1,000th Post

This is my one thousandth post! I am sure a few people, such as my mom, have actually read all those posts. I started this blog in December 2006 shortly after we started the process to adopt two children from Ukraine. When I started this blog, we had already tried to adopt a newborn within the US for 2 years and tried to conceive for 4 1/2 years. We had lost one baby in July 2005. Early in the summer of 2007 we found out that our 2.5 year contract with Lifetime was coming to a close without us ever being presented with a possible match with a birthmother and also that our translated dossier was going to expire in Ukraine before it was submitted to their government agency that processes adoptions. In light of those two "closed doors" we signed a contract with a different domestic newborn adoption facilitator and also began our first cycle of IVF. That summer it was very hard to understand why trying to conceive and trying to adopt (both domestic and international) were so difficult for us. I really thought by 2007 we'd finally become parents through adoption. However God had another wonderful plan for our family. It's amazing to think that in October 2007 we were still childless (having lost the 3 embryos transferred that August), and now 2 years later we have a precious 15 month old daughter and are expecting our son to be born in 3 months (I'm 25 weeks today). Praise the Lord!

I'm sure it's pretty obvious, but I love being a Mommy!! Of course every "rose" has its "thorns." For me, I'd say the thorniest part of being a parent has been the sleep deprivation. Those first four months were tough, and although I cannot wait to hold my son in my arms, I admit I'm dreading the weeks and possibly months of getting very little sleep. I got a brief taste of it again last night as Nadia woke up sometime after midnight and didn't go back down until almost 4am. Monday night she woke up crying at 10pm, and I gave her Tylenol and let her rest on top of me while I was in bed for about 20 minutes and then she easily went back down in her crib. Last night Paul had a hard time putting her down to bed, so he kept her up until I got home (a little after 8pm). I gave her Tylenol and put her down. She fell asleep about 8:15pm, about an hour later than usual. When she first awakened in the middle of the night, I went and brought her to our bed and she actually fell asleep on me. It was very peaceful listening to Paul & Nadia sleep, but of course I was also wanting some sleep! So I took her back to her crib, but she immediately started crying. I let her cry awhile, and then went and got her and gave her Tylenol and again she fell asleep on me in our bed. Again she screamed when I took her back to her crib. After letting her cry awhile, Paul tried giving her milk and rocking her, but she just kept crying even in his arms. I brought her back to our bed, but this time she just wanted to play, and it was 3:30am! After awhile I took her back to her crib and thankfully this time she finally fell asleep after crying just a few minutes. She slept from 4-7:30am and was very fussy in the morning until after her morning nap, which thankfully was 2 hours long (much longer than usual). She's been sneezing a lot the last couple of days, and today whenever she sneezes, junk comes out of her nose. She at least has a mild cold. If we have another rough night tonight (I hope not!), I am going to ask a doctor to look in her ears tomorrow morning when I have my OB appt. She doesn't have a fever, but she definitely doesn't feel well.

The outfit she's wearing today (see the picture above) was a yard sale purchase. I never used to shop at yard sales, but I have quickly become a fan of them! :-)