Bees and Chickens for Christmas

For the past few years, my niece Olivia and I have made a contribution to The Heifer Project each Christmas. If you are not familiar with Heifer, their mission is "To work with communities to end hunger and poverty and to care for the earth." There approach is simple yet unique. Through donations, they are able to provide a community with a source of income through the gift of an animal such as a goat, pig, chickens and of course a heifer. The livestock brings with it the benefits of milk, wool, draft power, eggs and offspring Here's the really cool part, every family and community that receives assistance promises to repay their living loan by donating one or more of their animal's offspring to another family in need. This practice of passing on a gift ensures project sustainability, develops community and enhances self-esteem by allowing project partners to become donors.
Here is an awesome story about someone who has benefitted by The Heifer Project.

It was actually Olivia that started the tradition. One year she saved her birthday money and bought a flock of chickens. She was probably seven at the time. I was so inspired by her, I decided to join her in the effort. Since then we have done two goats, chickens, geese, ducks. Over the years, she has given much of her birthday Christmas, and allowance money for this cause. This year we decided in January to both save our spare change all year and go for something bigger like the water buffalo. We were doing pretty good and had over $100 in Sept. Then came hurricane Katrina and we decided to give what we had so far to help the Katrina effort.

We continued to save our pennies and were able to contribute chickens and bees this year. I had no idea bees could be so helpful.

Speaking of Paperwork

My youngest niece Ivy (just turned 4) is very excited about the adoption. Although what is a long wait for adults, can translate to an eternity for a 4 year old, we have talked to her about it almost from the beginning. They had to evacuate from Katrina so she was here quite a bit while Jon and I were working on our initial agency application. She heard me say I was doing "paperwork", saw the stacks of "paperwork" on my desk. She even kept me company in the office while I was working on "paperwork". She knew that it was all related to the adopotion.
Recently, she asked my sister to play with her. My sister replied "Mommie can't right now, I have some paperwork to do (probably meaning bills, mail, etc.) Ivy's eyes got wide and said "are we adopting a baby from China!!!"

Paperwork update

No word yet on if the fingerprints passed or not. In case you haven't been following along, "passed" means my fingerprints were clear enough to be read and NOT that they uncovered my extensive "rap sheet". Actually that's the irony of it all. Once they do get clear fingerprints, they will probably fall asleep while checking me out. BOOOORING!!! Anyway, other than the immigration form of course, everything else has been notarized, authenticated by any necessary county clerks, authenticated by the Secretary of State of either Texas, Georgia orMississippi!!! YAY! Yep, I've been putting X's in my spreadsheet and sadly enough that is what makes me happy these days. This week, it all went to the Chinese Consulate in Houston for the LAST level of authentication. Hopefully that will all be ok and will come back authenticated within a couple of weeks. Once the immigration form comes through, we will expedite that one final piece of paper through the same authentication process.

Fall Cleanup

After being out of town the previous two weekends, this was our weekend to start thinking about Christmas. Unfortunately, we had quite a bit of clean up to do before getting out the Christmas bling. As I mentioned before, we still had pumpkins gracing the front door and were also buried in leaves. I guess you could say that we were becoming "that house" on the street. So, we raked a massive pile of leaves. When I say "we" I mean Jon and my brother-in-law Brian who was nice enough to lend a hand. This pile of leaves may not seem that big but keep in mind that our front yard isn't much larger than the pile itself. Yeah, the leaves were deep.

Here is my contribution to the raking effort.

What fingerprints?

Of course I have been obsessing over my lack of fingerprints. In fact, my hands are sliding off the keyboard as I type this since I have been using so much hand lotion. Not sure why I'm trying this - I always use hand lotion so I really don't think that is going to make a difference. I called our case worker to see if she has ever come across this. I'm expecting to hear something like "Oh, yes this happens from time to time - it's no big deal, all you have to do is blah blah blah." That's not quite what she said. It went more like "What, I've never heard of such a thing happening, let me ask the other case workers". Nope none of them have ever heard of it either. I guess maybe that's better than saying they have seen it once with someone's great great great great grandmother.
I still have my fingers (gently) crossed . The very patient woman that took the fingerprints said that there is a chance they will pass and that it depends on who reviews them. Is it wrong to hope for an untrained, apathetic, overworked FBI employee?

Winter Wonderland - Texas Style

We were treated to a small dose of sleet and ice yesterday. We don't get much actual snow here - what we do get is typically in the form of ice. And since we only get it once, maybe twice, a year the place really shuts down. Schools dismissed early yesterday and were closed today. Lots of businesses were even closed today as well. Of course, I work from home quite a bit so that doesn't do a thing for me. I'm sure our friends up north would get a chuckle out of the chaos that a little ice can cause here. However, I don't care where you are from, it's not easy to drive on a sheet of ice. I certainly didn't get out in it. I did however, get Jon to stop at the store on his way home last night. Depending on how bad the ice got, I didn't know how long we could survive on the gallon of milk and microwave popcorn that we had on hand.

We've been fingerprinted - sort of

Yesterday we went for our fingerprinting appt. This is the last step before we can get our immigration clearance and the immigration clearance is the last thing we need for our dossier. I was very excited because we got our fingerprinting appt. quicker that I anticipated. I heard from other local adoptive parents that it's no big deal, best to show up at 8:00 when they open and you can get in and out pretty quick. About what you would expect - fill out a form, take a number, wait to be called. Didn't take us too long to be called, so far so good. When they do the fingerprints, they do it digitally (no ink) and do all ten fingers. Jon's fingerprints were done in a matter of minutes. Mine on the other hand, totally different story. Apparently I have no fingerprints. Well, I guess it isn't that bad, but they could not get a good print from over half of my fingers!!!! I did not see this one coming. They tried washing, drying, lotion and some super secret eraser type substance from the back room that they got from the police station. She even called her supervisor over to see if she could get my prints. No luck. The women were VERY patient and tried for over an hour. They understood that this was for an adoption and that I will not be approved without an FBI check which is what these fingerprints are for. I asked her if this happens a lot. Note to self - never ask a question that you don't want an answer to. She tells me that this happened with a kid that had a habit of chewing his fingers (never done that) and can often happen with the elderly. Did she say elderly??? If I want to feel old, I can just make an appointment with the fertility doctor thank you very much. She also said that lots of washing dishes and working on the computer can wear out your fingerprints. Well who doesn't do that???? How come mine are so messed up? See there Dad, all those times you made me help Mom out with the dishes - it really did scar me for life.

They warned me that there is a good chance that the prints will be rejected by the FBI and we will need to try again. That of course means a delay which makes me very cranky. I did all sorts of reading on the adoption forums last night to see if anything can help with this. Several posts from people that have older people living in their house and had trouble. Great, again with the elderly reference. One person suggested lotion which doesn't make any sense because I use hand lotion constantly and I don't think Jon has ever touched the stuff. If anyone has any suggestions, let me know - I'll try anything at this point.

What a week

This past week has been quite a blur. We returned from our Thanksiving trip the Sunday following Thanksgiving. I had crazy days at work on Monday and Tuesday. Went to the Rolling Stones concert on Tuesday night with some friends. The concert was really good, better than I expected. Those guys still have it.
Wednesday, I flew to Atlanta for company meetings on Thursday and Friday. Jon joined me in Atlanta on Friday evening as our company Holiday Party was Saturday evening. We went to dinner in Atlanta with some friends Friday night and then the party on Saturday night.
You know those boring company partys where everyone sits around making small talk, trying to impress the management and not doing anything to embarrass themselves? Well, imagine the complete opposite and that is our Holiday Party. We had a great time. Names will not be mentioned in order to protect the guilty. I am lucky enough to work with a great group of people that are very passionate about everything they do and that includes company parties. I haven't had three big nights out in the same week in quite some time. Not as easy as it used to be. Then Sunday afternoon I had a wedding shower to attend in Atlanta for my good friend Kimberley who is getting married soon. I got to see lots of girlfriends that I had not seen in quite so time so that was great. We flew back home around 9pm Sunday night.
We've been gone much of the past two weeks. We really need to get ready for Christmas. I guess the first step should be removing the Halloween pumpkin decorations by the front door.

Thankful

I am quite late on my Thanksgiving post but didn't want it to go unmentioned. I think it has taken me 41 Thanksgivings to truly understand what I have to be thankful for. And maybe I still don't have it figured out but I think I am getting closer. I will be the first to admit that in years past I have been thankful for some pretty shallow and frivolous things. Jon and I left last Wednesday to see my sister and her family and my parents in Louisiana, just northeast of New Orleans. Their town was hard hit by Katrina. This was my first trip back since the storm. I spent my entire childhood there. Although I couldn't wait to get out of there as soon as I graduated from college, I still call it "home".
We've all seen pictures and video of the destruction. Believe me it's worse than that. I lived there for years but didn't recognize much of it. But what you don't see in the pictures are the stories.
We spent a good part of Thanksgiving day volunteering through my parent's church feeding a Thanksgiving meal to those that needed it. We actually didn't have that many people show up to be served. We didn't expect that. I think that the people that are back are "making do" with whatever they have (in some cases little to nothing) and the others simply aren't able to come back yet. I met some amazing people including two ladies named Lydia and Ruby. Lydia evacuated to Houston but had over 7 feet of water in her house and lost everything. The night before Thanksgiving was the first night in three months that she slept on a mattress. Ruby is 84 and rode out the storm alone in her house. She didn't evacutate since she had half a tank of gas, a flat tire and no money, and no one to help her out. God I wish I had known her three months ago. She had over three feet of water in her house for a few days. Now here is the amazing part. Neither of these women were there to receive lunch. They were pretty much leading the volunteer effort. Lydia was making sure that I put enough mashed potatoes on each plate. Ruby had me, my sister, and my niece slicing, covering and arranging pies like there was no tomorrow. I've thought of Ruby a lot since Thursday. Sometimes you briefly cross paths with someone, probably never see them again but never ever forget them either. That's Ruby.

Georgia on my mind

I can't believe it!! On Saturday, I sent several documents to the Secretary of State in Texas as well as one document to the Secretary of State in Georgia as part of the authentication process for our dossier. My employer is located in Atlanta so that document has to follow the procedures for Georgia. I had the letter notarized in Ga., certified by the county clerk in Cobb county and it then had to go to the Secretary of State for another level of certification. I overnighted the document Saturday and I checked yesterday and it was received in Atlanta yesterday morning. Today, Tuesday, I received the certified document!!! They received it yesterday, processed it and overnighted it back the same day. This may not seem like a big deal to some of you. However, my experience with this process tells me that a one day turnaround deserves some recognition. Therefore, I'd like to make a toast to the great state of Georgia!!! Of course, I am still waiting on our fingerprinting appointment and will wait for immigration clearance. However, this is an X that I can put in my spreadsheet and that my friends is a good thing. When I started this, I knew that my patience would be tried because no one was going to move as fast as I would like. I think I may have met my match.

2007

When we started this process, I pictured us traveling late 2006. Now there is a chance that it won't be until 2007. For several weeks, there have been rumors going around the China adoption community regarding a possible slowdown in the wait for a referral. Until recently, the wait has been 6 months from the time that all of your paperwork is logged into the system in China. Lately, referrals are coming in around 7-8 months. A couple of weeks ago, we received an email from our Agency acknowledging that indeed a slowdown is expected. No information as to how much of a slowdown is expected. Rumors have it anywhere between 2-4 additional months. The uncertainty bothers me more than the idea of an extra couple of months. I've ignored all of this until now. Not because I am strong, it's just that sometimes my "happy place" is denial. I am now somewhere between denial and trying hard not to get too worked up until we have more specifics from our Agency. They are great at communicating with us and I'm sure they will keep us informed. The other reason that I haven't said anything is that I do NOT want to hear any more of the following:
1. It will be worth the wait
2. Everything happens for a reason
3. It will be here before you know it
4. This is happening so that you can be matched with the child that was meant for you
5. Maybe you will get pregnant before then - (that one is the worst)
6. Everything worthwhile is worth waiting for
7. Anything similar to the above

After my short-lived pity party the other day, I mentioned to Jon that maybe the extra wait won't be so bad - trying to convince myself, not him. (He's much better at taking it all in stride than I will ever be.) It will give us time to save more money, learn some Chinese, do some things around the house, decorate an amazing nursery I tell him. His reply "Sounds good, what do you have planned for the second week." Hmmmm maybe I should add "try to relax" to that list.

Complete Homestudy - CHECK!!!!

My new best friend,the fed-ex man, made my day by delivering the completed homestudy today. I was very disappointed when I didn't have it yesterday. Earlier this week, my caseworker "G" told me to let her know if I did not have it by Friday. I called her this morning and asked her to PLEASE not make me wait until Friday. (I thought about pretending it WAS Friday but decided to go w/ impatient rather than clueless.) She chuckled and said she would check into it. Within 10 minutes, she called me back. Not only had she verified that it was on it's way but she had gotten the tracking number, tracked it and told me it was at home waiting for me. YAY!!! I'm so good at this waiting thing, I'm sure "G" is looking forward to our long wait for a referral. I'll be expressing it to Citizenship and Immigration Services tomorrow. Bring on the fingerprinting!!!!!!!!!

Next Best Thing

The word on the street is that the final, notarized copy of our homestudy is on it's way here. Yeah, I thought I was going to have this last week but remember I'm not in control of this process. After we got the draft, our agency requested the social worker add a few things so that took some extra time. No problem, I want it to be done right and don't want any surprises once it goes to China. Our contact at the agency called me today and she received her copy so ours should be here any day. Of course, I ran to the mailbox as soon as I got home but sadly it wasn't there. However, I did have a very sweet card from my niece Olivia. Other than a final homestudy, there is NOTHING I would rather find in my mailbox. It made my day - I think I can actually wait another day for that homestudy report.

National Adoption Awareness Month

November is Adoption Awareness Month. I was going to mention this earlier in the month but guess I was too busy with my "Where is the final homestudy report?" obsession. (Which by the way, I still don't have but since I am trying not to dwell on it, that's all I will say about that...for now.) As we have revealed our plans to adopt, we've gotten several (often blunt) questions. Most are well meaning I suppose but still intrusive. The most common question being WHY? I have tried to answer with "Why not?" but that sounds evasive...like I don't want to talk about it. Nothing could be further from the truth. I have to force myself to find another topic to talk about most days. So in honor of Adoption Awareness Month, I wanted to capture my own thoughts on how we got to this amazing journey.

When Jon and I started trying to conceive, my Dr. said to give it 6 months and then come back if we weren't successful. I gave it 4. Hey, I was 40 at the time and was on a mission! Over the next several months, Jon and I both went through several appointments, tests, procedures, etc. None were fun and some were worse than others. We ended up at the Fertility Endocronologist's office. This was not a nice man. He was way too intense and serious, and frankly did NOTHING to put us at ease. BTW, if that big, scary "INFERTILITY" sign above his door ever goes missing, I should be the first suspect - I hate that sign. I did lots of research and he is apparently "The guy." People drive from all over to see him. I drove 5 miles and it was too far. Anyway, due to several "factors", he suggested daily fertility injections and artificial insemination, possibly IVF. Based on said "factors", we were looking at about a 25% chance of success and then about a 50% chance of miscarriage. Hmmmm.... I'm no mathematical genius but I certainly didn't like the sound of that. That was a rough few months. I do remember one stellar meltdown right in the middle of the Houston airport. I guess that is one good thing about starting this at 40, the Doctors sort of "cut to the chase." I have friends that endured years of this, not months. I can't imagine.

Jon and I started researching these fertility drugs and procedures and also started researching adoption at the same time. Really, there was only one that we were drawn to. One that we kept coming back to. One that seemed right for us. Don't get me wrong, I have the utmost respect for anyone that takes the fertility route. It just wasn't for us. Frankly, being pumped full of hormones and having to listen to Dr. Serious say "At your age...." was not going to end nicely. I'm sure I would have scratched his eyes out. Sure, I could have found another Dr. but it wasn't about that. Jon swears Dr. Serious secretely works for the adoption agencies. Come to think of it, I should send him a Thank You note for helping us to reach this decision. For us, it wasn't about being pregnant, it was about being a family. There is not a shread of doubt that this is how we were meant to become a family. I have received comments suggesting that adoption was something that we had to resort to. No, this is something that we chose. And we couldn't be more content and at peace with our choice.

Ivy is 4!!!

My niece Ivy turns 4 on Monday. Happy Birthday Ivy!!!
Ivy is very excited about getting a new cousin someday. I've explained all about the paperwork involved and she's witnessed the stacks of paperwork on my desk. A couple of months ago, I read the book "I Love you like Crazy Cakes" to her. (It's a cute children's book about a lady that adopts a little girl from China.) When I was done reading she looks at me and says "That didn't take long for that lady."

The Birthday Girl 

How hard could it be....

to write a one page letter to the Chinese officials explaining why we want to adopt and that we promise to be good parents and never abuse or abandon her? The instructions from our agency clearly state to keep it to a page. I have had the toughest time with this. The letter is the easy part, the hard part is keeping it to one page. It's ironic to me that in a process so extremely lengthy and complicated, this letter is kept so short and simple. To me, this letter is the most important part of our dossier. I have so much more than one page to tell the people that are giving us this amazing gift. I have been working on the letter off and on for a couple of weeks. I had a draft done yesterday but I couldn't get it down to less than a page and a half. I took it out again today and was able to shorten it some but it was still over a page. Every sentence was there for a reason and I couldn't shorten it any more. So I asked Jon to take a look and see what he could do. Two seconds later, he said that he had gotten it to a page. I couldn't believe it. "What in the world did you do?" I asked him. He says.... "I changed the font size." Sometimes I scare myself.

Daunting Dossier

Spent a good part of Saturday working on our China Dossier. We won't be able to complete it until we get our approval from immigration but my plan is to get everything else done and then pay top dollar to get the final form from immigration expedited through the authentication process. I'm prepared to hand carry that baby to Austin and Houston if I have to. I've created a spreadsheet to keep track of each document and where it is in the authtication process. If anyone cares, here are the documents that make up a China Dossier:

1. Letter of Intent - one page letter explaining why we want to adopt from China and that we will never abandon or abuse her.
2. Certified copy of our Marriage Certificate
3. Certified copies of our Birth Certificates
4. Medical forms from our doctors stating that we have been tested for every horrible disease and we are in good physical and mental condition. (Believe me, this dossier is testing my mental condition.)
5. Financial Statement listing our assets and liabilities
6. Letters from our employers stating our salary and that we are an "employee in good standing"
7. Completed homestudy
8. I-171H form from immigration approving us to bring the child into the country. (aka "The Golden Ticket")
9. Local Police clearances for both of us - Just in case something escapes the state clearance and the FBI fingerprints that are also done - Jeez.
10. Photocopies of Signed Passports
11.Extra passport photos
12. Set of 6 photos of us and our home.

With the exception of the homestudy and the I-171H, everything has been obtained and notarized. That was the easy part. Besides being notarized, everything also has to be authenticated by the Secretary of State and the Chinese Consulate. Depending on where the document was notarized, a county clerk authentication may also be needed. We have documents from Georgia, Mississippi and Texas so there are three authentication procedures that have to be navigated.

And to think that my definition of "paperwork" used to be an expense report and weekly status report. HA!!

Tree Hugger?

We got a new tree for the backyard and it was delivered and planted today. Where we live yards are small and trees are sparce. Wish that wasn't the case, but sadly it is. There was one tree in the backyard, it was not well when we bought the place 3 years ago and well, it died. It's now a stack of firewood. So, our anniversary was about a month ago and I asked for a tree. Yep, a tree. Girls best friend? It's still pretty small but I love our little tree.

Recieved the draft of the homestudy!!!

Yay!!! Not sure if it is coincidence or the phone call that I made yesterday - doesn't matter. Today, we received the draft of our homestudy report. Yep, there it is, our whole life - past, present and FUTURE all summed up on 8 glorious pages!! I'll review it tonight, send in any changes and hopefully we will have the notarized copies by the end of the week. Not like we get to change a whole lot, just mispellings and such. No real surprises but I did love to read " (name of our Agency) recommends this family without reservation for the international adoptive placement of a child as described above. They have met all the adoption requirements of the state of Texas and are an approved adoption home."

It did mention that I can be stubborn and Jon over commits himself. The Social Worker asked us what we most admired in our spouse and then of course "least desirable" qualitites. And yes, those were included right along with the good stuff. Apparently Jon thinks I can be stubborn at times... imagine that. I tried to get away with "I just wish he would put the toilet paper back on the roll" but she made me come up with something else. She wasn't impressed by that answer - seems her husband does the same thing. Jon couldn't believe that I mentioned the toilet paper thing to her. He will be thrilled about this post. Sorry babe...