Happy Gotcha Day Ryker!

When you have a large family it seems like you always have some kind celebration going on. Tomorrow, January 6th is no exception. That is probably one of the most important days in our family. It's Ryker's "Gotcha Day". If you don't know what gotcha day is, it's a day celebrating the anniversary of one's adoption. This day is one we want him to celebrate, we want him to know we love him and he was meant to be with our family. It's crazy to think back to last year, he was a different kid. I remember the day we left I had triple checked our diaper bag to make sure every single thing was in there and kept changing his "coming home outfit" like fifty times before Jason was done in the shower. My anxiety level had sky rocketed and I was freaking out about if this little guy was going to love us or not. The whole way there we talked about our little boy and what he might like. We wondered if he would be like his older brothers and be 100% boy or if he would have other interests. We wondered if he was going to be okay with so many siblings and how he was going to react to each of them. Then the time finally came, we were handed our little boy. A gorgeous boy who had beautiful blue eyes, just like his sister. Those blue eyes filled up with tears when he was handed to us and his foster family, who had him his entire life and despite how poorly they may have treated him-they were his family-left him. His poor little baby mind was racing and he didn't know what to think. Before leaving the foster family asked for the outfit he was wearing back, I took him and changed him into a new outfit and diaper while he screamed his head off. I felt like a terrible mom, he didn't know me and I was trying to sooth him and I had no clue how! After officially saying goodbye to his former family, we decided to feed the cranky little guy. Where do you take a baby who is screaming? We didn't know what he liked, we didn't know if he knew what certain foods were! We were winging it. We went to McDonald's-yup! Fed my one year old McDonald's the moment I got him! He calmed down a little bit when I gave him some food, but we quickly realized he wasn't able to chew very well. Our day seemed to be getting longer and longer and more stressful by the moment. Luckily, I had some of the fruit pouches in the diaper bag and gave him one. That cheered him up, until we put him back in his car seat. Oh lord that boy HATES his car seat! Still to this day he screams like crazy when we put him in it. Regardless, he had to be in it. He screamed for about 15 minutes before I took out the iPad and found Paw Patrol. I figured since all of our other kids liked Paw Patrol, he would too. I was beyond right, he calmed down and his eyes grew about five sizes. I don't really recommend shoving an iPad in your toddler's face, but I needed him to not cry and not hate us. The following days were hard for us, we tried getting him to interact with his siblings without forcing it and tried to get him to trust us. It was clear that even though he was so young, he had been hurt in the passed and wasn't about to get hurt again. He knew what he was doing. He was seeing if we would go the extra mile for him. I am so happy we stuck with everything, Jason and I have tried every thing we could imagine to bond with this boy. I am happy to say a year later, he cries when we leave him at school and yells "Mama" when he sees me and "Da" when he sees Jason. He LOVES his siblings, especially Skyler and will look all over the house for her when she's with her dad's family. He is starting to trust more, maybe a little too much! He now gets in trouble at preschool for kissing the other kids! He is a garbage truck loving, hyper, adorable little boy and I'm so happy he's mine.