It Really Wasn't Set in Stone

Well, shit. I should have known better than to expect it would be this easy. The baby that we were told about on Friday is not the one for us. I didn’t ask our agency any details but what it boils down to is that it just didn’t work out for one reason or another so we are not heading to Kaz just yet. BUT I am OK with it. We’ll get there eventually. I’m just ready to GO already and having to wait all weekend to find this out was sort of torturous. But what it means is that we will have everything ready in time for the next possibility and won’t be running around like a crazy person at the last second. I knew I should have kept my big trap shut until it was a done deal. I guess I just jumped the gun. Oh well, that’s life in the adoption world. At least it didn’t happen after we got there, right? Alright, off to bed. I somehow managed to develop a massive cold over the weekend and I feel horrible. This news didn’t really help my mental state. More news when we find it out. Love, -m

One Quick Due Date

Hi Everyone-

Imagine you decide to start trying to have a baby. You get all your little ducks in a row- get the house baby-proofed, nursery decorated, get your job prepared, figure out how to get time off work and how to add a child to your insurance, buy all the bottles/clothes/monitors. You do all those things that people who have babies do. Then you find out you are suddenly pregnant. And that you’re due in 10 days. And you are going to give birth in a country located halfway around the world. You’d be a little stressed out, wouldn’t you? Please tell me it’s not just me but I am totally FREAKING OUT in a big way! I know that things are not set in stone or anything but I have been trying to go through the list of things we will need to bring with us and there is still so much I need to get done! The email that followed the phone call this morning said that we would need to be in the city where our child is by the 18th or maybe even the 17th, which means that we would have to leave here the 16th or maybe 15th. It’s now the 4th- holy smokes! And I found out that we have to get some letter from Peter’s work attesting to the fact that we have health insurance. It, of course, needs to be notarized/apostilled and his employer is based in Arizona which means that we will either be frantically FedEx-ing stuff back and forth from them after they type it up and get it notarized (hopefully correctly on the first try), to us in DC, back to AZ to the Sec of State’s office who we hope is not on vacation and will put the stamp on it really really fast and FedEx it back to us OR we are going to need to hire someone to pick up the letter from his work and personally take it over to the SOS office, wait for it, and then overnight it to us. How do we even do that? Is it possible? Aaargh! Peter offered to fly me to AZ to get it done- it’s insanity! And of course then there’s the passport visa to enter Kaz itself which will be totally last minute. I am wondering though if I can just bring it to the Kaz Embassy which is about a 15 minute drive from our house. Hmmm… And we have to get Rin’s passport which is going to have to be last minute and a giant pain in the rear. I guess I need to dig up all his original birth certificates and stuff. And we have to do this all while still taking care of our adorable but very attention-seeking preschooler. I am glad that it is last minute though. It gives me less time to worry about all the things that can go wrong. And there are things that can go wrong- but we’re not thinking about those right now. I am just keeping my eyes ahead and looking forward to seeing that sweet face for the first time. I just get the chills every time I think about it. I want to know what he/she will look like and what the little personality will be. If the powers that be are listening, I would like a calm one this time please. That’d be great thanks.

Love to all -m

When I got word about the possible upcoming trip, I was actually in the process of writing a blog post about how we hadn’t heard anything yet. I included it below just to show how your world can turn around with one phone call. I still can’t believe it. More news to come soon. We’re hoping it’s good.
Hi all-
I know. I haven’t blogged in forever. I have to be honest with you- I was waiting for news on the adoption front. I haven’t even bought plane tickets to Kazapalooza because I keep thinking we’ll get word soon. Still no word but we are hopeful it will be soon. Sometimes I have to remind myself that despite my best efforts, I am not actually able to mentally will it to happen by telekinesis. I am not one to sit around and wait for things to happen. I am lazy- this I admit- but once I decide to do something, it gets done. But in adoption it doesn’t really work that way. The fact that I am not in charge sort of hit home on the way to the lake this weekend. We left at Rinat’s bedtime on Thursday thinking it would be great to drive while he’s snoozing in the backseat so we don’t have to hear the inevitable “Are we there yet? I want a lollipop.” a million and a half times during our 5 hour drive. That was smart planning on our part- if only we had looked at the weather report. We hadn’t gotten even an hour outside of the city when it began to rain. OK, rain’s no big deal, I just figured it would just take a little longer to get there. Then it got heavier and then heavier as I leaned closer and closer to the windshield to try and see what lay ahead of us. People began to slow down from 70 to 40. As it got worse, they eventually slowed down to 20 and put on their hazard lights. Then we saw some people who had stopped underneath the overpasses to wait it out (how smart!), then people pulled to the side of the road. Then the ENTIRE highway- 4 lanes of traffic- came to a dead halt as we were unable to see further than 5 feet in front of our car. Peter eased the car over to the side of the road and put it in park to wait it out. Before we knew it, the rain got louder in a way that we knew it was no longer just rain. We looked out the windshield and hail the size of Skittles bounced off the car’s hood and piled up. I looked above to make sure the sunroof was covered in case it was shattered by the storm. The noise as it pummeled our car was so deafening that Peter and I could hardly hear each other talk. I had never been outside in the middle of anything like this (OK in the car, but still) and it was truly scary. There was literally nothing that we could do but sit there and wait while it raged around us. All of us people, sitting in our cars, given over to the amazing power of nature. It sort of makes me rethink the whole idea that I am in charge of anything. And then, miraculously, it cleared. The hail slowed and stopped, the rain lessened to a drizzle, cars began to tentatively creep back onto the road and into the travel lanes, my heart began to slow down its frantic beating, and all was back to normal. I then realized that I had heard not a peep from the back seat. I turned around and our sweet, exhausted boy had slept through the whole thing. Oh, to be young again…

Once we made it to the lake after 2 in the morning, all was well and we had a fantastically relaxing time. The weather was sunny, the lake water was warm, and the daiquiris were ice cold. It was fabulous. My cousin and his wife joined us with their 1 year old and I just spent the whole time thinking that hopefully soon we will have another little one of our own. A cute, sweet one like him, please.

Carson Has ESP

Hi Everybody!
Carson has been telling me for months that we would meet our new child on June 17.  Then a couple of weeks ago, she switched it to June 18.  Well, sistah was correct.  My phone rang minutes after I got out of the shower this morning.  I was still dripping wet and it showed an area code that I didn't recognize.  I wasn't going to answer it, thinking that it was a wrong number an not wanting to bother with it, but decided to anyway for some reason (maybe my subliminal took over?).  And I am so glad that I did.  It was the director of our agency.  It took me a second to figure out why he might be calling.  For some reason, I was thinking that maybe he was calling to ask me again about our requests in terms of age/etc because we were next in line or something but instead he told me that there was a baby available for us to meet (OMG!).  I told him I was getting goosebumps and he said "Now, don't get them quite yet, nothing's set in stone!"  I was trying really hard not to cry because I was afraid I wouldn't be able to talk and ask questions of him.  I did hold it together and ask a few questions, but as all adopters know, and he had just said, nothing is set in stone.  But important thing is...
There is a baby available June 20 and we'd have to leave on the 18th.  Craziness! 
Today is a really really really good day!
-m

JCICS Call to Action- We are the Truth

I can’t tell you how many times I have heard people- strangers and friends alike- tell me “Rinat is so lucky that you adopted him.” And I do agree (we’re pretty darn fantastic) but I never really know what to say in return. “No, we’re the lucky ones” doesn’t really seem to cover it. We were two people yearning for a child to love, who would make us a family, and the Republic of Kazakhstan put their faith in us and allowed us to be parents to Rinat. They trusted that we would take good care of him, raise him as a good and responsible person and, most of all, that we would love him with our whole hearts. And we feel so unbelievably honored that they did. I feel lucky to kiss away his tears when he wakes up crying from a nightmare. I feel lucky to hold his soft little hand in mine as we walk to school in the morning. And I feel lucky that, most of all, he has taught me what it is to be a mother. He is not perfect by any means but every single second of every single day I am so happy that he came into our lives. He is my life and my soul.

As a part of Kazakhstan adoption, we are required to send in yearly reports that tell about Rinat’s life with us. My friends always ask if it makes me mad that I have to jump through all these hoops just to have a child. But the answer, honestly, is no. In truth, I see it as a chance to brag about how well he’s doing. We have this smart, energetic, stubborn, loving, curious little boy in our family because they had faith in us and we owe them some reassurance. It is my chance to tell them, “Yes, you were right to trust us. He has a good life and he is happy.”

Sadly, there is now someone out there who has cast a shadow of doubt in the minds of people the world over. Someone did not take her responsibility as mother seriously and has made governments question whether US adoptive parents are capable. I am here to tell you that she does NOT represent American adoptive parents as a whole. She is not the norm, but rather a very rare aberration. In the US we are lucky. There are many many resources available to us should we have trouble shouldering any burden that we are carrying. All we have to do is ask. This woman did not do this and in my eyes, and the eyes of everyone I know, she is NOT a mother. A mother would never give up. A mother would never give her child away because he was not what she had in mind. She is heartless and no child deserves what she has done no matter how bad his behavior. It is a shame that she didn’t feel up to being a parent. It is a shame for all of those potential parents out there who would give loving and happy homes to a child and most of all it is sad for all those children who may never know a family because of her.

I remember the judge at Rinat’s court hearing asking “Do you think it will be hard to raise this child?” I responded that yes, I think it absolutely will be hard to raise him. But we are so lucky to be able to.

Love to all
-MAREN

Que Sera, Sera

Hi all-  Rinat has a relatively new obsession that I don’t think is shared by most other 3 year olds and it’s slightly bizarre. He is obsessed with dead people- the US presidents in particular. I know, random right? Here’s how it started: we were down at Peter’s brother’s house in Georgetown and Rinat asked who the man was in the painting over the fireplace. I explained that his name was George Washington and he was the president a long time ago like Barack is the president now. Noticing the crack in the paint he asked “He has a crack in his face, does that mean he’s really old?” “Well, he actually died a long time ago and he was a really nice man who did good things so people built a memorial to remember him by and that is the tall pointy building downtown.” This led to much discussion of the next several days about if he had a mommy and a daddy, if he ever used to be a boy, if he liked to play with toys when he was little, if he had a house, if he liked to play soccer, and on and on and on. Usually the questions would come out of nowhere as he was playing with trains, eating lunch, or reading a book. Then one day he was holding some coins to ‘pay’ at the grocery store and he noticed that there was good old George on one of them. “Mommy, dat George Washington on dis money!” Then he noticed that there were other men on the other coins and wanted to know all about them as well. The same questions were answered- Did ‘Hammerhead’ Lincoln have a mommy and a daddy? Is he really old? Did he have a baby brother? Did he ever ride on a train? And what about Roosevelt?- and I answered every one of them. Then I ran out of answers and dug around in my teaching books and found some kid friendly books about the presidents and we read all about them and went on the Internet and found photos of all of them. And then we decided to go downtown and visit the memorials and he wanted to know every little thing about them. I think it was in the process of looking for a bathroom that we went underneath the Lincoln Memorial and saw the exhibit about the Walk on Washington and Martin Luther King. So, books were bought, many more questions were asked- Did he like to go to his school? Why couldn’t he ride at the front of the bus? Why people not like him?- and answered. And as we were reading one of the MLK books, he noticed a photo on the wall in one of the illustrations and asked who it was. “Well, that is a very nice man named Ghandi.” “What did he do nice? Why didn’t he want to eat? Why did he live in India?...” And now we are off again on another famous person. Is it ever going to stop? Oh, and Rinat tells me that when he dies and they bury him, they will be building a memorial on top of him. Who knows? Maybe he’s right. He is most certainly devouring information rapidly. Sometimes I feel like I just can’t do enough. I give him my time, attention, and patience and sometimes I feel like it’s just not quite enough. That someone more patient, more giving could tell him absolutely everything he ever wanted to know. But then I have to remind myself that I am doing the best I can and that he is, after all, only 3 and he has a lifetime of learning ahead of him.  BTW- That Lego masterpiece above is a recreation of MLK giving his 'I have a dream' speech complete with the Lincoln statue, columns in front, microphones, and plenty of audience members.  Yup, he came up with it all on his own. 

And in that vein of complete and utter exhaustion (did I mention that he is also going through what I will call a ‘difficult’ phase?) Peter and I went on a proper vacation. Yup, we made reservations, packed up, dropped Rinat off with the grandparents, and 36 hours after booking it, hopped a plane and headed down to the sun, sand, palm trees, and Rum Runners of the Dominican Republic (“Mommy you know the ‘Minican ‘Pubbik right next to Haiti where the earth cracked?” “Um, no honey I didn’t know that actually”). We read, we lazed around, we took walks, and we missed Rinat- but just a little bit. It was fantastic and much much needed. The second day we were there, Peter said “I think we should do this once a year. It’s a necessity.” So there is our very hopeful resolution. Sometimes it’s just too easy to get caught up in the everyday and forget that we need some time to regroup and become better, happier people and better parents in the process so we are, especially now in light of the impending new addition in our family, going to try very hard to remember to pay attention to ourselves once in a while.

And, speaking of the new addition to our family, our dossier is officially logged into the system in Kaz! YAY! My agency didn’t give me timeframe but from what I can tell from other peoples’ experiences, it seems to be about 1-6 months before we'll be on the way. And our caseworker said it's likely we'll be assigned to the Akmola region which means it could be Astana or some other cities within a few hours of there. Very exciting! We just found this out earlier this week and I am already freaking out (in a good way!). So when I start to get all worked up, I just sing one of Rin’s songs from school- “Que sera, sera. Whatever will be, will be. The future’s not ours to see. Que sera, sera” and try to focus on right now instead of worrying about what the future holds.

And we definitely are having fun here in the present. Mom came in town for a visit over Easter and then went down to meet Rinat’s new cousin. The time she was here flew by and was so fun! Rinat was on Spring Break so there were trips to the dinosaur museum, the park, picnic with the cousins, cherry blossoms, and lots and lots of Easter eggs full of candy. I can’t believe that the Easter Bunny will be leaving eggs for another person next year. Yay!
And, I hate to do it, but I am going to have to stop allowing anonymous comments. Someone keeps leaving spam comments and it’s aggravating to have to go back and delete them. So now, you can read all you want but if you want to leave a comment, you just need to open an account (it’s free and easy) and comment to your hearts content.
I hope you are all enjoying Spring! I know we sure are. Much love, -m

A Party and Weekend of Peace

Hi Everyone!  So we finally got around to having Rinat’s 3rd birthday party. It was just about 2 months past his actual birthday but he didn’t really seem to care. We celebrated it first at school where they had a whole lesson on how the earth had gone around the sun 3 times since Rinat was born and we sang a song while he carried the globe and walked around the sun on the floor. Then I showed photos of him and we had some cinnamon apple cake for the class. Rinat was so darn cute. He gets this little smile on his face like he’s a little bit embarrassed and a little bit excited and a little bit proud- he’s not sure which to be more. I loved that Peter and I got to go to his school because we finally got to meet all of those kids that he talks about every day when he I pick him up. And I learned something new about my little Romeo too. He, at age 3, is already girl crazy. Miss B told me that he has a little girlfriend who he absolutely adores and he gets really upset if someone sits next to her on the rug or if she sits with someone else at snack time. And once I met her, I had to second his choice in playmates- she is totally adorable. After his teacher told me, I recalled that one time he came home sad from school and told me “X no want to sit next to me today. She say she sit next to me tomorrow” with the saddest puppy dog eyes on his face and his sweet head hanging down so far that his chin was touching his chest. It’s like his little world had ended- he barely even ate lunch that day. Oh what fun his teenage years are going to be- heartbreak city, just like it Daddy (or so I’ve heard). It was so much fun to see him in his classroom.

And then the official party was at the National Building Museum last week. How gorgeous is that place? There was a ton of blue icing consumed and then it was time to have playtime in the Construction Zone room. There truly is nothing that Rinat likes better than to be a ‘working man’ so this party was definitely up his alley.

And he really loved that he had friends both from school (yes, his girlfriend came) and from outside school (aka my friends’ kids) and Granddaddy and Nana, Uncle MattMatt, Auntie Ann, and they were all there just for him. He felt like it was a very big deal- which it was- and I am so glad that they all could come and celebrate with us.

Then the next day, we took GDaddy and Nana downtown to visit his friend Hammerhead Lincoln. He had a great time showing off his city and all that it has to offer.   

And this weekend…well… this weekend, I am sitting in my nice quiet house all by myself. I slept in for probably the first time in about 3 years and did whatever I felt like all weekend long. How did I manage that, you ask? Well, my darling husband has taken off for the entire weekend with Rinat and I am on my own. It has been fantastic but I have to admit that I’ve been just a little bit lost too. I have grown so used to the chaos that is life with a preschooler that I just keep thinking that something is missing or there is something that I forgot to do. I keep waiting for them to walk home from the park- his little face at the door yelling “Mama!! Mama!!  Open the door!  We home!” But, no, I am not forgetting something important. I am just forgetting about my responsibilities for a short while.

All will be back to normal tomorrow. And this may be my last chance for a while because once baby #2 comes, it’s back to day and night duty again for a couple years. I am looking forward to it, but I am also trying to soak up every second of our life as it is now since I know it will never be this simple again. Just as Rinat has made our lives more stressful, louder, chaotic, expensive, messy, and crazy, the new little one will just multiply what is already the insanity of our lives. And I know that just as Rinat has, he/she too will fill out hearts with more love than we thought possible. And now I am off to enjoy my last few hours of peace, there will be a sweet little face banging on the door soon yelling “Mama!! I home!!” Love to all -m

*SnowMageddon… SnowPocalypse… SnOhMyGod

Hi Everyone! So what do you do when you are stuck in the house with a 3 year old for almost 2 weeks with close to 4 feet of snow and the snowplows aren’t even trying anymore? Well, let’s see… you clean out every closet and have a fashion show trying to figure out what to give to GoodWill, cook everything you have in the fridge in case the power goes out (again), watch hours of YouTube videos of jellyfish and octopi, play the WowWowWubbzy Make a Robot Game at least 400 times, develop and appreciation of for Jazz music (Rin’s new fave), make use of every tub of Playdoh and every grain of Moon Sand, take at least 2 baths a day, drink 10 tons of hot chocolate (or really just eat all the marshmallows), order new cute boots for myself off the internet, use up every single piece of railroad to make the ultimate train track, line up every car that we own in one long line and see if it will reach all the way into the other room, eat an entire bag of Milano cookies by myself, and finally just give up and say “OK, you go upstairs and watch Finding Nemo while I stay down here and watch a dumb made for TV movie” just so we don’t kill each other. Yup, I gave in to the power of the idiot box for a little peace and quiet. I have to say though, that we have a pretty amazing little trooper here. He has been entertaining himself pretty well. It’s me, however, who is starved for some companionship. Peter was gone for a week of the snowstorm and all I wanted was a friendly voice to tell me that there is an end to this before I started losing my mind. There was the possibility of going outside to play but it never lasted long when it was blowing snow at 40 miles an hour and up to sweet little Rin’s waist so he couldn’t actually walk out there.

One of the days he decided that he absolutely HAD to go outside and I was so exasperated that I told him that he could go if he got himself dressed and then I walked upstairs to recompose myself. A few minutes later I heard him say “I all ready Mama!” and looked down the stairs thinking he may have put on his gloves or shoes and was claiming to be ready. Well, I never would have imagined that he would actually get it all on by himself - bibs, puffy coat, ski coat, snow boots, hat, and gloves. He had every single thing on the he needed to go outside. It’s crazy what you learn about your child when you are stuck with them for that long. He’s a determined little bugger. I tried to see this time with him as a flash forward as to how it will be in Kaz and it’s taught me that I think it will be a challenge and we will surely get sick of each other but that we will have a good time anyway because there was most definitely more laughing than fighting going on during the whole time. And, being as uncoordinated as I am, once the snow finally stopped I went out to shovel and ended up bashing myself in the face with the handle and putting my tooth through the inside of my lip and out the other side. My first thought as blood was running done my chin and dripping onto the snow was ‘oh my gosh, what if I need stitches? My car’s under 3 feet of snow!’ I was apparently cursing quite a bit because I realized I could hear Rinat’s little voice telling me ‘dat not a very nice word’. Oh well, sometimes it’s warranted I think. It turned out to be fine but I do look a bit like Mike Tyson at the moment. And sweet Rin kept asking if he could give me hugs and kisses and bringing me Blue Bunny to make me feel better. There are some times when I am with him that I am absolutely certain that I have done something right.

And I do have some news on the adoption front. We got our last piece of paper in our little hands right as the snowstorm hit and got it notarized literally when the notary was getting to walk out the door to go home as the snow began to fall. We then had to wait another week for the government to open back up before I could get it apostilled downtown. And, in typical adoption fashion, it wasn’t easy. A trip that should have taken 2 hours max took us almost 6. A derailed train, a shuttle bus that took and hour to go half a mile due to the snow, another train and we finally got home with all our stuff. BUT we got it done and now I am just waiting for Peter to get home to drive me to the shipping place to send in our big, fat packet of papers to the agency (I still haven’t dug my car out of the snow and now ice). And then it’s just a waiting game (well, that and we have to get our immigration stuff renewed, get Rin a US passport, buy gifts for everyone in Kaz…) But you all have to promise not to ask every day if we have heard anything because, believe me, you will know it when we do because I will be shouting it from the rooftops. Happy late Valentines Day! -m