I had a tough weekend - I think the post title says it all. What? You need more details? OK, ok...

Zman and Princess were both sick with the flu all weekend; technically, Zman is STILL sick though the fever has finally gone down. I've said before that Princess is not a fun person to be around when she's under the weather and she didn't make an exception this time! The whining, the fussing, the complaining... and that was just my hubby.

Wait, that's not the part you wanted to hear about? You people are all about the sensationalism! OK, here's the real story...

Scene:
A frazzled mother is juggling three whining kids, making dinner, and unloading the dishwasher. She turns her back to grab something from the pantry when she hears her oldest daughter cry out.

Princess: “Mom! Zboy is juggling knives!!”

The mom turns in horror to see her 20 month old son holding two very sharp steak knives by the blade, point up. She tries to maintain a calm demeanor because she knows if he thinks she’s going to take something away that he wants to play with that he will RUN… something that could end disastrously in this instance.
Mother: “Zboy, please give mommy the knives”

The toddler hands over one knife willingly.

Mother: “Thank you. Now, please give me the other knife”

The boy refuses to give up the second “treasure” tightening his grip on the blade while his pale mother tries not to panic. He now holds the knife in both hands and is trying to pick his nose with the point.

Mother crouching near the child: “Zboy! That’s not safe!! Please give mommy the knife and we’ll go read Baby Beluga. Zboy NO! Don’t put the knife in your nose!!!”

The boy sees that the book reading offer is really just a cheap bribe to entice him to give up his new toy. He’s not going to give it up that easily.

Mother: “Zboy, GIVE MOMMY THE KNIFE RIGHT NOW!!!”

The boy walks toward his mom seeming to be willing to hand the second knife over but decides at the last moment to give her his free hand instead. This turns out to be a mistake as now that the mom knows the boy can’t run off she seizes the opportunity to grab the knife-wielding hand by the wrist and exert enough pressure to prevent the toddler from tightening his grip on the blade and cutting his hand. Seeing his possession of the knife is at stake, the boy begins to trash about swinging the blade wildly back and forth. The mother is unable to release the boy’s non knife baring hand quickly enough to prevent being stabbed in the back of her hand. The mother drops the boy’s free hand and quickly wrenches the knife from her son’s hand and places it safely next to the other one on the counter-top. She releases the now screaming child and rises shaking to her feet. The stab wound proves to be very shallow and barely bleeding but the mom can’t resist calling out to her husband in the back of the house.

Mother: “Honey! Your son just stabbed me with a knife!!”

Yeah... it was that kind of day. I'm just thankful that no one was badly injured. After 3 kids, you'd think I'd know better than to leave the dishwasher open with knives in it!

I think that every family has things that are very important to them; things that you take a stand on every time. Seat belts, for instance, are a huge deal around here; my very small 8 year old will probably be in a booster seat until High School at the rate she's growing. But what is very important to one family may not be important to others.

I'm thinking about this today because of a recent encounter with another parent at Princess's school. This mother cornered Zman at pick-up time very concerned about a conversation she had with our daughter. She had been helping out in the classroom and talking with Princess about another student's antics and Princess had said "Yeah, he's being a real smart-ass."

She blinked a Zman expectantly and his response was "and...?" which is exactly what I would have said. You see, swearing is NOT a big deal in our house. We talk with our kids about the appropriate language to use in public and polite conversation, we emphasize the importance of never calling people names, four letter or otherwise, and then we let it go. That's not to say that we are all swearing like sailors around here, in fact we rarely hear any of the BIG no-no's, just the occasional dropped-something-heavy-on-my-toe expletives. I think that because Zman and I don't use swear words much, it's not something the kids are going say until they hit the swearing-is-cool high school years.

Princess has recently become much more creative with her expletives. Pooh! Is the one hear a lot right now, mostly when we ask her to do something she doesn’t want to. She did hit new heights last night with “Pooh, Pooh, McPoohson the 3rd” (that one had me biting the inside of my cheek and trying not to laugh) so it’s not all four letter words all the time around here.

What do you think? Is my kid destined for juvy because she referred to a class mate a smart-ass or will she turn out relatively normal in the long run? Where do you draw the “bad word” line?

We made it. I'm now trying to dig out my house, unpack, and go grocery shopping. It will be a few days before I can surface with an intelligible post but here is a quick synopsis.

We had a great trip and I have around 500 photos to prove it but I've learned that vacationing with 3 kids is almost more work then fun... but still worth it. I'm ready to have some alone time now though.

Some of the highlights of the trip:
- The Portland Ethiopian adoption picnic
- The beach trip - warm and not windy on the Oregon Coast is a once in a lifetime thing...
- The Oregon Museum of Science and Industry
- The County Fair
- The Water Park
- The Grandparents
- The yummy Ethiopian Restaurant in Portland
- The paparazzi session at the park for our family portraits
- Visiting old friends and old haunts (Zman and I both grew up and got married in that area)
- THE SUN BABY!!


Some of the lows:
- The flight down
- The airline destroying Zboy's car seat (I'm pretty sure the styrofoam isn't supposed to fall out in big chunks)
- The endless driving long distances
- Getting bitten by a donkey at the petty zoo
- The girls' never ending bickering
- Zboy learning how to operate all doorknobs
- Cookie tripping every time she turned around and sporting huge bruises from head to toe for the family pictures (no, we don't actually beat the child, she's just clumsy right now... honest!)
- One of my children *cough Zboy cough* flushing something large down my in-laws' toilet.
- Eating out (a lot) with the toddler who is working out his terrible two act at 18 months old

Now for the pictures...

To The Passengers of Alaska Airline Flight ---:

My sincerest apologies for misery that was Sunday's fight. I didn't realize the shear decibel that was achieved in our row until I took a little side trip to the back of the plane to use the facilities and discovered that you could still hear him 20 rows away. (Why yes, I do think he may have a future in the opera.) I wish I had ear plugs to pass out to all of you or at least some Valium for myself.

I could go into the whole adoption and attachment issues which complicate things in this situation but lets just say that I've learned my lesson about lap children.

So sorry,
A frazzled mama.

To The Flight Attendant greeting people as they left the plane:

I love getting parenting advice from complete strangers. I, in fact, did not know that the passengers around me would have been happier if my son wasn't scramming. I thought everyone loved it as much as I do. I also didn't know that I should "train" him to stop that. You know I was just sitting there eating bon-bons and painting my nails but now, thanks to you, I know that I should be trying to do things to get him to stop screaming. Thanks!

Here's a dilemma though... What should I do when he wants to get down and run around the plane during take-off and landing (when you were quiet implicit that we should remain in our seats with seat belts securely fastened) and when I don't allow him to do so, he reacts in a developmentally appropriate way for an 18 month old? What should I do when he wants to put down the tray table and use it as a step to climb on the head of the woman in front of me? Tough huh?

Now, here's a tip for you. When you see a mother who is covered in yogurt. mashed gram crackers, and apple juice who is obviously frazzled and one step away from collapse and still has yet another plane to board, an appropriate response would be to simply wish her a better day and be happy you are not her; nastiness only makes everything harder. Also, just because I was out of earshot doesn't mean that my husband couldn't hear your nasty remarks to the people behind me in line. It's a good thing your airline has a monopoly in the state of Alaska or you would have lost a customer Sunday.

Up your's,
A mom who has been pushed too far.

To the passengers of Horizon Flight ----:

Be thankful, be very thankful. While the 10 minutes of screaming during take off was annoying, it could have been much, much worse; just ask the people from our first flight. I attribute the subsequent singing, laughing, and playing peek-a-boo with everyone to the hard won 30 minute nap I managed to convince him to take during our 3 hour lay-over. I was very nice to see you smiling at his antics as he loudly proclaimed "WOW" over and over and over again during landing.

Thanks for the laughs,
A grateful mom.

To the housekeeping staff at our Portland hotel:

If you think this is bad you should see my house. Enjoy the nice fat tip.

Better you than me,
Mom on vacation

To All the people traveling home with us in 2.5 weeks:

I apologize in advance. I looked into getting the baby his own seat on the way home but feel that the kids would be upset if I spent their college savings on this... that almost didn't deter me though. I am getting over my usual disapproval of such things and plan to purchase some baby Benadryl for your (and not so incidentally, my) benefit.

You're welcome,
A tired mom.

To my blog friends in Oregon:

I'm here!! If you've read through this whole post and STILL want to get together, let me know. We will be spending most of the next few weeks at my in-laws house in Corvallis and are hopefully meeting up with some local adoptive families while we are here.

Hope to meet you,
Carrie

Just call me Supermom? Did I really write that? It must have been the bacon talking because I don’t feel like that at all. Sure, that moment in time I had all my sh!t together and all my children ducks in a row, so to speak, so was feeling slightly superior to the rude people who felt that my load was too heavy. Truthfully, I usually I feel like I’m barley keeping my head above water.

My house in a lesson in chaos; laundry to be folded makes huge drifts in my bedroom while the kitchen needs to be clean and decluttered…again! The girls’ room is covered with clean and dirty clothes; it’s a constant battle to teach them the uses of the hamper and the dressers. There are no toys covering every surface but that is only because I had a major melt down a few weeks ago a bagged up every toy in the house (other than a few odds and ends for Zboy) and threw them into the garage. The girls can earn back sets of toys by picking up after themselves and keeping their room clean… so far NOT ONE toy has been saved from exile. They play quiet happily in the playroom now with an old shoe box, a rubber band, and a tissue, making Zman and me wonder why we have all the toys in the first place. We are now placing bets on how long they will go without the toys and when we can start making some of them disappear for good.

I feel like there isn’t enough of me to go around. Zboy is in the anxious attachment phase right now and needs to be in constant contact with me. This means that if I’m making dinner he is fussing and whining at my feet while attempting to pull my pants off. When I’m sitting down giving him the attention he craves, Cookie is jealous and wants to crawl all over me. Her “Look at me, Look at me” behavior is as understandable as it is maddening. She has done really well with the transition from baby of the family to big sister but it’s still rough sometimes. Princess, as the BIG girl, gets the shaft. I try to make special one-on-one time for her after the younger kids are in bed but usually by then I’m all touched out and just want a little peace and quite.

I’m a good mom, but not a flawless one.

Last night, we all went out to dinner with our local adoption support group to celebrate my friend Sarah’s Ethiopian court date. (Her new daughter is only 1.5 weeks older than Zboy!) As I chased my son from one end of the restaurant to the other, held him while he screamed because he wanted to play IN the restaurant’s fish tank, thanked God that the place was almost empty, tried in vain to keep Cookie from playing fort under the table and finally just gave up as my girls joined together with the other children present in a ‘Lord of the Flies’ like mob and chased each other around the table, I was reminded of my last post here.

Humm… so maybe Supermom was pushing it a tiny bit.

After dropping Zman off at the airport Sunday morning for a business trip, I took the kids out for breakfast at a local greasy-spoon type breakfast. This isn’t something we indulge in very often since eating out a lot is expensive and when we do eat out I like to eat semi-eatable food, something that can be hard to come by at a greasy-spoon dinner, but the girls were feeling sad that daddy was leaving and a pile of artery clogging bacon can cheer anyone up.

When we were almost finished with our meal, two couples were sat across from us with one infant boy of about one. They paid nice compliments to my cute son, always appreciated, and then proceeded to have a conversation about me as if I couldn’t hear them the jist of which was that apparently I have too many kids or at least two many kids to be out in public with them by myself.

Now, I’m not the kind of person who really cares what other people think about me or my business so their comments didn’t hurt any feelings or cause any reaction from me other than some covert eye rolling, but it did make me wonder a couple of things.

First- What about my beautiful, very well behaving (for a change) children would cause them to think I had more children then I can handle? Sure, Zboy was getting pretty fidgety there at the end, but that’s pretty normal for a 16 month old, for who 45 minuets of sitting in one place is excruciating. Surely people who had an infant of their own would be familiar with the limited attention span of that age group. My girls were being angels, cutting there own food (something we have been working on), eating well, coloring quietly, and NOT fighting with one another. There have been times when I’ve been out with the kids alone when I’m sure it appears that I have more than I can handle, like when I have 2 out of 3 melting down and am clearly frazzled, but this was not one of those times.

Second - Since when has 3 kids been a lot? Sure, it’s more than one but is not, in my opinion, a big family. Maybe I have a squeued view on the subject since my mom is the oldest of eight children and a lot of those aunts and uncles have 4 kids. I also read a lot of blog of women who have 8 + kids which, in my view qualifies as a large family.

Third- When has it become ok to make derogatory remarks about some one when you know that they can hear you? Sure, there have been times when I’m out somewhere with Zman and I see something that raises my eyebrows but IF I feel compelled to comment on it, which is rare because I’m of the live and let live philosophy, then I will say something quietly when I know the person in question can’t overhear me. Is this kind of rudeness now acceptable? If so, I definitely have some things to say to people in the future!

When we were gathering our things to go, they turned back to me. They watched Zboy walking around as I dug under the table for his truck, and asked his age and mentioned that their son wasn’t walking yet. I told them not to rush it as I chased Zboy down as he tried to sweet talk some other diners out of some more bacon, things get more challenging when they can escape I joked.

With the captured boy under one arm, I made sure Princess had her drawing and Cookie had her jacket and book. I gathered Zboy’s retrieved truck and book and gently ushered us all to the front to pay while both girls wrangled for pennies to “feed” the little robot they have there. With one had full of toys and a baby on my hip, I paid the bill, fished out some change for the girls, and wished our “seating companions” a nice breakfast. As we were leaving I heard one of the women say, “If I had that many children, I’d never leave the house by myself,” and I had to smile.

Juggling the needs and wants of three kids is a challenge but I think I’m up to the task.

Just call me Supermom!!

Thank you all for your kind words during what has been a rough transition home. Things are finally starting to calm down a bit around here and the good moments outweigh the bad. We are extremely blessed to have lots of family and friends here and they have really surrounded us with love and support. Also, I have the best husband in the world and he has given 200% since we've been home. I would be lost without him.

Smiley is doing so much better that, at times, it seems like he's a completely different child than the one we brought home. We had no idea how much his breathing issues were affecting him until they started to get better. He has tons more energy, sleeps less during the day, plays and babbles more, and in general is just a much happier baby.

I feel really badly that he was so sick and we didn't know it. He had a wheezy chest and goopy lungs from the moment we met him so we didn't have anything to compare to. Since we started him on the steroid burst there has been a night and day difference in his breathing. Now that I know what he should sound like, he will never get that bad again...believe me

Sleep another area that has improved ten-fold since we started his treatments. Just in the last few days he has fallen into a doable pattern that allows Zman and me to get at least 5 straight hours each. He goes to bed at 9, and then is up for a bottle around 11, 2, and 5 and then is up for the day sometime between 7 and 8. We share the 11 pm feeding as one or both of us are usually still up then. Zman handles the 2 feeding and I field the 5 am kettle call. That way we both get a good sized chunk of uninterrupted sleep. While we are both still tired all the time, we are no longer in danger of falling asleep while driving or chopping of a finger making dinner.

Cookie is still having nightmares off and on, but now only ends up in bed with us once or twice a week. Princess is still giving us a run for our money but bedtime is getting better and last night both girls were asleep by 9pm. Of course this morning she made up for it by refusing to eat what I made for breakfast and then pitching the biggest fit in the world when I told her that she could eat what was available or skip breakfast all together. She chose to scream blood murder all the way to school. *sigh*

Getting some decent sleep, a concept that has changed completely since having kids, has made all the difference in my ability to be more positive with all the kids. I feel like I’m starting to get into the groove of things. We may eat crappy take-out more than I’d like, and I won’t even comment on the state of my laundry, but the basics are coming together.

I think we may just make it after all!

Frist, let me start by saying that both girls have come through the chicken pox just fine and I'm very thankful to have that all behind us now. It was a very busy and trying week. Nothing like being house bound with three kids and unable to even go to the store for popsicles and ginger-ale! I'm so happy we will NEVER have to do that again!

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I'm a just so tired.

Everyone says that when adding kids to your family that, depending on your circumstances, it's either harder to go from no children to 1 or from 1 to 2. We found both of those transitions very easy. I was sure that we would have no trouble adding a third because we are experienced parents who have two well adjusted children and tons of parenting tools at our disposal... What's that saying about pride going before a fall?

If we were only dealing with the logistics of caring for and meeting the needs of three children we would be great. If we were only dealing with one bio child completely regressing and throwing monster fits, we would be ok. If we where only dealing with 3 kids cycling through chicken pox, we'd be hanging in there. Add on serious breathing issues with the baby and Cookie having night terrors and we are about ready to throw in the towel.

I haven't slept for more than 3 hours at a stretch in over a week. If I wasn't so sleep deprived I might be better equipped to deal with my 7 year old who suddenly will not get dressed in the morning and throws fits so bad that she's physically attacking her dad and me. Just when I need my big girl to be the most self sufficient she is the least. Bedtime is particularly bad and she has been up screaming until 11pm or later every lately.

Cookie is a trooper and dealing well with the baby brother thing but Princess's wild behavior is freaking her out. She has started having nigh terrors that keep her awake for hours. She only will sleep if either Will or I sleep with her and it's almost impossible to get any good rest with a 3 year old kicking you in the face half the night.

Since one of us has to be up with Cookie all night, baby care falls to the other parent. Smiley has been waking up every 2 to 3 hours all night long. He usually will go right back to sleep after a diaper change and a bottle but for some reason decides that 4 am is play time and wants to be up for a couple of hours. He usually falls asleep just before my alarm goes off. If you’re doing the math, we go to bed after 11pm, wake up every couple of hours, and get up for good around 4am.... Good times!

I though we caught a break last night when Princess went to bed with only a minor fight and both girls were sleeping by 9:30. Nope. Smiley has been coming down with a cold that has triggered his wheezing and was up every 45 minutes screaming and wheezing and coughing. We gave him his inhaler and that seemed to help some but not enough. We contemplated taking him to the ER and if I had been more coherent we probably would have. Neither Zman nor I was thinking very clearly at this point. Sleep deprivation will do that to you.

Smiley was breathing better this morning but still wheezing so I took him into the Dr. She said that we definitely should have taken him to the hospital last night! She said that high-normal breaths per minute for a child his age is around 40; he was 68. We did another nebulizer treatment at the office and she gave us a prescription for our own nebulizer and Smiley is now on Albuterol, Steroids for the nebulizer and oral steroids. He is officially diagnosed with bronchial spasms. And we have strict instructions that if his breathing ever gets that bad again and the meds we have don't help that we are to go immediately to the ER. She said we were risking respiratory arrest by not taking him in last night... Very. Very. Scary.

Please keep us in your thoughts as we traverse these rocky times. I know that there is a light at the end of the tunnel and sometimes that light is the only thing that keeps me going.

Part of Z-man’s job requires that he travel quite a bit. Most of the time he’s only gone 2 days every other week, but 3 or 4 times a year he has longer trips; thankfully his next one isn’t until April.

When Princess was a baby these trips were excruciating. She was a very high needs child; we called her superglue baby. Even going to the bathroom was difficult when Z-man was at work. Showers waited until he was home and even then I had to listen to her screaming for me from the living room. Daddy was person non-grata with her then. When he was out of town life was hell. I didn’t get any kind of break from the constant neediness of my darling girl and I would start to come undone around the edges and by the time he came home I was extremely frayed.

When Cookie arrived things actually improved. Princess was in pre-school half days and Cookie was a mellow child, content as long as she was a part of everything. I could set her in her bouncy seat in the bathroom with a few toys and take long hot showers. She was a social creature and loved taking trips to the park and the stores. At the same time, Princess had learned to play independently and would often play in the family room for the entire time it took me to prepare dinner. My husband could be gone for a few days without the world falling apart…well, except the house. Keeping up on the house work too was just asking too much.

Now we are all in the groove. When Z-man leaves we have “mommy and girl time”; the patterns of the house don’t get disrupted like they used to. Sure, now mommy does all the cooking (not my strong suit) and mommy does the bedtime routine (something daddy always does when he’s home), but other than that not much changes. Ok, so the girls usually end up in bed with me, but I don’t mind because it’s really lonely in there without my hubby. There are still the days when he gets home and I hand off the parenting baton and go lock myself in the bathroom, but for the most part I really feel like I have a handle on things.

Today he is gone on one of his bi-monthly trips and as I was getting the girls ready and out the door this morning I thought about how this is all going to change again when the baby comes home. Three kids sounds like so many some days, especially when Z-man is gone. I found the transition from no kids to one to be tough, and the transition from one to two to be easy… now I wonder what the transition to three will be like.

Thankfully the one thing I’m very confidant about is that no matter what life hands us, we will adapt and grow to meet the challenge.