Houston, we have a tooth.

The prize has finally arrived after many months of drool beyond compare, and chewing, and fussing, and pooping. (What? Pooping is not a sign of teething? Then why do you always seem to read how someone's little one had "a big poop" and that's just how they knew a tooth was coming? I figure with all these diapers he's been working on something big.)

Anyway, the great moment of discovery was last night at dinner and of course the first thing we all did was immediately stick our fingers in his mouth to feel the tooth. Boy did THAT go over well (ahem).

I guess we'd better shape up, now that the little bugger can bite.

Cool tool

I'm one of those weirdo's who likes to color in maps to show where I've traveled. I've been to quite a few states, but I was nearly 30 before I left the US. So, I had to do something to make it look like I was "well traveled." I found this cool tool while surfing at Menita's blog.

I will admit that having the states where I've been as "red states" bugs me, but I'll get over it. I guess I need to go north more often, huh?

If you want to create your own visited states map, go here.

Revival

I feel like I have been in hibernation for an eternity. lately, life has been getting the better of my time, and has left me with little extra for things like blogging. It has also left me tired and not feeling like I really have much to say.

Gabriel is growing like a weed and seems to change each and every day. Some days, I swear I wouldn't recognize him by the end of the day because he has changed so much. That's actually one of my recurring nightmares...not knowing which kid is mine in a group. I don't expect it to happen IRL, but it sure is scary to wake up from one of those dreams and start to doubt your own mothering.

Now that it is officially spring, I feel like I should be putting efforts into something constructive. At this time last year, I was having a baby shower, preparing a nursery, and wondering whether I was really cut out for the whole mothering thing. This year, I am preparing for Gabriel's first birthday in May, reorganizing the house to make one of the rooms into a playroom for him (no, he really doesn't need a playroom at one year, but I want to have it), and thinking about the expansion of our family. We have discussed it at length and are not going to revisit the IVF path. Yes, we had an amazing run of success with our one and only experience. But we were fully committed to adoption before my pregnancy, and we are going back to that pursuit. In fact, only yesterday we reactivated our paperwork with the agency. The director will need an updated profile and we will need to get recertification for criminal and child abuse background checks, but outside of that our other paperwork should still be fine. We never got to the homestudy phase the first time around, so that would need to be done regardless.

Now I am anxious to really get things fixed up around the house because once there are two kids, we can forget ever having time to do *anything*. But I am really excited at the possibility of this guy having a little brother or sister. I think he'll be happy about it too.