Life with Lotus Maria and Lucian Stone

So I certainly have been lax in keeping our blog up to date. And it’s so nice to hear that some of you like the Lotus updates so much that you are upset that you haven’t received them. The vicious circle is that we have been so busy and I have so much to write about that it’s hard to find the time to write about it all. I sat down today and got caught up on some of our adventures from this past fall. I am having a hard time wrapping my head around the fact that 2006 has almost come to an end. Our little clan has a lot of changes going on. As you saw in my email I have officially left Pixar. I am off to pursue a new career paths which will hopefully allow me more time with Lotus and Nate and work in a field I am pretty passionate about. I am in the midst of applying to grad school for the fall and luckily Nate has three months off at the moment which has given us some great family time and I have a lot more freedom to get my applications done. I am nervous but excited as well.

As I just mentioned Nate is on a three-month break from Pixar and he got to be single dad the 1st week of November. I went back to Antigua, Guatemala to take a language immersion course and he held down the fort at home. He had a great time and though I really missed them both it was a really worthwhile program and my Spanish is much improved. It was also wonderful to spend more time in Lotus’ homeland and get an even better feel for the people and the place. I can’t wait to take her back there in a few years. I just hope I keep all that I learned up so I don’t have to start all over again on my next trip. As soon as I get pictures from Nate’s week I will add them to the blog. I know for a fact that they went to a kids dance party called Pip-Squeak- A- Go-Go, which sounded pretty cool.

But enough about us and on to the Lotus stories.

The most important thing that happened to us as a family is that in October Lotus Maria Stanton Pearl became officially stuck with us forever. On October 16th we had our family court appointment and finished the last hurdle of our adoption process. Though the adoption had been finalized in Guatemala this last step allows her to have a US birth certificate issued and she became an official U.S. citizen. In a lot of ways it is merely a formality, but important none the less. Though there was no worry that she would be taken away from us or that our adoption wasn't legal it was one of those things that still weighed in the back of my mind and now that it is finished we are like any other family.

Our court date was on a Monday morning and my dad flew down to spend the weekend with us and attend the hearing. Uncle Matt joined us at the Courthouse. Lotus was thrilled to be surrounded by her extended family. I was a bit nervous as we approached the courthouse since my last experience there wasn’t so smooth. Two weeks earlier I had to file all our adoption paperwork to get a court date. I was pushing it with Lotus’ naptime, but I really wanted to file it as soon as possible. As soon as we got in line in the Family Court administrative offices Lotus lost it, but I was already there and didn’t want to have to try and come back. Once I got to the window she was throwing a full on fit, complete with yelling and flailing arms. To make matters more nerve-wracking I of course hadn’t filled out all the paperwork properly and had to fill the rest out then and there. It was only the paperwork for her birth certificate, what her legal name name was now, our names, her place of birth, etc. Important stuff that I didn’t want to screw up. I flew through everything so quickly that I wasn’t sure I did it all right and I think the lady behind the glass wanted us out of there so quickly that she gave us a court date that was a lot sooner than I expected. As we approached the courthouse this time I was hoping that we wouldn’t get there and be told I that in my rush I had screwed something up and we had to come back.

We got to the courtroom and there were a few other families waiting. It turns out that they give five people the same appointment time. At first it was a bit annoying to find out that it would take longer than expected, especially since Nate had to get to work, butin the end it was fine. It was wonderful to see and be part of all these beautiful kids getting their forever families. We were of course the last family called so I got to sweat it out, worrying about the damn paperwork while every family went in before us. The family before us was named Pearl-Statt, which caused a bit of confusion and I had to send the bailiff in to retrieve Art before he used all his space on his camera taking pictures of another family’s adoption proceedings.

When we entered the courtroom the Judge was standing there with a stuffed animal for Lotus and the bailiff was really sweet. I think being a family court judge is really difficult and you spend most of your time hearing about children in terrible or not so great situations, so the Judge seemed to love this day when it got to be all about families coming together. We swore to take care of Lotus Maria forever and the Judge deemed us suitable enough for the task. The whole thing lasted about 5 minutes and then we took pictures with the Judge. Everything was filed properly and now she is officially official. It was such a great experience.

Lotus the Samuri at the insane Pixar kids parade. Apparantly Pixarians are breeding like mad, because there were several hundred kids at the annual November 1st kiddie parade. Basically the children of the Pixar employees wander through the building collecting everyone's leftover halloween candy, because that's what you want your children to have, more candy. But the costumes are always pretty impressive and everyone's kids are so adorable. After so many years of watching the cute little ones pass by it was pretty fun to pass through with our Pink Samuri Warrior.

Our first Halloween with Lotus!! It seems as if Halloween has sort of stretched out to a 10-day holiday, which means we got lots of use out of Lotus’ adorable costume. Nate brought her back a pink kimono from Japan last year. She wore it to the SF Guatemalan family event at the Zoo; when we went trick or treating to our neighbor’s homes and to the Pixar kids parade. She basically was confused the entire time and sometimes overwhelmed. We tried to keep the sugar at bay, but I believe we failed at some point. Besides what is Halloween with out a little sugar high.

In October we had a pumpkin patch across the street from our house that we visited often, and by often I mean about everyday. Lotus is walking/running now so she has no interest in being in her stroller. If we walk to the neighborhood or the park I then have to carry her back and the girl is no waif and that's a long walk with a 26 pound wiggly worm in your arms. So it was great to have a destination that she could walk to. It was a pretty cool pumpkin patch with turkeys, rabbits, a maze and hay rides (basically a tractor driving around the parking lot, but city kids will take what they can get). Now it’s a Christmas tree farm, which isn’t quite as cool, but is still better that the dirt lot it will return to come December 26th.

Lotus has been taking gymnastics and swimming. It's been really fun watching her play and learn. She loves both the gym time and the pool. Living in SF space is at a premium so to have a big place to play in that is also indoors is a great treat. She was overwhelmed the first day and spent the entire time trying to go back in the elevator, but after that she got the hang of it and now runs up to the room as soon as we get off the elevator. I have also met some super cool families in the class. The class is a big production though. It’s 30 minutes of gymnastics (or play time in a gym) and then you have 15 minutes to change into your swimming suits and then have 30 minutes of swimming. By the end of it we are both ready for a nap. Nate has taken her a few times and has felt a bit awkward being the only dad there. He felt the moms sort of stuck together and he didn't have much to talk to them about. Which I equated to pretty much my entire career. So he'll survive. He has a blast playing with Lotus and I'm sure the other dads wish they could take a day off to come to this gym

Rach, Kaiya and my dad came to visit around Thanksgiving week. Lotus really knows Grandpa now and loves sitting on his lap and having him read to her. He and Matt came with us to the November SF Guat-family play date and hung out with our friends we have made with kids from Guatemala. We really lucked out with some fantastic warm weather that day and had a great time at the park with the other families.

Lotus had her seemingly first spat of jealousy when Kaiya was here. Kaiya was touching Nate's shoulder and Lotus was not happy about that and gave her a little smack. Nate seemed quite pleased that the girls were fighting over him.

Our first holiday season with Lotus is upon us and we spent Lotus’ first Thanksgiving with the Stanton/Thurman family. Lotus had a great time tearing apart Megan and Billy’s house. Lotus loves both her Uncles, but I think Uncle Matt holds the title of Lotus' favorite relative.

A few more pictures of the Stanton-Pearl Aquarium trip

A couple of weeks ago we took Lotus down to the Monterey Bay Aquarium. It was such a wonderful trip with her. She loved looking at all the fish and playing in the tide pools. The aquarium has expanded quite a bit since the last time I was there and I am always impressed by it. Maybe I never noticed the amount of areas for the tots, but they are extensive. They really do there best to include all age groups. I am still wowed by the huge tanks and the crazy sun fish.

So the Christmas/Hanukah season is upon us and we (maybe just me) are of course going crazy trying to make it perfect for Lotus, who will never remember this Christmas and has barely even noticed the big tree in our dining room. But it’s important to me so she rolls with it. We, of course, needed to have the requisite Santa photo taken. So here it is, all the evidence she will ever need to explain her childhood to her therapist.