Bunch of things..

I am so tired I couldn't think of a better title for this post.. lol But I do have a bunch of things to post a little about.

First, in the midst of the commotion this past month, I TOTALLY forgot to post pics on April 1st of Yoshi's 2nd birthday! LOL I only had time to throw together a little birthday hat for him, which of course he just "loves!" (=tolerates) and snap some pictures.

Happy 2nd Birthday Yoshi-Bear!!

Also I never got around to posting the pics of the 2 cute outfits my sister bought for Raven when she was over a few weeks ago (how time flies).

Then there is this little knit jacket I found this past weekend and book, $9 total. Couldn't pass that up.

Let's see what else. My Mom went home Saturday, but is coming back tomorrow for a few more days. I had some time this weekend to work on the closet.. one side is pretty much finished, but I am not sure if I am going to paint it right now or sometime down the road. I think it's fine the way it is, plus that is such a small space I don't want to pass out from paint fumes! lol The section below without a shelf has a bar in there where I can store some of Raven's things on hangers. And I have a good amount of storage behind the shelves too.

Now I have to work on the other side of the closet which will be some higher shelves and bar. I still have to plan that out a bit. Plus I might wait a bit to start working on that as wood isn't all that cheap! LOL

Talking about money, I have been doing a little calculating and I almost want to say it's probably a good thing we have another couple of years to wait, because I started calculating how much Business Class seats to China might be as opposed to coach seats and we only budgeted for what the agency estimated. We will definitely need to add to that for better seats because I don't like to fly to begin with and the longest flight I was on was to Vegas and that was about 5 1/2 hours and we were in coach and it was horrible. I felt like a sardine. So I thinking we will have to do business class there and back. Not sure if we can do part business class and part coach, depending on what airport we leave from and how many flights we have to take. Anyway, of course if the money ends up not being there we might have to just be sardines all the way to China, but that is going to make for one miserable flight. I think if we have to do coach on the way back, then we would try to get a seat for Raven to give us a little more room, at least that would be cheaper than business class. I don't know.. a lot to think about there. I mean it's a once in a lifetime trip, I'd like to be somewhat comfortable if I have to be on a plane for 12+ hours! I don't think that is too much to ask for. Then I'm hearing from our agency that the Orphanage Donation fee will most like go from $3000 to $5000 by the time we go. THEN, there is the matter of time off from work. Neither one of us get paid leave, so we will have to use as much vacation as possible and then try to save up enough by then to take some additional unpaid leave. So add all that up and that's a lot of money people!! It's been kind of stressing me out lately. But I'm going to go over the bills and see what we can cut where and see how that goes, plus we'll probably have another 2 years of taxes so that will definitely help. I gotta say though, I don't think there is going to be much of a chance of us adopting a second child, not even with the tax credit, if the tax credit even still exists then. It really shouldn't be this hard to have children!!!!!!!! Sheeesh!

Ok, I'm done with my little vent.

One more thing, my baby Jake is doing pretty good. He continues to eat and drink and he tolerates the IV for 5 minutes a day which is good. He is still his affectionate self which is good to see. We're just spoling him for as long as he lets us. Here he is from this weekend, getting a little playful with his toy. He's gaining a little weight back too (so am I, but that's another post!).

I think that's all I have to post about today. :-)

1 YEAR!

Well, it's been a whole 12 months since we were officially logged in with China! It has gone by very quickly. Not to wish another few years away, but I hope the rest of the time we have to wait (however long that is) goes by quickly too.

Quick updates...

Gonna make this update quick because I am pretty exhausted. Let's see, first, my baby Jake came home from the vet yesterday. I didn't actually think that was going to happen at all, but I am glad he is here. He still is not in great shape as his kidneys are failing, but his numbers got a little better with the extra fluids. We have to give him an IV drip for less than 10 minutes a day and some meds. Hubby did the IV today since the vet showed him how to yesterday when he went to pick him up. Doesn't seem like Jake is even bothered by the needle at all, but he doesn't want to sit still for very long which is an issue. Also trying to give him a pill isn't great either and I don't want to stress him out so that's going to be interesting. The good thing is he is eating and drinking and all that. He is getting around fine although he can't jump as high as he is used to and I've made a makeshift step ladder out of boxes so he can get into the window, his favorite spot. My goal is just to spoil him (more) and keep him happy and comfortable. He'll have to go back in a week for a blood test to see if the numbers are still going down or just maintaining (not going higher) and we'll go from there.

I'm very late on my referrals post.. so I'll just say referrals this month were for people with January 5th, 2006 - January 9th, 2006 LIDs. 5 days. No more to say about that, except congrats to those who were finally matched and received pictures of their babies this month.

My mom is still staying with us, maybe for another week or so. My diet is pretty much out the window, but will be back on track shortly. I have no willpower when there are snacks in the house.

I had started working on my closet last week. Here is the progress so far.

So that's where I am at with the closet. What's good is I will still have extra storage behind the shelves for boxes, things that I will probably never have to go get.. haha but will be easy to access by just taking out a shelf. next step is to make another unit to put next to this one that will go to the other end of the wall. I'm debating whether to throw a big carpet down in the whole space or just a runner in the aisle since that will really be the only place I'll be walking. I could always just keep the lovely 50's gold linoleum.. naaaahhhh. I'll probably paint it all too.

Oh yea, my sister had come by the other weekend with my niece and nephew and we went shopping and she bought two very cute outfits for Raven which I still need to take a pic of and will post that soon.

I think that is all for now. Not as quick as I thought. HAHA

My Poor Furbaby

My poor furbaby Jake (aka "Jakie-Poo-Poo", "Booger", "MyGoodBoy") is in the hospital. He has kidney failure. Freddy brought him to the vet yesterday after I noticed that he was walking kind of wobbley and not acting like himself. They are flushing his kidneys and they say he looks better but it's only a matter of time when I'll have to make the decision to let him go. He'll probably come home Monday and then we'll go from there and decide when it's time to bring him back. Jake is almost 13 years old and he's been with me since he was a kitten and I found him outside of an old job I used to work at along with his 4 siblings. 2 siblings I gave away and 2 I kept, one of which I had to put to sleep a year after I found him because he had some muscular issues and couldn't walk anymore.

Jake is such a good cat. He likes me to hold him like a baby (up to my shoulder) and dance with him. He likes to sleep ("spoon" position) with me. He likes to play with those little foam soccor balls or a rolled up piece of paper. He likes to drink super cold water out of the bathroom faucet. He is spoiled. He's my baby.

I have more to post about referrals and shopping and stuff, but not right now.

Thank You Secret Pal!!

Hi Secret Pal!! First of all, I hope you and your mother and husband are all feeling better!! Ironically, my mother went into the hospital last week from which started out as a cold and fever and turned into (or already was) some kind of infection. After a week in the hospital they still don't know where the infection was but it has gone away and she's on anit-biotics. She's 79 and also lives alone like your mother and after she was discharged yesterday we too brought her to our house until she's feeling better. I'm glad your little one hasn't gotten it!

Second, THANK YOU! It was a wonderful surprise today (especially after the past week I've had) to see the Fedex man drop off a huge box at the door!! I even got to open your package with Raven's Grandma! (Hubby was at work and I just couldn't wait that long!!). I LOVE everything!!! Where to start?!?!? I guess with January & February...

THANK YOU SO MUCH for the Home Depot gift card!! You have no idea how much I will enjoy that! And it's funny because I had just decided a few days ago that I was definitely going to work on the closet next! That was right after I threw more stuff in there that needed a temporary home.. lol I pretty much already have a good idea of what I want to do in order to maximize the storage space while hiding a bunch of the storage boxes I have in there and also organize my clothes at the same time. Here's a pic of how it looks now... the "before"... The gift card will definitely help with this!!! I'll be sure to post "after" pics when I'm done. Should keep me busy for a while too, which is good because this wait seems to go slower the more I think about it, so I need to keep busy as I have been pretty good at doing that so far and hopefully it'll continue to fly by.

I can only walk into the closet about 3 feet before hitting my head on the slope, but that is all I need and I want to set up that space so I can walk across the closet in that walking space/aisle and still have shelving on both sides. Or, I can just keep piling things in here! LOL I should have plenty of organized storage space when I am done, and at this rate, I will need the additional space for all of Raven's things I am accumulating!!

Thank you so much for thinking about my birthday! I love the beautiful candle holder and how cool is it that you got it when you were in China!!! That is going right on my desk at home (I work from home) where I can see it all day long and know that it was once in the country of my daughter! Wow!

On to March... LOVE MARCH! The journal is so cute and I am trying to write more instead of just adding what I can to the blog, so that is perfect! And the blanket is BEAUTIFUL!!!! SO SOFT!!! I love it!!! I'm not going to pack that away so I can just go and feel it from time to time! LOL

And now to April! LOL Love the fleece blanket and the little outfit is ADORABLE!!! Too cute!!! And both have little ladybugs! Very cute!! Love the green!!

I love all of it! Thank you so much! And don't worry about it being a little "delayed".. I was meant to get it today! I needed it today!! Perfect timing! Thank you!