Packages in the Mail, birthdays, and various other things

So work has been quite busy but now not so much. To be honest, I’ve done about 5 minutes of real work today and I’m not shirking, that’s how much there was to do. It will likely be like this until Monday or perhaps even longer than that. Such is the life of a speechwriter. If no one is giving speeches … A colleague of mine and I were chatting and she was telling me that freelance speechwriters command really high fees (compared to my daily salary) but the downside is that when we are quiet so are they, the difference being that they don’t get paid over that quiet time. I like getting paid. Lol

This week, I mailed off 3 special packages. I’m feeling kind of proud of them although I didn’t do the hard part – all I did was make pretty covers and mail them. They are DVDs of the kids (different DVDs for each kid) highlighting the last year. The include pictures and little home movies, set to music (it’s nice to have a professional broadcast editor as a husband sometimes :)). They are our Mother’s Day presents to Sam and Kamryn’s birthmothers and Sam’s grandmother. I wasn’t going to send Sam’s grandmother one for Mother’s Day (I don’t know what I was thinking) because she is coming up to see him in a week and a half or so but I went to buy Mother’s Day cards yesterday and realized how stupid an idea waiting was.

We are still at odds with Sam’s birthmother over his name. She writes us e-mails quite often and always refers to him with his original name (it’s now his middle name). I never say anything because I don’t want to upset her. Still… it grates. It’s been a year now and well – his name is changed! I did note that she just used his initial on his birthday card, which I guess I appreciate. We chose his name based on the fact that his birthfamily didn’t use his given name and instead tended to call him by the initial. We stuck with the same initial. Otherwise his name really would have been “Sam.” Anyway, Daniel went through great lengths in editing the video (he was up until 3 am on Sunday night!) to remove all mention of his name in our home movies. Sweet of him except he didn’t tell me he had done that until yesterday (I mailed his birthmother’s copy yesterday morning). I made up little CD covers which I titled “A Journey Through my Second Year” and signed “Love Sam.” Ah well…

We are coming up on the anniversary of everything finally coming together for his adoption. This time last year I was absolutely miserable. Crying everyday miserable because things kept getting worse and worse. Today, I mailed the payment for our last bill to his adoption agency. His paperwork to finalize the adoption has been filed with the courts and we are just waiting for confirmation in the mail that that adoption has been finalized (we have no idea when it will actually happen but it should be any day now). After almost 5 years, we are finally done with attorneys, and adoption agencies, and social workers. Feels kind of odd. The tremendous bureaucracy of the adoption process has taken so much of our life up for so long; it’s hard to leave it behind. It’s a welcome load to put down though.

I’m busy planning for Sam’s second birthday party for the May long weekend. I so hope the weather is nice. We are getting (hopefully if my neighbour comes through) a bouncy house that the biggest problem will be getting Sam to share with his guests. Lol I’ve decided to go with a Finding Nemo theme (having learnt nothing from attempting to do the same thing last year for Kamryn’s birthday). He carries a little Nemo or Dory toy around wherever he goes, though; it’s definitely a favorite. The toys are actually remnants from Kamryn’s birthday cake last year. What the party will likely be (after I search everywhere and find nothing Nemo and Dory related) a party with blue and orange streamers, a Nemo cake and … well that would be it. Not that he will care. We will have a family party the following day. For that I will get a Buzz Lightening cake, another Sam Favorite. We are going to have a lot of cake.

My birthday precedes Sam’s. I didn’t think we would celebrate since it’s the day after Mother’s Day but Daniel is insisting on taking the day off work and taking me out for dinner and a movie (none of the good movies will have been released yet since my birthday is too early in May ah well). I told him that I was just flattered that he plans to do this and that it’s the thought that counts and he can work if he wants to but he is insisting. Pretty funny, I would be annoyed had he done otherwise, but now that he has I’m soooooo fine with him not doing it. Am I making any sense? Daniel’s birthday follows Sam’s (3 birthdays in 6 days) but he’s going to have to share his celebrating with Sam since his birthday is on one of Sam’s party days. Sam’s grandmother is supposed to join us for one of the parties. Don’t know which yet. Did I mention there’s going to be a ton of cake? Lol

Okay more from me later this week. I’ve been reading my journal entries from last year this time. It’s a little bizarre. Kind of like reading a book after you already know there will be a happy ending. You just want to yell at the characters – just you wait, exciting stuff will happen in chapter 2.