Thank you!

SO many people have commented or emailed me to congratulate me, wish me well, all those wonderful things. I want to thank each one of you from the bottom of my heart. As you can imagine life is super busy right now with homeschooling, one very busy 3 year old, and of course an upcoming TRIP! So I can't always respond to everyone individually, but I have read each message and saved them all.

As you can see from my new ticker, we leave 4 weeks from tomorrow! I know that time will go FAST but it also seems like forever! Thanks again to everyone for everything.

WE GOT OUR TA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

YES! We got our Travel Approval yesterday on Day 34! I doubt that's the fastest ever, but it's the fastest I've heard by one day. Another October LID family got their TA last summer in 35 days, another family a few weeks ago on Day 40, and another just this past Monday on Day 39.

So, without further adieu (or is it ado? hmmmm)........here she is......

Miss Allison Lingyun Kunstman!!!

All good things....

....must come to an end. And so must this blog. But not yet! :-) I am, however, going to phase this out before we go to China. I'm switching to a password protected website for the rest of our journey. I just feel like I want to keep some things private. If you're with AWAA, you will see the website with username and password in my signature line of my (infrequent!) posts to the email group there. If I personally know you or you've commented in my blog and really want my website info, I'd be happy to give it to you. You'll find my email in my profile. If you're just a lurker, well, I don't want to shut you out necessarily, but I have to draw the line somewhere. Maybe you don't care about my little life anyway. :-)

Another reason for phasing out this blog besides the privacy issue, is the time I spend on the computer. Once we get Allison home, I want to cut most of my computer time out and focus on my family and other things. I know many people are able to keep up their blogs, etc. once they get their child home, but I know myself and I know I haven't the discipline to stay off as much as I'd like to. I have a vision in my head of what I want my days to look like. I want to start them out with breakfast with my girls (and Ben is he's awake LOL) and not start it off on this computer. I want to get outside more, play with them more, and GET CONTROL OF THE CHAOS around here! :-) Will it happen as I envision it? I don't know but I hope so.

I leave you with a few pictures from last weekend when we went up to a friend's cottage. I love the brother/sister pics. Oh Lindsey can annoy Ben and vice versa, but there's also times when they make me go awww and warm my heart.

We made it to Day 30 of the wait for TA. That went pretty fast! We're really hoping to travel early November.

AMAZING RACE starts tonight! Woo hoo! Oh, and the Packers lost. Woo, big surprise, not.

I'll write again a time or two before I close this blog. It's been fun but as I said, it's time is done soon.

We are in t-r-o-u-b-l-e!!!

I volunteer in the church nursery once a month. Lindsey does so well in her class, I don't want to be in the same room she is in and have her think that is the way it is going to be. So when she was in the 1 year old room, I served in the 7-12 months area, when she moved to the 2 year old room, I served in the 1 year old room. Well this fall she moves to the 3 year old room, so I signed up for the 2 year old room (well of course). Except the children don't move to their new classrooms until next week, but the new fall/winter volunteer rotatation began yesterday. SO, I was in the same room with Lindsey. First it was just her and I, she was showing me the toys, and then a little crying boy came in. I went to pick him up and Lindsey had a FIT. I was the only volunteer in the room at the time and I had to tend to this little boy (thankfully he stopped crying immediately when I brought him to the train table). But the rest of the morning went well....NOT! Oh that was difficult. She is SO jealous of sharing our attention. So like I said, we are in TROUBLE when Allison comes! Eeek!

On another subject, Lindsey slept in her crib until she was almost 3 years old and then moved to a toddler bed (thanks Dawn!). That was to be temporary until we could find reasonably priced matching twin beds. We just bought matching headboards, put one in the basement for now, and set the other one up on Saturday. (We'll set the crib back up probably next month.) Her room still needs much decorating. Whatever we got done before she came home is what is done today over 2 years later. I can't believe some of the elaborate nurseries some of my fellow adoptive parents have created! Lindsey's room has been pretty bare. Hey, we're slow, what can I say?