We are plunging headlong into a project for our Thanksgiving holiday. We are replacing our carpet with laminate flooring. Judging by the coffee stains in the living room (from Olivia's "let's see what happens when we pick up Daddy's coffee mug and pour it out right here" days) and the multiple areas of cracker-like substance ground into the dining room carpet, it's time.
So. We've been ripping up carpet edges for the past several days and Joe has been removing the tack strips. As it turns out, removing carpet from concrete is not all that challenging. Tonight, my Dad is coming over and he and Joe will fold up the living room carpet and pad and start laying boards for our new floor.
In the meantime, I'm cleaning. We're putting in new vinyl over our old vinyl in the kitchen, so I'm getting the dirt out everywhere. It's a rainy day, which may lull the nappers into a longer slumber, making it a perfect time to finish floor preparations.
Except that the quiet...it allows for too much thinking. And I've been doing a lot of that lately. My mind swirls around various somewhat-related topics, all of them a little fuzzy and confusing and circling around the difficulties we've experienced trying to build our little family. I try not to think about it too much. But I'll hash it out a bit here, because that's what this space is for. And then maybe it will make more sense in my head.
Today, one of my nieces celebrates her first birthday. And her parents announced this weekend that she will be a big sister this Summer.
This news did not come as a shock to me...not at all. I didn't know they wanted to have another baby so soon, although apparently they did plan it that way, and I'm happy for them. It's not as if I thought they'd have trouble. Fertility abounds in this family, present company excluded. This baby will be the second 2011 addition to the family, bringing my parents' grandchild total to eleven. Our one child and my three brothers' combined ten children. Olivia, the youngest for nearly 17 months of her life, will now have four younger cousins.
The agency who did our homestudy and holds our profile encouraged us to submit our application (and fee) to another agency with whom they cooperate. We did...in September of LAST year. I have not heard one peep from that other agency since then. Except, of course, that the check cleared. Otherwise, I would have assumed that it had been lost in the mail.
I emailed our caseworker about it recently, and she wrote back to say that I should talk to their coordinator (a.k.a. The Woman Who Had Never, Ever Returned Even One Of My Many Calls, circa Jan-Sept 2009), and if that doesn't work, to talk to HER supervisor. I am saving that project for after Thanksgiving. I have no need to spoil a perfectly good holiday weekend being sour over idiots who can't do their jobs. And I fully intend to get my application fee back. I don't care how non-refundable it is. I'm pretty sure that 15 months with no communication counts as gross negligence of job duties, and I'm pretty sure I can make that case to the powers-that-be.
All that is to say that with the rather slow trickle of placements at our current agency and not getting any communication from the other agency, I'm not optimistic about getting any use out of our current homestudy, which expires in March.
Meanwhile, we have good friends who are fostering small children (age 2 and under), and I'm wondering more and more if that is where we should move next. Foster-to-adopt, that is. It has it's own set of problems...more than I care to name here. But there is such a need. And Olivia is old enough to understand the foster thing better, and she really, really wants a sibling. And we really, really want that too.
On another topic, my husband asked me last month if I thought the recent surgery was helpful at all in removing the monthly cycle pains that had been getting worse. Last month, I didn't think so. Now I'm starting to think that my innards were still healing and therefore more painful during my last period because this month has been completely different. I have not needed any pain medication AT ALL. I wonder if this is an indication of good things to come. Have I healed? Will fertility awaken, at last? I have also completed my first monthly hormone review and will be supplemented this cycle for the first time since surgery. Will it do any good?
I'm praying for patience. I feel strongly that our family isn't complete yet. I just wish I had some indication as to where we will go from here. This swirling brain activity is causing me to lose focus. I need to be cleaning the floor.
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