Rough Week

As I have stated time and time again the 4th week of every month is a really rough week for me and this month was no different. We tried to start off the week on a happy note, Adelé does such a great job of that!

But Tuesday was rough.  Adelé was really tired on Tuesday and so I took off a little bit earlier than usual to be at home with her.  She fell earlier in the day and had a little bump on her head and didn't feel well, I felt awful for our little bug.

That night as we were up in the bedroom I was putting laundry away and she was chasing after Dinky with the laundry basket, in between her giggles and squeals, she tripped and hit her face hard on our bed frame.  There was blood everywhere.  All over her, all over the floor, all over me.  It was a really rough night.  Once I was able to figure out where all the blood was coming from and get everyone cleaned up she was back to her happy old self.  I on the other hand still had a lot on my mind due to really big deadlines at work that I needed to meet, but I felt awful that she fell so hard that I laid with her until midnight - she fell asleep by 8:30 but I didn't want to put her down.

On Wednesday I was feeling so stressed and overwhelmed, I felt bad that Adelé hit her head the night before and I needed to deal with some tough personnel issues at work by the end of the week.   When I went to drop her off at Kim's house that day I totally spaced to leave her diaper bag there and went running into my 7 AM meeting not even realizing that I had the diaper bag and not my work bag.  All I can say is I am glad I work for an organization that is so understanding and that they all made a big joke out of it.  
Although as are all kids Adelé is very resilient and so was totally fine the next day, which was good because the Young Women were doing their Pine Wood Derby that night and I was responsible for quite a bit of it.  She came with me and loved watching the cars go down the track.  That night I was in need of some stress relief and laughs - Adelé knew just what to do.  I love this girl!

Once she was in bed that night I took a picture to send to Oley to let him know just how good our week was going - obviously not well.

After work on Thursday all of the tough issues were taken care of and deadlines met so Adelé and I tried on her Halloween costume to make sure that it was going to fit for Halloween night.  She loves the little tutu.   We danced around the house in it for 45 minutes before I needed to take it off of her to go to bed.  I am so incredibly blessed to have her as my daughter.  I knew that there were going to be rough weeks and easy weeks - this just seems to be one of those weeks. 

Pumpkin Patch

We try to make the most of the weekends when Oley is home so this weekend we went to breakfast with Aunt Shawnie and then hit up the pumpkin patch.  It looked as though it was going to be a typical Washington day - little overcast and chilly but still manageable to do something outside, so we were excited to do the pumpkin patch.
 Once we got to the pumpkin patch out of the car it was raining a little bit. 

 Soon it began to pour.

We found ourselves a little spot under a tent for cover.  Oley was drenched! 

Once it lightened up we continued along.  Adelé loved looking at the pigs but especially loved coloring.

I wanted to get a couple of picture of her but she just wasn't having it this trip.

We ended our trip with a stop at the toddler's pumpkin patch.  She loved walking through and picking up the pumpkins.

It was a lot of fun and we definitely will add this as one of our fall traditions. 

Feeling Confident

Week three and I am starting to feel like I am getting good at this, so good that I even cooked dinner three times this week!  That's right!

Adelé is becoming more confident too, she has started drinking from a cup.

Before this point we didn't have to put the dogs away that often but now we do every morning and she loves to help me with that - she'll walk behind them and yell "Go!".

Adelé got to go to work with me on Thursday.   I took her into a meeting and Tina my co-worker loved it.  She got out all her highlighters and notepads and let Adelé go to town.  Adelé had a ball!  When we got home she thought she was queen of the world.

This week has gone so much better!  I am feeling like I can do this for 8 more months!

Conference

We have kind of made it tradition that we go up to Grandma and Grandpa's for General Conference, so not to break tradition we did the same this past weekend.  Much like last year the American Heart Association was doing their annual heart walk.  My team at work had put together a team for our LVAD patients.  Saturday morning before driving to Mill Creek for conference Adelé and I went to be with my work team.   It's simply amazing the work that our physicians do.  We had over 15 of our patients there who have had a LVAD implanted, none of these patients would have been able to complete the 1.5 mile walk that we went on before having the implant and all of them were able to finish the walk.  Simply amazing!

Adelé loves going to Grandma and Grandpa's she loves Papa George.  Adelé did really well playing quietly while we listened to the afternoon session.

While the men went to the Priesthood session my Grandma and I took Adelé over to a park near their house.  I love going with just my Grandma.  As we were driving to the park we got a little lost and she got extremely frustrated with herself that she couldn't remember how to get to where we were going.  But the thing I love most about my Grandma is even when she is down and frustrated with herself she is always able to say something positive towards another person.  This struck me this past weekend and I have made it a goal of mine to be more liker her in that regard.  Adelé loved the park!

She is growing so quickly.  Every time I take a picture of her I look at it and think where is my little baby going.

Second Week Down

That's right we have successfully completed 2 weeks in this new routine.  At the beginning of the week I was not feeling so successful, but I am feeling much more confident now that it's over.  It was definitely a rough week.  I am sure by the end of the week Oley was feeling like this was never going to work with all of my texts letting him know how extremely difficult it was becoming.  This was me by the end of my work day on Monday - defeated.

It all started on Monday when dropping Adelé off.  She was wide awake and ate breakfast with an upbeat personality.  When I asked if she wanted to go play with Kim and her friends she enthusiastically said "Yay"!  So I drove her over to Kim's (the neighbor who watches her) and she practically leaped into Kim's arms and gave her a big hug and said "bye mom!".  It was disheartening to me that she doesn't even have a hard time going to the babysitter's house in the mornings. 
When I went to pick her up that day she wanted to stay and play with the kids longer.  As I recounted this with my colleagues, who all have grown children, the overwhelming response was be grateful she loves to go, it's heartbreaking having to drop them off and have them scream as you walk out the door.  It's true, I should be glad she is loving going to the babysitter, but it's been hard for me that it's not hard at all for her (that sounds awful), I don't want her to be sad but you know what I mean.
On Tuesday morning, I got her out of the car and she ran up to the front porch.  When Kim answered the door she ran in and then realized she hadn't grabbed her lunch box from me yet, she ran back got her lunch box and then waved "bye mom" as she hurried away.  I just had to repeat to myself the entire way to work - it's better than her crying, she's loving this arrangement I need to like it too.  She loves getting to play with other kids and it's so good for her to be able to, but it's so hard knowing she doesn't miss me at all.    
This week was full of A LOT of phone calls to grandma.  Adelé has learned how to call people on my phone.  I have pictures of most of our close family and so she finds the picture of the person she wants to talk to and she calls them.

 She loves to stack her blocks as tall as she can get them and then they fall over.

I absolutely love Adelé.  It's been somewhat of a blessing having Oley gone.  It really has given me the opportunity to rearrange my work schedule so I spend a lot more time at home with Adelé.  It will be fabulous when he is completely done and I can spend this much time with her all the time. 

I am so grateful for all the love Adelé has in her life and all the support we have, she loves to read her adoption book at night.  She points to every picture in the book and says who each person is, she always takes a little extra time on this picture with Papa Greg - she may not see him often but she sure does have a special place for him.

By Thursday I was still having a hard time with the fact that Adelé was just loving going to the babysitter, so much that I prayed a lot asking Heavenly Father if maybe I needed to find a job in Spokane and we all just move there.  When I got to Kim's house to pick Adelé up that afternoon, unlike every other day when she didn't want to leave, she came running to me yelling "mom, mom" she gave me a big hug and topped it off with a kiss.  It was exactly what I needed - I knew then that this is exactly what the Lord wants us to be doing.  Having Adelé in an LDS home where she gets to play with girls her age and get some social interaction for a few hours every day is good for all of us and the fact that she is loving going is a great sign.  I am so grateful for the tender mercies the Lord continues to bless us with.

She is a little firecracker and a lot to keep up with but I absolutely love her!