My little cutie is 10 � months old, and today we went to court for her adoption confirmation hearing! Now the adoption is complete.

We had some relatives there, grandparents and uncles, as well as our social worker and some friends. My former student who is adopted came with her mom and two other siblings, both adopted. I thought it would be something neat for them to see since they are also adopted. The judge was really nice to the kids and found ways for them to participate.

My little sweetie was really good in court. She was a little serious, but I would rather have that than uncontrollable squealing!

We got adoption papers, an adoption certificate, and information on how to get her new birth certificate. Our social worker gave us an application form to get our next adoption started as well as a book about what adopted kids want their parents to know. Grandma & Grandpa gave her a couple stuffed animals, and our friends gave her a plaque with a poem about adoption.

It was a special morning.

The little one is growing like a weed. She's a great crawler and has taken a few steps on her own. She spends a lot of time cruising around the furniture. She loves to look at books and likes animals and other kids, including that funny baby in the mirror! She's about 21 pounds and is over 30 inches tall.

I haven't heard anything from her birthmother. I continue to sent letters and pictures once a month and even gave her my email address over a month ago in case she wanted more updates. I encouraged her to send the letter & sketches she once planned to give us and any pictures she wanted to share. Now I doubt if we'll ever hear from her. When we tell people this they say it is probably for the best. I however would rather have a little contact with her just to get more information about her and the birth family. I guess we'll have to live with the limited information we have.

My attempts to get photos from the interim care/foster family hasn't brought results. My social worker thinks they are having issues with the agency due to a teenage foster child. I mailed them an invitation to the court hearing as well as a recent photo, but heard nothing from them. As we kind of expected, they didn't show up at the hearing this morning. My husband says that I shouldn't feel obliged to send them any more updates or photos since they have totally ignored all of my emails & mail since early this year. I tend to agree with him.

So now we move on to our next adoption. I hope to get our part of the paperwork done by the end of the summer. I'm not in any rush this time. I just hope to get a baby in the next two years.

I'll probably be teaching a high school drawing course once a week at the school where I used to teach. It would only be one hour, once a week, so I wouldn't feel guilty leaving my girl and possibly a new baby with a babysitter. A friend has offered to babysit and several other have offered to help too. I think it is going to be fun. I've been given the flexibility to design the course, and I've already got most of my lessons planned thanks to a great book that I found about teaching drawing.

Some other interesting news is that friends of ours decided to adopt from China. This is the family that had preemie twins three years ago. They asked us to be a reference for them. A couple months the wife was ill and needed a pregnancy test to take a medications....well, she found out that she's pregnant. It took a while before they were positive it was a true pregnancy, but now they have heard a heart beat, so the adoption is on hold. She has had a couple miscarriages, so until she is past her 15th week, when she lost her last one, she is still concerned.

When she told me she was adopting I was so excited and started crying, telling her how all our friends planning to adopt were getting pregnant. Even the one with two adopted kids from Guatemala lost weight and is now pregnant. She told me that she didn't want to tell me she was pregnant because of what I told her. I actually handled it very well. I'm glad that my daughter will have another friend her age. It's possible that this new baby could also be close in age to our next baby.

Last night we were at a high school graduation and saw the couple who moved away - the one who the minister announced was pregnant. We talked to them and found out that they are still considering adoption for the future. They asked us a lot of questions about the adoption and the agency we used. I know that they had a hard time getting pregnant, and want lots of kids, so adoption may be the answer for them.

While I was writing this my daughter discovered that she can climb up the stairs. I had to stop three times to stand behind her in case she slipped and fell! I must go now...."Daddy" is coming home for lunch soon, but I'll try to get a new photo posted soon.