Save The Date

I just got a letter from my attorney today advising me that our adoption hearing date has been set for August 24th! This is 4 days before my mom's birthday, so it should be a very celebratory week. I know it seems FAR AWAY... but rules are rules and we must have the children in our home for at least 6 months before we are legally able to finalize the adoption. And seeing as they moved in on February 6th, well, this is probably as soon as we could do it.

Family and friends are allowed and even encouraged to attend the event. The hearing lasts about 5 minutes, based on my experience volunteering for National Adoption Day, which I discussed here. Despite its brevity, however, it is still a pretty emotional event. The judge asks the kids age-appropriate questions such as "Do you know what adoption means?" and "Do you promise to be nice to your baby brother?" It's extremely entertaining to see what the kids say.

Okay, so what have we been up to lately?

Daddy is in the process of building a playset in the back yard. The children have enjoyed playing on it during all stages of construction. My husband, who is no slouch when it comes to construction/building/assembling, enlisted the help of three friends, all of whom have extensive construction experience as well. In fact, one of these guys works as a superintendent for a local homebuilder. Between the four of these guys, they have probably spent at least 40 hours on this thing and it still is not done yet! On the box it says "Adult Assembly Required." You think?

We have discovered the wonders of bubble blowing. Miracle of miracles, this seems to be an activity that allows the V's to actually SHARE with each other...

That is, until Victoria decides to get up and take her bubble bucket with her.

Tino and I enjoy our alone-time together during Victoria's nap. The other day we were outside and I sat down on the glider swing and he came and sat in my lap for about half an hour. The weather was beautiful, with a nice breeze gently blowing. I felt so happy and peaceful. He also allows me to take pictures of him without jumping around and making the photo blurry.

We went to the zoo with Abuela. I had a hard time getting photos because I was so busy trying to keep track of where the kids were. They enjoyed the animals greatly. It was fun to watch them looking into the enclosure, completely unimpressed because they hadn't yet spotted the animal- then all of a sudden their faces would light up and their hand would shoot up in the air to point out the animal to Mommy and Abuela.

Our friend Kevin taught us a wonderful new method of managing our dog, Lucy, who can be very annoying and barks at us when she gets excited. We put the leash on her and she now understands that if she engages in the undesirable behavior, we can step on the leash and catch her to administer (non-violent) discipline. Prior to this, we could never discipline her because Lucy is much faster and more agile than us. So she would bark and bark, and then when you approached her, she would dart away and bark even more. The Cycle of Annoyance has finally been broken. A side benefit to Victoria is that she can pick up Lucy's leash and has her own dog to walk in the back yard. I think it is hilarious because Lucy is actually a very small dog, but when walked by Victoria, she is proportionately the size of a mastiff.

Mommy has been experimenting with all kinds of foods to see what the V's will and will not eat. They LOVE edamame!

I took the kids to work a few weeks ago, so my co-workers could meet them, and so the kids could begin to conceptualize the idea that Mommy has another job, in addition to satisfying their every whim... Victoria was able to knock a few items off my to-do list.

Generally, the children are happy, loving, and secure in their new home. I am so grateful that I have this time off from work to establish a bond and attachment with them. Today is the end of week 7 of my 13 week leave of absence. I am more than halfway done. We have a lot of great stuff planned for the next few weeks, including a birthday party, some out of town visitors, and a trip to Pennsylvania to see and meet Dave's family.

One last photo...