Today, the day before Donovan's birthday, the weather was gorgeous - not sunny, but in the 50s and no breeze. After preschool and lunch, I asked Donovan if he wanted to play outside with Aaron, and Donovan requested a "birthday hike like we went on last year." He has a good memory! On his 3rd birthday both Rupert and I took the day off from work to be with Donovan. After his 3 year physical and lunch at Al's, we went for a hike. Last November was so mild, that in fact on Thanksgiving day while the turkey was in the oven, we went on that same hike. Just at the end of our road there is a series of hiking trails through the woods. It's quite extensive in fact.
And so today, the boys and I headed out for our hike. They had so much fun, exploring and talking to one another, and I enjoyed every moment of simply observing my two incredible sons. At the end of the 45 minute hike, when I told the boys I was so sorry I had not thought to bring my camera, Donovan said, "That's okay Mommy, why don't we go get it and do the hike again." And so, that is exactly what we did.
I must add that last Thanksgiving, Rupert and I knew about Aaron. We knew we wanted to adopt him. We were waiting to see if the Chinese government would allow his file to be pulled back from the agency he was listed to and returned to the government, and then sent to our agency, so that we could lock his file and submit our LOI (Letter of Intent) to adopt him. I remember we talked during that walk about our concerns about having two boys basically the same age. (Can't believe we worried about that - they are the best of friends and bring us so much joy every day!) We also wondered if due to having been in an orphanage for 3 years, if Aaron would have some gross motor delays that would make hiking like that difficult. (While it was certainly reasonable to expect those delays, in Aaron's case they were so far from reality - this is a boy who was riding a 2 wheeler with training wheels the weekend we got home from China, and a few weeks later, swimming in our pool. In the beginning we did notice lots of stumbles and falls when Aaron was running on grass, but that was simply from having never done that before.) Today as I watched my two boys running together, ahead of me, and then turning and racing back to me (and Aaron squealing on the top of his lungs with enthusiasm, and Donovan giggling), I felt like the luckiest Mom ever...
Never in a million years would I have ever thought that when Donovan was turning 4, he would have a BROTHER, 2 months younger than him. And, yet our unexpected reality brings me so much more joy than I could have ever dreamed of one year ago...
Tomorrow is Donovan's 4th birthday and Thursday marks another special one year anniversary, for which I am starting to compose a post...
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