September 13th - Giancarlo's 3rd birthday

Monday is over, which means we only have one whole day left to finish everything we need to do before heading to COL. I am pretty much in control considering Oli has been sick since Friday so not only have I had her at home all this time, I had to take her to the Dr AND start doing the nebulizer on her 3x a day. Thank goodness for my mom and aunt Nancy (her sister visiting from Argentina) bc I would not be able to do everything without them.


So, I was quite nervous all day since, I knew that at 3pm we would be connecting with Giancarlo through Skype . . . . I could not eat at all! When 3 pm rolled around, we all sat around the computer (Anthony, Oli, my mom, aunt, nonna, nonno and me) and it was soo wonderful to see him there. . .sitting at a desk and looking at us. I must admit the conversation was quite one sided, but we did plenty of waving, smiling, singing, clapping and aaawwwing. He did say "mami", "papi" and "Oli" a couple of times which just made me melt. We sang happy birthday to him with a tiny cupcake that had 3 candles on it. . . and when the song finished he tried to blow the candles out through the screen. Oli, AKA "Little Miss Chatterbox", who could NOT wait for 3pm to come went totally MUTE and hardly said a word for the entire 20 minutes we were connected. It was very funny.

I want to thank everyone for all the good wishes and prayers you have been sending our way. I am so happy I walk around with a goofy grin on my face all the time. Cant wait for Thursday, when our lives will change forever . . . .

Love to all,

Z

The day has arrived!

Hello all . . . . well here we are . . . . after waiting 3 years, 4 months and 15 days we have received the most precious little boy we could have ever imagined! 

We would like to introduce you to Giancarlo Andrés De Vita, age almost 3 (this coming Monday).  Raul called us with the amazing news late Wednesday and we have been on overdrive ever since.  We had been very good about keeping all our documents up to date and hit the ground running.  Since we have an I 600 visa we dont have to wait a few weeks before travel and we are actually going to be going to Bogota to pick him up in FOUR days!!!

This will be short bc we have SO much to do in a very limited time but needless to say we are extatic, overjoyed and thrilled all at once, as is Oli! 

J U L Y

I jsut erased a long entry that I had written. . . I was feeling sorry for myself at 5 in the morning.  It was such a depresing, sad entry . . .   Instead I am going to live in the present and be grateful for all that I have, my darling, newly svelte, hard working husband, my wonderful mother who is always available to lend a hand, I am so thankful she lives close to me, my health, my dear dear friends, my beautiful home, my amazing extended family and my daughter, ther light of my life.  When the day arrives that I can also be grateful for my second child I will cherish that at much as I do all the other good things I an blessed to have.  And that is all I have to say right now. 

Middle of March

and no referral news yet.  I have decided to just live life and not think about this call that will change our lives because if not, I will drive myself crazy.  We are all well, right now Anthony is away in DC on a business trip and Oli is happy in school.  My dear niece, Laura will be coming to town with her boyfriend, Maxi this Saturday to stay with us so we will have 9 jam packed days, which will include a trip to Disney which I am really looking forward to.  There is a great special right now, 4 single park days for $99 for adults and $89 for children for Florida residents until May 25th.  There are some blackout dates though. 

April will be a very busy month, there is the Cystic Fibrosis Awareness Week at the school I used to teach at, our big annual walk for CF called Great Strides on the 17th and a Gladney Family Association BBQ which will be a great hit!  Oli will also be getting a mole removed from her cheek . . .it breaks my heart but 2 specialists have already said it needs to be done since it is extremely black and constantly exposed to the sun.  Since she is so young, she will have general anesthesia so she does not move, and I am VERY glad her Uncle Ruben will be the anesthesiologist so she will be with a familiar face.  Sigh . . .  I am dreading that day but I know it is what's best and this way she wont remember this when she is older. 

Here are some recent pictures we took of my dear Colombia Adoptive families. I love you all!

Update

Well. . .  almost 2 months since my last post and nothing to report on the adoption front.  December marked 3 years since we signed our contract with Commonwealth.  We have been through a LOT this adoption process especially when compared with out first.  I was told it would take longer this time around, but somehow, I had refused to believe it would be THIS different.  As I look back these 3 years, particularly these last few months I see I have made mistakes along the way.  Funny, because when I was giving seminars for CAII to families considering adoption, I always reiterated how the process is filled with uncertainty, that you will have pitfalls along the way, that you have to be flexible and never lose hope. . . yet I have not done those things this time around.  Truthfully, it was quite easy to say them because back then I had not experienced them, everything went so smoothly with Oli's adoption (apart from the fact we still had not received our passports back from the Colombian Embassy the day we were to travel . . . but that is another story - See the end of this post for that outcome).  So following are a few recommendations for those of you that are "in process".

1)  Keep a blog, you will be grateful when you come home with your child, others love reading them and it will be a very special gift for your son or daughter someday.  Write down how you feel while you wait and the experiences you have during the process. 

2) Talk to your child (in your mind or out loud whatever you prefer,) tell them how much you are waiting for him/her .  . I truly believe you are somehow calling them to come to you.

3) Keep living, dont put your life ON HOLD!!!  This is where I messed up big time this time around.  For the past 6 months I have declined so many invitations to things and not planned events and trips "just in case".  I have missed out on a lot of fun activities because I did not want to have to cancel them at the last minute and I was sure we were going to get THE CALL any day.  Instead I sat like a fool next to the phone waiting and watching life pass by.  So this is my most important recommendation . . dont NOT do things "just in case we get our referral", keep as busy as possible and when it does happen you will be more than happy to call people and cancel plans (and I am sure they will forgive you when they hear the great reason you have)!

4) Even when you are at your wit's end and dont think you can bear the wait any more . . . distract yourself . . . call a friend, write in your blog/journal and vent, take your nieces or nephews for the weekend, even go to your favorite fast food joint and pig our but, NEVER lose faith that it will happen!

Here are some recent pictures, Oli, as always is such a joy to us and definitely keeps us on our toes!

This one is Oli on Christmas morning with her favorite gift and the next one is at her school on snow day

With Tia Maria and cousins at the circus

PS We did finally receive the passports on the morning we were to travel to COL. . . .I am sure we were the highlight of that Fedex guy's day because when he rang the doorbell he had 2 extremely excited people waiting for him . . . . I believe I even gave him a hug!  :)

An Unusual Thanksgiving

Well, if someone told me a week ago that this would have happened I would not have believed it.  Oli started coughing late last week and on Monday night woke up crying saying her ear hurt.  I took her to the doctor on Tuesday, by then the cough had gotten worse but she was still in good spirits.  After the doctor examined her, he proceeded to give her some tests (Oli was SO brave . . she did not cry once) drawing blood from her arm, inserting long Q tips up her nose, giving her 2 shots in her legs (an antibiotic) as well as some chest X-rays.  Well, long story short he diagnosed her with influenza AND pneumonia.  Mind you she had pneumonia less than 2 months ago. . .Fortunately she is responding well to the antibiotics and nebulizer treatments so I know she is well on the road to recovery but still, it was quite a fright!  

The doctor told us that he did not recommend Oli be with many people for the next few days so we had to cancel Thanksgiving at our house and wound up spending a very quiet evening with Anthony, Oli and my mom.  Very different from what I imagined I would be doing but regardless very nice.

Still no news about our son (or daughter), the waiting is very hard but I keep reminding myself that this is one of the lessons that this child that is coming into our lives is teaching us.

We spent November 21st, National Adoption Day with dear friends who have also adopted their children.  Here is a picture of that special day. 

WE LOVE YOU ALL!

Oliism

When I picked up Oli from school earlier this week she told me that one of the girls in her table said the following during lunch. "Raise your hand if you are Jewish". I asked her if she had raised her hand and she replied, "no, mami, I'm not Jewish, I'm Colombian!"