Ah, 2010. I'm trying to remember if you were more pessimistically-optimistic or the other way around. I do remember that you started off kind of painful. The fertility treatments weren't working and Kristen and I were faced with moving on to IVF (painful) or looking into adopting (something that we hadn't thought through at that point).
January saw me flush my cell phone down the toilet at a lacrosse game (seriously, it happens people) and the introduction of the iPhone to Misty (best. gift. ever.). Plus we had our First Annual Leavenworth trip! February brought around the initial meeting at the adoption agency where we got a feeling of what was to come.
March brought about the decision to go with Open Adoption and Family Services as the agency of choice to use in our adoption process. The Pre-Adoption meeting was fun and informative and that's where we met Warren and Chris. April and May were filled with paperwork, paperwork, paperwork and home studies and June was filled with gathering pictures for our photo collage, wrapping up the paperwork for the background checks and finishing the final drafts of our autobiographies. It was also the first time that I'd ever been fingerprinted before and I was nervous! Now I'm never allowed to do anything bad again because I'm in AFUS and they'll bust me faster than a clock can coo-coo.
We entered the baby pool at the end of July! The 27th to be exact and everyone knows how much that's my favorite number, so I felt pretty lucky. We also started working on the baby's nursery: painting the walls, fixing the trim and removing the ugly popcorn stuff from the ceiling. August brought around our big trip to Boston and NY to see friends. I hadn't been back to Boston since 2000 and neither one of us had been to NY so it was a great time! Plus we got to go to the beach in New Hampshire and play in the Atlantic and that's not something that you get to say/do every day, ya know!
September, October, November were waiting months. We've made a list of everyone in the pool and we're kind of monitoring the trends of who is adopting and who is still left in the pool. September was also the start of the monthly adoption gatherings through the agency and we've met some pretty cool people through there. It's nice to know that we're not going through this alone.
December has been another waiting month but has gone by so fast that it doesn't feel like we've been in the pool for 5 months already. We also went back to Eastern Washington for Christmas for the first time since my parents divorced. It was great to have everyone there.
2010 has also seen at least 6 our our friends have babies (that's just a quick count off the top of my head, sorry if I forgot anyone) and with that comes joy and pain for me (not speaking for Kristen here). Maybe that's hard to explain. I'm super excited for our friends and love that they have started or added to their little family units. At the same time we've been trying this for so long that it's painful in a way that to watch other people just be able to move on. Overall, though, I'm just happy that everyone that I love and care about it happy and safe.
So 2011, I have high hopes for you! You start in about 13 hours and you have some big shoes to fill. January will bring around our annual Leavenworth trip, April my birthday, July Kristen's birthday but other than that we don't have a lot planned for you right now. I'm sure there will be game nights and summer BBQs. Possibly a new roof for the house, maybe a new car for Kristen and some random remodeling projects. Hopefully you will bring and end to Gretchen's cancer and you will bless another 6 of our friends with babies.
Oh yeah, and feel free to send a stork (or two, hey, I'm not being picky!) around our way too :)
Editor's Note (that's me): September also saw my Seattle Storm win the WNBA Championship again! Woot!
Friday, December 31, 2010
Sunday, December 12, 2010
Movin' on up!
Slowly but surely we're making our way up in the pages on the adoption website. This is both good and bad in that it means couples are being picked and moving on with their lives and bad in that it's not us. Haha. I have my moments when I go crazy about the wait, but overall things are pretty good. I haven't done any more baby supplies shopping yet, but there's still plenty of time left in the month. I think that Shannon letting us borrow her things for the time being has really allowed me to calm down about not being all that prepared. Except this morning where the conversation went a little something like this:
Kristen: We have to pick up Mack tomorrow, don't let me forget.
Me: Okay, I'll add a reminder to my phone.
Kristen: I don't have baby carseat tie downs in my car. (Some other things but I don't want to freak Gretchen out.. haha)
Me: Um, maybe it's time we spend $25,000 so you can get baby carseat tie downs? Hint: maybe you need a new car.
We're totally picking up Mack in my car, Gretchen, don't worry.
Anyone who knows anything about Kristen and I knows that we've been having the "maybe Kristen should get a new car" talk for oh, about 3 years now. I know one day it'll happen but it's going to happen on Kristen Time and not Misty Time.
Christmas is less than 2 weeks away now and I'm excited to go spend a few days back home with the family. I think that mom is stoked that we're going back for Christmas which is cute to see. Everytime we talk on the phone she's like, "You guys are still coming back, right?" Yes, mom, the plan is to still go back. Pending the pass isn't a complete and total snowy mess. Even then the plan is for the 4 of us and Leo to rent a big ol' SUV and make our way back together. Unless the weather is going to be clear and then we might just take our own cars and save the moolah. Who knows?
Anyway, just wanted to touch base! Things are pretty much the same with us. Working, christmas shopping, going to the gym and hanging out with friends. Life's been pretty good :)
Kristen: We have to pick up Mack tomorrow, don't let me forget.
Me: Okay, I'll add a reminder to my phone.
Kristen: I don't have baby carseat tie downs in my car. (Some other things but I don't want to freak Gretchen out.. haha)
Me: Um, maybe it's time we spend $25,000 so you can get baby carseat tie downs? Hint: maybe you need a new car.
We're totally picking up Mack in my car, Gretchen, don't worry.
Anyone who knows anything about Kristen and I knows that we've been having the "maybe Kristen should get a new car" talk for oh, about 3 years now. I know one day it'll happen but it's going to happen on Kristen Time and not Misty Time.
Christmas is less than 2 weeks away now and I'm excited to go spend a few days back home with the family. I think that mom is stoked that we're going back for Christmas which is cute to see. Everytime we talk on the phone she's like, "You guys are still coming back, right?" Yes, mom, the plan is to still go back. Pending the pass isn't a complete and total snowy mess. Even then the plan is for the 4 of us and Leo to rent a big ol' SUV and make our way back together. Unless the weather is going to be clear and then we might just take our own cars and save the moolah. Who knows?
Anyway, just wanted to touch base! Things are pretty much the same with us. Working, christmas shopping, going to the gym and hanging out with friends. Life's been pretty good :)
Friday, December 3, 2010
Transracial shmasracial
We're fresh off our December adoption meeting and I always have a good couple of weeks after each of these meetings. They tend to remind me about the end goal and how we just have to stick in there because one day it's going to happen for us. This meeting was about Transracial Adoption and I was pretty excited about the topic in general.
In the beginning of this whole adoption process we were given a boatload of paperwork and one of them was a Transracial Adoption questionnaire booklet who's job was to ask us questions that would put us in situations where we had to think abotu whether or not we would be comfortable adopting outside of our race. I was pretty confident about my answers to the questions but when everything was said and done, I was one question away from falling into the "maybe you're not really ready to adopt outside of your race" category.
I was shocked.
I consider myself pretty diverse and a non-racist individual. Maybe it has to do with the fact that I fall into one of the smallest minorities on the planet. Female. Mexican. Lesbian. I couldn't believe that I was one question away from the being in the next category.
So ultimately this brings up the question of whether or not Kristen and I are prepared to adopt outside of our race. And I guess the short answer is: I'm not sure. I listened to the stories of the adoptive mothers that were there tell their stories of raising their beautiful African American daughters and the comments that even the most well-intentioned people would make. How would Kristen and I handle those? Would we be equipped to response with kindness rather than rash responses?
I would like to think that racism doesn't exist in the world that I live in today. That it's almost 2011 and it's time that we put all of that behind us. I'm no better than you and you're no better than the person next to you. Regardless of your color. But here's the thing that I've been painfully aware of most of my life. Aside from the fact that it's obvious that I'm female and unless you know my last name, I've pretty much been able to "hide" the fact that I'm Mexican or the fact that I'm a lesbian unless it's something that I want you to know. The idea of adopting a child of color or of a different race puts everything out there. They're going to have 2 mothers, they are going to look different than us and they are going to be adopted.
I don't know.. I feel like I'm babbling.. it's almost 11:00 on a Friday. Maybe it's time for sleep and more blogging later :)
Oh yeah, FYI: I'm blogging in purple and this font and Kristen's taking the white font. Now you can keep track of who's talking smack about who!
In the beginning of this whole adoption process we were given a boatload of paperwork and one of them was a Transracial Adoption questionnaire booklet who's job was to ask us questions that would put us in situations where we had to think abotu whether or not we would be comfortable adopting outside of our race. I was pretty confident about my answers to the questions but when everything was said and done, I was one question away from falling into the "maybe you're not really ready to adopt outside of your race" category.
I was shocked.
I consider myself pretty diverse and a non-racist individual. Maybe it has to do with the fact that I fall into one of the smallest minorities on the planet. Female. Mexican. Lesbian. I couldn't believe that I was one question away from the being in the next category.
So ultimately this brings up the question of whether or not Kristen and I are prepared to adopt outside of our race. And I guess the short answer is: I'm not sure. I listened to the stories of the adoptive mothers that were there tell their stories of raising their beautiful African American daughters and the comments that even the most well-intentioned people would make. How would Kristen and I handle those? Would we be equipped to response with kindness rather than rash responses?
I would like to think that racism doesn't exist in the world that I live in today. That it's almost 2011 and it's time that we put all of that behind us. I'm no better than you and you're no better than the person next to you. Regardless of your color. But here's the thing that I've been painfully aware of most of my life. Aside from the fact that it's obvious that I'm female and unless you know my last name, I've pretty much been able to "hide" the fact that I'm Mexican or the fact that I'm a lesbian unless it's something that I want you to know. The idea of adopting a child of color or of a different race puts everything out there. They're going to have 2 mothers, they are going to look different than us and they are going to be adopted.
I don't know.. I feel like I'm babbling.. it's almost 11:00 on a Friday. Maybe it's time for sleep and more blogging later :)
Oh yeah, FYI: I'm blogging in purple and this font and Kristen's taking the white font. Now you can keep track of who's talking smack about who!
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