Our First Family Christmas

I have such vivid memories of waking up on Christmas morning and running downstairs to see the piles of presents that Santa had left for us. That is my favorite memory, just seeing all of those wrapped presents, the anticipation, the wonder. I absolutely loved it. As I got older Christmas morning kept that same wonder. Just having those few quiet moments to take it all in. I guess that translates to life in general and how I love having those moments where I can just step back and take it all in. All the wonder...

After college I lived with a bunch of my girl friends from college. We lived in this three story crappy ass house that I personally loved. We had a LOT of fun in that house on Fairview. Mostly some crazy theme parties, but those are another story. However, one of my favorite memories is how my roommate Megan loved to lay under the decorated Christmas tree with all of its lights and look up through the tree. I think I loved it because it reminded me of being a kid and doing the same thing. I loved looking up into the tree and seeing all the lights reflecting off of the glass decorations. I love that Megan still did that at 24 years old (who am I kidding, she probably still does it at 33). Megan used to sleep under the tree too. She was always trying to get us to do it too. I would lay there with her, but i never slept under there with her. I think she may have talked some of the other girls to do it though... 

Having William wake up at our house on Christmas morning was priceless. We had a minor fear that William would wake up really early and open all his presents before we got downstairs, so Lawrence told William he had to stay in his room until we woke up (I told him I'd set our alarm for 7 am). When we woke up, I walked down the hallway and he was standing in his doorway. He hadn't left his room and it was just killing him. =)

I told him he could go downstairs and he moved so fast I was sure that he would break his neck on the steps. We followed him down and made him wait to open presents until we had made some coffee (Come on...the parents have to have some fun too).

 
When we finally let him at it, he was so cute tearing into the paper, screaming like a coyote, giggling, just being really excited. He made out like a bandit getting presents from both us and Santa. He got a computer from us and we all got a Wii from Santa. William especially was amused by the presents he got from some of Santa's reindeer. I think he got one from Rudolf and Dancer. He was very amused by the hoof prints on the presents. 

After opening our presents, we started preparing a big brunch. An hour or so later Aunt Anya, Grandma and Grandpa Miskel, and Great-grandpa Miskel came over to open more presents and to eat breakfast together. It was a wonderful morning. And most likely the last one where a certain little man still believes in Santa. Hopefully, however, the magic and wonder of Christmas will stay with him for the rest of his life. I just want to give him as many wonderful and happy memories as i can. And yes Megan...next year I'm gonna make him sleep under the tree with me!

Christmas Eve- Let the spoiling rotten begin!

Since I was a little kid, my parents have had Christmas Eve at their house. Everyone comes over...Aunts, Uncles, Cousins, Great Aunts and Uncles, Family Friends, Second Cousins, and Grandparents. Over time, Christmas Eve ebbs and flows. As people get married and have new spouses' families to see during the holidays, not everyone makes it. Some of my cousins started coming to Christmas Eve every other year. And of course, as time passes we lose some of the matriarchs and patriarchs that helped make Christmas Eve special. Grandpa Oscar, Grandma Martha, Great Uncle Ken, Great Aunt Helen, Uncle Walt, and family friends. For a few years, fewer people made it and then it picked back up. It will always be my favorite day of the year. It just holds so many memories. Things that make me laugh and others that make me smile through some tears. My Uncle Walt and how much he loved the frozen whiskey sours my dad made. My Uncle Joe proposing to my Aunt Marcia on Christmas Eve. My family Christmas Caroling in the neighborhood after a few drinks. Through all the change, there are certain things you can count on.

1) The party ends up in the kitchen. (Although now my parents have a big bar in their basement with a sink, fridge, kegorater, so I'm counting this as the kitchen.)
2) My mother will forget to put out some food item that she prepared. Sometimes things are left in the fridge and sometimes she'll put things in the oven and forget to turn it on, but every year something doesn't get put out.
3) There are certain family stories that you can count on hearing at some point in the night.
4) Someone will probably get teary eyed.
5) And finally, Santa Clause will make an appearance at some point in the evening!

When I was young I remember the Christmas Eve party lasting until 3am. One year I remember my mother, aunts Verneil and Jackie, my cousin Dave, and probably a few others sitting against the Dining Room wall (late into the night) and barking "Jingle Bells." I think there was some commercial that year that had barking dogs in it. Who knows?

So, this year our little man got to experience Christmas with the Barker/Green Family. It was so fun. He can be such a pain, but when it comes to presents he can be so genuine and so polite and so thankful. His reaction is just so real... He gets so excited, you can just see the sparkle in his eyes. The last many years we have had a pre-Christmas Eve gathering with the immediate family. My parents, siblings, and neices and nephews all get together and exchange gifts. The whole evening becomes such a blur. It always goes too fast.

These pictures are in reverse order. The ones below are the pre-party and the ones above are when Santa (aka. Grandpa Ken) came to visit later in the evening.
This may be our last year where William believes in Santa. I tried very very hard to cherish every moment this year. Him and Alex tried to chase Santa and see him take off with his reindeer. Who knew Santa could move so fast?? He's very magical.

William got spoiled rotten by my family. His big present was from Grandma and Grandpa. It was a five in one game table. He had wanted it soooo bad (mostly for the pool table). William LOVES pool. He plays at Herbert Hoover and the two of us have been going to a downtown restaurant bar on the weekends around 2pm when no one is there and play pool. He is quite the shark. I have to try pretty hard to beat him. So he screamed like a squeeky little mouse when he got his game table. I think he might have peed himself!


And so the Christmas Eve magic continues. Christmas Eve will always be a night of anticipation, joy, family, laughter, tears, and lots of hugs. I wonder sometimes about Christmas Eves at some point in the distant future. I picture William and my neices and nephews and their spouses and kids all getting together. Telling stories and laughing. I guess that is the true gift of families. They carry on traditions, they carry on stories, they remember the stories that get told over and over. They support each other, love each other. I can't even describe how it feels to have William as part of our family. Another little person that will be part of the next generation. That will carry on the stories about his crazy dads and all of their quirkiness.

And this year, my mom told me that some of my Aunts and cousins stayed until very late, in fact it was close to early morning. I love how things are circular. And life continues... And families live on through their traditions and I happen to love this one.

Adoption Day #1- One Dad Down, One to Go...

Today Lawrence officially adopted William. It was an early Christmas present for all of us.

There were some tears, but also some laughter.

We did hire a lawyer. It was necessary. I've been really nervous about this whole thing. I've just been so scared that someone is going to step in and say "No, these men should not be allowed to be parents!" It's a weird feeling. Almost as if you are being watched or followed. You're checking over your shoulder all the time. It's just an unsettled feeling, to worry about whether someone is going to step in and try to take away your family. Maybe I'm just paranoid...

So we have a lawyer. He's a nice guy. Very no nonsense and to the point. We got to the court building this morning and he pulled Lawrence aside to talk to him. I wondered about this, but tried to ignore the fact that as the spouse I was being left out of a discussion.

So here's the deal. Missouri allows same-sex couples to adopt, but it's very under the radar. Which means that the state (i.e., Foster Care System) won't endorse but won't prevent it. So if we were a straight couple, the state would have paid for both of us to adopt William. The reality is that they pay for Lawrence and I'm on my own. The other hitch is that you have to get a judge that is willing to do same-sex adoption. William's case got passed around in the two years he's been in the system, but the current judge is in his 70's and is NOT friendly to same-sex couples. If he had been, then we could have scheduled our adoptions on the same day, right after each other. Since he's not, I will file for adoption separately with a different judge.

Anyway, so we have this not friendly to our "lifestyle" judge who apparently has some rules that our lawyer was sharing with Lawrence. Rule one: William and Lawrence will sit up at the table in front of the judge, I will sit in the audience section with Lawrence's dad, step-mom and step-sister (Anya- William's Aunt). Rule Two: Lawrence will refer to me as "His friend that he lives with." Rule Three: He's got some thing about women wearing appropriate dress in the courtroom. Which I guess meant that I couldn't come in drag (I'm kidding people. I don't do drag, it's not pretty! but the judge did have some rule about women's dress in his courtroom).

I sat in the audience and I watched my two boys and I got choked up and I cried. And I almost died when the *#@*^ judge (I mean nice, little, old judge) asked Lawrence if he had thought about what would happen to William if something unexpected happened to him and Lawrence replied..."Well, I guess my friend that I live with will care for him." It seemed like there was a collective eye roll in the court room. Everyone saw us for what we were, but the judge wanted to pretend. Pretend that families like ours don't exist. Sorry sir, but we do and it's OK. Actually I think a lot of people think this way. They just want everyone who is different, whether its the gays and lesbians, or the people of color, or the undocumented workers, or the poor...they just want them to exist in the shadows, to not be seen or heard, to not speak out.

But we won't do that anymore. As Prior says in Angels in America... "The world only spins forward. We will be citizens. The time has come."

OK, I'll get off my soapbox because as I sat down in that courtroom none of it mattered. I only had eyes for the men in my life. Lawrence looked nervous and William was silent (which pretty much takes divine intervention...) It all went really fast. There are a bunch of scripted questions and answers between the judge, lawyer, and Lawrence. I was just relieved and very happy. Lawrence was officially William's dad and no one could take him away. It was like a great weight just lifted off of me.

At the end the judge also officially changed William's name. He's got a hyphenated last name and he's not so sure about it. I think it will grow on him! But when the judge was reading the proclamation (or whatever you call it) he said William York Miskel-Berger. William's eyes got huge and his head whipped around and he looked at me and I could see it in his face. PANIC! (The judge corrected himself but by then William was turned around at me and not paying attention). So when the whole thing is over a second later, William races over to me and says: "That man changed my name to BURGER!" really loud. Everybody starts laughing and I calm him down. Since then my dad likes to call William- Big n' Tasty. It's William's favorite McDonald's sandwich. So he's William "Big n' Tasty" Burger. Too funny.

It was all done by 9:30am. We took William to school and after telling us in the car not to tell anyone where he had been, he walked into school and told the first 8 adults we ran into "I got adopted today!"

so here's the little man...our little man...or at least Lawrence's official little man and soon to be my little man:

He's ours!

Little Brother's Birthday

Another birthday, Another Party...

Today was my little brother's 27th birthday! I can't believe he's 27. It makes me feel old.


He's had a hard go of things lately and he deserved a good birthday with a big chocolate cake. I hinted at things in an earlier post (and he'll hate it that I'm going to talk about this) but my little brother was diagnosed with cancer. I can't even begin to explain how it feels to hear your little brother say that to you. I clearly remember the day he went to the doctor and was sent immediately for an ultrasound. I was in a meeting and my cell rings and I see that it is him so I answer it. I say hello and I can hear it in his voice. He was just leaving the clinic and getting in his car. His voice cracked as he said it to me..."I have cancer." I can't even imagine what that was like for him to hear. It was horrible enough for me to hear as his brother. It was like time just stops and nothing else matters. I needed to see him and be there. This shouldn't be happening to my little brother. He's just a baby.

My little brother is a LOT like my dad. Everything is infused with jokes and laughing. It's the way they cope. But during this whole ordeal there were moments where I caught the look in his eye or the way his face would drop and you could see the fear and heartache. It's a horrible feeling to be powerless. I felt so powerless to say the right thing, do the right thing, make things better. There was no making it better. All we had was wading through it together.

At Thanksgiving, my little brother's wife Lori made a toast. She had been watching a TV show on elephants. When the baby elephants are in trouble or threatened, the adult elephants circle around them and protect them. The Barker family is like a herd of elephants. When someone's in trouble we circle around them, protect them.



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I love the show "Brothers and Sisters" because it is an over-dramatized version of my family. We aren't that bad, but sometimes we're a little much. At times the Barker's can be suffocating, especially if you aren't used to it. I'm not sure how the in-laws (Abby, Lori, Lawrence) put up with us. But it is absolutely true that if you mess with one of us, you mess with all of us. When someone is sick or wounded, we are there guarding them, watching them.

My little brother's surgery went well. They removed the tumor and got all of it. There have been lots of jokes about bronzing it and putting it in a bell. There has been lots of laughter and some tears, both as a family and as individuals. Aaron will start radiation in January. He'll have it every day (M-F) for a month. It's gonna be a tough month, but he'll be OK. He has to be OK. He's my little brother and he's 27 years old and I adore him. His wife has secretly told me that he looks up to me, but the truth is I look up to him too. He's always been the personable one, the funny one, the athletic one. But he also has a heart of gold and is like a giant teddy bear. Just seeing the way he is with his daughter will make anybody's heart melt. He is such a good dad.














And so we will circle around him. Like the giant herd of elephants that we are. And we'll get through it, he'll get through it.

But for now we'll celebrate his 27 years on Earth. And we'll laugh and we'll hang out and we'll eat cake and the kids will help open his birthday presents and we will probably have a drink or two and we will just be our normal crazy family.

Happy Birthday little brother!

And by the way take off that stupid Brett Favre jersey. The man is such a poser.

Jelena's Birthday- Food with Love

For Jelena's birthday she asked that "the gang" get together for some down-home cooking straight from the farm boy himself...Mr. Jamie. You NEVER leave Jamie's house hungry. And it's not just lots of food...it's GOOD food. And it's made with love. At some point I had William convinced that love was an actual ingredient in food and that Jamie's food tasted so good because he put extra love in it. =)

For now, this is an adorable trait, i.e., being gullible. However, at some point, let's say 33 years old, it isn't cute- it just makes you feel stupid. Yes, I am talking about myself. I am incredibly gullible. My brothers, father, and husband love to get me to believe the dumbest things. Often they aren't even that creative, I'm just trusting. Luckily, I have other gullible individuals around me. My sister Lori, my mother, and now my son. I love that he's gullible. Sometimes we have to be really careful about being sarcastic because he takes you seriously. In fact, one of his favorite things to say is "Are you serious?."

One night we were doing homework and he was reading a story about Oak Trees. He had to answer questions about the story. One of the questions was about squirrels and acorns. He wrote a really silly answer and I told him that it wasn't correct and that he needed to erase it (The correct answer was that squirrels save acorns to eat during the winter). He got upset and asked me what the answer was. I think I said "Come on William, what do squirrels do with acorns? Throw them at each other?"

A few minutes later he said he was done with homework and ran upstairs. I looked over his homework and there it was- "Squirrels save acorns to throw at each other."

Like I said. The kid will believe anything. Wait, maybe he knows that I'll believe anything and so he's just playing innocent to get away with stuff. Now that I think about it, I'm not sure whether he is truly gullible or just playing me. Who is teasing who? Does he have my number or is he as gullible as I am. The more I think about it the more unsure I am.

Back to Jelena's party. William did awesome. I think he is getting used to dinner parties/birthday parties because we have them ALL the time. Although at least at my family birthday parties there are other kids to play with. But even when it is all adults he does pretty well. At adult parties you can get one of two Williams. 1) Center of Attention William. Hey everybody look at me. I'm funny. I 'm cute. Love me! 2) Adults are Stupid and Boring William. I'm going to put my headphones in and listen to my ipod and ignore all of you. Either William has its pros and cons.

At Jelena's party he was a mix of both. At first he was being funny. Jamie made spaghetti and William was putting cooked spaghetti noodles on his face giving himself a fu-man-chu. Gary has pictures that are pretty hilarious. Later William went into William number 2 mode and was just chill.

Sometimes I feel a little guilty about dragging him places, but I'm learning that parents have to take some time to themselves even when you don't have a babysitter. For the most part it feels like my life revolves around the little man. But every once in a while I need to be around friends and have adult conversation. And we're lucky that he does so well. He almost never whines or says "When are we going home?" We're lucky that way. All the kid needs is his ipod, an audience, and some food made with LOVE. From Left to Right: Jamie (in his Michael J. Fox "I fell off a boat" coat), Me, William, Jelena, Ian, Charisse, John, and Gary (Lawrence is taking the picture).
Can you see how big those bowls of food are? William in his favorite hoodie shirt. He's getting ready to enter his "Adults are stupid and boring" persona. He's got his ipod in his hand.

Dancing Queen...Excuse Me...King

The long awaited premiere release is finally here!
I have no words for this moment, so I will let the video speak for itself. Needless to say, I was laughing through my tears.

I love this kid!