Our Family Blog

Tomorrow, 9/22 is our families second Gotcha Day!!  2 years ago our adoption for our baby boy Joshua was finalized.  I cant believe it has been two years already.  We will be in the Poconos for Yom Kippur with Steve’s family but we will celebrate this special day, all day with our entire family.  Such a special time it is celebrating his finalization and remembering that magical time as we became a family.  Joshua is wonderful, growing so fast, he is so smart, so articulate, so bright.  I am so grateful.  I am however struggling with the dialogue that needs to start happening between us and Joshua regarding his adoption.  I know it does not have to be anything intense but even breaking it down into its most simple form is even difficult.  We read books, sometimes I will throw in a “lets pray for your birthmother” and he looks at me weird, so note to all prospective adoptive couples -nothing about this is easy -but nothing could be more wonderful.  I have been talking about his Gotcha Day coming up and he repeats me like a parrot.  I will continue to keep my heart and mind open to beginning this dialogue with him. Without sounding to much like Carrie Bradshaw from Sex and the City -I cant help but wonder -”why do we have to talk about adoption, when nothing in my entire life has felt more natural?”  Meaning- not one part of me feels like he did not come from my body.  It is an amazing experience, a difficult experience, and an experience I would never, ever change one minute of.

Happy Gotcha Day Josh - we continue to fall more in love with you as each day passes and thank you for being ours.

As I sit here watching some tattoo show, I cant help but think of a conversation I had with a colleague at work today -someone who has become a friend by “walking her talk” and exuding a personal integrity that I admire.  She was telling me about her child and how she could not imagine working when her child was a baby or toddler in fact she did not go back to work until he was in the 1st grade.  1st grade!  I went back to work when both Josh and Maya were 6 weeks old -by choice.  I do not regret my decision to go back to work or go back as soon as I did, but I cant help but to think about everything I missed. My job keeps me away from my family anywhere from 10-15 hours a day, so you do the math.  I always tell people I live for the weekends but I am always find it difficult to relax because what if there is an emergency at work?  What if someone gets sick?  What if someone elopes?  Maybe I just need a vacation.  I dont know.  I do know that Josh and Maya call me mommy, momma, mom and I have never heard them call anyone else that.  Thinking to the future -as we prepare to have another child (sometime in the future -no I am not pregnant and no we are not in the adoption process right now)  will I ever choose to be like one of the moms that lives on my street?  I am the only working professional mother on my street.  My entire street -there are like 40 something houses on my street!  Are my kids going to hate me?  Do they hate it as much as I do when my blackberry goes off after 5pm?  Everytime I put my shoes on or go to take something out of my purse -Josh says, ” Mommy going to work” -Just for today -I would like to choose to stay home with my kids.  Unfortunately this is not a decision I can make and then change in a week when maybe I realize I do want to work.  Maybe its just about balance and how due to my obsessive compulsive nature have been incapable to this point unable to find a balance between work and home.  Are my kids suffering?

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-2913509678636569618

Dread. That is the only way to describe it.  I got up with Maya yesterday morning and we were playing.  I started to hear Josh singing so Maya and I walked in to greet him with hugs and kisses and to my surprise, there he was, in all of his glory, sitting on the ottoman for his glider chair.  He pulled his bb out and said “Morning Mama” and put his bb back in.  The problem with this being, the last time I had seen Josh the previous evening, he was in his crib!!!!!!!!  We all woke Steve up a little while later and since he has been in denial and procrastinating abouot converting his bed to a toddler bed, I gave him no choice, today was the day whether he liked it or not.  We went to the Babies R Us to get a bed rail and a toddler bed set that Josh picked out, ofcourse it has giraffe’s and alligators on it.  After his nap, we let Josh help us take the railing off the front of his crib and make his new bed.  We proceeded to talk about it the rest of the day and he went down to bed last night great.  Not a peep all night.  He woke up this morning as he usually does, singing and talking.  When I went in there he climbed out of bed and gave me a big hug!  So far so good, but so sad, he’s so big.

And if you were wondering…….Maya remains the most beautiful, sweetest, loving, charismatic little girl alive.  She does everything Josh does so maybe she will be in a toddler bed soon also?

Happy Summer!!!!!!!!

Joshua is now 2 years old!!!!!!!!  He turned 2 on the 20th and we celebrated with a birthday party with family.  It was a great day.  Josh was ofcourse spoiled rotten with lots of gifts and lots of love.  His birthday was bitter sweet for me this year. Sweet in that my baby boy is growing and growing…..he is such a little person now.  We have conversations!  I mean, so what if they are about the toilet, pee pee, poo poo, juice, camels going pee pee and the overall observation of other peoples bodily functions, they are still conversations and I love every second of them.  I think Josh is going through a whats mine is mine and whats yours is mine, phase.  He does get some sharing in there with Maya but requires some prompting to do so.  His birthday was bitter for me because it was emotional.  I cant help but think of the days leading up to his birth, his delivery, and everything in between and what a wonderful, magical time it was.  It is all just so amazing. We are now moving forward with transitioning into his toddler bed because we figure once you can get one leg out of the crib while the other leg is still in the crib, its time to move into a big boy bed!!!  We are also going to work on potty training over the next couple of months.  Steve is in denial that we have to do all of these things because he refuses to believe he is growing up, but he’ll get there.  Another great year and we are so excited to see that else is to come!!!!!!!!  Happy Birthday Baby Boy we love you!!!!!!!!!!

CLICK ON RECENT FLICKR PHOTOS ON RIGHT SIDE OF SCREEN TO SEE UPDATED PICS OF THE KIDDIES!!!!!!!

Can you believe it has been a year?  We sure can’t.  Our baby girl is 1 and getting so big so fast.  We had a little party for her and she had so much fun hanging out and being loved by all of her family on her big big day!  She partied hard, took a really big nap (why do they always take the best naps during their parties) and she really enjoyed the cake and mommy and daddy baked for her special day.  We now officially have 2, one year olds and they are not twins!!!!!!!!!!!  Josh will be celebrating his 2nd birthday in 2 short weeks and we cant wait.  Pictures to come!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hey All - New photos available of the kids. Click on Recent Flickr Photos on the right side of your screen to see the cutest babies in the entire world!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/steveguberman/

Peace!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We are starting with the oldest. Josh is quite simply, the best, most beautiful little boy in the entire world. He is sooo different from 3 months ago. He is saying everything and more importantly, repeats everything you say! We have been watching our mouths so its all good! Josh is doing tremendous in school and has been really healthy this winter. We are in the planning stages for Josh’s 2nd birthday! Can you believe he is going to be 2? We sure cant! As independent as he is becoming he is still so sweet and loving, always wanting to hug and kiss and touch and be close by us. We love that. Josh loves his sister Kiki who he just started calling by her real name! He says, “My Maya” “I Love you My Maya” ” NO NO My Maya” Incredible. Josh has a list of his favorite songs like, Bingo, Happy and you know it, Ants Go Marching, ABC’s and Twinkle Twinkle baby! Its great having two babies because I feel like they learn to share much better. They are always sharing with each other and playing with eachother. We have a built in playdate for life! And moving right along……….

Maya, oooooooooooooo Maya. Maya is the most beautiful, sweetest, non-crying, best baby girl in the entire world. She is coming up on 11 months and I can not, can not, can not believe it. To think it is has almost been a year makes me so weepy. I just cant believe that it has been over a year since I gave birth to this marvelous little person. Maya is walking with assistance, pulling herself up on everything and wants to be in everything. She loves our new cabinets in the kitchen! Maya is also a babbling fool!  She blah blahs, Da das and ba bas all day long!  She is eating lots of fun stuff. Weird, you would think we would be more lax with the second baby, we are not as progressive with her in terms of introducing foods as we were with Josh. Believe me, she gets all the food she needs and her belly and those cheeks can speak for that! She loves bananas, mashed potatoes, eggs, cheese and ofcourse her cheerios. We are also in the planning stages of Maya’s 1st birthday! We will be having a huge birthday party for both of them in June and celebrating on their actual birthdays with just family.

Life is so busy, but we are glad we got to post news about the best children in the entire world that we are madly in love with. In other news, Steve’s business keeps growing and growing and he is moving his business out of our home officially March 23, 2007! He has been blessed with an incredible office space in downtown Denville where his business is sure to continue thriving! We also finished the remodeling of our kitchen and you can see pics of that transformation on our Flickr account. Also, we will have videos of Maya walking and Josh chasing her up and running soon! Stay tuned!

Happy New Year!  We hope you all had a wonderful, peaceful and safe holiday season and New Year!  We all had a great time together as we all had the holiday week off so we got to spend really good quality time together. The kids had a great Hanukah and Josh even learned to say Hanukah, which is the cutest. Every night we would light the menorah he would say it.  We also had a great time in celebrating the Christmas holidays with Jess’s family.  It was a really great and warm time.  The kids are doing so much I do not even know where to start.  Joshua is just the most amazing little boy in the entire world.  He is so sweet and gentle, charismatic, charming and a total flirt.  He flirts with everyone.  He is saying everything to the point where he will mimic everything you say so we are being more careful about how many times a day we drop the “F” bomb around the kids.  Josh is like 34 pounds and 3 feet tall.  He is huge and muscular.  He loves his baby sister who he calls, Kiki - because when he was smaller he could not say Maya or baby and Kiki just kind of stuck.  We have found however that he calls all babies, Kiki, but no baby girl is like our wonderful, amazing baby Kiki.  Maya is absolutely amazing.  She is the prettiest little thing you have ever laid your eyes on.  She is 8 months old and she just stood up for the first time today!  She has been pulling herself up on everything, but today she really did it.  She has the most beautiful face and I do not think we have heard her cry yet!  The child never cries.  She is so amazed by everything she sees around her and you can tell she is a thinker.  She loves to take it all in.  She is saying the normal DA DA DA, MA MA MA with her tongue sticking out always as she is about to pop a tooth any day now.  She is loving her meats and veggies and fruits, eating her puffs and cheerios, running in the walker, crawling everywhere, sleeping soundly and playing all day long! 

We are so blessed to have these wonderful, god given children.  They are the best two children anyone could wish or hope for.  A lot of people tell us what great parents we are.  I gotta give it to the kids, they are so good, they make it look easy.  More to come in 2007 however, no babies this year from us, sorry to disappoint anyone!  We are going to wait a few more years!  Will keep everyone posted as these babies continue to grow and grow and grow.

Happy 2007 to you and your family!

Love

Jess, Steve, Josh and Maya

Pretty self explanitory, but I’ll tell you anyway! On her 7 month birthday, Maya strutted her stuff across Aunt Dana’s floor to get a block! She was so determined and really kicked ass to get to what she wanted.

Click Here to view the movie:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-5980445737174566033

LOOK AT THOSE TOES!!!!!!

Is that how you spell that? Just going through pics and saw these and HAD to post them. Ofcourse! The two most beautiful babies in the entire world!

OK, it’s been a loooong ass time since we’ve put up more photos of our amazing kids. So tonight I went all out, updated here and Flickr!

So, now you’ve got a few places to check for updates:

• The Flick Account: http://www.flickr.com/photos/steveguberman/
• The new PHOTOS button over there -> on the right hand side of the page, or use this link: http://www.thegubermans.com/?pp_album=main/

I finally figured out how to get the images that I shot with my Treo off of the phone and onto the computer, so I uploaded some of them. I’m sure that once Jess sees the nifty photo album over there -> on the right hand side of the page, that she’ll want to upload every image we’ve ever taken. But it’s late and I’m done playing.

It has been way to long since we have posted.  In baby time, way to long due to how fast they are growing up!  Josh and Maya are so awesome!  Maya just turned 5 months and Josh 16 months.  Josh is so amazing and developing so fast.  Everyday he has a new word, he has a best friend and couldn’t be sweeter.  Some words he is saying are:  Momma, Daddy, garbage, Kiki (for Maya), pizza, coffee, apple, happy, Scott (his best friend), diaper, cheese, ball, doggie (which he calls anything with 4 legs), home, elbow, light, hi, bye bye, go go, up, down, on, off.  We love the randomness of the words he is saying, it is hilarious.  He is so sweet and loving and is the best big brother in the entire world.  Maya is stunning.  She is so beautiful and is always smiling.  Our babysitter still has not heard her cry yet and she has been going there for over a month!  She is rolling everywhere and now eating cereal, rice, bananas, peaches, pears, and applesauce.  She loves all of it.  She loves the exersaucer and she loves loves loves watching big brother Josh.  We will post new pictures soon.  We are so blessed to have the best kids in the entire world!  More to come next month. 

Hi All,

Josh and Maya both had well visits today.  Taking them both to the doctor at the same time has become much easier.  Maybe the amount of work has stayed the same to get everyone up, dressed, fed and out of the house, but Steve and I are a great team and work really well together so it doesn’t feel like a lot.  Anyway……..Maya, who by the way, got raving reviews on her classic beauty by Dr. Sorvino, has weighed in at 13.4 pounds and 24 inches long which is exactly where she is supposed to be.  She is just perfect.  She cuddled on mommy while Josh was getting weighed with Daddy!  Josh had bloodwork done and it came back perfectly normal.  Josh received a MMR shot and handled it like a champ, I still cringe.  Josh is 24.5 pounds and 34.5 inches long.  He is so tall, has almost all of his teeth which he loves to show off and is sayin a new word almost every day.  Walking is no longer an option, as he runs everywhere.  He is in perfect health and it was a great visit for all of us.

We are so blessed to have the most happy, healthy and beautiful kids in the world!  Will write again at 16 and 5 months!