Tagged

I’ve been Tagged!  Christine at 12,450 Miles got me, so here it is:

1. What time did you get up this morning? 6:44am

2. Diamonds or pearls? Diamonds (wearing mine right now  )

3. What was the last film you saw at the cinema? Momma Mia

4. What is your favourite TV show?  Let’s go by day of the week:  Desperate Housewives, Intervention, House, The Office, Grey’s Anatomy, Coronation Street and Jon & Kate plus 8

5. What do you usually have for breakfast?  coffee and toast

6. What is your middle name?  Lee Anne

7. What food do you dislike? Sausage

8. What is your favourite CD at the moment? Viva la Vida by Cold Play 

9. What kind of car do you drive? Honda Civic.

10. Favourite sandwich? Summer Sausage, Mustard and Lettuce

11. What characteristic do you despise?  Shallowness

12. Favourite item of clothing? Not that I wear it very often, but my little black dress.  Fav item I wear a lot – my Mavi jeans.

13. If you could go anywhere in the world on vacation, where would you go? Korea!!!  And I would love to go back to New York.

14. Favourite brand of clothing?  Don’t really have one – although I do love Mavi or Esprit jeans

15. Where would you retire to? Cottage Country

16. What was your most recent memorable birthday? My 29th was really nice (2 years ago), had champagne, got dressed up and went to the Church for dinner. 

17. Favourite sport to watch? Hockey I guess….

18. When is your birthday? November

19. Are you a morning person or a night person? Night

20. What is your shoe size? 7

21. Pets? Mason – a wonderful Brittany Spaniel

22. Any new and exciting news you’d like to share with us? I wish – still waiting…

23. What did you want to be when you were little? A Librarian – and that is what I am!  Christine – you too!?

24. How are you today? Tired – just sat through a day of talk on Integrated Library Systems

25. What is your favourite candy(lollie/chocolate)? Coffee Crisp and Curley Wurlys

26. What is your favourite flower? Peony

27. What is a day on the calendar you are looking forward to? October 3- my day off – a nice long weekend

28. What is your full name? Krista Robinson

29. What are you listening to right now? My office mate’s phone continuously ringing…

30. What was the last thing you ate? Macadamia nut cookie

31. Do you wish on stars? Yep

32. If you were a crayon, what colour would you be? Midnight Blue.

33. How is the weather right now? The sun is peaking through the clouds.

34. The first person you spoke to on the phone today? My hubby

35. Favourite soft drink? Root Beer.

36. Favourite restaurant? Pazzo or Raja.

37. Real hair colour? Brown

38. What was your favourite toy as a child? Strawberry Shortcake dolls, Cabbage Patach Kids, Lego

39. Summer or winter? Summer – cottage time!

40. Hugs or kisses? Hugs

41. Chocolate or Vanilla? Vanilla

42. Coffee or tea? COFFEE.

43. When was the last time you cried? .I’m not sure – I usually tear up when reading sad stories in the paper. 

44. What is under your bed? Not much – perhaps some dust bunnies.

45. What did you do last night? Watched Desperate Housewives and The Amazing Race.  Recooped from making jam.

46. What are you afraid of? The leaping bugs in the library

47. Salty or sweet? - OMG!  That is so funny!  Christine mentioned both – with Kettle Corn – I found it at the grocery store yesterday and ate most of the bag… myself…

48. How many keys on your key ring? 5.

49. How many years at your current job? 7.

50. Favourite day of the week? Friday.

51. How many places have you lived in? .4 cities – many houses

52. Do you make friends easily? Sometimes

I will tag… Beth, Laura and Kristine (fellow blogger)

Etsy

So for a while I’ve had a real bad Etsy addiction.  When the computer is on, I check their homepage every hour – it rotates on the hour with new homemade items – and then I start exploring – seriously – it is a sickness.  I however have given in and created my own Etsy store.  Right now I’m not selling anything homemade (that will come!), but I have posted some vintage buttons that were my mom’s.  So if you know anyone in the market for cool buttons, have them check the site out.  All proceeds will be put towards our adoption costs.

Immunizations

In preparation to travel to South Korea, we were advised to have some Immunizations done.  So earlier this summer I had a tetanus shot and I had already been updated on diphtheria and polio so I was good there.  We have to find out about Matt for those 3… Today we started our Twinrix shots for Hepatitis B and Hepatitis A.  It is a 3 shot process – one today, one in a month, and one in 6 months from today.  Don’t believe the doctor/nurse when they say it won’t hurt – it will.  It goes into your arm muscle – and it gets sore!  Even Matt who has big arms was commenting.

One more step done!

Referrals

Today we received a new Children’s Bridge update.  In the last 2 weeks there have been three referrals received - a 5 month-old baby girl, and two 5 month-old baby boys – waits were 3 to 4 months.  But this past week there have been referrals for five boys (5-7 months old) and the wait for referral was 2 to 4 months!  Congratulations everyone!!

Referral Calendar

One of the things I love about having a blog is the interaction you get to have with people from all over.  As you can see from the map I have on the right – people have visited this blog from all over the world!  I have had the luck of meeting some really nice people who are going through the same things I am.  One blogger is from the blog 12,450 Miles.  Christine and her husband and Matt and I are both at about the same spot in the adoption process so it has been great corresponding with her.  She designed a Referral Calendar to graphically represent the time line for their referral – and generously created one for us in our nursery colours!!  So here it is – and Thank You again Christine!!

The Star represents when our Dossier went to Korea.  The phone represents when we hope to get a phone call about our referral.  The plan represents when we hope to travel!!!

Still Here… Still Waiting

Things have been pretty busy the last week or so.  Not on the adoption front but on the regular life front.

• Matt has started back at work – he’s a teacher so he is back at it full force.
• Matt is coaching hockey as well so he’s been pretty busy there
• Went to see Caesar and Cleopatra with Christopher Plummer at the Festival Theatre – great show to see if you have a chance
• Took the homemade pledge
• Working on Christmas presents – yep – I know, it’s a little early – but I want to enjoy the holidays this  year and not be stressed!  I’m making 3 flannel rag quilts – will post pictures on my second blog (see next point)
• Started a second blog for my girlfriends – Crafts n’ Such.  We are going to try and meet every few weeks to do some crafts / sewing / scrapbooking etc., and just hang out.  The first session is this Thursday, and coincidentally coincides with the premiere of Grey’s Anatomy!  Can’t wait!
• Went on a nice date with my hubby on Friday since we haven’t seen each other much – went to Down the Street (in Stratford)

And now I’m sick.  Matt had a cold all weekend – and of course, I now have it.  I just hope my throat holds out for the computer class I’m teaching this afternoon…  I know I shouldn’t be at work – but I dont’ really have anyone who can back me up in my programs.

On the baby front – not much going on.  I’ve been bidding on fabric on eBay and am just waiting for it to arrive so I can start some baby quilts.  Still waiting for the crib – should be arriving in another 4 weeks.   Then I can start the crib skirt, get some curtains etc…  I am also reading another book on making the choice to adopt.  Although we obviously have already made that decision it is still a good book on the emotions of adoption and it goes into the issue of attachment.  I will post more on it when I’m done.

Saving

Lately I have been freaking about how we will be able to afford to live when I’m off on parental leave next year.  Because of how quickly the adoption process has been coming together, we have had less time to save up – and what we have been saving is going towards paying for the adoption process – so not much left for saving for parental leave.  I’ve created some sample budgets for next year with the paternity benefits factored in – and we will be fine – but I’m still freaking.

I thought I would share some of the things we have been doing to save some extra cash:

• USE THE LIBRARY!!  Libraries are no longer just books – they have cds, dvds, magazines, free (or very cheap) programs, downloadable audiobooks/videos/music.  Why pay to rent a dvd from a video store for $5 when you can go to the library and borrow one for FREE- just return it on time.  Since I am a librarian I dont’ get fines anyhow, but I can’t imagine how much we have saved by using the library.
• Make a Menu.  We make up a menu at the beginning of each week and try to stick to it.  When you know what you are going to have it makes it much easier to go to the grocery store and get what you really need - and as a result, the grocery bill is less. 
• Don’t eat out – well we try… but we love to eat out – we have reduced it to about once every 2 weeks…
• Use Coupons – I love coupons – Free money!  Even at our favourite grocery store you receive coupons for cash off your groceries if you buy gas at their gas station – Free is good.
• Save your change – roll it – you will be surprised how much it can add up to.
• Turn down the thermostat – I try to be as green as I can – so we live a little cooler in the winter and a little warmer in the summer – and you really can see a difference on the hydro bill.
• Compost / Recycle – by doing this, you reduce the amount you put in the garbage and you then save on garbage tags (we have to pay to have our garbage picked up here)  Same goes for yard waste days – put it out on the curb in the special bags – don’t pay to put it in the landfill.
• While this one doesn’t really save cash, it does help out when the time is right – we put $50 away in a Xmas account each pay – then when it comes to Christmas shopping we have about $1200 and we don’t need to rack up the credit cards and deal with the January bills… 
• Use points – we have Air Miles and Club Z points – and use them to buy gifts for either other people or ourselves – and you can even get gift certificates for stores!  Free shopping – I love it!

Please share any other ideas you might have on saving money on a daily basis – I’d love to hear them!

Referrals

In the last 2 weeks there have been 5 referrals to families through Children’s Bridge!  While that is quite amazing itself, what is really amazing is that the referrals took 3 – 5 months to receive!!  3 Months!  The average that we have been told are 6-8 months.  How very exciting for all of those families.

North Korea

Across the headlines of all the papers this morning was the headline that Kim Jong-il, leader of North Korea is believed to be ill, and that he has perhaps had a stroke. Updates on the Globe and Mail state state that he is actually recovering from surgery.   Speculation as to his condition came after he missed attending a parade on Tuesday commemorating the communist state’s founding 60 years ago. 

So why is this an issue on an adoption blog?  If a new leader were to come into power, the political situation in the country may change.  Nuclear weapons may become an issue again, and if so, there is a chance of travel bans to the area. Also technically North and South Korea are still at war – and since we are adopting from South Korea…

A great video to watch on North Korea is called Inside North Korea.  It is a documentary done by Lisa Ling and National Geographic.  It is very well done and very interesting.  Stratford Public Library has a copy if anyone in this area wants to watch it.

Chusok

Starting on September 14 (this Sunday), Koreans will be celebrating Chusok (choo-sock) which is a 3 day Harvest Festival.  According to Wikipedia, in modern day Korea “during Chuseok there is a mass exodus of Koreans returning to their hometowns to pay respects to the spirits of one’s ancestors. People perform ancestral worship rituals early in the morning. They often visit the tombs of their immediate ancestors to trim plants and clean the area around the tomb, and offer food, drink, and crops to their ancestors. Harvest crops are attributed to the blessing of ancestors.” 
Songpyeon, a crescent shaped rice dish that is traditionally served during Chusok.  Here is a recipe if anyone is interested in trying it out (if you do, please comment on what you think of it!) 
I was planning on doing some canning this weekend, perfect to celebrate the harvest – and perhaps we can do another Korean feast.