Looking for a Little Sunshine!

Well folks, turns out is was pneumonia. So I am spending the weekend doing absolutely nothing, popping pills and resting. The medications are already helping and I am hoping I will be in top form by next week. Seems I find myself fighting this stuff every 6 months, like clockwork, and my history of allergy and asthma problems exacerbate it and make me quite susceptible to having a plain old ordinary cold turn into something quite difficult to shake. I HATE being down for the count like this, it is hard for me to simply stop, but I am slowly learning to be better at it.

As you can see, the downtime has finally allowed me to work on changing the blog layout...and I apologize for the imbalanced look at the moment. I do not know HTML so I am struggling to figure out how to fix the margins. If anyone out there has any clue, I'd sure appreciate the help! I kind of like the new layout and colors, it's a tad bit more "girlie" without being TOO girlie :-) In time I will add more to it, and I still want to tag/label all my old posts...but at over 400 of them that might never get accomplished...unless the pneumonia sticks around far longer than it should! Haha! I think it might be helpful to some though to find RAD, Older Child Issues, etc as right now they are buried in the blog. I never did it way back when I started the blog as I NEVER imagined writing it this long!

I also need to get started working with Matthew and Kenny on their blogs! Yes, eventually the boys will each have their own blog. We will use it as a tool for writing assignments for school when we finally travel to Kazakhstan. I am not sure how successful we will be with Kenny writing one, we will give it a shot and see how he does with it. I think it will be fascinating to read what each of them has to say about their experiences over there, and it might give our readers some insight into an adopted child's thoughts as they return to their birth country. I have no idea how "literary" it will be, but since it will be part of their schoolwork they will have to do their best. And I also think it will be a wonderful journal for them to go back and read someday when they are older. Who knows, we might even set one up for Joshie and have him dictate what he would like to say! We will certainly have plenty of downtime while traveling, so we should be able to do pretty well with it if we make it a priority to stick with it.

It has been a very interesting and unsettling couple of weeks around our house, lots of things happening that I am not really at liberty to share at the moment but which are causing Dominick and I to look deeply at God's guidance in our lives, ascertaining directions to turn and where we will be in a few months. I realized too just how much I have pulled back in terms of living for the adoption, I am going through the motions of doing whatever is required but nothing feels imminent, there is definitely a wall up right now and emotions are quite guarded. We have done absolutely nothing to prepare really, other than paperwork. It has been hard to start letting go a little at a time as I WANT to get excited, I WANT to be at the stage where we can talk about it again with joy and anticipation, I WANT to be DOING something to prepare....I WANT TO NEST!!! But for some reason, I just can't get there yet...can't allow myself to let go. I keep thinking that I will put so much distance between us and our long-hoped for reality, that one day I will wake up and get "the call" and scream in utter panic thinking to myself "How could you do this??? You have had 2 1/2 years, for goodness sake!!".

Oh how I wish that actually WOULD happen.

In the meantime, we methodically attack things that we know need to be done...still working on Matthew's passport and paperwork is on it's way to our friend, Ayana, in Astana. Need to get Kenny's US passport. Waiting for that new FBI background check to replace the expired one. Busy work, but all necessary. What I really want to be doing is calling for airline reservations, I want suitcases spread all over the floor...I want GIRLIE things (oh my gosh, did I REALLY say that???) to be bought!!

All in God's time, right? It's clear it will happen, I keep reminding myself when anxiety arises, it's been made known over and over again so I just need to sit back and not stress over it.

RIGHT????

But I will tell you, the day we get the call, you will see the most excited, over the top, glee filled post you have ever read!!

With that, I am off to rest, to pop more pills, to hopefully find myself feeling more human with each passing hour. In the meantime, here is a little sunshine for you all...sunshine and rainbows, man, here's looking for a little more! Even if you don't need it, I do!!