Homegrown Smarts

My child is so smart! I cringe every time I hear those words. In most of our circles, you'll be hard pressed to find a parent who (at some point in time) doesn't think that their child is an unadulterated genius. And so, it's with great strength and will power that I fight the urge to roll my eyes when parents use words like "incredible" and "advanced" to describe their 3 year olds. No, little Johnny is not going to be the next Tiger Woods just because he made 2 putts in a row with his Little Tykes golf kit. And yes, little Sally can spell STOP at the age of 2... great... but mind you, she's only watched that big red octagon go by her car window about 8 thousand times over the past 6 months. Get back to me when she can spell yield, no left turn, and pedestrian crossing.

It's because of (my own) cynical thoughts like these that we've been mum about Justin for so long. For me, to become that parent that I just wrote about would be to live a nightmare. I think it got to the point where Venesa and I absolutely refused to talk about Justin's aptitude to anyone else besides each other. His ability to conceptualize numbers, and read and write two years above his proper grade level somehow became our "dirty little family secret." While part of our denial was due to simple humility, I think that part of our silence has also been out of some irrational nervousness that he would regress the instant we said anything aloud about it. Also, in truth, neither one of us wants the pressure of raising a gifted kid. While raising a smarty pants may sound like a wonderful thing on the surface; when you're homeschooling your children, thinking that your child could potentially outsmart you before they hit double digits in age is cause for panic. And if, at 4-years-old, you're already worried about challenging your child at a satisfactory pace... that's kind of scary. But after attending this past weekends homeschool conference and having his somewhat bizarre aptitude level confirmed by a number of different sources... I thought it was finally time to break the silence.

Is Justin a genius? Not even close (if you ask me, anyway). With his boatload of idiosyncrasies (hypersensitivity to loud noises and certain texture foods, just to name a couple) I'm more inclined to call him borderline autistic than the g-word. But either way, it's becoming obvious that there's something different about the way he thinks. He baffles me on most days with simple stuff like his spelling and writing abilities. But more than that, he's got a thing with numbers. And so all I can say is, let's see what happens. From what we've been told by his pediatrician and a few other sources, if we were "that parent", we could probably shut down our summer, shun our lives and other two children, get him ready to start 2nd grade in the fall, and turn into one of those obnoxious families you'd see on CNN pushing to get their kid into college by the age of 14. But he's 4. And he has plenty of time to develop his academic inclinations. For now, we're content to let him dictate his own learning pace... doing what we can to not push him too hard, but also trying not to get in the way of progress. He's having fun, and life is way too short to disturb his tranquility with a premature entrance to the rat race that the rest of us endure. We enjoy watching (and being a part of) how interested he is in the whole process of learning. And for now, that's plenty.

So there... I said it. My child is so smart. Now excuse me while I roll my eyes at my own blog entry. Ha.

Adoption

We get it. And we know. We know that our lives are already full. We know that Naomi is barely crawling and we've been a family of 5 with a new job, house, and zip code for less than 7 months. We know that this is crazy. We know we are going to struggle. We know we are going to need help. We know we are going to need A LOT of prayer. But we also know that God called us to do this... and because we are receptive to his calling - we will NOT be alone in this.

99% of that last paragraph was stolen from the blog entry of a [somewhat] stranger (thank you, Elizabeth)... but the truth is that I could not have said it better myself (trust me... I tried... for 3 months). By inviting the world to share in their own adoption journey (here's a link... check it out), Elizabeth inadvertently shared the very thoughts and sentiments that have led our family down a very similar path. And so here we are, close enough to the finish line of this process to start getting cold feet... but yet still trying to figure out exactly how we got here to begin with. God's love is amazing. And the things that He will have you do (asking you all the while to trust in Him) will most certainly blow you away sometimes. This is so beyond our comfort zone. Yet, He has given us a level of peace every step of the way that would otherwise make no sense whatsoever. So do pray for us, because we are certainly operating in "full faith mode" on this one. But I get the feeling that He would have it no other way.

Naomi pt. VIII

The baby swing has been inaugurated. Welcome to the big leagues, Naomi.
Welcome to the great outdoors.





Well Nourished
In other news, Naomi has graduated to supplementing her breast milk regiment with a bowl of baby cereal and about 3 or 4 jars of baby food a day... and that's a good thing since (thanks to some very kind donations) I think we have enough baby food to last her until she's in the 5th grade. Her overnight feedings are still a crapshoot. She slept from 9 til 4:30 last night... but may very well wake up twice to feed tonight, and not at all the next night. But either way, I think her lack of routine has become routine (if that makes any sense) and so I think we've pretty much adjusted to it by now. Stat-wise, we're looking at 24.5" and 15 lbs 9 oz.

Mobility

Despite being able to (commando) crawl from one side of the room to the other, the ability to sit up unassisted has still escaped her to this point. It just seems a little backwards (crawling before sitting up) but it could very well be what the other two did as well. I honestly can't remember and am simply too lazy to look it up right now. In any event, I do know this much: She's at least got Justin beat in the mobility category. It wasn't until 7 months that he was rolling over both ways and commando crawling. Naomi had both of those crossed off her checklist at 5 months. On the other hand, we're not going to bring Jasmine Olivia into the conversation... because every time I think of her flying through the house in her walker at 4-months old, all I can do is shake my head. She was like a little olympic baby or something. Of course, all of these mini-milestones mean little-to-nothing (more like nothing) in the bigger scheme of things... but it's still fun to compare. They're just constant reminders of the uniqueness of each child. It's a beautiful thing.

Don't Leave Me!
As expected around 6 months, separation anxiety has kicked into high gear... but the good news is that we've got twice the number of warm bodies in the house to put around Naomi than we did with the first child; and so that usually helps to buy us some time. I've even stooped to putting her in front of the dog a time or two. Hey... say what you want, but I think I remember it buying me at least 5 minutes to do whatever task was before me (dinner? potty break for the other two? who knows what it was). And if lazy dog Tasha moved around a bit more, it could've bought me ten minutes. Any parent of multiple kids can tell you... sometimes those extra 5 minutes constitute that very thin line between a good, fun day with the kids... and involuntary admission to the insane asylum.