Pooh makes friends with a Cat

Today I woke up with an "existential" question:  Are bears and cats natural friends?
Uhhhmmm,  don't think so.... but neither are bears and little piggies or dunkies - and may I add... a piggy and a dunky are some of Winnie the Pooh's best friends! (according to A.A Milner).  Also,  Tigger is kinda of a cat... right?  So they could be, and if you are not convinced, discuss it with Walt Disney  ; )

In the end, it really doesn't matter in what part of the animal kingdom you are located or if you like honey or tuna as long as you have the right friends.  The kind you have fun with, and you can count on... the kind you can go through an adoption process with... and be thankful that they are there for you while you were trying to decipher the instructions provided by the Colombian officials regarding the mountain of documents that you are supposed to fill.  Yes. That kind. 

But I'm digressing... going back to the Cat.  I'll give you some clues for you to guess.  This is a very famous cat people, so concentrate:

1. Our little cat lives in a red roof little white house at a suburban town 20km from London.
2. Weight: Same as 3 apples! - definitely less than me! I bet you she doesn't have to do weight watchers or vegetarian diet or go on an 18 Km bike ride or any of that stuff... ooppps digressing again!
3.  Height: Same as 5 apples!
4.  What she likes (hobbies): She likes collecting little stars, little goldfishes, lollies and as many ribbons as possible as decorations. She loooooves candies.
5.  What makes her attractive?: What attracts the most is her red ribbon on the top left ear, and her fluffy round ball shaped tail.

By the way, I didn't make these "facts" up.  Those are from her authorized web site.  


If you are a woman between the ages of  30 to 35, you probably had a little pink wallet of this little cat when you were 10 or 11... or maybe some stationary.  If you have girls or you are japanese you probably already know who this little Kitty is... yeesss presenting!!! (drums in the back!) Hello Kitty!!

But you might be wondering... why is Hello Kitty such a big deal now? Well... I'll explain.  See,  if  you think that in our house we have some kind of Pooh cult... I can assure you that other people are almost Hello Kitty worshipers!!  And the social worker didn't even have time to notice! A really dangerous environment for a girl to grow up on!!

Imagine the poor little Colombian girl that is going to have to deal with this; 

 And this;

  And finally... THIS!!

Nooooooo!!! (read, very scary scream!!) She'll die of excessive cuteness.  ;)

That little girl or Colombianita will be our friend's Alex & Carlos' brand new daughter.  She will also be Nico's new little sis'.  They are a Colombian family who decided to adopt at around the same time as we did.  Because of that  coincidence, the agency got us in touch and we met here in Calgary about a year ago.  They are obviously very excited and very prepared to receive their little girl. 

It's been really a blessing having them going through all the process with us.  Talk about company and support! No kidding!

Oh and by the way... Alex and I decided that if we get a boy they'll be instantly engaged.  And they don't get a say about it.  All that stuff about freedom doesn't apply  : )   Everything is arranged (poor kids... over involved parents... and they haven't even landed in Canada!).

Here is a picture of Alex, Carlos and Nico.  And just to clarify the stick on Nico's hand is supposed to be a sword of some sort... he explained to us that it is lethal to the touch... so nobody messed with the kid with the stick...except Duna who was trying to get him to throw the "sword" for her to fetch.  : )

Oh! and a little story.   When we got to the trail we intended to walk the day the picture was taken, there was a big red flag that warned of a bear sighting just the day before. Which by the way,  means you are not supposed to go on that trail unless you are fully prepared to encounter a black bear.... not a bear like Winnie the Pooh who's fluffy and friendly... but one that might actually think that you are the 3:00 pm snack.  Ok ok... I'm exaggerating... but either way... there was a black bear. 

Our friend Carlos however, intended to continue on the trail... yeahhh right! Dude... I like bears but not that much.  So off  I went on the other direction.  I hope he didn't think it was personal... I just didn't feel heroic that particular day.  : )  Besides, the trail we end up walking was beautiful!
 
And this is a close up of us enjoying the rest of the walk in the mountains.

Of course,  Alex and I are praying to get our Colombianitos before there is more snow in those mountains.  And we'll make sure to take this picture with the two little ones next time. 

Until next post,

LuzM.

PS.  This weekend is Thanksgiving here in Canada.   Although this is not a Colombian tradition I realize that there are thing I have to be thankful for.  My top five 2010 reasons to be thankful:

1. My lovely husband who is so smart and patient with me.
2. My family which includes my personal favorite members in Colombia and Calgary - Including the baby who's already part of that family!
3. My friends who are spread-er around the globe than I would like.  Those in Colombia, Montreal, the US & farther away. Those that even in the distance still call and send fb "likes".  And those new ones here in Calgary who are now an integral part of our lives.
4. My pets who are always putting a smile on my face.
5. My health, which allows me to work, feel, run, go on bike rides, hurt the next day, cook with friends, read and just be happy me. 

All about Project Pooh

If you got to this blog by searching “Adoption”, you might be starting to wonder WHEN am I going to talk about this process, and specially about our future baby.  You know...  your usual adoption blog staff…  how we came up to this decision, the oceans of paperwork, the waiting, or some of those common themes. 

But people… do not try to hurry the creative process of a published author  : )  

Seriously,  I’m getting there.  It’s all about contextualizing the process, setting the scenery…  yeah yeah… blah blah...

I have to say thought, I feel your pain.  You see, patience is NOT one of my gifts so,  I decided to speed up the process and ease your curiosity.  Today is all about Project Pooh.

Technically speaking,  Project Pooh was secretly engineered in early April 2009.  According to the initial schedule,  Project Pooh was planned to be implemented in August and be completely operational (just in case Colombian officials got really fast) by the end of the year.  However,  like in many critical projects things did not go as planned.  You see,  our international specialist, coming all the way over from Colombia,  decided to get into another type of critical project in the same month!  It was then when all of the operational managers (read: Tavo, Luz, Milu & Duna) got together and  re-scheduled  the implementation activities to June.  Uff!! We were able to save Project Pooh.  (Draaaama!!!).  

 Our international specialist’s picture:

Now you see where I get my beautiful looks uh? :)  Actually, the rescheduling of Project Pooh kinda of fitted perfectly because then, I would have my mom over from Colombia for my B-day!

 

In a summary, with mom in town,  Tavo could relax about the B-day prep and the Project Pooh situation…  you see... we had the decorating under control.  Here is how it went: 

1.     The color scheme:  I know many people feel very strongly about pink or blue (yes… you know who you are!) but we didn’t have to think about that, since we don’t know yet if our Colombianito(a) will be a boy or a girl.   So it was pretty easy:  White was out of the question, so it was either green, yellow or a combination of the two – the standard palette of the - "we don’t know what we’re getting" - type of people. 

2.     The room “theme”:  Something that I came to realize very early into the engineering process of  this project  is that the - "we don’t know what we’re getting"- type of people,  don’t have as many choices as you might think.  Princesses (pink), Nemo (blue),  Cars (blue),  Hello kitty  (pink)  and many other themes;  are off limits for us for obvious reasons.   I tell you, after a long “theme” research I could nail down to three the themes available to us: 

- The Zoo.  

- Cute numbers.  

- Winnie the Pooh

Yes you guessed right smart readers... Winnie the Pooh it was.  Besides, to be honest, Winnie the Pooh is way cutter than any princess, Nemo, Car or Hello Kitty.  (Just so you know... I might be loosing some friends over that last statement).  We went Pooh insane!!

Go pooh, go pooh, go go go go...  oh! and of course... everybody participated, including the implementation team .  

 

3. The Furniture and Decorations: The last step was the furniture and other decorations.  In this section I have to say that Kijiji and e-Bay totally rock!.   You would not believe all the good stuff available for kids.   The basic principle to keep in mind is: Kids grow up FAST... so they hardly wear out anything that is new.  And believe me... after all the adoption expenses,  I was beyond happy to find all the good deals!.  

And is not like you're running against the clock in international adoption...  actually, if anything is true with an adoption process is that there is NO clock.  So if you have the time... use it, and wait for the lovely crib to come up for an incredible price! - Now that's the professional buyer in me speaking... anyone up for a market analysis???   :)  

So when everything was done I walked into this office made a nursery. - As a side note I forgot to tell you that Tavo is now enjoying his own space in the basement -  Anyway... it's beautiful, but at the same time is so weird!!! we have a nursery!!! in our own home!!  We're expecting a baby!!! Yes... it is kinda of scary... 


Imagine,  in this very second,  our Colombianito(a) might already be waiting... in his/her belly-mommy's  belly! I just hope that when the baby arrives doesn't think we're some kind of Pooh's religion fanatics!  But for all it's worth... we had a great time!. 


Until next post, 


Luz M.