Today I heard the sad news that a seemingly healthy baby boy passed away in his sleep–only one week before his new parents were to bring him home. This is sad news that no family deserves to hear. The loss of a child must be overwhelming, but the loss of a child that you have loved and watched grow from afar but have never held–that just seems ruthlessly cruel. This reminds me that nothing in life is guarenteed. Not today, not tomorrow, and certainly not the future. I am sad beyond belief for this family. I am sad that our children live in a place where their next breath is not guaranteed and many of them are “lucky” to have lived as long as they have in the conditions they may have had to endure before being brought into care. I believe that everything happens the way it should, but I don’t know how a baby dying that is ready to be taken into a loving family can be rationalized. It just is so unfair. At times like this I doubt the universe’s plan. How could one not?

I can finally see the end of the nursery in my sights. I am nearly done. Another coat of paint on two walls, paint the inside of the closets and then we are in business. I then have to lay the floor–but I have the floor. And it shouldn’t take long. We are doing laminte wood flooring. It should be pretty easy. Then a little trim–a little electrical and we are in business. Yay. I have worked really hard and I can’t believe that it is almost done. As soon as I find my digital camera I will take some picks and post the before and after. You’ll be amazed.

We are still waiting for an update. But I heard from another person that our agency reps in Ethiopia haven’t had any internet access for about a week now–maybe longer. So nothing really happens without that. So I can be patient. Okay–I can try. My dad and his girlfriend brought our shower gift over yesterday–they got us our stroller. They didn’t want to lug it to the shower and then us have to lug it home with all of our other spoils. Hopefully there will be other spoils. I have this horrible complex where I never think anyone is going to come to my events, even though they always do. I should have that checked out maybe. Yeah, I’ll get right on that.

I love the stroller. Now, of course I have only used it in the living room without anyone in it. I couldn’t get either dog or any of the cats to be harness in and get pushed around. But it is so easy to open and close–can do it all with one hand. It is pretty light for a big stoller I would guess–it weighs less than my grandma’s wheelchair. This is so exciting. I finally went through all of the clothes I have for the baby so far. I was shocked to see that I really had less than I thought. And so much of it he might not be able to wear for a long time. Most of what I bought was 9-12 mos stuff. Some 6mos and few 3mos things–when I was deciding what outfit to send in his welcome bag. I took all the tags off and am going to wash everything. Then put it all up in his room.

I am excited beyond words as well as nervous beyond words too. I am less nervous about making court closure since the director says she expects us to make it and that it looks good. Why does this ambigious statement comfort me? you ask. Well because she is extremely conservative in her information. She does not regularly volunteer waiting times etc. And for her to let me know without me asking her means a lot and gives me quite a bit of confidence. Those of you working with our agency I think can attest to her pessimistic info.

Hubby turns 40 tomorrow and he is handling it well. I keep telling him that 40 is the new 30–he laughs and tells me that is easy for me to say as 40 is still 5 years off. He is excited about the baby and has been reading up on Piaget’s stages for development. I humor him and listen but as a teacher, I have taken more classes in child development than I need. Really enough to make me dangerous. Hubby is so cute. He likes to know as much as he can. He is very cerebral–it really is cuter than it sounds.

Summer school is almost over and I cannot wait. 7 more days after today and then I am offically a housewife and soon to be mom. It is hard for me to believe that there was a time when I couldn’t imagine not working–now I can’t imagine anything else. Well this post certainly has grown longer than I had imagined it. If you are still reading–rock on. I hope to hear soon about a new group being formed. I am thinking it should be sometime next week. I should be in it. I hope I am as well as those of you who have been waiting with me. Come on S…..Can I buy one?

It is a happy Sunday. I got a message today from my agency director telling me that they are expecting to get our case to court before the closure. It is not a guarentee but it looks good. I can’t explain how that makes me feel. I know there are many things that have to happen in this whole process for everything to go right.

This process is much like the Tour de France–yes I am one of those who like to watch cycling and follow it as much as I can. The riders in the tour will cover 2100 plus miles over 21 days with only 2 rest days. They ride up mountains with inclines as much as 10% in temps well above 90 degress and in rain and other elements. They ride is a group of 189 riders(only 176 this year because of the drug scandaled the rocked the tour just a few days ago)–some breakaway each day and try to make it but the peleton is always close behind and generally foils thier attempts. I feel that adoption is very similar to this. There are easy days–flat stages- and days that I don’t know how I can go on not having my baby with me–the mountain stages. These hard days are the ones that show what we are made of and what we can find deep down when we don’t think we can pedal one more time.

Sorry for the extended metaphor but I am an English teacher and am currently watching stage 1 of the Tour de France. I love cycling. I wish I had more time to do it and was faster. I am going to try to quickly train for another century I did one two summers ago-when I was considerably heavier than I am now. The ride I want to do is in the beginning of September. I am hoping that by training for this ride, I am tempting fate and it will ensure we make the court closure. Sneaking on my part uh??? Well as I continue my quest for the Yellow Jersey(the leaders jersey) I will keep pedalling and hope I can make it to the finish line and don’t get disqualified because it took me too long. Heres Hoping.

These just came from a travelling parent. Isn’t he beautiful?

We received the camera we sent in our welcome bag back today. I was so very excited. I rushed to Walgreens ordered double prints and a cd of the photos. I was looking forward to filling a page in Noah’s life book with these pictures. We had one photo on the camera, the rest of the film was empty–wiped clean. The picture was in the middle of the negatives. I was so saddened. But one picture is better than no pictures.

I emailed our agency today and requested an update on our little guy. The request has been forwarded to Ethiopia so hopefully next week I should get an acutal update–how big he is, how he is progressing etc, and another picture. But he looks cute. I really just want him in my arms. It will happen soon enough. I am nearing the final phase of nursery preparation–will finish painting saturday and hope to lay the floor on Sunday. I am making progress. WooHoo. Tomorrow is friday and I will then only have 9 days of work until I offically a stay at home mom. It doesn’t matter that they baby isn’t home yet does it?