Three

My five year old dots her "i" with a heart.

I didn't even know she could draw a heart.

USCIS, part 6

I talked to the USCIS AGAIN today. haha. That's probably what they're thinking, too. They're probably placing bets on when I will call next.

The lady I spoke with today was by far the most helpful and pleasant person yet. She was able to tell me that applications from the 16th of February were being processed today. Based on what she told me and the other lady told me, it is my most sincere hope that our case will be assigned this Friday and worked on next week. I pray that we get a case worker who is as nice as the lady today so that our case will be processed quickly and sent to us in time to get it to Ukraine.

I'm sure I'll let you know...

USCIS, part 5

You are seriously never going to guess what came in the mail on Friday. And no, it wasn't our approval letter:)

Friday was a tight schedule and I had about fifteen minutes where I ran home and picked up kids before taking off again for the night. On my way out the driveway I grabbed the mail. Low and behold a large envelope was shoved in the box from none other than the USCIS. I actually got excited for a second thinking that maybe, just maybe this was our approval and a miracle had occurred. I had my oldest daughter take the envelope and open it for me. I pulled over, ready to rejoice.

It was another finger printing appointment. As in somehow, they sent us two. This one was for a different time and date, but in all other regards was the exact same thing that we already had. It was not, to the best of my knowledge, a request for an additional fingerprinting, nor was it a request for new finger printing due to a mistake (other than their own).

I had my daughter dial the 1-800 number on the form as I drove. What. a. joke. This, I realized later, was a different number than the other paper offered, but that other paper was clear back at home. I was on the phone for almost half an hour with them and it was absolutely non-productive.

They had NO idea what I was talking about. Why am I being fingerprinted for an adoption? ummm... pretty sure everyone has to be, is this the correct number for case inquiries regarding non-Hague adoptions? Yes. We're not sure why you have to be finger printed. Did you commit a crime? Startin' to feel like it. j/k I didn't really say that. Anyhow, by the time I got home they had closed for the weekend. I tried calling anyway, the different number just in case. I am feeling frustrated. Given my new hobby of blog stalking I have found several other people applying for Ukraine adoptions that from the day they MAILED their application in to the day they received their approval only waited a month. 30 days. They've had our stuff for a month and a half. I even know of a few people who had their approval within two weeks!!!!!!! I promise. PROMISE. I am SOOOO nice on the phone. Maybe that's the problem. I may have to enlist Huz's help on this one.

On the bright side, my neighbor just brought over some of my mail that ended up in her mailbox. It was our apostilled papers!! Thrilled to have that back in three days!! That is amazing. Thank you local government. I'll keep you posted.

For now, I want to share something from my friend whose son has the brain tumor,

"The number one thing people keep asking me is, "Well, do you believe in miracles?" For me this is a very tricky question. OF COURSE I believe in miracles. Of course I believe that God has the ability to make miracles happen. Of course we are all asking...if there's a miracle waiting to happen...can we PLEASE have it?! This will never stop. But, all of the asking about miracles really got me thinking...just what is a miracle? A miracle to me is that there is a big beautiful plan, that if we open our minds and mostly our hearts, we can see glimpses. It is a miracle that no. matter. what. we have the opportunity to be eternal families. It is a miracle that we are here on Earth together learning and growing. It is a miracle watching people from all over come together and share the tender love of their hearts with each other. It is a miracle that we can forget all the distractions around us and focus on the true purpose of this life...and believe in it. With our whole hearts. It is a miracle seeing a brand new baby join our family. So, yes, YES I believe in miracles. In fact I believe we overlook most of the miracles happening every single day. I believe that if it is God's will for this tumor to miraculously go away, it will. There is so much peace in that. Peace that only can come from turning our will over to the Lord. Today is a miracle. '...for I do know that whosoever shall put their trust in God shall be supported in their trials, and their troubles, and their afflictions, and shall be lifted up at the last day.' Alma 36:3. -Chelsea

USCIS, who knows what part

Judas. I'm going to have an aneurysm.

Just got off the phone with my bff's, the USCIS.

Do I have a case worker? No. When are cases assigned? Once a week on Fridays, but they were sure to tell me that they received their case assignments today and that I was not in there, so don't call back. Once a case is taken, how long do they take to process? I don't know. You can't give me any idea of how long it takes to process a case? No. How long does it take you to process a case? It's different for each person. (I wanted to say that I bet hers took extra long, but I refrained.) We have a date that our paperwork needs to be over in Ukraine and I'd like to make sure that we are able to make that happen. Can you give me any information? No. Our website currently says that it takes 75 days.

Just wanted to say how glad I am to see my tax dollars hard at work.

P.S. We just found out our friend's 9 year old son has an inoperable brain tumor and he has been given 12-14 months. The USCIS is not that big of a deal anymore.

Submission Date!

We have a submission date!

The SDA will be reviewing our application on Wednesday, April 13, 2011.

Hallelujah.

Today we dropped everything else off at the capitol to be apostilled and had our USCIS fingerprinting done. FYI, the apostilling thing is pricey. We are doing it the "regular" way, which is 3-5 business days. It costs $15/document. The "next business day" price significantly increases to $40/per document. Finally, the "same day service" price is a whopping $65/ document. We already sent a few of our documents to Ukraine and had to do the "next business day" expedited service, but that was only for four documents. This was fine as it was VERY important to have them ready and shipped to Ukraine. Todays little adventure came to a grand total of $270.00. As a side note, Arizona charges $3/document. Hmmm. Tomorrow starts my incessant phone calls to the USCIS to ensure our paperwork is ready in time for us to get it to Ukraine for our date. I was really wanting all of this to happen a lot faster, but I'm feeling fairly patient (especially for me), knowing that Heavenly Father will be sure that things happen how they should and when they should. Also, even though three weeks seems like a long time, I have a feeling we'll be in a little bit of a panic trying to get that USCIS paper.

In my mind a rough time line is as follows:

April 13-SDA submission of application

May 4-(or somewhere close to that time) receive letter from SDA extending an invitation to travel to Ukraine for adoption

May 25-(again, somewhere close to that time) appointment in Ukraine with SDA to get referral to adopt our boys

Spring?

This morning we woke up to 8 inches of snow. After most of the old snow had melted last week during the great flood, I'm not sure how I feel about this. On one hand I bought crocus to plant in the yard. On the other we don't have to return our skis until April 15. I guess it's a win win either way.

Side note: We noticed last night that one of our documents that was notarized was done by someone whose license expires within the next six months. Ukraine wants all notaries licenses to be good well beyond six months, so we are taking that one to be notarized again today. And then we're really done. Until we find the next mistake. I was really, really hoping to have the boys home by May. BoyTwo's birthday is at the beginning of May. Then, I was really hoping to be in Ukraine by his birthday so that we could spend it with him. Now? Who knows...

New Rule

Tonight at dinner we had to establish a new rule after Four shoved a pea up her nose so that she wouldn't have to eat it. Luckily, a few blows got it out. Believe it or not, that's a first. haha

I'm Amazed!!

This was a busy week, like most. We were hoping to get our USCIS fingerprinting done, but then the house flooded and there was just no way to make that happen. Here's hoping for next week...

This particular Friday I did a story time/activity for Two's class. Also on Fridays I teach a writing class at our elementary school (don't judge. I'm just a parent volunteer.) Right as my writing class was starting, I ran into the school OT and the district OT that has helped with Two's 504 and at-school therapy. We had to discuss a few things. These two are really great people. It is so nice to know that I am not the only one that sees her needs. Sometimes I feel like crazy mom and begin to think a) I am alone to meet her needs, or b) I am the crazy one. Their support and agreement is refreshing. That being said, we talked about many things that need to be done or aren't being done. That added to my to do list. Anyhow, after writing class we raced home only for a minute. We had to leave home right away for a dance competition that One was in. (She did great and had a great time.) I grabbed the mail on my way in and I am so. glad. I. did.

There was a thick envelope, felt a little padded, addressed to me. My first thought was that I had not ordered anything. Then I saw that it was from Washington. Then I saw who it was from and it took me a second to recognize the name. A lady that works for the same company as Huz had sent me a package. Right away I knew what it was. I was jaw-dropped amazed as I opened it.

Suzi and I met 6 years ago on a business trip that spouses were allowed to come on. She is a really fun, easy going, easy to get along with person. Since that time I have had the pleasure of seeing her on several other trips like that. In fact, she was in Scottsdale with us. I had found out that she liked to quilt and she and I had a fun conversation about quilting and fabric and giving. It was really great. So, as I recognized her name and felt the padded envelope, I knew she had sent me fabric. For all of you who don't know, fabric isn't exactly cheap anymore. This woman had bought me two different prints from my favorite designer and a pattern so that I could make a quilt! There was also such a nice note inside.

Every time I think about what she did I am amazed. Not only did she remember our conversation, she remembered my favorite designer, she took the time to think of me and when she saw the fabric, bought it for me, along with a pattern so that I could use it, wrote the nicest note (on a cotton fabric note card-bet you didn't know there was such a thing:I)) and sent it to me. I can't even believe someone was thinking of me like that!! Amazing!! We need more Suzi's in the world. Me included.

I

The Rains Came Down and the Floods Came Up

Thanks to all the well wishers from my last post! Your encouragement is much appreciated:)

Well, the title of this says it all.

Yesterday afternoon at about three, we decided to move furniture around in the girls' room. It had been drizzling all day long. I knew that it was making the snow melt, but until I went upstairs and looked out our top deck, I had no idea what was going on. Pretty much a river was flowing through my neighbor's yard, into his house and back out the front of his house. Not around his house, through it. Another river was on the side of his house between his and his other next door neighbor's houses. A third river was flowing behind that neighbors' house. These rivers were two to three feet deep and just as wide. It was crazy.

Two houses away neighbor didn't have water in her house yet and we couldn't get ahold of next door neighbor. Two houses away neighbor had next door neighbor's house key and went inside to find their basement filled with about 6 inches of water. I grabbed our pump and hoses and ran over with them. While I was hooking stuff up the fire department, police department and county somebody showed up. This was worse than last time.

We set up another pump in two houses away neighbor's crawl space. I checked ours and we were fine, but I knew that our turn would come. The county reassured us by saying they were bringing in a team of supervised inmates to help sand bag and asked that we provide an additional 30 people to help. No problem with that. It's great to belong to a church that is so proactive about emergency preparedness.

While everyone sand bagged the creeks and bailed water I made dinners and watched kids and made hot chocolate for all the helpers. Once again, grateful to have my food storage. At about eight or nine, we noticed water leaking into our crawl space so we hooked up our pump. By ten we had two pumps in there and were bailing water by hand. It was really so awesome to see so many people helping us all out.

Workers left around eleven when they hand sand bagged the creeks enough to divert the water from running into our houses. I need to explain that the water doesn't leak in through windows or doors, it comes in through the ground, through the foundations.

In a nutshell, it rained all day until ten when the rain turned to light snow. Two feet of snow melted. The golf course behind us has some big huge pipes that are supposed to flow into the creeks, but they were blocked and that's why they came to our houses. We had a ten gallon bucket that we were bailing water into and had a pump in there as well. To give you an idea of how much water we are talking about just in our house, which had the least amount of water, we bailed and pumped until 1:30 a.m. and continued to pump with two pumps, one with a fire hose attached (thanks fire department:)) until eight this morning. Then, we would just use the fire hose pump every half an hour for about a half an hour until eleven. All morning I have been bailing water and using a wet vacuum and it's three now. And the smaller of the two pumps is still going strong. When the ten gallon bucket gets full I set the small pump in it to drain the water. It takes fifteen seconds. The small pump has been pumping water for a solid 19 hours!!!! The large one went for twelve hours. That is a lot of water.

It was great to see so many people pull together to help each other. It was extra great that our basement is unfinished and that we will now have an opportunity to figure this problem out before we finish it.

For now this is Noah, signing off. I'm off to bail some more water:)

Miracle!

I can't remember if I explained this already, but in case I haven't, here you go. First you compile all your documents into a file called a dossier. One of these documents is that form we need from the USCIS. Then the Ukrainian State Department of Adoptions, SDA, assigns you a submission date. The submission date is when they will review your file and decide if they will let you adopt. This approval takes about three weeks. Then, they assign you a travel date. The travel date is about three weeks after that.

So, right now we are trying to get a submission date. I believe that we are looking at the middle to end of April. I hope I'm wrong. I hope it's sooner. But, it is what it is and I will try really hard to stay patient.

Our agency emailed me yesterday asking me to find out a time frame from the USCIS. You all know that I have been calling the USCIS to find out a time frame, but I decided to call them one. more. time. before telling the agency what they had already told me. I guess I was hoping that they'd give me different information than before. No such luck. Again, I was told our application was in a pile of papers, waiting to be assigned a case worker. The lady told me it would be another two weeks at least before that happened and then another couple of months after that. Bummer. I asked if they were still expediting Ukrainian adoptions due to the moratorium. She said no, the only way to expedite is if you have a court date.

Well, you can't get a court date until you have a submission date. And you can't submit until you have that approval from the USCIS. I asked the lady if by court date she meant submission to the Ukrainian government, the date that the government must have that paper by and she said yes! That is great! So, as soon as we could get a case worker and be put into the system, we could go ahead and get a submission date and then they'd process our application. I emailed this information to our agency and she replied saying that they'd try to get a submission date and we could hope that the USCIS had our approval by then.

But then, drum roll please,

I got the mail. Sitting there amongst all the Tuesday ads were two letters from the USCIS assigning us fingerprinting appointments!!! This is great! This means that we can go in before our scheduled appointment, get printed and they will get the results to the USCIS and our case worker will process our app!! At least that is how it should go theoretically. I was overjoyed! I do think it's funny though that for more than two weeks now I have been told that our app was sitting in a pile and that we wouldn't get fingerprinting dates for another two weeks. Go government employees. So, pretty much they didn't even really check. If they had, they would know that we already had a fingerprinting date and that it was being mailed to us. Whatever. The important thing is that we actually have that fingerprinting date, which means we are in the system. And, according to the USCIS, we are two weeks ahead of schedule! Hallelujah!!

Tribute to Princess

This is Princess. Princess died Thursday.

Princess was born two years ago. We adopted him and his brother, Wilbur. Wilbur was the runt, thus the name. And Princess, well, what do you get when you have four daughters. One picked out Princess, Two picked out Wilbur. Huz had said absolutely no rabbits. He is the yes man, except when it comes to pets and kids. haha. So, the day we picked them up from our neighbor I didn't even have a cage for them. Soooo, I put them in the bathtub. Of course, all 400 of the neighbor kids came over to see the baby bunnies. As soon as Huz got home from work, one friend hollered at him that she loved our new, soft, little, baby bunnies. I was bummed. I had planned on keeping them in the bathtub until he noticed. He got that look in his eye, you know the one your dad usually gives you when you are wearing his patience thin, and said, "Wiifff." But by then it was too late. They were permanent members of our family.

Poor Princess the boy was doomed to his life. Someone casually mentioned to us that as the bunnies grew up, they may begin to fight because they were both boys and that we may need to separate them. So, when I hear the word MAY, I think maybe. What they should have told us was they WILL need to be separated. I thought that we would notice them fighting and not getting along and that if that ever happened, we would put them in separate cages. In the meantime they were keeping each other warm.

Little did I know that this was like a little bunny prison (if you get my drift) and that Princess's days were numbered.

One lovely spring afternoon in 2010, One's friend raced inside yelling, "Sister Holbrook!!! The raccoons attacked One's rabbit! Help!" Now, we had many raccoons that had caused many problems so hearing this I dropped what I was doing and ran outside. Poor One had taken Princess out of his cage to play with him and discovered he had indeed been attacked. It was like a bunny war zone. I really should have taken pictures, but it was so gory. Believe me though when I say that I am not exaggerating. It took me all of ten seconds to realize that poor Princess had not, in fact, been attacked by raccoons but by his very own brother!!

Princess was in shock. His tail had been chewed off (his vertebrae left exposed), along with his boy parts, part of his face, ear, left hind foot and the most ghastly of all (as if the previous weren't bad enough) were two giant holes in his hind quarters. I'm talking a good three inches wide EACH, and about 1 1/2 inches deep. It was disgusting. And my little kids had discovered this.

I left the kids with my sister (I think) and raced the rabbit to the animal emergency room. Huz met me there as I had called him and told him to. He stayed with the rabbit while I went home to finish making dinner and comfort the kids. Princess required surgery. And Huz actually asked me what I thought we should do-as if there were any question as to what my response would be. Several hundred dollars later our once free rabbit was back at home, in his own cage with bandages and medication. The medication had to be applied topically to all wounds twice daily and orally twice daily. If you think giving a toddler medicine is bad, try a crazed rabbit.

After several weeks of this, Princess began to recover. Eventually Huz decided we should let both rabbits out at the same time. This decision was obviously made while I was not at home. Wilbur went straight for Princess and both rabbits reared up on their hind legs and went at it. It was like a little rabbit boxing match. Did you know rabbits growl? They do. Huz separated them and I would've never known had the kids not busted him.

They eventually learned to just keep their distance from each other and we had a great time letting them out of their cages and playing with them and watching them bound across the grass. Less of a great time trying to clean their crazy massive amounts of poop (seriously, tons) from their cages.

I remember in our old neighborhood my kids would call their friends to come over and play. They would say, "We can get the rabbits out to play and then watch my mom try to catch them." Apparently it was quite a sight. I wouldn't know. I was too busy chasing circles around lilac bushes and lunging across the grass only to face plant empty handed.

When we moved, Princess became magic. As in he could escape from his cage. At first, I thought the neighbor kids were letting him out to play and then couldn't get him back in. Until the time we woke up one morning and Princess was sitting on our front porch. His favorite places were the front porch, underneath our back deck and our neighbor's front porch flower pot. We attempted tying his cage shut with layers and layers of twine until we could find something heavier to use that night. An hour later, though, Princess was hopping happily along the back grass. In desperation I found the biggest rock I could move. It is about the size of a basketball and I had to roll it. And I'm not a wimp. It was freaking heavy. I rolled it right up in front of his cage door. If I could barely move that rock, there was no way eleven pound Princess could. Except somehow he still got out. A lot.

Recently we saw him out the kitchen windows leaping through the snow as if he were taunting us. One and I raced outside and using our team efforts corralled him several times before actually catching him. One gets the credit for that. In shorts, she dove for Princess as if it were a volleyball. She had snow down her shirt, in her shorts, in her shoes, hair, face, but she caught him.

We had a funeral for Princess. It was a sad time for our kids. We laid him to rest near the creek in our backyard and piled rocks on his grave as a headstone (and so that any curious wild animals would have a very difficult time getting to his resting place). The top rock was, of course, the one that was in front of his cage. Hopefully it does a better job of keeping him in his grave than it did in his cage:)

USCIS, part 3

So, I called the USCIS again today to find out if I had been assigned a case worker yet. As soon as we are in the system, we will be able to get finger printed and hopefully that will move this step along. But, maybe not. But, it's worth a try.

Today, the person I spoke with at the USCIS was very polite and spoke kindly. The information she gave me was the same though, and that's discouraging. Am I in the system? We don't know. Is the processing of applications taking longer than usual? Yes. How much longer? It's about three to six months, but closer to three right this minute. Is Ukraine being given priority attention due to the potential moratorium? (this was the case early in February) We don't know. And we can't tell you. Should I just keep calling back to find out if I've been updated to the system? Yes. At least this time when I said thanks and have a nice day, she said you're welcome.

A new development in our story is that we are sending several of our documents to Ukraine on Saturday with friends that are traveling there to complete their adoption. This will help us get in line to get a submission date with the SDA. Approximately 3 weeks after we submit to the SDA we will hear from them a date to travel. Personally, I am hoping to submit in April and travel in May. That could be optimistic, but I hope it's realistic. I'm hoping to find out when SDA submission dates are being given tomorrow and then I'll know how far off I am or not.

To all my traveling friends-

Congratulations!! You've made it so far! Enjoy your time in Ukraine. We'll see you in a few weeks when you're back with your newest family members! Our prayers will continue to be with you. Safe travels and God bless!!

...and yes, I'm super jealous that I'm not going with you all:) Tell our boys hi!

USCIS, part 2

So, to all of my friends who have been through this and those who are going through this-I am feeling a little panicked!! I tried to get fingerprinted without an appointment, as I know many of us have done. The fingerprinting place would have done it, but we weren't in the system. As in, USCIS hadn't registered us yet.

Part of the problem is most likely the fact that I sent in the application without our home study to get things started. This was fine to do, as we were told by the USCIS and the adoption agency. We have received notification that they have our home study and our app, but we haven't been assigned a case number or a case worker. When I called to talk to someone at USCIS to find all this out, the woman I spoke with told me that it would be quite some time until we were assigned a case worker. She told me that there were cases still in their office waiting to be assigned a case worker that had been sitting in their office since THE BEGINNING OF FEBRUARY!!!!!!!

This is not good!! I told her that time frame surprised me as I had several friends who had submitted their paperwork and had received it in a much timelier manner. She told me that they must have just had better luck. Thanks a lot lady. I thanked her for her help and told her that I appreciated her explaining this to me. Then she just hung up. Without even saying your welcome, or thanks for calling, or call if you have other questions. So much for good old government customer service. Sheesh.

p.s. I knew there would be a part 2. grrrrr.

A Split Second

My little Ukrainian guy was a little younger than Four when his country became his legal guardian.

I saw a photo of Matt Damon the other day. He looked awful. (No offense, buddy) He looked over weight, sloppy, and his hair was grown out a bit. Hopefully he's assuming a character for a movie and hasn't let himself go like that. I hope he can go back to his "Bourne" look soon. haha

It was weird. He looked like a regular joe schmoe . He could've been anyone you see at the grocery store every day. Then, I had this moment, you know the kind where you have enough thoughts flood your mind that it seems an entire hour or more has passed by, yet it has only been a split second. In that split second, this is what happened in my mind:

I thought about how with a personal trainer, chef, hefty income, any one of us has the potential to achieve the "Bourne" look. Any one of us, given the resources, opportunities and education could have endless possibilities. Who's to say I'm any smarter or more successful than another who has had less an opportunity. Who knows how many Bill Gates or Oprah Winfrey's or Einstein's are in the world at any given time, only to remain unrealized due to their country of origin or their gender or birth order.

Which led me to her. The boys' biological mother.

Behind every orphan, every fostered child is a biological parent who for some reason, usually many reasons, is no longer the suitable caretaker of their own child. It is true that these biological parents have had their rights stripped from them due to choices they have made. They behaved in an irresponsible and sometimes dangerous manner. Losing guardianship of their child was a direct consequence of the life style they chose.

But then I thought of her. A woman whose history I only know a small part of. The part I know is ugly. It's enough reason for anyone to judge her, to be disgusted with her, to make assumptions about her, to even hate her. But in that moment, my heart broke for her and I loved her.

What had led her to this chapter of her life? I don't know for certain how things played out, but from the conversations we had with BoyOne and the information we know from court documents, I can almost guess. I think it started out alright but then, somewhere along the way, a path of pain and heartache was taken.

I choose to believe that most people are inherently good. We all come from the same amazing, loving Father, so how could that not be true? I think a lot about the life of an orphan. The sadness of the events that led them to that place. The loss they have experienced. The pain that they have suffered. The heartache they endure. The statistic they are and the likelihood of the statistic they will likely become.

When I look at Four, I can't imagine my life without her. I can't imagine doing something that would terminate my right to be her parent. I can't imagine what it would be like to not wake up to her "toddlerness." (yes, I just made up that word) I can't imagine what it must be like to wake up each morning without her and remember that I had done something to make that happen. I can't imagine the unbearable pain that I would feel. I can imagine what it might lead me to. I imagine that there must have been some terrible things going on to lead me to that point.

And that is where that split second brought me to. Imagining how hopeless and sad and impossible her life must have been for her to have not been able to stop all of this from happening. Imagining how she must feel every day-if she allows herself to think of her precious babies. Imagining that she had done everything she could and that she loved them so much and that life just didn't work out the way she had hoped it would. Because of where she was born, because of her gender, because of the lack of resources available to her, poor decisions were made. I'm not trying to make excuses for her, I know that what she did was not ok. I also know that she lives with that every. single. day. No matter how hard she may try to forget and how uncaring she may seem, she is still a mother. And as a mother, I feel her pain.

Good Laugh

Funniest thing just happened. Here I am, sitting at my computer, which is in the kitchen, looking at quilting websites when, out of the corner of my eye, I see One trying to shut herself in the fridge while she mutters to herself,

"I wonder if the light goes off when the fridge shuts..."

A Little Something

Congrats to a couple of my friends whose adoptions were just completed officially by the courts of Ukraine and to those who just received their travel dates to start that phase of the adventure. Hopefully we're just behind you!! Except I just called my doctor and the results of my blood work won't be available until next week. ?!?! Huz had his draw on Monday afternoon and his results were back Tuesday at 2. I was a little worried thinking that maybe something was wrong and that was the hold up. I started thinking back to all the needles that had been poked into my body during my pregnancies. But the doctor assured me that it always took his office this long because they send their blood work out for these particular tests. Of course they do. I should tell you right now that I have the worst luck ever. And Huz, well, he is quite the opposite (that's how he ended up with me. hehe:) In all honesty, I think he is my one lucky happening that I'll ever have). Seriously, if we were having a contest to see who could get home first and he was in Idaho and I was at the market two miles from our home, he would win. My kids never want to drive with me because something always holds us up. Like the time there was some random dog on the middle of the highway out for a Sunday stroll and everyone was afraid of hitting him (it's a narrow two lane highway) so traffic was literally stopped for like 1/2 an hour. I finally got out of my car and got him when I got close enough to see what was going on. But we are way off subject. Anyhow, should've gone to the other doctor. Oh well.

My good friend is leaving for Ukraine in just a couple of weeks and has offered to take a little something to our boys for us. So, what do you give a couple of orphans who will end up sharing whatever is sent with everyone around them? I've already sent candy, matchbox cars, ping pong paddles and a net that can be attached to any table, and pictures. I know they love pictures, so we'll send some more of those for sure. I was trying to think of something different, though. It needed to be something that was small, too, because there is not very much luggage room. Today while we were out we decided to look around a bit to see what we could find. We finally came across something that we hope will be a hit: a whoopie cushion.