(click pictures to make them bigger)Isn't she wonderful!? We know she is "eclectic" and we love it.:) She is soooooooooooooooooo wonderful! If any of you know my sister Ashley, she's worse at random conversations! smile. (love you ash AND your random conversations, i passed them on to you after all) As you can see her hair is not a natural color, it's blue but fading to green. She did it last Saturday. This picture was taken at the end of our visit at 530pm (see, still smiling!). You are enjoying one of my 'signature', 'I don't want you to see my body so here's a self portrait head shots' with Courtney. She loved it. smile. Our "face to face" meeting started at 12p today. We were still driving to Kennesaw when Hannah called and said, "Hey, do you guys just want to come and meet us at Courtney's Doctors appointment?" Ahhh, YEAH! So we get to her doctors office (she hadn't met him yet, it's a new Dr. since leaving jail) after getting late for the looooongest 10min of our life and were ushered into a hallway with Hannah. Apparently C was giving a "sample" in the restroom (man, this is just how I pictured meeting my birth mother! LOL). The employees were introduced to us, "the Adoptive Parents" and we got, "OH! Nice to meet you!" So we're talking casually (the hallway is getting hotter) when 'someone' pops their head out of the bathroom,' psst'ing Hannah to let the employees know "someone's pee is already in there" then turns her head to us and says, "oh, hey!" and goes back in the bathroom. LOL. I know descriptive but I have to give you an idea of how crazy this is. We are totally rolling with it at this point, despite beginning to perspire from stress and the increasing heat!
Finally Courtney comes out with a HUGE smile on her face and arms outstretched for me (lingered of course cause i'm so huggable) and then Michael (sooooo he 'says' she lingered for him too but, we know i'm better ;). We just took off from there. She wanted us to come in to be part of the examination because she wants us to "experience everything we can for our son!" I'm not making this up! She is crazy or an angel, I say both. smile.
So first of all, she's wearing this crazy shirt. It's something my mom would wear or appreciate at least. It's completely my families sense of humor. Then, on the exam table (nothing was exposed, Michael was comfortable) she and her Dr start right in to mixing it up when he makes fun of her hair color. I cannot repeat the other exchanges as some where inappropriate for mass consumption but (Lindsey c. in particular) some of you will be very upset you weren't there yourself to experience this. We were laughing and having a great time. The Dr. got her prepped to hear the heartbeat with the old school 'midwife' heartbeat detector thingy. He finds the heart beat immediately and says, "Here's number one"... Courtney gives him 'the eye' and says "I don't think so" and he moves the Doppler to the other side of her belly and detecting the heartbeat again says "and here's number 2"! (NO, not twins, he was totally playing with her the whole time and they fed off each other, it was great) She just shot him a look of 'I'm not going to let you get away with that' and bantered back and forth. We are soooooo grateful to have been able to go to her appointment and meet the very casual doctor (but professional too). We will look forward to meeting him again and are thankful he was willing to take Courtney in her ninth month. What a blessing (thank yourselves for all those prayers!).
(her idea to "oh wait, take one from the side!" she's so amazing!) After lunch at "Joe's Crab Shack", (one of C's cravings while in jail) with Courtney, Hannah and her intern "Ashley" we went to her hotel to visit more personally after Hannah had to go to Sealing of a baby to it's family in the Atlanta Temple. Eventually we gave her her wrapped belated Birthday gifts along with letters from Michael's Mom and Step-Dad and from my Parents. She LOVED the letters. She really enjoys learning about our families and especially is enamored with the idea that my family is so big and still close. (wait, she likes both families equally but is mesmerized with a big family... hope that clears that up?) Anyway, after seeing her in person and getting to know her on that level, I have to revise the second part of the gift but, she liked the gifts. We gave her the book "Oh the Places You'll Go" and "Fablehaven book 1" (of 4 or 5) and a hand made by me, GREEN scarf. She was very impressed with the handmade aspect especially. We will omit the mention of "movie theme" as she has apparently sold her PS2 she was watching movies on and the doctor was worried about her sugar levels soo, I might be omitting some of the candy to find a new home in my purse! She'll still get the robe and socks etc.
Anyway, before I forget, she said it meant a lot that so many people are praying for her. She specifically said to tell everyone (doesn't know I have a blog but knows I let lots of people know what's going on, at a time), thank you so much for your prayers cause she feels them. She explained that it's what helped her to feel so confident, SURE and "at peace" about choosing Michael and I (THANK YOU ALL SOOOOO MUCH! We know this is real and will be indebted to you for all our lives. We will name our son after all of you. lol)! Again, I do not kid and cannot make this stuff up, she is so great! She also informed us (we had NO idea) that when the baby is born, we will get our own room next door to stay for a couple days, as if I had the baby! AWESOME!!!!! During this conversation, she re-iterated her Birth Plan to us, that we would be in the delivery room and this time she said, when the baby is born, they will hand him to ME! OH MY GOSH! I told her that she could hold him, it's ok and she said she's learned it's really not good so she doesn't try to get attached to the baby. (I'm sure she will hold him later, she's just distinguishing the first time). It's exciting for her to see us be parents. She cannot wait to bless us, she says it over and over. It's almost like all of you, knowing our history and wanting it so bad for us. She's like, "do you want to see all my family pictures so you can see what he could potentially look like!? It was just so great. She shared so much, very personal feelings (even poetry and writings about life and the baby and she is actually very talented with it). Anyway, we
finally had to close our meeting with her cause we got about 3hrs of sleep each last night and had yet to check into our hotel. We had the greatest day today! The cherry on top? Can it get any better?? YES! We shopped at IKEA! We bought our crib! And highchair! AND etc! Here is a picture of that to close....
Ahhhh to all your well wishes for a wonderful day. We also, thankfully made some headway on names! No I will not share yet!? Are you crazy?! ;) I will however, announce it when we know what his name is for sure. Just to wet your appetite though, we are decided... his last name WILL be... "Stuteville". LOL! There. you got it out of me... smile. I'm actually really excited that we made some headway cause before MDS was shooting me down right and left! smile. He means well, he just wants it to be important too. Alright, I'll keep him.
