travel log - Cape Canaveral, Florida

After our visit to Sarasota for Christmas with C's family, we drove over to Orlando to spend a few days with our good friends, the Baker's. We skipped the craziness that is DisneyWorld during the holidays and spent one afternoon at SeaWorld (also crazy) and the next day at Cape Canaveral where we took the tour at Kennedy Space Center.

Let me just say that this was pretty darn cool! I slightly remember visiting the center when I was a kid, but they have really built it up since then and we had a lot of fun seeing all the old rockets, the shuttles, launch pads, etc.

If you ever get the chance, I recommend it - however, I warn you that it isn't cheap. One day admission is $38.00 per person (although we got a discount since the Baker's had season passes). I think it used to be free, but I guess they have to charge an arm and a leg now that all of the government money is going to the war on terror.

Still, it was an interesting visit and we got some cool pictures - to check them out - click here.

OK, now we're off to party it up on what we hope will be our last NYE without our girl.

Cheers and Happy New Year to you all!
[clink, clink, clink, clink, clink, clink, clink]

one small step in age, one huge leap into the next survey group

greetings from florida - i found that we have an internet connection!

my birthday was saturday

I am having trouble with this one - it is one of my "scary birthdays" - this year has officially kicked my butt out of the 18 to 34 set.

How did this happen? Now I understand how the phrase "thirtysomething" was coined.

Let's just hope that we get this baby before I "officially" forget what is was like to be a kid myself.

blah, blah, blah, blahgity blahg blog

So, the news is now out on the street - we heard from several well meaning friends today asking if we had heard about the new regulations for china adoptions - yes we have. NPR, CNN, The Washington Post, and many others are now reporting the latest new restrictions for applicants for adoption in china. Lots of rumors are floating out there whether these rules will take effect right away, in May of 07, or a combination of both. We are also hearing conflicting indications of whether it will affect us since our application has already been filed - the problem is it hasn't been reviewed yet which leaves us vulnerable to anything at this point. However, I am choosing to believe that it ain't over til the fat lady sings - in this case, until the CCAA officially issues their list of new rules. . . more on this later.

In the meantime, I am frustrated and apparently not very coordinated - someone sent me this link to a "stress relief" game called "SMACK THE PENGUIN". Don't get me wrong, I love penguins, but this is pretty funny. . . check it out.

http://n.ethz.ch/student/mkos/pinguin.swf - click once to launch the penguin, then click again to get the snow monster to swing.

We are heading out Friday for Florida for the holidays - not sure how much or whether we will have internet access - so, we'll talk to you on the other side.

Yes, I know I am a dork.

This week, we have made our last payment to CB's school loan and are officially school-loan-debt-free! This money will now be allocated to paying off more of our mortgage until all those baby bills start rollin' in again.

***an update from our adoption agency***

We received a letter from our adoption agency, Heartsent Adoptions, Inc., this week with an update on the status of our case:

". . . Your case is currently processing in China as follows: It is currently taking 15-18 months from the time your dossier is logged in at CCAA to the time of referral. We will keep you posted on any significant changes that may arise. Let's hope for speedy news!"

So, it is official - the wait has grown to at least 15-18 months. From what we understand, this is due to an influx of dossiers for prospective parents. Specifically, we are told that the CCAA has received TWICE as many dossiers than they did last year. This explains the trend lately of taking two to three months to fulfill referrals for one month of LIDS (dossiers).

In light of this new "official" information, we would like to propose a little game - a prediction game. You know our LID (log-in-date) is JUNE 6, 2006. Using the timeframe as stated and the knowledge that it is taking about 2-3 months to finish 1 month of LIDS, please make your best prediction for when we may receive our referral. There might even be a prize for the winner - especially if you can figure out a way to make it come faster!

Let's just all hope that it comes before the Beijing Olympics 2008!

travel log - Seattle, Washington

We had the opportunity to visit Seattle, Washington last weekend. CB's company had their holiday party up in Eugene, Oregon, to celebrate the opening of one of their new buildings, The Oregon Federal Courthouse. Afterwards, several members of the firm rented vans and drove the five hours up to Seattle for the weekend. JK met up with them on Saturday for a weekend of wandering the streets of Seattle, some really good food and a lot of really interesting architecture.

The weather was crisp and cold, but good enough to walk all over town. We enjoyed downtown Seattle as it is really easy to get around on foot. We were able to hook up with an old friend of ours from college. We hadn't seen him since graduation over 11 years ago. He has not changed and we had a great evening of drinks and chatting to catch up.

The highlight of the trip was touring the new Seattle Public Library designed by Rem Koolhass. It is a revolutionary idea in terms of a library and takes on more of a persona of a modern museum than a functioning library. Our hotel was right next door to the library as well as being centrally located to downtown which made it easy for us to see the city in the short time that we had.

Of course, we had to trek across town to see the famous Space Needle (the icon of the Seattle skyline). It is spectacular, if not a little worse for the wear, however, I was surprised at how small it seemed in person compared to the photos I have seen.

I have attached the gallery of photos from our trip - click here and it should take you to the gallery on our smugmug photosite. The photo at the top is of the "Experience Music Project" building designed by Frank Gehry - next to the Space Needle. Let's just say that it looks A LOT better in the photos than it does in real life, although this photo is very cool showing "EMP" with the Space Needle in the distance.

blogger milestone - subscribe to us via e-mail!

Thanks to my overachiever and technical whiz cousin, I was able to fulfill my dear mother's request to set up a subscription to the blog via e-mail.

So, sign up (see link in sidebar), sit back and just wait for all of those waves of posts to hit your e-mail box . . . so much better than the Neanderthal practice of checking into the blogsite every once in awhile for your info!

the management

one half, one third or one quarter?

Today we have been waiting on the list in China for six months. It has actually gone by very fast.

Since we started this process, the wait time for families to receive a child has gotten longer and longer. To be exact, for every month we wait, the wait time gets a month longer - effectively leaving us going nowhere (even on the slow boat).

At this point, your guess is as good as the rest - we have heard that it could take from a year to even two years to receive our referral. That means that we are either half way to our girl, a third of the way to our girl or maybe even only a quarter of the way to our girl.

In the meantime, here is a rundown of where things stand right now:
Our LID (Log In Date) - June 6, 2006
Families currently in "Review Room" - Files received in February 2006
Families receiving Referrals from "Matching Room" - Files received through September 8, 2006

Current Wait Time - 15 months and growing . . .

FYI - The "Review Room" is where your file goes after it is logged in. The China Center of Adoption Affairs must review and approve your file before it is sent to the "Matching Room" where they will match you with a waiting child. Hopefully, we will reach the "Review Room" soon and will be approved, this will be the next milestone, and then bring on the "Matching Room"!

[everyone think good thoughts] and we will just go out tonight and enjoy our childfree lifestyle for just a little longer!

REFERRAL DAY

The China Center for Adoption Affairs (CCAA) sends out referrals for babies to waiting families about once a month. Referral days are always nice. Lots of happy families, lots of cute babies, and a little bit closer to our own little one.

Today, the CCAA sent referrals for families that were logged in on the waiting list through September 8, 2005. That means the current wait is now around 15 months plus about 2 months to travel.

We leave you with a traditional Chinese proverb,

"You cannot clap with one hand."
(my guess is this sounds more eloquent in Chinese, but it gets the point across)

So, Rejoice & Happy Referral Day! (one of the only festive occasions that happens every month!)

we're baaaaack! [6 weeks in review]

So, we haven't been keeping up with this (as I suspected), but will be making a huge effort to remedy that. However, we do have some (what I feel) are valid excuses, but you can be the judge.

October [week 2] - JK travels to Hawaii for work/ CB (on hiatus from office) working full-time on exhibition project to open at end of October

October [week 3] - JK travels to Hawaii for work (again) and just misses the earthquake by one day/ CB continues work day and night, 24/7 on exhibition project.

October [week 4] - JK travels to Colorado Springs for work and gets stranded in the "Blizzard of 2006" for two extra days/ CB still working day and night, 24/7 finishes preparations for exhibition project.

November [week 1] - CB's exhibition opens - A Great Success!/ CB goes back to work and immediately begins a new quick competition for a project in Taiwan/ JK travels to Hawaii (yes, again - that makes 3 red-eyes in 1 month - a new record!)/ Upon return following day, JK tumbles down stairs outside office on her way to travel in Northern Cali - sprains hand/ wrist (RIGHT HAND - nice job)

November [week 2] - CB travels to Taiwan/ JK learns how to put her hair up as well as do many other tasks with her LEFT HAND (not cool).

And that brings us up-to-date. We apologize to all of you whom we have not been keeping up with lately - we were definitely flying under the radar. But, we are regrouping and have a long list of "things to do" to get us back on track.

Coming Soon!
1. Attempt to fix the sidebar links!
2. Figure out how to link photo slideshow like Laura V. B.
3. Oh yeah, write more posts. . .

For now, we leave you with a few photos, "in progress" shots of CB's exhibition piece "en assemblage" in our living room and up in the loft:

THIS IS INSIDE OUR HOUSE PEOPLE!!



and the members of the Hylomorphic exhibit team collaborative at the opening:

life before the little one

There have been comments the past week about our new blog. Most people are wondering where we will find the time to post. Short answer . . . we don't know . . . yet. I am not sure what got into me last week, but looking back on it now, I am not so sure why I thought I could pull this off.

I guess I am looking at this as the beginnings of some new discipline for us, making more time for family and more time to spend with our soon to be little one. You can see already by the date of this post, that this will be no small task. Couple that with my lack of technical skills and fear of the blank screen staring back at me and we have some big issues. (FYI - I realize that my some of my links don't actually link to anything - unfortunately, I haven't figured out what I did wrong yet)

Life now, as you may already know, is very busy. CB has been working for the last two years on an architecture exhibition with his research group, OSA. This work is on top of his regularly insane scheduled full-time job. The exhibition will be opening on October 29, 2006 - next Sunday. We are very excited as well we will be very relieved when it is finally open. You can see the link to the website for the exhibition here. As part of his full-time, day job, CB has been working on a lot of interesting architecture competitions in the past year, the latest being a large office tower in Paris, France.

I am currently juggling various hotel and timeshare design projects that seem to keep me on a plane every week lately. This month includes (3) separate trips to Hawaii, all complete with full accomodations for a one day visit and an all expense paid round-trip, red-eye plane flight back to LA. In the spirit of making "lemonade", I am considering this hard core mommy training for the late night wake-ups/ no sleep phases of parenting. This week I will be on a plane headed in the opposite direction, to Colorado Springs, CO. This week will be a three night stay, so I can settle in a bit - woo hoo!

Oh wait, but there's more! We have a serious deadline now to get this condo in order. Our list of renovation work includes many, many things, but we have narrowed down the list to the absolute priorities required before our girl arrives. This includes the "little one" room, new flooring throughout condo, new paint throughout condo, guest bath renovation, kitchen renovation. By the way, we are accepting any and all offers of visits and assistance if anyone is up to it!

So, back to our new project - the blog. We decided to use our waiting time constructively and for the past year or so we have been learning and experiencing as much of the Chinese culture as we can. It has been very interesting so far and we have thoroughly enjoyed this journey. We would like to use this forum to share our education with you. They say it takes a village to raise a child and we hope you will all be along for the ride.

room for one more?

Our lives are already full with family, friends, travel, work and renovation, but now we are adding a "little one" to the mix. Adoption, parenting, china culture and language are now suddenly on the list, too. Join us during our wait and preparation to become parents.

ps. I should probably add "blogging" to the list . . . peer pressure has gotten us to this point - so this is for all of our "faraway" connections (and those close by too). If getting this thing up and running is any indication of what we are in for - we are in big trouble (and I will really need to work on my technical skills) . . . so I apologize in advance, bear with me while I figure out how to say "hello" in html . . .

the rainbow

Yesterday, we saw a rainbow . . . in LA . . . a FULL RAINBOW - from one end to the other. As I was driving home from work last night, it began to rain. It was real rain with big, fat raindrops coming down all at once. I can count on one hand the amount of times it rains in LA in a year, and that is including the wimpy drizzle mist they usually call rain out here. I spotted the rainbow as I turned onto Santa Monica Boulevard only a few blocks from home and it caught me completely off guard. My second thought was of CB - I wanted him to see it too. (first thought - confusion, double-take, mouth open, awe)

Of course, after I parked the car, rushed up the stairs, called to CB and got him out to the front of the building, I slipped down three stairs and ended up on my back side in a puddle of water. Yeah, moment ruined. CB got me back upstairs, but by the time he got back out to take a another look, the rainbow was gone.

These are the little things I can't wait to share with our girl. I have only seen one FULL RAINBOW before this - it was in Hawaii (land of rainbows). I got a picture of that one . . . now let's see if I can get it posted on this blog.

*Doesn't look like Hawaii, you say? Well, let me assure you that on all my "glamourous" business trips to Hawaii, this is usually what I see.

By the way, I'm fine - bruised back, bruised elbow and strained muscle in the neck, but otherwise good to go.