Lucky Number 7

I have been blessed over my past couple of years of blogging to discover an amazing village who have been gracious enough to share their journeys with me as I travelled mine. And I’ve been even more blessed by virtue of the fact that, as a result of my work work, my work for the CFA Institute, and the aeroplan points generated by both, I’ve been able to spread my wings and meet a great number of these amazing women in person.

Work work takes me often to Calgary where I met the first of my adoption peeps, the amazing Haze. Through Haze, I met Gina. An IAMASLUT convention last May took me to San Francisco where I frolicked with Haze, Porter, Tasha (private) and Suzanne (private). Tash made that trip all the way from Ohio which frankly, I couldn’t even find on a map if my life depended on it. At Afrikadeys in Calgary this past summer, I added Dianne. And now, after a trip down (and to the right) to Washington DC, I’m excited to add Tami to my “in-person adoption peeps” list. We had dinner at Dukem, where my friend Leslie (aka one of the aunties) took this lovely snap of the two of us. Is her hair killer or what? She has agreed that notwithstanding how gorgeous she looks with that hair, she will side with Haze and make sure that Makeda does not get near any straightener until she’s at least 18.

And this list doesn't even include the non-bloggers that the bloggers have introduced me to - big shout out in particular to Marelise, Bridget and Evelyn. Love all you gals - thanks for sharing the ride!

Some Very Merry Christmas News

Hot off the press from my adoption agency:

"Hello Imagine Families!

It seems this is a week of very good news here at Imagine!

As was communicated yesterday, we received our Ontario Ministry License
renewal early this week. We have further received word today that our
NGO license renewal in Ethiopia has been approved!

We are also very excited to inform you that we have been able to
commence the process of referrals once again!

We trust that this news brings you all a sense of relief and joy, as it
did in our office today! We recognize that there may be challenges
ahead. However, there has been much accomplished in these last several
months, and we know that the lives of these children and families, one
by one, will be forever changed!

The Board and staff continue to await the final review and approval
from BDO. The Board does not anticipate there to be any significant
issues that will arise during this process."

5 exclamation marks! We're back in business baby!

A Bumpy Start to the Season

Apparently Christmas is to receive no more deference than Halloween.

Our seasonal festivities started this weekend with a Santa Claus breakfast. No sooner had we arrived with our entourage (both grandparents and nanny tessie) than gramma was kind enough to point out what appeared to be a very damp baby bottom. Normally this would not be a problem, but today, with the distraction of extra people and trying to get her in and out of gymnastics before the party started, the diaper bag got left behind. M didn't seem distressed, so I decided we would try and tough it out. Unfortunately, she wasn't sitting still, and it was really hard to pretend I didn't see it the huge wet spot. I felt the inevitable "bad parent" balloon start to float around my head.

I decided to take her up to the craft table to make a reindeer hat. This entails tracing small child hands into an outline that resembles two antlers, cutting them out, and stapling them to a paper headband. This is where things started to fall apart. Firstly, said small child refused to let the headband touch her head, so I couldn't measure it and had to guess at the right length. Another "bad parent" balloon started following me as I guessed wrong and made it too small. Now it had to perch on top of her afro just to stay on. However, that turned out to be irrelevant as, upon finishing, nothing in the world, including 2 goofy grandparents modelling the headgear for her, would entice Makeda to let it come to rest on her curls. And forget the tears - they are no longer necessary. Unlike Halloween, now I get a hand in my face, or perhaps a karate chop, with a loud "No" that causes the "bad parent, child abuser" balloon to attach itself to me as the crowd gathers.

Luckily, at that point, the pancakes arrived, so I put her on my lap and fed her, thereby closing her mouth and hiding the wet spot. The "bad parent" balloons started to float away. Unfortunately, the wet spot started to transfer to my lap, which was uncomfortable and easily observable as I stood up to get more food.

Then Santa arrived. Santa is often a good distraction, but not when you have a small child with a Santaphobia that will not allow her to get closer than 5 feet to even a picture, never mind the up -close-in-person version. She screamed as soon as he made eye contact.

I put her in the chair next to me to put some distance between her and the evil bearded man, and Tessie took over the breakfast feeding. A moment later, a look of alarm came across her face, but that was followed by "good, she was able to get a burp out". Unfortunately, the calm didn't last. Makeda exploded like a volcano, the likes of which we haven't seen since Grampa got caught in the cross-fire in our last night in Addis, when she was still the projectile queen. Not only was that meal on public display, but the "pre-gymnastics" snack and the morning milk followed closely behind. Despite the attempt at a quick cover up (she's a lethal but silent barfer), the rest of the banquet table guests cleared out. We felt we'd made enough of an impression for one day and slinkered out the door, the multitudinous "bad parent" balloons following closely behind...

Ethiopian Book Club

Way back when (it seems like forever), as our adoption agency was just crawling out of bankruptcy after a successful restructuring vote, 4 of us rather vocal BC'ers tentatively decided that our support group could perhaps now evolve from organizing conference calls to meeting in person and discussing common interests (adoption from Ethiopia seemed like a good start). We decided to start at my house, set a date of November 30th, and determined that we would discuss a book.

After much to-ing and fro-ing we settled on Cutting for Stone, by Abraham Verghese. As time passed, of course glitches arose. Some idiot left her book in a hotel room in Washington, DC (ok, that one was me). Another forgot to get started. Another went to Hawaii and tried to finish it at the last minute and fell asleep and forgot the ending. Basically, we were meant to be together.

We cracked open a bottle (or two), toasted today's successful milestone of 246 amended retainer agreements received by our adoption agency; enough to just maybe get our adoptions back on track, and tucked into Thai food. Yes, perhaps the food/wine selection didn't quite match the reading material, but it's my party and I'll Thai if I want to. And just like that, new friendships were born. We never got around to discussing the book but we covered pretty much everything else. To keep the momentum going, we've settled on My Father's Daughter, by Hannah Pool, for January 2010, but I wouldn't bet money that we get a discussion going.

Here's to new friends!

More Belated Posting

This time from the big birthday party. Thirty people spread out over the house leaving me not too much time with the birthday girl. But we had a great time anyway. And in keeping with old wives tales, I measured her, sans afro, and she came in at a very respectable 34.5 inches. Apparently you take a child's height at age 2 and double it, and you'll get their adult height. Based on that, at 5'9", she'll measure up eye to eye with her dear mama. But her hair will take her over the top, no doubt.

My Little Monster

Yes, I'm very late posting, but I needed time to get over the trauma. Halloween was not a happy event this year. She screamed just looking at the costume. The feet freaked her out so I had to tuck them out of sight, up her pant legs. Putting on the head gear was out of the question. It took two of us to stuff her in - one to manipulate arms and legs and the other to distract and console.

Finally, off we went, one mama and three aunties in tow. She refused to walk - I would set her down on each doorstep and she would quietly reach in a bowl and take her candy, put it in her pumpkin, and promptly reach for pick up with a solemn "up peas". Then I would carry her to the next house. This is why you travel with 3 aunties. Anything less and there's not enough people to take a shift and still collect enough candy for the adults to remotely make the event worthwhile.

The first smile I got was once we were back in the house and she had her first taste of chocolate bar - an Aero to be exact. With her mood having improved somewhat, we tried a photo op - but still to no avail. What you mostly see is a tricky manoever called the "headgear hover", such that said headgear does not actually come to rest upon the reluctant head. So, you have to imagine what the costume might have looked like by combining her body with her aunty's head. I will be amortizing this costume over next year I think.

A Fairy Tale

Once upon a time there was an aspiring cirque du soleil performer who thought that jumping up and down in the crib was a good way to practice lift off. One day she went a little too close to the edge and bounced head first, right over. Luckily, her multi-talented coach, a.k.a. "mama" was standing close by and caught the little trapeze artist head first about 3 inches off the ground. Mama gave herself a pretty big pour. Then she went shopping for (another) baby trap. No more lift off for you baby girl!