DAY 11: Head over heels for the Red Sox

TV Turnoff Week ended just in time for the first of a three-game series against the Evil Empire (the Yankees) last night. The first seven innings didn't really give any reason to be too excited. It was Varitek's 2-run homer vs. A-Rod's two homers and 4 RBIs. By the way, what did A-Rod do in the offseason? I mean, 12 home runs in 15 games is just crazy. Steroids? Perhaps he's seeing a good sports psychologist? He appears so confident that it's scary. Let's just hope he gets over this hot streak soon. Like tonight.

After being down 6-2 in the bottom of the 8th, the Nation put on their rally caps and came back to win it 7-6. A few things contributed...Varitek's hit, Coco Crisp's triple down the first base line (after his backward flip into the Sox bullpen to try to rob A-Rod of his 2nd homerun - see photo above), and Alex Cora's game winning hit. Oh yeah, and don't forget Mariano Rivera's choked save attempt. With Papelbon unavailable, Okajima got the save for the Sox. It was a terrific nail-biter of the game, just the way games against the Yankees should be.

DAYS 9 and 10: Babies R Us

Tonight, we visited the local Babies R Us store to scope out all the itty bitty cute stuff. Actually, we were really only there to scope out the one piece of equipment that we need, a baby carrier. We have everything else (as my attic cleaning has proven)...a crib, an exersaucer, a high chair, a swing, two of each car seat in at least three different sizes, etc.

While we were there, we also checked out the bottles. Now, I know it's been EIGHT years since I last did this bottle thing, but let me tell you, I was completely overwhelmed by the different sizes, shapes, and logistical concerns of bottles, nipples, liners, etc. With EJ, we pretty much filled a cheap Walmart bottle with water, added the formula powder, and shook it up. However, everyone says doing the bottle-liner thingies are so much easier for traveling, because you don't have to worry about cleaning the bottles as much? I dunno...for some reason, they look far more intimidating than they probably are. There's just something about putting a zip-lock thing in a bottle...

One manufacturer makes these new things called drop ins...little plastic cylindrical liners for the bottle. It's not just a liner, it's a whole new feeding system. I don't think I like the drop-ins, though. They will consume too many cubic inches of precious packing space.

As I walked around the store, I did feel as though I was in a foreign land. It felt very strange. Some of the equipment they have is simply beyond belief. What a marketing scam. A co-worker of mine is getting married soon and I was telling her how brides are such a captive audience because everyone wants their wedding to be just perfect...and then they tell you what you simply MUST have at your perfect wedding. Well, marketing for babies is the same thing...you only want the best for your baby, right? I am here to report that EJ did just fine without having a $50 Ultra Diaper Wipes warmer...

I did not escape all of their clever marketing ploys, however. On our way out the door, I spied this little number that Sophie absolutely MUST HAVE for her return trip to the good ol' USA. Right after we started the adoption process, my mother-in-law called to inform me that there were cute little red, white, and blue outfits on sale at the mall, so I went and grabbed up two of them. Of course, they are both size 18 months, so I'm sure they be too big for her this summer. But this should work just fine:

DAYS 7 AND 8: Mt. Laundry: The Sequel

Not a whole lot of new stuff to report the past two days. I made a lot of progress in Sophie's room over the long weekend. Load #7 of baby laundry is in the dryer now...three loads of baby clothes (one more to go), three loads of bedding, and one load of all the fabric seats for the playmat, carseats, swing, and exersaucer. I think about three more loads to go for blankets and quilts.

The weather has been horrible here for the last few days. The nor'easter that came through has really bombarded us with about 6 inches of rain since Sunday morning. Luckily, we've never had a problem with water in the basement, but the little stream in the front of the property is gushing through the wetlands right now. It looks like we have a moat around the lawn. There were quite a few trees down in the neighborhood, including a large dead one in the back corner of our property that K wanted to take down anyway. Luckily, it fell straight down on the boulders that kind of define the edge of our property, so we could probably just roll it over the boulders into the woods, which is where our Christmas tree graveyard is! For those of you not familiar with our house, we have about 2.5 acres, with about 1.5 of it wooded...most in front of the house.

EJ's desk is nearly done. K finished painting it and it should be all set up in her room in the next few days. She's anxious to get it up there, and I'm anxious to get rid of the little plastic desk in the family room. It will join the other large plastic toys in the attic - an easel, a kitchen, etc. I told her she can set up a play area up there for Sophie.

And finally, you might have noticed that the posts are counting days until will get Sophie in our arms! Let's hope we don't get beyond 50 or 60! We submitted our travel paperwork on Friday, and we are planning to leave for Beijing a day early to take in some extra sites and to adjust to the time change a bit more before Miss Sophie keeps us busy.

DAY SIX: Mt. Laundry

I sorted through the rest of the baby clothes today and came to the realization that, even though the cute little duds were nice and clean when they were packed away 7 years ago, they really all need to be washed again so that sweet Sophie won't smell like a cardboard box! And it's not just the clothes...it's the blankets, the bedding, the quilts, the stuffed animals, the fabric seats for the car seat, stroller, exersaucer, swing, blah, blah, blah. K suggested just going to a big laundromat and getting it all over with in 2 hours!

I also sorted through the smaller (size 6 months) clothes and sorted them into multiple piles: trash, donate, give away, eBay, and of course, the sentimental I-would-never-get-rid-of-these piles. The latter pile has EJ's first Christmas and Easter dresses and two or three other cute ones that I don't think I can part with.

I spent an hour or so on the phone last night with MP, a fellow adoptive mom from our agency, who travelled to China in September (I think) to add daughter S into her family. We met M and her husband B at a parenting course that is required for adopting parents in our state. They met S in Nanchang, the capital of Jiangxi, where we will meet Sophie, so she had a lot of good information about the hotel, restaurants, and shopping on the trip.

Well, it has been a blustery day here in New England. A big nor'easter storm arrived this morning and is expected to hang around through tomorrow, which is a state holiday (Patriots Day) in MA, so I get an extra day in my weekend! I feel bad for the marathoners in Boston tomorrow. To run 26.2 miles is a feat in itself, but to do it when it's 35 degrees, sleeting, and the wind is howling in your face sounds like a miserable way to spend a few hours. Here's hoping there aren't many injuries.

DAY FIVE: Chinese Cuisine

If you know me, you know how much I love to cook. Nothing incredibly gourmet, just good home cooking. I've been busy the last few months doing a little extra cooking on the weekends to fill the freezer with meals that will be easy to prepare when we get home from China...meatloaf, homemade pasta sauce, homemade raviolis, chicken enchiladas, etc.

Speaking of enchiladas, I went on a Mexican cooking binge over the last few years. I love good Mexican food but didn't really know how to cook any of it. Now, I make enchiladas, fajitas, and tacos (without the little packet of mix).

Other than stir-fry, however, I don't really know much about Asian cooking. I think it's time for that to change! Tonight I made a really good soy ginger chicken recipe with a dark brown sauce that has a lot of ginger and garlic in it. But the homemade eggrolls stole the show. I've always wanted to learn how to make them, and they really aren't that hard, once you find out where they're hiding the egg roll wrappers at your grocery store! They were very good. The recipe made about two dozen, so the extras will be added to the freezer's stash of meals.

Today, EJ and I started going through some baby clothes in Sophie's room. I seem to have a lot of 6 month things that I'm pretty sure we won't be able to use, since she'll be almost 9 months old when we meet her. I did find plenty of 9 and 12 month outfits that should work just fine for travel. So far, the seasons of EJs clothes look like they'll line up, since she was born in late May, but always was behind a little on sizes since she was such a peanut. Of course, EJ got a little bored with the baby clothes, especially as I would pull out cute little outfits and start cooing, "Awwww, I remember when you used to where these little pants with the cute lace rows across the behind...I called you my little ruffle butt...." She's nearly 8 and in the midst of the eye-rolling phase, so she had lots of practice at that today.

If you find all this adoption talk interesting, you might want to check out this blog: www.kaffee-klatsch.blogspot.com. This couple just returned from China with their daughter, Sera. I'm not sure which agency they used, but it was very interesting reading about their travels. They give pretty detailed descriptions of their adventures.

Another good book that I'm almost done with is Wuhu Diary by Emily Prager. My friend H read this and thought I would enjoy it. The author adopted a baby named Lulu from China in 1994, and when Lulu was 4 years old, she took her back for a two month visit to her hometown so that the girl could appreciate her homeland through the innocent eyes of a child. It's a very good insight into everyday life.

DAY FOUR: TGIF

Today, I made another trip to the adoption agency to drop off more paperwork - the travel forms and a no change statement (that nothing substantial has changed since our last homestudy update).

As if it's not tough enough to find parking on Beacon Street in Brookline, the whole row of parking spots where we parked just four days ago simply didn't exist today. There was construction and they completely ripped up the street and the parking spaces in that block. I just wanted to get the paperwork there today, as the whole street is closed on Monday for the Boston Marathon! Traffic was already very heavy there, as many runners have already arrived.
We received a copy of Sophie's Growth Report. It says that at two months, she liked to smile at other people. At three months, she would get excited when she heard her caretakers' voices! By four months, they reported that her limbs were very strong, and she could recognize a bottle. When she saw the caretakers holding a bottle, she would quietly wait for them.

I like this paragraph: "She has an extroverted personality and likes others to interact with her. She occasionally is very willful and sometimes is also very impatient. She likes to play outdoors." It also reports that she sleeps well... YEAH! The report is from mid-January, so I hope that the good sleeping trend continues!

I'm hoping to start working in the nursery this weekend. The room is all painted, it's just that everything (mostly the clothes and toys) needs to get in its proper place. You might remember the post way back in January where I spent a whole weekend sorting and repacking EJ's outgrown clothes in the attic? Well, all the boxes that hold clothes for 6-12 months are stacked up in Sophie's room now, so I need to get organized a bit in there.

Finally, today is the start of TV Turnoff Week for EJ. It's a program that the kids can choose to participate in by signing a pledge that they won't watch TV for the next week. They have to list other things they plan to do for the week, and then complete a log of activities for the week. Next Friday, I sign the log attesting that she didn't watch TV and all the participating kids are entered into a raffle for prizes. Of course, last year she had no problem with this, as she rarely watches TV anyway! So, now I have to wait until 9 PM to watch the Red Sox after she goes to bed. Shhh...don't tell her - she has a big sign hanging on the TV:

DAY THREE: More paperwork?

You know, I thought that the worst of the paperwork happened in the first six months of the adoption process, but we've quickly realized that the last six weeks will probably be even more challenging!

Today, Sophie's care package got in the mail. Not an easy process, however. We already had everything in a nice little pile, but there were still Chinese/English labels to put on all the photos in her photo album, and labels for everything. We sent a stuffed animal, a rattle, an Elmer book (in Chinese and English), a blanket, a photo album, and some disposable cameras so that the nannies can take pictures of her and her surroundings until we get there! There is also a letter to the nanny that asks for more specific eating/sleeping information. We also included some lemon ginger tea and pomegranate raspberry tea for the nannies. Seems funny to send tea to China, huh?

Of course, the local post office couldn't ship an express package to the Peoples Republic of China, so an extra trip had to be made to a larger post office.

Next, the visa applications were FedEx'ed to the travel service in New York along with our passports. Once they've been processed, the passports will be returned with a visa stamp in them to allow us into China.

And then, there is another small stack of paperwork that I can deliver to the adoption agency's office tomorrow. Then, I can take a rest for a while (actually, I took a desperately-needed rest through all of this today too - K's the paperwork guy).

And finally, we received this beautiful baby quilt from PC, a fellow member of our church. Isn't it just gorgeous? And I think little Miss Sophie is going to look just gorgeous all snuggled in it. Thanks!