Happy Ending!

Hello, Blog world -

I don't know if anyone is looking at this blog anymore, but I wanted to add one last entry... we are finally parents! We switched to a domestic adoption program in late summer, waited on their wait list for only 4 weeks, and are now completing the adoption of our new daughter, born in November. We are thrilled and humbled and exhausted (in a good way!). I don't intend to keep updating this blog, or to post many details here in such a public space, but if anyone would like more information about our new agency or our process, I'd be happy to share. Leave me a comment with your email address or send me a message.

Best wishes to those of you still on your adoption journey....


(Our first family portrait!)

Difficult Decision

Hi all -

Well, it's been a month since I last posted, and it's been an eventful month for us.

After lots of thought, prayer, tears, and more prayer, we have decided not to move forward with our Kazakhstan adoption plans. We met with our agency on Friday to withdraw from the program.

This has been a tough decision for us.

Our paperwork has been at the Ministry of Education since October 1st of last year. We requested a child of either gender, under 18 months of age. This is a pretty typical request. But for some reason, our paperwork just has not progressed out of the MOE. Our agency has requested information about our dossier, and they are simply told "There's nothing wrong with the paperwork." That's the only info they've been able to get. Meanwhile, many families from our agency that are technically "behind us" in line have gone ahead of us. As I stressed in my previous post, we are ecstatic for those families who are traveling... but when this happens repeatedly, month after month, we're left with the impression that something's not quite right.

Also, because Russell is starting a new job in August (a teaching position), he has no opportunities for leave time until next summer. There's no paternal leave, and he doesn't qualify for FMLA. So even if we got an invitation to Kazakhstan, we'd have to decline it.

I have to stress that the staff at Children's Hope have been nothing but supportive, kind, diligent, and empathetic during this process. We have felt so blessed to be working with them and we'll miss them tremendously.

For those of you with CHI who are still waiting on a Kazakh adoption, you are in my thoughts. I used to obsessively read blogs written by those who were ahead of us in line, and when something wouldn't go right for them, I'd get really worried - both for those families and for us. Please, please, please... don't let our experience and our decision shake your confidence and your faith in your path to adoption. If your child is waiting in Kazakhstan, then nothing can stand in the way of your getting there!

All of you who are traveling or about to travel - I am thrilled beyond words for you and can't wait to follow along with your journey.

We haven't totally given up on our quest to be parents. We're not entirely sure what the next step is. We might do some more research on domestic adoption. For now, we're just going to spend some time enjoying each other's company and not worrying about the phone ringing (or not ringing) with adoption news.

Thanks so much to all of my new blog friends and to all my friends and family who've supported us...

Guess What We're Doing?

That's right, still waiting.

You know what, blog friends? I'll let you in on a little secret....

I'm really sick of waiting.

There. I've said it.

This weekend, Russ and I will be working on putting together our 3rd dossier in 3 years, since all of our Kaz stuff has now expired (except the FBI and the 171 form, thank goodness). We'll need to update our homestudy and re-do all the other documents (including notarizing, apostilling, etc.). Is there such a thing as a "Frequent Apostiller's Club" ??? Can we get a discount or something? We're probably single-handedly funding some state programs in Missouri and Illinois with all the apostille fees we've paid over the years....

You know, 2 weeks ago, I was SURE we were going to get a phone call that week. I got a funky, weird, excited feeling the weekend before... I just felt certain that the phone call was imminent. Heck, I then sat down to read a weekly Bible lesson that I subscribe to, and there were all kinds of passages about family and children. It was so cool! There was the verse from Psalms about how "God setteth the solitary in families." There was also the story of Moses' mother making what I now think of as an "adoption plan" for him when she realized it was no longer safe for her to keep him. She put him in an ark and placed him in the reeds by the river where she knew he'd be found. I took great comfort from all those ideas.

And the days passed that week, and there was no phone call. No news. No updates. :^(

So the question I had then was: what the heck WAS that feeling? It felt like inspiration... was it wishful thinking? Was I being delusional? I just felt so sure.... that has happened a few times during the past couple of years... I don't know what to make of those feelings anymore.

There are two things that are really challenging to us during this part of the wait. First is that we are way beyond the original estimation of when we'd travel. When we turned our paperwork in last spring, we were told we'd travel in 6-8 months. Once 8 months came and went (back in February), we started living week-to-week, anticipating imminent travel. That's a long time to be waiting on the edge of one's seat. We feel like we're floating around in some sort of limbo.

The second thing that's kind of tough to take is that there are folks from our agency whose dossier got to the MOE after ours who have travelled already. We've been "skipped" several times now. We're not waiting on a girl (I know that slows things down). We requested either gender, up to 18 months. But we keep getting skipped. I don't mean to sound jealous of those families...I'm thrilled for those families who are traveling to Kazakhstan to meet their children. But it makes it pretty tough for us to wait, week after week. Our agency has been so supportive and understanding through this time. They don't know why we've been skipped, either. We've been told there's nothing wrong with our dossier.

But I still believe that international adoption ain't for wimps and it requires optimism and courage, and that we're in this for the long haul.

Hope springs eternal...

Maybe the phone will ring this week...

New Kaz Books

Just a quick post for all you fans of Kazakhstan...

I ordered two books from Amazon that came in the mail today. One was "Apples are from Kazakhstan"... it's a just-published travelogue by Christopher Robbins... looks interesting.

The other is called "Kazakhstan" by Dagmar Schreiber. It's a travel guide with details about accomodations, etc... nowhere near as detailed as the Lonely Planet's Central Asia guide... BUT... it's got gorgeous photos (and tons of them!), plus excerpts from famous literary figures in Kaz history, plus info about treks you can take that are off the beaten track... it's really cool. And the writing is fun, too... here's an excerpt (the first two lines of the entry on "Karaganda"):

"A remarkable, spherical thorny plant named 'karaghanik' grows in the central steppe region of Kazakhstan. It comes to life in stormy weather and whirls over the plain like a horde of rabid hedgehogs. Karaganda owes its name to these plants."

I love this!

New Goats! New Goats! New Goats!

We bought more goats for the college today!!! We expanded the goat herd by three new babies today, putting them to work on controlling shrubs and invasive species next to our prairie plots on campus. The new ones are about 4 months old, Boer/Nubian crosses. Here are some pictures of the new babies:

A goat on the go (we brought them home from the farmer's place in a dog crate):

New kids in their new neighborhood, checking out all the cool stuff to eat:

They came from a farm with a short grass pasture and had been raised on goat chow... so all this green stuff was totally fascinating! They eventually gathered around a really big oak tree and nibbled on the bark.

One new baby was born with no horns... we're thinking of calling her "Baldy"... or "Nubby"

These are our two older goats, Mata (in foreground) and Buko (background), hanging out under their summer shelter (it was raining) and checking out the new additions. They weren't sure about them AT ALL.... There was a little head-butting at first. I'm sure they'll be working out the "pecking order" for a little while.

Here's everybody under the shelter, still checking each other out...

So cute!!!! Sometime in the last year or so, I have obviously developed a fondness for goats. I was a little wigged out by the thought of starting this project at first, but one of my students, who comes from a sheep ranching background in Montana, really helped talk me into it. And I'm glad we did it... they do an amazing job on the weeds and shrubs around our prairies! We're also fortunate enough to have student workers who can go feed and water them. But now I've got other folks in the region calling me for advice with how to start a weed control project with goats! Somewhere along the line, I seem to have become the local "Goat Woman" (which is bizarre, because I am a total novice at this and am still nervous about the idea of caring for livestock... I worry about them all the time (ask my student workers and our land manager, who oversees them... I'm constantly asking if the shelters okay, if they're getting enough to eat, etc, etc.)

You guys are awesome!

A big THANK YOU to all of you out there in blog-land who have posted hopeful and encouraging remarks on our blog in the last month or so... after I've posted two marginally cranky posts in a row, I owe you guys a lot for your uplifting comments. I especially appreciate all of you granting me "permission" gripe and moan a bit about how things are going (or NOT going, as seems to be the case here...)

So here are a few tidbits of good news:

First, CHI (our agency) opened a new region today! They're now working in the Karaganda region. Of course, the first thing I did upon hearing that news was jump on Google and check out who else has adopted from there. Sounds like a cool place. I'd be totally happy to be our agency's "guinea pig family" and be the first from CHI to travel there. Who knows? :^) Hopefully, opening another region will speed things up a little bit?

Second, the CHI families who are in country (or currently between trips) have apparently had smooth travels and smooth experiences (not many of them currently have public blogs). I'm so grateful for their good experiences!

I don't have any idea when our big exciting phone call will come in, and yes, the wait time has started to make me pretty cranky at times. But I came across an awesome quote from II Corinthians yesterday: "We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed; we are perplexed, but not in despair..." I was reading an essay that quoted this passage from Paul. The author of the essay described the apostle Paul as the biggest "cheerleader" for the early struggling Christians... and he sent this quote in a letter to the Christians in Corinth to encourage them during trying times. So I'm trying to live up to this quote... the frustration and sadness threatens me, but I'm going to choose not to be distressed... I'm perplexed by MANY, MANY things about the adoption, but I'm choosing not to be in despair.

I've been thinking about how blessed I've been - with many aspects of my life - but particularly recently - great husband, great job, great colleagues at my office. Last year, I led my last study abroad for a while, and I've been reviewing pictures and videos from that trip. So I thought I'd share a few pics from my last abroad to New Zealand in 2007 (my "farewell" to study abroads before taking on parenting.... but my abroads were really what taught me about parenting in the first place! I've had fabulous students on my trips!):

Here's me, right before hiking up a glacier (one of my favorite parts of the trip):

And here's my 2007 group up on the glacier:

A photo from part of the trail on the Milford Track, a 33 mile backpacking trip we do in southern New Zealand... a fabulous place... it gets nearly 21 FEET of rain there per year and last year, we had 2.5 sunny days out of 4. Amazing!
Students on a swing bridge during the trek:

Me and a student, contemplating the overlook called "12-second drop" (i.e. how long it would take for something you dropped to hit the valley below... it's a looooong way down!):

One of the very few sunny days at the top of the Milford Pass... that's my group of students, milling around on the lookout...

(Oh my gosh, can you imagine anything more beautiful????)

A kea, a mountain parrot, on the roof of our hut during the trek (and yes, he's turned his head completely upside down):

Below, the most amazing view imaginable: dolphins surfacing in front of your sea kayak on a gorgeous sunny day in New Zealand:

I miss New Zealand!

Still here...

Hello blog friends,

I am still here, still alive and kicking. Been avoiding the blog for a while... I'm really a pretty private person, and it's weird enough to be sending thoughts about my life out into the blogosphere...It's been a long couple of weeks here in Waiting-For-LOI-Land... and still no news... so during the past couple of weeks, I have been operating under the mantra, "If I don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all." I had an encouraging phone call from my social worker a couple of weeks ago. His suggestion (which is a great one) was "Live your life." Meaning, don't live on pins and needles, waiting for an imminent phone call. This is, of course, easier said than done (although my SW is an adoptive dad, and I'm sure he remembers the waiting time, too!).

So I'm trying to live my life, but there are some things that just end up being affected anyways.... I'm skipping my annual week-long field trip next week to the Smoky Mountains with my botany class because there's no cell reception at the campground where we stay, and I thought that a week was too long to be away from the phone. :^(

I've been teaching most of my classes as though I perhaps won't be here towards the end of the school term... getting student projects started early, etc. Thankfully, the schedule this term is pretty flexible.

So I'm TRYING to be patient, but I still feel like I'm sitting on the edge of my seat, waiting for something HUGE to hit me. The question is, how long can you sit on the edge of your seat before your butt falls asleep and you start squirming around impatiently? How long before you hop up and start pacing around the room? How long before you start jumping up and down and yelling randomly? :^) I think that all of us waiting parents-to-be ought to have some kind of stress-reliever get-together, where we can ping off the walls and scream and laugh until we cry about what a bizarre process international adoption really is....

'Til next time...

Tick...tock...tick...tock....random thoughts on a Friday afternoon.

That sound you hear is the ticking of the clock.... we are still waiting, waiting, waiting, waiting... endlessly waiting... I sometimes feel like I'm in some weird state of suspended animation. I'm going about my life - eating, sleeping, working, etc - but I'm killing time, waiting for something BIG to happen. I feel like I'm on a treadmill, walking on and on and on, but not really getting anywhere. How do people ever feel a sense of progress when waiting for an adoption?

There's definite progress when you're paperchasing... you get your dossier documents together and check things off the list. But after that, it's so difficult to feel a sense of progress. You can see people who are technically "ahead of you" on the list going off to meet their little ones. Right now, the people from my agency who are traveling have paperwork dates that are very close to mine. And so I know, somewhere in the back of my mind, that this means I should be approaching that travel time, too... but for some reason, it never really feels like progress to me. I wake up every morning and think, "Today could be the day!" And then around mid-day, when there has been no exciting phone call, I realize that it won't be today. Is our LOI days away? Weeks away? Months away? I've never been pregnant before, but I sort of imagine that this is like being in the 11th month of a pregnancy... you're pretty ready for something to happen. I live and work on a small college campus and EVERYBODY knows that we're waiting on an adoption. So I typically get asked "Any news?" or "Where's the baby?" about 3-5 times per day (no exaggeration). I love all these people, and they mean well (they're only asking because they're excited and they care), but there are only so many ways to answer that question. Sigh...

It's tempting to try to not think about the adoption at all (HA! Like that's possible!)

I fully believe that this adventure has been divinely impelled and directed. And so I think a lot about the idea that this will unfold on God's time, not ours. But then I start wondering... why has this taken 3 years? Why do I feel so impatient? Is it ungrateful of me or does it show a lack of faith to question the timing? Is it okay to be a little grumbly about it? Would I really WANT the process to speed up, if it resulted in getting ourselves OFF the right track? Is it even possible to mess up what I truly believe is God's plan for this? People talk about going overseas and meeting their child and seeing later that if they'd gone sooner or later, they wouldn't have met that exact right child - the child that is perfect for their family. So by wishing for a speed-up in this process, am I wishing for something that would jeopardize that sort of experience? Man, this is metaphysically messy.

Okay, on a completely different note, here's how I spent my spring break:

We did some prescribed burning on several prairie areas on our campus.

Here's me in a Nomex suit. Totally cool. (Except that it was a men's extra-large. Not the most flattering fit...):

Check out the smoke "tornado" on the right hand side...

New Job!

Adoption news: Nope. Still waiting.


Other news: Russell got a new job! He's been working on his PhD at Washington University for several years (in evolutionary biology). He just accepted a faculty position at Maryville University (in St. Louis), starting in the fall. He's on track to finish up the PhD and start the new job in August. Yay!!! It's a little weird now, since we live on the campus of the college where I work, and we're in the same athletic conference as Maryville. So to my student atheletes... don't worry... I'm super happy that Russell has a job at Maryville, but I definitely know where my sports allegiances lie... :^) (And I've told Russ that he can't wear red to soccer games this fall...)

Goat update: the goats are back to their silly, happy, ornery selves. They have dismantled the little shelter we built for them (we keep building it back up) and this morning, the white one head-butted me as I filled her water bowl. She also wouldn't stop chewing on the zipper pulls on my jacket pocket. I'm thinking that they're pretty much OVER the dog attack now.

Fun update: check out www.nerdtests.com. You can take an online quiz to tell how much of a nerd you are (as if I needed outside confirmation on that...). Here are my results:

I'm particularly proud of my low, low score in the "dumb/dork/awkward" category. I think this is why the final analysis came out as "Uber Cool High Nerd."

I hope everyone had a great Easter & Nauryz!

Embassy/Consular Hold-Up

I know there has been lots of conversation and worry in the last couple of days about what's going on at the Kazakhstan Embassy and the Consulate in Washington DC and New York. (For those of you who may have missed it, the embassy is temporarily suspending its processing of dossiers for adoptions from Kazakhstan, pending a review of adoption procedures). This does not affect our adoption process, personally, since our dossier made it through the embassy stage last July, but my heart goes out to all those who are just starting the process and whose files are with the embassy. If there are any blog lurkers out there who are in that position, please know that we are thinking of you and hoping this resolves itself quickly! I know how heart-breaking and frustrating things like this can be... believe me. We made the decision to adopt 3 years ago this week, and our ride has been a definite roller coaster. The only thing I've learned for sure is that nothing is ever sure or easy in international adoption.

From what I've been able to gather, it sounds like Kazakhstan is wanting to review their procedures and make sure they're doing what's best for their children. If this is the case, I can only commend this - it's a good thing. But it sure doesn't make things easier for those who find themselves stuck in the process.

So, if you're affected by this and you're reading this post - Don't give up! Hang in there! And here's hoping for a quick and positive review by the Kaz officials.

Still No News

No, we haven't dropped off the face of the earth. Just no news on the adoption front. We got the FBI report all done and delivered to our agency. Today, Russell is driving a couple more power of attorney forms up to Springfield to get apostilled - more forms that the Kaz government requested of all prospective parents. I think we know the way to the Secretary of State's office by heart... we could drive it in our sleep by now.

It's finals week here at my school (we're on the quarter system). Then 2 weeks of spring break, during which I'm gonna keep cranking on my research project, then it's back to teaching full time for spring quarter. It's going to be pretty quiet here with all the students gone for 2 weeks.

FBI update!

I called the FBI this morning and they said our clearance was mailed yesterday!!!! Wow!!!! That was less than a week!

The phone call was kinda funny... when the woman said they were mailed already, I blurted out "Are you kidding???" She said, "Ma'am, I try not to lie about things like this." I told her I was just shocked because the woman I spoke to last week told me it would be about 4 weeks, and this was completed in under 1 week. She said "We're supposed to say 3-4 weeks. We try to get it done faster."

Cool!

So now we get to notarize, apostille (by taking another day off work at driving it up to the capitol) and then get it to Kaz.

On a completely different note, it's thundersnowing in St. Louis right now. Freaky.

Optimistic?

(Note: Chris, there's a response to your comment down at the bottom of this post!)

Okay, I'm trying to stay optimistic here. After asking around a bit, I'm finding that it's not very common at all for the Ministry of Education to ask for an updated FBI clearance (especially since it's not set to expire for another 6 months). No one has any idea what this means. I called the FBI today - they received our fingerprints but said it will be 3 and a half to 4 weeks until we get the report back. Then we have to notarize it, drive it to Springfield for apostilling, and get it to our adoption agency. Then it has to make it all the way to Kazakhstan. I know that in the grand scheme of the nearly 3 year wait, this is a drop in the bucket... but it's not feeling so much like a "drop" right now. It's feeling like yet another hurdle that's adding another month or two on to the wait. I don't get this... I was feeling like we were so close, and now it feels like it's slipping further away again.



On a brighter note, we went to a really nice reception last night at our agency for one of their Kazakh staff who is in charge of development and humanitarian aid. It was nice to meet someone who is involved in the process of adoption via the development side of things. I got to try out my 2 words of Kazakh (I tried to say hello). Not terribly successful. I had a bit more luck with my limited Russian. She gave bars of Kazakh chocolate to the handful of waiting parents who attended the meeting and I was at least able to thank her appropriately in Russian! :^)



Also, thanks for all your comments about our goats! They are doing a little better today. They're pretty sore and not putting any weight on their injured legs. They're also not eating much (which is REALLY weird for a goat). But they seem calm and they like their new surroundings. Here are some pictures of them in their new "nest", close to the science center on campus:

We have several Kenyan students who have grown up raising goats, so I asked them to give our goats good Swahili names. I described the two goats' personalities to them, and they came up with Matatizo (for the white one... which means "Trouble") and Masumbuko (for the brown one... which means "Bad With People"). Pretty accurate names... Mata likes to test the limits of things and get into trouble, and Buko is really jumpy, skittish, and runs away from people.

Close up of Mata... she's so cute!!!!

The building has a door that leads out into this unused garden/paddock area where we are keeping them now... and the goats have discovered their reflections in the glass. So far, they're just fascinated with the strange goats in the windows. The computer network people (who work behind the door) have enjoyed the goats' company but found their constant stares a bit distracting, so they lowered the shade.

**************************

Note to Chris: Yes, I have the same question (about electronic fingerprinting). Why CAN'T we do that????? I don't know... but the FBI insists on the old fashioned way. When we did the state police background check two years ago, they did electronic fingerprinting - it was awesome! Our local police department actually takes our fingerprints for us, then we mail them into the FBI office. The first two times we did this, they used this cool red ink (well, it was red on your fingers, but turned black on the paper). It was not messy and it made perfectly clear prints on the paper. This time, they had the old black, gloppy ink. The fingerprints were really messy - we even had him re-do Russell's because they were so dark and it was hard to see detail. I'm kinda worried the FBI will reject them and make us do it over again. Ugh.

Dossier Sees the Light of Day (????)

Yesterday, the MOE (Minstry for Education in Kazakhstan, for those of you playing along at home - this is the government agency that matches us with a child) asked for us to update our FBI clearance. This is the first communication we've had from any level of the government in Kazakhstan. Our fingerprints and clearances won't expire until August. So this leaves us wondering... are they just being proactive and getting us to run our prints again because our file is going to sit there until the clearance DOES expire? Or does this mean that our dossier is finally seeing the light of day and is possibly headed somewhere soon? We simply don't know.

What I do know is that Russell and I rushed down to the police station yesterday afternoon only to wait and wait and wait to get fingerprinted. We watched a woman come into the police station to get her car out of impound only to see officers "sneak" up behind her and arrest her right there in front of us... apparently she had a warrant out for her arrest! Sheesh! So at least it was an exciting wait...unfortunately for that woman. We finally got the fingerprints and I planned to send them off to the FBI first thing in the morning.

Except that first thing this morning, I got a call in my office (at 7:45am) saying that one of our two campus goats (which we keep for weed control) was found limping down a busy, main road not far from campus! So I grabbed a truck and went out looking. I found her, being held down by a friend from work who had gotten there first and was huddled on the road side (in the snow and high winds). Both of our goats been attacked by dogs and scattered away from their pen! So I spent the morning with my friend at the vet's office, getting the goats fixed up. Poor babies. They're okay now - but both have lots of puncture wounds and scrapes. They're pretty freaked out. We're moving them to a more secure paddock closer to the central part of campus.

So after trying to deal with that, I still hadn't mailed off my fingerprints... I ran to town (which is 20 minutes away) to get a money order, but then realized I'd left the required cover letter for the clearance check request back in my office. Ugh. Back & forth & back & forth all morning. Long story short... the fingerprints are now being overnighted to the FBI office. Whew. I wrote "ADOPTION APPLICATION' all over the outside of it so it goes to the right office (we learned that lesson the hard time the first time we did this... it took WEEKS and weeks and weeks to get our clearance back). The second time we did this, I wrote all over the envelope, and they turned it around in 10 days. Cool. Keeping my fingers crossed for that to happen this time, too!

Baby Gift!

I got the most fabulous, unexpected baby gift in the mail this week from my friend Lisa. For one of her very first knitting projects, she made a gorgeous baby blanket out of rich raspberry-colored cotton yarn. I totally love it! I'm so impressed! I'm such a novice knitter - I've never made anything bigger than a hat. This blanket is terrific! Here it is, over the edge of our crib, with all of our little kiddo's stuffed critters gathered around to admire it...
Lisa, thank you thank you thank you! I really needed a bit of a baby "pick-me-up" this week. (By the way, just so the WORLD now knows this... Lisa Jean was a Prom Queen.) (That has nothing to do with this topic or this post... but has everything to do with a long-standing inside joke that I just KNOW Lisa is really enjoying right now.) :^)

On the adoption front, there is mixed news. After a marathon phone call to my wonderfully supportive agency coordinator early this week, I decided that I would go back to work during the next school term (which starts April 1st). It is so hard to predict when we might be traveling. I just didn't want to risk taking another school term off on some kind of leave, and then NOT traveling until summer. So I put myself on the schedule for teaching courses next term, and BOOM! One of my agency's clients who has VERY similar paperwork dates to us gets an LOI (yesterday). Her travel dates are Feb. 25 to March 13. She got 12 days' notice! Wow!

I realize that this means next to nothing in terms of a predictor about when we'll travel. (For those of you not as embroiled in Kaz adoption as we are, the invitations to travel don't go in chronological order. In other words, it's not always "first come, first served" with this process.) But it's encouraging to think that other clients of our agency are starting to move through the process again (after a big lull with the holidays, etc.).

Stay tuned...!

Horst

Yay snow! I love snow! We got about 9 inches last Friday evening. It melted pretty quickly, but not before Russ and I decorated our yard with Horst, the 6-foot tall, Bayern Munchen futbol fan (note the scarf) snowman and his pet bunny, Kaninchen. And yes, Horst has raquetballs for eyes. In fact, if you look closely, Horst has eyebrows, since his eyeballs kept falling out and bouncing out into the street. Thankfully, his eyebrows held his eyeballs in place.

Tragically, the warm weather has not been good to poor Horst. He was listing heavily this morning as I left for work. I don't hold out much hope for him this afternoon. Ah, Horst... we hardly knew ye.

Tagged!

Hey! I was tagged... not once but twice! The rules for this game are as follows:

1. Link to the person who sent this to you and leave a comment on their blog so their readers can visit yours 2. Post the rules on your blog 3. Share 7 strange/weird facts about yourself 4. Tag 7 random people at the end of your post, linking their blog 5. Let each person know they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.

My only problem is that the only blogs I read are other Kazakhstan adoption blogs, and it looks like everyone has played this game already! I'm not sure there's anybody left to tag! Bummer!

Oh well... here are my 7 weird things:

1. I grew up in the military (dad was in the Air Force) and we moved every two years, on average. I went to 11 different schools (including 3 different high schools). I've lived in the US, the Azores Islands, and Germany.

2. And speaking of Germany, a friend and I were once locked in a castle tower in Germany. Our cries for help went unanswered for about an hour and finally my friend and I decided to figure out how to pick a lock. We were successful. :^)

3. I once sat on the roof of the Notre Dame cathedral in Paris.

4. Over the years, I have had 4 giant millipedes as pets, ranging from a nearly 13-inch long female named Millificent the Magnificent Millipede to a skinny little guy, only about 8 inches long, named Slim.

5. On this day, one year ago, I was petting fuzzy little leaves on New Zealand edelweiss plants along a trail leading up to Aoraki, the highest mountain in New Zealand, while my students took their midterm exam (by trying to identify plants, birds, rocks, etc. along the trail).

6. I get really excited by really cold weather. The coldest I've experienced is -40 degrees, while leading a wolf-watching trip to Yellowstone National Park. (Did you know that -40 is the same on the Celcius and Fahrenheit scales? It's where the two scales converge! Cool!) Anyways, when the temperature hit -40, I ran outside in my long underwear and jumped up and down with exitement! (And quickly learned that -40 will freeze your lung tissue almost instantly!)

7. I've climbed to the top of a 14,000 foot mountain in Colorado! (Even though lots of my friends have peaked numerous 14'ers... I'm still proud of my ONE 14'er!)

Hmmmm..... now who do I tag???? Who's left in Kaz blogland? I'll have to search...

(PS. Does anyone know why blogger continues to double-space between my paragraphs, even when I go back to edit the post and delete the extra spaces continuously????)
(PPS. Hey! I just noticed that on my poll on the sidebar, someone just voted for us to get "the call" this week! Thanks for the vote of confidence! :^)

Nope

For those of you out there that are checking this blog weekly to see if we've heard anything new, the short answer is: Nope. The long answer is: Nope. Nope. Nope. Nope. Nada. Nichts. Nothin'.


Try again next week! In the meantime, I've posted a new poll... cast your votes!


(Amy, if you're reading this, my mildly cranky attitude this week does NOT negate the fact that we're still optimists by default. I stand by that claim! :^)

(UPDATE on 1/18/08: Okay, I realize that my poll on the sidebar is incredibly poorly constructed. I'm clearly not a social scientist. I guess I was wondering, will I get the phone call this month? Or will it be later than this month, i.e. later in the year. Clearly if I get the phone call this month, it will also be this year. My brain is fried. I'm glad it's the weekend.)

Science!

Well, still no news on the adoption front, but I finally got my DNA extractions to work! I'm working on a research project during my "maternity leave" from teaching. I'm hoping to compare genetic diversity of some small populations of prairie plants along the Mississippi River bluffs. But first, I had to actually extract the DNA out of the plants, which just wasn't working. But last week, I set up the reaction, left the room for a bit, and when I came back, there was DNA!!! Yay!!!! It was like a late Christmas present! Here's what it looks like:

The little pinkish, glow-in-the-dark bands is DNA that is flourescing under an ultraviolet light. This picture is actually sugar maple DNA that one of my students extracted last night, after I taught her how to make the extraction work. She's doing this for part of her senior capstone project. Groovy.

On a completely different note, we had freakishly warm weather this past weekend, so we enjoyed it by taking the dog to the state park at the confluence of the Mississippi and Missouri Rivers.

The obligatory self-portrait shot:

Russell and Deva learning about the great rivers: