Without further ado...

Here are our children!

Tewodros at referral (above and below) January 28, 2008


Yodit at referral (above and below) January 28, 2008

Olivia Yodit & Ezra Tewodros - pictures from a friend in mid-February

Update picture from our agency... look how cute Olivia's smile is and Ezra's little chins are!!!

Drumroll please...

I am proud to announce that Olivia Yodit & Ezra Tewodros are now officially ours! We're finally a mommy and daddy! I'm in shock, and was so relieved to finally get word from our agency... what a LONG morning it's been!

More to come later... back to making some phone calls and working on my now VERY serious to-do list!!!!! Hooray! No word on our embassy date yet... hopefully we'll get more info in a day or two... HOPEFULLY!

I'm a MOMMY!!!!!

Nothin', Nada, Zip

Ok, so here I sit still anxiously awaiting news on how our court appointment went last night whilst I tossed and turned (couldn't call THAT sleep by any means). When I did drift off, I dreamt of Ezra & Olivia... meeting them and finally setting eyes on their incredible little faces.

*Sigh*

I gave in a moment ago and emailed my agency. Just to remind them that we're here and we're waiting. We're ready for the news, so I wanted to be sure they knew that, in case they were wondering. Just in case. Cause MAYBE they forgot about us or were wanting to wait until we couldn't stand to wait another second. Are we a family yet?? Huh, huh?! You can tell us!

I can't believe that today, after all this time, I MAY be able to post some pictures of our precious angels!

........Back to refreshing my email and staring at my phone.......

A few hours to court!

It's hard to believe that our case will be seen before a judge in a matter of hours. Ethiopia is 10 hours ahead of us (Pacific time), so while we're sleeping tonight (or NOT sleeping in my case I think!), we should officially become a family. It's hard for me not to get worried as the big moment gets close that something could go wrong. I'm generally pretty optimistic, and think it will go without a hitch, but... you never know. Some families have multiple delays, missing paperwork needed by the judge, etc, etc. I hope our attorney has EVERYTHING he needs, and all the t's are crossed and i's dotted.

When I awaken tomorrow, I will finally (hopefully) be a Mama! I think tomorrow a celebration will be in order! And, a celebration IS happening this coming Saturday... it's our baby shower! I can't wait to celebrate with our family and friends. And to think... as soon as a week or two after the shower, we could be hopping on a plane and heading to Ethiopia! Just the thought makes my heart flutter in anticipation. I'm sooooo ready to start filling up suitcase with donations for the orphanages, baby clothes, diapers, bottles, etc. I guess this means I've really got to start figuring out where all we're going to travel to while in Ethiopia so I can start making those arrangements the minute we get our travel date!

As I type this, Joe is putting the chair rail up in the nursery, then I'll finish painting the grass on the walls. Tonight or tomorrow we should be able to get the crib that DID come set up, and the dresser put where it goes... and in another week the other crib and dresser should get here. I love how it's all just about to pull together and be finished! Their room is going to be so neat! I love it! Although I'd claim very little talent in the artistic department, I am also thrilled with how good the wall colors are and how neat the grass I'm painting is turning out. I had a vision of what I wanted it to look like, but figured there was no way I'd be successful when I actually did it! And, thanks to my mom's help, the mural looks INCREDIBLE! I hope Ezra and Olivia enjoy their room as much as I've enjoyed dreaming it up and pulling it together!

We also took an expedition to IKEA today to look for some shelves/organizers for their closet. We found a neat storage unit with pull-out, plastic cubes. I think it'll give us a lot better use of the closet space, so just one more exciting thing to have found! I'm having wayyyyyy too much fun with this!

Ok, back to work! I'll post pictures of everything once we get it done! And check back tomorrow morning... I'll post news as soon as we find out how court went!!!

PLEASE everyone cross your fingers, toes, arms & ears, pray, chant and do the successful court dance.................... anything to help the powers that be get us through smoothly and quickly so we can get to our children!

The weirdest thing...

So, I get back from the neurologist with Chloe (our mini dachshund who was in for a follow up on her inflammatory brain disease), and see I've gotten an email from our agency. I anxiously open it, wonder what it could be about. It states the following:

"Hello
how are you? We do have the court date:
Court date March 17/2008"

Ummmm.... yes, I KNOW we have a court date, and I DEFINITELY know it's on March 17th! I hadn't sent any emails/questions prompting this, but our director sent it as a response to an email with questions (that he'd already responded to) from late last week. Ok... yep... weird. I would love to know what that was about. It seriously got me hoping and freaking out while trying to open the email and figure out what he meant. I've heard of families who had a court date a few days away that got a call saying they'd made it through court... so yep, the thought crossed my mind as I began reading an email that said "court" in it. Ugh... toy with my emotions, seriously! I'm not complaining because I'm seriously excited about our big day on Monday, it was just weird I guess. And I'm glad that at least he confirmed it's still the same date... I would've been devastated if it was an email about the date being rescheduled!

As for other news, 3 out of 4 pieces of our baby furniture finally arrived today! They had to inspect it before we could pick it up, and then we got a call back. Apparently only ONE crib and one dresser made it. We were told TWO cribs and one of the dressers were being shipped, and the other dresser was on backorder until late April. They're looking into what happened with the other crib.... we kind of need TWO of them, ya know?! Such a bummer... but I'm so excited to go pick up the pieces that did arrive! We've never even seen the furniture in person, so I hope it's as beautiful as it looked in the pictures! The nursery furniture was a gift from my incredibly generous, and WAY too giving parents. Otherwise, I think we would've been shopping at garage sales for everything! ;-)

My mom may even help me hang the mural today.... then the nursery will be JUST ABOUT there. I still need to touch up the paint in a few places, do my artistic grassy stuff on the bottom half, and then put up the chair rail... but we're GETTING there! Oh, and I also still have to paint the inside of the closet. Psh... details. I've been a painting machine though, and have gotten the room painted quite quickly so far! Soon I'll be able to get back to my sewing and finish up the quilts and baby blankets!

3 days til court! :-D

An incredible video

As we inch our way towards the big day on Monday, I'm spending WAY too much time stalking blogs and reading forum posts on the various Ethiopian Adoption boards I'm a part of. This evening, I saw a post with a link to this video. It melted my heart... what an incredible story. I had to share.

http://abcnews. go.com/Video/ playerIndex? id=4416303

We're hanging in there as we get closer to the big day. Only 3 more days! Wow, how exciting to say that! I think the next few days will go relatively quickly too... the weekends usually seem to fly by!

Baby updates from our agency!

My apologies for not getting this information posted sooner, it's been so busy, I'd nearly forgotten to add updates on our wee ones. We heard from our agency director last Thursday upon his return from Ethiopia. He returned with pictures and medical updates on Ezra and Olivia. At that point, we hadn't gotten any information on their sizes since they were three weeks old (we got the referral when they were five weeks old). Obviously they should be growing (quite a bit at this age...), yet the news was still shocking. Our little guy is now tipping the scales at a hefty 11 pounds! Yep, that's our boy! He's got a couple of chins now, and a few neck rolls... and we love them! No failure to thrive there, not a bit! Olivia hasn't gained as much, but is still growing rapidly and now just a bit shy of 10 pounds! They both look so much bigger!

It's exciting to see them doing so well (obviously no failure to thrive here!), yet also a bit heartbreaking missing these changes. It's partially that feeling of being so close, and yet so far. I look at their tiny little bodies from their referral pictures and sit in awe at how much they've changed! Olivia has the CUTEST little smile in one of the pictures, finally showing a bit of personality. Ezra still definitely has a cold, which means he's been dealing with it for at least a couple of weeks now. :( His nose is plugged up and you can see he has to breathe through his mouth. :'-( He needs his mommy! Ugh! This part is hard, I know they are SOOO well taken care of, but it still doesn't compare to having them home with their mommy and daddy!

On another positive note, we are now a mere 6 days (ok, 7 days if you include what's left of today) from court! Our babies are officially eligible for court as of Saturday, so we are SOOOO close to the point where we're "in the clear" and don't have to worry about any of those remote chances of something not going as planned. I think soon I may be able to breathe once again! Holy smokes... by this time next week we should officially be MOMMY and DADDY! WOW!

I'm going to go breathe into a bag now to try and stop hyperventilating...

Just kidding. I'm actually wavering between utter excitement and total peace about all of it. As we get closer, and make progress around the house so I can SEE how close we're getting to them, I've begun to feel more and more peaceful. Our children and beautiful and are thriving. I'm sure we'll make plenty of mistakes as parents, and I know twins is a scary thought for many people. Yet, I know Joe and I will manage and do we'll be an awesome family! We truly have been doubly blessed!

That's all for now... back to making progress! (I got the lower portion of the nursery painted, now I've just got to get the top half done... then we'll be ready to put up the mural!)

Taxes are D-O-N-E -- DONE!

Yep, that's right! Finally got my booty in gear and did our taxes this afternoon! I would have loved to have been painting the nursery (which is now skim coated and ready to go!), finishing the baby quilts, or running some errands that I need to do, but instead I forced myself to get those darn taxes out of the way! I knew I was quickly running out of time, so it feels great to have one more thing checked off the to-do list!

Now... on to errand running (my CostCo coupons expire TODAY!) and then maybe painting a bit!

Hooray!

8 days until court!!!!

Ever wonder if time has stopped?

It's one of those days where I'm beginning to wonder if time has stopped. Maybe it's ceased to exist and we're just frozen in this moment. Okay, maybe it's not quite THAT extreme, but seriously, time is not "flying" by. I imagine that will begin to happen once we're through court and preparing to travel. Who knows.

Yesterday I had a weak moment and splurged on my dream stroller. It was such an awesome deal I couldn't pass it up... I just COULDN'T! ;-) I bought the 2008 BOB Revolution Duallie in Mesa Orange! Oh yeah, I'm so excited for it to come! I may have to put our two dachshunds in it when it arrives and push them around the neighborhood! Oh course, the whole time they'd be barking and fighting to get out of the seat and run around! Our dachshies are total spazoids when it comes time to go out for a walk. Particularly Cooper... he goes NUTS and squeals, yips, pulls, and wiggles until we are through the gate and into the park. Ugh. He makes it sound like we're beating him or something. People come out of their homes and stare. Is it embarrassing? You bet. Do I hate it? You bet. Can I get him to stop? Heck no! We've tried... I think we need a visit from the dog whisperer - Cesar Milan!

There are still a number of things around the house that need to be finished. Joe installed the first of 3 baby gates last weekend, the one at the bottom of the stairs. Now he just needs to get the one at the top of the stairs done, and the one between our kitchen and living room. THEN he needs to get the skim coat on the wall in the nursery so we can finally hang the mural! Oh, and I still need to paint that room too... but not until after the skim coat is done!

In the meantime, I'm working on finishing up the baby quilts. They would've been done long ago, but I had a VERY hard time finding a fabric for the outside border and backing of the quilt. Now that I have that, I'm in the process of quilting the layers together on Olivia's quilt, and will then do Ezra's. Once those are done, it's time to decorate their bumpers! I bought bumpers that are an off-white, minky dot, super soft fabric. I'm going to sew on some ribbon and fabric pieces that I used in the quilts to tie them together! Oh, and when I'm done with THAT, I'm going to have a bunch of baby blankets to sew out of all these adorable fabrics mom and I keep finding! :-S

Ok, back pretending I can focus on ANYTHING!

To be a mom...

A friend emailed this to me... I love it... so funny! Talk about some serious talent, I couldn't sing all this! Thanks Leslie for making me laugh!

Our life... the whirlwind

(21 days until court - including what's left of today!)

Yep, it's official. Our lives now seem to be a whirlwind of activity. While on the one hand, it feels as though court and meeting our little angels is still so far away, we have plenty of things to keep us busy. I need to get a more extensive list together so I can check items off as I go. It's become more than my brain can manage on its own, I think.

Over the weekend, I did manage to get paint colors selected for the nursery, and hope to begin painting in the next two weeks. Before I paint though, Joe needs to put a skim coat on the area of wall where the mural will go, so the wall texture doesn't show through the mural. I picked a light, off-white/cream color for the top half of the walls, and below the chair rail is a light yellow-green that I will use for the base color. Over that, I'm planning to use the two darker greens to create a grass type of effect, hopefully somewhat like the grass in the Serengeti. I'm no artist though, so I hope it turns out OK! If not, I'll have to paint over all of it and stick with a solid color. How boring! :) The mural will go up after the room is painted, and then lastly we'll stick up the chair rail. Whew, what a lot to do!

I finished the tops of the baby's quilts a week ago, and just need to find a border/backing fabric I like. Then, I can finish assembling the quilt and actually quilt the layers together. I also need to get busy and finish up making some baby blankets. I got some adorable fabrics when out with my mom a couple of weeks ago, and want to make some baby blankets - both for Olivia & Ezra, and to take and leave at Toukoul when we go. If I find the time, I also want to get busy making the sock dolls I've been slowly gathering supplies for - they're too cute, and apparently not too difficult to make.

My mom and I went on a small shopping spree Friday afternoon, and returned home with bumpers for the cribs, 4 ADORABLE wall hangings, two great children's books, and a number of cute outfits! Yeah, it was so much fun! Shopping trips like this help make this craziness feel a bit more real... I'm going to be a mommy in 3 weeks! Exactly 3 weeks from today, we should get word of our successful (please, oh please let it be successful the first time) court appointment, and we'll be Ezra and Olivia's parents! Then, a couple short weeks later, we should be in Ethiopia to meet them! WOW!

At this point, I'm not anticipating the nursery furniture will arrive before we head to Ethiopia. If it comes in earlier than anticipated, that'd be great... but I'm not counting on it. The anticipated date is April 10th and they give a window of up to 1-2 more weeks! So, I think we'll try and do two pack'n'plays in our room initially. We've been considering having them be in our room for a while anyway, so it's easier to get to them at night. We'll see... I know it'll all be an experiment until we find what works!

I also had a blast this past weekend beginning to work on their life books. So far, I've just been able to create a few pages in each of their albums, so there's lots left to do. I still have to fill in things on the pages and add pictures once we get them. I really need to spend some more time on this in the coming weeks, as it's something that I'm sure I'll have a hard time FINDING time to work on once they're home! I think the pages I have so far are a great start though, and I'm really pleased with how it's turning out! Many thanks to my teacher and guide in the process - Sabrina! I couldn't have done it without you!

On Sunday, I spoke with a travel agent and he's going to start helping us come up with a tentative itinerary and give us some airfare costs for the approximate dates we're thinking we'll be traveling. I also emailed the guide that comes highly recommended from a friend I met online through the WONDERFUL Ethiopian adoptive family forums, and hope we'll be able to use him for our trip south to Awassa. I definitely need to do a lot more research and make some decisions on where we want to go during our extra time in Ethiopia. Joe may not be able to join me for the first week now due to his work schedule. I'm so bummed. I can't imagine seeing Ethiopia without him, but we may have no choice. I think it's so important for at least one of us to see whatever we can while we're there, for Olivia and Ezra. I don't want to see only Addis Ababa, as I know that won't give us a good picture of Ethiopia in general.

The last big item is that this morning I had an "impromptu" interview and will be starting on site for "H" tomorrow morning. This new client is in Torrance, so I'll be on the road a bit and will lose a lot of productive time in the mornings and evenings because of this. Such a bummer with all I have to get done! But, it'll be good to be billable again, even though it's not a long term solution for my job. I'll be on this project for the next 5-6 weeks, basically until we travel. Then, whenever I come back to work, I'll be looking for another contract or job transfer - ugh! My hopes are still that I will get another job lined up so I will be remote again and be ready to hit it hard when I come back from leave! Wish me luck... it's been a LONG time since I've had to work on site anywhere... no more loungy clothes workdays! Super bummer!

COURT DATE!!!

Drumroll please... we have a COURT DATE!

Our court date is March 17th! Saint Patrick's Day, yeah!

(24 days until court!)

Quick update

Sorry guys... still no news. I am definitely checking myself into the loony bin if we don't get a court date in the next few days! I've lost all ability to focus on tasks and have practically broken the F5 (refresh) button on my computer from constantly checking for updates! I told you that this was going to be tough for me! Times like this make me wish I'd learned to master patience as a child. Heck, I could never even wait for Christmas day to open presents! I was always snooping around the house until I found them, and even sliced open the scotch tape to peek in packages with my brother a couple of years!!! (Don't deny it Zak! You TAUGHT me how to do it!). So yeah, patience is just not my virtue. Grrrr.

But, I DID get a response from my agency today. I sent an email yesterday asking if there were ANY updates yet... just in case an email didn't come through to me or something (*grin*). Well, I've been told that APPARENTLY a court date has been assigned and we're waiting for it to be given to us. Huh. Ok. He says it'll be "very soon." Right. WHAT?! If we know we have one assigned, why don't we know when it is?!

Ok - breathing deeply now. Ooooommmmmm, oooooooommmmmmm - wish I'd gotten into yoga, I could really use the relaxing & deep breathing about now! I don't know what I'll do with myself once we have our beautiful babies home and I don't have all this craziness to obsess about! ;-) (Of course I'm kidding... I think twins will keep me plenty busy!).

So, as a distraction, I'll post a short blurb about myself. There are plenty of you out there I've never had the good (or bad??? I've had some nasty comments early in the process - some mean folks out there :-S) fortune of meeting, so you probably only know a little about me. Well, I talk a lot. Apparently, this is true. Oh, and not only do I talk a lot, but apparently I talk VERY quickly... especially when excited. Poor Joe probably hasn't understood much of what I've said over the last 3 weeks since referral - cause yeah, I've been pretty excited the entire time. I also LOVE dogs. Animals in general actually. I used to ride horses and had two beautiful mares before moving to Southern California. I am loving and compassionate, and fight tooth and nail for the ones I love. I can be totally stubborn, and completely obsessive sometimes. (Who would've thunk it, right?) I feel it's my job and my right as a human being to do what I can to help others in need. For two summers, I worked in orphanages rehab centers, and hospitals in Romania - it was an incredible, challenging, life changing experience. Oh, and I definitely have a serious travel bug. Yup... international travel is something that makes me ridiculously giddy. And yes, I've been excited to become I mommy since I was itty bitty myself.

There ya have it. That's me in a very short nutshell. Cool, eh? Ok, maybe not so cool, but who cares!

That's it for now. Thanks for reading this far... it feels good to ramble a bit and get it all out there. I don't know how people get through 5 months between referral and travel... and hope I don't have to learn about it firsthand!

KEEP ON GUESSING THOSE COURT DATES! :-D I'm liking the March 24th guess the best so far!!! April 16th?! Yikes! Hee hee hee.

A poll - since I have nothing better to do :-D

Ok, so we still have no news on our court date. So, I thought in order to have a little fun and see what people think, I'd do a poll.

-- When do you think our court date will be? --

Here are the basics of our timeline to help you decide:
- Referral on 1/28/08
- Accepted referral on 1/29/08
- Children taken into care on 12/22/07 (3 months in care prior to court rule applies)
- Told to expect to hear about our court date in approximately 3 weeks (which would be today!)


So, go ahead, have some fun, make your guess, do the court date dance, or whatever you can do. Comment away with those court date guesses, and I HOPE that anyone that guesses SOONER than later is the one that's right!

Waiting...

Oh yeah, we're still waiting. No news whatsoever. I finally emailed our agency just to make sure there we no updates of any kind yet, and was told "we are still expecting to hear news of your court date soon." I do realize it's not been 3 weeks quite yet (and that's how long we were told it could take), but Tuesday will be the 3 week mark... so we're almost there. In this stage it's becoming increasingly difficult to not compare ourselves with the timelines other people (even with our same agency) have had from referral to court date to court itself. We aren't setting any records yet for how long it's taking, but I'm still struggling with the wait for news at this point. I THINK (keyword is think here) that I'll be a bit more at ease once we at least know whether or not they are giving us a court date at this time, or making us wait until Liv and Ez have been in care for 3 months and then reapply for a date at that time.

It's all part of the process, and I am doing my best to wait patiently. I just can't say it's easy. Some days our little angels seem like more of a dream than a reality. Having heard nothing new about them since the day we first heard of them... it starts to feel like none of it's real. This past week became increasingly difficult since we are waiting and hoping that we may get an update and new pictures from a wonderful new friend that was there picking up her daughter at the same orphanage. Once she gets home and settled in, we will hopefully get to lay our eyes on new pictures of our babies!!!

Ok, now pray for my sanity as we wait "patiently" for news. Poor Joe is doing so well tolerating my whining and baby talking obsession, but I know we both need an update soon!

OT - We took Chloe to see the oncologist and another neurologist today. The oncologist felt that since we are still able to control Chloe's symptoms with Prednisone and Cyclosporine after all this time, that it likely IS NOT Lymphoma! No guarantees... but it was hopeful news. He said if it is Lymphoma, that we should expect to see her declining very soon, so it'll be a tenuous few weeks/months. Our little girl is so precious to us, so we'll do whatever we can to keep her comfortable and help her fight the bad zee-bees attacking her brain! Go Chloe! She's such a fighter... even after 4+ months of this!

Some days up, some days down...

Yep, I hate waiting. I know it's only be 2 weeks now that we've been waiting for a court date, but it feels like a lot longer. Other families with our agency have gotten court dates in just under 2 weeks, and since we don't know what'll happen with our court date (will they give us one or make us wait until after 3 months to assign a date), the waiting is particularly difficult.

A cyber friend of mine is currently at Toukoul picking up her beautiful daughter. While she's there, she's planning to look in on our precious ones, and possibly even take some pictures if she can. On her blog today, there was a post from her stating that she'd met her daughter, and would be trying to get info on our kiddos soon. Oi! It's harder and easier knowing that someone is going to see them. Obviously I'd rather it be me over there meeting them and wrapping my arms around them, but since it can't be... yet... I'm just thrilled that she's going to take some time and learn what she can. I'm dying to know what they're like. Are they laid back, fussy, smiley, what?!??! Any little piece of information would be so exciting. Just knowing someone else has seen them, makes it feel that much more real.

So, to add to the adoption roller-coaster, we're still battling whatever mystery illness Chloe has. When we finally got to try reducing her Prednisone from 2x per day to 1x per day, she spiraled backward. Her neurologist is NOW thinking we may need to reconsider the original diagnosis and consider some of the other possibilties that he'd mentioned to us. Particularly... Lymphoma. This is obviously not good news at all. Our options are: 1) to put her through another spinal tap and send off more fluid samples - one to test for Lymphoma, the other to test for infectious disease, 2) give her a shot of aspariginase (sp?) which is the chemotherapy drug that would be used to treat Lymphoma - if it is Lymphoma she should show signs of improvement after 24-48 hours, 3) continue with the increased dose of CycloSPORINE and do no further testing.

It's obviously a difficult situation, particularly now that we're waiting for news on our court date and then travel. Lymphoma is a terrible diagnosis, because even with chemo, we're being told she'd have maybe a year. Putting her through chemo sounds awful, but apparently some dogs do great and it's only a few treatments, so most of that "year" she'd be feeling pretty good. Not doing anything doesn't sound fair to her either. When she's on a high dose of Prednisone and CycloSPORINE, she seems to feel comfortable. Tomorrow we drop the Pred back down since the increased dose of CycloSPORINE should be starting to kick in. It took a few days after dropping her dose before to see the negative result, so it'll be a stressful few days of watching her and praying she doesn't get sicker and feel so awful again. It's gut wrenching to watch her shivering and shaking in pain.

To top it off, she'd developed a mild ear infection, and definitely seems to be in a bit of discomfort from the 1/2" diameter bladder stone we've learned she has. I have added ear drops to our twice daily medicine routine, and the ear drops have left her beautiful, soft, long ear hair greasy and gross. Poor Chloe looks sickly and rather miserable. She's still got a fighting chance though... especially if it's not Lymphoma. Please keep her in your thoughts, your prayers, or whatever it is you do. She has been our little love bug for over 7 years, and I am definitely not ready to lose her. She's got so much attitude and spunk, if anyone could pull through it, it's her! She's got a consult with a new neurologist and an oncologist on Saturday... so hopefully we will be further enlightened after a new set of eyes look over her charts.

So, yeah. We've got a lot going on. My dad flies in late tonight for a visit and baby planning and celebration. While he's here, we hope to do whatever room re-arranging we need to do in order to start setting up for babies. That may include having him help us start prepping the mural wall with either a liner paper or a skim coat to smooth the texture. The tracking info on our mural shows that it's supposed to arrive on Thursday - Valentine's Day! That day is ALSO my dad's 50th b-day... so it'll be a fun and busy day! I also have to get the fabric for the baby quilts cut, and then get sewing! I have to paint the nursery, but can't pick out paint colors until I get the mural here. I think in a couple of weeks I'm going to be wrapping up a number of these projects and then I'll really start going nuts with waiting! Once the nursery is finished... I know I won't be able to stand waiting much longer to bring Ezra and Olivia home!

Just for laughs

For those of you needing a goofy pick me up... this should hopefully do it. Joe shared this with me this evening, and I have to admit it's pretty funny! Don't ask me how he had time to be watching goofy videos on YouTube with all we have going on though! ;-)




Hope you enjoy!

Baby steps forward

I can tell you one thing, my heart is still receding from my throat back down into my chest. I don't know why my heart leaps into my throat anytime I see an email or phone call from our agency now. Well, I guess I do know why... until Olivia Yodit and Ezra Tewodros are officially ours, I'm on edge a bit. Anyway, I just received an email from our agency (in response to an email I sent yesterday), and saw it had an attachment. I immediately figured it was either more pictures somehow (I know, keep dreaming!), or some sort of bad news. In general, my philosophy on life is to be optimistic and look at the cup half full. Why can't I do this now?! I am so afraid of the uncertainty of this part of the process.

The update from our agency director was all good. One more step in the process of getting to court was taken, and for that I'm thrilled. According to the agency, we will hear something about our court date "in the next weeks." A bit vague, but I'll assume it means 2 or so more weeks since we were originally told it'd be 3 weeks or so after accepting our referral that we'd hear back about our court date.

I can't say I haven't been busy lately, and that should be helping pass the time. Late last night I began trying to design the quilt pattern for Ezra and Olivia's quilts, and I can't say I'm feeling like this is my forte. I love being crafty, sewing, etc., but rarely do I do it. It's been a couple of years since I've sewn a quilt, so who knows how these will turn out. I'd be thrilled to use a pattern from somewhere, but haven't found one that was easy for me to visualize it working with the fabrics and prints I have. I'm using a light pink fabric with brown accents for Olivia's, and a light blue with brown accents for Ezra. They will both use some brown/white zebra print fabric, and a brown leopard print. I also got a number of fat quarters in various light tans/browns to mix in if needed. The quilts will be the same other than the pink/blue fabrics.

Room and furniture arrangements is still in the works. Hopefully we'll get this decided upon sometime in the next week or so. We have a big, beautiful desk with a peninsula on it in our office, but since the office is the larger of our two rooms, it looks like we may have to set it up as the nursery. It's fun to figure it all out, but also a bit difficult. Once we move our big honking desk, I don't want to decide we don't like what we decided and move it again later! I also want to be able to put up the mural when it arrives, and that means we need to start prepping the wall we're going to put it on.

All in all, I'd say we've got plenty going on to keep us busy. Soon enough, we'll be getting a court date, becoming Ezra and Olivia's parents legally, and then hopping on an airplane to go meet them! :-D

And my productivity soars...

Well, I can tell you one thing our referral has done... it's increased my productivity enormously! On Thursday, my mom and I got the cribs and dressers ordered (which should be arriving April 10th or so). Yesterday, I finally decided I WAS NOT going to find the right crib bedding sets, and should just make my own. Do I have the extra time for it? Maybe, who knows. I will MAKE time. I bought fabric and am ready to start laying out the quilts for our beautiful babies.

The most impressive step we took was in deciding on names for them! We are happy to announce that their names are Ezra Tewodros and Olivia Yodit! I spent a lot of time stressing over how I could incorporate my late Grandma's name, Sue, into Olivia's name, but didn't want to give her 2 middle names, and we really didn't want to get rid of their Ethiopian names. Tewodros means "King of Ethiopia" and Yodit means "Woman from Judea." With such strong, meaningful names, we knew they had to stay. :-D



I ALSO splurged a bit and ordered this AWESOME wall mural last night for the nursery. I've dreamed of having a Safari nursery for years, long before I knew we'd adopt from Ethiopia. I worried about whether that would be cliche since our children are coming from Africa, but decided that was silly to stress over. So, I ordered a big mural (10'2" wide by 4'8" tall) to put on one wall of the nursery. It is called "The Sentinels" and is a landscape of the Serengetti with a tall Umbrella Thorn tree, three giraffes, and some zebras. There were SO MANY cool ones, it was a tough choice. I finally decided this one had a level of calm to it that some of the stampeding zebras didn't... as cool as they were! Check out the mural we chose (and others) at: http://www.muralsyourway.com/myw4-design.cfm?pid=MMIARK2003. I'll tell you what I think of it once I get it here and put up. THAT will be the challenge for me! ;-)

Joe thinks I'm nuts with all the projects I'm taking on... but staying busy is a GOOD thing for me. Since I can barely stand to be halfway around the world from Olivia and Ezra, I have to keep working on things that make me feel closer to bringing them home. Even the unnecessary things like making the neatest, most fun nursery for them that I possibly can! The biggest challenge has been trying to make it a nursery that has a little boys element AND a girly element too. Hence... I'm making my own crib quilts and bumpers! Wish me luck, I'm sure I'll need it. Sewing isn't the trouble, it's the layout that always gives me the most trouble with a quilt.

As for my job, I'm still working on a resolution. I have a meeting with my boss at 3:00pm today that I'm admittantly dreading. Her lack of enthusiam aside, I know she wants me to be working on finding a new job, and until I have one, that's stressful. Especially considering that our "side" business now looks like it'll be able to take over my job and income in the next couple of months! Not trying to count chickens before they hatch or anything, but THAT would be awesome! I KNOW we can do it! And in the meantime, I'll do whatever I can to work with my boss and try and make sure my company is happy with my efforts. I agree with everyone that's said not to let her thoughts get to me, and try to live my life that way. There are people that aren't supportive of adoption and don't understand where you're coming from. That's why I'm so glad I've met so many wonderful people to share in the excitement! Thank you to all of my wonderful friends and family, local and distant, that have supported and encouraged us every step of the way. Your love and support means the world to us!

Back to work... make it a great day!

Tiny distractions...

While it's still a little hard to believe that we are really only a matter of months away from meeting Yodit and Tewodros, the fact that they are in Ethiopia waiting for us is definitely starting to sink in. How in the world am I to get any work done when I have these two beautiful faces to look at? There is so much planning to do, we are still working on their names, and I desperately need to get my job situation figured out.

Speaking of my job, one thing I've come to realize is that not everyone in this world is equipped with some of the basic courtesies we often take for granted. When talking with my boss, W, I had no idea she would show so little respect and professionalism. Although I have never felt she has good interpersonal skills, and realize we've never had any sort of relationship beyond the basic yearly review and touch point here and there, I still expected SOMETHING different when I brought up the fact that we'd received our referral. There's no way I'm going to give her the satisfaction of dragging on about the frustrating conversation we had, I will say it's time to find a new group within my company. Now that my *rant* is out of the way... I can move on to the exciting whirlwind that is now encompassing our lives!

Honestly, could it get more perfect than being blessed with a handsome little boy and a beautiful little girl?! I'm sure there are days when we will be exhausted, sleep deprived, and questioning our abilities as parents, but there is no way I would ever have it any other way. As crazy as it may sound to those that haven't experienced adoption first hand, this was meant to be. When I look at their little faces, I can't imagine how I could already be so in love with them. Tewodros has such big, thoughtful eyes, and Yodit has such a sweet, cuddly look. I have no idea how much they cry, or if they make slurping sounds when they eat, but I know they weren't meant to be with us.

Tomorrow, my mom and I will be heading to Direct Buy (such a wonderful place!) to hopefully get the cribs and other bedroom furniture items ordered. They have some awesome prices on really great stuff. *I already KNOW this since I've been "window shopping" for a while now!* We know that we want some sort of whimsical safari sort of them, and have a few decorative items we've picked up here and there to use. If anyone has cute suggestions on a nice boy/girl safari type nursery, let me know!

I guess it's time for me to get back to it - working, baby name brainstorming, day dreaming, etc.! Make it a great day everyone!