It's Back to Work Now

Coy seems to be having so much fun. Most everything that we do is new to him and watching his reactions is lots of fun. This weekend was his first weekend in the church nursery. (We went last weekend but let him stay with us.) The report was that he did great. This was no surprise since he has basically been in organized chaos his entire life. The folks at church are wonderful about teaching the children but lets face it, 15 2 year olds could drive the most sane person crazy in a couple of hours if left alone.

Our neighbor (Addison, Caleb and Katie's friend) had a birthday party. He didn't want to get in the castle that is behind him but he did not want to leave the swing and the slide.
We did get out a little mini-trampoline on Sunday and he liked to jump on it. He pretty much loves to be outside. I don't know what we will do this winter when we are stuck inside most of the time.

We got to go to Caleb and Katie's soccer game on

Thursday night. We had missed 4 games while we were away. That may not seem like a lot but it was huge for us. I feel sorry for children whose parents sign them up for activities and then don't make it a priority to attend the games and cheer them on. I know not every family is fortunate enough to be able to attend most all of the games like we are, but it hurts me to think that there are fathers or mothers that aren't at the games because they are not interested in what their children are doing or because mowing the yard or washing the car is more important.

Both Caleb and Katie enjoy playing soccer and we enjoy encouraging them to always do their best, no matter what they are doing.

Katie's recital went great on Saturday. I kind of already knew about the surprise but the last song that they did was titled "Thanks for Being My Dad." During the song, they showed pictures of all of the girls with their fathers. The picture of Katie and me that they showed is the one at the left. It was a very emotional moment, as if I haven't had enough of those lately. Coy was on my lap and Caleb was at my side while I watched Katie sign the words to the song. Since Coy can sign a few things, one of the things that he recognized from the song was the sign for Thank You. So as the girls would sign 'thank you', Coy would also sign it. I am so glad that we made it back home in time for that recital.

Coy got to meet the rest of his cousins this weekend. My sister's kids and Stacey's sister's child were all at the recital on Saturday. Coy must think that he is some sort of international superstar because it seems that everywhere we go, someone that he has never met comes up to him and greets him by calling him by his name.

It is back to work for me tomorrow. Some might say that I don't work enough to call it work but I do work hard. When Stacey and I were praying for me to get this job, our desire was for me to be able to be at home more with the children. I think it was God's plan to put me in a situation where I would be able to spend time away from Caleb and Katie so that we could adopt Coy. I believe that God had worked it out well before we knew what we were doing. My work has been super about this adoption (I will let you know if I have changed my opinion on this tomorrow once I see what kind of shape all of my projects are in now since I have been gone for so long). I will still have over 2 weeks of vacation left since I was able to use sick time for about 1/2 of the time that I was gone. What we intended for one purpose, God intended for a different purpose. I don't know if I would have had the flexibility to do what we did had I stayed in private practice and not moved to Civil service. I am glad that I will never know.

It will be interesting to see how much I am able to post once work starts back. It will definitely be harder.

We have started on working to help Coy to stop sucking his thumb. This is very hard for us because we know it has been his source of comfort for probably his entire life. I sat with him while he cried himself to sleep tonight, but without his thumb in his mouth. We hope he knows (or at least figures it out someday) that we are just trying to do what is best for him. It is a habit that he needs to break now so that it is not double misery for him after his palette surgery.