Tuesday, September 30, 2008

Love in the Time of Color, uh

I really, really appreciate all the congrats and well wishes! Here's how it stands:
I met with the little girl's (J) caseworker, her supervisor, etc. last Wednesday a.m. to get and provide more info. It all seemed good, and we were set to plan a meeting for me with J. I was given 24 hours to decide whether I still wanted to move forward. I told them before I left that I did. I haven't heard a thing since. My adoption worker was to try to get a hold of the caseworker yesterday to try to schedule something. Nothing. So, keep hoping that this moves forward, but at this point I feel a little left in the dark.

But the house is coming along! I still can't find my camera battery charger, so no pics--sorry! The master bedroom, bathroom, office, and hall are all painted - only need to paint the doors. The living room walls are painted & half the molding - still need to paint the ceiling & other half of the molding & front door. Then I need to paint the dining room. And eventually/soon the family room and kids room - whenever the kid gets here and tells me what color they want. I'm thinking I want to put an embossed tin ceiling in the dining room, but that'll run me around $500, so I'll just paint it for now. I also need to install the ceiling fans I have for the office and living room. I took the ceiling fan from my bedroom to good*will today. I'll do the same with the others once I replace them. I also took my sad, old t.v. - a hand-me-down from an ex-beau. I bought my first t.v. last week - a 32" flat panel LCD. Fun! I also put together 3 bookcases & mounted them to the wall. I'm so proud of myself!

Tuesday, September 16, 2008

1 fish, 2 fish, blond fish, my fish

I'm gonna be a mom. Yes, I said it!! I was selected this morning to parent a 10-year-old girl!

Within the next couple weeks (probably sooner rather than later), I'll have a meeting with the case worker and my adoption specialist to discuss the details of her case, ask questions, etc. Then we'll plan the transition. In most cases, they like to see the transition take place over a couple months.... meet on neutral ground, meet at her current placement, meet at my house, a sleep-over, more meetings and sleep-overs, etc.

I was also told that judges usually want a child to be in a placement for at least 6 months before the adoption proceeds. ...So my hope is that she lives with me full time by Christmas 2008, and is adopted by Christmas 2009.

But now it's time to be both excited and panicked at the prospects of being an instant mom!! I have lived completely alone for the past 10 years and only shared domiciles for a total of 5 of the previous 15 (including married at 21 for 3 years, other roommate situations). And I'm about to share my home and my life with another person. A troubled little person. A little person who will need me. wow.

Monday, September 15, 2008

Sugar and spice and everything nice

It's finally cooling off around here... Low hundreds today. I think upper 90s tomorrow. Yay! Summer's about over.

I STILL haven't found that camera battery charger. But started moving boxes and unpacking more in earnest today. Painted the hallway the same color as the one wall in the bedroom, durango blue. The hall has incredibly 6 doorways and an archway, plus 3.5" molding, so lots of white as well as the blue. It's really lovely and I'm SO happy that's done. Still need to do the ceiling and paint all the doors and molding. Then I'll be head over heels.

I had my quarterly visit with my adoption specialist today. She said that she had great news (and she didn't lie). Apparently she found out this morning that one of the girls I'd been interested in parenting has become available for adoption again. Someone connected with the family (her brother's adoptive mom's mother) was considering her, but it didn't work out. So TOMORROW is the meeting with the caseworker, and only one other family is being considered. My specialist said it looked very good for me. I should know tomorrow by early afternoon!! The girl is 10 and super cute. And I remember that she loves animals and thinks she wants to be a vet. So this houseful would be pretty perfect for her.

Back to the unpacking... where is that charger?!!!

Tuesday, September 09, 2008

For Want of a Nail

Woo! Sorry. I've been painting and going crazy here. But I can't find my battery charger for my camera. So I can't take any new pics, but here's a few I haven't shared yet. (I guess I coulda not said anything, posted these, and you'd be none the wiser...)

So, here's the "durango blue" accent wall in my bedroom, before I got a picture hung up there in the middle of it...
And here's the opposite wall, with my "boudoir girls" hanging on my "radiant sun" wall. Notice the chic modern ceiling fan that I installed myself (replacing the previous hideous piece of metal and glass).


Hmmm... and here is my dining room slash temporary office while the "real" office has yet to be completed. Painting... baseboard molding. I'm hoping that happens Wednesday night. Then I can get that room put together.


Cuz this is what it looks like right now...

And yes, you can be sure that I have already purchased the replacement ceiling fan/light for this room! Oh, and by the way, the dining room has not yet been painted... at least not by me.

That's enough for now... but I'll leave you with a shot of the back yard. Exciting, I know.


And it's dusk in the picture, so you can't tell what the hell is going on. But in this shot, you see the edge of my patio, a big block of grass, something else (dirt and weeds, if you must know), and in the distance, a concrete block wall with a red (take my word for it) stained wood plank gate. And the tree in the right of the pic, or what you might be mistaking for a large, dark, amorphous blob, is a pecan tree. Yeah, that's right... behind the very large ghost orb. (Does anyone else watch the RotoRooterGhosthunterGuys??) Behind the tree is a decent-sized garden that is already fenced, has water hoses plumbed with the faucets right there in the garden, and has overhead lights that can be switched on for working at night... when it's cool. Or at least cooler. It's 12:30am, and currently 88 degrees F. And you know what the F stands for...

Hopefully I'll find that camera battery charger and be able to get some new pics soon. If anybody knows which box that damn thing got packed into, I'd be so happy if you'd let me know...