Wow, adoption is a long road no matter which way you slice it. We seem to be presented with "possible" scenarios fairly regularly, but nothing pans out... I think it must be like dating, you just know when you find the right one, the one in this case being a birth mother, I guess.
The matching process is a tough one. It makes me a bit jealous of our friends who go international. They have someone who does the matching for them. Still, as I have often been told, If you took all your problems an layed them out with anyone else's side by side, chances are you would take yours back. I guess I have no real complaints, only minor grumbles :)
Well that's it from this neck of the woods! Just three and a half weeks till I leave for a trip to China... I will post some pics as I go.
Well, it was the end of the school year... and since I had the urge to finish this, my third and final evaluation year, (before two glorious years of not being evaluated) as amazingly as I could, I worked my tail off by day and snoozed on the couch by night.
All the while, though, things they were a-changin'.
Matt and I got approval last night to switch our agency. I first must say that the agency we were working with is a wonderful agency with many fantastic services and a heart of gold. They are just not the right ones for us, but we are very glad to be able to call them neighbors and we plan to continue using them for our post placement services.
We opted to switch to an agency with the ability to work in more than three states and one that does the bulk of the advertising for you... although my cute little business cards and fliers are the bees knees, I am overwhelmed at where to begin in sending them, and since I don't have an advertising background, I didn't feel up to leaving something as important as finding our child up to my lack luster skill set!
When we first looked at our old agency they talked of having an upward limit of 2 years wait, but that seems to have grown to 3 years. They have a pool of 70 waiting families and only do business in DC, MD, and VA.
So new agency works across the country,with only 50 families at a time, but does not work in MD, or PA. I have to breath a tiny, self centered sigh of relief there because the 30 day period of"will the birth mother change her mind" that is part of the process in those states sort of turns my tummy to jello.
I have amazing amounts of respect for birth mothers and plan on honoring our own with what ever visitation, recognition, or privacy she desires... I simply know my own nature well enough to know that I would not do well for 30 days of not knowing if the baby in my house got to stay my baby. Maybe I'm a wimp, but it is what it is.
So new agency, hopefully shorter wait, and the very real possibility that when the mini-mystery Ravenstahl crosses our threshold, it will be as a legally permanent member of the family. *sigh*
I have also had the fun of catching up on all the blogs I link too and am amazed by all the lovely stories pictures and new additions!!!
It feels good to be back :)
And yet, there is very little to report! Both Matt's parents and mine have been for visits, and we have had some nice gatherings... we even built our own lower level deck with no help... but really life just ticks along with no real drama
**Dear God, let me not have just cursed my self!!**
Two and a half weeks left of school and then we get a week off before summer school, I am looking forward to it! (the break, rather more than summer school, but both will have their good bits)
I am also looking forward to my brother and his wife coming to stay in July, and my own three week trip to China in August with my friend Laura.
Ahhh, summer. Bring it on!!
So I was visiting our agency about a week ago and was spying, er, looking at all of the other waiting family albums and I was getting really down hearted because they are all so cool and I just couldn't get happy about ours.
I am missing that essential female gene for scrapbooking. This is odd because I am an elementary school teacher and construction paper, glue and stickers are my life! C'est la vie... nothing I can do about it.
Just when I was about to give up hope on ever attracting a birthmom to our family through my photo album wiles, I was introduced to an amazing, FREE, downloadable software from www.blurb.com . It is a way to make you own books with very easy templates that can be manipulated in just about any way you can imagine. I am now proud to say that we have one of the spiffiest waiting family albums out there. My zero-talent album making will no longer hinder our ability to find offspring. *sigh of relief*
As I was imagining what I might blog about this week, this seemed like it would be the highlight of the week, surely nothing more interesting than free album making software could appear in my suburban environment!
Well, as I have learned again and again, never underestimate the power of a Ravenstahl to "shake things up" Typically these shake ups are in the form of surprise head injuries, stitches and broken bones. Most often it is Matt, a danger magnet, but sometimes it is the boys. Still a general rule is that the more catastrophic injuries will be acquired by Matt...
Just goes to show where generalizations will get you.
Seth decided to take first prize as the most seriously injured Ravenstahl ever (a difficult mantle to get, especially if you consider my beloved and very accident prone mother in law)
He was running through the woods and an evil stick jumped out from behind a tree and shanked him... or he tripped and fell on a stick... whichever version you like best...
Anyway, our youngest boy was the new proud owner of a large and horrible abdominal stab wound. Braver than any 11 year old has the right to be, he gets his buddies to walk him home and collapses on his moma's stairs.
Whisked off to the emergency room by Matt and Laura (and met there by every other family member in the tri-state area), Seth spends the next five hours at Reston Hospital undergoing various tests and needle jabs to ensure that nothing life threatening has been punctured, before he is ambulanced to Farifax Hospital at 10:00 pm for a consult with the pediatric trauma surgeon.
After hours of tests and exams, it is determined that he managed to avoid all major organs and that this is just a really nasty, ugly, non-life threatening stab wound and he is stitched up and sent home by 2:00am. The most amazing thing about the entire night was that he consistently turned down the offer of pain medication... I cannot imagine!
So he began a marathon of sleep, donuts and video games that ensure a rapid recovery for a wounded little boy.
I am not sure I ever want to see the inside of a hospital again after this week, but if I had to go to one with a child, I would say that Fairfax Hospital is the most amazing place for an injured child. We are very lucky to live near such a good hospital!
For now I am just very grateful that everything turned out the way it did. Tough stuff, those Ravenstahls! All the same, Seth is only going to be running through open fields from now on... trees are scary.
The Sunday Morning Broadcast of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir
Mountains, mountains, everywhere!!
Matt inside the Tabernacle
*** The following is written in loving acceptance of my beloved family, friends and animals. It is a humorous, hyperbolic interpretation of what would otherwise be a ridiculously un-funny day... sadly; animals and people were harmed in the making of this Blog post.
***** Please do not turn me in to PETA. I love all animals, especially my own, I sometimes just need to laugh to keep from crying!
So when we were in Salt Lake City (which I promise to write a picture filled post about soon) we got a call letting us know that our Golden Retriever, Miles, had mysteriously escaped the yard and found a dog that was outside in his own invisible fence enclosure. Miles is typically a friendly, slobbery, loving creature so, of course, he practically ate the dog and we came home to an emergency vet bill for $1300 and a strangely unfriendly neighbor...
I now hate that dog (Miles), almost as much as that neighbor hates me. I hope he chokes on the next peanut butter jar he steals off the counter and consumes in the center of the living room floor. Frankly I am only refusing to consider having him put to sleep because I don't want to spend $200 on Miles right after spending $1300 on someone else's dog, and after (I cannot make this stuff up) the lawn mower burst into smoking flames when Matt tried to mow the lawn this afternoon.
Still, we could not figure out for the life of us how he managed to escape, unless some neighborhood mischief maker had opened one of the gates... Matt went out at midnight last night (as soon as we got home) and checked every inch of fence and gate and just could not imagine how he could have broken out without help. Matt has been assiduously maintaining and fixing every little thing that goes wrong with that fence like it was a second job.
Well it turns out that Maris forgot some things at our place this weekend... big surprise there... so Laura brought him over to grab it. He went in through the back door and out through the front and, you guessed it!, didn't shut the gate, so when Ariana let the dogs out, off they all ran (except Gobby who evidently knows which side his bread is buttered on)
As per my usual dog-related humiliation, my former babysitter and now backyard neighbor, Christina sent her daughter to alert Ariana that the dogs were out. She leashlessly wrestled them home, still unaware of the fracas that had just occurred. As a testament to Ariana's skill with dogs, Monroe bit her on the arm for her trouble. In his defense, I have also been tempted to bite Ariana from time to time. When you love someone like a sister, they can get to you, ya know?
So what to do with the walking mass of absentminded hormones and puffy hair who is my beloved oldest stepchild??? He is going to bloody well come with me to drop the check of to the neighbor and apologize. I am also going to make him get on all fours and apologize to the dog. I was given a full color 8.5 by 11 digital picture of the wound site with the itemized bill, and I'm going to tell you that I am not going anyway near that oozy mess with all six of its stitches and its shunty-looking thing... did I mention I hate Miles?
So that is Maris's recompense for the ill done to random neighbor with stupid electric fence that offers no protection and only keeps their dog in like some form of mobile, canned dog treat for larger, more evil canines. (apparently my silly, slobber-faced, tummy-rub junkie is one of these)
But what about the damage done to my bank account? Did the child not know that we lived in a house with three large dogs who often go outside, therefore necessitating the shutting of the gate? They are rather hard to miss, Miles weighs in around 70lbs... Matt and I decided he will either be our personal unpaid lawn boy for the ENTIRE summer, or that he can sell one of his four guitars to contribute to the financial hit. Personally I would rather have the free lawn service, but he seems to think that selling a guitar is the more painless of the two options. Apparently sweating away at mowing the lawn while your step mother sits on the deck, reading a book in a floppy sun hat while sipping iced-tea does not seem like the softer option! ... go figure.
You know how, if you are me, the second one of your friends tells you that they (or their wife) are going to have a baby, you have a list of automatic questions you need the answer too? One kind of like this:
Oh, my gosh!! When are you due?
Are you guys going to find out what you are having?
How long are you going to stay home?
How do you feel??
Do you have any ideas for names?
See it is a nice little list, and for people like me (those with the obsessive need for the answers to questions) it helps me mentally prepare for this new little addition to my friend/family world.
So, I have posted in the past from an "outside-looking-in" perspective on what "we the adopters" experience in this process, but have you ever considered what it must be like to be the friend of an adopter??
*We cannot with any real accuracy tell you when the little person will arrive.
*If you are with my agency, gender preference is not an option, so no dice there.
*I don't really know how long I get to stay home... my guess would be 6 weeks-ish unless the MMR (Mini-Mystery-Ravenstahl) shows up in the summer (yay, teaching!). I do, however, know that Matt has WAY more leave saved up than I do, so he will get to stay home longer. I am not really very bitter about this. I sort of hope that he will bring the MMR to lunch a couple times a week though.
*I feel fantastic! This one is a total bonus of adopting. I am sleeping great, my ankles are in full view and the scale is still a close friend of mine. I have been wearing the same size jeans the entire time we have been expecting!!
*Of course someone as obsessive as I am has names ready to go!
So, friend of adopter... I have some info, but no end date. There will be no pre-baby shower. We can plan an introduction party instead. I can't give regular updates because I don't get them. I live in the limbo of waiting. It isn't a bad place. There are lots of us here, and we have some fun while we wait, but it can't look very interesting to you from out there.
Stay tuned, though. You never know where this wild ride will take us. And your support and friendship does count... more than you know :)
Sorry for the long absence from this blog!! I wish there was anything interesting to share, but we have had a fairly quiet month.
Work, work, work, soccer, grad school, housework, grocery shopping, sleep when possible and now finally... Spring Break.
(OK. I have to cop to having read the whole Twilight series in the time since the last post. I can't explain what happened. My inner 13 year old hijacked my body and made me keep turning the pages. My only comfort is the AMAZING amount of other 30 somethings I know who have also surrendered a week or two of their lives to this surprisingly addictive saga)
The weather has begun to warm up in time for this much needed break, the tree outside our bedroom window is full of fluffy white blossoms, and the dogs track mud into the house every time they go outside, so it must be spring :)
We are looking forward to Easter, even if this year there will be no egg dying ("we are too old for that") and there has been requests for Easter candy, but NOT for baskets.
We need this new baby to bring back some of the childlike joy that can surround holidays... our crew is just about too cool for school, and while they are magnificently independent, I miss the little traditions and holiday treats.
C'est la vie. We wait. At least we have nine million things to keep us busy in the mean time.
Happy Spring, Y'all!
So for my 30th (which occurred some time last week) I am being given the gift of a weekend in Utah. Now, I know that some of my friends hit Paris for their 30th, and still others went off on fabulous "30" cruises to sunny, tropical places with clear blue waters and steel drums tinkling in the background, but I am continuing my conquest of the continental US by pushing my western frontier out to Salt Lake City.
It helps that Matt has a conference there that weekend and that the hotel is paid for, and that round trip air fair from DC to SLC is around $200, but I honestly am very excited to see more America and would have taken a spontaneous trip to this spot anyway.
O.k., So I just made my self laugh with the title of this entry because I actually do remember (some of) what used to pass for a wild weekend... and if you had told me at 20 what I would define as wild at 30 (T-minus 3 days) , I probably would have fallen right out of my keg stand.
Ces't LaVie!! Time marches on, and blessedly so does maturity and (thanks Claudia for the reminder) so do crows feet.
So with three decades tucked neatly away under my belt, what is it that passes for wild??
I'll tell you. It is a whirl wind of activity that begins on a Friday evening when 15 year old, newly minted JV soccer stud Maris arrives home from practice, shovels down a quick dinner and then- in direct contravention of the "be fast please" mandate- takes the world's longest shower and somehow slithers out of dish duty all the while making the family an hour and a half late for our five hour drive to Pittsburgh.
Arriving at the sanctuary I like to call my in-law's house at midnight, we chill for an hour or so and catch up with Grandma and Papa. I have to admit, I did indulge in a little post-drive venting. Just where does an 11 year old get contextual accuracy for "that's what she said" jokes anyway?... dear God, let that have come from school and not my house! Then it was off to bed to prepare for the big day to follow. Have I ever mentioned that the bed in my mother in law's guest room has a memory foam topper?? Blissful rest!
A new day dawned and it was off to buy toothbrushes and donuts. ( I honestly don't see an issue with this combination. ) My in-laws have a donut shop right behind their house. I try to convince myself that the 2.5 minute walk to Big Daddy's Donuts will counterbalance an apple fritter that is bigger than my head, but my jeans beg to differ.
Once home, fed, bathed and dressed, the crew headed to the other side of Crafton... a grueling 40 second drive, to meet the one and only, beautiful, delicious, fantastic and perfect Cate Anne Ravenstahl who entered the world on March 3rd. (where are the pictures of this newly earthbound angle? See above rant about departure time to see what I was stewing about instead of remembering my camera)
We spent one bliss full, peaceful, intoxicating day with our niece. We didn't leave the living room for most of the day, but I have to say that cuddling, cooing and drooling over this little princess was by far the best spent day I have had in ages.
Our "older" niece, the divine Miss Grace was spending the day with her other Grandma at the science center, but we did get a good hour and a half of Grace time in at the end of the day. She is a pretty awesome big sister... very quick on the draw with a pacifier when Cate utters even the smallest squeak. The boys were fantastic with both girls. They are very natural with babies and very patient with toddlers. They will be a fantastic help when our little one comes home.
Nieces are the best thing ever. I think it is even nicer to have nieces than to have your own children because you get all the good bits and leave when the kids get cranky! When those two got cranky at the end of the day we swanned out the door to the King's up the road and had dinner with Grandma, Papa and Matt's brother Mark and his wife Caroline. Then home to watch some Harry Potter and get some rest before an early morning trip home.
We hit the road after a quick trip through, you guessed it, Big Daddy's Donuts and headed back to VA for the birthday party of a special little man who made his entrance into the world a year ago. 5 hours of car trip togetherness and one "I have to go to Mommy's and get my math book!" later, we dropped Seth off at the X-box, I mean house, and headed off to the birthday party. Yes, that actually means that we have the kind of 15 year old sweet enough to spend 2 hours of his Sunday playing with babies!
High five to Misty, the Mommy, who knows that the best spot to have a kids party is anywhere other than your own home. The community center was a great choice and if I hadn't gotten my fill of adorable babies with Cate and Grace, then two hours on the floor with an assortment of gorgeous lovies was enough to round out my weekend.
I did, for the love of splendid one year olds and 15 year strong friendships, dance a few rounds of the awkwardness tango with the ex and his new Mrs, but I was very pleasant and per the aforementioned maturity, I made it through the entire experience focused on the wonderfulness that are my friends offspring, and made no snide comments to any one at all. Can you hear me patting my self on the back? Shameless self praise! I earned it :)
So my rip roaring weekend continued with a trip to Target, a half hour in the other sanctuary known as my husband's first wife's living room (how cool is that?) while finding the math book, and then some quality time spent in my own kitchen making yummy "Indian" food from scratch... parenthesis indicate my lack of actual culinary know how, leading to a marked lack of authenticity in our cuisine.
So it was with great satisfaction that I crawled into a steaming tub with a good book and soaked away the exhaustion of what now passes for a wild weekend in the life of this Ravenstahl... you can keep the Keg Stands. I wouldn't trade this life for anything!
We took the kids on a long weekend trip to the big apple this past weekend... and despite the gruling 10 total hours spent in the car and the millions of dollars spent on tolls getting there (thanks, Delaware.... really! So glad we could help) we had a great time. We stayed in this tiny hotel way down Broadway in the garment district and we walked everywhere we went. Walking through Times Square with the kids was great, their eyes were popping out of their heads. There is a ferris wheel INSIDE the Toys R Us, and everything is completly over the top. It was pretty perfect. I love that they are old enough to do city things.
When we were first planning trips, they were only ever to outdoor places with plenty of room to run, becuase two little boys bare MANY resemblances to two puppie dogs, especially after long car rides. This time, they handled the trip well. They were really into the whole thing, even the trip to the Iridium Jazz Club to see the legendary, 93year old, Les Paul do absolutly amazing things on his guitar... guess which kid inspired our choice of show?
And even if my puppies, er, children did need half an hour of uniterrupted pillow fighting after the car ride to settle down, nothing was broken, and we made it back with out a scratch! We love New York and I love adding another page to the family scrap book.
A few brief posts ago I "totally got" my oldest step son. Today I am ruining his life. I am so good at it that I have accomplished this without even leaving my desk at work.
Technology must be the bane of any teen's existence when it means that the second your Spanish grade turns into a D, an e-mail goes out to your mom who quickly sends it to the rest of the members of "team parent". Then your unaccountably vile stepmother in whose home you are expected to sleep tonight grabs the cell phone and with a quick push of a button conferences with your dad, e-mails the team with an up date and (like the horrific monster that she pretends not to be) calls you guitar teacher and cancels your lesson that you had scheduled for tonight so that you can make up the work that you haven't turned in to your Spanish teacher.
If it is any consolation (and I promise you it will not be) I feel like a massive jerk. I have sacrificed a majority of my cool points on the alter of this Spanish grade... do you suppose he will thank me one day? yeah, I don't think so either.
When I listen to Eva Cassidy I can see all of the wonderful moments I have ever shared with my beautiful husband Matt, and I listen to her songs all of the time.
I met Matt the year after I divorced my first husband. I was interested in him as a person from our first conversation, and it did not take too much expressed interest from him to ignite a deeper interest in me.
We met in the spring and came together after a gathering in summer. We couldn’t seem to part after meeting up at this gathering and went out for a coffee that lasted untill the wee hours of the morning. Two days later I accepted an invitation to his house and we sat on his couch in his sparse bachelor living room and talked, while the sweetest voice sang softly in the background. I asked about the music and was told that it was one of his favorite singers, Eva Cassidy, and was asked if I liked the music. I of course replied that I did and we spent the rest of our evening holding hands, revealing parts of souls, listening to Eva and planting seeds that would grow rather quickly into love.
Strangely when I got to my second job the next day, someone had a copy of an Eva Cassidy CD, Songbird. I mentioned how much I had enjoyed her music the night before and my co-worker sent me home with the CD.
Over the next few months I listened to that CD each night while falling asleep thinking about this wonderful man I had just met. Each song on that compellation seemed to have a special relevance to something I was experiencing at that time, or something that I had experienced in the break up of my first marriage. I never grew tired of falling asleep to the sound of her voice.
A couple of years passed during which Matt and I had combined houses and lives at a steady pace. When we were choosing our wedding music it seemed only fitting that she would be a part of our ceremony and so I walked down the isle on my father’s arm to Songbird, the title song from the album that I had listened to so many nights when I was falling in love with my husband.
Eva’s music has always been a part of our life together and my deep appreciation of her gift has grown with each new song I experience.
My husband and I were on our way to the store the other day when Songbird came on the radio. We stayed tuned to hear more of her lovely music and were amazed to hear that her parents were in the studio taking calls. It was the day before Eva’s birthday and as we listened to our favorite music and the parents of its amazing performer we sat quietly, both of us with tears in our eyes.
We are waiting to adopt a baby, our first child together, who will complete our family of four that includes Matt’s sons from his first marriage. We had long ago decided that if this baby turns out to be a boy we will name him for a beloved friend of Matt’s who passed too soon. On that day, in the car with the voices of Eva and her family ringing in our ears we decided that if we are blessed with a daughter, it will be our honor to name her Eva, after another beautiful soul who passed too soon.
Beyond the fact that I clearly stole the idea for these pictures from another blogger... I have a lovely story to tell.
My step son (the older chap whose pic is more of a head shot) tells his Mom that I totally get him. That rocks! No one has ever said that about me before. The fact that the person saying it has also been yelled at by me a number of times for things as various as dumping clean laundry from the dryer onto the floor while searching for socks, to refusing to eat anything more nutritious than a pop-tart, kind of just makes that cooler.
You see we share the bond of being oldest siblings and so we tend to see one another's point faster than other family members... His dad and bro share the bond of both being youngest brothers... who in the world understands those folks?!? :)
What is also WAY COOL is that his Momma likes me enough to share that comment with me and gracious enough to take enjoyment out of it too (not sure I am capable of that much serene awesomeness, myself)
It seems that for me, this lad and his brother are certainly living up to the labels at the bottom of these cool posters!!
We are HUGE Pittsburgh Steelers fans and we HATE the Baltimore Ravens. So it should be a fun weekend with the two arh rivals playing in the AFC championship game.
It has been a family joke for years about how unfortunate it is to have the word Ravens right there at the front of our name. It became a bigger family joke when Matt's second cousin took office as the mayor of da 'burgh a few years ago. So I fell out of my chair laughing this morning when a friend e-mailed me a link to this article about how Luke Ravenstahl has officially changed his last name to Steelerssthal for the week leading up to the AFC championship game. God Bless lunatic sports fans! Go Stillers!!
So our family is settling down nicely into a routine of work/school, soccer practices, teaching night classes and going to grad school... All without the help of our stay at home Grandmother whom we were all spoiled by from Thanksgiving to the first week of January. I love my Momma and all of the TLC she lavished on us during her stay!! I miss her laughing, our conversations and dinners that are ready when I walk through the door :)
Even with all of the chaos of our lives post-spoiling our oldest guy has still been practicing guitar fiendishly, from the time he wakes up till beyond his allotted bed time, if he is home, he is strumming. It is an awesome thing to have a child who is so devoted to his music (it is even ok to have to lovingly impose boundaries on when it is ok to play and when you HAVE to wash dishes, take out trash, do your homework or let your brother get some sleep)
While he is working on finding his balance between his life and his art, we have been enjoying the fruits of his labour. I'm sure everyone says this about their kid, but he is incredibly talented. We have a wonderful musician in our house! As soon as he began taking lessons last year we knew he had found his "thing" and his continuous and rapid improvement makes me want to document his journey so we had him ask his guitar teacher, a former student of Matt's, to help him record a CD with a few of his best songs on it.
The coolest part, for me, was that when his guitar teacher suggested having someone sing on the CD, Maris asked me if I would do it! So now I get to "jam" with my step son while cooking dinner and hanging out around the house in the evenings. I am having such a good time with this, he is very easy to work with... if only it were this easy to get him to clean his room!!
I am very glad to have music as a way to bond with my oldest boy. It bothers me to think that the baby we are waiting for will get to spend so little time living with his/her uber cool oldest brother. He is a very special guy. You can't have everything though, and while life is sweet, I will savour it... and maybe see if my guitar hero would be willing to learn how to play a few lullabies for his little brother or sister :)
So we went to the pediatrician yesterday since the kids had to get their physicals done (much hilarity ensued apparently when the "turn your head and cough" part of the exam was carried out... I could hear the giggles from down the hall.
Then things turned sour. Our paperwork indicates a need for TB testing which is done by injecting a little serum under the skin to see if there is a reaction... I swore to my needle phobic youngest boy that, having just had this done my self, it was no big deal and he would barely feel it. So the nurse accidental went too deep made him bleed and he teared up and then look right at me with murder in his eyes for my apparent fraudulent claims, and he began to sob quietly. I felt like a jerk, but it really shouldn't hurt. It didn't hurt the big guy when he had his 10 seconds later.
The real kicker came when the next needle came out, this time for a "real" shot, the kind that goes right into the muscle. Big guy took his with a little wince and the nurse turned back to the youngest. He went rigid and refused to be vaccinated. He is 11 and in the 95th percentile for weight and height and is quite a strong guy... also very stubborn.
He had decided that there was no way this needle was going into his arm. He bargained, begged, shouted, ducked, squirmed and was threatened by his dad to no avail. Finally my big strong husband pinned him to the table and the nurse jabbed him while he screamed bloody murder (for about 5 seconds until he realised that it did not actually hurt)
I stood in the hallway with our oldest guy and cried a bit my self. If I can't handle an 11 year old crying at a shot, what am I going to do when they jab my baby??
The tears may have been a bit guilt related, after all, His dad and I are the ones who decided to adopt a baby, why should he have to be a pin cushion on our behalf? Still, its all done now and everyone has been pronounced healthy and in no need of further prodding for at least six months! Whew!!!
So I bought them both a big bag of candy and let them each eat the whole thing before dinner.... I'm a sap.
These two charming gents (yes I am such a slacker that summer was the last time I caught the 2 of them on film at the same time!) are on their way to the pediatrician today to do their part for their new little sibling and then we will be all finished with the medical side of the process.
At this point it has taken so long to organize this around every one's schedule that I am left wondering why I am quite foolish enough to have begun a home study two weeks before thanksgiving... did I not realize that appointments, and courthouses, and DMVs would all conspire against our finishing this part of the process in any type of timely way? Just goes to show that I am never quite as well prepared to meet life's challenges as I think!!
Still and all, I am excited that the holidays are over and the process is moving again. Since we are on a domestic path for our first adoption this one should (fingers crossed) be a little lighter on the paper work than our tentatively planned second adoption in which we hope very much to adopt an older child from Africa.
I do love the idea that a girl like me with no discernible trace of fertility could one day be the mother of four beautiful people from all over the world and from various different beginnings. (I am, as usual, way ahead of myself here!)
Step parenting has been a lovely life lesson about how much you can love an older child whom you not only did not give birth to, but who grew up with a world view untouched by you until you first met. Well, that is quite enough rambling from this Ravenstahl!!
