Zero to Zen: June 2012

Lily and Semira with their cousins Jack and Emma in Lake Michigan

It's been forever since I updated this blog. I have several things I wanted to write about in my head, but I have lacked the motivation to actually do it. Perhaps it has to do with the fact that we have been waiting over six months now to get good news from our adoption agency that we have a new court date scheduled and we still haven't gotten it. To be honest, the last few months have been a mental roller coaster.

I won't bore people with all the details, but there is a significant slow down in adoptions from the region of Ethiopia where our son is from. The impasse has not relented and there has been little news indicating any sort of near-term resolution; I don't want to say much more because we have been advised not to by our agency. As a result, we are caught in a paperwork struggle that defies common sense. We will have a conference call with our agency next week to discuss the situation and figure out a game plan (if there is one). Never did I think I would be sitting here nine months after receiving our referral dealing with this adoption madness! Because of our limbo adoption status, it has been really difficult to plan anything more than a few weeks in advance. I have to say that I have been wrestling with a funky mood lately.

I am attempting not to feel sorry for myself for another minute. I am not going to fritter the summer away waiting. Because of my work schedule, summer is when I get some serious time off and I will be kicking myself if I stayed in Laramie the entire time. It's not that Laramie isn't nice this time of the year. The weather is actually perfect! It's just that I need to escape every three months to maintain my sanity. There is something mentally wearing for me about feeling trapped in the hinterland. Many of my Wyoming friends know what I mean by this!

So I took my girls to see their cousins in Chicago last week. We had planned to see the Chicago cousins over winter break in December, but we ended up in Ethiopia instead. A year and a half was far too long for cousins not to see each other. We had a great time! And a lake house in Wisconsin was a great change of scenery.

Now onto my wild hair plans. The other day I must have lost my mind because I booked a southern Carribean cruise in early July. It will be a girls vacation - me, my girls, and my mother since my husband will never set foot on a cruise ship. Ok, so this is either a brilliant idea or totally financially irresponsible (if we end up going to Ethiopia later this summer). But you know what? I don't really care. My kids are beyond excited! I remember the first time I went on a cruise when I was about Lily and Semira's age. It was magical and is something I vividly remember to this day. For those who know me well, I do like to travel and I would rather spend my money on experiences than on things. And I would rather live my life doing the things I feel are important for my family rather than looking back and thinking about what we could or should have done.

In addition to my upcoming travel, I want to start writing about some other interesting things I have been pondering lately. Perhaps the hottest topic is our ongoing food journey (Holy Cow - the Pragers have taken a hiatus from vegetarianism after two decades - look for more in a future blog post). Yup, we continue to obsesses about health related matters in our house. I also wanted to share my unhappy bone density results from a recent DEXA scan. Again, I need a few other distractions to stop obsessing about the status of our adoption.

Dealing with the uncertainty sucks. But hey, that is life! In the meantime, here are some pictures from our recent trip to Chicago and Crivitz, Wisconsin.