All Hallow's Eve

Hope you are having a spooky evening! It occurred to me today that this will be our last Halloween without having a child of our own (I hope and pray!). Next year, we'll be getting Zeke decked out in some ridiculous costume for his first trick-or-treating adventure! What fun! HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!

See the baby!

Another family with our agency is in Vietnam to get their beautiful baby boy. Check out the lovely photos of their cutie by clicking here.

I can't decide if it feels like we'll get the call/email about Zeke very, very soon or if it's still a ways off. If you look at the 30-60 day range for baby boy referrals, we have 12 days on the short end or 42 days on the long end. Brad likes to say, "The train is coming!"

Over the Thanksgiving holiday, I'm going to get serious about decorating Zeke's room. We've got the bedding but it's still tucked away (mainly so the cats don't transform it into their "nest"). I have been thinking about ways to decorate the walls but I'm going to get serious about doing it while I have a couple of days off.

Hope you're having a lovely Tuesday!

This weekend

We had a wonderful time this weekend at the Heart of the Matter Seminar. We received some excellent information to prepare us to be the best parents we can be for Zeke and Lily. We hope to share some of the info with you in the coming days and weeks.

Brad had a lovely birthday and he was glad we went to the seminar. Afterwards, we hit a local arcade that has games from the 1980's and then we had a very nice dinner at one of our local favorites. Then it was back to the arcade for more gaming and then home.

I hope you had a lovely weekend!

Fright Night

So, what do you find scary? I didn't really see "scary movies" when I was growing up (unless Disney's "Watcher in the Woods" counts). I got my chills and thrills in much better ways. Growing up, I LOVED to hear someone tell a good ghost story. Many of our relatives told excellent spook tales, many of them supposedly true or at least, supposedly happened to someone in the family. There was the writing that appeared on the wall of a family house, the coke bottle that came floating through the living room, or the sound of footsteps that prompted my grandmother and my uncle to run out of the house, sure that someone was there besides them. What made these stories so great was that they were based in reality (we can always debate if they were "real"). It wasn't like someone came face to face with a ghost. It was always better and creepier that they didn't actually see the source of the mysterious happenings. So, for me, scary movies have to be based in reality and the minute you actually reveal the monster or ghost or whatever, the illusion is gone because you've crossed from the realm of "could it really happen?" to "that's so ridiculous!" Witness "The Exorcist." The scariest part of the movie is not the little girl going nuts in the final scene. It's much more frightening when a character walks into the kitchen. Everything seems normal. She turns her back. When she turns back around, absolute fear registers on her face. Then the camera pans and we see what she saw. All the cabinet doors and drawers are open. Creepy!! So, if you have high standards like me when it comes to scary tales and scary movies, let me recommend "The Others." It's a most excellent and creepy movie for this time of year. Brad and I are watching that tonight (we own it!) because we couldn't find anything at the video store that wouldn't include the final dramatic scenes, the big reveal, which ultimately is a big let down for ghost story connoisseurs like me.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO BRAD!!

Today is Brad's 32nd birthday! I had set my alarm to go off at 7:05AM but we didn't wake up until Trav called at 7:40AM. Thank goodness you called, Trav! I think both of us were dead to the world! So, we didn't get to do our big breakfast before the seminar and I feel just terrible that the radio on the alarm was set too low to wake us up. BLAH! So, it's oatmeal at home and then off to the adoption seminar, which will take up the bulk of the day. I gave Brad his gift this morning...a snazzy new jacket. I hope he likes it. He's wearing it today so that's nice! I have a lovely evening planned with dinner at one of his favorite restaurants and then plans to see Ring of Fire, the Johnny Cash musical. Here's to a happy birthday for the best husband in the world!

Will it Bark?

If this is where babies come from, I'm glad I'm not pregnant!

A change in the process

We just found out today that the US government will be requiring us to file paperwork verifying the baby is an orphan before we travel to Vietnam. This is mostly good news. It means there's virtually no chance we could get to Vietnam and have the US government decide at that time there's a problem with the baby's paperwork and he can't come home with us. (I can't even imagine how horrible that would be.) The potential downside is a delay from the time we get his photo and other info to the time we travel to get him. The delay is not a sure thing. Our agency is reviewing this new process and will let us know what impact, if any, it will have on the wait to travel (now, it's typically 2-3 months). Again, it sounds to me like a good thing to get the paperwork all cleared up before you get there. The change takes effect almost immediately so by the time we get our referral in the next month or two, maybe the kinks will all be worked out. Thank you for your continued prayers through this journey!

6 months and 1 day

We hit the 6 month LID anniversary yesterday for China. It's hard to imagine but we will be home with Zeke (keep praying!) in less than 6 months. The wait for China is just abysmal. The Chinese government just finished referring babies to families who were logged in November 2005. ARGH! Unless there's a major turn around, I don't expect to travel until 2011. It will all work out though...Zeke should be four by then and Lily will be 1 year old so they'll be 3 years apart, which is nice spacing for siblings.

Update on the Zeke wait...I heard yesterday through the grapevine that the wait for baby boy referrals is two months or 60 days. So, as of Saturday, we'll be one quarter of the way through our wait. How exciting! Will keep you posted!!

Birthday/Seminar Saturday

Saturday is Brad's birthday (YAY!). He has graciously agreed to forgo b-day activities for the bulk of the day so we can attend "The Heart of the Matter" seminar for couples preparing to adopt internationally. It's supposed to be a GREAT seminar with very practical advice for how to parent kids who spent their first months in an orphanage. I just found out some friends of ours who already have two girls from China and are adopting a baby boy from Vietnam will be there Saturday. So, I think it will be fun and informative!

Thanks to everyone for posting in response to our great news yesterday! If you count from the 12th, that means that by Brad's birthday this Saturday, we will have been in line 15 days out of 30-60 days! The time is ticking by fast and I feel like we will get our first peek at Zeke's sweet face VERY soon! Of course, we will keep you posted!

Blessed with some excellent news!

We found out today that our dossier got logged in by Vietnam on October 12th. That's when our official wait began for our baby (like we haven't been waiting our whole lives for this!). That's a full week earlier than I expected so this is excellent news. We expect to get our Child for Consideration (his photo, medical reports, etc.) within the next month or two, definitely by Christmas. We believe Zeke has been born and we pray for him everyday, that God will watch over him and keep him safe, healthy and happy until we get there.

This weekend, we finally made it to the theatre to see King of Kong. This was by far the most entertaining documentary I've ever seen. (That's not to say it was the best, just the most entertaining.) The uninhibited display of sheer nerd-dom throughout the movie was great fun. If you get a chance to see this doc, be sure to watch it. I'm sure you'll get a kick out of it just like we did!

We had a lovely weekend, recouping from a very, very busy week. We're both taking off work this Thursday and Friday. We may just hang out in town and not do much. Wouldn't that be a little piece of heaven?!?!

31 Years, 11 months, and 23 days later..

Hilarity ensues

Watch the clip from The Office on Greg and Laura's blog. You won't be sorry!

FRIDAY!!

I will collapse after I finish my public TV call-in show tonight. It ends at 8:30PM. This has been a marathon week with public radio fundraising, a visiting journalist from Germany and filing a story for NPR. All these fun things have come together to make for an exciting but exhausting week. We hope to do NOTHING this weekend!

Busy Week

Just a quick hello! It's been a very busy week. We had a really fun time at the football game Sunday. Also, the pageant was a lot of fun. Brad might have a different take. *smile* Hope you're having a great week. More to come when things slow down.

Weekend Fun

Tonight, we're going to our independent movie theatre to see King of Kong, a documentary about two guys who compete for the Guiness World Record on the arcade game Donkey Kong. Just the sort of nerdy thing that Brad and I will enjoy! Saturday, I'm judging a local pageant. (Yes, I was once a pageant girl myself in the Miss America system.) This weekend's pageant is a prelim to Miss Missouri, which is a prelim to Miss America. I've become very, very disappointed with the Miss America pageant in recent years as it's lost its network TV slot and has been bumped around second rate cable channels. But I still enjoy the local pageants. I always had fun being in them. So, that should be interesting! Then, Brad got FREE tix to a pro football game this weekend. So, we'll be heading out of town Sunday for that. It's a packed weekend but should be loads of fun. Hope you have some fun things planned!!

Look at the babies!

One of my favorite things to do as we wait for our CFC (Child For Consideration...the term referral is no longer used for Vietnam adoptions) is look at the blogs of our agency families who are in Vietnam now or just recently returned. Check out a few of my favorites:

Journey to Christopher
Cookie Is in Vietnam
Max Homecoming

Some of them haven't been updated in a while but since most of you haven't looked at them before, you'll still enjoy the photos and videos that are on there. I'm especially partial to the blogs of families who have adopted baby boys. What cuties! Of course, the girls are adorable too!

Missy's Latest Brush with Rock and Roll History

You might recall that earlier this year, I had the privilege of interviewing Mary Wilson of the Supremes. Today, I engineered an interview for NPR with Bill Medley (that means he came to our station to talk to the host in D.C.). Ok, I admit it. I'm an idiot. I didn't know he was one half of the Righteous Brothers until I googled him. (In the way of a disclaimer, I don't know the names of the members of those 50's and 60's acts except Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys.) He was the nicest, coolest guy ever. His son came with him. The three of us sat for about 15 minutes in the studio, waiting for the host in D.C. to come on the line. So, we chatted. By the time he left, he gave me a hug, took my address and promised to send me an autographed copy of his new CD!! WOW!!

Requisite question: "Did you have the time of your life?"
Requisite answer: "Yes. I've had the time of my life. I've never felt this way before. I swear. It's the truth." (You know you're humming along!)

Happy Friday Dance!

Yay! It's Friday! The whole blessed weekend is sprawled out before us. We want to go see a movie this weekend but we're not sure what to see. Our independent cinema has some cool flicks showing so we might go there. Last weekend, I rented Music and Lyrics. It's such a great, fun romantic comedy. Light and bubbly!

Is it really October?

It sure doesn't feel like it. The weather was lovely and fall-like yesterday but it's back up to 85 degrees today. I'm totally ready for fall to get here and stay! We've been burning pumpkin-scented candles this week. Very nice. Is it warm where you are?