Thursday, July 19, 2007

Guess what time it is???

Time to wait!! I met briefly with our recruitment worker Thursday afternoon (her second last day of work as a recruitment worker) to submit our PRIDE homework. She appeared genuinely sincere that she was unable to complete our homestudy before her contract ended...oh well. I guess Grant & I will do what we do best...wait, wait, babysit, decorate our nursery some more and wait some more!!

Monday, July 16, 2007

Somewhere in the World Today

Somewhere in the world today...
* A child who will someday be adopted was born...
* An adoptive parent's paperwork was matched with his or her baby...
* Someone got the call and saw a tiny picture of her little one for the very first time...
* Someone looked across a room or a hotel lobby or an airport and came face-to-face with that little, long-awaited sweetheart...
* Someone reached out and took that child in her arms...
* Somewhere in the world today...a family was born.

~ Truly Yours: Thoughts on the Miracle of Adoption - Laura Dail ~

Two New Elements

Grant & I have added two new elements to our Blog - a list of books we have read or are currently reading and some of our favourite quotes (from the books we have read or are currently reading!). The library is a great source for books about adoption and it appears that Grant & I are not the only ones browsing the shelves - I have placed holds on a number of books and one of the books on hold is ready for pick-up. I don't know how I'm going to keep up with all this reading!!

Right now I'm reading - Twenty Things Adopted Kids Wish Their Adoptive Parents Knew by Sherrie Eldridge - I'm on "thing" number 2 and boy, am I learning a lot from this author. I will share the author's insights with you soon...Grant also plans to read the book when I'm done (don't want to give anything away) & the book's upstairs (I don't want to mis-quote anything).

I will share with you right now some of the 100 reasons Why Adopting You Made Us a Family by Gregory E. Lang

Why I chose you...
I chose you to fill my days with a more meaningful purpose.
I chose you to teach me how to play again.
I chose you because you are the child of my dreams.
I chose you because I felt your heart beat when I first held you.
I chose you because you were and always will be the choice of my heart.
I chose you because I knew that you would love the toys I had collected for you.
I chose you because I wanted even more than what nature had in store for me.
I chose you to bring happiness to the empty places in my heart.
I chose you so that I could celebrate your birthday with you.
I chose you when I realized the kind of love I was missing - that between a parent and a child.
I chose you to watch the stars with me.
I chose you to explore the wonders of the world with me.
I chose you because I wanted to hold your little hand.
I chose you because when I first touched you, I wanted to hold you forever (this one still brings tears to my eyes).
I chose you to fill my arms, which ached to hold a child.
I chose you because I wanted to be the one to wipe away your tears.
I chose you because I wanted to be the one to give you piggyback rides.
I chose you because I wanted to be the one to teach you how to tie your shoes (how OT!).


Sunday, July 15, 2007

Babysitting is great practice!

Grant & I babysat our 10-month-old Goddaughter overnight on Friday. We were both looking forward to spending time with her and taking the parenting test-drive!

She taught us many things during her short stay with us. First, she brought us back to eating meals at the table instead of in front of the TV and enjoying that time together.



She showed us the flawless team Grant & I make - mastering a quick two-person diaper change to tag-teaming at the dinner table.

I think my favourite lesson she taught me was - Grant is going to make a fantastically wonderful dad one day (I sorta already knew this)!! I sat outside the nursery when Grant was putting her down for the night and listened to him interacting with her and I was smiling from ear to ear.



When she woke in the middle of the night, Grant was the first to run to her...I actually had to tell him, I'll get up the next time...remember, I said I would go this time...

Parenting is going to be amazing and I can't wait for our day to finally arrive!!

Tuesday, July 10, 2007

Our first Tuesday off...

Last week we celebrated our graduation from PRIDE training and today is the first Tuesday in 10 weeks we didn't have to rush home from work, wolf down dinner and drive to Woodstock for 3 hours of training - it sorta feels weird. We were actually presented with a certificate of completion and several of the couples joked that we would frame and mount our certificates in our child's room!

Last weekend Grant surprised me with a good ol' fashioned wooden rocking chair, just like I've always wanted and I absolutely love it! I can't wait to rock our baby to sleep...

The frequency of our posts may slow down as we wait for our homestudy to be conducted - 6 to 9 months from now - But then again, we did just borrow some books from the library about adoption and there's already a lot to reflect upon from what we read last night and there's no way we will ever stop thinking about our baby-to-be until he or she is in our arms and the final papers are signed (Grant & I will share with you that scary time-line later)!

We found the book by Jamie Lee Curtis in the library we have been looking for...
Tell Me Again About the Night I was Born.

Tell me again how you and Daddy were curled up like spoons and Daddy was snoring.
Tell me again how the phone rang in the middle of the night and they told you I was born.
Tell me again how you screamed.
Tell me again how you called Granny and Grandpa right away, but they didn't hear the phone because they sleep like logs.
Tell me again how you got on an airplane with my baby bag and flew to get me and how there was no movie, only peanuts.
Tell me again how you couldn't grow a baby in your tummy, so another woman who was too young to take care of me was growing me and she would be my birth mother, and you would adopt me and be my parents.
Tell me again how you held hands all the way to the hospital and when you got there you both got very quiet and felt very small.
Tell me again about the first time you saw me through the nursery window and how you couldn't believe something so small could make you smile so big.
Tell me again how tiny and perfect I was (I absolutely love the illustration on this page!)
Tell me again about the first time you held me in your arms and called me your baby sweet.
Tell me again how you cried happy tears.
Tell me again how you carried me like a china doll all the way home and how you glared at anyone who sneezed.
Tell me again about my first bottle and how I liked it so much.
Tell me again about my first diaper change and how I didn't like it at all.
Tell me again about the first night you were my daddy and you told me about baseball being the perfect game, like your daddy told you. (Grant will be talking about hockey!)
Tell me again about the first night you were my mommy and you sang the lullaby your mommy sang to you.
Tell me again about our first night as a family.
Mommy and Daddy, tell me again about the night I was born.

Wednesday, July 4, 2007

Know where I can get more patience, mine has run out

Last night was our final night of PRIDE training!! Grant & I began the night very hopeful, you see, last week we asked the social worker teaching the course if there was a possibility to have our homestudy conducted in Woodstock (everyone else in our course is almost done their homestudy) and she sounded very hopeful and offered to do it herself but needed to ask her manager. When we showed up last night for the course the room was decorated for a summer camp program with tropical fish hanging from the ceiling, many of which are included in the mural we painted in the nursery - we thought that was a positive sign...well, that's where all the positives ended. In conversation with one of the other couples we learned that our recruitment worker from Waterloo (the one who is done her mat leave position July 20th and is part of the reason why we need to wait 6-9 months for another worker to pick up our file) was conducting their homestudy in Woodstock. I was in complete shock and then after the course ended the instructor pulled us aside and said her manager said "no." So many emotions flooded my thoughts, that I had tears running down my face the entire car ride home - how could it be that our worker from Waterloo doesn' t have time to conduct our homestudy, but she's doing it for a couple in another jurisdiction (spoke w/her today and learned she works privately for Woodstock on the weekends), I was angry at the manager that would not allow our homestudy to be conducted in Woodstook, I was angry that Grant & I can't conceive, I was so mad at the characters from "Knocked Up" (saw that on Monday and cried more than laughed) that got drunk one night and slept with a complete stranger and then got pregnant. I was mad that the guy character in the movie was a drugged up loser, while Grant is the most amazing husband and will make the most loving, caring and nurturing father. I was so angry that teenagers and addicts are able to get pregnant and Grant & I are being dragged through coals, hoops and mud just to be considered as adoptive parents, then these pregnant teenagers and addicts get to pick who would be best suited to raise their child. I am so discouraged, frustrated, angry, mad and completely out of patience. I wondered when I would run out of patience...well, it's gone. So many of our friends are announcing pregnancies...when will it be our turn to announce we are also expecting? Why can't God just give us our baby now? Grant & I are so ready for this, we even have the nursery ready, what is He waiting for? I am just so tired and out of energy.