It's Not Real Yet

I just finished reading this article.
I think this explains my feelings about adopting our little boy from Florida.
Nothing is certain until he's in our arms and papers are signed. ...and even then it's not for sure. Nowhere does it say that you are immune from tragedy just because you've experienced it once already.

I remember a few years ago when Zack and I decided to look into fertility treatments and I just dreading being pregnant again. I wanted our children so badly, but I was terrified that things would go wrong...again. I was worried that if I got pregnant I wouldn't really let myself get excited for that baby. I didn't want to be hurt again.

So here we are expecting another baby. And I'm excited...but it's not real until he's HOME.
We find out on Friday (hopefully) if and when we can bring him home. Until that happens, this doesn't feel real. Not yet.

Ethiopia, Clarified

We've had some questions lately about how this news will affect our plans to adopt from Ethiopia.

The short answer is, it won't.

The long answer is... (inhale)

...not only are we still going to adopt a baby boy from Ethiopia, but we are so excited about it! Caleb (oh yeah, we plan to name our Florida Boy Caleb, and we may call him Baloo...we'll see) was born August 16 and was a preemie. We definitely don't know for sure, but there is a chance that Noah (oh yeah, we plan to name our Ethiopia Boy Noah) will be born sometime between December and April. So Caleb and Noah will be very close in age, and could be in the same school year if it seemed like a good thing to do. We are ecstatic about that. They will obviously have their agency, but I can see them being great friends, being there for each other in many ways.

The logistics of picking up Noah will be more interesting, since we'll have Caleb, but we'll figure that out with the help of our awesome Family and Friends.

So yeah, we are still anxious to get our Ethiopia referral. We'll have to wait a few months between the referral and passing Court, and going to pick him up. So this 1.5 week wait to pass court for Caleb and the few day wait after that to go pick him up, and the 5 hour flight home, will just help prepare us for the next order of magnitude we'll see with Noah.

Thank you all for your excitement. It is so fun to see the comments (and even the blog stalkers) and know that we have such a great support behind us. We'll do our best to be even half as good of parents as we've tricked you all into thinking we'll be. :o)

In the Meantime...

We found out tonight that things should be finalized in court on the 23rd. Once (or if, nothing's final until it's final) that happens we'll probably fly to Florida the next week.
That means we have 2 weeks to wait.
So what am I going to do for 2 weeks?

Try to give myself a headstart.

I'm going to make sure my house is really clean.
I'm going to finalize everything at school.
And I'm going to make freezer meals. I already have spaghetti sauce and taco soup in my freezer and I plan on making some lasagna to freeze. But that's all I know.
Does anyone have any really good freezer dinner recipes? 'Cuz I've got time to spare now.

It's a Boy!

In the midst of all the craziness that is our lives right now I just realized we haven't taken the time to include all of you in our good news! We were going to be clever and hint around about it by posting maybe pictures of baby stuff and a map of Florida...but my mind can't do creative right now. It's too full!

We found out yesterday that we were chosen by a birthmom in Florida!
Here are the facts about our boy:
He was born on August 16th. (His due date was September 27th, so he's a preemie.)
His birthmom is African-American. His birthdad is half Caucasian, half Hispanic. This would make him 100% aDORable. (I've used that phrase a few times and I'm sorry, but it's not getting old.)

As soon as things get passed in the courts and whatnot (please don't ask, because I don't know), we'll fly to Florida to pick him up.
It generally takes about 10 days for the Interstate Compact to go through and as soon as it does we can fly home! (Yes, this means we will be spending a couple weeks in Florida. It's a shame there's nothing to DO there....)

Yea yea yea yea yea! Celebrate with us! Go take yourselves out to dinner or something!

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AAI Blog and Holiday Project

I've added AAI's blog to the sidebar over to the left. If you'd like to check it out, it talks about what's going on at the orphanages, Layla and Wanna House. It's fun to read and keep up on what's happening where my baby will be/might currently be living. There are some really dedicated people over there doing a lot for these kids. I love it.

Right now they've started their annual Holiday Project. I don't know a lot about it, but I do know they ask for donations and then they use that money to buy gifts and other things like holiday parties for the orphans at all the orphanages they work with.
If you'd like to be a small part of that, you can donate here. The minimum donation is $30.

As Zack and I work to bring our little one home I know we are part of something great. We feel strongly that building our family this way is what we're supposed to do. We'll be providing a home and family for a child that otherwise wouldn't have one. (Though I can't help feeling like we're getting the better end of the deal.) The more I learn about it the more I want to bring all those children home. I know I can't and I can't help but feel bad for all those who are left behind. Donating to this Holiday Project is one way for me to give something to them. It sure feels like a drop in the bucket. But at least it's something.

*Update on our own humanitarian project: We got a list from Susan over at AAI of all the items they currently need at the orphanges. It's pretty big so we're going to chose just a few things we'd like to collect. Everything we collect will be delivered by us when we travel to Ethiopia next year, so we've got airline weight restrictions to keep in mind. We'll be posting more info soon.