The Olympics and Exercise

We've been watching the Olympics along with everyone else and Anna loves the ice skating, whether it's racing or figure skating. When figure skating is on she twirls about the room. When it's speed skating, she runs around our living room in circles and screams "go! go!" Then when NBC cuts to another sport or goes to commercial, Anna cries "Mo! Mo!"

The photo above has nothing to do with exercise or the olympics, except that it is an example of the excellent diet we enjoy at our house. I made a chocolate carrot cake for a friend in the ward and let Anna lick the frosting spoon. What a happy face!
Somewhere Anna picked up the word "essersize" (exercise). When I took her swimming at our rec center a few weeks ago, she pointed at the people walking around on the indoor track and said "essersize." She also constantly asks me to put in my Biggest Loser Last Chance work out DVD for her. She pulls it off the shelf, hands it to me and says, "essersize Momma." She's probably trying to tell me something since I haven't exercised since Evie came home, but the last thing I want to do right now is exercise with Jillian Michaels. I tried the DVD back at the beginning of the year and couldn't move for two days afterwards. Anyway, Anna loses interest pretty quickly, but it's fun to watch her try to mimic the DVD.

We've also been working on a different sort of training: potty training. Actually, I'm in no big rush. She seemed to be showing signs that she might be ready, so I bought a potty and Sesame Street panties. When I got home from Target, she was going through my bags and suddenly I heard, "Yay! Yay!" She had found the panties. In an effort to encourage her, I thought I'd let her wear the panties. We've experimented with a few different arrangments: wearing the panties over a diaper, wearing just the panties with plastic swim pants (worked pretty well), and wearing the panties inside the diaper. That last one might have worked out okay if she hadn't pooped right then. Yeah, that was a rookie mistake, but my thought was that she'd feel the wet easier with the panties inside her diaper and might become more interested in potty training, but after the poop, I'll let her feel the wet a different way.

So we got out the potty and let her sit on it a few times. Then last Saturday she came and got me, said, "potty" and after I helped her take off her diaper she sat on the potty. I thought I'd keep an eye on her, but after a few minutes, she kicked me out of the bathroom and shut the door half way. I didn't trust her enough to let her shut it all the way. Then I got distracted and suddenly she was yelling at me and there was poop in the potty and some had fallen out on the floor. But, now she won't even go near the potty. So I think the poop scared her. I figure we'll try again in a month.

Here's a photo of my brother Ryan using Anna to get girls. He's a freshman at BYU and we went to his dorm to see him open his mission call. He is going to the Birmingham, England mission and reports to the MTC in England at the end of May. We're excited for him.

Evie at One Month

I really regret the fact that I didn't do a better job of keeping track of Anna's monthly milestones, so I'm going to try and do a better job for Evie.

Evie turned one month old last Saturday. She can already hold her head up and actually started doing that in the hospital, but she's getting stronger every day. In the last week her eyes have become more coordinated and she's started to focus on faces. We've been working on smiles all along and her best smiles always seem to come right before she spits up half her bottle. She has also just started making noises that are almost coos--not quite baby talk but not crying either. And best of all, last week she had one night where she slept from 10:45 p.m. until 4 a.m. Yay!

Taking after Momma

I have been known to talk and, occasionally, walk in my sleep. It seems that Evie also talks in her sleep. She is such a noisy sleeper. She is constantly grunting, snorting, wheezing, or whining. I've learned that just because she cries out, it doesn't mean she's actually awake. Several times I have hurried into her room after a loud yell only to discover that she is still sound asleep.

Lately she has also started to require more bouncing and swaying to even get her to sleep. The hospital sent us home with a DVD about babies crying as part of their program for preventing shaken baby syndrome. When I first put it in our DVD player, it got stuck, and ultimately we bought a new DVD player. I'll admit I wanted to shake my DVD player at that point. Once we got the new DVD player, I finally watched the DVD and learned that babies often increase their crying once they turn two-weeks old up until they are five months old. I wouldn't call Evie colicky, but Anna had us pretty spoiled. After feeding Anna at night, I could put her back in her crib right after the last burp and she wouldn't make a sound until it was time to eat again.

Lately Evie has started fussing more and the only thing that seems to calm her is if I stand and rock her. She just seems to need extra help to fall asleep. And if I dare to put her in bed before she is firmly asleep, she'll call out almost as soon as I'm in bed and starting to drift off to sleep myself. I admit that I'm a little discouraged, and it's especially hard in the middle of the night when it seems to take me a good forty-five minutes to get her to sleep after she's finished her bottle. But it does help to know that for many babies, increased fussiness is normal at this stage. Plus I've got lots of good shows on my DVR and I just updated my netflix queue, so I've got plenty to entertain me in the middle of the night.

Growing

When we brought Evie home from the hospital, she was dressed in an outfit Tamara, her birth grandmother, bought her. Not knowing how big Evie would be, Tamara bought an outfit sized 0-3 months. That first time she wore it, it seemed so big and loose on her, but she's quickly been growing into it and it's fun to see how she is changing.

Evie's first night at home

One week old and already it fits better!

Two weeks old

Three weeks: I forgot to get a photo of her in the outfit, but here she is at three weeks.
Four weeks old: It still fits great, so we're not quite ready to jump up to a larger size, but she's already looking taller, especially when I put her in her car seat.

Three days old

Four weeks old

I just had to include this photo because I love her hair in it!

One Week Old

Probably because Anna's hair is so blond and Evie's is so dark, people often ask what Anna's hair was like when she was Evie's age. Above are photos of both my girls when they were each a week old. Can you tell who is who? To me they both seem to have the same amount of hair and Evie's is only slightly darker, but Evie's got much fuller cheeks. Evie is in the yellow and Anna is in the pink.

Evie has always been a much better eater than Anna. Evie regularly drinks more than four ounces of formula and gained back her birth weight when she was three days old. I love her cheeks and her double chin. With Anna I had read that bottle-fed babies are more likely to be overfed and thus have issues with obesity later in life, so I became really paranoid about over feeding her until she measured in the twentieth percentile for weight. She was always healthy, but even now she's not that interested in eating, unless it's fruit snacks or candy.

Evie's a good eater, but she lets us know when she's done. If we try to keep feeding her, she'll cough and make gagging noises. At her two-week appointment, Evie measured in the sixtieth percentile for height and weight and if I were even tempted to worry about her weight, her growth chart says her weight is 99% of the ideal for her height. So I'm just enjoying her cute baby chubbiness.

Anna Loves Evie

These days I don't have as much time to post about what's going on in our house as I'd like. But I have been writing to friends about Anna's reaction to Evie. Rather than rewrite everything, I figured I'd just use what I've already written and save myself some time.

Three days old

Anna absolutely loves Evie. As soon as she wakes up or comes home, she wants to check on the baby. She loves giving her kisses and loves "holding" her too. She either sits on my lap or Dan's to hold Evie, or right next to someone who is actually holding Evie over Anna's lap. Anyway, it's been really sweet to see how much Anna loves Evie.

The only time she gets really upset is when she can't help with Evie. When I gave Evie her first sponge bath, Anna freaked out and I really think it's because we didn't put her up on the counter with Evie.

She started trying to push me away from Evie. You can imagine how fun it was to try and bathe Evie while Anna was freaking out and pushing me.

One week old

Anna continues to love Evie, but I think she thinks of Evie as a doll. She's started taking Evie's pacifier and stealing her socks when her clothes have open pants legs. Last night she started walking around the room saying, "kicking" and practicing her kicks. Evie was on the floor, but we stopped Anna before she got within range of Evie. I'm having a hard time figuring out how to explain to her that she can hurt Evie if she's not gentle and soft around her.

Two weeks old

I really worried that Anna would be jealous of Evie, but actually, Evie's presence has helped a lot with Anna's behavior. I used to have to turn on the TV and then wrestle Anna to the floor to change her diaper. That still happens sometimes, but if Evie is up, I can just lay her on the floor and Anna will happily go lay by her. Then we have a diaper changing assembly line. Of course she wants to hold Evie's hand and sometimes that makes it hard for her to lie on the floor, but we make it work.

This time she's not stealing Evie's socks; Evie just managed to stick her foot between the snaps on her leg. I guess this outfit was still a bit too big for her.

For Evie's two-week check up, I got to take both girls to the doctor's office. It was my first time taking both of them out all by myself. Of course I was running a bit late and so when we got to the office, I was anxious to move quickly from the car to the reception desk. Anna had other ideas. It's hard to carry an infant in a car seat and drag a 25+ pound toddler, but that's what I did. I was probably too tired to be completely rational. Otherwise, I probably would have realized that it would be a lot faster to take the time to calm Anna, rather than drag her screaming into the office. After we made it past the reception desk, for the most part, things went smoothly until we had to take Evie to the lab for the PKU. It's in the same building, which is convenient, but on the way, I lost Anna. She had been following me because she didn't want to hold my hand. I got to the lab desk and realized that Anna had disappeared. So I quickly walked back down the hall calling Anna's name. I could hear her yelling--I think it was "no." Thanks to her yells, I found her. The doctor's office really isn't my favorite place to play Marco Polo. She had stepped into a stairwell that I didn't even know existed. So at that point I picked her up and carried her back to the lab and refused to put her down while I filled out the paperwork. At one point she was hanging upside down, but at least I knew where she was.

Sometimes I'm a little overwhelmed by trying to manage two kids, especially when one of those kids likes to wander off, but as Dan has pointed out, Evie has helped us see that Anna has a good heart. All of the crazy stuff she does is just because she's little and curious about her surroundings. But she really does love Evie and has never done anything intentionally mean to her. Although the other day while I was in the bathroom, Anna decided to sit on Evie. I was not gentle as I yanked Anna off poor little Evie. After that I've been much more careful about leaving Evie on the floor around Anna. We do have a swing for Evie, but Anna likes to push Evie so hard that she practically sends her into orbit. So there aren't many safe spots for Evie besides her bassinet.
This last photo is courtesy of my friend Kate who took Evie's newborn photos when Evie was ten days old.

A few nights ago Anna pulled out the Primary song book and said, "Song Mom!" meaning that she wanted me to sing to her. She opened to the song "I Love to See the Temple." After I sang the first verse, she said "temple! Song Mom!" So I sang it again and she actually did her best to sing along with me. Of course a few minutes later she was lifting up my shirt, trying to look down the back of my pants, and saying, "Poop!" So precious.

How Evie Joined Our Family

At the beginning of October, I got an email from a woman named Heather telling us that she was pregnant with a gorgeous little girl and wondered if we were still looking for a birth mom. We had just been approved to adopt again in August. Of course we were still looking for a birth mom! It felt like we had just started looking.

Heather and I began to send long emails to each other and almost immediately, I felt a connection to her. After one of her first emails, I felt like I should mention that my parents have a West Highland White Terrier (Westie). It turns out that Heather and her parents each have a Westie and we both agreed it was a sign. After just a few more emails, Heather emailed us and told us that she had contacted LDS Family Services to “call dibbs” on us. It all happened so fast, that in some ways it seemed unreal, and yet, I felt such a connection with Heather from the beginning that it all felt like it made sense too.

Heather was due in January, so we continued to email and text each other over the next few months, talking about the baby, who we called Lily, and our other common interests like books and movies. We also got to meet up with Heather two more times. She met my parents and we got to meet her bishop and some of her friends.

Heather wasn’t due until January 23, but by the end of the first week in January, Heather was already having contractions and starting to make progress towards going into labor. We had been getting ready slowly and I had thought we were ready until the possibility of a baby showing up in just a few days started to sound like a reality. Plus, I had decided to make matching quilts for Heather and Evie. I had started in early December, but this was my first time to make a quilt from start to finish and suddenly I realized that I still had a lot of work left to do. I stopped going to the gym and started staying up late to finish the quilts and other preparations, like cleaning and freezer meals.

When Evie still hadn’t arrived by Heather’s doctor’s appointment on Jan. 13, her doctor agreed to set an appointment for Heather to be induced on Jan. 20, a few days before her original due date. Of course, despite the fact that Heather continued to have contractions, Evie decided she didn’t want to come on her own.

Heather had invited me to be at the delivery and to be honest, I was a little bit worried about going. I was excited about the prospect of being there when Evie was born, but worried that I would crowd Heather and her family during a sensitive time. I should have known that I didn’t need to worry. Heather never made me feel like I was imposing and it was amazing to get to be there when Evie let out her first cry.

The day before Heather was scheduled to be induced, I was full of anxiety. The logistics of being at the birth started to make me nervous. I had a babysitter set up for Wednesday, but what was I going to do if Heather’s labor lasted more than twenty-four hours? I wasn’t sure I could stay away from Anna that long. I also worried about how hard that would be for Heather if she had a long labor and I was nervous for her health and safety as well as for Evie’s. I was also wondered if Heather would change her mind. Heather never gave us any indication that she would, but choosing to place a baby for adoption is one of the hardest choices a woman can make and I could see how after holding Evie in her arms, Heather might decide not to place. That Tuesday, as I sat rocking Anna before her nap, thinking about all of these concerns, suddenly I had the strong impression that Heavenly Father takes care of birth moms and whatever happened, He would help Heather and me get through it.

Heather was scheduled to be induced around eight in the morning at a hospital a little over an hour away. I figured I wouldn’t miss much if I waited to leave my house until 8:30 in order to give my mom time to get there and to avoid rush hour traffic. When I arrived at the hospital before ten, Heather was still waiting to get the IV line set up, so I hadn’t missed anything at all. Finally they got the pitocin going and then around 1 p.m. the doctor came in and broke Heather’s water. Then we waited. For some reason, the nurses forgot to check on Heather for the next few hours. Finally, around four-thirty, her nurse came in and checked Heather. She was completely dilated and ready to go. So the doctor was called.

While he put on his scrubs and washed up, the delivery nurse who had just begun her shift decided to have Heather practice pushing. She explained to Heather what to do and then as Heather was following her instructions, suddenly the nurse said, “Stop! The baby just came out. I need you to put your legs together and wait to push until I get the doctor here.” Poor Heather! Within minutes, the doctor entered the room, out of breath from running, and with one more push Evelyn was born at 5:29 p.m.. She weighed 7lbs. 12 oz. and was 19.5 inches long.

After Evie was cleaned up, measured, and weighed, I got to hold Evie. Dan made it to the hospital minutes after Evie was born and also got to hold her, as did Heather and her parents. Heather was so kind to us, letting us stay to watch Evie get her first bath. Eventually we decided to leave Heather and Evie to get some rest, stopping in the hospital cafeteria to grab some dinner—the first real meal I had eaten since breakfast.

Evie's first bath

The next day, Dan and I got to go back up to the hospital to spend some time with Heather and Evie. We spent all afternoon at the hospital, holding Evie and spending time talking to Heather and her family.

One day old

Heather and Evie were scheduled to be discharged Friday around five and placement was supposed to happen then at the hospital. Heather had invited my parents to join us and Anna also got to come along. This would be her first time to meet Evie.

As we’ve learned though, placement doesn’t usually go as planned. Right before Evie was discharged, the pediatrician at the hospital decided to give her a CT scan. We learned that during delivery she developed a bruise on her scalp (cephalohematoma). I guess these bruises happen often, but the pediatrician just wanted to make sure that the bump wasn’t caused by any bleeding on the brain. Then just before Heather and her parents were going to join us, Evie decided to spit up and make a messy diaper, so placement was about an hour later than we had originally planned on. I’m just glad my parents were there to entertain Anna because I wasn’t in a very good frame of mind to do so.

Grandpa made a balloon for Anna while we waited.

Finally Heather and her parents joined us. Evie was wrapped in a flannel blanket with a beautiful crocheted edge that Heather’s mom had made for her. Once we were all together in the overflow nursery, we took lots of photos. It was kind of like a wedding. We took photos of Evie with her birth family, photos of Evie with her adoptive family, photos with the birth and the adoptive grandparents together, etc. Heather gave me two books she wanted Evie to have along with a letter from Heather to Evie and another to Evie from Heather’s parents. Then I gave Heather the quilt I had made for her that matches one we have for Evie.

Heather with her parents and Evie.

Two moms kissing Evie's hands.

The matching quilts

For most of the evening, Heather had held Evie. She let her parents each hold Evie, before Heather gave her one more hug and then after giving me a hug, placed her in my arms. It was such a tender moment, that it’s hard to describe. Of course we were so excited, but we also felt sympathy for Heather and her family.

After they left, we got to sit through the new parent instructions. Again my parents came to the rescue, taking Anna down to the cafeteria. By the time we were ready to go, Evie was ready to eat. So we fed and burped her and then finally we put her in the car seat. It’s a good thing the CNA inspected our car seat. It’s been so long since Anna was that small, so I hadn’t adjusted the straps right. As we headed out to our car, it was snowing lightly.

Anna had been a good sport on the way up, but it was almost nine and well past her bedtime by the time we left the hospital to drive an hour home. She kept crying for a binki and I thought that the sibling jealousy had already begun and that she was crying for Evie’s binki. But the next morning, I found one of Anna’s on the seat. Poor kid. She eventually fell asleep, which was a huge relief because the closer we got to home, the worse the snow got. Around the Draper/Sandy area, it felt like we were in white out conditions and Point of the Mountain was pretty scary—not the sort of conditions you want to be driving in with a two-day old infant in the car. But we did make it home safely and we were able to get everyone tucked into bed. It was a long night for us—Heather had held Evie most of the time, even all night long, in the hospital and she probably still had her days and nights a bit confused—so we spent much of the night holding Evie too. To be honest, we were both so happy to have Evie, that we loved it even if we were pretty exhausted when Anna woke up bright and early the next morning. Welcome to the world of parenting two young girls.

Evie at home

Ever since Heather’s first email, all of this has seemed too good to be true. When we started the adoption process a second time, I was sure that Anna would be four or five before we got a second child. Plus, after Anna’s confidential adoption, we had always felt a little uncertain about having a more open adoption. We worried about how such a relationship might impact Anna and we wondered if we would be comfortable with a birth mom ourselves. We still worry a bit about how Anna will feel as she gets older, but I’m so grateful for Heather, for all that she has given us in addition to Evie. Along with a second daughter, we gained dear friends in Heather and her parents. We love them and they have become part of our family. Through my relationship with Heather, I’ve also gained a greater love for Anna’s birth mom. We know so little about her, but as Heather shared her experience with us, I felt like I came to better understand Anna’s birth mom. I have learned so much about love and sacrifice, knowing Heather. For our profile letter Dan wrote, “When people say that a birth parent’s decision to place a child with an adoptive family is Christlike, I think that what they’re saying is that it is akin to the experience that Christ had in undertaking the Atonement: exquisitely painful, totally selfless, and perfectly charitable, and accompanied by the Spirit in a quietly peaceful, reassuring way. “

We expect to continue our relationship with Heather. I wouldn’t want to go without her emails, texts, or phone calls. They have been the highlight of my day for the past four months. We also look forward to meeting up with Heather in the coming months. We don’t deserve Evie or her birth family, but we are so grateful for them and glad to be a part of their family and include them in ours.