Rhomboids and clovers

Yesterday marked two months with our little Carter Jack Allen!  It seems like forever and it seems like only yesterday that we were here:

And now we are here:

and here:

Carter loves shapes. When I say love, I mean as much as any almost two year old can adore an inanimate object. He has been with us now for exactly two months and he can already correctly identify stars, diamonds, squares, circles, ovals, hearts, clovers, triangles, and rhomboids. Rhomboids aren't a shape, you say? Well, yes. Rhomboids are back muscles.  I guess my mommy brain and my doctor brain got a little muddled on maternity leave and after I taught him to say "rhomboid" he now refuses to say any other name for his favorite shape.

     Mr. Star is out for a ride

Carter is also determined to learn the alphabet. How he knows that letters are things to be learned is beyond me because we really have been focusing on basic things like, "More noodles, please" instead of the alphabet. But once he realized that letters were things that needed to be learned, there was no stopping him. As of today, he can recognize the letters, B, P, M, L, O, A, Y, & C. 

     Blueberry syrup everywhere!

We lost track of how many English words he can say at 100. He talks non-stop. Even Charlie, our talking machine, will beg Carter to stop talking "for just two minutes, please!"  New words have to be repeated at least 50 times. He makes me repeat them, too, just to make sure he is saying them correctly. A typical conversation goes like this:
Carter: "Mama, what's that?"
Me: "That's a butterfly."
Carter: "Butterfly? Butterfly...butterfly....butterfly. Mama? Mama! Mama! Butterfly?"
Me: "Yes, butterfly!"
Carter: "Butterfly, butterfly, butterfly, BUTTERFLY!"

 Before he goes to sleep at night he has to look around his room and catalogue everything he sees that he knows how to say, "Owl, alligator, backpack, fan, bed, light, Mommy, owl, alligator..."  Over and over and over again.  It takes all of my willpower to sit there and just rock him, waiting for his little brain to finally slow down and be ready for sleep.  Whenever I start to get impatient, I remember all the nights he didn't get rocked, all the conversations with a mama that didn't happen, all the hours he must have lain in his crib alone with no one to hear him talk, and I suspect that he is just trying to make the rocking, the snuggling, the holding, and the kisses last a little longer.  I think we both know that those are magic moments when his heart is being healed.  

   

So sweet I can hardly stand it. 

I'm shamelessly bragging on Carter for one reason: this brilliant boy was at one time considered almost unadoptable and I am haunted by the realization that there are countless other brilliant children just like him with scary medical files who just need one thing: a family. Had he remained an orphan in China, his visible ear deformity coupled with his orphan status would have kept him from ever getting an education or being able to choose a career. In our country, we assume that anyone can overcome the odds and rise to the top if they have the desire to learn and work hard. But for orphans around the world who have no one to advocate for them, this is simply not the case.  Their futures are often without hope. For orphans in China with special needs, it is virtually impossible for them to get accepted to a university or to find successful employment opportunities. I cannot imagine what it would be like for a child to live without hope and without promise of a future. I think of the millions of children who are still waiting and my heart becomes paralyzed with the vastness of it all.

Every day I look at Carter and think that he is nothing short of amazing. I wonder what his future holds and I know the possibilities are endless. They say adoption is a miracle. That is true, but not really. Adoption is not a miracle, but many endless miracles that continue to unfold day after day.  Seeing the way Charlie and Camdyn have grown in their love for Carter, that is a miracle.  Each time Carter leans over to give us a kiss, that is a miracle.   Every person who tells us how much joy they've gotten from following our family's journey, that is a miracle.  Finding out that the hole he once had in his heart is now so small the doctors consider it gone, with no follow up testing ever needed again, that was a miracle. But, the miracle that I am most grateful for today is Carter's future. The doors that will open for him. The choices he will have. The limitless possibilities that wait for him simply because we took a leap of faith and said "Yes" to a baby who had only ever been told "No."  The thing about miracles is that  they require more faith than action or ability on our part.  It is God who steps in and does the rest.   When I see this boy smile, I know that God has stepped into our lives in a big, undeniable, beautiful way. What is more miraculous than that?  

"To love another person is to see the face of God." 
           (~Victor Hugo, Les Miserables)