Version 2.5

My little man will turn 2.5 next week already. He is changing a lot right now, and I know that I have neglected my blog during the holidays. I thought it would be fun to write a few things about Kellan these days :)

• Suddenly, we are in the middle of potty training. One day, he wanted to wear "unnies" and we haven't looked back since. He is doing awesome! The only issue is that when he throws his 2 year old fits, he forgets that he isn't wearing a diaper. Some days, this means that we change a lot!
• Kellan is our resident expert taco eater. He loves food, and he is an exceptional dipper. Anything that he can dip into ranch or sour cream, he will eat.
• He is a really big lover of babies. He is extremely caring and nurturing. I picked out a baby with a stroller for him for Christmas and he LOVES it. I even caught him giving his baby a time out yesterday for not using her words. The baby's name is Princess :)
• We've let Kellan's hair grow out. It has a personality of its own. Some days it is "rocker" and some days it is "business".
• Recently, Kellan got another ear infection and 10 days later he was full of welts! This is my first exposure to medication allergies, and I'm hoping that it will be my last as a mom. I swear, I could take a job as a pediatric nurse after having these two kids.
• Kellan still sleeps in a crib. I'm wondering when the best time to move him to a bed would be. After having Ben (who would get out of bed for hours), I'm hesitant and want to keep him in his crib until he's 10. By then, I figure I can bribe him with technology.
• His language still amazes me each day. He can be difficult to figure out, but I am an expert in Kellan's speech. He told me the other day that my hair needed fixing while I was unloading the dishes. Two minutes later, he arrived with the blow dryer and curling iron from my bathroom and warned me that every thing was VERY, VERY HOT. And then he said "Do it now Mommy!". Beauty expert :)

All in all, I can't believe how big he is getting ~ I'm already questioning myself about sending him to preschool next fall. With his birthday being in July, many of the kids are several months older than him. At the age of 3, it can be a big difference. I don't want to move him too fast! We'll see in the next 6 months if he is ready or not. I'm okay with keeping him out of preschool for another year.

Tough Talks

"Mom, when are you going to adopt me?" This was how a conversation with Ben started at 7:15 a.m. in the car on the way to daycare. I never quite anticipated it. As an adoptive parent, I thought that it would be Kellan asking why he wasn't my biological child in a few years. Isn't that what the adoption books say? The kids who are adopted are the ones who may feel left out?

That's simply not the case here.

Ben has started asking about Kellan's adoption more often. The conversation usually starts with the picture of Kellan's foster mom on our fridge. "Why does he have three moms and I only get one?" or "Kellan has more than one mom that he lived with."

My thought is that this is Ben's way of sorting through all of the information that he hears fairly often about Kellan's adoption. There is a lot of attention that is spent on Kellan when we are in public. In the grocery store, we will hear He is ADORABLE! Where is he adopted from? and Oh my gosh! He is SO CUTE. When did he come home? The interesting thing is that I love to talk about Kellan's adoption. It is fascinating to me and I love to share a little information about Kellan being from South Korea with people who are genuinely (and I mean genuinely) interested in our story. I love that adoption is a part of our home, in people and animals.

And, obviously, Ben wants to be a part of that story too.

So, I'm going to start telling him more about his birth story. I'm going to put together a photo book with ultrasound pics and baby shower pics, as well as the pictures from his first week. We're going to talk about how Mom couldn't have any more babies in her belly because it was broken after he was born. We're going to talk about how Mom and Dad had SO much love for him that we knew we wanted to find another baby for our family to love him too, which led us to adoption. He was a part of this, which is not hard to talk about.

The sad thing is that I will never be able to create this same type of book for Kellan. I only have two pictures of him before he was 4 months old, and then only about 25 until he was 10 months old. But, it is something. I just wish that I knew more information behind the pictures! I hate to create ideas behind the pictures when I don't know.

Wordless Saturday

Kellan's alternate Halloween costume

October

Last weekend we braved some shaky forecasts to go to the pumpkin patch ~ we actually won the lottery, no one was there and we had lots of space to roam on our own! Compared to last year, Kellan is SO much more independent, he had a blast running around the place. Here he is with his dad on a "dia", which is the consistent word for "tractor".
At least 30 minutes was spent in the corn box. I'm still finding kernels of corn in my car and in the house :)
Look! Kellan is almost 3 feet high! Can't believe how big my little man is getting!
This is his first introduction to a horse. He was fascinated yet frozen with fright. He seemed to have a 3 foot radius with all of the animals.
Ben wanted to add a kitty to our family. Unfortunately, our Manny cat is enough for us right now. But, I tried to find a good home for these two babes (a.k.a. Tun & Kadi's house). We'll see!
Yesterday, I took a few hours and painted our bedroom a gray/blue color and I really like it! Over the last year we added a new bedroom set, so I wanted a change with the color scheme. I tend to always make sure that the kids have a nice crib/bed, drawers, lamps, etc. ~ and nothing that matched in my own bedroom. I'm slowly working on it, but it is hard to do now that Kellan can climb up on my bed and launch himself off of it!

300

Can you believe it? 300 blog posts? I must have a lot to say (with not a lot of material folks!). Andy is taking a break with his friends in Las Vegas this weekend, so the boys and I are flying solo. There is typically some sort of mishap that occurs during these time periods, mainly a furnace failing, nail in a tire, or satellite malfunction (the WORST to me!), but somehow we've made it through without any of these . . . or barf/fever/squirts either. Thank you.

Fall harvest is upon us and my family members (of the male gender) are pretty much gone most of the time hauling corn and soybeans to the grain elevators during the day and night. Luckily, with two boys, I can join in on the fun. I always find it interesting that they can sit and watch tractors, trucks and farm equipment without boredom! They are fortunate to have these experiences, and I am thankful that my uncles, grandpa, brother and dad are welcoming Ben and Kellan to tag along. Maybe farming is in their future :)

I attended Ben's IEP meeting for his qualification of Deaf/Hard of Hearing for school this week. He did end up qualifying under "speech perception" for some services. Ben (with his one good ear) hears well in a quiet environment, but once the volume increases, he finds it difficult. I notice this in several different situations ~ the main ones being when he is in our house playing hide-and-seek when he has difficulty locating my voice with our hardwood floors, at swim lessons he finds it hard to hear over the echos in the pool area (and over 50 kids in the pool at one time) and he does not always properly locate the directionality of cars (which makes him riding his bike far away from me a "not-so-carefree" time). I knew this was coming ~ we've prepared for it since he failed his newborn hearing screening in May, 2007 ~ but it is another thing to go to a meeting to hear that your child finds something difficult in life. I hated it. We are closely monitoring him to see if he needs an FM system (which is a mic on the teacher piped into a tiny hearing aid for one ear). It is one thing to listen closely for 3 hours, but it is another thing to listen for 7.5 hours next year in a classroom with double the amount of children. Thankfully, I know he is in good hands!

My back is BACK :) It was a bitch of a week, but I am in a better place! I think that my feet problems pretty much made my body scream STOP! but I continued to push my normal 25 miles on them. It wasn't pretty. I am trying to rest a bit and let things heal before starting again. I'm also going to get some custom orthotics, so hopefully they will help. I don't ever want to be in that position ever again.

Ben, of course, wondered why my hands were "broken" and I couldn't use them. He asked if my "bender-downer" was broken and if we could buy a new one at Tar*get.

Because there isn't much in my world that can't be purchased at Tar*get these days.

Stealthy Monster

He's quick. He's quiet. He's inventive. Kellan is getting to be so big these days. He is able to communicate in his own way ~ "apple" for fruits and veggies, "NO, BAH!", "ooooos on, pweees!" ~ it is easier to see him as a boy than a toddler right now.

He is silly. Kellan loves to be funny and he eats every ounce of attention up that anyone will give him. To not give him attention is a punishment. In fact, I've found the the most effective way to get him to stop a tantrum is to take him to his room, tell him that he can cry in there and then come out when he is done. It is amazing that the lack of attention and comfort of us around him zaps him right out of the crazy tantrums that he has sometimes.

Kellan pretty much wants to do everything that his brother does. He loves Ses*ame Street, his family, his babysitter's house and anything that has to do with trucks/trains/various transportation modes. Kellan has also started to sit for longer periods of time to read books, which makes me happy :)

My job as MOM has been challenged this week. I bent over to pull something out of the dishwasher and I pretty much couldn't get back up! We were planning to go to the pumpkin patch that afternoon, but I sadly had to cancel our trip because I couldn't figure out how to get my body to sit in the car. I've had some problems with my feet over the summer (some tarsal tunnel, tendonitis, collapsed arch, etc.) and I figure that this tipped my body over the edge of the cliff. And I hate it. Andy had to dress me on Monday before going to work and for two days I couldn't really sit for any length of time. It isn't good when you are the only one in charge of getting everyone ready/clean/fed and out the door in the morning!

I'm having Andy help me and some chiropractic work done, so hopefully this will be in the past SOON. I certainly don't know how my toilet paper rolls will be refilled due to the bending involved in getting them (and I seem to be the only one who can do this job!). Wish me luck!

Boys

We really have our days here. Some days, the kids play together so well, I can actually talk on the phone for 3 minutes (for the 4 people who do really call me, you know) and clean the toilets. Then . . . there are days like this!

I'm really good at doing the laundry, but I am not so good at actually folding it and putting it away. The boys find this mountain of laundry (probably 6 loads!) very fun to jump into. Kellan relishes in rolling around in it, and Ben finds it frustrating because he wants.to.go.RIGHT.NOW. This is where the mood can go from giggling to screaming in 1.2 seconds.

I know we are heading into the fall/winter weather of being inside. I may just have to figure out how to re-work the dynamics of this extremely fun bridge jumping escapade :)

Other than that, school/daycare is going smoothly for everyone now. The only issue that I have now is carving 15 minutes of alone time into my schedule between work and home. Andy's job is scheduled in a way that he leaves super early in the morning, so it is my responsibility to get the kids out of bed, ready, fed and dropped off. I also have a student teacher at work this semester, so unless I use the bathroom at work by myself (again, a stretch some days), I really don't have 10 seconds alone unless you count the 8 minute drive to daycare. Andy has helped out with this by taking the kids outside or downstairs to play for 15 to 20 minutes so I can clean up from dinner by myself. I'm familiar with being around kids 24/7, but it gets to be overkill when I'm talking to someone all day long. Those 15 minutes go a long way!

Ben has also asked me to teach him to read. I'm excited to watch him learn this skill, but I'm also nervous to be teaching him. Right now we are working on creating a sounds book with photos of his choice, from there we will work on some easy sight words. Wish me luck. Like Andy says, you do this EVERY day, right? What he doesn't understand is that the students that I work with each day don't see me as their mom . . . the mom who Ben routinely says NO too!