Tomorrow, tomorrow I love you tomorrow... I REALLY DO!

I'm starting to write this post on Wednesday afternoon while the kids are cracking up watching Wipeout repeats on demand. I love hearing children laugh, it truly is one of my favorite sounds in the entire world and let's face it this world has millions of sounds to choose from, but that's my story and I'm sticking to it. Thursday is a big day and I wanted to be able to share this ASAP!

J has been in baseball camp this week. He loves baseball almost as much as he loves Lego's. He is excited to be part of a team, so hopefully we will be able to sign him up for fall ball if he is still interested in playing after the intensive introduction he is receiving this week. The coaches have been working on skills with the boys all week and they have games scheduled for Thursday and Friday mornings. Thursday morning was J's judicial review in court so I attended that while Michael filmed the start of J's game. I arrived in time for the last half of the game. It was fun watching little guys bat and slide, bat and slide, bat and slide. But enough about ground in stains on brand new white ball pants - yup that's right Michael bought him WHITE ball pants - it is easy to see who doesn't do the laundry in this house.

So about this morning in court, first I'm thankful to be able to say I drove myself into downtown Tampa and I made it home safely. Now for what we know about the adoption after the judge had her input.

Here is what we were looking for going into today...

1. An update on the at risk situation that could prevent J from being adoptable, unlikely to be resolved today but sure would be nice.
~ The judge was not impressed that this has not yet been resolved - it should be old news by now but she set a future court date for this to be completed.

2. Solidifying when J can move in as a non-relative placement, as adoptive placement is currently not an option.

~TOMORROW! TOMORROW!

HE MOVES IN TOMORROW! 

3. Will the judge approve us taking J to Canada? Will she provide a letter to that effect stating we have permission to apply for a passport for him?
~Yes we have her approval - an official order will be completed this afternoon. 

So that's what happened today, and here's where we go from here....

1. Take the boy to get passport photos taken.
2. A day trip for mom, dad and J to Miami to try to get that mystical passport.
3. Get packed for Canada - one way or the other some of us are headed north!

UPDATE July 27, 2012 - THERE'S (at least) TWO SIDES TO EVERY STORY


So when I originally published this blog J didn't yet know about the exciting moving in news. Michael and I took him to his therapy appointment in the afternoon, where his therapist told him he would be moving in while he was on neutral territory without the pressure of reacting for our benefit. We could hear his excited "woohoo" from out in the waiting area. He took the news VERY well and my eyes filled with tears as Michael and I sat there and stared at each other in silence. I should preface this by saying his therapist has been preparing him for the adoption and this move for months now. After his therapist told him he was moving in with us forever, the very next day and his initial excitement wore off he asked her about his foster parents, "Will they miss me? Will they be sad?" I know from experience when we were foster parents, YES they will miss him. He was in his last foster home for just short of 18 months, that is a real blessing in that he had that stability for the first time in his life. His foster parents are wonderful people who have trained J to be a kind, caring and polite boy and I'm sure he will miss them too.


His therapist also talked with him about the possibilty of him traveling to Canada with us and that got another great reaction. She did explain that there is still the issue of a passport to be worked out and if that comes through then we are off for International adventures!!! 


So that brings us to today, Michael & I, along with R, picked J up just before 8 this morning. He hugged his foster mom goodbye and we grabbed the last couple of  bags of his possessions and loaded in the van for the drive to the last day of baseball camp. Yesterday when we got in the van after leaving the therapist's office he said this was the 'best day of his life.' :-) He then went on to say 'we should have a celebration and a cake.' So after I left them at the field this morning I headed over to Publix to buy a cake, ice cream, balloons, and poster board to make a Welcome Home banner. Tonight , while T is here between babysitting gigs, we will eat dinner, have cake and ice cream for desert and celebrate our son's first offical day living with us as a family. 


BTW we are back to a change of first name again - I really thought that had died off but he REALLY wants to change his first name and get a fresh start in as many ways as he can. Although a change of name can't change his past, it is something he has voiced repeatedly to a variety of people - including a random boy who was helping coach him at ball camp yesterday. The boy was wearing a Newsome Baseball t-shirt and J connected the dots and asked if he knew T - he did, what are the chances of that? Newsome high school has over 2000 students. T's friend texted her that he just met her brother.....Sawyer McIntosh.

Weekend dynamics...SO much energy

So last weekend we enjoyed the company of our son, the six of us had a full weekend together. The six of us...the six of us. Why does that sound like SO much more than the five of us? Another question, how can one little boy make SO much more noise than three tween/teen girls? The Wii brings out the fierce competitor in him. He frequently enters the room with a back flip over the ottoman. What? Why walk across the floor when you can incorporate a hand spring or two? All of this energy is amazing. Honestly boys are SO much different from girls - even three girls together. The more time we spend with J the more time I think back to growing up with my own little brother and all my broken toys that accompanied having said little brother. While I was content to spend my childhood quietly alone in my bedroom reading, Ian was outside, no matter the weather, playing in the dirt or the snow depending on the season. My brother was in constant motion, much like his nephew.

One of my favorite moments from the weekend was Friday night when the kids had voted for homemade pizza night over homemade Chinese food. Pizza won - sorry K - but homemade Chinese food came around on Saturday night. Sorry for the diversion, Friday night J & R were working feverishly at their mounds of fresh pizza dough and J says, "Remember last time we made pizza and mine looked like Florida?" Remember last time? Our son is making family memories over a lump of pizza dough. Teary eyed moment. As a mom I love hearing our girls reminisce about favorite memories and have struggled with the fact that J has missed out on 11 years of memory making with us and our families. There will be many inside jokes and funny stories that he won't get and we will have to explain - you know nothing is ever as funny when you hear it retold rather than being there to see it in person. On the flip side he too has 11 years of memories that we will not know about unless he chooses to share them with us. That being said we have many more years ahead of us to make new memories together.

J's pizza masterpiece

A start to the memory making was the Star Wars marathon on our first weekend visit together. We watched the first three original Star Wars movies one each night Friday thru Sunday. We grabbed snacks, blankets and pillows everyone settled in for a couple of hours with an occasional interruption by J, "This is fun!" ~ I agree J ~ SO much fun!

New shirt, new shoes, no problem

It's taken me a while to get around to writing this post, I apologize. Adopting takes lots of time and energy outside of what I write about here. It is emotionally and mentally draining by times. Oh and I DO have a family of three girls and a husband to be concerned about while maneuvering the adoption hoops. Two cats, and a dog with a penchant for eating non-food items. Add in a new son who now understands the meaning of "be sure to pick up your socks and put them where the dog can't get them." Ugh! Mentally and emotionally draining and as for the dog - yes he is "drained" too.

Last week we had visits with J almost every day. Our usual Tuesday and Thursday visits were both shall we say "unusual." An extra visit on Wednesday due to a slight complication with the timing of Tuesday's visit. See emotionally and mentally draining mentioned above. Thursday was unexpectedly longer than usual - again emotionally and mentally draining when you think his case worker is picking him up and she thinks you are picking him up and come to find out he is at the foster home waiting for anyone to pick him up. Friday was R's birthday and J got to spend the afternoon with us and come along for birthday dinner out. In preparation for R's birthday dinner out I had purchased a chambray shirt and tan shorts for J. He still needed shoes and R wanted TOMS for her birthday gift. So off to the mall we went. This seemed like a new experience for J. R was thrilled with her black sparkly TOMS and we knew J had found his perfect pair when they turned into dancing shoes in the middle of the shoe store. Too cute.

Did I forget to mention dear husband had to work 7 days straight starting July 1st, including MANY late nights? J really misses Michael when he isn't around. Out of the blue this week J was playing on the Wii with T & R and he says, "I really need Dad, I need Dad the most." Awwwww..... yes it was just that sweet and it was so unexpected.

Sunday everyone was home - all day! Michael wasn't working, T wasn't babysitting and J arrived at noon. We had a nice afternoon - J got a new ball glove that needs to be broken in for the baseball camp he will be attending in a couple of weeks. He also got to go to church with us. Now if you were at church on Sunday and are wondering why you didn't get to meet J - Michael and I were teaching 4th & 5th graders in Building B at the 5 o'clock service. It just so happens that J is in the right grade for our class. So we got to see him in a new environment. He did really well. It was a small class with only 3 students including him - the only other boy there he had met the previous Sunday at our Canada day celebration. What a blessing that was - they joked around and were silly together - it was nice to see J so comfortable his first time at church. Of course we did have the opportunity to introduce him to a few new people, nice how certain people just happened to be there. :-) Meeting so many new people has to be overwhelming, I know it would be for me.

This week our visitation scheduled has been changed, to avoid a repeat of all the confusion of last week's visits. We now will visit on Wednesday's and ALL WEEKEND - Friday - Monday - OVERNIGHTS. This is a major step forward. So about those goals in my last post...

~ first sleepover July 6th did not happen
~ first weekend visit July 13-15th YES! scheduled
~ move in date July 20th - the week before J's baseball camp begins. Not going to happen
~ The current court date is set for the end of July so I'm going to hope it can get moved up to the week of July 16th. Not going to happen

~ At that court date July 26th I'm hoping we will solidify the move in date as an official adoption placement and that we will get a court order for approval to take J to Canada on vacation. Adoption placement cannot take place until 30-60 days after this court date HOWEVER he may be able to move in as a non-relative placement following court. We'll take it! Still holding out hope for Canada though. 
~ Of course the item I continue to have no control over THE PASSPORT! ASAP PLEASE! Still hoping.

Updated goals

We had such a great Canada day visit with our son and with wonderfully supportive American friends. 

Thanks mom for sending us all the fun decorations. 

It was nice that J got to meet a few of our friends and their fabulous children. Last night as we finished the clean up from the gathering I reflected on the fact that Canada Day had been my goal for our first unsupervised visit with J. We actually had our first unsupervised visit on June 19th almost 2 full weeks ahead of our goal.

July is going to be a very big month in our adoption process. There is a court date to deal with the ongoing "at risk" concern. Hopefully this will be resolved this month and there will be no question that this sweet boy will officially become a McIntosh. There is the potential that J will begin to have sleepover visits this month and "maybe" even move in. We are hoping J's first sleepover will actually be this Friday which also happens to be R's 12th birthday - what a present that would be. We know for sure he can come spend the day with us and go out for dinner to celebrate R's birthday. The tears at the end of our visits are getting more and more difficult to deal with. We are all growing closer and it now feels even more unnatural to return him to his foster home at the end of our visits. July 1st was a big day marking the beginning of this month where many things need to happen. Not the least of which is the continued search for the elusive passport.

Because our goals have been met or exceeded up to this point I'm going to step out and set some new ones -
~ first sleepover July 6th
~ first weekend visit July 13-15th
~ move in date July 20th - the week before J's baseball camp begins.
~ The current court date is set for the end of July so I'm going to hope it can get moved up to the week of July 16th.
~ At that court date I'm hoping we will solidify the move in date as an official adoption placement and that we will get a court order for approval to take J to Canada on vacation.
~ Of course the item I continue to have no control over THE PASSPORT! ASAP PLEASE!

One week closer

We had our first week of unsupervised visits with our little guy this past week. He really got to see what life would be like living in our home. Just the routine, mundane, day in day out stuff. T is babysitting full time and not home until after 5 each day. R was away at her first youth camp. K was here with us most of the time. Michael had to work late, an unfortunate reality of our lives, and didn't get to see J a couple of nights. Better this than his initial visits being filled with expectations of being the center of the universe and trips to Disney World and Legoland - this is real life. Don't get me wrong the Disney and Legoland trips will come later but for now we just want to maintain the monotony. Tuesday we had a 4 hour visit that I detailed in this earlier post.

It was just the two of us for a while on Wednesday's visit. When I asked what he wanted to do until K got home from school (K is participating in extended school year) he suggested WE make chocolate chip cookies.  So we stopped to buy chocolate chips on the way home. This is where he met Bryana - she is the first family friend to have met our son. I'm sure his take was that we have extremely friendly cashiers at our local Publix. It was SO much fun to bake with him. Initially when we got home he went to his room and commenced playing Legos and told me to 'let him know when the cookies were ready.' I explained that this is not how WE bake cookies. So together WE made his first ever batch of chocolate chip cookies and then continued to make a batch of gingersnaps that K could have. Half way through the first batch of cookies, after he cracked an egg to perfection, he suggested he and I get our own TV cooking show. He obviously felt more confident in his baking abilities. He frequently reminds me of the significance of the small things I have done and continue to do with our girls. From the time they were able to stand on a chair in the kitchen and almost reach the counter top the girls were baking with me or Grammie Susan.

K and R baking up a storm in Charter's Settlement.

Wednesday's visit also included a trip to the Y for his swimming lessons in the middle of our visit. K and T got to come along and watch him at his lesson.

Our official visit schedule is 4 hours Tuesday & Thursday afternoons. so we had another visit on Thursday. Any other mutually agreeable visitation times between his foster mom & I are just a bonus. For example Friday for 8 hours! On Friday R got home from youth camp and her brother was with us when we picked her up from church and he met many people there. Later when we asked him if he remembered this person or that person - he couldn't remember who any of them were. Sorry everyone. It was a bit overwhelming I'm sure because they have all been hearing about him for weeks but they were all new to him. In true brotherly fashion he grabbed onto her pretty pink suitcase and pulled it around the parking lot while we each introduced him to this friend and that friend. I'm not sure how this came to be that J took her suitcase from her but I was impressed by this chivalrous act. I'm sure there will come a point in the future that their brother- sister relationship takes a turn in a different direction and I'll be happy for this small act of kindness.

For now we will have a quiet weekend at home and see our boy again on Tuesday.

Have a wonderful weekend everyone!

A whole new world - transitioning to unsupervised visits

UNSUPERVISED VISIT NUMBER ONE!

You can't even imagine how exciting today's visit with J was. K and I went to pick up J and the three of us went to the library (more on that later) then to Publix to get food to grill for dinner. We went swimming and just hung out at home.  Can't you just feel the excitement? No - well maybe it is just us. Unfortunately R is away at Youth Camp this week and she gave us strict instructions "not to do anything fun" while she is at camp this week. She was particularly concerned that we not do anything on our Summer Bucket List with J while she is away.

FaceTime with Grammie Susan, Grampy Terry and Uncle Ian was fun. We all got to see a new side to our sweet mannerly boy - competition on the Wii!!!! He likes to win! Of course so does everyone here so he is in good company and has stiff competition.

So allow me to elaborate on the visit in more detail. J's Guardian ad litem gave him a Rays flier the other day about their summer reading incentives, so I took him to the library - we spend a lot of time there and I figured he should have his own library card. Brace yourselves, guess what you need to get a library card for a child?  A BIRTH CERTIFICATE OR A PASSPORT!!! I could have died right there. For any of you who have been following along you know that we have been trying to obtain a passport for J since our May disclosure meeting with the intent to bring him on vacation to Canada in August. So now I can't even get my sweet son a library card let alone flying across international borders - the boy just wants to borrow a book or two. That was like a slap in the face to start the visit but we moved on and went shopping - grocery shopping but shopping none the less.

Just an FYI to our local Publix shoppers, Publix has not instituted a new sound track for your listening pleasure that is my son walking skipping around Publix singing "Mom, Mom, Mom, do we need chips mom? What time is dad getting home mom? Mom, let sis pick out which salad we get, mom." All the while grinning from ear to ear. He looked at me at one point and said. "I'm getting used to this mom" referring to using the family words he was trying to wear out. :-)

At home we waited for T & Michael to get home from work. J snacked on some grapes and then got to see his new bedding.  He liked it! Time being short we fired up the grill right away and hit the pool - well the kids hit the pool and Michael fired up the grill I just smiled a lot at each one of them. Now let me tell you, this boy may be small for his age but he can eat!!! Two burgers, one hot dog and a good helping of barbque chips washed down with a huge glass of milk. Vanilla ice cream came later for dessert. I think the size 8 swim trunks I bought him will fit a little better by the end of the summer if he continues eatting like this. :-)

We played on the Wii for a few games of baseball. J obviously had to create a Mii profile before he could play. That was interesting. Watching him design how he sees himself. Also he named his profile JJ -  he only has one J in his name but this made me think of you Jana. I didn't mind that he wanted to be creative with his name because when we first got the Wii the girls created all kinds of Mii's with all kinds of names, Oprah, Dr Phil, Simon Baker, Archie comic characters you get the picture so JJ isn't a stretch by any means. This was obviously more involved than I thought though. On the drive to his foster home J started a conversation about "What should my new first name be?" That was interesting. He tossed around a few possibilities. Jay, Ben, Michael (wonder where he got that one?) In MAPP classes we heard about children sometimes wanting to change their names to signify their new start in life. I really didn't see this coming and we really like his given name but if he wants to change his name we will support him. I'll keep you posted on this, I'm anxious to see how it turns out.

Awesomeness and fancy restaurants

There is no other way to describe this past week. Monday afternoon Michael & I met our son, our daughters met their brother and J met his forever family. Tuesday afternoon I went to his school and met with his teachers who all sang his praises in the behavior and work ethic departments. J struggles in school and will need some intensive instruction to catch up with his peers. I'm hoping with enough structured one on one directed instruction he will make significant gains this next school year. Before I left school I got to say a quick hello to J and get one of those hugs. Wednesday was J's swimming lesson and his foster mom REALLY wanted me to have an individual visit with him without the "distraction" of Michael and the girls. Heehee, she really has strong opinions but she does love J. So J and I had a nice 1 hour visit with just the two of us. I took along the video camera which, let's be honest, has spent the majority of the past 5+ years collecting dust.  I had planned on video taping his swimming lesson but when I was telling that to my mom the night before she suggested he and I interview each other on tape. So we did! It was fun. I asked him some very basic "getting to know you" stuff. He giggled lots and I learned a little more about him. He has never been to Disney World and has his sights set on visiting there and Legoland. He LOVES all things Lego and baseball. He definitely wants to please us, when I asked him if he could travel anywhere in the world to visit where would he go - his response was Canada. I accused him of playing favorites because we are Canadian, his response was a sheepish grin and denial. We are still hopeful to have him travel with us but there are legal steps to be taken to ensure he can get a passport. Unfortunately we have no control over these kinds of things at this point so I just keep asking and asking to see if others are getting done whatever they need to do.  So far no progress but I will hold out hope for a complete family trip to New Brunswick in August. Thursday was just an ordinary day. Yesterday J and his foster parents came to our house for dinner. Yup - our son came home - just for a two hour visit but he was here.  He came through the door and very shortly after greeting each of us he looked at me and said, "I wonder which one is my room?" I told him we would check it out after dinner.  So we all sat down to eat and then began the house tour.  Of course we started with his room. It is almost complete - at least there is a bed in there now - that just got established yesterday morning. We ordered his bedding but it hadn't arrived yet. Hope he likes it.

He then got the complete house tour including his sisters rooms and our room. He was very excited about seeing the pool which, thanks to the monsoon that was happening when they arrived, was filled to the brim.

After the tour J and the girls hung out in his room and visited and he explored some of the things in his room. Most of which are hand me downs from his sisters. His favorite find was a Nintendo DS that T no longer uses. Michael said J opened the case it was in and said, "It's just like new." For those of you who know T that will come as no surprise. All three girls went through their DS games and he now has quite a collection of games to choose from. To our surprise he did not ask to take anything with him when he left. He put everything back in its place and it will all be waiting for him on his next visit.

We then gathered at the table for dessert and J showed us the homemade bracelet he was wearing.  It had the initials "J" & "M" on it and a number of colored beads.  The J & M obviously stand for his new name. The other beads represented each of us in his life and each of our pets and he had one bead to represent sports which he obviously loves. It was very cute to see that he is thinking about us just like we think about him when we are not together.

When the time came to say goodbye for the night he ran straight into Michael's arms for a great big full on man style bear hug - good grief - then the girls and I each got snugly little side hugs and big grins. He is going to love having a daddy, and in my humble opinion Michael is the best there is.

So the obvious question is when will our next visit be? Right now all we have scheduled is a visit on Thursday afternoon. Hoping we get another one between now and then. Also related to visitation is the fact that his worker told me on Thursday that she would like to see us begin our UNSUPERVISED visits with J on June 24th. That is not too far away.

If you are taking prayer requests, here are ours for this next week, more than one visit with J, positive movement towards obtaining a passport for J to travel to Canada with us, and more unsupervised visits on the official calendar.

Oh and back to the interviews we did, his cutest question for me was, "Do you like to eat at fancy restaurants?" Of course I said, "Yes!"