Sigh.

How is it a small, cheery little room is an emotional mine field? The pretty little nursery jammed with baby paraphernalia. I ha vent been able to work on anything in there for weeks, its too sad. Every once in a while I'll do a load of laundry and discover an article of baby clothing waiting to be washed. Tiny little pants make me wonder will I have a baby that small? Will they be brand new from the hospital or an older toddler who is already mobile? Will they be a girl or a boy? When will we get the call, weekday, morning, afternoon, 2 am? What will it be like to go from a young couple to a young family? And when? When?

WOOOOO!

WE ARE FINALLY FULLY LICENSED FOSTER PARENTS! I have the license in my hot little hands! Its official. Now if the phone would just ring. . .

Waiting, waiting

Still waiting on the adoption front. The longer it goes the harder it gets! Seems like pregnant women and babies are everywhere! I posted an ad on craigslist for baby sitting. I think it would be good for me, and the extra money could go into the house account. For projects or a new roof.

Bum knee

Our in home interview went wonderfully, thank goodness the agency sent us an animal person! We were pressed to accept a sibling group again but she did accept our refusal. I have nothing but respect for parents who can do so, but thats not me. We *should* be licensed foster parents right now but Dh's boat refused to honor his signed day off, and as such we have to wait to take the class again (and drive very far to do it sooner) till July 12th. This could pose a problem as i have injured my knee badly enough to require a full leg immobilization cast. And the military doctors are dragging their feet, i hurt my leg a week and a half ago (had to go to the emergency room because I couldn't get a doctor appointment till the 24th) and Monday a full two weeks after i was hurt i can SCHEDULE the MRI to see whats up with my knee. Yeah. And i need another minor surgery that is waiting to see whats going on with my knee. I'll tell you what, I will book EVERYTHING around this class. Its more important to me then getting my knee fixed.

i'm struggling right now with being laid up on the couch. I had plans to pain my bathroom, finish the nursery trim, attack the yard, make concrete stepping stones,finish painting the outside of the house, make a rock back patio, and plant flower beds in front of the house. not to mention enjoying summer. Dh and i were thinking about taking a cruise! (through the military) We were going to stay in the caboose we stayed in our first night as a married couple for our 3rd anniversary. Instead my poor over worked husband is having to do the best he can around the house, while i do what I can without injuring myself.

There is a positive to all this.
I get time to read.
I found Dave Ramsey, and he is getting me fired up to do better financially.
I have time to scrap book, i love to do it but am usually to busy.
Plenty of time for animal pets.
Lots of time to coupon, and really search for good deals.
More mind full of trips in the car, since riding hurts and I cant drive.
We have cable TV, when i was sick from my ulcer we did not.
I don't make any income so we're fine financially
Navy medical, all the things I've been through would cost a fortune otherwise!

I'm trying to learn to be content with the way life HAS to be and not beat myself up over letting things go. I AM going to vacuum while sitting on the couch, lol. If only we had a wheelie chair down here i could vacuum a lot more but it would probably hurt the floor.

I do need to call our agency and advise them of the injury, which i hope does not cause any problems. I'm SO worried about that!

Adoption

I'm happy to report my husband and i are well on our way to adopting! Our home visit is scheduled on the 29th. I'm so nervous! There is so much to be done, and its not frugal my friends! Making sure we meet all the regulations is costly! But it will be worth it in the end. I am concerned with our agency. The woman who will be doing the home visit has pushed me during both phone calls to accept 2 children at once. We are not ready to go from no babies to a toddler and infant! Thats far too overwhelming. She says, and i understand that typically they have better success finding 2 healthy little ones under 3 then one healthy baby under 12 months. But this wanna be mama is not ready to go there yet!

Path to parenthood

After a good year of debate dh and I settled on foster to adopt as our route to parenthood. Thats not to say it will be sucessful or that we wont adopt a different way in the future but for now, its how we're going.

Last week I emailed about a $40 baby lot that contained a boopy, swing, tigger door jumper, and a box of clothes. I drove out to my dream area (big lawns, no city, quiet but close to the city amenties) to meet a wonderful woman. When I told her we were adopting she sold me everything but the boopy (which she had determined belonged to someone else) for $20. It was SO awesome! The clothes are boy 0-6 months, stain free and theres a LOT of them. The swing and jumper are both for small infant so if we get an older infant it wont work. But I'm quite sure I can re-coup my $20 if thats the case, everything is in perfect condition. I've been eyeing baby equipment but in till we get everything moved out and painted its best to wait. In less I see an amazing deal or a freebie. I would like to get all my equipment secondhand, theres a lot of turnover in our area and i see great stuff for cheap. I've been debating getting a highchair or one that fits on a the table and i've decided on a highchair. I want to be able to set the baby in the highchair with me in the kitchen. Our table isn't in the kitchen, so that wouldn't work for me! I want a pack and play pen. The stroller might be the only thing we buy new if we decide to get a travel system. Car seats must be new! I have the rocking chair my mom used for me. I'm still thinking about the changing table, we'll see. Its a small room so we might use our tall dresser as both.

I wish spell check was working!

Friday fun

A few days ago I broke down and bought cheap laminate furniture. *sigh* We have several pieces of laminate that I would like to replace, not add onto. But we had pressing storage needs and I have been unable to find something wood I liked. We bought a small cabinet and a shoe storage box to go on top. The one with cubbies for the shoes. Both pieces were on sale for $24 at target. I've been unpacking our last few boxes (we recently bought our first house) and organizing my craft stuff in the new cabinet. Its working very well the little cubbies keep small things from falling all over the place and the bottom cabinet holds bigger items nicely. It even fit in a good spot upstairs so I'm really rather pleased with my new white laminate. *sigh* Hubby mentioned the paint sprayer with a wicked gleam in his eyes. I countered with the much neater paint rollers. We'll see!

Why would I purchase more laminate? Because the faster I get our spare downstairs bedroom cleaned out the faster it becomes a nursery! I'm watching for deals on freecycle and craigslist so far we've been given a walker, play thing, and infant seat that goes in a bath tub. I also watch for deals on baby clothes in the thrift store and in retail stores. My highest price for an outfit is $2.50. Baby day is still a long ways off (longer if i don't get the room set up) I'm looking around for baby stuff now because the more time you have to search for deals the greater the chance of finding a good deal. or better yet free! Unfortunately we need to get some work done on our home before they will approve the home study (foster parent regulations are very detailed) hopefully it wont be too long till its taken care of. I sometimes wonder if our focus on paying down debt wouldn't be better shifted to adoption/foster care. We recently paid off a credit card with a lump $2000 payment.$2000 would have paid for the work on the house. But I suppose paying off the debt will make a huge improvement on our finances which will benefit a baby in the end. We have about $800 in credit card debt left, one car payment and a mortgage. Not to bad. Except for our recent mortgage we're pretty debtphobic, we made that mistake once!