Storm Story

Yesterday afternoon a line of wicked stormed moved through the entire Chicago area causing a lot of damage. Winds up to 74 mph were reported in the City. It came on fast and furiuos. I was still at work and was amazed at how difficult it was to get people in the outdoor areas of my workplace to move indoors. Tornado warning in effect, people! I almost got hit by a flying tent - that would have hurt.

As we were assessing damage at work I got a call from Jacek who got call from his brother who got a call from my neighbor - we had a large tree branch down on wires in the back yard. It took a while but I was able to determine the lines were not electrical. Our patio umbrella is trashed, half of our garden including our cucumber trellis is gone, and the worst is this:

That's the remains of our plumeria and the beautiful handpainted pot that Jacek made. Go ahead, click the link see it's story. I'll wait. Yes, that plumeria (this link is a photo of its first flower. This plant brought as a simple stick from Hawaii was ripped in half and toppled over. The top half was found about six feet away. I temporarily stuck its end in the dirt of the broken pot. We'll do a clean cut and see if it can be saved, but I'm not all that hopeful.

Tuesday, on the other hand, is loving it. When we went out this morning to take photos and futher assess the damage she was gleefully hopping from one little stick to the next. She LOVES stick chomping...I thought her head would explode with the excitement of yesterday's bounty!

16 Months LID

Sixteen down ??? to go...

Say What (part 2)?

Welcome to installment 2 of our Say What? series. In the last installment I discussed comments we've received related to forming a family through adoption vs. birth. In this installment I'll outline other comments we've received related to our adoption. Beleive it or not, we've heard the following from friends, family and acquaitnances.

"But you know, she'll look Chinese!?"

Said with sincere concern that perhaps we hadn't thought of it when told we decided to adopt a child from China. This was said to Jacek when I wasn't around. I so wish I had been there to feign surprise: "Really? Chinese?! Jacek, we have to talk about this!" (yes, I have a sarcastic side).

"She'll just be American!"

Said in what I preceived as a combination denial/annoyed tone when informed our child will be Chinese-American and that we will do our best to teach her about her Chinese heritage. Not sure if this was sheer 'patriotism', an effort to deny that our child will born in China or what. I chose at the time to simply ignore the comment.

"Will she speak Chinese or have trouble learning English?"

Said with much curiosity (keep in mind our child will likely be 8-14 months old when we go to China). Cute. Children are very resiliant and pick up on new sounds and language very quickly, so even if our child is older and speaking, she will transition to English. When our child is old enough we will give her to opportunity to learn Mandarin.

"You don't know what your getting - What if something's wrong with her? What if she's retarded or sick?"

Said out of concern and I think with hope we would cancel the adoption and try for a bio-child - also said right after telling me about distant relatives who had just gave birth to a developmentally disabled child. The logic escapes me. Genetic material does not guarantee the health of a child. While we know there are no guarantees in terms of undiagnosed conditions, we are adopting a non-special needs child. If our child does get sick or we discover an previously undiagnosed condition we will take care of her and ensure she has great medical care.

"Will you tell her she's adopted?"

Said in the midst of tearing up with me while previewing the adoption related child's book Shoey and Dot (in all fairness, this person barely finished the sentence before realizing the sillines of it - remember she'll "look Chinese" and we do not). We will always be very open with our child about her adoption, starting the day we receive her. As she grows, we want her to feel comfortable talking to us about her feelings, good, bad, and ugly related to her adoption story so that she can work through them and not let them define her entire being. Adoption is not a dirty little secret.

There are more crazy comments that I've heard from other adoptive parents who are already home with their child. I'll talk about those in the next "Say What" installment.

August Stork Alert

Congratulations to all families logged in November 15 through November 21, 2005 on your long-awaited referrals! As usual all the photos I've seen posted are absolute cuties!

7 days of referrals means there are now 149 LID days ahead of us to be matched. We're still guessing that we'll receive referral sometime late next summer/early fall.