Things I love about Camden (10.5 months old)

He loves to crawl under stuff and get stuck. Every single day I find him stuck under my desk, under his walker or under the piano. His favorite place to get stuck is under the kitchen table...

He can stand up for very long periods of time but he still can't walk.

He likes to suck/chew on my shirt, on my shoulder. The shoulders of my shirts are usually crusty and soggy. Gross but cute.

He likes to eat. He gets very impatient when he sees us making his food.  Normally it doesn't take that long to get his food ready but lately Aric has gotten really into the baby food grinder, so it takes longer than usual.

Camden took his sweet time figuring out how to put things in his mouth. He just started doing it a couple of weeks ago. On one hand it was great because I didn't have to worry about him choking on stuff, but now it is so nice to have him sit in his high chair and eat stuff.

Now that he's gotten the hang of it he tries to put his whole hand in his mouth.

It is finally cold enough to put warm jammies on Camo. Aric and I couldn't stop laughing when we put these on him...

 

When I check on him at night this is what I find...he likes to sleep with his little bum in the air...

For most of his short life, Little C has been a pretty mellow baby. But this kid definitely has developed his lungs. It's like he just realized that he could be loud.

 

(Notice the toes...well that's because he rubs his feet like a cricket so we can't keep his socks on him. Today I got him some Robeez...they stay on.)

Camden has recently discovered his fingers. In this picture he is showing me his thumb.

This kids hair is OUT OF CONTROL!!!!

(I took this picture while he was sitting on Grandma K's lap. I didn't realize it until later how it looked like he had an afro!)

We seriously have to do something about this hair soon. Aric is very protective of Camden's hair and he won't let me touch it.

Needless to say it is not growing in very even. I wish I could get a better picture of his tight little curls.

This next picture isn't the greatest quality but I love his sweet little expression. As you can see by his drooliness, his teeth are finally coming in...YAY for teeth!

 

What's not to love...really!? Sometimes I will just stare at him with a giant grin on my face, I can't believe that he is mine. That he is really here to stay. Maybe it's because of all the D.R.A.M.A that we are experiencing...who knows.

What I do know is with this adoption stuff still hanging over our heads, it's so easy to get frustrated. I try not to let the weight of it squash me. Most days I do pretty good. But lately I have had to make a conscious effort to not be angry or bitter. I just can't believe that Camden is almost eleven months old! That means we have been dealing with this legal stuff for almost a year! When I find myself going to that ugly place, I look at that precious face and I am comforted.

I know that Camden is worth every single moment of stress, every single dollar spent and every hour of work I've had to do just to get us this far. So today, just like every other day, we are still hoping and we are still praying, that this month we will finally make some progress.

I just realized that most of you don't know exactly what the DRAMA is....well let me tell ya.

Right now we are trying to terminate paternity, something our lousy agency didn't do. The problem is that the laws in my state are way different than those in South Carolina. The details are long and boring so I will spare you them. But for now we are grateful to finally have an attorney in South Carolina who seems to know what he is doing. We thought we were going to have to go back to S.C. but now it looks like we may not...we'll see.

The other thing we are still dealing with is the financial issue with the agency that we got stuck working with. They found us on line, the day C was born, and because they were working with our birthmom we had to switch over to them. They left us high and dry and want us to pay them a RIDICILOUS, and I mean RIDICULOUS amount of money for services they did not provide. In fact, we had to pay other people to do the work they didn't do! Again, more long...boring details. Bottom line is, we have been trying to settle things with them but they are not cooperating.

I wish I had more happy news. I feel like my adoption updates are depressing. One of these days I will have great news. One of these days I will have a birth certificate. And that birth certificate will have Camden's name, Aric's name and my name on it. It's crazy how a little piece of paper can mean so much...but it does.

So I leave you with a much happier note...someday, hopefully soon...hopefully before Camden is bigger than me...

...we...

...will be here.