We have arrived, and we are exhausted. Tuesday night before we left, we did not sleep for several reasons. At 10:00 that night, we decided to kidnap Avery and take him out for ice cream in his PJ’s. We love this kid, and he doesn’t get a lot of one on one with two other kids in the house, so we wanted to do one last special thing with him before we left. When we got back home, Asa decided to wake up crying only for Mama. I stayed with him in his room 12:00-1:30 and was okay with that. I think he could sense we were leaving. I have been telling him a story every night for the past few nights about a boy named Asa and all the adventure he would get to do while his Mama and Daddy went to get his new brother. I always tell him Mama and Daddy will be back. It’s the best I could think of to prepare him, so I hope it helped. My mom told me he kept looking in the sky to see if he could see our “hairplane”.
After he finally went back to sleep, I decided to do one more think to help Ave while we are away. We have left a present for the boys to open each day so that they have that to look forward to when they are sad. There is one bigger gift, Lego set for Ave and new toy for Asa, and the rest are their favorite food, candy, games, crafts, etc. Ave opened his first gift that night before we left. It was a journal. I asked him to write down all the fun things he did while we are away because I don’t want to miss a thing. (Ok, now the Aerosmith song is stuck in my head!) Anyway, I took his journal and dated each day for him and wrote a note to him each day. I told him our itinerary for that day and even gave him some homework (the teacher in me) to do some days that correspond with what we are doing, ie look up some fun facts about the Great Wall and share them with me. I hope this is a good outlet for him to get his thoughts down on paper while we are away.
We also made a paper chain for each boy so they could cut a link each day and count down to when we return.
I did A LOT of research and reading while preparing for this trip, and I learned from other BTDT mamas the importance of making the children we were leaving at home feel safe in knowing we are returning, and they are loved and thought of while we are away. I pray these boys feel our love and the time passes so quickly for them. It takes a village to raise children, and we are so blessed that our friends and family have adjusted their schedule to make this Mama’s heart have peace knowing they are being loved on while we are away!
After he finally went back to sleep, I decided to do one more think to help Ave while we are away. We have left a present for the boys to open each day so that they have that to look forward to when they are sad. There is one bigger gift, Lego set for Ave and new toy for Asa, and the rest are their favorite food, candy, games, crafts, etc. Ave opened his first gift that night before we left. It was a journal. I asked him to write down all the fun things he did while we are away because I don’t want to miss a thing. (Ok, now the Aerosmith song is stuck in my head!) Anyway, I took his journal and dated each day for him and wrote a note to him each day. I told him our itinerary for that day and even gave him some homework (the teacher in me) to do some days that correspond with what we are doing, ie look up some fun facts about the Great Wall and share them with me. I hope this is a good outlet for him to get his thoughts down on paper while we are away.
We also made a paper chain for each boy so they could cut a link each day and count down to when we return.
I did A LOT of research and reading while preparing for this trip, and I learned from other BTDT mamas the importance of making the children we were leaving at home feel safe in knowing we are returning, and they are loved and thought of while we are away. I pray these boys feel our love and the time passes so quickly for them. It takes a village to raise children, and we are so blessed that our friends and family have adjusted their schedule to make this Mama’s heart have peace knowing they are being loved on while we are away!