motherhood

Mommy’s Diary 58: Adoption Progress

July 20, 2012 By Chie

Hello! Today I want to take a break of Kiko’s terrible two nightmare talk and talk about our adoption process. After our initial interview with ISSJ, we were notified that we got approved! Yay! Now we can move on to collecting necessary documents for the study. If you are new here, my husband and I are trying to adopt a child, and going through two different routes to increase our chances of receiving a child: we are trying both adoption and foster care. I’ve written our process for foster care registration here in the past.

When we received the letter from ISSJ informing us of the list of necessary documents, we glanced at it and put it back on Andy’s desk. The letter sat there for a bit – there is a long list of documents we have to get, starting from certified copies of birth certificates, marriage certificates, physical evaluations, personal statements, self biographies, pictures of our place and so on. Today we decided to tackle this long list and got a little over half done. We had to order Andy’s birth certificate from the U.S., since we live in Japan now. Andy started writing his biography, and has spent at least 3 hours on it already.

Although collecting all these documents is a lot of work, I think it is good that the agency requires a through information and background check of the hopeful parents. If I were a parent who was putting my child up for adoption, I would want the agency to be as through as possible. I forgot to write about our initial interview with the case workers at ISSJ, but it went well, and Andy and I wished that the child guidance center did the same thing for foster care registration. The ISSJ case workers asked many questions about our selves, our plans etc, many of the topics Andy and I had discussed at home. I think having an interview like that would help weed out some of the bad foster parents… I like ISSJ, I feel like they really make sure to place the priority on the children.

We are hoping to have all the documents sent to the agency by the end of this summer, so we can do the home study. I am excited. Another step forward toward adoption.

Photos are from my Instagram – Follow me @vivatveritas

Mommy’s Diary 57: Ueno Zoo

July 14, 2012 By Chie

On the 4th of July, my friend, her daughter, Kiko and I went on a little date to Ueno Zoo. It is right near the JR Ueno station and the entrance fee for adults is 600 yen, which is pretty reasonable. It was great to have Kiko run around at the zoo, where I did not have to worry about cars and other similar dangers. Although she still calls every moving animal “wan wan” (doggie in Japanese), I think she had a good time.

Thank you for all the advice and comments on “terrible two” post last week! She has been a bit better this week. I should celebrate that she is in this new stage, since she is growing and it is necessary for her develop accordingly.

Mommy’s Diary: Terrible Two’s…. Already?!

July 5, 2012 By Chie

Hello! Hope everyone had a nice Forth of July vacation:) I had a day off, so Kiko and I went to a zoo in Tokyo with my high school friend and her daughter. More pictures of the zoo next week..

But, as the title says, I’m feeling like I face different challenges as Kiko develops and matures. As soon as one challenge is conquered, another one comes! I feel like Kiko is hitting “terrible two’s” stage already even though she is still 14 months old. I read in Baby Center that some kids can start this delightful process early. Kiko wants to do many things on her own. For instance, she wants to walk on her own without anyone holding her hand, particularly on busy streets. This is perfect because we live on an intersection of two busy streets and I’m terrified that she will get run over by a car!

Adding to her knew found self exaltation in the terrible two stage, if something something happens that she does not like, she picked up the habit of sitting on the ground and crying. I’ve spent the past couple of days being frustrated with her because of this.

I’ve also had it reported to me by my mom that when she and Kiko went to a community center (where there are toys and a play ground), she dominated the slide like a little tyrant. She did not let the other kids play on the slide…Sigh. I wish I were there to beat that out of her, but alas I was not. How do you teach kids to share?

The photos above are from a recent visit to my parents – we hung out, ate my mom’s delicious meals, played the piano and played with bubbles Those days were “Terrible Two-less” thankfully. At this point I need all of those days I can get.