Camp and MY Baby

This past long weekend, Jordyn made her debut at a camp I've been volunteering at for ten years. It's in Maine, and it's a retreat for families that have a child with cancer or another life-threatening disease. In recent years, I've gotten "hooked" on the brain tumor sessions (I know that sounds weird) - sessions where each family there has a child who has or had a brian tumor of some kind. I've made good friends with some of the families and volunteers who go to these sessions, and everyone has been wanting to meet Jordyn.

My parents and I all volunteered (they've been there a couple times before, too). I never could have done it without my parents' help at this stage. It's way too hard to get somewhere at a specific time (especially early in the morning!) without help with Jordyn so I can shower and get dressed. The camp is set up where each family (or a few same-sex volunteers) live in a suite together, and then everyone is split up into different age groups (nursery for 2 and under, tot lot for 3-5, 6-8s, 9-12s, teens, and parents/adults. I used to always be a volunteer for the 6-8s or 9-12s, but this time, I'd requested that either my mom and/or myself be in the nursery with Jordyn since she's so young. We ended up both being assigned to the nursery, so we were both with her almost all of the time. The nursery and tot lot usually end up being combined, and that happened this session. We had eight kids who were all 4 and under. I thought Jordyn would be the youngest, but there was a 4-week-old baby there! His older brother has a brain tumor and is blind (or at least partially blind), so I guess his mom was comfortable with him being at camp and with dropping him off with us in the nursery/tot lot. It was really fun putting the two of them down together on a mat for a "playdate".

Anyway, Jordyn was a hit! All of my friends from camp finally got to meet her, and she got passed around and held by lots of people, which she did fine with. I tried not to hover too much and not to be too anal about having everyone wash their hands before holding her. Maybe I should have been... but I'm really trying not to be a pain-in-the-ass, anal type of mom, and more of the relax-and-go-with-it type of mom. (I'm not sure how well I'm doing with that, and it's a whole post in and of itself, but I'm working on it!)

Everyone loved Jordyn, and kept saying how cute and beautiful she was, and how much she looked like me. :) All my mom-friends had advice for me about some things, but it wasn't done in an annoying way at all, and I was fine with it. I mean, they've all been there done that, so why not at least listen to what they have to say? It doesn't mean I have to actually do it all.

Camp was really fun, as always, and it was so nice to see all my friends and catch up with everyone.

But my favorite part?... That Jordyn is MY baby.

I've spent YEARS (at camp and elsewhere) ogling everyone else's babies, saying how cute they are, holding them, and quite frankly, often feeling jealous of the moms that they had a baby and I didn't. And feeling that longing of wanting a baby so very badly.

And now it's finally my turn! Now it's MY baby that everyone is ogling, and talking about, and wanting to hold! Now it's MY turn to get to be the proud mom, and say thank you to everyone when they make nice comments/compliments about her! It's so surreal, but I'm absolutely LOVING finally being a mom and having Jordyn. It's just so totally cool that it's finally MY baby that everyone is gaga over!