No Ordinary Family

Yesterday, Jim picked up the recliners we ordered. They are great. They look great in our living room and they are also comfortable. Our home is really starting to look like grown ups live here. It has only take 8 years but it really is coming together. Well this is going to be a short post but I wanted to get some pictures up. Survivor is on so a quick update on the adoption. CCAA have finished the review of Dossiers sent before 8/31/06 so that means that we are only about 8 months from review, Yippee!!!! Referrals are due any day now so I will update about how far that has gone as soon as I hear. I am keeping my fingers crossed for a big batch!!

Hopefully those reading my blog will understand my image but if you don’t, YOU ARE TO YOUNG!! Jim and I have waited for 5 months for Little Miss What’s Her Name to come home. There is no telling how much longer the wait will get but we are still hanging in there. If I were pregnant I would be more than half way though by now, wouldn’t that be nice. I am actually feeling pretty good about the wait lately. I have been keeping busy and that really helps. This blog has certainly been a lot of fun, also. I am sure some months will be harder than others but I am going to try to stay more positive than negative. Although it is fairly easy to have a down day where all I think about is whether I will ever be a mom. I know it is when not if, but it is not completely real to me yet. Today is also the Mid-Autumn Festival , sometimes called Moon Festival or Lantern Festival. It is one of China’s major holidays. I don’t know that much about it but I plan on learning, as it will be a day we will obse...

Sunday I got the fish tank in Little Miss’s room taken down. I have been hoping that the guppies that were calling the tank home would kick it and I could just take it down but alas there are survivors. Six little guppies were all that have survived my lack of attention and the ever-invading algae. I could not bear to flush them so since there were only six left, I decided to transport them to my office. I got one of those beta vases with a peace lily in the top of it this spring right before I got sick with pneumonia. I had a really pretty blue beta fish, unfortunately for the fish, I got a fever. You would not think a fish would care if my fever went up but as it happens I did not realize I was running a fever and just cranked up the heat in my office thinking I was cold. I then ended up missing a few days of work and the whole time the heater in my office was on high. When I returned it was about 110 degrees in my office and the pretty blue beta fish was no longer among the living. ...

So I have got a few offers to help me secure Katie’s new car, although I don’t think they are feasible. First Laura will help me if I let her have my, oh so sweet, Gypsy. I don’t think this is an option because not only will I lose my dog but I will probably end up still with out a car. There is also the fact that Toby would be alone all day, which could only spell disaster for our home. Also I don’t think Gypsy could escape the yard and find her way to Pepper’s from Laura’s apartment. Second offer was Uncle Dennis offering Katie and her car for the price of a trip to China. Nice try dear Uncle, but there are several flaws in your argument. One, Katie I am sure would still insist upon driving her car once she was here. Two, I don’t think she would fit into this adorable little sleeper I found at Fred Meyers today or the stroller that I spent half a day cleaning up a couple of weeks ago. Check out the cute feet!! Three, we asked for as young as possible and while Katie is still in the p...

Anyone that knows me knows I am not a shoe person so maybe I am just missing something but I don’t understand why anyone that is going on survivor would even take high heels on the trip? I watched Survivor last night and I loved it. I love to I sit at home on my sofa or lay in bed (soon we will be enjoying it from our new recliners) and Jim and I discuss what we would do. I would never go on a show like this but I know if I did I would do it better ;0). I really have to wonder if these people have ever watched the show before. I would say that 99% of the time Jeff Probst takes all of their belongings in the first episode. I understand that they probably don’t know exactly when the game is going to start but they do know they are in another country for a survivor game, right? So why on earth would you ever bring a dress and high heels? If it were me I would layer my clothing from the moment that I stepped on the plane and I would not pack anything but sensible clothing and shoes. ...

I just read the wonderful comment from Grandma L about how I have a knack for writing. Thank you, but I have to admit I cheat a little. I have an awesome editor, I can not spell or punctuate anything correctly to save my life so after I spell check everything it goes straight to Jim to proof read. I rarely post without him going over it first, trust me you would not be able to make sense out of what I write with out him. I just have to write a bit about Survivor . I am so excited that it starts tomorrow!!! I am a bit of a reality TV junkie. I watched Big Brother faithfully all summer and I have seen every season of Survivor since the beginning. I don’t care for the bachelor or the dating shows but other than that I like it all. Although, I must admit that the final episode of BB8 was not that exciting since it was a father-daughter team in the final 2, I mean come on you know they are going to share the money anyway. I was interested to see how they were going to reveal the America’s P...

It has been more of the same in the land of non-parenthood. Not much happening to blog about unless the few readers that I have want to hear about re-organizing the kitchen. Since I can’t wait for you to answer I am just going to tell you about it anyway, if you don’t care just skim until I start ranting about something else. I came home from getting my hair cut on Sunday (don’t worry nothing drastic just a trim) and started doing the dishes that lead to a complete reorganization and a trip to Lowe’s. Well, we did need to get a new step stool too as Jim collapsed ours, as Jim said it had obviously been a stool too long. So we bought all kinds of wire organizers and things to put things away with and then came home and realized that half the things we bought are the wrong size and needed to be taken back. Back to the stores we went and returned what did not work and bought another cabinet for the dinning room to hold extra stuff. We have to have more storage if we are going to stop...

Jim survived his first day as a substitute teacher!! He taught middle school math, yes, math. He loved it. I am so happy he is finally getting paid for all the work he is done in school. Granted he owes a fortune so he really won't be making money for a few years but it is start. Other than that nothing new is happening. I am happy that Jim is home this evening. Him working nights has been killing me. Not that I can't be alone but I end up staying up later than normal and I also don't eat right. Jim cooked a wonderful dinner tonight so I feel much better. I almost forgot an update on Gypsy. She went to the vet and we are trying some antibiotics and some cream to see if the growth goes down. It is a much better option than surgery and less costly, so I hope it works. In the mean time she is in a cone and looks pathetic.

It is truly amazing, how a new coat of paint and decent colors can change the entire feel of a house. Maybe it is because I have hated that color since we moved in. I don’t think the pictures truly show how pink the house was and how teal the trim was. So after a weekend of hard work it is pretty much done. We need to get the porch lights back up but as we live under a street light it is not a priority. Now if only the inside of the house and the yard looked as good. Before After Sunday night we joined Jim’s family and friends in welcoming Emma to her new room. With the new little one on the way they found a room in their house that was the perfect size for Emma. It turned out really cute. So it was the perfect excuse to go shopping for cute kid stuff. We thought we would get Emma a pillow or a cute wall hanging and we wanted to get Eli something too since he also has a room to himself at least for a few more months. It was harder than it sounds. Eli was easy; we found th...

I was going to post about our weekend painting the house and visiting and show some before and after pictures but that will have to wait. Currently I am writing this while a dog whines incessantly next to me. Toby has found a new toy, a squeaky football that I am sure was Missy’s that we somehow acquired when we helped Emily move (sorry Emily and Ryan if this is a beloved lost toy.) Anyone that knows Toby knows he is death to squeakers, but until they die they are truly annoying. That is why we try to buy him non-squeaky toys. So what is better take to toy away and listen to the whining or the squeak, squeak, squeak, squeak, squeak, squeak, squeak, squeak, squeak, squeak, squeak, squeak, all night long? Jim thinks I am obsessed with the adoption and becoming a Mom I wish he was here to see his dog longing for the squeaker toy. It is a completely new definition of obsession. When Jim came home for lunch he put the toy up on the table as soon as he left, Toby devised a way to retrieve it...

My wonderful, talented, brilliantly beautiful, Niece Emma created this for me and I love it. You know you’re loved when you get home and find a bracelet in the mail, that a 3 ½ year old made and could not wait to give you so she had her mom mail it. I called her the other night to thank her and had a good conversation with both Emma and her Mom. I don’t know if they realize that it could not have come at a better time, I have been feeling down about the wait and work is exhausting lately. Something like this makes me realize why we are waiting, at the end it is the simple things that I long for and as long as we stick to our decisions and trust that we are doing what we know is right then our dreams will come true, someday. It feels really good to know that there are 2 wonderful, special kids in my life and 2 more on the way. One is going to be here a lot sooner than the other but I hope that someday, not too far away, they will all be playing and laughing together. I hope you enjoy th...

I hate smoke detectors. Yeah, yeah, yeah they save lives, I know, but come on do the people that make smoke detectors sit around and devise ways to make people like me crazy. I got home today after a long day at work and as I sit down to check my email and relax, beeeeep. I thought smoke detector or maybe I am hearing things but then a few minutes later, beeeeep. Ok that is definitely a smoke detector so, off to our many “junk” drawers to search for a nine volt battery. Why a nine volt? I mean, I don’t think I own anything else that takes that type of battery so needless to say we don’t have a large supply. I finally locate a new nine volt, but now comes the real challenge, which of the FIVE smoke detectors in our house is in need of the only new battery I have. We don’t have a large house so why do we need smoke detectors that are less than two feet from each other. Now, you think that the geniuses at the smoke detector factory would possibly make a way to determine that the battery n...

Well, it has been a few days since my last post so I think I will start at the beginning of the long weekend. To start things out I got my secret pal gift for September!! I was so excited and I did not expect it so soon. I opened the package and found all kinds of onesies and t-shirts. They are so, so cute. Little Miss’s wardrobe is increasing quickly. It is one thing that I was going to wait on was clothing because we don’t know when we will get a referral or what size she will be. But you know what I figure if I keep the tags on things and if I can’t use them I will either find someone that can or have a big ebay auction. For now seeing the little clothes in the closet makes me happy. I convinced Jim that the “Daddy’s My Hero” top needed some little pants so we headed out shopping. It helps that he wasn’t in a big hurry to get the house work done that we were planning for the weekend. We ended up at my sister Emily’s because I was frustrated with the local shopping. I got some cute p...