Summer...with a side of milk

I am so happy.....it's that simple....I am so  happy...i spend my days with my girls, i stay up late watching movies with my husband, i say "yes" to the pool, "yes" to ice cream, "yes" to sidewalk chalk and sprinklers...."yes"...and it feels so good. Summer has offically started, and has worked it's way back into our lives..... Like an old friend, picking up right where we left off, Summer and i are enjoying getting to know each other again.
And i am enjoying watching my girls make their own reintroductions.


Go get her my little hermit crab.....


Lately Ava and i have found a new love for sidewallk chalk. We play hopscotch and draw mermaids. Paloma goes between scribbles and eating the chalk.......never the less, i'm sure the neighbors by now are used to a grown woman chasing rolling chalk down the driveway or me running through the  sprinkler fully clothed.....did i say i'm happy? I'm happy:)


I think someone else is happy too...


Yum! Yellow...her favorite flavor! So many to choose from......


And now a few picturea by Ava, she loves to photograph Paloma...







......and mama, a treasure i found on the camera from our nap the other day..


We aren't quite there yet, but we are working on it, little by little. I am eight weeks into reclaiming what we lost....it isn't easy, and i've almost quit many times. But each time i want to give up something like this happens, and my girl keeps me going...........so yes, i am very happy.....

A Birthday Post

While planning Paloma's birthday, i could have never imagined that it would take me two months, one surgery, and my own birthday to be able to write about her party.

But i just wasn't in a good place.... I wasn't able to shake the feeling of "why her?" "Why us?" And it isn't really like me to be very upset over Down Syndrome. But as time was passing by and Paloma still couldn't eat solids, and still had reflux every day, and still wasn't crawling....it got easier and easier to get very, very upset over Down syndrome.

But that was then.....and times have changed. Baby girl can crawl, as of eight days after surgery to be exact, and she can eat...and feed herself....and do all of the things a big girl of one should be able to do....and mommy can breathe. Because my baby doesn't hurt any more.....so, on to birthdays......hers and mine.



Since the week after Paloma was born, i had been planning her party. I wanted a chance to do it right. I wanted to step out of my comfort zone and organize an evening with friends to celebrate our littlest girl. So we planned a fiesta, and a fiesta it was!

Friends came over early and helped us cut out papel picado banners to string from the trees and in the house....
We put up pictures from the year.....


And of family whom we wished were there.....


And as if Paloma knew how much i needed her close, she refused to be held by anyone but me. Keeping me tight in her little arms and her sweet voice whispering mama........if only i could have known this one year before....
 
And about our friends........our friends are......amazing. Looking around that night and seeing some of the same faces that where there in that hospital room, and in our home those first weeks, faces that smiled with so much love at my girl, faces that showered her with gifts and listened to me cry.......so much love in one tiny house.

Can you see it there, the love? Husbands doing dishes, new friends meeting old friends........everyone there to celebrate my girl....Love practically bursting out of my kitchen....


Speeches were made and Happy Birthday was sung...and in case you are wondering,.......  yes i cried.
I spoke briefly about the year......wishing for more good in the year to come....and about our love for our girl.

 I had no idea just how soon i would get my wish........



You are my wish Paloma...



and i think this says it all......


We did it Lady P........

So a fiesta for Paloma and  birthday cake on the beach for mama....



 beautiful luminous Ava.....


And sisters finding baby crabs in tide pools.....

Two beautiful perfect evenings.......and all is right in the world once more......I love you to the moon and back sweet girls....and i'd do it all again....every single moment.

Home, Answers and a Square Dance!

Some people say that you can't run away from your problems. I wasn't sure that i believed this to always be true. ....so after much thought,( not really) and some coaxing from my husband (not much)..... i ran away.

I canceled therapy, sleep studies, and ENT appointments. I declared it national stay away from my baby month. My girls and i were going to stay with my sister and get back to our roots. Ava was going to be allowed to run barefoot and spend entire days in the pool while Mandy and i watched over sun bathing babies and ate bon bons......the food and past time of choice for stay at home moms.

And this is exactly how the first two weeks played out. I declared almost daily that i was never going back to Georgia, and a Saturday night Square dance sealed the deal.

Something magical was in the air that night. The sound of Blue Grass floating through the air, mixing with the smell of  Kettle Corn and homemade ice cream. Watching the pack of cousins float from vendor to vendor as the little ones where used as pawns to ask for hand outs...I mean samples....





And i bet you'll never guess who was the Bell of the ball.....


We danced.....


And we danced some more....


Some of us even drank ice water out of Yoo-Hoo jars..



And the best part was, this wasn't some special holiday...it was just Saturday night.....
it was just...perfect.
And all the Nannies, me maws, pa paws and cousins were there, with plenty of kisses to go around.



Wouldn't you want a kiss from this face?


But like all magical Square dances, this one had to come to an end. And with it the reality, that you really can not run away from true problems.

Therapy appointments, and Doctor visits are not true problems. The fact that four and a half months since you were told that your baby had food allergies your baby can still only tolerate liquids That is a true problem....

So i put my "boots" on and went to yet another Dr. and pleaded with them that i believed that my baby had a common birth defect found in Down Syndrome, a duodenal stenosis. I am quite sure that sitting there with my chubby one year old, i sounded crazy, but i knew my baby. I knew what we had been through. And not another day of reflux, worry or what ifs was going to go by.

One week later we where on our way to be scoped. And because i was used to pleading with G.I. doctors to listen to me i begged. "Please look for a stenosis, i think she has a blockage." And he said,
........"I will.".......May not sound like much, but to this mama it was music to my ears.

Thirty minutes later, they had answers....A duodenal stenosis so severe that it my even be an atresia,
a mama in tears, and a doctor in a bear hug.

Surgery to be scheduled the next day..........the world was beautiful again. My girl would eat.

And mama had some pumping to do. Because we were robbed and i was going to reclaim what was taken from us.

So here we are, in beautiful east Tennessee on Mother's Day, going on day five in the hospital.....probably at least five to go.

And we did it........words can not express the road to this place, or the joys at the end.

Sweet Paloma, my baby dove, they don't know how you made it this far. How you have thrived and grown, with no more than a pin hole to receive your nutrition. But we know don't we.

........Love.

"Don't wish it away Peg."

I always try to be as honest as possible when i write....if i'm head over heals or hurting...i say so.
......and for that reason, i have yet to write Paloma's birthday post. 

I want the post to be as beautiful and perfect as her party was, but how can i be true to myself if i am hurting.....and then writing about hurting makes me feel guilty. As if i am saying i love my girl less because yes, sometimes Down Syndrome makes my chest ache. And sometimes i feel as if this war i have waged against a chromosome is futile, and just denial outfitted in false strength....And if i openly say that i may be having a hard time. What does that say about my daughter? Or people like her? What does that say about me as a mama?

I want to have a beautiful year. I want to rejoice in my amazing daughters. I want to have less appointments and more days at the beach. I want to think less about Down Syndrome and more about Paloma. I want to wake up one day and not question, not once, if i did enough that day with Ava, or if i did enough therapy with Paloma..........or what the hell happened to April.

Because I am so very blessed, and like a friend told me in high school, and i think of it often....
"Don't wish it away Peg."

Something Bigger

I don't think we were even into our first week with Paloma when i heard it for the first time, "A lot of families go on to adopt another child with Down syndrome after having one of their own."....

I'm sure i said something very dismissive and cold.........something along the lines of, "We are good with Paloma"......not meaning it in the best of ways.

But she was new, and i was new...and honestly, in that moment Paloma was enough.

But days flew by and i fell in love........and during one of many nights spent researching how i could help my girl, i clicked this Link .........

And there, staring back at me, were too many sets of almond eyes to count. And i knew, at that moment, that we were a part of something bigger.

See, in other countries, namely eastern Europe, when a baby is born less than what we consider "perfect" they do not get to go home with their families. They do not get mommies who wait patiently while they learn the difficult task of nursing or taking a bottle, or daddies that work side jobs on weekends, or paint portraits so that he can have that little extra to help his baby. They do not get pretty new sleepers and soft blankets, big sisters, hugs, kisses or even welcome committees.......instead, they go to an orphanage, they go to a crib, and they never know really what it is like to be.........Paloma......loved.

But let me tell you....there are families willing to pay the ransom for these children, willing to beg, willing give, and willing to say over and over again..."Yes, i want to be a part of something bigger."

And this year, for Paloma's birthday, that is exactly what we are going to do....

So instead of gifts, instead of more beautiful clothes and wonderful toys, we are asking our friends to come to our home, celebrate the life of this wonderful little spirit, and on the anniversary of the day that forever changed my life, help for ever change the life of another little girl...a little girl across the ocean, who needs to be here with her mama.....

Remind you of anyone?


You can read her beautiful story here,  and if you'd like there is a box on the right, where you can be a part of something bigger. But you don't have to give to make a difference, you just have to know.......

Sweet big girl, i'm so glad your mama found you...

because everyone deserves a mama......

And to be a part of something bigger......

Under Current

There is something stirring beneath the surface, something has shifted, and like many times before, it is taking me a few days to find my footing. .... a quiet quickening, a sudden thought...and if i'm not careful a moment of self doubt that threatens to bring down all of the good of my day...our day.

Ava found some good...and she took a picture.........


I have been questioning.... Why? Why do i feel so........off....and then it hit me........it's been nearly a year.
It's been nearly a year since my world was rocked.......
And my heart is getting ready for that day, that moment on the clock, on April 7th, at 5:34.......when it was broken in half........


My life is now defined in two parts, clearly and perfectly divided...before Paloma, and after Paloma.....and as much as it has hurt......i like this second part much better.
But that doesn't mean that it still doesn't hurt sometimes. Because it does.......especially now, and for reasons that i won't say, i'm hurting........

I have come to realize that what i have been feeling, is an under current of sorts, and it is me pulling back to where it all began... to those first hours with Paloma.  What we felt, was so gut wrenching, and so real....a hurt like no other, and that place that we lived in those first few days was unlike any earthly place, or state of being that i had ever felt...... Such a rich, heightened sense of fear and love, heartache and the unknown.......all in one tiny face.....


It is still so raw, that i can barely look at pictures of her birth....... because i remember that girl........and i want to tell her that it will all be ok...more than ok.......and i want to hold her baby....and love her while she gathers the strength to do it herself....because i know the ending, and i know this love.....

I want to go back to that room, but i don't know what i will find.....will i find who i left there? I don't think so......

That's the thing about under currents...they decide where they take you.

And i think i need to ride this wave all the way to the end.
.......because my baby is turning one.......and this time, when that clock hits 5:34...my heart better get ready........

Because it's gona explode......

And i'm gona celebrate the hell out of my lucky little package.....

Lucky Charm

Ava made me a mama.....

Ava loves when i tell her all of the beauties and extra specialness of that first baby. She loves to hear how upon seeing her all i could say was, "Thank you Jesus"......She loves to hear her birth story, snuggled up close to me, we go over every detail.....she knows her story by heart......


It doesn't seem possible that in just a few hours, my sweet girl will turn five.....five is the very edge of big girl....and as of tonight, she has a missing tooth to prove it.......In case your wondering, yes...i cried


Being Ava's mama is sacred and something so embedded into who i am, that it is difficult to put into words... having Paloma has only heightened this relationship and created a stronger bond between us.....my first baby..My Ava.

Going through pictures for this post, and seeing my baby again, was so bitter sweet. It is so easy to let time slip by, not to notice the subtle changes that occur day by day......until the only Ava that i see is my big girl....i guess she's always been my big girl.....


Ava always ahead of the game, Ava so witty and smart, Ava beautiful inside and out..........
Thank you Jesus.........
Happy Happy Birthday my lucky charm......I love you to the moon and back...