The weight

has finally been lifted.  We got our medical review file from the doctor just a bit ago.  It's been a rough day!  I am not one to check my phone but I had it out and visible at all times.  Thankfully I had some distractions.

I met a friend for lunch in the city after an endodontist appointment.  Turns out my root canal re-do is alright. Yeah hoo.  So I met my beautifully peeled, botoxed and invisiligned friend for lunch.  The perfect, entertaining and fiercely supportive distraction.  I showed her a couple of pictures of the little girl we're reviewing and she tried really hard to make me cry. But I stayed strong.  I want to melt into tears over baby sister but I have to make sure it's going to work out.  For both of us. For ALL of us! So I'm keeping that layer of protection over my heart for now.

After that I picked up our little guy who was filthy and full of sand and who talked and talked about how much fun he had at sool.  (school).  Music to my ear's from my lil' mama's boy! Only took a year and a half!

We then went straight to the big kid's school to pick him up.  I was super early as he does an after school program...  but my boys provide the best distraction and perspective there is so I wanted them around even if the "schedule" said otherwise.

On the way home, we stopped at the local UPS store to send out my and Parker's birth certificates to get apostilled by our respective secretaries of state.  It took a while because the addresses and zip codes weren't matching up. So rather than risk my big kid reading one of a hundred dirty cards to the little guy, I made them sit along the side and take turns playing angry birds with the promise of ice cream afterwards. It worked.  Amazing what a little mid-afternoon treat will do.  I enjoyed it too!  Better than taking them to the bar.  Oh wait, we live in a no bar town.  Can you even believe that. Sheesh.

When we got home, I put the boys in the bathtub.  Weird!  I know.  But I had a 5pm hair cut and color and Parker does not like doing bath time so I was doing him a favor.  Only to be called... by him...  from his office... in the city... at 4pm.  CRAP! What about my freaking hair?  I can't have gray roots on my 39th birthday.  Thankfully traffic karma was on our side. He met me in the parking lot outside the salon at 4:59.  We won't discuss what kind of Mario Andretti, ahole driving he had to do to get there that fast.  The important thing is that he showed up alive and on time.  Now my hair is dark and shiny and ready to party.

I may have checked my phone 125 times during my hair appointment. I felt like one of "those" girls.  At least I wasn't wearing my sunglasses inside too.  But I am most certainly not that girl.  I just played the part all day and all night.  Then it came.  An email from the doctor.  But it was just a tease.  An update that she had read the file and would now begin compiling her report.  AAAHHHHH... LADY you're killin' me!

So on the way home I tried my best to implode my car.  I listened to all my faves as loud as I could stand it.  And it worked.  It not only drowned out the noise in my head, but it made it sort of a freakshow of driving distraction.

Got home.  Husband so graciously had water simmering to build the fresh ravioli I brought home from our favorite Italian deli in our old neighborhood.  We finally sat down to relax.  He has a lot of not so fun stuff going on at work and I can't stop thinking about this little girl. But it's strange.  I don't think either one of us really wants to talk about it because we really are trying hard to not make an emotional decision.  It's the white elephant in the room with two people who are talking, intimately.  Weird, weird, weird. After checking my phone for the umpteenth time I finally said this is killing me!  And he said me too.  We talked for a brief minute but we both caught ourselves. This is such a big deal that we can't really talk about it until we have something more to talk about.

So we hit play on the American Idol that was on pause.  Ugh. I finally made a deal with myself that I would try to go 5 minutes... then stretched it to 10.  And then it came in.  An email from the doctor with a pdf attachment and a question about what time we can conference call in the morning.  I ran to the computer with hands shaking to print out 2 copies.  Meanwhile Parker grabbed the iPad and began to read the report.  We sat down on big beige as I am now affectionately calling it. Those of you who recognize the, no it's not crusty and it wasn't free, but it's so comfy and such a part of us now that's it has been with us for 3 1/2 years that I think we'll keep it forever.  And it helps that you can simply wipe off anything that intentionally or accidentally gets on it.. puke, poo, crayon, marker, snot, ketchup... wine.

With a lump in my throat I read through the report as fast as I could. I was looking for the bad news, the bomb, the reasons why we shouldn't consider adopting this little girl.  But as I read and reread, and reread the report, I couldn't find it.  It wasn't there.  It was a decent report.  A somewhat positive and somewhat hopeful report.

I will sum it up by telling you what Parker said.  He said "This is exciting."  Parker never says the word exciting. He never gets excited.  He's not excitable. He's calm, cool and collected.  And when he's not doing that, he's falling asleep.  Because he's narcoleptic.  I am beside myself with emotion.  I am afraid to let one tear fall because it will release the floodgates.  Why?  Because I really think we've found baby sister.  And I don't want to break my own heart in case we have to decide, rationally, otherwise.

We have a conference call with the doctor tomorrow morning.  Her report was very promising.  But also practical and we need to talk through all of the issues and unknowns before making a decision. At this point, I'll be very disappointed if we decide not to move forward, but I know we have to make the best decision for our family and our future.  So many components to consider and I can't legally share any of the medical stuff until we decide.  Which we have to do by Thursday night.  Totally sucks that Parker has a sales meeting and I won't see him until tomorrow.  Seems like a decision easier made and better celebrated, or not, in person.

Staying strong and level headed... or at least trying to!

Anxiety, insomnia and indigestion...

Yep, just like being pregnant.  But the good thing is I don't have a heel in my ribs and a head on my bladder.  So, it could be worse.

These two little girls have turned my world upside down.  I made a thousand phone calls and sent two thousand emails yesterday and today trying to get some perspective.  Okay, maybe not in the thousand(s) range but it feels like it.. eating, drinking and dreaming about these girls.  I wish I could say that we are ready to embrace one of them, but we aren't just yet.  It's hard when you feel so much with your heart but have to think as clearly as possible with your head.  Thankfully there is one level head involved in this... my super awesome low key husband... and smarter minds... our pediatrician and a doctor at Oakland Children's Hospital that reviews adoption files.  I've emailed her and called her.  I'm sure I've annoyed her.

I also had a really encouraging and supportive discussion with a complete stranger last night. The wife of Parker's buddy from college.  My new friend!  I think I mentioned she use to be the coordinator for this program at an agency in Washington D.C.  She's also the mother of 3 bambinos ages 4 and under.  And I kept her on the phone last night until 8:30pm my time / 11:30 her time.  So generous of her to talk with me.  The nuts and bolts of the conversation were that these are two seemingly good files. She brought up a couple of red flags from things in the reports that we never would have picked up on.  She also said if these files were at her old agency, they would have been placed immediately. Thankfully we're in California. Nuff said.  She also talked me through other considerations.  Some people going through this want the youngest child they can get with the most minor special need... i.e. cleft palate.  But as easy as that sounds, there's more to it than you think.  From a mother's perspective she encouraged me to think about our support system, what we will do with the other two kids when the new little one has to have surgery, and post op appointments, and more surgery, and maybe bone grafting, and speech therapy.  She also said she's seen these easy cases turn into more difficult ones as when the baby grows and continues developing, more "stuff" comes out... and with a little older one, you have a little better idea of what all the "stuff" is.  So much more to think about!

Parker is traveling but we talked late last night and have decided to have one of the files reviewed at OCH.  It's costly. Not that it isn't worth it, but we will start with one and go from there.  If we had both of them done, it's more money and more work for us to process.  I agree with him.  We are having the younger and healthier of the two girls' file reviewed as I type.  We've been cautioned that the pre-adopt medical review errs on the more conservative end.  Meaning they'll tell you all the really bad stuff that could happen and give you the most dismal prognosis just to make sure you know the worst case scenario about what you're up against. Again, like being pregnant.. you read those awful week by week or day by day, whatever the heck that crap is.  They tell you all the scary stuff that could happen to your baby but not the practical stuff that happens during pregnancy.  i.e. the stuff that Jenny McCarthy's book DOES tell you.  So we'll look to the doctor's report for the scariest of the potentials and to the BTDT (been there done that) elders on the discussion group to give us practical perspective.

I'm totally stressed about this and I won't lie, my heart is hopeful that one of these little girls is a good match for us.

I knew I shouldn't have!

You know that old saying don't get the cart ahead of the horse?  Well, I've done it. Not sure where that ol' horse is, I left him in the dust yesterday when I took a look at our agency's individual list, i.e. the list of kids our agency is trying to place.  (Not a "shared" list.)   And whaddya know I found a couple of little girls on there that may make sense for us.

So I don't think I have mentioned that there are 2 ways to get matched with a child. The first way is the way we were planning to do it, and we still may.  That process includes sending our Dossier to China (DTC), where it's logged in (LID) at the China Center for Children's Welfare and Adoption (CCCWA).  After that, we would wait for our agency to match us with a child.  This process is best if we were set on a younger girl with a minor/repairable special need.  The second way to get a match is to peruse our agency's individual list and essentially pick out a child. The kids on the list are typically a little bit older, lots of boys and many moderate special needs.  Our plan has always been to just go through the process step by step and wait for a referral.  BUT!  But then I went and looked at the list.  I'll tell you what folks.  It's nearly impossible for me to look at that list and not talk myself into one of the little girls on there.  There are 3-6 pictures of each child along with their birth date (made up of course), their American name (which I don't think they even use other than for our benefit) and their special need.  For some of the moderate special needs, there are pictures of a malformed hand/eye/ear, whatever it may be.  It  hurts my heart to look at those.  For many reasons.  Most of all because I know a lot of those kids will stay on our agency's list until their time runs out, which I think is about 6 months from the time the CCCAA gives them the list to the time they have to place the kid.  After that they may go to another agency.  Or if they've already made the rounds, they become special focus and go onto a shared list.  From there it only gets more dire.  The older they get, the more impossible it becomes to place them and many end up institutionalized.  So when I say it's hard to not find a child on there, I mean it. It's one thing to discuss this or that special need, but when you look at the little faces and read what their special need is, it's hard to find a reason you couldn't work with it.  Maybe it's more than we thought we could handle, but I think like many things, we can handle more than we think we can, and more than we can succinctly plan for.

I emailed our agency yesterday.  I got one file just as I was turning out the bedside lamp.  I just knew it was coming so I kept checking my phone every 5-10 minutes.  I saw that it came so I ran out to get the ipad to read the medical report to my narcoleptic husband.  He may have heard the first two items.  There wasn't anything "glaring" in it. Now take that with a grain of salt because this little girl does have a moderate special need that I'm not all too familiar with.  I have a soft spot for her though as one of her issues is something my parents were told about me .. yet it turned out to be inconsequential so maybe that's the case with this little one as well??  Our pediatrician is reviewing the files now and will give me her thoughts later today.  She may very well tell me that this is a lot more difficult than it seems, or that there is more to it than my layman's eyes were able to discover.

I received little lady #2's file this morning.  Same thing, nothing that concerning in her, very uncharacteristically detailed, medical file.  But again, there is something sort of major going on with her so I need medical eyes to review it and shoot back a dose of reality.

Depending on what our ped has to say about this, we may or may not look for further medical review.  Children's Hospital in Oakland has an International Adoption Clinic. They provide pre-adopt evaluations, etc.  The hitch is that it's pretty expensive. I'm sure it's worth it when there are detailed files, and in many cases, video to review.  I'm just not sure it will make sense given how little info is provided.

I am also going to talk to a woman I mentioned in another post.  Parker got together for dinner with one of his college buddies who was in town for work a month or so ago.  He learned during their conversation that night that his buddy's wife used to be the Waiting Child Program coordinator for the state in which they live.  Parker reached out to his friend this morning and he talked to his wife.  She generously agreed to review the files and give me a call tonight to discuss.  Not sure if I'm more nervous to hear what she has to say, or simply to talk to someone who will have so much insight on what we are going through.

I thought for a bit that it may be too premature to share any of this with you all. But this is a significant part of our journey, whether we move forward with one of these precious little babes, or just keep trudging along the alternate path.  I didn't sleep well last night ... too many thoughts swirling in my head ... did I just look at a photo of baby sister?  It's almost too much to process so I have to try my best to keep a level head and let the advice and help from others, who are much more knowledgable, aid us in our decision.  We don't have much time though.  Other families are viewing one of the files and even if we put a hold on one of them, we have to make a decision within 72 hours. While Parker is traveling.  Good times!!

Nothing significant to report

It's been a pretty uneventful week on the adoption front. Thank goodness because some of the other mumbojumbo stuff I've gotten myself into seems to be taking a lot more of my time than I anticipated.  Well, that and the summer like weather. Who can work when it's 75 degrees outside.  In mid-February.  In Northern California!  It's all been a nice distraction.

Parker picked up our police clearance letters/background checks from the police station on his way home from work today. As I thought.. those suckers are NOT notarized so it's a good thing I held off on notarizing the small pile of docs awaiting the same. I'll probably take them in tomorrow to get done.  I have to get any and every little task done this weekend as Parker is nice and busy, traveling and/or otherwise gone next week. As crappy birthday luck would have it.

We had a couple of funny conversations this week.  The first was short and not so sweet...

Big kid "Uh, mommy, how old are you going to be?"

Me "39."

Big kid "Whoa!! That's ooooold!"

Little kid "Yeah, you're going to be a giant!  Are you gonna die soon?" (He is young enough to still equate age with size... the mortality thing is just plain creepy.  And rude!)

The second was about the "what if." What if we are referred a sibling pair?  As much as we'd love to have 2 more children, we've pretty much only prepared mentally for 1.  (And it's not like we've done a bang up job on that one either!)  Parker's response when I asked him if he thought he was ready for a 2 for 1.  It was a simple.... "Well, that's one less trip to China."  Yes indeed.  I suppose that's one way to look at it.  My husband, a man of few words and low energy.  As much as I wanted to tell him that was such a jerky thing to say, he's actually got a good point.  Not so much about the one less trip to China thing, but more about one less adoption process to go through.  And maybe with sisters, the adjustment and bonding would be easier/faster because they'll also have each other.. I dunno.  All things to ponder. Not as if it's likely to happen, but just in case...

So let's see where we're at:

I-800A application - done and submitted.. waiting for fingerprint appt.

Police Clearance - done

Birth Certificate Authentication - to do!  but I'm confused on this one. Working on it.

Half dozen notarizations - to do!

Special Needs List -yep, you guessed it, to do!  We can't seem to get to it. Or rather, we keep freaking avoiding it.  Of course we do.  It's going to be the most difficult and excruciating part of the process. Procrastinate, procrastinate, procrastinate.  At least we're consistent.  

In closing, we took a big step a couple of weeks ago. We made our first purchase for baby sister.  We have things set aside for her but this was the first time we bought something specifically for her.  Wondering what we bought?  Costco had Hanna Andersson pajamas for little girls.  Cheap!  Anybody who knows Hanna Andersson knows the jammies are so soft and comfy and still look like new after many, many washes.  And they're expensive!  I reserve Hanna Andersson jammies for Christmas and Christmas only!  But I saw a big pile of cute pink, striped and flowery girly jammies and I couldn't pass up the bargain. Parker is totally weird about this stuff. He thinks we should wait until we know who baby sister is and are within moments of getting her before buying anything for her. I told him fooey!  If we wait till then, there will be no good deals to be had and we will end up spending way more than necessary.  He doesn't care about that stuff, but I do.  I'd rather be practical than a superstitious spendthrift.  So I went ahead and picked out a couple jammies for baby sister.  Welcome to the Costco lovin' Colvins baby sister!  

Off, off and away

Well, we were right to check the yes box to adopting two children concurrently as well as filling in the number 2 in case we do get referred a sibling pair.  After that little confirmation that our paperwork was filled out accurately and thus ready to go, I packed it up and took it for a ride to the local UPS store and had it sent it on its way.  It should be delivered to the USCIS post office box tomorrow.  Then we'll be on pins and needles waiting to hear when and where our fingerprint appointment will be.

While my mom was here visiting we also managed to finally, finally go to the police station in town and request our police clearance letters/background check.  I really don't get all this redundancy but I'll say it again... they say jump, we jump and jump and jump again.  We should get that back in the next day or two. If it's notarized, then we're good to go. If it's not, we have to attach a statement to it and go have that notarized.  For this paperwork, which is all going into our Dossier, I have a few things that need to be notarized but I'm waiting on this one document so that I can get them all done at once. And if I go in with a bunch of documents for adoption, rather than just 1, it's more likely that I'll get a discount. I'm not one to count pennies but these notarizations add up!  Not that baby sister isn't worth every last one ... BUT ... I'd rather put those pennies to better use in the way of all the stuff I'm going to have to start gathering at some point. I don't think baby sister would be all that happy with little boy hand me downs.  Even if she probably will look like a little boy with her shaved head or flat top!

Over the long weekend we conquered the I-800A and got our police clearance letter going, but we didn't manage to do our additional hours of pre-adopt training. We're just going to do a couple of classes on line.  Looks like next week's after bedtime entertainment will be in the form of clicking through pages on the screen. Oh well. I could stand a little break from those trashy housewives that I'm embarrassed to say I watch.

I need to get Parker's birth certificate sent to the Chinese Embassy in Chicago to get authenticated. Why Chicago?  Because the embassy in Chicago has jurisdiction over the state of Minnesota, where Parker was born.  Mine is easy.  I was born in Washington and the embassy in San Francisco has jurisdiction over the state of Washington so mine will go with all of the other documents we're gathering for our Dossier, and be couriered to the embassy in SF to get authenticated.  Once we have our I-800A approval and all of these other documents authenticated, we'll be ready to DTC AKA "Dossier to China."

Next steps:

Police Clearance Letter
Notarizations - 4 or 5
Fingerprint Appointment
Birth Certificate authentication
and the dreaded list of special needs
Authentication of all Dossier documents

After DTC, we wait for our LID.  Confused yet?  Me too.  Glossary follows:

CCAA: Chinese Centre of Adoption Affairs. These are the folks that oversee adoption in the People’s Republic of China. All adoptive parents must have their approval in order to adopt a Chinese orphan.

Dossier: This is your application to adopt an orphan. It includes a letter requesting permission to adopt a Chinese orphan, home study, police reports, immigration approval, reference letters, medical reports, marriage certificate, birth certificates, letters of employment, and photos of your family and house. 

LID: Log In Date. This is the date that your dossier is “logged in” or received by the CCAA.

LOI: Letter of Intent. This is a letter to the CCAA that you intend to adopt a Chinese orphan.

PA: Pre-Approval. After submitting your LOI, you receive pre-approval from the CCAA to adopt a specific child. Typically, you will receive your PA anywhere from 1 – 10 days after your LOI is submitted.

DTC: Dossier to China. This is a celebration day! You have finally collected all of the required paperwork. This is the date that your dossier is mailed to China.

LOA: Letter of Acceptance. This is the official approval from China to adopt your child. This comes after LID.

NVC: National Visa Center. After USCIS approves your immigrant visa petition (I-800/I-600), your petition is forwarded to the NVC in New Hampshire for immigrant visa pre-processing. This is only for U.S. adoptive parents.

TA: Travel Approval. This is the go-ahead from the CCAA to travel to China to get your child. Your TA has 90 days before it expires, so you better get packing!

CA: Consulate Appointment. This is the date that you go to your Consulate in China. You fill out paperwork to get your child’s visa to enter your country.

Take that I-800A!

I-800A application for determination of suitability to adopt a child from a convention country is complete and ready to send.  YES!  One more box checked on the never-ending paper trail to baby sister.

It wasn't as bad as I thought.  9 pages for the application and a 1 page supplement.  It basically just asked for factual information. Name, address, dob, place of birth, marriage and citizenship info.  The supplement was simply to provide the name and info for our agency so they can communicate with them if need be.  There was just one question that stumped me.  It asked about the pre-adoption requirements for the state as relevant to state statutes and regulations. Huh?  Legal jargon.  Or more legalish than I knew how to answer.  So I tapped into the resource that I knew would come into play at some point. The yahoo discussion group.  I sent out a note and by the time we finished dinner, the answer was in my inbox.  Another woman going through the process sent me a pdf sample of an I-800A with helpful hints and the difficult parts completed with appropriate info and documentation. Not only did it give me the legal jargon to write in for the pre-adoption requirements, it also gave me a little tip. Do not leave anything blank!  If it doesn't apply, mark "N/A."  Well, let me tell ya, there were a whole lot of boxes that didn't apply that I never would have touched had it not been for her tip. So I spent 10 minutes pasting in"N/A" to all the empty boxes.  I printed it out, signed it, wrote the $720 check to Homeland Security and attached all the other documents they require.  I had Parker double-check to make sure it was filled out correctly.  We are 99.5% sure that we're good to go but are waiting on a reply from our agency regarding one little question. On the application there is this question:

Do you plan to concurrently adopt more than one child from the same Convention country?  If "Yes," how many?

We are approved to adopt one little girl OR a sibling pair of girls.  Yes I said sibling PAIR of girls.  As in 2.  At once!  WHAT?!  Yep.  So we marked yes and filled in the number 2.  We assume this is the way we should fill it out so that should we, by some slim chance, get 2 girls, we'll be on the right path to get visas, etc.  But we thought we should make sure with our agency because it isn't a sure thing.  We can't mail it out until Tuesday anyway so it won't delay us in any way to dot this i.

I'm sure this info may come as a surprise as I've only ever talked about baby sister.  Not baby sisterS!  As amazing as it would be to bring two little girls into our lives, there really is very little chance of it happening.  At least coming out of the waiting child program in China.  There are a handful of countries where this would be pretty easy, but not China.  Especially not for what is deemed the "ideal sib pair."  That is siblings that are the same sex and 1 and 3 year(s) old respectively.  It doesn't happen that often and it's pretty much a one in a million chance it would happen for us.  So that's why I haven't mentioned it.  Now if I get a call in the next couple of months that we have been referred two little sisters, I know I will totally have a shit fit.  I can't even think about it because it would be so freaking exciting.  So I'm zippin it.  I'm not going to talk about it anymore.  Unless it happens then I will be blasting it out of a bull horn!  Until then I will keep my eye on the prize of baby sisteR.

I miss the water

I had dinner the other night with two of the loveliest ladies I know.   We met in prenatal yoga when we were all pregnant with our firstborns.  Our group started out much bigger than just the 3 of us.  If I remember correctly there were about 10 of us.  We all had our babies within 6 weeks of each other and if I remember correctly, they were all boys minus one little girl.  At that time, I hadn't even heard about "mommy groups."  But a mommy group we became.  It was the best thing I did for myself, for my baby, and for my sanity.  There were so many times when I thought there was no way I could make it to our get together so I would call Parker in tears and he would somehow talk my unshowered, sleep deprived, milk leaking butt into going. And it never failed that I would show up and feel the comfort of not being alone in my squalor. I wasn't the only one struggling with being a new mom. With the exception of one mom being a super douche who ALWAYS showed up with a beautiful blowout, full makeup, size 2 figure hugging clothes and her baby in some totally stupid getup, complete with pants, shirt, vest or sweater, shoes and a matching hat.  That b*&#h also had the nerve to recommend Spanx to me in a very friendly just trying to help you hide your fat my friend, sort of way.  I almost slapped her in the mouth.  Aside from her, I wasn't the only one who hadn't showered. I wasn't the only one who forgot to eat breakfast.  Or lunch.  I wasn't the only one who showed up with a kid in pajamas rather than real clothes.  I wasn't the only one who had spit up down the back of my shirt. Or in my hair.  I also wasn't the only one who forgot to bring diapers.  For a newborn, seriously?  Yes, it happens.  And lastly, I wasn't the only one who forgot her boobyliner milk absorbers a time or two.  Circle back to some recurring items - first time mom - sleep deprived - milk leaking.  Sprinkle on some hormones and it's an absolute effing train wreck. Don't tsk me.  Babies are tough. They totally suck sometimes.  It has nothing to do with how much you love and adore them. They simply do a number on you physically and mentally.  Anybody who denies that is lying. Anybody who doesn't confess to this is spineless coward.

We struggled alongside each other in those early, foggy days.  But we had a lot of laughs.  We would spend hours together on our "play dates."  My favorite memories are of walking along the bay in Tiburon with views of the Golden Gate Bridge.  We had one epic get together that, if we recall accurately, may have lasted about 6 hours.  We strolled, we nursed, we strolled some more.  We had a long, lazy lunch.  We cleaned up blowouts and spit up.  We strolled some more.  We laughed and we cried.  Sometimes in a hysterical combination thereof.

Those days are long gone, but fondly remembered.  I know having such a supportive group got me up and over that first year hump.  Our group has changed dramatically since that first year.  A few of the girls went back to work. A couple of them couldn't hang.  Thankfully!  (i.e. super douche) And a couple of the others, sadly, moved away.  (Never a get together goes by that we don't miss you T.)  As you can imagine, being in different areas, going to different schools and classes, it's hard to get together as often as we would like.  And now with second children, it's nearly impossible to find days and times that work for all. So we settle for the next best thing which is getting together, just the girls, a few times a year.  If I could get together with any or all of my girlfriends for dinner once a month, I imagine I would be a much happier, much more resilient person and therefore, a heckuva better mom!  I walked away from our dinner the other night totally rejuvinated. And I walked in feeling pretty darn good to begin with!  But there's nothing like the love and support of wonderful mama friends to lift you up and set you a-flight.  We caught up as much as we could in the time we had.  I once again marveled at the unbelievable beauty of friend 1s virgin locks.  i.e. She never has to dye them.  Not even never has to . Never has. I know, it's sickening.  But amazing hair + would never suggest spanx = a good friend to me.  Friend #2 shared her feelings about the moment she met her daughter.  In a hospital room, with the birth mother present.  Eeee gads is right!  She's one tough chick.  We also compared the exasperation of trying to get out of the house and to school in the mornings.  Amazingly, I'm not the only mom who gets tired of the sound of her own voice while herding the wee ones out of the door and into the car.  I love hearing about what's going on in their lives.  It makes my life seem simple and boring in comparison, but it also makes me want to tackle my days with ferocity.  If they can do it, doggone it, so can I!  And if one of them has gone through this whole adoption business  and lived to tell the fairy tale, potty training difficulty, end of it, then so will I!

Power to the mamas!  Thank you for helping get me going down the road and up the hill.  I can't wait to celebrate with you as I come barreling down the other side.  Get your corkscrews warmed up.  Mama won't be breastfeeding this time around.