2 More Referrals

Our agency sent us the good news that 2 more referrals were received; both were for 2 infant girls, one 4 months and one 5 weeks. In two weeks, we've received 7 referrals at our agency; if this keeps up maybe eventually, the wait will go back down, at least to where it is. We should be about #117 on the waiting list as a whole and about #73 for a boy. This is going to be a very short post, since I'm feeling tired and want to get to bed. With the weather changing all the time, I don't want to get worn down and become sick.

Happy 4th Annversary

Yes, today is our 4th wedding anniversary! We went out to dinner at Outback, where the meal took forever. The cook didn't receive it, so we were offered soup or a salad, which we really didn't want. we finally got our meal, which was very good. I got a fillet and Kevin got the fish of the day, mahi mahi. When we got home I was surprised to find a bouquet of roses on the kitchen table. They are gorgeous as you can see. I can't decide which picture is better, so I'll post them all.












Also, here is a picture of us that was taken last month at my cousin Amanda's wedding.

Finally Referrals!

Our agency finally received several referrals today! 5 in all! 3 were of healthy children ( one was even a 3 month old girl!) and 2 were of waiting children! This means we are now #119 overall on the list and #74 for those open to a boy Let's hope this is the start of a our agency getting a lot more referrals. A deluge of referrals would be nice, but just a steady amount of referrals would be a positive step forward to bringing the wait times back down! In other agency adoption news, 3 families returned this week from Vietnam with their children and 7 other families will be leaving tomorrow to get their children, all in orphanages in Ho Chi Minh City. Congratulations to all the lucky families. One day it will be our turn!

Even without this good new, I am in a much better mood. I just needed a break from blogging, but hope to post regularly again.

The other weekend we went to the last county fair of the year here in Illinois. We also saw my cousin and her husband, who live a few miles away. It was great getting together with them. They are going to be opening a coffee shop in their town. It will be the only coffee shop in that town and one of the only meeting places in the town other than a couple bars and an ice cream shop that closes for a good part of the year. We wish them all the luck in the world; although we think they have a real moneymaker there.

Japanese Toilet Training Video

Oops it disappeared from my original entry! So, here's a reposting!

Japanese Toilet Training Video

I've just not been in a blogging mood, but I plan to get back to posting on Friday night. Until then enjoy this cute video. It's from Japan and in Japanese, but it's really cute! Probably would get annoying after awhile though!

No News is Good News, and This Definitely isn't Good

Finally, we received an update from our social worker. Unfortunately, no new referrals were received, but a 12 year old girl was placed who was a waiting child. It's always so nice to see older kids getting to have a family of their own, but especially when that older child is at the age of adolescence. That is incredibly difficulty age group for almost any parent, but to bring a child of that age into your family really shows that family is very special. There are about 6 families curremtly in Vietnam with their children.

The big news, but definitely not the news any of us waiting families want to hear is that wait times have increased. New families being added to the list are being told over 2 years for a girl (this has been so, for many months), but they are now saying the wait times for those waiting for a boy will now be 18-24 months. Our agency does expect the wait times for many people currently on the list for boys to be closer to 15-18 months, but this is just an estimate. Referrals the past few months have really been slow, so they say if referrals continue to be slow the wait times could increase even more, but then if we start getting more referrals, wait times could speed up. Expect the wait to be longer and then if it turns out to be shorter than one can be pleasantly surprised. So who knows we can have anywhere from a year or two wait. This is especially depressing when you are waiting for your first child and getting to be an older parent. The way things are looking I'll be past my 40th birthday, before a child is even a possibility. What's even worse is that since adoption in Vietnam isn't centralized like in China (each agency works with one or several orphanages, so wait times and referrals differ from agency to agency and orphanage to orphanage.) Because of this difference between agencies and orphanages, there is a big fluctuation in wait times. Also, there are unfortunately several unethical agencies, that find ways to get many young healthy infants; thus the quick wait times and large numbers of referrals. Hopefully these agencies will be shut down and not the entire Vietnam adoption program. Anyone considering agencies, please do your homework and if things sound too good they usually are. There is a yahoo group where one can research agencies that are licensed in Vietnam. I do not have the link, but search under Yahoo Groups for "researching Vietnam adoption agencies". Also anyone considering agencies, use only licensed agencies. The Vietnam Embassy requires all adoption agencies to be licensed for Vietnam adoption. Some agencies umbrella or piggyback with a licensed agency and this too is illegal. Sorry for being such a downer today, but I now feel somewhat better.

We had a pretty busy Labor Day weekend. Friday, Kevin went to his 2nd high school football game of the season. Saturday morning, we spent at the Immediate Care Center. I started getting an earache and since my doctor was not in, I decided I better go get it treated before it got bad. In the evening, we went to watch the races at Rockford Speedway. NOT a good idea to do when you have the startings of an earache! Sunday, we went to church and then my parents came over and we went to a dinner at a steakhouse about 30-35 minutes from here. It was so good 3 of us had pork chops and Kevin got a steak. I gave him one of my porkchops and he gave me half his steak. The porkchops were good, but the steak was even better. Then on Monday, we went to another county fair in nearby Wisconsin (Walworth County). So, it was a pretty packed weekend.

Not a lot to report adoption-wise, but our agency did receive one referral for a healthy 4 month old infant boy. There are 3 families currently in Vietnam and 3 more families will be leaving this week. So we have moved one more place on the list. We are # 129 overall and #76 for those open to a boy. Come on referrals, e need to make some more progress. A nice leap would be nice! I'm trying to wait until the end of next week to check with our social worker to see where we are on the list. I try to wait at least 6 weeks between e-mails about our current status. I'm sure as we get closer, it will be more frequent, but at this point 6 weeks is adequate.

Another Game of Tag

1. You must list one fact that is somehow relevant to your life for each letter of your middle name.

2. If you don't have a middle name, use the middle name you would have liked to have had.

3. When you are tagged, you need to write your own blog post containing your own middle name game facts.

4 At the end of your blog post, you need to choose one person for each letter of your middle name to tag. Don't forget to leave them a comment telling them they're tagged & to read your blog!

Here we go:
M - Married - to the most wonderful guy in the world, Kevin!

A - Adoption - How we are forming a family.

R - Reading - Something I really enjoy doing.

I - Impatient - How I feel about this process.

E- Excited about being a mother.

Let's see. I have to tag 5 people. How about Kelly at snips & snails, Elizabeth at Fajitas & Pho, Sue at Waiting for Our Sweet Pea, Jennifer at This Is Now, and Gina at the Leonards at Large

Since I last posted on Tuesday, we had even more rain on Wednesday and Thursday. The worst was on Thursday with lots of areas flooding, lots of downed trees and lots without electricity. Luckily, we were fine, but it took me over an hour and a half to get home on the train and Kevin over 2 hours driving and it usually takes about 40 minutes. The rain was so bad on the roadway.that Kevin put his arm out the car window and it was well past half of his forearm. When we got to one of the train stations; a couple of the parking lots were submerged with water between the door handle or higher. The Fox River a few blocks from our house has gone over its banks, Here's a couple photos that I took this afternoon.

The playground is usually a ways away from the water.

None of these trees should be surrounded by water

Those are young kids who ventured out into the water. The picnic bench behind the guys is usually several feet away from the shore.

None of the homes around here that I know of were affected, but there were many homes that were in other suburbs.

Yesterday (Friday), one of my cousins got married in an outdoor ceremony. Unbelievably, it was dry and not really even humid. The wedding was very nice and the weather was just about perfect for August. I had heard the reception was going to be outside under a tent, but it turned out it was inside in a very nice room in the banquet hall.

High school football has officially started; yesterday was actually suppose to be the first game, but with the weather as it had been with more rain expected last night (although it did not happen), the game for the local high school was postponed until tonight. Kevin was quite glad it was rescheduled, since he loves attending high school football games and the neighbor, some friends, and him try to go to all the games. They were undefeated the last 2 years until the quarter finals. A very interesting bit of trivia, the founder of Jimmy John's graduated from the high school.

One more bit of news; this one adoption related. A waiting child was placed, so we move down another slot on each of the list. We are now about #130 overall and #77 for those open to boys. There are also 3 families traveling to Vietnam this weekend to get their children.

Rain, rain, stay away

We have had so much rain since the weekend. In less than 48 hours we probably had 3-4 inches; luckily today, has been dry, but the humidity is definitely back. It is suppose to possibly rain on and off the next three days. I definitely hope not, especially not on Friday, since my cousin is getting married. It is to be an outdoor wedding and reception, so it would definitely be nice for it to stop raining a day or two before, so the ground can dry. In addition several areas of Chicagolandare experiencing flooding. More rain is the last thing we need right now!

We had our work outing to a Chicago Cubs game. The weather was beautiful. It did not rain at all as they had predicted for the morning. Because of the prediction of rain, the picnic we were going to have in Lincoln Park was instead held in our office lunchroom. It almost turned into a catastrophe of sorts, because we had all the pop and chips and Subway sandwiches on this one table. Well, what haappened was one of the legs broke and everything started sliding down the table. Luckily, the soda had not been opened, otherwise we'd really have had a mess. It seemed to happen in slow motion and everyone just stared increduously while it happened. Luckily, we only lost a few sandwiches and the rest stayed on the platters. The game was great. We played the Cincinatti Reds, who we had already 2 games of the series to, but we started with 4 runs in the 1st inning and by the end of the 7th inning, we scored several runs again in a row and won 12 to 4. I left after the 7th inning in hopes of making my usual train. Iended up having to run a good part of the 8 blocks from the subway to my train station, but I made it. And a good thing I did, because one of the trains after mine hit a pedestrian or bicyclist and some trains were delayed 3 1/2 to 4 hours.

The next day I was off work, so I decided to take the train downtown and go to my parents, where Kevin would meet us for dinner that evening. Well, as I was walking to the train. There was a bunch of police officers and emergency personnel gathered down near the tracks. It turned out that one of the train engineers from an earlier train had reported a body near the train tracks and it turns out sure enough that someone had been hit by a train earlier in the morning. What they were doing at that section of the tracks is questionable, since there isn't a crossing right there. An investigation is still ongoing whether it was a suicide or an accident or what. But the victim's car was found in the parking lot nearby, so I think it looks like it might have been suicide. It turned out the train was only a little over an hour delayed, so I did end up getting on a train, just a little later than expected.

The rest of my weekend was pretty much uneventful, except for all the rain that fell from Saturday night through Monday. On the adoption front, we did move down the list one place. A referral was received for a healthy 9 month infant boy. Our agency also received referral for a few waiting children, a healthy 12 year old girl and 2 healthy brothers, 8 and 14. A family is reviewing the girl's information, but so far the brothers have been placed on the waiting children's page, since no agency family is requesting this age group. They are really cute boys, so hopefully someone will decide to adopt them. We now are #131 overall on the list and for the list of those open to a boy, #78. So we are slowly moving on the list. Hopefully, there will be more referrals over the next 2 weeks. A few more families received travel dates, so their should be 3 or 4 families traveling next week.

Our Flower Garden

On the other blog last year, I would post updates of our flower garden. This year I haven't done that and fraankly, I think it's better this year than last. We have a couple more varieties and last year actually was our first year with a garden. Because although we moved in here in May 2005, there was no time to really do much planting. So here's a shot of most of our petunias.


Our rabbits ear and if anyone knows the name of deep purple plant, I'd love to know! Even my mom who is quite the gardener has never seen it.

Our mum has just started blooming in the past couple weeks and there are many more buds waiting to bloom soon.

Our begonias.

And a cropped shot of our entire flower garden.

Well, today is our work summer outing. We are going to go to a Chicago Cubs game! We were suppose to have a picnic in Lincoln Park, but they have been saying morning showers all week on Thursday, so they ecided to have the lunch in the office and then go to the gasme. This actually works better for me and probably several others who live in the noth and west suburbs, because to reach that area at leat I'd have to end up taking a bus. Instead I can just take a train into the city, stop at the office for lunch and then walk to the el/subway and take it straight to the ball park.

Simpsonized

You too can Simpsonize yourself at www.simpsonizeme.com, I think. I don't think I look too bad Simpsonized.

3 New Referrals!

Good news now that the visiting Vietnam officials are back at the IAD (or is it the DIA; I.ve actually heard it referred by both names). O our agency received 3 referrals: a 14 month old boy, a 3 and a half year old boy and a 4 and half year old boy, so we have moved up three spots on both of the list . We are now # 132 on the overall list and #79 on the list for those open to a boy. Just to memind you when we started out we were #159 and #95 on each of the lists. So not bad for a little over 3 months. They are expecting more infant referrals in the near future. We have one family traveling from our agency and their website is under my traveling links under The Needhams. Also, our agency's 1st Ethiopia adoptive family should be on their way back to the United States, with another family leaving for Ethiopia this upcoming week.

Vietnam Provinces

Can't remember if I ever posted a province map of Vietnam. Our agency is in 3 provinces, Kien Gang, Vinh Long, and Ho Chi Minh, which are in the very southern part of Vietnam (all of which are in pink).

3 Month Anniversary

Well, it has been 3 months since we were added to the agency's waiting list on May 7th. If all goes as they predict, we can expect a referral in 9-12 months. I guess this means we should start getting busy preparing for our son. Several months ago, we started removing some wallpaper in what will be the nursery and discovered at least 3 layers of wallpaper. Well, we got vwhat people recommended we use to remove the wallpaper, but with so many layers, we are having a heck of time with it. We have decided we will hire someone to remove the wallpaper, who has experience doing things quickly. One of the couples at work has a son who has a decorating business, so we will go with him. We will do the painting ourselves most probably, but the wallpaper will be someone else's job. Hopefully, we can get this done in the next month or so and then paint before, it gets too cold where we don't want to open the windows.