Little help...

So, ethics is a big deal in adoption. It isn't something I have talked about a lot, but it is something that I feel is incredibly important.  I mean, some day you have to look your children in the eye and answer their questions about their grief and losses. And you damn well better know the real answers. And you really want to make sure that you weren't knowingly or unknowingly contributing to the vast misfortune that lead to them leaving their family, culture, and everything they knew and loved. A. and J. were doing their best to make sure they could look their new son from Haiti in the eye and tell him that they loved him enough to make sure that there really was no other option for him that would be less traumatic. That, while the things that led him into an orphanage and into an 'adoptable' status were tragic, they weren't caused by an agency trying to find children to meet a need for rich Westerners. The investigating they did led to some very troubling discoveries about their agency. While their adoption has been independently investigated and found to be lawful and necessary, the agency has been doing some incredibly unethical things. This sweet boy, Alex, is legally A and J's son. He has been waiting for a year to come home to his permanent family; all they need to do is to submit their dossier to the officials to obtain a visa to bring him home. Their agency (you know, the one with all of the shady dealings) will not release this dossier unless A and J agree to sign a gag order and not divulge the unethical nature of their practices. They are holding this kid hostage so that they don't get in trouble. In order to make sure that A and J can expose this agency and what it is doing to families in Haiti and still bring Alex home, they need to redo their entire dossier. This will cost them around $8500 that they really don't have lying around, because they, you know, just completed an adoption. They paid for the adoption fees, but don't have enough to pay to redo everything (and who would? Certainly not me!).  If you have a few extra dollars, please consider sending it their way. You can check out the story in their own words at:
http://at-the-watershed-blog.blogspot.com/p/why-we.html

Searching...

So... I was screwing around on Facebook a few weeks ago. I put in the name of an Ethiopian relative of one of my children, just on a whim. And there it was. Same rather unusual name. Same town. I didn't know what to do.  My first impulse was to friend them and write them a long letter about how I longed to know more about them and make connections for my child. Then I got scared. I have had a lot of babies taken from me in a lot of ways, yo. I won't even pretend that there wasn't a part of me that panicked thinking that if I found her, she would want this child back. That something would happen and I would lose this person who is not just a part of me, but is my very soul.  Is this likely. Well, it is probably impossible. Is this a fair feeling to have on my part? Not at all... it is a very selfish one. After all, this person in Ethiopia has a prior claim.  It is wrong to pretend that they don't. So, what does a person trying to be the best mama they can be do? Well, I made a new Facebook account with just a few family pictures, no last names or locations, and sent a friend request along with a brief note explaining that I was the American mother of TS and that if she knew T. I wondered if she was interested in having contact.
I didn't want her to get in trouble. What if this was all a big secret that I would be dredging up? What if my message would make her uncomfortable or upset? So, I tried to keep it neutral. I waited, checking my new Facebook account religiously. And then she posted a picture of herself. The owner of the account can't be more that 14. She is certainly not the person I thought she was.
I was crushed.  I realized all of the sudden how much I wanted that for my child. How much I wanted my kids to have a real, tangible connection with their history and biological family. How much I want them to have their questions answered.  How much I wanted this family on the other side of the world to be a real part of our family.
So I want to search. I want to find who I can before they are scattered to the winds and impossible to locate.  Has anybody done this? Any tips? Any boundaries I shouldn't cross? Any advice of any kind?

Eastering it

The Outtakes:

And the good ones. Well, who am I kidding? I think the outtakes are just as cute, and much more accurate. 

 Two and a half days at Grammy and Papa's house, zero naps, scads of people eager to play and a holiday. Zero crazy melt downs. Well, one, but it was from someone other than the usual suspect at holidays and, well, he really isn't a morning person. I think we are getting this holiday thing down. Happy Easter to us all.

Pretty sure...

I just told my four year old son that he has to sweep the floor to show our house he is sorry for treating it badly (cause he spit on the floor, but by the time his time out was done the dog has already licked his spit off the floor). How did it come to this? So, I am supervising Kai's ineffectual cleaning, while simultaneously playing with the girls. Amazingly enough, I am able to blog at the same time, because the only part the girls want me to play in their game is "daycare"... which means they drop their babies off, give them kisses and tell them they love them and go play. My only real participation is that when they come to pick them up I have to invent stories about their day like, "She had a great morning, however she did eat too much at lunch and got sick to her stomach. I told her you always remind her that she needs to listen to her body so she knows when she is full." I try to work in teachable moments so that I feel like it is good parenting.
I'm pretty sure I never pictured my life quite like this.  To be fair, I also never envisioned things like yesterday. The kids reenacted The Wizard of Oz, complete with their own renditions of the songs. Then we were treated to a dramatic reading of Goldilocks and the Three Bears and several rousing choruses of "Mary had a Little Lamb" all MC'd by Meron using a hairbrush as a microphone. I mean, sure, it ended with them 'inventing' songs which sounded like Gregorian Chant only more... toneless... and us inventing a reason that all of the children needed to go upstairs and get pajamas on immediately, but I never would have been able to imagine how much fun is underneath  the noise and chaos (which are also things I NEVER COULD HAVE IMAGINED!).

Comfort

What are your comfort foods? What are the foods that are the culinary equivalent of putting on your fuzzy jammies and curling up with a great book?
Mine used to be the things that my mom made a lot when I was young: hamburger gravy on boiled potatoes, Creole rice, grilled cheese sandwiches with tomato soup, and chili come to mind immediately. My grandma used to make me milk toast when I was sick, and sometimes I still make it for myself when I am feeling under appreciated.  The foods I ate when I was a child bring memories with them. Sitting at the kitchen table and laughing.  Feeling loved and cherished.
As the girls and I were ripping injera into little pieces to make fir fir for lunch after a particularly rough morning, a realization struck me. These flavors, the berbere, turmeric and onions, the squishy tang of the injera, used to be so exotic to me.  The first time I ate Ethiopian food I wasn't sure whether or not I liked it. It shocked my palate in a way that seems funny now.  We used to cook Ethiopian food occasionally because we thought it was important that Meron grew up with it, and began cooking it more often when Hani and Kai came home. It was comfort food for them, and so we tried to make it available. I started to like Ethiopian food a lot and sometimes crave it.  But that day, as I looked at growing pile of injera pieces, I realized that Ethiopian food has become another comfort food for me. It makes me think of parties we have had, of birthdays we have celebrated, of days spent smelling the onions and spices cooking for hours while the kids waited with breathless impatience for the food that brought back memories of some of their happiest times in Ethiopia. 
It is a pretty good metaphor for the best parts of adoption, don't you think?   Our family now has a completely new culture made up of bits and pieces of all of our heritage: hamburger gravy and boiled potatoes from my family, chicken and dumplings from Nathan's family, and Mesir Wot and fir fir from our children's families. I think it is a beautiful thing... this coming together of worlds. None of us losing our essential heritage, but incorporating new things to make our family whole. It isn't anything I ever envisioned, but I love it. I love us.