Impossible Question of the Day

Q: According to a recent survey, 90% of college freshmen said they have never used one of these. What is it?






A: Typewriter


I guessed that right away, but did not have time to call; why can't they have these types of questions on the days I'm off? Of course,. if I'm off work, chances are that I won't be up at to hear the impossible question of the day.

The Winter that Just Won't Quit

Another 5-9 inches of snow is slated to fall between now and tomorrow morning. I can't tell you how ready I am for spring, it is always either snow falling or extreme cold. The snow hasn't even fully melted at all. Like most everyone else in the Chicagoland, I am just so sick of it!

The other Saturday, the Chicago chapter of FCVN (Families with Children from Vietnam) had their Tet (Vietnamese New Year) celebration. I got too meet several of my blogging buddies and see those that I met last year and meet their new children. Several of the photos I took didn't turn out too well, because of the lighting, but here are a few that did.







On the adoption front, there weren't any new referrals received by our agency. A total of 4 families were in Vietnam. 2 are back home, but 2 are still there. This past week, we both got our employment letters and had them notatized, so one small thing done. As soon as I finish, this blogpost, I'm going to send my adoption worker an e-mail concerning some questions about the dossier. So, hopefully, we can get more stuff done soon.

Good News!

Today, I came in to work after being off yesterday and found an e-mail from my adoption worker that we can start our dossier. What is funny is last night, I sent off an e-mail to her about some forms we needed to complete and also asked that now that we are under #100, when we'd be able to start our dossier. Too bad, we weren't told this before the weekend, I could have shared this with the people I saw at the FCVN Tet celebration. (More about the Tet celebration in a future post.) Also, just today on the train, the people I ride with asked me how things were going with the adoption. I guess tomorrow, I'll have some news for them Well, I really need to get back to work. Just wanted to share our good news!

JUST ADDED: Because of this, I decided to treat myself to Starbucks (also our coffee maker and hot water dispensed is out of order); well it is getting colder and colder, this morning was not even 5 above and by now it is even colder. I swear it has to be below zero and then if you factor in windchill, it would be even colder still. 1 month and 1 day until spring. Hurry up and get here. March 20th will also be Kevin's b-day!

Book Meme (How they came up with this name, I don't know?

I got tagged by Megan at From Virginia to Somewhere and Back. Here are the rules:

1. Pick up the nearest book of at least 123 pages.
2. Open the book to page 123.
3. Find the 5th sentence.
4. Post the next 3 sentences.
5. Tag 5 more people

The first book I picked up had no words whatsoever on P. 123, and believe it or not the 2nd book didn't have anything on page 123 that I could type since it was a form to fill out for my bible study. So the next closest book was is the Life Application Study Bible. So I guess,I need to use that.

As Egypt. buried its dead, the Hebrew slaves left the country, a free people at last. Pharoah made one last attempt to bring them back, but the people escaped when God miraculously parted the waters of the Red Sea. But on the other side, the people soon became dissatisfiedand complained bitterly to to Moses and Aaron about their trek through the desert. I'm really behind in reading blogs, so I don't know who has done this and who hasn't, so if you are reading this, have a blog, and haven't been tagged consider yourself tagged.

Double Digits, BABY!!!

The Tet holiday is now over and things are getting back to usual in Vietnam. Our agency received 3 referrals this week. All three were for infants- a 2 monthold girl, a 3 month old boy, and a 6 month old boy. With these 3 referrals, we are now officially down into the double digits and we are now #97. Finally going below the #100 mark feels like such a milestone. Let's pray those referrals keep pouring in!!!

There are currently 2 families in Vietnam with their new children. You can follow Danielle and Barnabas' Jouney to Norah and next week 2 more families will be going to Vietnam and follow along with The Wooley's as they meet "Sweet Caroline".

Winter - A Picture Speaks A Thousand Words

I think a lot of us in the Midwest, particularly Chicago can relate to this guy's sentiments. He just put it a lot more creativelt than any of us would have!

We've reached 100!!

The other day, I was reading Mindee's blog and noticed that she is now down to #99 and I know we are right behind her on the waiting list, so I sent off an e-mail this morning to our adoption consultant and she confirmed our place in line was at #100. Although, I don't know when, we can't be too far away from starting our dossier. Last year after we initially got on the waiting list, I predicted that we would start our dossier in the spring and it is looking that, that may come true; it depends on how fast and how many referrals are received, but hoefully in the next 6 weeks or so.

We have 2 families currently in Vietnam getting their children and next week there will be two more. Our staff in Vietnam is now back at work after the Tet holiday. (For those of you who don't know Tet is the Vietnamese New Year, the equivalent to the Chinese New Year. ) Hopefully, the referrals will start rolling in, as well as I-600s and travel approvals.

I also want to thank everone who left such nice comments about my new blog background.

Facelift!

I finally did it! After seeing several others who did it like H at Star Light, Star Bright, I went to The Cutest Blog on the Block and finally decided to snazz up the old blog. I was getting so bored of the way it looked. This is so much better and I think it will be relatively easy to read. But boy was I nervous that I would lose everything, but I followed the directions on her blog and PRESTO, everything turned out fine! If I find it hard to read, I'll just drop on by http://cutestblogontheblock.blogspot.com/ and find a different background. I want to change around my links on the right. Some of the blogs, I don't follow anymore and since I use Bloglines, to keep up with the viewing of the blogs, I have a bunch of new blogs to add. Leave a comment and let me know what you think so far! If you've never commented on a blog, it's easy. If you don't have a blogger/google acount or a Typekey,WordPress, LiveJournal or AOL/AIM account, you can still leave a comment now or any other post, just click the circle for Anonymous or Nickname (for nickname, you don't need to leave a URL Then just type your comment in the box like an e-mail and when you are finished just hit "publish your comment". Nothing really difficult really!

Digging Out in the Northwestern Chicago Suburbs

Last night, it pretty much just rained, but the snow started in this area just before I got on the train about 7AM. By the time, I got downtown, it was only raining downtown, but the snow continued back home and they predicted 1-2 inches of snow per hour. It really didn't start snowing in downtown Chicago until around noon, but it started coming down pretty hard. Luckily, we goit out of work early. I was able to catch the 2:30 train and got into my train station a bit before 4. A little later than what it should have usually been, but under the circumstances totally understandable. At first, it didn't seem too bad, but as we got further north and west, the snow was heavier and was accumulating. I ended up having to walk home, since although Kevin was let out from work early, he was home shoveling and snowblowing. Actually, it was really quite pretty to see . After I got home, I grabbed the camera and took a bunch of pictures.
We had about 12 inches in all here. Areas further north and northwest had more like 14 inches, but south of us in Naperville, only 2-3 inches.

Another Snowstorm Headed Our Way

This has been one of the snowiest winters in quite awhile. We had an additional 5 inches of snow on Sunday evening and another 10 to 14 inches are expected after 11pm. It's been said they are expecting at least an inch an hour. Hopefully, the snow will hold off to later tonight since it is primary voting in Illinois and the contests in Illinois will be pretty close, plus 2 of the presedential candidates are from Chicagoland. Barack still lives up here with his family and Clinton was raised in Park Ridge. We also have our 2nd Crown Financial Bible Study tonight and I somehow managed to get all the homework done for this time. I think after this time that the homework will be alot more manageable. It would be nice if they are wrong and the snowstorm misses us, but I'm not planning on it. I am so ready for spring; it can't get here soon enough and although spring officially starts in a little over 6 weeks, I don't expect it to be here until April.