Happy Birthday to Me!!

For those of you who know me, you know birthdays are very big to me. Even though I'm not thrilled to be inching closer to the big 3-0...I did very much enjoy my birthday today. I had lots of phone calls from friends and family, including the birthday song sung to me in harmony. I also got tons of Facebook messages (a new form of communication in my life). The girls at work brought in a cake and got me some of my favorite Jelly Belly jelly beans. Shawn was super sweet all day. After work I opened my presents (including an iTunes gift card and a certificate for a shopping spree with Shawn) and then we went to dinner at a fun French restaurant in Carytown...Can Can Brasserie. We had a delicious meal with a trio of sorbets for dessert. On Friday, I will be celebrating my birthday with my family (including my grandparents and aunt that are visiting from Missouri) that will be topped off with a Cold Stone Creamery ice cream cake...yummy:) Maybe by the time my birthday rolls around again next year we will be parents!

Summer has arrived...

With the celebration of Memorial Day last weekend, summer has arrived for us. That is always the first weekend we head down to my parent's lake house and start enjoying the water and the sun. It was too cold to do much outdoor stuff over the holiday weekend, but Shawn and I took a really quick trip down on Saturday to get in some skiing. The conditions were perfect...warmer weather, smooth water, and we had almost the whole lake to ourselves all day. Usually we have to get out on the water by around 7:30 am to avoid the crowds, but we were even able to ski in the middle of the afternoon yesterday...a real treat!! Shawn is a much better skier than me and he likes to show off by using only one ski, but we both have a great time and my parents seem to enjoy watching us.

On the adoption front...we are plugging along on the paperwork for the dossier. We are hoping to have everything done that we can by the end of this week or early next week. We are still waiting on some things to come back to us from the FBI and US Immigration, but we have no control over that and just have to be patient. We have both been working very hard to gather everything up and it will be a big relief to be able to mail it off and stop thinking about all the little details!

Visiting with Friends

This was a weekend that I had been looking forward to for a long time. My college roommate, Cindy, was coming in from Missouri for a visit. Cindy's sister has been attending college here in town and graduated on Saturday with her Doctorate in Physical Therapy (way to go Becca!!) and I had the pleasure of hosting Cindy and another college friend, Kristin, at my house for the weekend. Shawn was out of town with our Sunday School class for a mission's weekend, and all of us girls took advantage of having the run of the house on Friday night. It was like college again...talking until the wee hours of the morning (okay, I didn't really do that in college since I went to bed at 10:00 every night:), giggling like school girls, and just thoroughly enjoying our time together. Cindy and I don't get to see each other very often, but when we do, we take every opportunity to catch up on everything that we have missed. This time I was also able to spend time with Cindy's parents, who I haven't seen since college graduation in 2002! And the even more exciting thing is that the next time I see Cindy, it will be at her wedding this September in Missouri. There is nothing like being able to share life with great friends who know you almost better than you know yourself!

Big Adoption News!! Dossier Requested!!

We received word today from our social worker that we had moved to the top of our adoption agency waiting list and that the main office is requesting we submit our dossier!! That means that in a few short months we will be on the official waiting list!! For those of you following along closely with our adoption journey, this event has happened 6 -12 months earlier than expected. Due to some other families switching to different countries, the list moved very quickly. We will spend the next few months preparing our dossier which includes things like physicals, marriage and birth certificates, photo pages, fingerprints, psych evaluations...I hope we pass:), and lots of visits with the notary. After we gather everything we need, it is sent to the main office for review, to Colombia for translation, and then to the orphanage where we wait for the call that we have a child. After submission, the wait is estimated at 8-12 months. All of a sudden, this is all seeming very real. Before we know it, Babies R Us will be our favorite store!