It is so sweet reading some blogs with the nicknames they have for either their children or the ones they are waiting for. "Dreamsicle" has got to top the list for me right now(not to use) but as a nickname that is just so darn cute.
When Julia is finally in our arms, I know nicknames such as "my precious little jewel" "Jules" will be often used, not too sure what other cutsie names I would use...pumpkin is one that I have used with other kids in the past, just not sure it will fit...I wonder if it might take a picture of her to inspire this...hmmm.
In Random news, off to attend a mandatory information conference put on by the denomination I work under...I am quite annoyed at their lack of organization. They haven't told us if we are getting picked up from the airport, how to get reinbursed, if the rooms they have for us require us to bring bedding or towels, and when I emailed early in the week they said, "we will send you some info later in the week". All that was, was info on how to get a password to let us into the building and then of course everyone's office was closed so I couldn't get more info... should be an interesting few days ahead. BAH, would much rather be staying at home and catching up on work than this, oh well, each job has its hoops to jump through...
Saturday, February 24, 2007
Thursday, February 22, 2007
Geoff Moore and other musicians with China treasures
Steven Curtis chapman has been known to us as being in the whole China Adoption picture, but I just found out back in 2002 Geoff Moore anoher Christian singer, had make that trek and had recorded a song from his Beautiful Sounds album called Swept Away, detailing the Gotcha moment. I had the album back when it came out. Cara had bought it for me because I loved the stuff he had done with his band in the past, but this album didn't jump out, I hadn't looked at it in years, I will post some lyrics soon, it is a nice song, not as strong as the other ones we have found, but cool nevertheless. We also see that Newsong was in China in November and got their little treasures and have said their upcoming album will have a song about it in it, so we will look forward to that.
Nine Month LID
Couple days late in posting(and I think we missed number 8 as well...) but 9 months logged in, in a couple months I will have to start using my toes to keep track...
Got my first set of shots today, Twinrex(Hep A and B protection), with no sideeffects thus far. Growing up with some of the allergies I had(and some that I still do have) I stayed away from innoculations, but this one went well, and next month with the booster for it I will get the typhoid one and that should do it.
News in the cup half full division...as a number of past posts have been with a feelign of fustration etc. over the waiting, I came to a realization with some recent events that are more optimistic.
Our trusty "steed"(93 Olds) has needed some TLC in the "stables"(garage) the last 2 weeks, and it has meant shelling out a few bales of hay($$$), which we were blessed to have as we have been saving for the eventual trip to China. So since we aren't going to be needing to buy those plane tickets for the foreseeable future, we have plenty of time to resave the pennies and quarters to replenish the trip to China fund!!! Wonderful news eh!
Okay, so there is a BIT of tone in that, lol :)
Taxes are due, so my hope is the tax fairy will leave a decent deposit rather than withdrawal under the pillow this year...just have to get motivated to crunch some numbers.
In blogging topic news... I have tried to keep this blog fairly on topic with adoption related stuff, but I think, since our journey is going to be a bit longer than we initally expected, I may just have to occasionally veer into Random Randyness from time to time...just giving ya' all some warning ;)
Monday, February 12, 2007
CNY
Chinese New Year is on the 18th but it was celebrated on Saturday here by the Chinese Association. They booked our cities arena, put on a great spread and provided entertainment and some auctions of Asian ornaments etc. Some friends of ours invited us last year and we were unable to go because we had already registered for Breakforth, but no such barrier this year. It was a nice time. I wish we had more opportunity to chat with our friends, but we did get to spend some quality time with their newest daughter Kayla, a real Asian cutie.
The auction items were interesting- ceramic and jade bonsai fruit trees being the items that stood out to me(not the greatest looking design, so although it was interesting, I wasn't tempted to purchase :). They had an Asian lady magician perform. We only caught the first half of the show. She was technically sound, but her english wasn't great so it made for some awkward moments with her and her volunteers for one of the tricks.
They had a number of traditional Asian dances, the Lion Dance, to bring in the New Year(Year of the Pig) started it off. They did a nice drum dance, but the hilight was the butterfly dance. The use of hand held fans, choreographed very nicely into a beautiful display of grace and movement. There is a crazy story connected to it, a Romeo and Julliet type romance and then the guy dies, the girl goes to the grave, the grave opens she jumps in and then 2 butterflies fly out of the ground and into the beyond. Obvious Asian Religious symbolism of reincarnation etc. in there, but the dance itself didn't tell you any of that, it was just a dance.
It is one of the interesting thing Cara and I talked about in relation to Julia and her birthplace countries culture. Being Christians there are philosophies and beliefs the Asian culture holds which we obviously don't agree with. Yet for some Asians the things they do(action wise) are done without the spiritual connection to the event, the action and the culture have mingled so much that the original spiritual intent is lost and just delegated to culture or tradition, similar to the Jewish people, many who just follow actions out of tradition or because they are "born a Jew" but don't do it out of the personal belief system they have.
It is a challenge because we don't want to ignore or cut off Asian culture from Julia(much of which I am fasinated with and personally enjoy, before I even thought of adopting my Asian daughter), but we don't want to endorse any spiritual belief that is contrary to Christ, so trying to figure out what is good, and what isn't will be an interesting journey.
On the other hand, because I have worked closely with a generation of Asian kids who have grown up in Canada. I have seen the challenge they have faced in trying to determine their identity. They have grown up like "any other Canadian kid" but at home there is the influence of Asian culture, thought and practise that is also part of their world, so they have to work through that, and the result is they end up saying "I am Canadian". But being Canadian means very little(I am proud to be Canadian, don't get me wrong, not saying that at all...) but what is a Canadian? Because of the cultural diversity we have in this country, it is very hard to define what that actually looks like. I am GLAD we have the diversity, which will make it "more acceptable" to have a baby from a "different ethnic origin", and that there are many different ethnic people groups around, so we aren't a "white only" type place. This outweighs, in my opinion, the country confusion idea.
The thing that totally dispels the determination of "Who am I?" is not who my parents are, nor the country I originated from, or the country I live in, or the way that I look, or the people I hang out with... or any list people us to try to answer this age old question. The answer, the key that solves all of that is simple and yet profound....
We are to be a child of God. Our Julia has been created by Him, with purpose plan, personality, passions, and gifts uniquely hers, given by her Heavenly Father. Her identity is found, and blossoms, in her relationship, we pray, she will have with Jesus Christ. We are not citizens of this world or this country, or country of our origin. As a Christian we are a citizen of the King, a citizen of heaven...and when Julia(or anyone) comes to the place of realizing and living in that truth, the identity issue is resolved and you get a focus that guides you in who you are, who you become and what you do and why you do it, that is amazing, and that spiritual perspective puts the temporal things in their proper place.
We hope that by the next time CNY rolls around Kayla and Julia can hang out, eat some Chinese stirfry veges together, watch a butterfly dance, and begin to gorw their appreciation of some wonderful apsects of the Chinese culture while being totally content to watch hockey, live in an igloo all year round, be polite, say "ehhh" a lot and enjoy ALL there is about being in Canada ;) heh!
The auction items were interesting- ceramic and jade bonsai fruit trees being the items that stood out to me(not the greatest looking design, so although it was interesting, I wasn't tempted to purchase :). They had an Asian lady magician perform. We only caught the first half of the show. She was technically sound, but her english wasn't great so it made for some awkward moments with her and her volunteers for one of the tricks.
They had a number of traditional Asian dances, the Lion Dance, to bring in the New Year(Year of the Pig) started it off. They did a nice drum dance, but the hilight was the butterfly dance. The use of hand held fans, choreographed very nicely into a beautiful display of grace and movement. There is a crazy story connected to it, a Romeo and Julliet type romance and then the guy dies, the girl goes to the grave, the grave opens she jumps in and then 2 butterflies fly out of the ground and into the beyond. Obvious Asian Religious symbolism of reincarnation etc. in there, but the dance itself didn't tell you any of that, it was just a dance.
It is one of the interesting thing Cara and I talked about in relation to Julia and her birthplace countries culture. Being Christians there are philosophies and beliefs the Asian culture holds which we obviously don't agree with. Yet for some Asians the things they do(action wise) are done without the spiritual connection to the event, the action and the culture have mingled so much that the original spiritual intent is lost and just delegated to culture or tradition, similar to the Jewish people, many who just follow actions out of tradition or because they are "born a Jew" but don't do it out of the personal belief system they have.
It is a challenge because we don't want to ignore or cut off Asian culture from Julia(much of which I am fasinated with and personally enjoy, before I even thought of adopting my Asian daughter), but we don't want to endorse any spiritual belief that is contrary to Christ, so trying to figure out what is good, and what isn't will be an interesting journey.
On the other hand, because I have worked closely with a generation of Asian kids who have grown up in Canada. I have seen the challenge they have faced in trying to determine their identity. They have grown up like "any other Canadian kid" but at home there is the influence of Asian culture, thought and practise that is also part of their world, so they have to work through that, and the result is they end up saying "I am Canadian". But being Canadian means very little(I am proud to be Canadian, don't get me wrong, not saying that at all...) but what is a Canadian? Because of the cultural diversity we have in this country, it is very hard to define what that actually looks like. I am GLAD we have the diversity, which will make it "more acceptable" to have a baby from a "different ethnic origin", and that there are many different ethnic people groups around, so we aren't a "white only" type place. This outweighs, in my opinion, the country confusion idea.
The thing that totally dispels the determination of "Who am I?" is not who my parents are, nor the country I originated from, or the country I live in, or the way that I look, or the people I hang out with... or any list people us to try to answer this age old question. The answer, the key that solves all of that is simple and yet profound....
We are to be a child of God. Our Julia has been created by Him, with purpose plan, personality, passions, and gifts uniquely hers, given by her Heavenly Father. Her identity is found, and blossoms, in her relationship, we pray, she will have with Jesus Christ. We are not citizens of this world or this country, or country of our origin. As a Christian we are a citizen of the King, a citizen of heaven...and when Julia(or anyone) comes to the place of realizing and living in that truth, the identity issue is resolved and you get a focus that guides you in who you are, who you become and what you do and why you do it, that is amazing, and that spiritual perspective puts the temporal things in their proper place.
We hope that by the next time CNY rolls around Kayla and Julia can hang out, eat some Chinese stirfry veges together, watch a butterfly dance, and begin to gorw their appreciation of some wonderful apsects of the Chinese culture while being totally content to watch hockey, live in an igloo all year round, be polite, say "ehhh" a lot and enjoy ALL there is about being in Canada ;) heh!
Monday, February 05, 2007
Same old, Same old
Sigh.... there is like 7 months worth of referrals that still need to be done, as matches were just done for Oct 22 2005. I have been holding onto the hope that by late Fall 2007 we could be heading to China, that doesn't seem likely, it would mean processing a month of files per month, and that just hasn't been happening. I really don't know how my heart will process starting 2008 without Julia, I just can't imagine it, don't want to.
After reading through the blogs of folks who had just gotten their referrals, I went to bed over the weekend and had such a vivid dream where Julia was home and I was holding her, it was insane. I knew I was dreaming, I was aware it wasn't real, yet I could feel her hugging me, I could feel the way she felt in my arms, her hair brushing against my cheek...it was so vivid. Needless to say, it sucked to know it wasn't real.
In baby room news...Cara found a crib set, bumper pad, and wall border set that has now set in place the colors we will need to have to paint the room. So that will be something in the near future to work on.
Had the kids from my church run the church service on Sunday. Went really well. It is awesome to see kids serving and worshipping God. Very encouraging...one day it will be extra delightful to have Julia in there...
After reading through the blogs of folks who had just gotten their referrals, I went to bed over the weekend and had such a vivid dream where Julia was home and I was holding her, it was insane. I knew I was dreaming, I was aware it wasn't real, yet I could feel her hugging me, I could feel the way she felt in my arms, her hair brushing against my cheek...it was so vivid. Needless to say, it sucked to know it wasn't real.
In baby room news...Cara found a crib set, bumper pad, and wall border set that has now set in place the colors we will need to have to paint the room. So that will be something in the near future to work on.
Had the kids from my church run the church service on Sunday. Went really well. It is awesome to see kids serving and worshipping God. Very encouraging...one day it will be extra delightful to have Julia in there...
Thursday, February 01, 2007
CCAA has new batch in
Reviews are done up to March 22 2006 and referral being sent to those LID Oct 13.
So that means just 2 more months worth of dossiers til we are through the review room(please note this doesn't mean 2 months only to wait for this stage...*starts broken record). But that is promising, we are getting closer to another stage. Hope abounds :).So if all pacing stayed the same(not likely) Augustish we could get a referral, then travel in Octoberish? Can't wait to get to the stage were I can report with less "ish" and more solid timeframes.
We are past our 8 month LID. Got shots lined up for the end of February, and maybe, just maybe are close to deciding on paint colors for Julia's room we have been receiving or getting a number of insect related things, and I got a couple of felt clouds to put up, so I think we are reaching the saturation point, we must paint and place!
Work has slammed me making it harder to think adoption stuff and have time to reflect and write, but hopefully it will normalize soon.
So that means just 2 more months worth of dossiers til we are through the review room(please note this doesn't mean 2 months only to wait for this stage...*starts broken record). But that is promising, we are getting closer to another stage. Hope abounds :).So if all pacing stayed the same(not likely) Augustish we could get a referral, then travel in Octoberish? Can't wait to get to the stage were I can report with less "ish" and more solid timeframes.
We are past our 8 month LID. Got shots lined up for the end of February, and maybe, just maybe are close to deciding on paint colors for Julia's room we have been receiving or getting a number of insect related things, and I got a couple of felt clouds to put up, so I think we are reaching the saturation point, we must paint and place!
Work has slammed me making it harder to think adoption stuff and have time to reflect and write, but hopefully it will normalize soon.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)