little T did...
I would wish it when I told everyone that it didn't matter how much if felt like they were going to fall over or their knees hurt in the position they were put in.... (So yeah, our card said "Peace, Love, Family" & it's quite possible that it wasn't all together peaceful as we tried to get 5 people posed & smiling at the camera, but we still can hope for it, right???)  :o)
I thought of him when I got the card & saw it & felt like someone was missing...
I thought of him as I figured out what to write on the card...
And then I decided to not write anything about him.... 
It's my one regret this Christmas. 
As I've said before, essentially adoption is like being pregnant for this very, very long time - (at least that's what it feels like to us!).... But what's different this time around is that no one can see the baby growing inside my belly & heart.... So I know people look at us, look at me, & they don't get it - maybe they forget or don't know or whatever - but truth is, I'm carrying a baby in my heart & mind 24/7!  And I get it why it's not something they think about the way we do, I really do...and so... well, I think that's why I did it - why I decided not to write about him on our card.  Because I didn't want it to seem like I was obsessing, or not thankful for the ones I've been given, or like I have to keep throwing it in people's face to remind them when after 6 months, people often are like "Isn't he going to be here soon?"  or "What's taking so long?" (& most of the time, I'm thinking "LONG??  Ha!!  We're just getting started people!  YOU think it feels long?  Try walking in our shoes - thinking about it every day & knowing that if maybe, just maybe, everything goes smooth from here on out, we could be having him home NEXT Christmas.... as in 12 more months... as in this is the longest, hardest pregnancy of our lives!!!!!!")
And so I didn't write about him....
and it's my one regret this Christmas...
and if I could have a do-over, my card would read something like this on the back:
 "From our Family to your Family: May you have a blessed holiday season... & despite the fact that it might be another year or even longer, would you still continue to join with us in praying our little son home from Ghana?  Without a face or name, he has somehow already occupied a place in our hearts & we look forward to someday introducing him to you when he arrives home with his forever family!!" 
No regrets anymore...  Merry Christmas little one...  You are greatly loved....