Pool Bash

Things used to be pretty simple. But, hey, things change. This is what life used to be like around our house. Mercy was Thomas' main girl. Now he has his hands full with a new girl and boy, luckily Mercy seems to be Ok with it.


Last week, I spoke too soon about us all being healthy. S. was sick with a fever for on Sunday and Monday this past week. And was up a lot at night coughing. So, on Memorial Day we sat around, did some housework and stayed home. For some reason, both Thomas and I decided to make something ... I made a blackberry pie, and he made homemade butter. (he has no idea that I took this photo, I wanted to be sure everyone knew he was obsessed about making some homemade butter for weeks =)




S. is better now, but P. has a cold. She looks absolutely pitiful at certain points. But, today was a lot of fun for all of us. Well, Thomas probably did the most work of any of us, between school and yard work. But we also watched our friend's daughter play softball, and then they came over for a swim. S. LOVED having so many friends to play in the pool with. We all swam for an hour or more ... it was nonstop excitement. Our friend's have a 12 year old daughter, a foster daughter, and then another friend was also with them. P.watched from the sidelines and then slept through most it. Mercy and Forge also had a blast chasing the ball.




Notice in the photo below, S. sleeps with his head under the covers. This is an every day, the moment he is laid down in the bed thing ... the covers have to go over the head. Yes, he is actually asleep in this photo. Also, he thinks he is ready to drive.





Here are a few photos of P. from this week. She is sitting up now by herself (complete unassisted) for several minutes at a time. She is such a good baby. Everyone asks if she is always this good ... and she is.









And just in case you were wondering how fat her cheeks are ...

More Videos

We both wanted to load up some videos of P. laughing.

This one is a month old - she was 5 months old.


Then there is this one from earlier this week. I was trying to get S. to eat his lima beans. It worked. He gobbled them all up.

6 MONTH UPDATE

We have had both of the little ones just over 6 months now. K was six months old on the 18th and S. will be 20 months old in just a couple days.

Both are still battling a runny nose --- this has been a everyday, all the time problem -- probably because they are in day care. But otherwise they are in good health. I would like to put more weight on S. It seems rather strange that he hasn't gained more weight than he has. He is so thin, and so strong, he has the "cut and ripped" look that a baby shouldn't have. K, on the other hand, has the rolls of healthy baby fat.

Most of you probably already know, we are planning on renaming K once she is adopted. So, based on that fact, I am going to start referring to her as P on the blog. Hope you can keep up. =)

P is growing fast. I end up talking so much about how S is doing developmentally, and never really mention P. Probably because she is always right where she needs to be. She can reach and pick up a toy, transfer a toy from one hand to another, hold her bottle a little bit, sit up for a little bit on her own, and stand holding onto something. She also is saying vowel/consonant combinations, such as " a-da-da" She has stayed right on track and a little ahead. She also loves being tickled, playing peek-aboo, and reading books. So far, she likes sweet potatoes and peas. We are also continuing to try broccoli, green beans, and carrots. But she doesn't really like these. Usually she starts screaming at the top of her lungs if I try to feed her a food she doesn't like and it is very hard to calm her down with other food. At this point usually only a bottle will help. It can make meal time very loud and crazy. Because usually S is also up to something also.

Update: I forgot to mention when I originally posted this link. P. went to the doctor for her 6 month checkup this week. She is 16 lbs and 26.5 inches long - about the 50% for weight and the 75% for height.

Today we went to the park and got some great photos ... while thomas stayed home to work. It was P's first time on the swing. And a few other photos from around the house.

Watch This

I spent hours tyring to edit some videos and post them over several days... but I was not successful. So, what you have instead are some basic videos with no editing. That I finally uploaded on youtube because I it was the easiest way to do it and nothing else seemed to work.

This is something I have been meaning to do for months and just haven't had time. These are short clips of video taken on our regular camera so the quality is just OK.

This video is of P eating peas (for what is really the very first time ever eating). The only thing she had eaten before was rice and oatmeal cereal. Thomas tried unsuccessfully when I was on the cruise to give her baby food without thinking I would want to be here for it. Now she eats her peas without too much of a fuss, and other non-green vegetables. She is not the least bit interested in brocolli or green beans.

One step closer to adoption

Yesterday marked a very important day for us in the Croom household. We are officially one step closer to adopting K! Thomas and I both made it up to court late in the afternoon for the proceeding. In summary, the state asked the judge to terminate parental rights, the guardian ad litem asked for termination of parental rights, and K's biological mother's lawyer quickly stated she had no defense. It has been about 2 months now since anyone has heard from her mother ... we each have our ideas about what happened, but no one knows. The next court date is July 8th. This is an advisory hearing to basically spell out the finality of the event and let her biological parents know they should probably have an attorney. If they find her mother and are able to serve her papers and she doesn't show for court - her rights will be terminated by default. If she shows up for the advisory hearing then the next court hearing is required to be held in 45 days. And if they can't find her, then my understanding is that a notice has to be published in the newspaper for 30 days before her rights are terminated.

In the meantime, Thomas and I will be pursuing her adoption. Yesterday after the hearing, the lady with the state department responsible for adoptions spoke with us about finalizing all our paperwork. She said they would be in touch shortly. Basically, the plan will be for us to make sure we have everything done in the next couple months so that we can file the adoption paperwork as soon as parental rights are terminated. So, we are looking at a few months at most.

Other things have also been happening. Thomas is now Professor Croom, or at least that is what I call him along with about 50 students that he is teaching this summer. This week is his first week teaching classes. Yeah! I couldn't be more excited that he is gotten to this point. It was a lot of hard work.

Also, my hard work for the year has ended ... the Legislative Session is over. To welcome the summer, I took a cruise with my sister for her big 40 birthday. This was a great trip for me, and my husband once again showed that he is top notch. He stayed at home for about 5 days by himself with the two little ones.

And also, I have decided to work a more part time schedule for the rest of the year to give myself more time with my new expanding family.

The children are fantastic. There is not much to say that hasn't already been said. We are by far their biggest fans! S. is learning new signs everyday. He also sometimes repeats words ... not as often as we would like. He is extremely smart. He understands most of what we say, follows multiple step directions, and learns quickly. He just isn't talking very much. Which isn't that big of a deal at his age, however, he is now in speech therapy twice a week. This a really good time for someone else to challenge him with words and sounds. Plus his therapist is teaching and reinforcing sign language. Thomas and I need to take more time to learn new signs on a regular basis and hope to take a class sometime soon. Yesterday he smiled for the first time for the camera ... and it was a big smile!



S. is going through what I hope is the worst of the terrible twos. He gets the opportunity to sit in time out a few times a day for either throwing, hitting, or some variation. As you can see in the photos below, S. loves his little sister. He also gets quite jealous of her. Usually this translates into wanting to be held at the same time. Luckily, she is now big enough to withstand his weight when he lays or sits on her.





K. has started to eat big kid food. She has been barely eating cereal for about a month now. So we decided to move her forward with some vegetables. Below is how she first felt about peas. But, its getting better. Tonight she did really good eating peas and carrots.



Today, we went swimming with the children for the first time with the children in the back yard. They were both OK with it. But Silas did get a little cold and was clutching us kindof hard around the neck for a little while.



And here are a few more pictures you can enjoy of Thomas and K chilling on the sofa one evening.