I can hardly wait. Tonight is the staff party to celebrate the end of our work year. It's going to be so much fun. People, we are having a CAR RALLY! A scavenger hunt with our vehicles. No one is allowed to go insane but it will be competitive and fun. No way is the boy team going to beat my team! Of course all of this crazy fun is followed by a fabulous steak dinner BBQ at the end. Whew-we made it. One more year down!
For you non car people out there this is a 2009 Kia Sportage LX V6 Luxury model. Does it sound like I'm bragging??? Hellyaaaaa! I have NEVER bought new, and it felt soooo good! We don't get it until Friday because it hadn't even been taken out of the plastic yet!!! Ours is "Black Cherry" in colour with black leather interior and heated seats!
Now for those of you thinking this doesn't seem like much to get excited over you have to understand what I have been dealing with. All winter long I have driven my 1996 sedan (Chrysler Condorde) over snow packed gravel roads with one hand on the wheel and the other gripping an ice scraper; So that I can scrape the inside of the windshield when it is too hard to see out of. No matter what we did the heater just couldn't keep up with the cold. The seals were all shot so I literally froze EVERY SINGLE DAY on my way to work.
Of course with the kidlet on the way in the next year we also needed a bigger vehicle as I am pretty sure the kid won't want this on their lap:
OK, our girl is not quite that big but you get the idea! Now we have space for both of our loves!
Have a great day everyone, or not, the choice is yours.
Many of my friends not "experiencing" the adoption world have a great many questions about the process, attachment and bonding, and any "issues" otherwise associated with adoption. I think its great that my loved ones want to be more informed of the process and I am happy to oblige them in providing information as best I can. I am no expert, rather I am a Mom-in-Waiting who reads a lot. My latest bit of reading is entitled Keys to Parenting an Adopted Child by Kathy Lancaster Ph.D. The information is quite good but it reads like a textbook so I'll try to paraphrase the info.
Strengths of Adoptive Families: Adoptive families have a great many strengths. Most adoptive parents were required to examine their motives for parenting before placement. Determined to become parents and to provide healthy, nurturing families for their children, they tend to enjoy parenting and to work hard at it. Without genetic connections to their children, they tend to accept each child for who he is rather that to bring preconceived expectations to the parent child-relationship. They believe that adoption is a wonderful enriching experience.
Seriously folks, there can be no safer person on the planet to have babysit you own child than an adoptive parent. They have been inspected, interviewed, approved at a variety of governmental levels, fingerprinted, medically checked, psychologically checked...we go through a lot for the amazing privilege of being entrusted with another life. Having to go through this extreme process really leaves its mark on us too. Kind of makes me wonder why bio parents don't have to go through it. I mean, does the ability to copulate qualify a person for parenthood? Just something to think about.
I love the double entendre of this title. I am in fact thinking both in terms of where my baby is in the world these days as well as trying to figure out my own mind about this whole adoption adventure.
Sometimes I lay awake at night trying to process the fact that my baby might be out there somewhere. Out there with a birth mom and dad and a family, and here I am waiting for something to go wrong so that I can have the chance to be their mom instead. Man what a head trip!
Some nights I just try to imagine what it would be like to hold a child in my arms and not have to give them back to someone else...
Anyway, I heard this song the other day and it just totally summed up how I feel, go ahead, have a good cry if you need to...I did!
You can imagine that I don't sleep much or well lately.
Knowing now that our wait times are longer I...well I mostly just try not to think about it too much. Sometimes I succeed for whole hours at a time!
Oh yeah, and yet another baby shower to attend on Friday. I will go and I will smile and I will cuddle. But in the end I must remember that it is very wrong to smuggle a baby home in my purse :) ! Just kidding of course, but man, I am really starting to hate baby showers. Of course I also have to deal with teh fact that this particular new mother (while I am very happy for her) had been in the middle of the domestic adoption process and then just "popped" up pregnant. Just like ALL those mythical stories people always tell me about. You know the ones, "Oh honey, I knew a woman who got pregnant as soon as they started the paperwork." Yeah, because I chose adoption as the magical cure to my fertility issues. Sheesh!
Recently I purchased Jane Eyre, a favorite book from when I was a teen. Holy Cow, the language is more complicated than I remember! Obviously reading trashy romance novels(however fabulous and fun they are) has allowed my brain to rot. I still love the story though...
Anybody else noticed such issues? Maybe its just me?
Yep, we hit the 11 month mark and our 5th Wedding Anniversary can you believe it? I love him more now than the day we married, which I didn't think was possible. I guess with all that we have been through together it has really helped us to appreciate each other. So, in the spirit of appreciation I decided to list 5 things I love about my DH:
1. He never complains about how messy I am even though he likes things neat. 2. He supports me in every new endeavor-and usually believes in me more than I do! 3. He reads Barbie stories in a Yoda voice to the little nieces in our life. 4. He is willing to workout with me every night and keeps me going even when I want to quit. 5. He is always kind to my friends and doesn't mind being the only guy in the group!
One of my students handed me a book today with a passage marked. He said to me, "Mrs. E., I thought of you when I saw this page and thought you might want to read it." The book is called Book of Secrets and the page he had marked is the secret of successful parenting. Here is what the book had to say:
Parents can only advise their children or point them in the right direction. Ultimately people shape their own characters. ~Anne Frank
There are times when parenthood seems nothing but feeding the mouth that bites you.~Peter DeVries
Children aren't happy without something to ignore, and that's what parents were created for. ~Ogden Nash, Poet
I have found the best way to give advice to your children is to find out what they want and then advise the to do it. ~Harry S. Truman
Hmmmmmm, I wonder what message this child is trying to give me about being a parent? I THINK that knowing how I am waiting to be a Mom he was genuinely trying to help me out. Still, I thought it was pretty cute that he even took the time to share it with me.
