First of all, meeting our girl for the first time was extraordinary. It certainly wasn't the same as giving birth was and yet it wasn't completely different. Obviously it physically was much less painful and smelly...yuck...but emotionally it was so close. The first moment I saw her I dropped to my knees. The earth stood still and it was just her and I. Previous pictures that we had seen of her did not do her beauty justice, she stunned me and blew my heart wide open. And then she said "hi". That was it, that was all I needed to fall so madly, deeply in love. It actually took me a moment to remember that Paul was there too and that he needed to have his moment and so I took a step back and saw it through a different set of eyes. There is nothing sexier than watching your husband fall head-over-heels in love with his babies. Even thinking about it now gives a slight case of goose bumps. It was a truly glorious moment and I don't think that I could ever put into words the beauty of it all.
The rest of the first day we spent watching her and getting to know her. We played and snuggled and took her for a walk. Her foster parents were so unbelievably accommodating, friendly and open...but more about them later. We were invited to stay for dinner and so our first meal together was Chinese take-out. We left her that night after we put her to bed. We were ALL exhausted. We met our boys and my sweet-sister back at the hotel. (Amber drove the boys down so that she could be there with them when we needed to be there with Brandy. We wanted them to be part of the whole experience but needed them to be with someone when they couldn't be with us. Besides, my sister was there for the birth of both of my boys and we wanted her here for this 'birth' too). After telling the boys and Amber all about our big day I fell into bed.
I woke up on Tuesday feeling like crap-on-a-cracker. I had been sick since the 21st and so I was surprised that I was feeling so bad. None-the-less the four of us got up and went to meet Brandy. When the boys met Brandy it was love-at-first sight for Noah. He wanted to pick her up and never put her down again. Now Marcus on the other had was impressed but distracted by the news cast that was on the television, a completely normal and expected response from both of them. We visited for a bit at the foster house and then went out for our first family of five outing. We took the kids to the Spark Science Center in Calgary, Marcus was thrilled! Compared to our Science center in Edmonton the one in Calgary is much more mature and hands-on. Noah spent the trip bonding with Brandy, lifting her to see things and playing at the exhibits with her. It was a lovely trip, we all wanted to be with Brandy and so were taking turns holding her hands and carrying her. I had my first touch of jealousy about Brandy when she kept going to one particular woman, we kept seeing this woman everywhere and Brandy just loved her. I wanted her to be that excited to see me and yes she was but there was something about this woman that Brandy just was drawn to. This is totally a personality trait of Williams kids and is something that we are going to have watch. She is so cute and so comfortable with strangers that anyone could easily take her. Anyway by the end of the trip I was really sick and called Amber to pick me up from lunch and take me to the doctor. Paul took Brandy back to her house for her afternoon nap. Amber and I sat in the emergency for three hours and then at the end of it left and went to Calgary to go to a doctor there. I was put on anti-biotics and sent home. Oy! So back to Brandy we went, took her our for dinner and then back to the hotel for a sleep over. I was so ill that Paul did all of the work, all I could do was collapse into bed with a fever.
On Thursday morning we were up really early to take Brandy into Calgary for an eight a.m. cardiology appointment. I knew that I shouldn't have gone...I slept the whole way into Calgary and then had to leave the appointment in the middle because I needed to throw up. I didn't go back in but rather slept in the van. After that we went to Toys R Us to spend the remainder of Brandy's foster rec fund. We got a stroller and a play pen for free. We then took Brandy to lunch and then back home for a nap. Her foster parents asked us to let her have her last night at home with them and so they did, they had dinner and put her to bed for the last time.
On Friday, we arrived at about ten o'clock to take Brandy home. It was emotional to say the least and as exciting as it was for us, it was extremely hard to watch Melinda say goodbye. There were plenty of tears from both her and I. I don't know how they did it, how they were able to have and raise this little lady since the third day of her life and then let her go, but thank goodness they did. The drive to Edmonton went well, other than both Noah and I being so sick. I was coughing so hard that I almost peed and Noah coughed so hard that he threw up!
Getting her home was surreal. Here it was an event that I had been thinking about and planning for months and really it was alot less exciting. We got her home, introduced her to the house, her room and the dogs and then put her things away. Really it was all just lovely and calm and easy. We came home to a beautiful banner that Bailey and Katie made for us, it all made my heart sing.
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