It’s official. Jaden is saying “dada.” He actually said “mom” first (spoken like a true mother) but then I guess he decided it was too difficult to reconcile with ‘more’ so he started saying “dada.” Now that he knows he can say it, he walks around repeating it over and over again. I’m just glad his first word wasn’t $h!t. LOL
Seriously, has it been 3 weeks since I last posted? Where does the time go????
There must be something in the air recently. I’ve been digging up old, faded, dusty ‘to do’ notes and starting to actually DO some of the items on them. Like get the blog going again, and get some of the latest the pictures posted to the website. Today I hooked up my speakers to the wireless network – something that I should have done over a year ago but just could never find “the time.” I started cleaning out my desk (eeeeeek!), I finished decorating Jaden’s room (’bout time!), and I went through my kitchen and tossed any food items that had I could no longer identify. Now if only I can bring myself to make the dozen or so phone calls I have to make — I hate phone calls. If anything gets pushed to the bottom of my to do list, you can bet it has something to do with the phone.
Before the tornado of to-dos today, Jaden and I went to our 2nd “Music Together” class. It really is a lot of fun. He enjoys it; at least it seems that way. When we arrive he turns to each kid there, one at a time, and yells out his hellos – “eeeeiiiiaaa.” Once he’s finished saying hello to everyone he opens it up to the teacher who starts us out with a hello song. He sits in my lap and watches everyone singing and clapping. Today he actually picked up a little drum and played with it for a while. Probably only because it had a red string attached to it, but hey, it’s a start. By about the third song, he put his head on my shoulder and started falling asleep. Of course perpetually sleep deprived Mommy thinks: “So this must be the trick! I’ll just sing to him, and dance with him, and tap out songs on his legs until I put him to sleep.”
If it were only that easy.
I have to say things are getting better even though I still complain. 
We’re about 50/50 now for good/bad nights. He slept through the night again last night – I think. The nights get blurry after a while.
So — does anyone remember what their New Year’s resolutions were/are? It’s only been a few weeks and I’m already not sure what mine were.
After the insane day I had yesterday running around to all of my engagements, it has finally hit me that we were approved by CIS!!! I think I was in a daze yesterday – the email was so unexpected. In the adoption process, this is truly a significant milestone. CIS is usually the biggest holdup, according to the adoption community circles I’ve run with, in the entire process. Having them process our paperwork in less than two weeks is utterly amazing. I have watched as waiting parents have sat on the edge of their seats for 30, 60, sometimes 90 days, biting their nails, waiting for the OK from the US to travel to pick up their baby. We are so blessed to have this portion of the process go off so quickly. CIS has just given us the gift of two more weeks with Jaden during his infant months. This is tremendous.
I did hear back from agency #2 and they are jumping up and down for us too! They are sending us a packet of materials covering travel details, and we have to give a call to another representative (let’s be original and call her rep #2) to discuss travel plans. Here is part of their response, outlining the next steps:
“From this point, we generally receive travel notice about 4 to 6 weeks. The notice will come in the form of “[Jaden] is ready to travel at any time” – at which point you will arrange to travel to Korea on the first Friday that you are able – it’s definitely a whirlwind!”
Whirlwind – no kidding! The way I’m thinking about it, if we are really, really fortunate, the process in Korea will go as quickly as it did here in the US, and we could potentially travel in 2 weeks! I guess that is my optimism carrying it a little too far… but it is fun to imagine!! I guess I really, really do need to get the nursery together now! So much to do and so little time!
When I finished defending my dissertation in May I really convinced myself that this would be the summer that I finally prepared in advance for the coming semester. By August 1st I would have all my lectures planned out, all my exams, quizzes, and homework assignments ready, my course websites designed, and my office cleaned. Here I am on August 5th, and not only have I not accomplished any of the above, but I have not even ordered my desk copies (textbooks), so I have no idea what my first class is going to cover yet.
I’m off to campus today, for the first real meeting before the start of classes this semester, which means that I need to be ready for take-off. After today, the first day of classes will arrive so quickly it will seem as if it were to happen tomorrow. This semester I am teaching two new courses that I have not taught before. One of them is new to the department and I’m the lucky one who gets to set the curriculum (in other words I get to make all the mistakes that everyone teaching it in the future will learn from). The other is a twist on a basic finance course I taught in the past – but the last time I taught it was probably 2001.
Of course I have my excuses for not being ready for the semester; first I was food poisoned at a restaurant the night of my defense and ended up in the hospital and bedridden for a week, then the meetings and all the paperwork started for the change to Korea, and once that was finished (not too long ago) I started to catch up on all the visits with friends and family that I missed out on since 2000 while working on my PhD. As a matter of fact, this week I have a friend (or two) to see each day that I’m not on campus. So all is not lost. It just feels that way when weeks go by without me noticing.
As I look at my “to do” list with amazement I wonder how I’m going to do all of these things AND keep up with a 9 month old. If the weeks go by this quickly now, how fast will they go when Jaden is home??? I can’t imagine…. maybe those of you in the know can give me an idea. Does time just fly by at Mach speed? It sure seems like it will.
Funny how I want time to speed up now so that I can go to Korea to pick up Jaden, but at the same time I feel like classes are approaching too quickly. I’m sure once we return from Korea, I’ll want time to slow down again. As soon as someone has developed a time-bender, let me know – I’ll try it out for you. 
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