Giving Thanks

This was somewhere on the first full day we were home.  Which was a Friday…I think.

It really was all a haze, a blur, a fog.  Not sleeping for 30+ hours and then being teased with five teeny hours of sleep was tough.  The not sleeping continued for a couple more days which was brutal.  The kind of brutal where I couldn't form full sentences or think of how we would ever put on clothes again let alone do the 12 loads of laundry to have clean clothes.   But we poured more coffee and just soaked in the fact that James was really with us in our house…so very thankful he is with us.  There have been so many moments over the past five days where I am overcome with thankfulness. 

Thankful that instead of praying for him as were separated by continents, I am able to pray over him as he is wrapped in my arms.  One night we put James to bed and then came in the girls room to talk and say prayers and it hit me right there in that moment.  All those nights…every night for the last 21 months…we have prayed for our son with our daughters.  Every night prayers for who he would be, prayers about protecting him, prayers for his health, prayers for the process to quicken, prayers for preparing him to be in our family, prayers for his nannies to love him, prayers for our own preparation, prayers for our trip, prayers for him to know our love even before he knew us.  All those prayers…answered.

Thankful for all the joy he is experiencing and for all the overwhelming joy he is bringing to us.  This kid is funny.  And thank goodness he thinks I'm pretty funny too.  So we laugh a lot.  Since we've got to keep things simple for him while he adjusts to everything, you might not get to see this side of him but one day you will.  Oh what a ham.  

Thankful for all he is learning.  He is so smart and is already saying so many english words, using the sign language we've taught him, and observing everything going on around him.  Nothing gets by this smarty pants.

So thankful that he is experiencing the love of family.   Sometimes he must feel smothered with all the hugs and kisses and tickles he gets from us in a day.  But he doesn't show it…he genuinely seems to just LOVE it. 

So thankful that he is showing us more and more of himself.  The more he trusts us and his environment, the more comfortable he feels to be himself.  His whole two year old tantrum throwing self…crazy to be celebrating a tantrum right?

So thankful to be making memories with him each moment.  I do feel sad that I missed two years of him - two years of my son's life.  I can only imagine how precious he was a teeny newborn, how adorable he was at his first birthday, how wonderful it would have felt to hold him when he was so small.  But I'm so much more thankful, grateful, and joyful that I have him now.  He is so beautiful, so smart, so funny, so brave, and so mine.

I am so thankful.