Monthly Update

This update is coming a little later then I had hoped/planned, but adoption stuff aside, this past month has pretty much been non-stop crazy. My last update had us heading into the last month of school for the older kids, and that brings a special kind of crazy/busyness to the table. So we had that going on, friends came in from out of town for a few weeks, we had a birthday to celebrate, and the week after school got out we had family come in from out-of-state to stay for 5 weeks (they're still here). That's a little sample of the non-adoption related events happening here, and add in adoption stuff, and well, this is one of those days I'm thankful to be standing or functioning at all. I will admit I've had way too much coffee lately, but there's a tiny Asian peep waiting for us in China, so I do what I need to do. :)

Here we go...

May 14th- 1st of several Dr. appointments we went to in order to have medical forms filled out for everyone (a couple of us missed our physicals last year).

May 21st- Another Dr. appointment. Dropped off older kid's and E's medical forms to be filled out by their Dr. Also picked up medical form from previous Dr. appt. and watched as she filled out the form for the small person being seen today.

May 23rd- E and I apply for our passports. I still don't understand why you can't smile for your passport picture...not very flattering, and it was humid and had rained that morning so my hair was a little Frodo-esque...good times.

May 24th- Appointment with a nurse to catch one of the kids up on their vaccines.

May 28th- Time for my Dr. appointment and blood work (I haven't had that much blood taken since I had blood drawn at my first pre-natal appt. with our last baby). Picked up the older kids completed medical forms.

May 30th- E went in for blood work so his medical form could be completed.

May 31st- My first appointment with our psychologist. E and I need psych evaluations for our dossier.

June 3rd- E goes in for more blood work because the lab mixed something up the first time and they didn't draw enough blood.

June 6th- E's Dr. hand delivers (to our front door) E's filled-out and notarized medical form because he felt bad about the mix-up with the lab. Love our doctors!

June 7th- E's first appointment with our psychologist.

June 11th- We meet our social worker who came out to do the walk-through portion of our home study. She also interviewed our kids and E's dad and step-mom.

June 11th- Set-up our next meeting with our social worker.

June 14th- I have my paper work appointment (filling out questionnaires) at our psychologist's office.

June 17th- Our Passports Arrive!! :)

June 18th- My completed, notarized medical form arrives in the mail.

Also, mixed into as many of these nights, as we were physically able, are hours of education we've completed. The education portion is going slowest for us right now, simply because with everything else going on it's hard to find free nights and free nights where we're both awake enough to retain the information we're learning. But it's getting done, slow and steady is better then nothing at all.

This past month was hard. Very busy and stressful at times. Emotionally and physically draining. Just an overall hard month.
Again, I know, months from now I will probably look back and think this was the "easy" part, but this was not that month! :)

Thank you for those who have been praying for us!! Please continue to pray!! We have a long way to go, but as each item on our adoption to-do list is crossed off it brings us one step closer to meeting our daughter, and that, some days, is what gets me through!