February…it’s a big month
1.5 and 4.5
Those halves mean a lot to little dudes…or at least my oldest little dude…and I can find no reason not to point them out and tell the world.
Leo turned “half way to two” this past Saturday. We enjoyed a Korean Lunar New Year lunch with a large group of adoptive families (many of which we’d never met) and picked up a few treats at the Korean Market. Leo could not get enough rice, noodles…and my soup and water. And, it was really nice to meet some families who traveled to bring their little ones home around the same time we brought Leo home. We look forward to seeing some of these families again someday. After lunch we joined some neighbors at the local ice arena to cheer on our high school hockey team. I cannot say that we moms (or both of our one-and-a-half year olds) really did much cheering…except maybe for the times that the Zamboni came out for that was when we got a break from chasing/holding/feeding/
Drew turns the big FOUR-POINT-FIVE in 14 days. He is looking forward to celebrating with sparkling juice (which he has never had)…and keeps slyly reminding us that Red Lobster is the restaurant you should go to for your birthday. Hint received.
Now…while I am truly a fan of half birthdays (comes easy for me with my birthday two weeks before X-mas) and will always celebrate with the honoree (come my thirty-seven-and-a-half birthday in June, I plan on celebrating with brownies and ice cream while wearing flip flops), what I seem to be focusing on the most these days is PAPERWORK.
Throughout the adoption process, there is a lot of paperwork. We knew this going in. I even knew about the required one-month, three-month, and five-month Progress Reports. I’d like to think I got pretty good and efficient at it all. But, then came the finalization paperwork. That paperwork nearly threw me into complete frustration and paralysis. Our agency…in our instance…did a sub-par job communicating the timeline of next steps and forms that needed to filled out. It was extremely frustrating knowing I could have had these forms and had them submitted way sooner than I did. But, I prevailed and I keep reminding myself that it doesn’t matter how quickly things get finalized, as long as they do. The forms were finally completed and notarized on January 24th and I drove out to the “country” and personally filed a Petition for Adoption with our County. One week later, we had our Court Hearing date. March 31, 2011 is marked on our calendar with stars and stripes!
Last Friday I also submitted our last required Progress Report to the Agency. In some ways, it is hard to believe that Leo has already been home with us for five months. Despite the extremely cold and snowy winter we’re having, it feels like just yesterday that we were in sunny and hot Korea…or having our ‘all accounted four’ photos taken…or taking Leo to the International Clinic for his first check-up…or introducing him to friends and family for the first time. In other ways it’s amazing how time allows for such gradual growth that often times you don’t notice all the progress that’s transpired. When really take a moment to think back to the first few days and months, we are amazed at how much Leo has grown (his pants are short, his belly fills out his shirts, and he has a mouth full of teeth) and how much he has learned (his vocabulary is amazing (as are his manners), there’s no more bottles, the nuk is a crib-only thing, and he seems to have learned the rules of the house) and how much more comfortable he is with us and his new home (sleeping well through the night, slowing down long enough to let us read him a book or two or ten, and pushing the limits – just like a toddler should be doing). It has been “fun” for me to document these things for the agencies and write the required letters. Lately, I have been thinking that whether required or not, I want to continue to send some sort of update, maybe a yearly letter and pictures to Leo’s foster family and birth parent’s file. It just doesn’t seem fair to only send a single snapshot of Leo’s life with us…especially one that was taken so close to the time he came home. Leo is way too neat of a kid to only provide this one snapshot. Those who’ve loved him in Korea deserve more than that.
And, believe it our not, there is paperwork for things other than adoption!!!
Last week Damon and I attended a Kindergarten Parent Information Night at the local Elementary School for Drew. As hard as it is to believe that Leo has already been home with us for five months…it is even harder to fathom that Drew is ready to start kindergarten. But, the registration paperwork is complete and I look forward to dropping it off in the school office with Drew tomorrow. Drew is extremely anxious to set foot into “his” school for the first time. And, I am excited to see him continue to grow and learn. Exciting times!
Until next time…it’s time to dust off those running shoes; what have you been putting off? I'm starting to think there’s no better time to start than now!!
