Jonathan

Yesterday we met our little boy! It was overwhelming yet very easy and natural at the same time. He recognized us from our pictures and called us mommy and daddy. I melted a little and started to cry but held off the ugly cry once I took a moment to breath. We played and hung out for an hour or so and he hugged us goodbye.

He's full of beans, very smart, and very expressive.

This kid is amazing.

For the rest of the night we kept looking at each other with a 'did that just really happen?' look. It's hard to believe after thinking about that moment so many times that it actually finally happened.

We will continue to do some visits over the next week building up to him spending Monday night with us and if all goes well he will just stay. Tonight, Anthony is coming to meet Jonathan. Anthony's been a little hot and cold but over all a little  in different about the whole situation. But, this past weekend he really got interested and was asking questions and maybe even got a little excited.

This morning, when he opened his door, he woke up to a celebration of his new big brother status:

He was pretty tickled.

We cannot wait to go back and spend more time getting to know this little person. 

There is so much more I want to write but don't know if I can without turning into a fountain. I think I need some time to process things and just to sit back and enjoy the moments that are coming our way. 

Thank everyone for you're amazing support and excitement for us! 

We are so happy to be a family of FOUR now!!!

Almost there!

Infoshare. Check.
Information overload. Check.
Meet my little boy...still waiting!

We are through some of the official business; that happened Friday and both of us, running on only a few hours of sleep, had so many names and dates and thoughts and images of seeing our little guy at preschool (man alive he is cute) running through our heads that we felt like they were going to pop right off.

The rest of the official business comes tomorrow when we formally say yes to our worker. There is also a court shindig tomorrow to wrap up a document that should never have existed in the first place, but we are expecting no issues. 

Next up, a transition plan will be put into place and we are hoping by late this week to go meet the little guy and start moving him into his forever home over the next couple of weeks!!!

So you know there's that. Whateves. No big deal. HA!

Also, this has been happening:

Cooked my first Turkey!

 

The cats have been extra cute and extra cuddly since it got chilly out.

I took this as a sign to start making a scarf

 

Had an epic (5 hours counts as epic right?) board game night with some friends 

and an impromptu date night with my love.

 We went for a walk/hike one day...and then this happened

 I found The Jackpot. Plus we bought a few wee things for the little guy. 

You may sense a theme in his items.

 I baked banana bread today and have been slowly figuring out my dehydrator. 

You'd think it would be simpler....

I've also been working away on my two quilts. Perhaps I will even come close to finishing one tomorrow if I...ahem...cough...cough...stay home from work tomorrow:) Got to stay busy somehow to keep away the crazy waiting!

Bring it on

Yesterday it was hard to breath.

The excitement of it all, now that it's only a week away, was brought up a notch as 7 days suddenly seems tangible. 7 days is doable and foreseeable. 7 days seems like a good place to count down from.
The butterflies moved in.

We officially began freakin' out.

My head is everywhere; can't focus, can't keep on topic during a conversation. Even if that conversation is about J it spurs a maze of off-shooting thoughts.

How the heck do I get through the next week?! Today as I was driving home from work, I thought for a moment that it wasn't actually safe for me to be driving. Yep, that's how far my brain has wondered. I had to take deep breaths and turn up the talk radio to try to get out of my head.

Breath.

Breath.

Breath.

I figure tomorrow I start list writing. That always seems to calm me down.

And we made some celebration plans.

Thursday night, the night before our Infoshare and possibly the last night Gord and I will have just the two of us (because of the way Anthony's schedule is with his mom's house and if things move like we think they will we are assuming it's THE last night of our half time parenting), we are going out to celebration the end of a chapter in our lives together. We are going to a restaurant that we can't take kids to and we are going to celebrate US. Then on Saturday we are going to celebrate Anthony and his last few moments of being an only child and do something that we wouldn't do with a 4 year old -  We are going to bundle up once it's dark and drive out of town and do some star gazing (and if we are lucky see some northern lights). And we will probably eat cake. Late at night. Just because we can. And four year olds, well they can't, so that's pretty special.

Bring it on; the tears, the excitement, the joy, the fear, the everything. I'm so ready for this.

Fall photo explosion.

We have had a beautiful fall. Usually in Calgary we get summer and winter but every few years we actually get a few weeks of warm days, cool nights and yellow leaves on the trees for more than 3 days (really, they're all yellow, no orange, no red. Yellow). It's been fantastic.

After getting the news about our match and scheduling our Information Sharing (for October 19th - yeah yeah!) we've been balancing all the excitement and freaking out with carrying on with our everyday...or at least going through the motions but now just with all kinds of crazy thoughts running in our heads! This is what we've been up to:

 Enjoying a real fall and harvesting the last morsals of our wee garden

Enjoying no-rush weekend cooking and dressing like I'm 

going to the county fair in my new boots (from Seattle:)

 

 Enjoying being tourists in our own city during a city open house 

(yyc naked) and exploring cool old buildings and spaces.

 

Getting Anthony into the new hobby of model building. And this one I'm not enjoying, but had to post it - Yep that's a spider in my grapes. You can see where I just pulled one off and ate it before discovering this little friend. I did enjoy that he was dead. I'm now in thearpy.

Enjoying spending time with this soon not to be only child

Working on quilt top number two when number one is still in progress (hurry up Fabricland sales so I can get my batting and backing!!). AND, of course enjoying those super sweet kitties and their peeking under doors when they get left out. Seriously can't get enough of them. Best. Cats. Ever.

Up next: more quilting, more pretending to work and trying not to check out completely, more freaking out and counting down days (12) AHHHHHH!!!!

Catch up - Seattle

Oy, where to begin? The last couple of weeks have been a whirl wind of the crazies and busyness and, well, name an emotion and I think I've had it. Actually the whirl wind started the week before when we went on a 3 day Seattle binge for a last minute and probably last chance get away. It looked like this:

 Early morn' plane ride (why do we always book ridiculously early flights?!)

 

A full day of wondering and walking the market and harbour

 Practicing our horror movie faces at the EMP museum

 

 The aquarium (I love them those otters)

 

 

 

 Chihuly Garden and Glass Exhibit. Loved loved loved it.

Underground tour and serious seafood night. Both were delicious.

Short and sweet. That's how you play catch up:)