Oh yeah...this is why I love staying home with my children.

Today I feel happy and at peace.  I think since coming home with Polina I have focused so much on attaching and sticking to a schedule that we don't often leave the house.  Well today we dropped the boys off at school, ate breakfast and then went for a walk.  What, its only 9:30am???  It was starting to sprinkle so I put her in the car and headed to Parkside Coffee House which has 2 play areas for kids.  One is a  gym with scooters and balls and the other area has some "Step2" stuff for toddlers to climb on.  She loved both of these.  Parkside also has outside seating that over looks a beautiful pond/park.  Unfortunately the city has it all torn up for improvements right now but it gave me the itch to go play outside since it still wasn't raining.  So I took Polina to what we refer to as "The Train Park".  We call it that because a train goes by about every 5-10 minutes.  It was great!!!  We had fun on the toys and saw 5 trains while we were there.  Then we headed to Barbra's Bakery and had bacon and cheese Kolaches for lunch..yum!!!  I've always been happier staying home when I have activities to do in the morning.  Today was wonderful for both of us. 

 

This week was not easy...

I felt like I read tons of information on attachment before adopting Polina and I thought I was prepared.  In a lot of ways I was but when you are living it, you really "get it".  Polina seems to have a pattern.  Every Monday is very difficult for us.  She is demanding, throws a lot of fits, and wants her way or the highway, and doesn't want either of the boys on my lap or getting my attention.  As the week progresses things go better and better and by the end of the week, we are 2 peas in a pod.  Then the weekend comes and it's Monday again and its right back to the fits.  My thoughts are that this has something to do with our weekends being so chaotic.  Which brings me to this week...Monday was Presidents day.  As a mom, when you have all of your kids out of school at the same time you want to take those opportunities to do fun things with them.  So we went with a friend to Kaleidoscope and then to Animal Tales & Trails exhibit at Crown Center.  Both places where crazy busy and probably not the best idea I've ever had.  But we were already there.  So Monday was crazy, Tuesday I get the kids back to school and Polina is worse than ever with the fits.  So I took her outside to play which is her favorite place to be.  She loves our cat so of course Jasmine is the first thing she looks for when we go out.  Polina picked Jasmine up and something didn't seem right.  I brought her in and watched her for a few hours and decided a trip to the vet was needed.  The vet took some blood and by Tuesday night confirmed that Jasmines liver and kidneys were failing.  This is a VERY special kitty to Joe and I and we both took the news very hard.  I was crying, the kids were crying and Polina didn't quite know what to think.  I pulled it together and cared for the Jasmine and the 3 kids, Joe was out of town all week.  

The next day Jax was sick with a fever so my dad came over to help.  I took Jasmine to the vet to get her fluids hoping she would make it until Joe got home. That night all 3 kids slept in my bed (not much room left for me!) and I was up every hour to check on Jasmine.  

By morning I was not feeling well.  Polina was not happy with my lack of engagement and my request for her to play with some toys on her own.  When Polina got up from her nap I was counting the minutes until my dad got there.  I was running 102 temp and aching from head to toe.  My dad got there at 3pm to relieve me.  I checked on Jasmine and she had passed. She couldn't hold on until Joe got home.  Friday morning, as a family, we buried our little kitty.  I loved her so much.  
With this week being so difficult on both Polina and the rest of us, she has been very difficult and it just reminds me how fragile our attachment still is.


I will leave you with this awesome little video clip from earlier this week.

Planning to Blog...

I was planning to get the kids to bed tonight and spend time writing a blog post.  About 8pm I gave the dog a bath and when she was done, she loves to run around the house in circles.  Well Princess P just happen to walk right into "DD" and Brandy just took her out!  Poor baby.  She got knocked off her feet and hit her little head.  We thought it was a good idea to make sure everything was okay before we put her to bed for the night.  So we went to urgent care and had her checked out.  She's fine but look at this cute picture I took.

Eye Doctor

We went to the eye doctor today at Children's Mercy.  Polina was premature, we don't know exactly how premature but I thought it was important to have her vision checked.  I am happy to report that her eyes formed perfectly in-spite of her prematurity.  I'm so thankful that despite being a tiny premature baby she has perfectly formed ears and eyes!  I'm so in love with her!