Is anyone else married to Clark Griswold? It looks like our house has thrown up Halloween, orange twinkle lights on any part of the house that will stay still. My husband is crazy about Holiday decorating, September 1st he started bugging me that it was time to get started for Halloween, I was able to hold him off until this week...... My surgery is scheduled for October 17th, I sure hope it makes me feel better, I am tired of being in pain.. I read some funny travel adive the other day, it stated that you should try to blend in while traveling abroad. That gave me a good laugh trying to picture my husband who is about 6'4", 240lbs and blonde trying to "blend" in while we are in Vietnam..... maybe not!!!!!!! We received our updated homestudy on Tuesday, so I raced it to the Post Office so it would get to our agency ASAP... I had the age range changed from 0-12 months to 0-30 months, we told our agency that we would accept a referral under 2 years old, so we will see where that gets us. When our Dossier went over, we were in the 1st 40 families with our agency with completed Dossiers. Well, almost everyone requested a girl 0-12 months with the majority wanting as young as possible. So after some thought, we decided that as young as possible was not a big deal to us. Maybe, with this change, we will get a referral sooner (please cross everything for us). Since Kitten may be a bit older that originally planned, I am thinking about ordering a new carrier, the EllaRoo Mei Hip Baby Carrier http://www.ellaroo.com/mei-hip.php Looks great for older babies, and I like it cups the shoulder. Cute patterns too. I am sooooooo excited for everyone who received referrals this week and also news of possible referrals. I hope next week brings more referrals and travel news.

I survived Cedar Point..... We had a great time, we went up with 3 other couples. The 3 of them decided to share a room to save money, we wanted no part of that, so we had booked our own room. We ended up with a King size suite with a huge jet tub, large living, dining room and kitchen. Their room was tiny, only about the size of our hotel living room. I really loved having a king size bed, so much more room, we have been talking about buying a new pillow top mattress, but now I think the husband finally agrees that a king size bed is a great idea. I think it is a great idea, especially when Kitten comes home, more room to snuggle in bed with her and watch Disney movies. The Halloween stuff at Cedar Point was fun, I stayed away from the scary stuff, but Rich enjoyed it. Had I been feeling better, I may have done some kind of scary things with him. See the thing is, I am going to be having surgery on my right ovary....... I know sounds like fun right!! The ovary has attached its self to some stuff it is not supposed to and so now it is very painful and if I make any sudden movements (sneeze, turn suddenly , stand to fast ect.) I get a stabbing pain that makes me want to through up. So needless to say, I did not want to be scared and jumping around. I am hoping this surgery makes me feel better, my mom is planning on coming up for it, she is a Surgical Nurse and has been in on tons of surgeries like mine and being a mom she wants to supervise everything. I told my Doctor I want this taken care of before we get Kitten home because I want to be 110% for her. Well enough talk for now.

12 weeks since our paperwork left for Vietnam. We had our homestudy updated to include a child over 12 months. We went ahead and just did it incase Kitten in over 12 months old. I hope to get the new homestudy tomorrow and then get it mailed right out to Faith. This weekend we are going to Cedar Point in Ohio for their Halloween Spooktacular... I am not into roller coasters or scary things, but Rich is, so I will be the good wife and enjoy myself being the map guide. We will be gone for just one night, but it will be nice to get out of the house, it gets hard looking at a room for our little person that is all done and ready, but it is still missing the most important element, Kitten...
I hope everyone has a great weekend and next week brings lots of good news from Vietnam.

Well, I cryed myself to sleep last night after the Notre Dame game...... Now today is a better day for me, the husband took me out to dinner for our Anniversary, it was very nice. Our actual Anniversary is tomorrow, but he has to go out of town for work so we celebrated today. I got him a new wedding ring, since he lost his a while ago. He got me a fantastic new Coach purse (I LOVE Coach purses), I only have a few because they are a bit pricey. I suspect he got me such a nice one because he knows I am sad that we do not have referral yet and Coach always makes me happy. I must say that I have a great husband that takes great care of me, and I know he will do the same with Kitten. Speaking of Kitten, I saw a cute shirt made by Carters that says "Cute As A Button" on it and has a little bear button on it, I just had to get it. Target also has a cute t-shirt that says "Everyone Loves A Brown Eyed Girl" I have to get that onetoo... As I said before, my parents a relocating to Tennessee, they are going up next weekend to house hunt. They have decided that they want to try to find a house with a few acres, with that, they also informed us that they intend to get Kitten a Pony and some Goats. I had Horses, Ponies and Goats growing up and they want the same for her... I said that's great, but she is going to be disappointed that here at home it is against city code for us to have Ponies and Goats..... I am beginning to think that my parents have been abducted by aliens because these are not the same people I have know for almost 28 years...... They are constantly sending packages for Kitten with books, toys and clothes in it. I am just not sure what to think of these people that claim to be my parents... Deep down I think it has to do with the fact that my mom was 20 when she had me and they really did not have much for a while, now they are almost 50 and financially secure so they can really splure on the grandchild. Plus, I am an only child , so Kitten will be the center of their Grandparent Universe. My parents are such great people and we always have so much fun with them, I guess that's why we always seem to go on vacation with them. We are very excited for them to move so much closer to us.

I really need to get with the program and figure out how to load pictures onto this thing, one of my friends said she would show me how to do it, but its a matter of having time to get together..... I'll get it done soon enough then I will load everyone down with photos of cute clothes, a cute baby room and my couch potato(e) dog the lovely Miss Shelby. Today being Saturday, I get to enjoy my favorite pass time, College Football!!! I especially love to watch my beloved Notre Dame Fighting Irish. I sit here in my Notre Dame Football Jersey ready for them to take on that school from Ann Arbor Michigan (I choose not to call them by name). I love game days for Notre Dame, I can see the Golden Dome from my house and hear the Marching Band play the fight song and of coarse hear the roar of the crowd. You probably wonder why I do not actually go to the games since I live so close, the answer is, I can see the game better from my big screen in my basement, plus I do not have to wait in line for the bathroom and the weather is always better in the house. We normally go to 1 game a year just to enjoy it from inside the Stadium. GO IRISH!!!!!

Oh how I love Target, I went to Target this morning and scored several items of clothing and did not spend more that $2.50 on each one. Deals like that always make me smile. I spoke with our agency today, no new news. But, the director of our agecny is in Vietnam so maybe more news when he returns. We also decided to let them know that we would be open to a girl a bit older than 12 months if one becomes available. We were told that most people are wanting for as young as possible and we wanted them to know that older if fine by us. When we first started this process I wanted to adopt between a 2-3 year old and my husband want younger so we requested 0-12 months now we are saying less than 2 years old would be fine..... We figure God will match us with the little girl that is supposed to be ours no matter what.

Some days I think it is strange that I have trouble remembering what I did the day before, but I have NO problem remembering every single thing I did on September 11, 2001. That fateful day 5 years ago will be with me for the rest of my life. I remember someone's stupid remarks that truly showed he had no soul. I remember my husband (then boyfriend) was out of town for work, I was scared to be home alone, not knowing what was going on in the world. I was constantly on the phone with my mother who lives in Florida. The one good thing I can say was that my Grandfather had not lived long enough to see those attacks, he passed away 4 months before this happened. To me, my grandfather was an American War Hero, he was a Fighter Pilot in World War II, he like all American Soldiers really knew /know what it is to give all for the country that they love. Had he been alive and seen the attacks on the U.S.A. he would have been so heart broken and probably would have wanted to fight the terrorists himself, never mind he was 80+ years old and had Parkinson decease so bad he was basically wheel chair bound. With all this being said, I send my thoughts and prayers out to all American's as we struggle to come to turns with the changes that have happened to us in the last 5 years.

We had a new Macy's store open up here, they had a great grand opening sale. So me and the MIL went to see what kind of trouble we could get into. We got some great outfits for Kitten on super sale..... They where $40.00 outfits that we ended up paying about $7.00 for. (I love sales like that). We decided to get 12 month size clothes since they go up to 25lbs, they should fit her for a while. We will have one stylish Kitten on our hands.

How about I start with some back ground information. I am Jody and my husband is Jon, we are waiting for a referral for a baby girl from Vietnam. We are working with Faith Internation Adoption Agency, our Dossier went to Vietnam on June 29, 2006. I will, from now on, refer to my husband as Rich (my favorite nickname for him...) and to protect our little one I will call her Kitten (nickname my mom has for her). Kitten will be the first grandchild in both of our families, so needless to say there are two grandmother's not so patiently waiting for this little one to get home so they can spoil her. My parents who currently reside in Florida are actually moving to Tennessee to be closer to us (we are in Northern Indiana). Tennessee is as close as they would move, because they don't want snow...... Plus, my dad is able to transfer within his company. Well, enough for now.....