My Heart

I love my sweet baby more every day! He gets funnier and cuter and sweeter every day! Here are some of his deliciously sweet quotes:

"Mommy, even when I'm a grown-up big boy I'll still be your little baby."

"I love Daddy the most and you the best."

He says he wants to be a daddy when he grows up. His favorite book is I'll Love You Forever and he wants me to sing him the song every night. Some nights he sings it to me in his sweet little falsetto voice and I could just MELT. I want to stop these moments in time and relish them longer.

On Halloween with Izaiah's old preschool teacher, Cassie. She babysits for us now and
we LOVE her!

Brotha from anotha Motha

We had a perfect weekend. Forest Park, dinner at Highland Brewery, movie night with Dana, shopping in the Loop, smoothies, Bread Co., soccer in the backyard, reading books with Izaiah, etc. PERFECT.

A few weeks ago we found out Izaiah has at least 3 additional siblings that we did not know about. That throws a wrench in the adoption plans, but just a small one. The next week we were made aware that Izaiah's biological grandmother died of AIDS; therefore the next day Izaiah's 13-year old uncle (who we also did not know about) came into foster care. Izaiah lived with his grandma when he was taken into care, so I assume he spent a lot of time with his uncle. We can't bring him into our home, though, because we can't do foster care with the state because of my job. That's probably a good thing, as I'm not sure that would have been good for Izaiah. I was really excited to go to the funeral and get to meet Izaiah's family while staying under the radar, but they're all heroine addicts, so there were no funeral arrangements made. Isn't that so sad? Now we have the dilemma of whether or not to contact Izaiah's siblings and uncle to try to maintain relationships with them. That would be no dilemma, except I think their parents would be hard to deal with. Tough stuff.

LOVE. IT!

Where Does the Time Go?

It's almost November?! We have been so busy here at the Fitzgerald home! Izaiah is growing exponentially. He is cuter and funnier than ever! He had to switch Kindergarten teachers again. Let me show you just how many he has gone through:

1. Ms. Totten
2. Ms. V
3. Ms. Glass
4. Ms. Totten (again)
5. Mr. Richardson
6. Ms. Anderson
7. Ms. Anderson (same name, different teacher)

This time it was because there was a kid in the room that has bad behaviors, too, and they would feed off one another. I don't think the teacher could handle them both. Then we had the issue of the school nurse refusing to give Izaiah his medicine because his heart rate was up! Of course it's up! Because he's running around hyper because you haven't given him his medicine! Then some days she just wouldn't give him his medicine. Then she'd call us 6 times a day. Then she'd tell me Mark had been up at the school to get Izaiah when he didn't. Then she'd say Izaiah was sleeping through class everyday (that part was quite humorous). Then she'd call and leave messages on my voicemail about chocolate. I think that nurse is losing it. Either that or she's getting dementia. The principal was so exasperated with her because Izaiah would have to spend an hour in her office every day after cussing out the teachers because he hadn't gotten his meds. Then the principal started sneaking behind the nurse's back to give him meds. Then the nurse got wind and would call us to come pick him up because she refused to give him anything. It was CRAZY for awhile, although humorous now :)

My job is nuts...NUTS! But I'm going to love it once I get into the swing of things. That should be in about a year. One of the biggest, sneakiest things God has used me for in my life happened at work and it's an amazing story. I will try to blog about it soon. Other than that, I took my first kid into foster care on Friday. It was awful. I'm so thankful to be that person, though, that it brings tears to my eyes. I have wanted to be "that social worker" ever since I was nine and read a book with a social worker character that was cold and jaded while working with kids, like it was just a normal, boring day when she brought a kid into care. To get to be the one to love on those kids during such an awful, traumatic experience means so much to me. I wish I could take that hurt and feel it for them.

Our neighbors are awesome. Our home is awesome. Friends are awesome. God is awesome.

The adoption process has officially begun! Hopefully things will be finalized by January. Ran into some pretty big - yet minor - setbacks. I'll blog about that later too. Promise.

Washed By The Water

Sometimes it's hard for me to see past the hurt in my life, especially the hurt that people I once respected and trusted have caused. This puts into perspective for me that God is good, even when others are not. Those people, too, are washed by His blood.

Lady Gaga's super shocking performance!

Am I the only one who thought this was brilliant?

What Does a Mommy Say?

We were in the car quizzing Izaiah on what noises each animal makes. Here's how that conversation went:

Me - "What does a pig say?"

Izaiah - "Oink!"

Me - "What does a cow say?"
Izaiah - "Moooo!"
Me - "Good, now what does a horse say?"
Izaiah - "Naaaay!"
Mark - "And what does a Mommy say?"
Izaiah - "NO!"

A Little a This, A Little a That

Hello all! There's been so much going on I barely get a moment to breathe these days! Izaiah finally got a teacher - Ms. Anderson. However, in a school of amazing racial and ethnic diversity, he is the only one in his class that's not fully African American. I'm not entirely happy about that since we chose the school mainly for the diversity. The other 2 classrooms have mostly Caucasian students, with a slew of African American, Asian, Latino, and Middle Eastern children. I don't really understand how that happens really, but I also don't want to be the mom calling to demand that her child be placed into the "white kid room". Race is so complicated.

I started a new job on Monday. I will be working with child abuse hotline investigations and family preservation services with the state of Missouri. So far everything is going well. I really like my supervisor so that's a good start. I've gotten close with some of the people I've been in training with, so that's good, too.

Mark and I had a date night last night and went to see "My Sister's Keeper". Hands down, the SADDEST movie I have EVER seen!!! I cried through the WHOLE movie. It was one of the best I've seen, though. Totally worth it. Just make sure you're alone in your own living room when you watch it.

We're getting to be friends with our next door neighbors. They are really awesome! Ladd and Jen have a 4-year-old daughter, Mya, and a 3 month old little boy, Adrienne. Izaiah LOVES playing with Mya, and they are SOOOO sweet together :) Ladd is a general contractor so he's really helpful with getting the house fixed up. Jen is an artist/photographer. They are really neat neighbors to have!

When we moved in, the neighbors all said that there hasn't been any crime or theft or anything on our block in at least 4 or 5 years. Well, here we come and jinx that. We left the garage door open one day and our car got broken into. No biggie, except that they stole the garage door opener from my car. That was a little unsettling, but not a huge deal.

We are loving having my sister living with us. It's so fun having her and Carlos around all the time.

And the biggest news lately deserves its own post, so that will be the next one. Keep reading :)

Dana Brooke

Dana and I with our kids from the inner city

I was in 8th grade when I met Dana. She was almost three years younger than me, but you'd never know it. We were fast friends and thick as thieves. We went through so much together over the years. I always told people that Dana was my soulmate. No one ever understood me the way Dana did, and we had the kind of friendship that one only finds once in a lifetime.

Over the years we drifted apart, as she moved to Chicago to pursue a career in acting and I moved to Arkansas and got married. There was the presence of an antagonist in there somewhere coupled with me being at a bad place in my life, and Dana drifted completely out of my life. I was distraught over it for years. I know that makes me sound pathetic, but it was one of the hugest losses I've encountered in my life. Dana got into some awful things back in Chicago, and it felt like there was nothing I could do to save her. I cried night after night after night for God to keep her safe and to bring her back to me, but He never did. As she faded further and further away, I grieved her like she was dead. I fought with God over why He would not rescue her, and why He would not rescue me from the guilt and pain of not having her in my life and of feeling somewhat responsible for the hurt and horror she was going through in her own. I wrote her all the time, but could never bring myself to send the letters. I never knew where she was anyways.

Two weeks ago I randomly saw her on someone's facebook page. I wrote her, and before I could agonize over my wording or freak out about whether or not to send it, I pressed 'send'. I cried the whole day, not knowing if contacting her was going to make her upset or make me vulnerable to being hurt again.

Three days later, Dana is sitting on my couch. A couple days before I wrote her, God spoke to her and told her to come back home. He provided a way out of her current situation, and completely rescued her heart and her mind. It turns out that I had written her the day before she left to come home. We spent the next 2 days together in tears and in prayer of thanksgiving for God delivering her and restoring what has been broken.

She has been through sooo much, and she has a really tough road ahead of her. But what once was lost has now been found and I am once again dumbfounded by God's timing and His goodness, even when we think He has forgotten us. There's so much I could say. There is so much evil that has been overcome, and so much hurt that God has begun to heal. What Satan meant for evil, God turned to beauty.

With my Dana back, I am able to laugh again, and it feels really, really good. Please pray for Dana as she starts her life over, and begins a journey of healing and recovery. God has been sooooooo faithful and will continue to be, no doubt. I will praise Him until the day I die.