I'm So Outta Here!

This has been a week from HE(insert double hockey sticks here)! By a miracle from God, I have managed to avoid a migraine!

Everything, and I mean everything that I have done this week has ended in some stupid or frustrating way. For example...try to make an exchange at Old Navy and end up in the ER until midnight. A friend told us that we were the most hospital prone family that he knew. Since September, I have been to the ER twice, and now Connor has been once. Let's hope Greg won't have to make any visits to the ER!

Work has been UNBEARABLE and unusually frustrating this week. Today, I swear if my job was just some hourly wage job and I didn't have a family, I promise you, I would've walked out the door! And.....I only worked until 11:00, because I had to go to a lunch meeting with the superintendent. I was supposed to talk about things that our school and other inner city schools wanted to voice their concerns about, but everything just comes back to the federal NCLB mandates or lack of funding, so nothing can really be done. I'm beginning to feel like working in education is always going to leave you with this frustrating feeling that you will never be able to do everything that you're expected to do, so maybe I should just give it up and get used to it. It is a terrible feeling, going in each day to work and knowing you will NEVER be able to do everything that is expected of you. I have the type of personality that this just doesn't mix well with! I am a perfectionist and if I'm going to do something I am going to do it right, so it is driving me up the wall! We'll see what happens with NCLB once Bush is out of office, see if anything changes with these federal mandates. If not, I just might have to turn to my Bachelor's degree and try to do some technical writing/editing from home!

Anyways, I am off to Nashville very early in the morning for a conference for low-income schools across the nation. Dolly Parton is the keynote speaker, and I'm excited! We all know I love Dolly! The governor will be speaking also, so it should be interesting. I'm scheduled to go to a couple of workshops tomorrow, but I should be done by 3ish. I'm going to check into the hotel and take the BIGGEST NAP EVER! I will be in workshops most of Friday, and a couple on Saturday. Mandy is coming up tomorrow to have some quiet time and get some sleep while I'm working. Nancy is coming over on Friday. Hopefully in between the workshops I can have some much needed girl time with my best friends. I am so, so, so looking forward to talking and laughing and eating at the Bound'ry!

I feel bad leaving Greg here with Connor. His week hasn't been the best either and Connor has been pretty difficult at night lately refusing to go to bed. All you boys need to plan a weekend!!! I know Greg needs it!

I'm sure Greg will post some adventure he and Connor go on this week while I'm gone, so stay tuned......Mommy is out of town...AGAIN!

A Brave Little Boy

This is Greg writing (yes, I'm allowed to write on this too!) and I wanted to tell you how brave our little boy Connor is.

Last night Connor and his mommy were at Old Navy looking at some shirts. If you've been in Old Navy before, you know that their signage is all made of metal and is shaped like squares... that means sharp corners. Poor little Connor leaned over to look at a shirt and his head grazed that sign and it gashed his head open right above his eye. I was in Bristol at the time and got a call from Jessica who was as you would expect, freaking out. I would have been too... she said there was a lot of blood.




After almost 3 hours of waiting in the emergency room, they finally took us back to get Connor his stitches. He was so brave... I can't hardly believe that he didn't even cry when they were putting them in. They told him they were going to put magic string in his head. After they did the first one (I was about to pass out watching that needle go in) Connor sat up and said "Hey... that wasn't that bad!!!". He's such a trooper and so sweet even in the worst situations. Here he is pointing to his new stitches:





We finally got home sometime after midnight and we let Connor sleep with us. This morning I took him to McDonald's for breakfast and then we came to school... he was pretty excited to tell everyone "I got a boo boo on my head at Old Baby and got 3 stitches and a cool hot wheels band-aid!"

Connor's 4th Birthday!

I'm four! Connor on his fourth birthday on Tuesday!



Mommy let me go to Toys-R-Us and pick out any toy that I wanted. All I wanted was this $10 bouncy ball...she tried to talk me into something else, but I told her that it was all I wanted!



Connor's birthday party at Sprout Studio on Saturday. He's one popular kid! Seventeen kids showed up! We had quite the crowd!



Blow out those candles!



Daddy and Mommy love their birthday boy!




We had a lot of fun with Connor's fourth birthday this year. In all the chaos of adoption stuff this week, we made sure he had the best birthday ever. His big day was on Tuesday and Greg stayed at home with him until I got home. I took a half a day and took him to Toys-R-Us, out to lunch, got our annual birthday pictures, and spent the evening at Chuck E. Cheese. He had a great time and got way too much stuff!

Today was his birthday party at Sprout Studio. It was so much fun. We will definitely be making frequent trips to play there. He had seventeen little guests and they all seemed to have a great time. He told me tonight that he was so sad he had to leave there. He thought it was his most fun party yet. He asked me several times tonight when we could go back.

He got TONS of cool presents. We've never let him have presents at his parties, because he really doesn't need a thing, but we decided to make an exception this year.

It's been a LONG week here in Knoxville, but seeing Connor so happy today made it worth it. We have another long week ahead. Connor and I are headed to visit my grandmother in North Carolina tomorrow, Greg is out of town Monday, and I'll be in Nashville for work Thursday through Saturday or Sunday. I guess I need to go get some rest while I can!

Not so done......a few surprises to end the week!

So, we're not as done as we thought!

Our program is a brand new to our agency, so we're kind of figuring things out as we go. They have been great about helping us and are so quick at getting back to our questions. I continue to be impressed!

Anyways, we didn't know we needed a passport immediately. One of our forms asked for a passport number, and Greg and I have always traveled in the Caribbean or Mexico and used our birth certificates for customs, so we don't have passports. Well $300 later after a trip to the post office today, they're being expedited to us. We thought we could just leave that blank and get back to it, but not so much!

Also, the I-600A must be back before we can proceed. We thought there was going to be a process of Taiwan preapproving our application, but apparently that is not the case with this program. So, we can't get in line until Memphis gets the form processed. Right now, they are running at an average of 4 months to process the these petitions. So, if they keep on the pace that they've posted on their site, we won't have our approval until April.......which totally, completely, and utterly stinks!

We know everything will work out in God's perfect timing, but we want to be in line! We just want to be done so badly! Please pray that Memphis will process more quickly than expected and pray for a lot of patience....especially for me. Greg seems to be handling this all well, but I am not a very patient person sometimes. I have quite a bit of patience in my profession, working with inner city kids, you have to have patience or you'll end up having a mental breakdown. But, I absolutely have no patience when it comes to waiting on other people to do something. I need to work on that!

We're getting there!

It's done...really done!

We just got back from our brief overnight trip to Nashville where we visited with the Haneys and got the last of the paperwork finished up.

It has been a rollercoaster of emotions the past two days to say the least. When switching to Taiwan, we called many agencies, but they all were very backed up or temporarily not accepting new applications. Greg just googled "Taiwan adoptions" to get some more leads and ended up calling our agency, Shiloh. When talking to the agency, the woman told him that they were only taking applications for special needs. Greg was about to hang up, when she asked him to wait because she wanted to look over an e-mail she had received earlier regarding the Taiwan program. She went on to explain to Greg that it was a complete God thing that he called at that moment, because it appeared that they were going to begin to take applications for healthy children. That was back in November, and we really never had gotten a definite that Taiwan was going to approve our agency for a healthy children's program. We have never really worried about it, we just felt like everything would work out. Yesterday, as we drove to Nashville to finish everything, I felt a little worried, a lot sick to my stomach, and shed a few tears. We called our wonderful program director, and she explained that she had no news, but she planned to call Taiwan that evening. We really prayed hard last night, and today, while we were getting our fingerprints, we found out that our agency is approved to send applications for the healthy children program, and we will be #1 with our agency! I shed a lot of tears of relief! We then headed to the Secretary of State's office to have all of our paperwork state certified, and even managed to squeeze in some time with some of our other friends who also live in Nashville. We are so relieved to have all of this finished! Everything will go in the mail tomorrow. Part of me feels so helpless that there's nothing left to do but wait, everything that I could control is now done. Now all I can do is pray for A LOT of patience as we get into line and begin the wait for a referral. We don't really know a timeline, when exactly we'll be officialy "in line," but we'll keep you posted!

An emotional day...getting all the paperwork finished, finding out there REALLY is a program to be in, and the last day of Connor's threes! This fourth birthday is hitting me VERY hard. I'll post some pics of his big day tomorrow. I'm taking a half-day from work, so I can spend it with him and make sure he has a great day (well, we're on two hour weather delay, so I think I'm going to end up working for like an hour). I can't believe he's four...in an hour!

End of the Week Update

We had a very busy week. We got our fingerprinting appointments (as mentioned previously) and our homestudy was finally completed and looked over by all the necessary people. It has been notarized and county certified, and we will get it state certified Tuesday while we are in Nashville getting our fingerprints done. So, on Wednesday, it will be on its way to Kansas....finally. From there they'll get one last certification and then hopefully soon after it will be ready to go.

We have had a very busy, but great week. Last night Greg and I had a great time taking a cooking class from Williams-Sonoma. We highly recommend it. It was very good food and very entertaining. Tonight, as most Friday nights was our "Family Night." A movie and greasy pizza was a great way to end a busy week! This weekend, we're doing boring things like haircuts,cleaning, and maybe, just maybe actually relaxing. Monday afternoon we're headed to Nashville to visit with our good friends, the Haneys and take care of all of our adoption "business" on Tuesday. Wednesday is going to be a GREAT DAY and a TERRIBLE DAY all in one. GREAT....all the papework will finally be out of this house.....TERRIBLE.....my baby boy is going to be FOUR!!!!

Tonight, I'll end in a random thought from my almost four-year old "Mom, "t" is a letter and "tea" is a drink.....that's weird!"

Short Notice on Fingerprinting!!!

We received our fingerprinting appointments yesterday in the mail. I was relieved that it finally came, and completely annoyed that they gave us exactly one week's notice. I have an Inservice Day with tons of meetings on that day, so I am praying that I can work it out with work. We are highly encouraged not to miss Inservice Days, so I am a little stressed about asking for special treatment. I am truly a person who plays by the rules, and if you know me, you know I HATE asking for favors!!!

So, we're one step closer! Our homestudy is finished! It was faxed to Kansas and they're looking over it to make sure it meets all of their requirements. We should know if we are cleared to get it notarized soon. After that, our agency will forward our official copy on to Taiwan for pre-approval. We are so ready to get in line! Baby steps....it feels like VERY TINY baby steps!

Holiday Pics!

How did Santa know I wanted a BLUE bike??




Christmas morning...we're looking a little tired!



My boy...riding his bike in his pajamas and favorite "army" boots....ALL BOY!



Happy 2008! Ringing in the new year at my parents. My little brother, Daddy, Momma, and Me!

Happy holidays....a little belated! We had a great Christmas and New Year! Christmas Eve consisted of a lot of running around as usual, trying to spend time with everyone we love. Christmas Day, all of our family members came to the house for breakfast and spent time with Connor as he opened his gifts. We love having our two families together, and Connor loves having everyone together! We continued our long running Christmas tradition of Chinese food for dinner and then a movie. Connor was dying to see Alvin and the Chipmunks, and he loved it! I spent most of last week, relaxing and shopping with all of my giftcards. It was a good week!

Greg and I got each other some "different" Christmas presents this year. Greg is really into cooking lately, so I bought him cooking classes at Williams-Sonoma and a really nice pie dish from Williams-Sonoma. He has been wanting to learn how to make pies..see his blog for the details...it's a little different, I know! He has made some GOOD pies the past week. I'm not so sure about how much I like this new hobby of his....it's hard to eat healthy with pies laying around! Greg got someone to design this adoption blog for us. Our old site was just a template from blogger. I love it, and have decided to design my nursery around it! He also got me travel guides to Taiwan, which I've been wanting.

Mom and Dad had us all over for New Year's Eve. Mom cooked way too much food, and we stayed up way too late playing cards. We had a GREAT time, and it was wonderful welcoming in the New Year all together with the people we love the most.

As far as a New Year's resolution, I think we both are trying to be healthier, eating a lot better, and we bought new mountain bikes on New Year's Eve. Biking is something we both love, and we've been wanting our own bikes for a while now. Connor's favorite Christmas gift was his bike, so we thought it would be a great family thing to do!

Only 4 days till I go back to work...ugghhhh! I plan to have lots of fun, see a lot of friends, and do a little more shopping! We are looking forward to next weekend, as we'll head to Gatlinburg for TCTC. We always love going up there to volunteer and hang out with our friends. Connor's 4th birthday is also in a few weeks (I can't even make the words come out of my mouth....FOUR YEARS OLD???????) January is a busy month..what month isn't in our house?

In the next few weeks, we are praying to get our homestudy back and sent for preapproval to Taiwan. Keep praying for us, as we should be getting in line in the next few weeks! We'll keep you updated!