First Day Was a Doozy!

I don't care what you say spell check.

Doozy is a word! I Googled.

Noun: Something outstanding or unique of its kind.

After a decent night's sleep, we were up early with a couple of kids who gravitated into our bedroom at around 6:00am. We were so happy that Joshua slept in his own bed. He is sharing a room with Micah and Trey although he is in a big boy bed as is appropriate for his status of big brother.

We had decided that if everything seemed copacetic that we would go to church together at 10:30am. We had a leisurely breakfast. The kids gave Joshua a tour of the outside in the daytime and introduced him to the rabbits. We packed up up the van and headed over to church at 10:20.

Joshua is a wonderful kid, polite and friendly, and smiled and said hello to everyone who greeted him. Bob and I were in a bit of a haze and we followed our regular routine of walking up two flights of stairs into the atrium with all the kids. First mistake!

The atrium at our church is a high ceiling-ed very loud room. I could tell that Joshua was overwhelmed with the noise as he stopped and sat on the couch after being dragged up the stairs by one of our daughters. O.k., not fair. But she went at her pace and not his.

I saw that he was uncomfortable, got him off the couch, and took him across the room to try to get him into the quieter sanctuary.

And then IT happened.

A little cough.

A little sputter.

And I knew........

Joshua was going to TOSS.HIS.COOKIES. Revisit breakfast. You get the picture.

So what's a self-respecting mother to do?

She makes an instant decision to catch it with what is naturally available.

Oh yuck.

Bathrooms were not near but we found a sink at the coffee station and finished our business.

Good doobies cleaned up the aftermath not so discreetly.

Hey, Joshua. This is church. Don't you love it?

I cleaned him up and took him into the sanctuary to assess what we should do.

We ended up staying in our bedraggled state and Joshua fell asleep on my lap.

The day got better after that. Joshua slept off and on for a few hours and then perked up enough to hand out presents.
We are incredibly grateful to Grandma Marcia and Grandpa Jere for holding down the fort while we were gone. I can never thank them enough for what they did. Here they are with their new grandson. The Old Lutheran and the New American. I love it.My brother and nephew came to the airport and hung around on Sunday for most of the day to help welcome Joshua into our family. I took this picture of Carlson and Cora because they are both nine for a short time.
We got Joshua to eat some noodles later in the day.

Then he cried.

For the first time.

Which made me cry.

Let's just say the second night didn't go as well but all normal grieving and understandable.

Joshua continues to be a delight to everyone he meets.

We are so proud of how he is coping with all the changes.

He is a wonderful boy who has blessed us greatly already.