Spring Soccer

This weekend started the official spring soccer games ! All 3 kids had great games that were really fun to watch. Carson is on the kindergarten team and this is his second season. Zoe is on the 3rd-4th grade girls team and this is her first season. And Zane is on a team that covers 5th- 8th grade boys. It was hard to get any action photos of his team they were moving so fast:) and some a couple feet taller than Zane! He has played soccer since he was 4 . GOOD TIMES ! I am glad the weather held out yesterday. Today we are back to windy, cold, rainy and a chance of snow. UGH.
Bambi

Flights Booked

Just a quick update . Adam booked our flights today to and from Haiti ! How exciting is that :) I just had to share our excitement. Later,
Bambi

Yea!!!! We received an update today from our agency on Vania. The update says she is developmentally on target, healthy and happy ! Great news. I am so glad to see her smile and know she is doing well . Just beautiful !! Can't wait to pick her up and hold her tight. Bring on June.

Bambi

Wild Things

Well, spring has sprung and our new bird friends are back. Adam says the word on the street must be that the Estep's are taking in animals and giving out free food :) Part of a stimulus package for animals i guess . Any how...Last year we had a yellow finch who sat on the ledge of our half round window and pecked at the glass. Annoying but somewhat tolerable( and cute :) This year we have a huge robin that keeps dive bombing our window morning and night ! Zane actually printed off a picture of a bald eagle and taped it to the window to try to scare away the robin, but to no avail it is on a kamikaze mission to get in the house and nest.

It has been like an episode of Wild Kingdom or National Geographic around here. I keep waiting for the theme song to start up at any minute. you know the one !

Zane also has ,what we think is, a catfish that he caught in our friends creek last summer. It used to look like a small sucker fish . Now it has tripled in size and started to prey on the other fish in the tank .( Please see picture below) this is what we woke up to yesterday morning. You will notice a pretty black and yellow fanned out guppy tail hanging out of it's mouth. Time to set the catfish, or whatever it is, free .



Then we have Bulls Eye the Gecko who we supply crickets to ( dusted with Calcium ) every morning and watch him slyly hunt them down. And of course we control his temperature and humidity with heating lamps and de chlorinate his drinking water as well. He even has a night light . AHH, the circle of life:)










And Cleo, our domesticated Canine that just tries to keep up with it all. She has that Robin marked though. I don't know who it bothers more us or her. If only that robin would just fly a little closer.......
Bambi:)

Birthday Fun

Here are pictures from Zoe's birthday. She had a rough start to her day but eventually ended up having a great party with family and friends.

Yesterday morning Adam took her to her pre op appointment and she had to get her blood drawn. Well...the stick part went fine but then 2-3 minutes later she blacked out. The nurse carried her into another exam room to lay her out and she came to while he was carrying her. She was fine and alert quickly but Adam said it was pretty freaky. The nurse was great and gave Zoe and Carson each a popsicle and off they went to the next destination , Pet Smart.

Zoe has wanted her own pet for awhile. So we decided to get her a Gecko. Adam and I had bought all the necessities for Gecko living ( which can be an expensive initial investment:) and stored it in the back of our van last weekend so that all we would need to do on her birthday would be to take her to get the Gecko. So after the doctor appointment they went to pick it out and brought it home 30 min before her party. That is important to know because it tends to get a little chaotic at that time. We were downstairs trying to put the Gecko back in the cage , and things were getting a little dramatic as we were going back and forth about who was going to put the Gecko back in the cage. So when Zoe tried to take over ,the Gecko twisted it's little head around and bit her! She dropped it flew into the bathroom & slammed the door ."Take it back to the store" "I hate that vicious creature"she yelled. Well I'm glad to report that 24 hours later she and the Gecko are best buddies and adjusting to each other well. As I type she has it out AGAIN ! Instead of a lap dog it is a lap lizard and hasn't tried to bite her anymore. As everyone arrived at her party she had two things to report right off the bat.1) I passed out after my blood draw today and 2) my birthday present bit me:)

Make a Smilebox slideshow

HAPPY BIRTHDAY !

Zoe turns 9 today ! I can't believe she is already half way to 18 ! Boy, how time flies. I'll post birthday pics tomorrow after all the fun. We love you ZOE BELLE ! HAPPY BIRTHDAY !



MOM & DAD

The Amazing Race

Adam and I love to watch the show the Amazing Race. We joke that being on the show would be the only way we would ever be able to travel around the world. The only bad part being that it's a whirl wind vacation ( a Mc Vacation:) not really being able to see but a glimpse of everything as you try not to be the last team to the pit stop for fear of elimination.

The first time we went downtown to be fingerprinted by USCIS for our i600A it was kinda like the amazing race. Not knowing what to expect we left early so we could find a parking place and take our time walking a couple blocks to Leveque Tower. Little did we know there was a parade scheduled that was running right through downtown. After navigating through detours and finally making it to an underground parking garage we threw the van in park and rushed out of the parking garage afraid we would be late for our appointment. Our plan of a leisurely stroll turned into a jog and eventually we held hands and made a break for it through the parade blocking our route. Whew, we had made it just in time! We checked in at the front entrance of the building and up the elevator we went. Once there we threw open the doors and all you could hear were crickets. I'm not kidding, it was like the twilight zone. We were the only people there. We laughed as we were instructed to find a seat and wait until our number was called. Needless to say the next time we were fingerprinted we new we did not need to risk life and limb to get there. I think there was one other person this last time:) But hey, we'd make a great team if we ever made it on the show.

Soccer has started in full swing this week. Keeping us busy:)

We have been hit really hard with illness,namely strep throat, since fall.Carson in on some strong antibiotics and still managed to pick up a virus and is home from school today.Zoe has a pre-op appointment, for a tonsillectomy, this Friday( which is also her 9th birthday:)so that tells you how sick they have been. Zane has been able to stay well for the most part. Please pray that we can knock this illness out of the family soon!

The adoption front has been quiet and I keep reminding myself to keep moving and back off from the e-mail. Remember a watched pot never boils. Oh well ,I've gone on long enough. Bye for now!
Bambi

On The Job Training

Last week I was in line at the drive through pharmacy and the person in front of me abruptly backed up and sped off. Apparently unhappy with however long he had to wait. I will be the first one to admit that I hate to wait! I love my drive thru coffee shop, pay at the pump gas service, drive thru restaurants and drive thru pharmacy. A couple years ago I would probably have backed up and sped off after a 5 minute wait too. But it dawned on me while sitting there...hey I think I've gained some ground in this waiting business. So I started to think of the other things the adoption process has taught me...

• I have learned to appreciate FedEx, UPS & my neighborhood mail lady. I 've even developed a sixth sense of being able to hear the mail truck anywhere in the neighborhood.
• I have learned about all my government offices. County, local , state you name it. I can tell you their weekday, weekend and holiday hours.
• I have learned to use my computer. I couldn't imagine not having it and feel like I should name it!
  
• I have learned to use e-mail. My husband has taught me that 24 hours is an appropriate length of time to wait for an e-mail response. I tend to get crazy and refresh(which I have also found that button:) a thousand times.
• I have learned to blog! Finally a hobby of some sort.

I have learned so much and have so much to learn. A friend of mine at an adoptive mom's group said when she started the process she was envisioning a "Mc Adoption". You pull up get what you ordered and off you go. I think until you get in and start doing the work it is hard to fathom the enormity of the process and what is involved. There are no drive thru's. It is a journey.The deeper we get into the process I begin to realize how much of a privilege it is to be adopting and the importance of the steps we need to go through. Adopting is not for everyone. It's big and complicated and emotional. But,we're running the race and going the extra mile. How sweet it will be to get to the end and bring our children home. Until then , we wait , continue to learn and enjoy the journey.
Bambi

A Chapter Closes

Today Adam and I made the decision to pull our dossier from China. Adam and I seriously started investigating adoption in January of 2007. By May we had started the paperwork for China and by fall we had our dossier logged in with the CCAA. Wait times began to grow( I think they are now estimating up to a 4 year wait) . Our agency had to close all out of state branches due to hard economic times. We placed ourselves on the special needs /waiting child list only to find out a short time later that our agency had not been Hague approved therefore the CCAA had put a hold on their waiting child program as well. We were going no where!

Last fall in 2008 we decided to start weighing out our options. I started looking around at agency's that allowed you to view their waiting child lists with out filling out an application. Remember, we had just funded the first part of the China adoption so we could not just go around investing a lot of money in other agencies. And we prayed!

Well our prayers were answered. I happened to find the Wasatch site while looking for agencies working with Taiwan and what popped up , but Haiti waiting children. Then she caught my eye. Little Witchina ( Callia Grace, our Haitian angel ). I immediately contacted Wasatch and the rest is history.

And then we prayed even harder. How were we going to be able to afford starting the process all over? Well God answered that question too. But he waited for us to make the decision to proceed first. Once we decided to take that step of faith, God provided. Adam was literally pulled into his bosses office the next day and offered a promotion we were not expecting. We felt recharged and ready to give it another go!

We thought we would keep our dossier in China until we had our paperwork done and submitted to Haiti. Well that is done now and I have been feeling like it is time to close that chapter of our adoption journey. I would have never thought almost two years ago we would be adopting from Haiti. I have said before that I tend to be directionally impaired. Sometimes it takes a couple of u-turns to get me going in the right direction. But, we couldn't be happier than to be on the road we are on now! Haiti or Bust.

Bambi

RUMBLINGS

Yipeeeee! There are rumblings of plans for the next parent trip.This is when we will get to meet Vania for the first time and also file for our I600. We are super excited!The tentative dates are June 13th-19th. Just perfect.Here we come, Haiti or Bust!
Bambi

Music to my ears

Zane had his first 5th grade band concert this afternoon. He had missed his last concert due to strep throat , so we were very excited see him perform with his classmates. We were very impressed by the whole 5th grade ! Bravo ! Funny enough Zane refuses to practice his trumpet at home. With that said we rarely get to hear what he's learned. Yesterday he whipped the trumpet out and gave us his own private concert in the living room. WOW! Music to my ears. At the beginning of the school year( when it was still warm enough to keep the windows open in the evening ) people would pass by and give the "someone's learning to play the trumpet look" :) Now I am happy to say we are past the point of ear plugs. We really enjoyed hearing him play. And I have to say he looked very handsome in his black tie! ENCORE !
Bambi