Another Instagram Post

A little while back I posted all of the photos that I had taken with my iPhone using the Instagram app.  I finally pulled the photos that I have taken since then and am dumping them all into this one giant, photo-laden post.  It turns out I pretty much take photos of three things with my phone:  1. Clara.  2. Myself.  3.  Food.  Often the photo is some combination of the three things, especially photos of Clara trying new foods (which is endlessly fascinating for me and I am not sure why). 

At Ikea eating a lunch of swedish meatballs.  It is so weird to me seeing Clara's bottle since she has been weaned from the bottle since her birthday almost two months ago.


Just after Ikea when Clara barfed up her meatballs on my shirt and I had a thirty minute drive home where I was trying to ignore the smell on my chest.  Ugh.

At the YMCA.  She looks so grown-up in this little outfit which makes me think of Cindy Lauper.  Girls just wanna have fun, right Clara?

 Digging letters out of a jar during class at church.

A dinner I made on the grill while we were remodeling and had no kitchen.

Just before swim lessons.

We often go outside just before bedtime.

Sometimes on bad hair days I put my hair in a ballerina bun.

The artichokes at the farmer's market were so beautiful I just had to take a picture.

We like to go to the mall and play at the indoor play area when it gets too hot for us to hang out around our house which lacks air conditioning (like most houses in our area).


Clara's birthday cake!

Bathtime after her birthday party.

Opening presents with dad.

Sometimes I wear my glasses when my allergies are really bothering me.

At the memorial day pancake breakfast that our ward held in the church building.  It was the best pancake breakfast I have ever been to with tons of blueberries, strawberries, and whole wheat banana pancakes.

Our corner of San Jose used to be entirely fruit orchards and even now there are fruit trees everywhere in yards and lining the streets.  In our yard we have a lemon, apple and fig tree (and used to have an orange tree that we took out).  Trees planted between the sidewalk and the road are actually on public property so it is legal to pick the fruit and eat it (at least according to a book I read - I haven't actually researched the law on this and it feels a little sneaky to do it) so these cherries were ripe for the plucking. 

At a memorial day bbq with friends.

This was right after our new floors were installed and Clara could walk barefoot around the house again.

I am not sure what she was eating here but her pigtails were so cute.  This was before her first haircut.

Playing at the splash table that was a birthday present from Grandpa & Grandma Nash.

She was supposed to be sleeping in this next picture.  Clearly, she was more interested in having a party and staying up late.

Eating brussel sprouts for dinner.  What a good girl since they are pretty much mom's favorite vegetable.

Checking out the police & firemen ride at Happy Hollow with her cousin Emma when my family came to visit.

Okay, I will admit to a point of vanity regarding this picture - I totally took it because I thought my eyebrows looked perfect this day.  I sort of hate my eyebrows almost always (weird, I know) because they are white and I have to draw them in and I always rush it and do a bad job.

Getting ice cream at Marianne's in Santa Cruz.  I had the Maple Nut and the Raspberry Cheesecake swirl.

Paul and I went and saw "Snow White & The Huntsman" at the movie theater.  I actually liked it and it was the first movie we had gone to see in a long time.

Sleepy girl in her carseat.

Clara is a TOTAL beach baby.  She loves playing in the water and the sand.

Clara & Paul playing together after Paul got home from work.  I think Paul was trying to get Clara to climb onto his back for a horsey ride.

I was supposed to be making a stink-face in this picture because the Young Men were in charge of the combined activity and for refreshments they boiled hot dogs in the kitchen just off the gym.  The entire cultural hall was a cess-pool of steaming frankfurters and adolescent perspiration.  Ick.

Beautiful girl on one of our daily walks around the neighborhood.

Father's Day breakfast.

Father's Day dinner.  Clara ate all of her asparagus, halibut and salmon but just picked at her roll.  The one thing she doesn't seem to eat very well is bread.

Getting her first haircut.  We went to Kinder Kuts, which is one of those places where the kiddos get to sit in cars and watch cartoons while they are having their hair cut.  She did great and it was nice to even up her length since she had a really uneven patch in the back where she had worn away a lot of the hair as an infant.

Reading books before bedtime.

Clara has a favorite spot.  It is in the closet in the office where there is a box of photos that makes the perfect size chair for her.  She sits here while I am getting ready in the morning or if I play the piano for her and talks or plays happily.  She went through a phase where she carried this green sieve around everywhere she went.  You can see her holding it in her right hand.

This was at the airport before our Utah trip, sieve in hand.

Checking out the airplanes while holding onto her trusty sieve. 

This was her look if you tried to take the sieve away from her.

The Grand Canyon! 

Playing in one of those pop-up tunnels at Paul's parents' house.  This is one of my favorite dresses of hers - it has a square sailor collar in the back and has sailboats all over it.

Clara tore apart my parents' basket of newspapers that were supposed to go out to the recycling bin.

When things started looking like they might be falling apart with the adoption, my mom was so great and listened to me analyze every interaction and text with the birthmom.  We enjoyed sitting out on their front steps and watching my dad weed the flower patch.

I was starving while in Utah (like, I literally lost six pounds in just a few days because I wasn't eating or drinking because there was just too much happening too fast with the new baby and birthmom and then things started going belly-up and I was feeling sick).  One night it was probably 9:00 p.m. and I hadn't eaten and the only thing that sounded good was Chick-Fil-A (which we don't have in the Bay Area) so my mom took me there to get a lemonade and a chicken sandwich. 

Sadly, this is the only picture I took of Clara in her Fourth of July dress.  I should take her out and do a little photo shoot still.  Maybe Paul and I will dress up too since we took Fourth of July pics as a family last year.

Kissing her cousin Lily on the Fourth of July at the splash park in Spanish Fork.

We are eating lots of popsicles to beat the heat these days.

Teaching Clara how to jump rope.

Phew, that was a lot of Instagram photos. 

Miss July

Fun Saturday

We need to say a huge thank you to everybody who has offered prayers, sympathy, and support for us over the past week as we have gone through one of the biggest trials of our lives with a failed adoption.  We know that the healing process will take a while, but we didn't want to keep the blog private any longer than necessary.  And thanks for putting up with my drama while I took the blog private so I could tell the whole story once for friends and family rather than having to relive it over and over in the retelling on a case-by-case basis.  For now, I have unpublished the post where I described the details surrounding he failed placement but plan to republish a shortened version in the future.

For now though, I thought I would talk about our fun Saturday.  We spent the morning at the farmer's market where we tasted peaches, strawberries, blueberries, plums, pluots, nectarines, tomatoes, walnuts, apricots, salmon, spinach bolani, gluten-free brownies, snow-cones, kettle-corn, naan with cilantro mint chutney, cheese curds, and more.  Clara was in heaven with all the fruit.  We bought our Sunday dinner - fresh fettucine, heirloom tomatoes, onions, and smoked peppercorn salmon with the most amazing fresh peaches for dessert.  I can't decide whether I should make a peach cobbler or whether we should just eat them plain, they are that sweet and delicious.

While Clara took a nap, Paul went to the bike store and picked up his new blue beach cruiser and a helmet for Clara that he picked out himself.  We had a fun time riding around the neighborhood once Clara woke up, although she still doesn't seem to know what to think yet about this mode of transportation. 
 

Clara was NOT very happy about the helmet at first.  Her naps were really short today and she kept waking up grumpy.  Paul dressed her this morning, and he made me smile when he came out and told me that she was wearing purple so that they could match.  I just love him.

I do not like this helmet, Dad!!  It is messing up my pigtails!

Once we got going she did lots better though.  She especially liked when I would ride by and make faces at her.  Paul's new wheels are pretty sweet, right?

Another fun thing we did today was to make homemade chocolate ice cream with a recipe that our friend texted us from the Ben & Jerry's ice cream book.  Apparently this is the chocolate base in many of the Ben & Jerry's ice cream flavors.  It did not disappoint.  It was super chocolatey and very rich and we will DEFINITELY be making this again (probably with dark chocolate pieces and marshmallow and carmel swirls, a la Phish Food, which is Paul's favorite ice cream).  I loved it with the fresh raspberries we picked up at the farmer's market.

Want the recipe?  Here you go:

Ben & Jerry's Chocolate Ice Cream

2 ounces unsweetened chocolate
1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 1/2 cups milk
2 large eggs
1 cup heavy sugar
1 cup heavy or whipping cream
1 tsp vanilla

Melt the unsweetened chocolate in the top of a double boiler over hot, not boiling, water.  Gradually whisk in the cocoa and heat, stirring constantly, until smooth.  (The chocolate may "seize" or clump together, which is totally what happened to us and was kind of frightening, but it dissolved once the milk was added and we whisked it for a while.)  Whisk in the milk, a little at a time, and heat until completely blended.  Remove from the heat and let cool.

Whisk the eggs in a mixing bowl until light and fluffy, 1 to 2 minutes. Whisk in the sugar, a little at a time, then continue whisking until completely blended, about 1 minute more. Pour in the cream and vanilla and whisk to blend. 

Pour the chocolate mixture into the cream mixture and blend. Cover and refrigerate until cold, about 1 to 3 hours. Transfer the mixture to an ice cream maker and freeze following the manufacturer's instructions.

Clara approves.  Look at the chocolate on that little face. 

And to end the night, Paul and I watched and rewatched this little video that Paul took a few weeks back of Clara showing up some crazy dance moves when she was way tired and couldn't keep her balance.  It had us cracking up and trying to keep from laughing too loudly so as not to wake her tonight since she had already gone to bed.

It was such a wonderful Saturday spent reconnecting as our little family of three.

What it's like to be Prometheus...

I once wrote a post on our adoption blog about what it is like to be waiting to adopt your first child.  I woke up yesterday morning feeling desolate and thinking of my high school Greek mythology class and decided I should write a post about what it's like going through a failed adoption.  As a disclaimer, there are many, many versions of how an adoption falls apart and so this post is very specific to our failed adoption which happened after the baby was born and we had held him, named him, introduced him to our daughter, taken family pictures and introduced him in person to almost our entire families as well as on Facebook, and loved him as our own for four days.

In Greek mythology, there was an immortal named Prometheus.  He was a Titan and he is regarded for his intelligence and as a champion of mankind after he stole fire for them.  In the western tradition, Prometheus represents human striving and the risk of overreaching or unintended consequences.  During the Romantic Era, Prometheus was regarded as the "lone genius whose efforts to improve human existence could also result in tragedy."  (Note:  I am supplementing my recollection of my Greek mythology class by resorting to Wikipedia.  Not very scholarly of me, I know, but I wanted to tell the story of Prometheus with at least some degree of detail that my brain just won't conjure up for me at the moment.)

Zeus punished Prometheus with an eternal torment for stealing fire and giving it to mankind:  he chained Prometheus to a rock and sent an eagle every day to feed on his liver.  Because Prometheus was immortal, his liver grew back every night and the next day he suffered the same fate of having his liver eaten again.

I feel like Prometheus.  I feel like perhaps I overreached in thinking that this little boy could be my son.  That the idea of an infertile woman like myself having a big family (as if my dream of four children is all that big) was too much to want or hope for.   We felt like our efforts to adopt this baby boy would improve his life, our lives, and even his birthmom's life (even though we knew it would cost her so much to place him - we aren't insensitive to the sacrifice and pain it takes on a birthmom's part to go through placement).

In my mind, the eagle from the Prometheus myth is infertility and she swoops in to pluck out my liver (or my heart rather) more often than you would think possible for someone who has known since she was 15 that she would never be able to get pregnant.  It happened at lunch at Cafe Rio when I literally felt trapped by pregnant women or women carrying carseats with infants all around me - it was a dizzying, sickening experience and I don't know how anyone lives in Utah and gets through a failed adoption with any degree of sanity because of the overwhelming abundance of fruitful wombs. 

I thought I could handle a quick in-and-out at Gymboree to return the things I had bought for the baby so that I didn't have to pack them in my suitcase and unpack them again in California and go through the pain of returning them there.  But when the salesclerk started asking the standard questions of "was the item too small?  was there anything wrong with the item?" I found myself literally doubled over in the middle of the store bawling out the whole story of the failed adoption in an incomprehensible gush of nonsense words and snot while my mom tried to let the poor clerk know she hadn't said or done anything wrong. 

The cursed infertility eagle visited me again at the splash park when I thanked my sister for being there for me this past weekend and being excited for us when we thought this baby boy was going to be our son.  She said multiple times while things were looking so sure and solid that she was "jealous" of me and as I hugged her I started feeling bad for not worrying about her feelings and my mom's feelings and my in-laws and other family members and their struggles going through this too (and their other burdens such as the Utah wildfires that forced my in-laws to evacuate their home the day before the Fourth of July).  I tried to stop the tears from coming there at the splash park, but they came just the same there in the blazing hot Utah sun while the mountains burned black as my heart.

He is a week old today and I can still feel the phantom of the wristband that I wore for three days that granted me access to him in the nursery and it kills me.  I can't scrub off that feeling on my left wrist in the shower no matter how hard I try.

I loathe being this volatile. 

One moment I am feeling strong and can go to a movie with my sister or play with my nieces, and the next moment I feel my throat clench and I am choking back a sob.  I have been trying to keep it together around Clara because I don't want to traumatize her through all of this.  Our sweet girl has just been so, so wonderful this past week.  She just adores her Grandma Cece (probably because she gets anything she wants like walks in her stroller way past bedtime or having grandma pull her out of her crib and read her books until I got home from a movie at 10:45 p.m.). 

And it is not just me either.  Paul had to go back to California and he told me that on Tuesday night there was a knock on the door and our bishopric (local church leaders) had come by unexpectedly.  They hadn't heard that the birthmom had changed her mind - they were just there to talk to Paul about a new calling.  Paul said that he cried the entire time he told the whole story of what had happened.  I am so thankful for our church and for leaders and friends who are prompted by the spirit.

I know that we will heal eventually.  I feel comforted so much of the day - the majority of the time right now, actually, and I feel very close to my Heavenly Father.  I even actually feel the healing occurring in some ways and getting home to California has been the biggest relief.  Reading everyone's comments and feeling the indignation and even outrage on our behalf was a balm to my soul. 

Paul and I worried about being self-pitying until we realized that what we are feeling is not self-pity - it is grief.  And it is okay to feel grief - lots of people grieve and get on with everything else in life. 

Paul and I have a recovery plan though.  It involves temple attendance, a trip to Disneyland for Clara, family walks in the warm July evenings, and farmer's market apricots.  It involves miles on the treadmill for me and maybe even a commitment to do a race in the not-too-distant future.  It involves hikes in the mountains for Paul.  Our recovery plan includes recognizing situations where we know we will hurt and preparing ourselves mentally and emotionally beforehand or avoiding them altogether if we have to (I am thinking friends' baby showers are off-limits for me for a little bit). 

It also involves stepping back from our adoption plans and waiting for just a bit - maybe one month, maybe more - until we feel like we wouldn't totally lose it if a new birthmom contacted us.  It involves editing the previous post (or creating a new version of it and unpublishing the original) and hopefully taking this blog public again. 

Prometheus was eventually freed from his torment.  I know that we will be too.