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Help Me!

helpwantedI don’t like it when people help me. It’s painful! Or at least vulnerable.

For one thing, I don’t want to put anyone out. When I had pneumonia, a friend offered to come get my kids for the day. And I almost said, “No, I’ll be fine,” because I didn’t want to inconvenience anyone. I had freakin’ pneumonia, people! And I was still trying to not be a bother.

But I think, even more than that, my introvert side is hesitant to allow people free access to my Personal Zone. Because sometimes my Personal Zone (i.e. my bathroom) is kind of messy.

When Phoebe came along, friends started to offer help. By default, I was ready to brush them aside with, “Thanks, but I think we’re OK.” Chris, who knows I do this, convinced me that I needed to let people help me.

One of his persuasion tactics was asking a friend to pick the kids up for school for the first two weeks after he went back to work. He told me the plan once it was all settled. So I decided to throw caution to the wind and jump headfirst into being helped.

I mean, I’m still not OK with people dropping by the house unannounced (I might have a mild panic attack… or more likely, just not answer the door). But when people offer help, I’m learning to accept.

In the past few weeks, friends watched my kids so I could run errands. They brought food. Someone even came over and dyed my (unwashed) hair. And most of the time, I hadn’t had a shower, my sink was full of dishes, and I hadn’t cleaned the bathroom in a week.

Because, apparently there are people who love me enough to not mind that I have no makeup on and can’t remember the last time I swept my floors. They don’t care if my table is covered with stacks of papers that my husband considers a filing system. Or if all of our laundry is unfolded and my house smells like poopy diapers.

And I think I feel OK with allowing people like that into my messy chaos once in awhile. At least more OK than I would have been a couple of years ago.

Maybe this means I’ve gotten over myself just a little bit more. Maybe I’m becoming a healthier person. Or maybe I’m just too tired to care.

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A Baby Update!

We brought Phoebe home to meet the family almost one week ago.

Progress report: We are surviving.

holdingphoebePhoebe sleeps and sleeps and somehow is still way more DRAMA than Enoch ever dreamed of being. Like, if you pick her up too quickly, she cries. Silly girl.

And Enoch has just flipped the switch from baby to toddler or something. He’s not technically toddling yet, but he’s crawling very fast to get into EVERYTHING.

And then I hurt my toe. It’s really not serious… kind of a massive stubbed toe, that may or may not lose its toenail. But when you’re sleep deprived and the bigger baby is trying to chew on computer cords and the tiny baby just puked down your shirt, a stubbed toe is just too much.

So between all that excitement and spending copious amounts of time holding Phoebe, we haven’t had a chance to give you guys an update on our adoption fundraising.

A couple really exciting things have happened!

First: In a week’s time, you guys have given about $5,000. That’s amazing! We are so grateful!

Second: We received an interest free adoption loan that allowed us to pay the agency their fees. This is a big blessing!

You can help us pay back this adoption loan by giving here. As we return the funds, the money goes directly to finance other families’ adoptions. So your donations are the gift that keeps giving to adoption!

Remember, every donation of $15 or more will receive a tiny little baby, hand-painted by me! (For those of you who’ve already given, yours will be coming shortly, as soon as we are awake enough to remember where the Post Office is!)

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Pretty soon we’ll be sharing some exciting fundraising stuff that will brighten your autumn and might even help you out with your Christmas shopping! So stay tuned.

 

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Now We are 6

So one minute you’re sweeping the floors and the next you’re finding out you might have a baby.

Well, that was our Thursday night, anyway.

The agency called us about a baby girl that had been born the day before. I mean, normally with adoption, you have at least a few weeks to prepare. But she was already here!

At midnight we got the confirmation that her birth mom had picked us to be her family and we needed to be on a plane to Utah the next day. So that was the end of sleeping.

Do you know how much you can get done on a surge of adrenalin at midnight? I cleaned the bathroom while Chris contacted our friend to see if she could watch the kids. I packed clothes while Chris ran to Wal-Mart to get last minute essentials. I made TO DO lists while Chris booked a flight. I did laundry while Chris did the dishes.

And then we laid in bed, wide awake.

Because we were getting a baby in less than 24 hours. A BABY, people!

Since we were running on about 2 hours of sleep, the next day was crazy. I mean, with 3 kids staying at home, you don’t just pick up and leave. You write letters to the school, and try to have some food in the fridge and list out their schedule and how to make bottles. And you make sure all the school uniforms are clean. But no matter how much you plan, it turns out Enoch has no socks just as the weather turns cold.

Once we got through all that, flying wasn’t much better, because they decided to leave us sit on the Tarmac for an hour, LIKE THEY DIDN’T KNOW WE HAD A BABY TO MEET.

When we finally got to Utah (about 10:30 pm, Louisville time), we headed directly to the hospital. We walked into the nursery with our social worker. And there she was! Just laying in her little hospital crib, so tiny (6lbs, 12oz and 18in), waiting for us.

It was kind of surreal, because everyone was just talking all calm and normal and we were meeting our daughter.

We named her Phoebe Cheyanne Glory Davis. And she is our girl.

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Because this all happened so fast, we’d hardly gotten started with fundraising. We need to come up with $15,000 pretty quickly. Just over the weekend, we had people already give $2,300 which has totally blow us away. Thank you all so much!

If you’d like to help us too or share our link with your friends, head over to adopttogether.org/thedavisadoption. Thanks a million!

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Baby FAQ

IMG_4666Basically, when you have a new baby, everyone asks the same questions. Which is fine, because at least I know what to expect. Like, if they asked me math problems or something, it would totally throw me off.

So, to save everyone time, I’ll just cover the most common baby questions.

How are you adjusting?

I’m not sure. But then again, I don’t even know what day it is. I mean, I never sleep straight through the night and I don’t even know what “personal space” is anymore.

None of this comes as a shock, since I’ve done it a couple of times before.

But there’s no adjusting about it. You don’t get used to having an infant puke down the INSIDE of your shirt (there’s a reason Jesus makes babies so adorable). It’s never really enjoyable to clean poop off of someone’s butt.

You just survive, wishing he’d stay small forever and hoping he’ll potty train in the next week or so.

Is he a good baby?

What EXACTLY makes a baby good? He doesn’t rob banks or anything. So yeah, he’s pretty darn good.

Has he reached ______ developmental milestone?

OK, just don’t ask this one. It basically giving me a recipe for something to worry about.

When Enoch was about a month and a half, we went to the pediatrician. The nurse quizzed me from her developmental list:

“If he wakes up crying in his crib, and nothing is wrong, does he calm himself down and go back to sleep?”

Um. No. Does any baby? I’ve certainly never had one that did.

My kids have all been very goal oriented people, so when they wake up, it’s because they need something done. And they will not relent until it’s accomplished.

“Does he follow you with his eyes?”

I… I don’t… Um. I haven’t noticed. OMG. MAYBE HE’S BLIND.

(He started following us with his eyes about a week after the appointment, so I’m breathing again.)

“Is he giggling and smiling?”

No. No, he just stares at us with huge eyes and a serious face. (Yes, I realize this should have negated the blindness question.) So, if he’s not smiling, maybe he doesn’t like us. Maybe he’s not happy! Oh dear.

(He is starting to smile. I guess he’s planning to keep us.)

“Is he sleeping through the night?”

Don’t. Just don’t.

Now that I’ve covered the basics, you don’t have to bother with them next time you see me. You can just walk up and ask the question you’re REALLY dying to ask:

“Can I hold him?”

Yes. Yes you may.

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I was Mad at God

When our first adoption match failed, I was mad. Really, really mad at God.

It’s not that I think I’m some entitled person who should never have any hardship. But God had specifically spoken to both Chris and I that we were to pursue that match. Even when our very wise Adoption Consultant cautioned us against it, we didn’t feel released to back out.

So I was angry. Because God made me walk down a path that He knew would end in pain. I didn’t have a road-map for that kind of God. It’s not a side of Him that is usually talked about on Sunday mornings. He’s scary.

In 2 Samuel 6:1-9, David was bringing the Ark of the Covenant to Jerusalem. He was doing it to honor the Lord. As they were traveling and worshiping, the Ark almost tipped, so one guy put his hand up to steady it. And God killed him. For doing what seemed like the right thing.

It says David was angry with the Lord. And it says David feared the Lord. I think he was angry and afraid because he didn’t have parameters for that kind of God.

Because God is beyond us.

He does things in a way we never would. His methods of being good are different than our ideas of goodness. But He IS good.

At the end, that was the only place I could land. God’s goodness was different than mine, but I had to trust that He is good. Reading the Psalms that David wrote, I think that’s where he always landed too.

A month and a half after the first mom decided to parent her baby, we found out about another situation. A situation where all the pieces fell into perfect order.

We were matched with an expectant mom who was due in only a few weeks. We loved her from the moment we talked with her on the phone. She was steadfast and committed to her adoption plan. We all became like family.

When the baby was born, she included us in every step of the process. We were amazed at how beautiful the experience was and were so honored to share it with her.

After 5 days, papers were signed and Enoch Irvin Warrior Davis was our son.

None of that beautiful story would have been ours if the first match had happened according to the plan.

I can’t necessarily say it all makes sense, even now. But I am convinced that God’s goodness led us to where we are today. The path was twisted, hard and confusing, but I can rest that He led us.

And that’s all I really need to know.

Our little warrior:

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