Now A Family of *gulp* Six.

We have decided to get Roman on a little rewards chart. Well, a big rewards chart. It worked miracles for him when he was giving us a lot of trouble at bedtime; now it will cover things such as behaving at the dinner table, following directions, and a couple of chores; setting the table, and the like. It starts tomorrow, and every 2 days (for now) he can earn a reward. So we'll see what happens. Charlie has been overly stuffy for about a week now, so I think I will call the ped. tomorrow. He has trouble drinking because of the boogers, and we've taken to saline drops and aspiration a few times a day. On the plus side, however, he is obviously seeing better than he was; he actually goes cross-eyed because he's trying so hard to focus on what's in front of him, and he actually appears to be looking around the room, versus staring and having people in his way. Charlie attended his first big family party on Saturday, where we were part of a surprise 40th birthday for my cou...

I've been sick all week, and finally feeling on the upswing today. But my 2 boys made it a poopy (Charlie) and rude (Roman) day. We're still trying to settle on an agreeable formula with Charlie; we had switched to GoodStart, which everyone in Internet-world seems to think is the best thing ever for fussy or gassy babies. Charlie's farts smelled so bad, I'm not kidding - it was like rotten poop. Seriously. So we switched back to Enfamil, and now are trying Enfamil "Gentlease" formula. The gas is under control, but the poop... not so much. Charlie has pooped 4 times today. The fourth and best, in my opinion, was his first "blast out of the diaper." Up his back, onto his onesie. It was a minor blowout, based on what I know is coming from my experiences with Roman, but it was still unexpected. Luckily Charlie already needed a bath tonight. Roman, we confirmed tonight, has exactly the same temper as his Mama. This isn't bad; I like fighting with some...

Thug politics. That's what we call it here in the suburbs of Detroit. When the mayor of Detroit needs an entourage, including multiple bodyguards - bodyguards? - to travel with. When he was first elected, even I was excited - a young African-American man, whose mother is a Representative in the Federal House, could be just what Detroit needed to inject some life into the city. Four years later, I was hoping against hope that Kwame would lose his reelection bid and Detroit could get a man in office who actually cares. And now it has all blown up. For those of you who have heard the story on CNN or the front page of Yahoo! News, and who knows where else, you have not heard the whole story. Kwame's indictment this week on 10 felony counts, among them perjury and obstruction of justice, is about his testimony in a trial, NOT the fact that he had an affair. Like Bill Clinton before him, he doesn't seem to get that the public could care less if he cheated on his wife; it's t...

At 4:00am EST today, it was the 4-year anniversary of when we nervously walked into a courtroom in Ekaterinburg, Russia to answer questions about why we felt we were fit to be Roman's parents. One hour later, our petition to adopt Roman was approved; we walked out of that courtroom sweating bullets, but with huge grins on our faces. We were finally parents. Today is also Charlie's due date. And I am so glad he has already been in our lives for 10 weeks; although the circumstances were not pleasant, I can't imagine him arriving in any other less-dramatic way. And now I reveal to you the first official photo of the brothers, taken on their very special day.

Our Easter service theme was standing in awe. Of the empty tomb, of the risen Christ, of the wonders that God can do. Our pastor started out asking us to consider a time when were speechless, in awe of something we were witnessing. And then he actually mentioned that recently he had stood in awe when looking upon our baby. I just about burst into tears, because of course that was what I was thinking. Tomorrow is Charlie's due date. Doug and I consider this entire time, from January 17 to tomorrow, as "borrowed time." I am in awe of the fact that Charlie was born healthy, that he came home in only 3 weeks from the NICU, and that he has continued to thrive. That our family has adjusted reasonably well, and basically.... that everything works out as God intended. Just awe-some. Easter was great at our house. I will illustrate with pictures. Charlie as a bathing beauty (honestly, he did have a happy look on his face just before this!); Roman checking out his haul that was h...

When we go to the pediatrician, I am always asked "and how are Mom and Dad doing?" I thought it was time to talk about us in this blog for a change! (the kids, by the way, are fine.) Doug is surviving on the lack of sleep, although he is notably more grumpy than in the past. I don't think this is just lack of sleep, however; for some time he has been struggling with what he wants to be when he grows up. Now that he's the proud father of two, I think the matter has begun to niggle at him again. That's about all I'll say about that right now, though. He is very excited to start a golf league that meets one evening a week at a local course he used to play with his brother. Since Roman joined our family Doug's golf has been limited to the range & maybe once or twice on the links. I'm happy for him too - my one night out with the ladies lifted my spirits so much, I think golfing once a week will give Doug some happy time away from home. Together we are...

I went to Roman's party at his preschool today. I was in charge of the egg-dying station. It was interesting to watch him interact with his friends, and to watch his friends as well. Roman certainly is a class clown. During show and tell he made a dramatic "fall" to get the class to laugh; unfortunately, he doesn't know when to stop, doing it at least five more times until I gave him "the look." He was very excited to have me there, and even though he didn't get to my station until the end, he kept his eyes on me most the time. It was neat. After the party I drove just a few blocks away to go to our 2-month checkup at the pediatrician for Charlie. For vaccinations he got 4 shots and one oral medication. Wouldn't you think that scientists could come up with more oral vaccinations? Anything better than shots. Anyway, here's the information you want, though... the boy weighs 8 lbs, 15 oz! That's just shy of NINE pounds! In two weeks he's gai...

Today threw me SO off schedule, in fact, I totally missed a meeting at church. When another member called me and asked if everything was okay, I still didn't get it. "We're fine." Awkward pause... "Are you coming?" she asked. I said, "the meeting isn't until the 17th!" Never mind that I wore green today and made green Jell-O in honor of St. Patrick's Day. Duh. Roman has a really bad cough, the kind that makes your throat hurt whenever you have to do it. He had a low-grade fever too, but that seems to have vanished this afternoon. He slept from 2:30-5:00pm. I woke him up, honestly, 3 different times. I hate it when he sleeps so late, he never falls asleep at night. But each time he fell right back to sleep. If you know Roman, that is completely out of character. And then he stated he was going to bed after the movie we were watching was going to end - and he knew there was probably only 15 minutes left. Took him awhile to actually fall aslee...

Ah, not me! My friend Cat gave birth on Saturday morning, 3 weeks early so he's considered a preemie too! We became friends in first grade, and were amazed to find ourselves pregnant at the same time and due within a week of each other! But now, we both have preemies. Funny. God has taught me today that I made the right choice in not being a full-time stay at home mom with multiple kids. Roman is home today sick (horrible cough, low-grade fever) and between his neediness and Charlie crying like a real newborn for 15 minutes for no reason whatsoever (gas, I think), there's no way I could handle this every day. I ate my lunch standing up and got about 6 bites of chicken and 4 bites of rice. An hour later, I had string cheese. Not the way to live life! We have an appointment on Wednesday at the pediatrician for the official "2 month" checkup. I also have a couple pictures on the camera but I will get them posted later.

Charlie update first: eye doctor visit was fine. Everything normal. Dr. said again that he will not have "meaningful" vision until 3-months adjusted, which is roughly June. Roman is excellent, wanting snacks & candy all the time. We had to re-serve him dinner tonight because he wouldn't eat enough at *actual* dinner. We'll see how it goes, it's cooling off right now. Tomorrow Charlie goes on his first outing. Well, besides the doctors and the occasional CVS or IKEA visit. My niece is having her 5th birthday party at a nature center for maple syrup tapping, should be really unusual & cool. Doug and I are torn 50/50 about Doug staying home with Charlie. Nothing to do with the baby, actually, but because we are so darn exhausted at night, we don't get anything but the essentials done. It would be nice if both boys could disappear for a day or afternoon... but at the same time, we're not ready for Charlie to be out of our sight for so long yet! Speakin...

Here's a size comparison for you. While Charlie is getting bigger, he's still a tiny little dude. I can't believe I haven't blogged since Saturday. As the sleep deprivation continues, days are becoming foggier and running together more easily. Unless it's something outstanding, I can't remember what day it is anymore. Sunday was an outstanding day. Our friends from the Flint area (Flushing, specifically - I don't know if they want to be equated with Flint!) came to visit. They have 3 kids who Roman loves to see; he plays well with their middle child. Their youngest, Sarah (one week older than Roman), could not wait until she had baby Charlie in her arms. They warned us, too - be prepared, because Sarah wants to get ahold of that baby! She held him just fine, as did their oldest. It was a fun afternoon. We were exhausted, though, after they left. Really, the most activity our house has seen since Charlie was born, I think. Monday brought me shopping with a gi...

Forget the milk mustache. This baby's got a milk goatee! This is after one of his very satisfying 4-oz. bottle feedings on Friday. It was just too cute. Had to take about 5 before he would even open his eyes a slit, but I think this shot is precious. Things worked out well in the meeting with my boss. He had me scheduled for exactly what I need for next year, and in discussion with Doug we think that we can swing me still being part-time next year (even with some part-time daycare payments), and yet I will still be able to walk Roman to kindergarten and spend my mornings with Charlie. How's that for "having it all"?! I'm sure there will be some obstacle that will come up (best laid plans, and all that) but it looks like for now, God is delivering the perfect year for me next year. Except for having to find time to lesson plan and grade papers, and all that. :) Roman was rescued this afternoon by a church family who is becoming better friends of ours - they have a ...

Staying at home for ?? long is nice because I can tackle tasks around the house that have been driving us crazy for months but we didn't have time to attend to. This came to a head last weekend, when I had to finally clean out the closet in the spare room to move Roman in. This caused a giant pile in the 3rd bedroom. To find places for that pile, I had to clean out the closets in that room. And that led to the hall linen closet needing to be cleaned out. So essentially, in 5 days I cleaned out 4 closets. The 3rd bedroom was trashed for a few days, what with donate/trash/keep piles all over, but it's done now. And just like on those tv shows, there is room to add things in 3 of the 4 closets. Amazing. Out on the front deck currently is/are 3 bags of donation items, and on the curb is/are 2 bags of trash from these 4 closets. These are no ordinary bags, either - they are Doug's industrial-grade, 4-foot-high trash bags. I'm very pleased with myself. Lastly, a plug for the...

Charlie is right on schedule. At 37 weeks gestation (7 weeks old, or "minus-three" as Doug says) he is 19.5 inches long and weighs 6 pounds, 15 ounces - that's just an ounce shy of 7 pounds! Wow! At this rate he would've been a 10 pound baby! So the dr. said it was really okay that we weren't on the preemie formula as he obviously is doing well without it. We will continue the multivitamin drops in his formula once a day, and check in around the 19th of the month for his 2-month appointment. Got his second shot for prevention of RSV, and he will have to have one more. While there, gathered the completed physical sheet and immunization record to be turned in to our school district for Roman. Can you believe it - the boy is going to start kindergarten in the Fall. Wow. He is oh-so-close to reading... he recognizes whole words that he has seen repeatedly, but not so great at sounding them out. Perhaps he will be a whole-word memorizer. Better to spell that way, in m...

The grand painting experiment began this weekend. The room is now gray and Roman does believe it looks like the inside of the Millennium Falcon. However, as a simple 4-year-old, he also has to have ALL his possessions in his room, so the M. Falcon now has books, stuffed animals, and a train bank inside it. There is room for a couple posters around his bed, and we definitely are going to get the Yoda cutout. Over the desk is where our attempt at the cockpit is going to be, and we found Star Wars removable battle stickers on Ebay that we can put on the wall so it looks like he's looking out at it. He already has sat at the desk and played Han Solo. We also heard the most musical, lovely words any child can say - "I'm going to go play in my room!" YES! It didn't last long ("Will someone play with me?") but he really does like playing in there. We allowed his toy box to go in there too; figured as Charlie grows bigger, Roman will need a separate spot for h...