Let’s relive the moment together.

Mike took Delaney to school with him because it was his last week of school and everyone is all hippied out on the last week of school often allowing furry animals, child animals and party snacks etc. into their classrooms. And also I was all “HOW ABOUT YOU TAKE DELANEY WITH YOU ON A DADDY DAUGHTER OUTING!?” (Read: Take your child or there is no guarantee of dinner, a clean house OR sex tonight or for the next week).

So they went. It was about 12:30 at this point.

I, being deliriously tired having been awakened to the sweet morning dew at 5 am that morning, did what any normal person would do with a couple free hours and exhaustion infiltrating the inner sanctums of the mind. I took a bunch of pictures of myself!

Every 7 or 8 months or so, I like to study my face. Like I’m a scientific researcher. See how I’m aging. See how other people see me. See what I look like when I say things like “DELANEY TAKE THAT OUT OF YOUR MOUTH AND GIVE IT BACK TO THAT STRANGER!” Because I don’t have time to study my face everyday in the mirror. That’s totally weird anyway. Everyone knows that if you really want to see your face, you take self portraits of yourself with your camera. Duh.

Don’t act like ya’ll don’t do this. Because we both know that you do. Maybe you delete them afterwards instead of posting them on the internet, but nevertheless, self-portrait-takers are everywhere, living amongst us all.

So, uh, there’s what I looked like the day I got the call of our new son.

After I finished that task, I headed upstairs to blast some music and clean the house. As I was compiling an awesome playlist of tunes from my classy and intellectual repertoire of song options, my best friend Erica called me. I don’t even remember what about, but we were talking, complaining, validating, the usual, when I heard the beep for the other line. I checked my phone and saw “WHFC calling” on the screen.

At this point, I inexplicably morphed into Mary Murphy where I couldn’t control it, everything that came out my mouth was about 4 octaves higher and 20 decibels LOUDER than I intended for it to be. From this moment on, for the rest of the story and for the rest of that day, I was inflicted with this condition.

So, I screamed something to the affect of “OHMYGAADITISOTHERLINESMEEGLESMANDERHIZZLE” and hung up on Erica.

I clicked over to the other line and said, again, with entirely too much force “HELLO?” And lo and behold it was Erin, our sweet social worker on the other end of my yodle. But I couldn’t let myself fully concentrate on what happened next because it registered in my mind at that moment that a somewhat ludicrous rap song was playing from the speakers of my computer, the kind of rap song you can only play when your child is out of the house with her father during his last hippied out week of class. And I thought to myself “This is wrong. I’m getting the call right now and my speakers are busting out some gangster grind”.

So I fidgeted with the speaker volume for a minute and then got flabbergasted and went into the actual music program and finally found the button to make it stop, I wasn’t about to let someone tell me of my new child to the tune of Cypress Hill, Insane in the Brain.

After that fiasco was diverted, I came back to the moment and literally screamed at Erin “TELL ME WHY YOU’RE CALLING!!” to which she hesitated, because I maybe sounded a bit insane? Possibly even mad at the situation. It’s just that I needed to get that out of the way, because if she was calling to say that they had a new fax number or something, well, that was information I needed RIGHT UP FRONT PLEASE.

Erin replied by saying “Jamie, this is the call!”

And then my head spun around 10 times, smoke came out my ears and my eyes exploded in their eyes sockets.

But really, I screamed and screamed and screamed, I think I even told Erin “HOLD ON A MINUTE WHILE I SCREAM” and then screamed some more. And I’m not typically a screamer. I didn’t expect this reaction. It’s like there was this creature in my guts, like in Alien, and the only way to get it out was to scream it out. And scream I did.

Then instead of letting Erin talk and you know, tell me details about our NEW CHILD, I started talking to her! Telling her a play by play account of exactly everything I was doing right then. “Okay, I’m walking in here, I’m sitting down, okay, I’m trying to find a pen, I don’t want to use a pencil! I think I found a pen, I need paper, I’m looking in the drawer for paper, I found paper, I’m setting it here, and OKAY! I’m READY!”

Seriously.

So, after that brief intermission, I think the very next word that registered with me was the word “boy”. And then I lost it again.

More screaming. Except, instead of just general screaming, this time, I was screaming “A BOY! WE HAVE A BOY! IT’S A BOY! ARE YOU SERIOUS! A BOY!”

I can only imagine Erin sitting there on the other line being like “Seriously this is taking so long, I’m craving Cheez-its. I wish I had a big handful of Cheez-its”….

I joined Erin again. I think she asked me “Are you ready again?”

Yes.

Okay. He is 2 years and 4 months old. His name is Siyum Yohannes.

And then she waited, I’m sure to allow for screaming match round 3. But just as soon as it started, the screaming tendency stopped. I had worked through the screaming phase and was moving on. Much to Erin’s dismay. Little did she know that the next phase was far scarier than the screaming phase.

She started to say something to the affect of “Katie is working on putting his documents and pictures together for you but since it’s already 3:30 here, she might not be able to send them to you until tomorro—-

“Nenenenenenenenenoooo. Say Wha? Neneneneneno. That won’t work for me. Tomorrow will not work. I need to see his face! I need his face! BRING ME HIS FACE!

And then Erin started talking to me like I can only imagine a Crisis Negotiator does when talking someone off a cliff. Or how someone talks to a 2 year old about to throw a fit. She was all “Well, she might be able to send them later tonight, it depends, she is working really hard.”

In my mind I was all WORK HARDER! TELL HER TO WORK HARDER! Maybe YOU should work harder! MAYBE EVERYONE NEEDS TO BE WORKING HARDER THEN HUH?????!!!!! But what came out my mouth was “I will give her anything. What does she want? Cookies? Brownies? Money?”

I think at this point Erin realized just exactly how crazy I really am.

So she pawned me off. She gave me Katie’s number faster than a geek on expert level Guitar Hero can play Metallica’s Nothing Else Matters.

My message on Katie’s voicemail:

“Oh hi Katie! This is Jamie and we are just so BEYOND EXCITED about our new son Siyum! YAY! I understand that you have his pictures and that there is this insane notion that we may not get them until tomorrow! I am calling to offer you anything in order to get his photos. I will give you vintage family heirlooms Katie. Name your price.”

While I was waiting for her return call, I speed-dialed Mike. No answer. He has his phone off, he’s in class. CRAP! I left a voicemail that resembled something like “WEGOTOURREFERRAL!CALLMEBACK! NOW!”

Next voicemail for Katie:

“Oh hi again Katie! Listen, I am chewing off my left hand here. Please can you call me back? I need to know what’s happening and when we’ll get to see his face! Okay thanks!”

My life was eerily quiet. I had no pictures of our son. I had no husband to scream with. I had no Delaney to squeeze. I had no one calling me back from my agency. I was paralyzed with anticipation of either getting his pictures, getting a phone call from my agency and getting a return call from Mike. And none of them were happening.

I emailed my agency yahoo group. I had to tell SOMEONE! WE HAD OUR REFERRAL! HELLO! I’m just chillin here at my house by myself with no pictures of his face!

Next voicemail for Katie:

“Katie, it’s Jamie again. WHY ARE YOU HOLDING MY SON’S PICTURES HOSTAGE?! It’s been an HOUR and a HALF!”

Everyone on my yahoo group was congratulating me, telling me how wonderful this was. It was awesome. I asked who lived closest to the WHFC office and could go be my picture avenger and retrieve his pictures for me. And they laughed. And I was all “NO REALLY.” I got some private emails telling me to hang in there, I’ll get his face soon. Enjoy the moment, etc…

At about 10 minutes till close on the east coast, I called the Manager of the Ethiopia program. Surely SHE would call me back and give me the FRICKIN status of my son’s face. But no. Nothing. I left her three voicemails, in addition to the three I had already left Katie. And then just for good measure, I sent them both two emails.

I know. Looking back, I could have done without the last 5 attempts.

At this point, it’s been 2 hours, and my agency office has been closed for 30 minutes and I’m just hanging on by a string to my sanity, HOPING someone is working late and is working late on my son’s face.

I forgot to also mention that I had been repeat auto dialing my husband this entire time. I probably logged in 85 calls only to continue getting his voicemail. “Hi! This is Mike! Thanks for calling, please leave me a message!” YA I’LL LEAVE YOU A MESSAGE, I’LL LEAVE YOU A MESSAGE UPSIDE YOUR HEAD IF YOU DON’T TURN YOUR PHONE ON AND CALL ME BACK! WE HAVE A SON YOU MORON! I KNOW YOUR CLASS HAS BEEN OVER FOR AN HOUR!”

But then. What’s this? The garage door? The lone Ranger? Returning? After all this time?

I RUN downstairs and throw open the door. Where have you been? Oh they were running some errands, stopped and got an ice cream, whatever, wrote a sonnet, weeded alongside the highway, you know, whatever…. forgot to turn phone back on. Sorry.

I said, “Oh. Okay. Well, you have a 2 year old son.”

Mike made that face that he makes when he sees Disneyland. Or the ocean. Like a 6 year old again, pure excitement. He was all “Are you serious? I have a SON?! Do we have pictures?!”

Uh about that. No. Not yet.

And then he said, “Well why not? Have you asked them to send them?” Like, “What have you been doing this whole time?”

And poor Mike had no idea. He had no idea what he was walking into. Because I. I was a madwoman at this point. I was balls to the walls crazy with anticipation still, really livid at my agency for not communicating with me, entirely too worked up and also a little thirsty. I hadn’t eaten or drank anything since the call. About 3 hours ago at this point. So, when Mike stepped into the bathroom to pee and his peeing took WELL BEYOND an average pee time, like the longest pee ever recorded in history, well, it was too much. His pee sent me over the edge.

And instead of being all glowy and sparkle-happy when I told him our son’s name and information, I was acting like a possessed woman, going back and forth on the emotional extremes like a yo-yo. Giggly and then exasperated. Elated and then vexed. Gleeful and then pissed. I even went to send another email but Mike stopped me and said “I’m saving you from yourself.”

Another hour went by. Like torture. Mike tried to motivate me to finish cleaning the house. It didn’t work. All I wanted to do was sit and stare at my inbox. I was trying to WILL the pictures to come. In the mean time, Mike checked the mail and had received some stupid chain letter weird scam crap about sending the top 6 people a dollar and then you would get EIGHT HUNDRED TWENTY SIX THOUSAND DOLLARS BACK! For some reason, Mike became fixated on this letter, this junk mail, and kicked me off the computer to research it. And this nearly sent me into convulsions. HOW DARE YOU! YOU’RE FOCUSING ON A CHAIN LETTER! WE HAVE A SON AND HIS FACE SHOULD BE IN OUR INBOX!

About 20 minutes later, I got a call from Erin saying his stuff was ready 4 HOURS after she originally called. She had sent us his face. Go check our inbox. Like I hadn’t been doing that obsessively for my whole life.

I BOLTED back to the computer and pulled up the email. And I looked upon that sweet face and smiled. He was beautiful. And sweet. And precious. And perfect. And he was our son. Mike said “He just couldn’t be any cuter could he?” and we both fought the urge to reach into the screen and pinch his cute cheeks. We fell in love and the previous four hours of anguish, the mental and emotional treadmill I had been on, it all vanished. Along with the 10.5 months of waiting. Gone. We had his face. We had a little boy. He was a part of our family and we already loved him.

We showed Delaney his pictures and she said “Can he come over right now?”

Then she drew a picture of of us flying in an airplane over the ocean water with fish to Africa where Siyum is waiting in his house. Complete with arrows and smiley faces. And I’d upload it here for you all to see because it’s just the cutest thing ever, but I’m tired of writing this post. This is the longest post I have ever done. And I’m tired. That’s it. Enough. The end.

FOR REAL! AAAAHHHH!

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

We got the call this afternoon at 1:30 and then proceeded to NOT get his pictures until 5:30. Okay, and you all know me. You can imagine what those 4 hours were like for me. And everyone within a 1 mile vicinity of me. I was losing. my. mind. I HAD to see his face. BRING ME HIS FACE!!!!!

But people. It was worth it. OOOHHHHH so worth it. We saw that face and now we are forever in love with that face.

He has HUGE brown eyes, big beautiful lips, big cheeks and the sweetest, most kissable face there ever was. We are smitten with his pouty, lovable face.

The story of the call to come soon. It’s good stuff. I don’t think you’ll be disappointed, my craziness was in full effect, an all time high, really. I was startling even myself.

BUT YA’LL WE HAVE A SON!!!!!

Love,

Mike, Jamie, Delaney and SIYUM

And PS. Chan was on the money. She guessed May 8th!

I’ve registered for school. I’m going back to school. I’m gettin me an edumacation. Fancy that.

But Jamie. You are adopting a child, you will soon have TWO disease-spreading, grimey, loud-mouthed short stacks running around your house and through your head, screaming banshee-like chants that will leave your brain feeling like mush by about 10 am every day. Do you not realize that your brain can barely press play on the tivo at night, let alone study algorithms and juxtaposed sentences?

Well, there is that.

I plan to counteract this decay of my brain by drinking lots of Tahitian Noni Juice and forcing myself, in all my snot-streaked glory, to the classroom whereupon which I will staple my eyelids open and slip a smart girl a 20 for her notes. (Was Tahitian Noni Juice all the rage where you lived too? Cure cancer, liver disease, flat feet and a lazy eye…. ringing a bell? Well, let me tell you, it was quite the miracle potion here in Mormon-land for a long time, maybe it still is, I’m out of the loop these days).

The thing is, I finally have the motivation and drive to go back to school. So I’m going with it. Because who knows when this feeling, this feeling of optimism, ideal and positive outlook, who knows when this will hit me again. I feel smart right now, like I could be smart, like there is this possibility of being smart. And I feel ready. I figure I best do something rash like enroll in school before my body (or my mind, whichever is playing this awful trick on me) realizes what has happened.

Plus, now that Mike is done (next week) I’m thinking it’s HIS turn to put MY arse through school. That’s what I’m talking about. MMmmm-hmmmm.

It’s not that I didn’t want an education before, I enjoy learning and of course I wanted a degree, I just didn’t know what in. What did I want to study? I was petrified that I would either A. waste my time studying something I would eventually loathe or B. waste my time studying something that would turn into ZERO job opportunities for me. Which is maybe why I avoided the whole inner-mind altercation and did things like enroll in 20 dance classes my first year of college.

So when I started this quest a couple months ago, I explored all options. What did I want to do. What were my options. What could I see myself doing. And I asked friends and family these questions as well. I got all kinds of responses back. Be a Nurse. A Wedding Planner. Be a Dental Hygienist. Get a Business Degree. Be a Flight Attendant. A Politician. A French Teacher. All of which I really put thought to and strongly considered. These and many more. I think my problem was that I could see myself doing any of these things, in fact, I would switch professions every year if I could! Be a Sheepherder for a year and then pack it in and be a Researcher for the next.

But then I watched Oprah, that job intervention show and realized I was thinking about it all wrong. I needed to be thinking about what my strengths were, what I was good at, and what I enjoyed doing.

That’s when I stumbled on the Journalism section of the catalog and realized that every single class offered within the program was a class I would LOVE to take. And that’s how I knew this was what I wanted to study. FINALLY. Journalism, who knew? Sheez.

So, I’m off and away to conjure up the courage to walk amongst 19 year olds and fight for parking. Buy notebooks and pens that say GO BRONCOS! Spend a disgustingly large amount of money on books and feel tired, even more tired, all the time. To take tests when I don’t want to and do assignments I don’t want to. To suck up to Teachers and pretend I don’t want to stab other students in the eye with that new Broncos pen. Oh the joy. But I’m ready.

Wish me luck. Here’s to studying Journalism.

And then I was kind of sort of thinking of trying for Law School after that. The End.

Thank you for the concern and encouragement and comments on my last post. Everyone, except Anonymous, was so fantastic and sweet. Y’all are my Holla-back-girls.

The end of No Pants Day is nearing it’s end, I’m afraid, and we have not heard from our agency with news of a new battle station kid. It looks as though our wait will continue into next week. Whoever put their money on Julie totally lost. Which, people, it’s your fault if you placed money on a woman who painted her house purple. I can’t help you there.

This week has been an exciting week though, being on alert like this. I feel so special. Like I’m on call to save the world, like my heightened level of security and alertness is crucial to the well-being of all living organisms somehow. I don’t know. It’s a weird sense of being. Knowing that this phone call, one that will change our lives forever, is coming at any moment, it’s making me jittery and shaky and sweaty. It’s like the feeling of knowing a referral is coming so soon and the feeling of being off heroine for 3 days, they are one in the same.

Anonymous is probably thinking “I KNEW she was a Heroine addict” right now. For the record, that was a joke, I’m not a Heroine addict.

And I’d like to end my post on that note.

Hoping for good news soon. Thanks again ya’ll. It’s nice to be on this roller-coaster together.

Jamie

We are no longer requesting siblings. For a variety of reasons, one being that Mike has ALWAYS wanted to just do one at a time and I have always been the one to be like “NO! Let’s adopt SIX at a time! C’mon!” and another reason being that we are tired of waiting and Delaney is ready for a sibling. Like, NOW.

So, we changed our request to a single child, either gender, between the ages of 12 months and 2.5 years. We changed this on Friday.

AND I THINK WE HAVE A SON. A 2 year old son.

Our agency sends out a weekly update to all the families on the waiting lists and it shows the referral activity of children so far each month. Well today’s showed a 2 year old little boy that went to a family that waited 10 months (WE have waited 10 months) and I think that little boy is ours. Our Social Worker would be the one to call with the referral and she leaves at 3:00 every day, meaning I think she left the office before our referral was ready and that’s why she hasn’t called.

So, I’m freaking out. And I don’t think we will know anything for sure until the morning. But I’m 70%, no 80%, probably 90% sure that we have a 2 year old son.

95%

But maybe not.

But maybe so.

I think so.

But it could not be so.

I’m freaking out.

Jamie

Edited to add: FALSE ALARM. Another family, who ALSO waited 10 months and ALSO changed their request at the exact SAME time as us got that referral. So false alarm. But I love that my agency called me at 7:00 pm to let me know the situation so I could stop freaking out. I love my agency. Stay tuned, though, because we really are the next family on the toddler list now and should have good news very soon. I’m sorry I yelled at you all.

So without further adieu, I give you “Why Not Post Vegas Girls Weekend Photos On My Mommy-Blog?! SURE!”

Starting things off, remember we DROVE the ten hours down. And back. Which, was pretty fun. Driving down we have the anticipation and excitement of leaving and drive back we have our deliriousness and sheer exhaustion to keep us amused. Amused, as in, every little single thing is the funniest thing to happen in the history of funny things happening.

Take for example, Erica’s GPS system that she (thankfully) brought that would either A. Tell us the WRONG DIRECTIONS WITH OUT FAIL every single time or would B. simply remind us, TAUNT us really, of exactly how much farther we had to go. “Continue another 385 miles” “Continue another 375 miles” “Continue another 365 miles” like that. The latter you actually got used to believe it or not after an hour or so into the drive, but the giving of the wrong directions? I mean…. really? You want me to turn around, DO A U-TURN, right here, in the middle of the freeway on-ramp. You can see how this situation would never lose it’s charm. Especially since we knew we couldn’t turn it off and throw it out the window what with Erica and her blatant demands that we USE HER EXPENSIVE PRESENT FROM HER HUSBAND! IT WAS EXPENSIVE! WE’RE USING IT! And so we did. Which, really, brought the van total to eight loud-mouthed opinionated females instead of seven.

After driving through the night and crashing at our friend’s house for a couple hours, we awoke and rose, like angels, to scrap our way over to the pool, to cling onto SUNLIGHT! ACTUAL RAYS OF SUN! And silly us, we thought we’d be able to sleep there, at the pool, the outdoor DISCO DANCE PARTY that it is.

We got in our groove though. Actually, we are all suckers for a good mix, since believe it or not, Boise Idaho, not on the map for world famous DJ’s. The music was fun, the sun was magnificent, the water was amazing, it was perfection. This is a picture of my sister Audrey and I. True or False: Audrey’s Father was an Eskimo. OR True or False: I was tanning like skin cancer was going out of style. You be the judge.

This picture I love because it’s of me and Erica TOTALLY STARING at this group of people that were there. Jaws dropped, not blinking, not even TRYING not to stare. Because the group of people, they were all backup dancers and dancers from the show So You Think You Can Dance! MY SHOW! MINE! MY SHOW! They were all dancing there at the pool, like it was a private show just for me and my undying love for them. I LOVED it, they were completely showing off and shoving it in everyone’s faces that no one there would ever be as cool as them. It was awesome. And then my friends had to hold my arms back and push my face under the water a few times. It was for the best, to stop my vagrant attempts to go lick all their faces. Just to taste their dancer beads of sweat.

Who loves themself?!

Next up, we started getting ready, at like 3 o’clock in the afternoon, for our first night of hitting the town. You can imagine all 7 of us girls getting ready together, picking outfits, doing hair…. it was total mayhem. And several of us were victims of “sudden involuntary hairspray attacks”. But it worked. And we looked fabulous.

And so it began.

I love this picture because it so clearly displays the total culture shock we are always in on the first night. Michelle even has her hand on her cheek as if to say “Oh my” and Nichole is coping by laughing, sometimes that’s all you can do.

But don’t be fooled. We worked it out.

Yes. We worked it out. With a little help from our friend, our little friend, we like to call THE BEAT. I think in literally every picture we have, we are screaming the words to the songs, just like our kids do in the car. I’m sure the people in the booth next to ours were like “Cool. You know the words. Guess what. WE ALL DO. It’s JUSTIN TIMBERLAKE morons.” But we didn’t care. There will always be people trying to rain on your Justin Timberlake parade.

These photos were from LAX, but we moved the dance fest over to a place called Tryst, where our pal Floyd Mayweather stopped by. Hey Floyd!

We’re BFF’s.

That concluded our first night. SO MUCH FUN. Fast forward through a few more hours of sleep, another day at the pool, another schmorgasborg of curling irons and hairspray and VOILA! Second night!

Whoa Nelly. Welcome to The Bank. That was the name of this place and it was madness. But, a few elbows throws here and there and before you knew it, we had created our own dance floor domain. Upon which we danced with each other for, oh, I don’t know, SEVEN HOURS STRAIGHT.

Dance dance dance dance dance

Sleep sleep, pool pool, hairspray hairspray in the eyes… well look at that it’s already the third and last night. Time flies when you can’t feel your toes anymore!

We amped up the glam and headed out to Jet, a really really really fun place. The music at this one was the best, throw in a little Prince, a little Madonna and you’ve got 7 happy girls.

You’ll notice the camera angle is slightly below us. This is because we were up on the ledge above our table. Just like our kids want to do at every restaurant we go to. We’re such hypocrites.

And there’s me, at one with the music. At one with Vegas.

And that’s a wrap. As usual, we are all still recuperating, our feet are still recuperating, even still, one week later. And we probably won’t be ready again for another 11 months. But dang we had a good time!

I’m back from Vegas ya’ll!

More later.

At least for the weekend.

I’m off on my annual girls trip to Vegas.

4 days of sleeping by the pool, talking with my girls and dancing our HEARTS OUT on the dance floor. Dancing for our LIIIIIIVES. Only those of you who obsess over shows like “So You Think You Can Dance” and “Step It Up And Dance” will understand the need to, once a year, dance till your guts can’t dance anymore. It’s a once a year dance binge that former dancers, like myself, use to satisfy our un-quenchable desire to be SUPERSTARS! again, just for the weekend.

A weekend free of brown-streaked Ariel panties, stepping on toy cars and listening to Disney soundtracks on repeat until the hairs on the back of your neck stand up. It’s awe-inspiring. Not that I won’t miss the little monster, I will, but I sure as heckfire won’t miss the responsibility. It’s funny and may not be true in all cases, but for me, going on these weekends, it makes me a better Mom and Wife. I come back and appreciate what a nice little life I’ve created for myself, how RADICAL my husband and kid are and how relieved I am to not be single. Because the MEAT MARKET that it is down there? Gag me with a spoon.

This trip will be especially amazing because there are SEVEN of us going this time, all of us having known each other since 6th grade, all of us happily married with kids and all of ready to party it up with our dance party posse. And all of us piling into the Blue Steel for the 10 hour trek down there. One that will, no doubt, have not ONE MILLISECOND of quiet. And those conversations, their what I remember most, what I love the most and what makes me feel like the SUPERSTAR! that I am. When not cleaning poo streaks off Ariel panties.

Peace out! See you next week! Get lots of referrals while I’m gone!

Being the only child that she is, Delaney has latched onto these children like a newborn to the boob. Not a day goes by, not an HOUR goes by, that she doesn’t PLEAD for me to let her play with these kids.

Don’t get me wrong, I am grateful for the distraction and the play dates that occupy her time. And I’m happy to know that their parents are nice and normal, potential perfect neighbor material. We have had freakishly inappropriate neighbors before and so this change, it is good. I am also proud of Delaney for making friends. After watching her watch the neighbor kids through the holes in the fence, longing to play with them, for weeks, I am happy it has all worked out swimmingly in her little world. By the way, the Dude next door was all “Hey, we see your daughter’s eye peering through the fence all the time, it’s pretty funny” and Mike goes “Well, sometimes, that’s me.”

And it was really quiet.

And then they laughed.

With all the sarcasm that’s flowing around the battle station here, you might be surprised to know that we do, in fact, care what people think about us, we like to keep up appearances just as much as the Jones’. So, it was important to us that we try to control our daughter and her rabid attempts to suck the faces off of the neighbor kids.

We started off small, baby steps, having the kids over for an hour at a time and then sending Delaney over for an hour at a time over the span of 6-7 days we did this. But things started getting sketchy when Delaney decided she’d had enough of the rationed-out new-BFF-interactions.

The other day, I hear her doing her usual thing, playing, pretending, tormenting the dog in the backyard when all of a sudden, I realize I haven’t heard her. For like 10 minutes I hadn’t heard her. The backyard yielded nothing but cinderella crowns and a stick collection, then I turned the corner to see the gate wide open and knew she had escaped. Sure enough she was over at the neighbors.

I don’t know what was more embarrassing, that I didn’t know my child’s whereabouts for 10 minutes or that my neighbors thought I had sent my 4 year old over, unaccompanied, without a pre-cursor phone call. A tad mortifying, to say the least.

And then?

Like a moth to the flame, she does it again, 2 mornings later. I was at work but apparently, Mike said he awoke to the doorbell and our neighbor accompanying our sleepy eyed, bed-headed child swaddled in a living room throw blanket back to our house. Which, I have to commend her for thinking ahead and shielding herself from the bitter morning dew for her long trek across the front yard, A+ for preparation Delaney, A+.

But ya, the new neighbor first impression bit couldn’t be going any better, if you ask me!

Oh Hey again! Sorry my child so desperately wants to live at your house instead of ours! And clearly you see that our word is LAW around here because that talking to she got the other day for running away and not telling us? It CLEARLY instilled the fear of God into her.

So, here we were feeling like we’ve risen to the top of our parenting game, like our neighbors must think we are total schmucks, why else would a child rise in the morning and immediately plan her escape?

But lo and behold. All’s well that ends well. The universe smiled on us, because the younger of the two neighbor kids? Totally pooped her pants at our house today.

YES!

And that, my friends, is how you become pals with your neighbors here in the Wild West. You gotta settle the score, even things out. Our neighbors, you see, want to be friends with us, wanted us to know everything was okay, so they sent over their kid to shat her pants in our playroom. That’s how it works. It’s a natural progression. So now when one of THEIR kids does something embarrassing again, we’ve already talked about it, to keep the friendship going, we’re going to send Delaney over with a picture of Mike’s nipples.

Sigh.

Let me demonstrate, a verbally illustrated picture perhaps.

The other day I took Delaney shopping downtown. In Boise, it’s tricky doing anything outdoors this time of year because often it LOOKS chirpy and cheery and sunny out but then when you step outside, it’s like stepping out into the arctic tundra and then your stuck wearing flip flops and a tank top in sub-zero degrees. People look at you like you’re an idiot when this happens and you often have to yell back at them that WHAT?! you HAPPENED TO FORGET WE LIVED IN IDAHO FOR A MINUTE OKAY?! GET OFF ME! This is especially embarrassing when not only are YOU dressed like you’re in denial but you also dress your CHILD like you’re in denial, like you made your whole family try to WILL it into spring that morning. And this being National Child Abuse Prevention Month, something Boise is taking very seriously right now, you just don’t want to find yourself in this predicament.

So being the thoughtful and ever-evolving Mother that I am, I asked Delaney before we left to put on a jacket, that I thought it might be a little cold out. Being the mature 4 year old that she is, she politely declined saying she had been in the backyard already and it wasn’t cold and she had also thought ahead and put on a long sleeved shirt. So, I was all “Really? Okay, if you say so, four year old Daughter, you would know what’s best for yourself” and we left the house without her jacket. Legendary Mom skills already playing into effect. Because the earlier described rendition of public humiliation? EVEN BETTER when the child is going without the comfort of warmth but YOU THE PARENT are nice and snug in your parka. Classic. Way to be, Mom.

Of course, as you would guess, once we get ALL the way downtown and out of the parking garage, I realize that it’s actually cold outside and my kid doesn’t have a jacket.

I mention this to myself, out loud, saying “Shoot, it’s pretty cold out, gosh dang it.” Then I continue talking mostly to myself but now also towards Delaney and say “I’m sorry Honey, I’ll buy you a little jacket at one of the stores, okay?” And we head out to brave it on our supposed-to-be-fun-and-cheap-but-now-not-so-fun-and-not-so-cheap shopping trip.

Ten minutes goes by, we are briskly walking down the sidewalks trying to find the closest children’s clothing store when Delaney looks up at me while we are stopped at a crosswalk and says “Mom, I’m so sorry, I should have brought my jacket, I should have listened to you, it’s MY fault Mom and I’m really sorry.” Then bats her eyes a few times.

(pause)

(pause)

(pausing while you realize that FOUR YEAR OLDS DON’T TALK LIKE THIS.)

What the? Whose child is this? She doesn’t get this kind of reflectiveness from me, that’s for sure. She IS Mother Theresa! This kind of stuff happens ALL THE TIME! All the time she think, ponder and reflect on situations, EMPATHIZE and convey feelings like this. It’s just beyond me. I’ll find myself, all the time, saying “Well Honey, everything’s okay, you’re a kid you know.”

She’s just so….

It’s like she carries this burden. This burden of making sure everything is right in the world.

Again, just the other day, I was making German Pancakes for breakfast and they takes 30 minutes to bake. During the span of the 30 minutes, Delaney must have asked me 5 times if she could have some fruit snacks, a fruit roll up, a bagel, some candy etc… to which I kept saying that No, the food would be done soon, I was making special pancakes and they would be delicious. Well, not 3 minutes before the timer goes off, Delaney runs in to tell me that she ate a WHOLE SLICE OF PIZZA ALL GONE MOM! I was bugged because 1. the scrumptious breakfast I was making was SO close to being done and 2. I never cook fancy breakfasts and I envisioned a round of applause once the timer went off, NOT a full-tummied kid who wasn’t interested. So I said “Oh DeeDee! I was making special pancakes, remember?”

I’m not kidding, for the next 2 hours, she must have told me 37 different times that “Next time, Mom, I won’t eat Pizza when you’re making special pancakes, Mom, I’m sorry about that Mom, I’ll wait next time for the special pancakes to be done and I won’t eat Pizza, okay Mom?” I finally had to say “Delaney. I am NOT mad. Nobody is upset here. Everything is okay. I don’t want you worrying about the pancakes anymore okay?”

I mean, what child cares this much? She’s an over-carer. It makes me look like a freak-out Mom, like she’s one of those kids that has to soothe her parents because her parents can’t soothe themselves. But it’s not just us. She does it with everyone. She’s a people soother.

She tells her cousin “It’s okay Cousin, I know you didn’t mean to hurt me, it was an accident, I love you.” She tells her Grammy “Grammy, I love your face and the way you sing.” She tells her Teachers “You look cute today, good job teaching.” She tells me out of nowhere ALL THE TIME “Mom, I think you’re the best Mom ever.”

Huh? Shouldn’t you be peeing on toys or something?

This clip captures a tiny bit her ways, her careful, quirky, patient ways. Is it just me, or would she not make excellent room mates with an 89 year old forensic pathologist named Beatrice?

To Do from fully operational battle station on Vimeo.