Wednesday, March 31, 2010

the butcher, the baker, the candlestick maker

I'm clearly not grown up yet. I've determined this because, with the exception of being a mom, I have no idea what I want to be or do . . . when I grow up. I thought this was something I would figure out in college as I diligently went to class (nearly each and every one) carrying with me the knowledge I was "undeclared." It's all good and fine to be undeclared but you still have to take classes and unless you want to stay all summer (each and every summer) or start tacking on a fifth or sixth year then these classes are determining your major. That's how I graduated as a biology major. Sometime in the next year as I crawled into a large steel cage to scrub the last remnants of dog feces off the back, I realized this wasn't for me. Animal rescue was where I could fulfill my desire to help animals. Veterinary school, I decided, was a way to get even farther into debt and a sure fire way to prevent myself from being able to become a stay-at-home parent.

I never applied to veterinary school, and I didn't even attempt to find a calling after that. I applied for a job I still feel I was totally unqualified to get (not unqualified to do), but I got it. I learned a ton and I loved it. I ended up leaving it about seven years later not because I wanted to but because I needed to grow; I was stagnant. I'll skip the next two positions I held at the company because really they just lead to my becoming a stay-at-home mom. They gave me the experience I needed to freelance and the 'I'm so over it' I needed to make the leap.

So here I am, and I have to say I'm heading down a path that in my mind ends in one of two places . . . I will either be wildly successful and you will see me tearing up as Oprah interviews me OR I will end up as the crazy, jumping from one thing to another mom who is exponentially more embarrassing than the already very embarrassing "normal" mom.
Ah, yes laugh.

Job one for me is "homemaker," and I gotta say, I hate that word! It's weird and old-fashioned to me. Let me re-start, job one for me is stay-at-home mom (which is longer to write but more appealing to me so I'll suffer with the extra keystrokes). Job two is the very limited amount of freelance work I do, and if I continue in this limited capacity I will not be able to call myself a freelancer for much longer. Job three is the apparel company I started. I need to devote a lot more time to this one. It's on the cusp of where I could grow it into something really good. If I leave it for too long, like a houseplant it'll shrivel and die. I recognize it needs tending, but I'm a terrible gardener and apparently I'm no Trump either.

I'm easily distracted. I feel like I should take this opportunity to try things out but then I have too many plates spinning. I also lose interest in things when they get confusing, not difficult but confusing. I can handle the stress of something difficult but I freeze up when I'm confused. I think I'm looking for something that will come somewhat naturally to me, like being at home with J.

Why am I confessing all of this? Because today I want to (again) become a baker. Seriously, you ask. Seriously!?!? Well, yeah why not. There are all these recipes that look so yummy and everyone loves sweets! I'm not talking about opening a storefront, just baking here for us (for starters). Of course, I have no need for sweets (see "blogcation" post), and I can think this through logically and tell myself to let this one go. I have enough going on and clearly this is a distraction from coming up with something to send as a query to my regional parenting publication. I can come back to baker when the kiddos are in school and I have a purpose for baking - after school snack anyone?

Up next - modern day Mrs. Ingalls right here in suburban Ohio! That's right. Landscapers are coming tomorrow to start our master plan. In it I will be sure they make room for my garden as well as raspberry, blackberry and elderberry plants along the back fence. I'll need all of this for canning (okay, and baking).

I'm really not sure what my deal is, but I can say after the cathartic experience of writing this blog I can see the battle lines are clearly drawn. This appears to be a struggle between modern, career mom and old-fashioned homemaker. I'm not sure there are enough hours in the day or enough energy in my body to accomplish both. Maybe I should consider starting to drink coffee (gag).

Tuesday, March 30, 2010

Adoption Makes 4

We've decided to adopt. I *think* I'm prepared for the roller coaster ride of our current adventure, but I have to admit I'm hoping it's like an old steel favorite, the Magnum, thrilling, smooth and relatively short.

We've decided to go the route of private domestic adoption. For those who don't know, here is some basic information on the types of adoption:
  • Domestic Private - this is done through an agency and/or attorney and is usually associated with those who want to adopt an infant; this route can take a year or more and it can be very pricey.
  • Domestic Public - in our area this would be an adoption (or foster-to-adopt) through our county; these children can range in age and often you may find sibling groups in need of a home.
  • Inter-Country - this is an adoption of a child from another country; based on the length of time for a match and to finalize in that country adopting an infant is rare
I'm taking an adoption class through the Adoption Academy at Capital Universityy. I've learned quite a bit there in the CORE track, however, they are not able to give out specific contacts as that would be a conflict of interest. Researching agencies, lawyers and support groups has been tough. You would think in this age of Internet it would be easier. After researching what we could and talking to a few people we did find enough information to make a choice and to feel confident and happy with that choice.We opted to go with a lawyer and do private adoption strictly through him versus using an agency instead of or in addition to him.
Now we're working through an enormous stack of paperwork which includes getting our fingerprints and clearances, a fire inspection as well as a home study and safety inspection, copies of our driving records and last but not least medical exams. All of this must be done before we can be pre-approved by the court to adopt. Once we are pre-approved we can work on our profile or life book.
The profile is like a little magazine all about us. It's for a birth mother to view so she can get an idea of what our family, values, marriage, and day-to-day lives are like. It's extensive and surprisingly difficult to write. After the writing will come the re-writing and then the addition of photos. Once it's good to go we'll print it on some glossy paper and have it bound somehow (I've not researched this yet). This will sit at our attorney's office in a set of files deemed the "waiting to be active" group.
Our lawyer works with exactly 20 adoptive families at a time. As they successfully adopt their spots are filled by the likes of us, the waiting to be active set. We're in the middle, behind the actives but a step ahead of the call-in group. This group calls each month to see if there is room for them on the active list. When space is available the one calling the most and the longest gets in, aka the squeaky wheel. This group has not put the attorney on retainer yet and if they have a life book or home study completed most likely he does not have it yet. We chose our path because sometimes a birth mother does not like her 20 options and asks for additional options. When this occurs our attorney pulls out the profiles from our 'waiting to be active' group for her to read and sometimes she choose one of those families.

We're informed and realistic on the amount of time, money, energy and stress this process will likely take. However, with that said I'm remaining positive. I may even be going beyond that into confident that we will have a new little soul in our family sooner than later.

Stay tuned.




Sunday, March 07, 2010

"Blogcation"

I had a really bad day on Friday but only a couple of hours of bad and it's the sort of bad that you look back on and laugh. In fact it's the sort of bad that you know in the moment isn't funny but is being handled in a ridiculously melodramatic fashion by none other than yourself. With that said, it's the type of melodramatic, soon-to-be-funny bad that will likely play out in exactly the same fashion in the future because it's driven completely by emotion . . . um, yeah I'll say it, teenage emotion that I am confident lives in us all not just in me. Maybe that's why I was so well-behaved and adult on Saturday? Anyway, I know I'm being cryptic so hopefully this helps. I'm not sure how far back to go. I'll just start at the end and work my way back until even I'm sick of it all.

I'm sitting here on Sunday in sweatpants. I see nothing wrong with this. I love it actually. What I don't love is the fact that I'm in said sweatpants for one, well okay two reasons. The first is that I'm behind on laundry. But anyone who knows me knows that I can be weeks behind on laundry and still have plenty of things to wear. So the second reason is that nothing really fits. I had to come to the realization my dryer was not to blame a few weeks ago. My holiday gift request was cash that I could use for sessions with my trainer, as if I could still call her that after not seeing her for months (years). I've started out with working out five days a week which was just unreasonable. Mainly I couldn't hog everyday for myself when D wanted to get to the gym and have his Loomsmen bookclub or whatever they call it. So I opted for fewer days but longer sessions. I've settled into 3-4 days a week with a mix of cardio, resistance and ab work.

I have to say it - I hate scales? This is why I do not use them and do not own one. I managed to lose, gain, lose in a seemingly normal though frustrating manner until the one week that I gained 8lbs in 36-hours. Really?!?! Considering I was not gorging on lard or bricks that's just stupid. So I only climb on a scale for my trainer and I hate it because, as I just said, it's stupid. I rely on my clothing to tell me what's working. I don't want to worry about fat weighing less than muscle. Do my clothes fit or not? That's it; end of story. Well, the answer is no, my clothes STILL do not fit.

And while I love D, I do not appreciate the male need to offer suggestions, fixes or ideas of any sort to me when I've tried on every pair of pants I own (with the exception of sweats pants, workout pants, and the one pair of maternity pants I still have). I will address these here as perhaps you too are wondering if perhaps the reason my clothing does not fit is because . . .
  • my thyroid meds need adjusted - hmm, could be but the lovely docs don't feel a need to have me in the upper portion of the range apparently; regardless I will make an appointment to be poked and prodded and I'll leave the nurse a note for the doc that requests I be bumped. Nearly 15 years after diagnosis, I can tell you what I'll hear back is "you're within range; maintain current Rx" I will spare you the ensuing @$!*# I'll be thinking though politely not saying to Mr. Nurse.
  • I'm not working out enough for me - insert @$!*# from above
  • I've eaten pancakes three times in as many weeks - yes, this IS true but still, please see answer above plus "pancakes, really? it's not like I'm living off some sort of IHOP super stack bobbing around in syrup"
I think the top three will do it. You get the idea. For clarification though, I went to the gym Friday morning and did half an hour of cardio followed by an hour of my trainer's bootcamp. I showered there and was ready for the day but my shoes hurt. I was passing home on the way to the errands so I stopped to change shoes. That lead to me changing pants because honestly they were just too uncomfortably tight too. I ended up 1 hour later leaving the house in designer jeans and heels because I could not bring myself to hem the expensive jeans which thankfully still fit. That hour involved a good deal of stress though I'm happy to say no tears. I did try on 99% of the pants I own (yes that would be a large number of pants) and I will admit I did dump all my folded clean laundry into piles on the floor and then I dug around in them like an angry gopher looking for something - anything that would work.

Today everything is folded again though, ah-hem, still not put away. I'm still super frustrated that I'm working out like a fiend with no results. By the way, I'm not someone that enjoys working out. I've opted for classes that are more enjoyable than chaining myself to an elliptical for an hour, and you would need to chain me to get me to stay that long, but I'd still rather do something else. I'm trying to take a harder look at what I eat. I did Weight Watchers about eight years ago and lost a decent amount. So basically I know how to take a hard look at what I'm eating. I just don't want to be that harsh so for now I'm making a conscious effort to eat more salads and other veggies. It's pretty sad when the only green vegetable a vegetarian (or anybody) eats in a day are the green beans off their toddler's plate. J hates green beans. In defense of my diet though, I don't eat horribly by any means but I can do better. I will admit Friday's episode did lead me to seek solace in a box of Samoas. That implies I ate the whole box, c'mon I could not legitimately whine here for everyone to read if I ate an entire box of Samoas, I had three . . . cookies, not boxes. Geesh!

Anyway, no matter what size is written on the label in your clothes if they don't fit comfortably it's bad. If you're working hard to make them fit (or to lower the number there) and it's not happening then it's clearly worse. I think most everyone has been there, hence why I think looking back my behavior was comical, but I also know I would behave that way again. I mean, seriously I'm sure I've done that before and in the heat of moment I did it again two days ago. I'm also not letting the thyroid, pancakes or pansy workouts that are apparently to blame win. I'm just going to keep working out, eat better, and channel my inner Jenny (yeah, that's my feisty sister) when I talk to Mr. Nurse.

I'll keep you posted; spring shopping is right around the corner with bathing suit shopping hot in it's heels. I think I can skip that last one though.

Now I'd better go put my clothes away; maybe I can get that gorilla (let's call him "blogcation") in the corner to help me.