one of *those people*

I have officially become one of *those adoptive moms* that lurks and grimaces at all the super fast time lines I see on other blogs, and then feels some odd sense of comfort or camaraderie with families hitting obstacles like us. I have found solace in reading over blogs of families who already have their children home. Reflecting on the days in which that mom or occasional dad would say "this is never going to happen.....something has gone wrong.......our hearts can't take it anymore." This stage seems to last forever. In actuality I am one of the lucky ones who didn't have to wait over a year for their referral ....but the hang-ups with court and the changing system are hitting me hard. I just know i would be an even bigger mess if i had waited nearly a year for a referral then still had to hit every change, road block and system switch ET adoption has faced in the last 10 months....i am also one of *those people* who do find some sort of comfort in saying "wow, at least i am not in their shoes"...regardless, some of these "shoes" really just suck right now.

S is going to the doctor

I emailed, a third time, to rquest some sort of clarification abot why the measurements for S on his Dec medical eval were the same ones from like July. The HOLT Eugene staff forwarded my eamil to the ET staff and we were told that a new set of measurements will be in their way soon since S is scheduled to have a medical evaluation done this coming week...so i hope we will get that info soon (it will probably take about 3 weeks due to scanning/translation etc) and maybe new pictures soon!!!
All this uncertainty has made me really uneasy, its even hard to look at pictures of S because "what if"? What if something happens with the investigation? We are already under more scrutiny since he is an abandonment case...i just fear something will go wrong :(

Autumn

more formal update

An assistant in the Africa program from our agency called and let me know that they did have some information about our case. A few weeks ago our case was submitted for court- however the court then requested a birth certificate. Well S was abandoned, so none exist. At this point i am under the impression (the phone call was very fuzzy, nearly breaking up- damn cell phone) that the agency staff in ET have requested that the Ministry of Womens Affairs issue a quasi birth certificate for S, so that the court would accept it and proceed. The assistant with my agency said this has never been requested for an abandoned child being placed by them before....so that kinda has me worried. I am guessing that once the certificate is issued, we will be submitted for court again......two steps back- but at least we have some kind of a clue as to what is going on.

the waiting and frustration dont end

i am just posting what i was emailed regarding our unending wait to hear any news about court. We asked about the status of our case, reminding the Africa director that she told use she was inquiring about our case specifically, 2 weeks ago *****sigh******

We have asked repeatedly for this information for you and other families. As of yet, we have not received it. Our consultant is in Addis now. We know that you and other families are expecting more detail. Just remember that even though the staff may not have been able to tell us, it doesn't mean that they are not working hard on everyone's case.

Weekly by-pass

There was big news with HOLT waiting AP's this week.... court dates are being given! Just not to us yet:(
Well, at least the systrem is back up and running...the ministry closures for holidays, bogged down with rehearing so many other cases due to missing documents last Nov/Dec, then moving offices....ugh! At least now there should be some kind of routine- but as we find out with international adoption, just when you *think* you know the routine and system, things change.
In the mean time, i am just focusing on school, work and family. Gabe started Akido a the UUCC last week, and likes it...John and I are reading "How to Parent Your Internationally Adopted Child" and making notes. We are redoing floors and starting to plan on moving the boys room to the bigger guest room that Danielle uses when she is here. In two weeka we are starting a class at the UUCC called "the story of stuff":- focused on the realities of materialism and capitalism. i am making it a goal to not buy anything new (other than food and such) for one year.....think i can do it?!?!?!
The thing is, i have tons of clothes in various sizes- :) so i dont need anything...if i do desperatley need anything then we go to the thrift store, consignment sales, craigslist or Ebay :)
The one concession we will be making is while we are in Ethiopia. I can also predict that coming home will be hard when we take S to Universal or Disney...but i will not buy *myself * anything new , maybe one thing for the children.....
I am starting off my *buy nothing* year. The last thing i bought was Gabes V-Day present...Kids Bop 19....couldnt find that used anywhere, and i am going to order a newly made family scrapbook from shutterfly.com....so i am making the official start date VALENTINES DAY (tomorrow)....for one year, until next Valentines Day 2012- BUY NOTHING YEAR. This mainly applies to clothes, appliances, shoes, toys, books, dishes, towels, bags, . I will be getting new tires at some point soon.....but thats just needed for saftey. I actually dont thin it will be too hard...considering i dont do alot of clothes shopping....but i do buy lots of clothes for gabe, so i need to refocus and be more resourceful.
We are hoping and praying for good news this week!

a new week- starts with a bang

....we are hoping for some news this week to end the confusion and frustration. In family news- john had a fun fun birthday. We went to the Columbia Musuem of Art on Friday night to view the film Citizen Architecht- about Auburn's Rural Studio. We also saw some short films about local music, saw some of a band, ate, had wine, hung out with friends. Saturday i had a conference and john redid the floor in the dog room...it looks fantastic and we can hopefully redo the whole down stairs between now and the summer. Saturday was his actual birthday. I got him a mandolin for slicing up vegetables all gourment like. We went to Gervias and Vine, one of our favorite restaurants and met up with some friends....more bars/bands and also went and watched the end of the UFC fight- love Anderson Silva.
Busy busy.... yesterday we went to UUCC service, we had teachings about Buddhism - which brought back memories of my undergrad days....chatted with members...and came home for more floor duty. I had the pleasure of doing taxes...ugh- but will hopefully be getting back a pretty ok sum. Next will be my FASFA. I started putting together a small paper due tomorrow....so i went to work at Panera bread (to escape all the sanding)- while driving past the small college in our neighborhood i saw the weirdest thing...local police guy had his car parked all weird across the road, lights on...he was out of the vehicle looking up at a smoking power line...then flames...then a weird surge sound came...i had slowed to see what was goin on...then an exploision....downed lines...the power poles looked like toaches- this continuend down three or four more poles. I was astonished- called 911...just the one officer was there..then he was running. I circled the block to get behind it, around to the other side and saw two other police cars come speeding in....still no firetruck. The truks came later...this was all at 3pm...and even with all that craziness the power was back on by 6:30!!! These guys really wanted to see the superbowl. ok on to a new week....i am hoping for good news.

where is the off button!?

Didn't I say i was turning myself off to all this stress, emotion and frustration.....that didn't last long. This is mainly due to a HOLT email sent out discussing how court has been/is/will be delayed because the offices are moving to a better facility. Our agency has said that court will be closed an "indefinite amount of time"- (John and I both about lost it when we heard). Another agency posted that the closures are for about a week......still this is just wearing on our hearts and minds. HOLT moved their Addis offices and care center in the last month, now the court offices. The moves are for the better- i am not upset about that. I am concerned about our dossier and documents....where are they? I emailed the Africa program director at HOLT and just asked "with all this moving, where is our stuff? what if it gets lost?".  She probably expects an email from me just about court....so she responded about court, that she still hadn't heard anything....that she was going to contact the ET offices about our case specifically, and also informed us that there is a new HOLT employee sent to ET to help in all these new changes- with embassy and court proceedings. That made me feel better. It is hard for us to be a squeaky wheel to advocate for our kids when as far as we can go is contacting a person in Oregon. It is our agency professionals that need to be the squeaky wheel. We have at least three families who all had their items accepted/ready to go for court in early December and none of us have heard anything.
I am still trying to divert my attention and focus on things here- i am getting active with my UU congregation .... ITS JOHNS B-DAY, we are doing things tonight and tomorrow with various friends...i have a conference and am helping cook tomorrow morning for our new Parenting Education classes (a community program)...but in my down time- Ethiopia and S is all i think about