Feburary 1st ---FRANCE????

1 out of 3 people smoke in France! I cannot imagine them making it smoke free!

February 1st-- workplaces, schools and hospitals will have a ban on smoking in France. Smokers will face fines of 68 euros (88 dollars) for lighting up in the wrong place, while business owners will be fined 135 euros.

Companies can choose to provide hermetically-sealed smoking rooms, with powerful extractor fans, but few are expected to install the costly systems, preferring to let staff puff away on the pavement and offer them advice on how to quit.

The rare exceptions to the new rules are places considered as "substitutes for the home" -- such as hotels or retirement homes.

The government has also said it will be lenient towards hospital patients with mental illnesses, who would not understand a sudden ban, or those already struggling to give up alcohol or drug addiction.

Then on February 1st 2008 the Cafe and Bar crowd will have to give up the smoking as well. Although some are already doing it. One cafe owner said that he has always been smoke-free and pregnant women and women with children are his main customers because they prefer their children not to breath in the smoke.

Other Countries who are smoke free:
Ireland, Italy, England, Norway, Sweden, New Zealand, Uganda, Malta, Uruguay, and Bhutan

In the US:
1) California: Restaurants, Bars
2) Connecticut: Restaurants, Bars
3) Delaware: Workplaces, Restaurants, Bars
4) Florida: Workplaces, Restaurants
5) Idaho: Restaurants
6) Maine: Restaurants, Bars
7) Mass.: Workplaces, Restaurants, Bars
8) Montana: Workplaces, Restaurants (Bars 10/1/09)
9) New York: Workplaces, Restaurants, Bars
10) North Dakota: Workplaces
11) Rhode Island: Workplaces, Restaurants, Bars
12) South Dakota: Workplaces
13) Vermont: Restaurants, Bars
14) Washington: Workplaces, Restaurants, Bars

New State Laws effective in 2006*:

15) New Jersey: Workplaces, Restaurants, and Bars (4/15/06)
16) Utah: Restaurants, new law covers Workplaces (7/1/06) and Bars (1/1/2009)
17) Colorado: Restaurants, Bars (6/1/06)

*Washington D.C.'s smokefree law will take effect in 2007

IF YOU ARE FAT OR UGLY YOU CAN'T ADOPT FROM CHINA

From a Christian adoption sight:

Beginning May 1, people will find it more difficult to adopt children from China. Xing Kaimin, director of the China Center for Adoption affairs, says the new rules will guarantee “optimal family conditions” for adopted children.

The restrictions are as follows:

• Applicants should have a Body Mass Index (BMI) of less than 40. This applies to both men and women. A BMI of 40 indicates extreme obesity, and according to the ministry, obese people are more likely to suffer from diseases and might have a shorter life expectancy.
• Applicants must be married for at least two years. Xing says that a “complete family” is essential for adopted children.
• Those who were earlier divorced should have been currently married for at least five years.
• Couples must have less than four children.
• Couples must be in the 30 to 50 age group.
• Applicants cannot be wheelchair dependent.
• Applicants cannot take medication for psychiatric conditions including depression and anxiety.
• Applicants cannot have a “severe facial deformity.”
• Applicants cannot be “economically precarious.”

I cannot believe this - does it make you a bad parent if you are overweight? Does it decrease your love for a child if you have a "facial deformity" --- It is appauling!

I Have My Own Opinions!

I am conservative, I am outspoken, I have my own opinions. This does NOT make me a target for ridicule. It makes me human.

I have feelings, feelings about adoption; my own and my daughter's. What I feel, what I believe is not wrong and is also not fodder for ridicule. There is love, and as long as there is so much love who is to say I am wrong?

We have our own experiences, we have our own feelings....I cannot say anyone is wrong about how they feel - because they feel it. Why am I not entitled to the same if my opinion differs from yours?

I wasn't aborted

I could have been aborted, my biomom could not keep me and her family was not happy. She could have easily made me just go away. She didn't...it's one reason why I thank her.

My daughter could have been aborted. They could not afford her, emotionally, physically or monitarily, it would have been easy to go somewhere (especially in this day and age) and quietly get rid of the pregnancy. She didn't do that and how can I ever be thankful enough? My daughter is the light of my life.

So no one can tell me that people have a choice to kill. Where do we draw the line? Why is 8 weeks gestation, even 24 weeks, not life and 37 weeks is? Where in there did life miraculously begin? At what moment is it killing a baby and not tissue? I am tissue, I am life.


-50 million babies aborted every year
-In the US 3700 abortions a day
-For evey 100 babies born there are 31 aborted
-46% of woman that have an abortion have more than one
-Methods of abortions:
......babies are suctioned out of the womb with a powerful vaccuum
......burned with a powerful saline solution, baby dies and mother delivers 30-36 hours later
......Chemical is given to the mother starving the baby of nutrients and it dies
......After dilating the cervix a hook shaped knife is inserted to cut the baby into pieces and the pieces are suctioned out
......Of course the worst of all....the baby is pulled out feet first, head left in the birth canal (so it's not really "delivered" and a hole is poked into the skull so the brains can be suctioned out.

I think instead of talking about a woman's choice and her body we should concentrate for a moment on what happens to a babies body through the whole process of abortion. We have trivialized it and made it seem like a simple medical procedure. I could have been one of these babies.........I choose life.

A Few Things People May or May/Not Know About Me

-I have a degree in Art (a minor in abstract sculpture)
-I have a lot of "food rules": (here's a few)
I don't like my foods to touch each other on the plate
I don't like any fruit with anything else (especially dairy)
Nothing sweet can touch anything that isn't sweet...
-I like to wear tight clothing (like hose and turtlenecks)
-I have a pretty high IQ but don't feel that smart
-I'm a curly girl who hates my hair
-I love getting dressed up, Halloween was my favorite holiday growing up and one of my favorite gifts was a wig (that's another post). Now I get to do that a lot when I do dinner theater....and I get to make up my own characters.
-I like to learn a few words in a lot of languages so I could at least say hello to anyone
-I wanted to be a ventriloquist when I was young and stood in front of a mirror practicing talking and singing with my lips not moving.
-I have a master's degree but don't feel like it's gotten me anywhere I couldn't have gone without it
-I had a heat stroke in 1991
-I don't sweat
-I have scoleosis, a tremor on my right side and a bunion but am pretty healthy besides that
-I am PETRIFIED of getting cancer and am a little over the edge about it (in my head).
-I thought I would die before I got married and walking down the isle I kept thinking I could still drop dead in the isle....1/2 joking to myself, 1/2 serious
-I really don't like shopping, talking on the phone or shoes (I am a disgrace to the female race)
-I dream about losing my teeth
-I LOVE the news and can watch it all day
-I love foreign films, ethnic food and other cutures
- I secretly think I have a serious chance to win the lottery
-I love filling out forms about myself (even at the doctor's office)
-I like reality shows
-I work with old people but fear getting old
-I cannot stand liars, cheats, people who are one way in public and different at home, people who are mean to other people, people who are slow to forgive, moodiness
-I HATE coffee, to me it smells like acid
-I cannot stand the smell of most buttered popcorn, it smells like rotting meat
-Anything that is supposed to smell like grapefruit smells like old sweat to me
-I lose my voice once a year
-It hurts me to be too hot or too cold
-I love oldies and know 100s of songs from the 20s 30s and 40s (this includes most songs from musicals from the 20s through the 50s)
-I HATE cats (in the late 80s my brother's cat bit me in the back of my leg and I had to pry it's jaws off so it would let go---then it swelled up for a few days)
-I hate doing laundry but I secretly like to match socks (like a game i guess)
- I love liver and onions, brussle sprouts, pickled herring, sardines and other things people usually hate
-I NEVER want to skydive or bungy jump-i'll leave that for those who have adrenaline

This was me....












When I see this picture I think of my biomom. It's the first picture taken of me, I'm three weeks old. When I showed her this picture she cried...this was the picture of me she held in her mind for 32 years.

I am so glad I found the BIOS

I know there are so many people on these sites that have all sorts of different opinions about adoption, open, closed, semi-closed. Reunion, open records....whatever.
All I know is...I was adopted, I had an awesome childhood where I was loved more than most kids who are not adopted. I have a very normal, God-fearing, heterosexual, friendly, kind, caring, family (no divorce or abuse anywhere that we know of). I guess it's unusual, I have a great self-esteem, no baggage and a great family....most people can't identify.

All of that said, I'm glad I found my bios.....why? There is a nosey curiousity about where you come from and who you are blood related to. There is a need to see people that look like you and know where you got yout your looks, your skin, your hair....your boobs! (we still haven't established that one)

Today we ran into my biodad and his wife at the restuarant we went to after church. It was sweet....they are so nice. He kissed on J and played with her...he is a proud grandad. His daughter will have a baby in a few weeks and she is jealous but she is giving him his blood-related grandchild - he doesn't care, baby J is his first grandchild to him. sweet.

My biomom is the same way but thank goodness her girls are not jealous. The first borns are the ones that are usually NON accepting of the new "surprise" sibling----what do you mean they aren't the first born?? They were both leery of me....now they are much more accepting.

Yes, I'm glad I found them...

Boxing Boxer

I would like to take a good solid punch at Barbara Boxer.

She had the audacity to ask the President for the "amount of soldiers that will be killed if we send in more troops" - "exact numbers"...(1st stupid thing)

Then she was quoted as saying:
“All of the troops in the world can’t make up for the lack of a political solution in Iraq. The only way forward is for the Iraqi people to reach a compromise and for the Iraqi security forces to take responsibility for protecting their own people. Putting more U.S. troops in the middle of a civil war will only result in the loss of more American lives.”
compromise? The Iraqi people? Iraqi forces take responsibity?? (which ones? the ones that are killing Iraqis or Americans?)....(2nd stupid thing)

Voted NO on banning partial birth abortions (3rd stupid thing)
Voted NO on banning human cloning (4th)
Voted NO on criminal penalty for harming unborn fetus during other crime (5)
Condemned restrictions on embryonic stem cell research (6)

She talkes out of both sides of her mouth----is she worried about life or not???
The soldiers are volunteers...they know what they are getting into and what they will be doing. They know the risk. The millions of babies aborted don't have that convienience.

This was what I saw when I walked into my SIL's bathroom...it was somewhat disturbing and very sweet at the same time.

The #1 Song at Birth

I looked what the #1 song was the day I was born HERE

It was Honey -- It's spooky to read these words....I'm e-mailing the lyrics to my biomom



Honey
Bobby Goldsboro

See the tree, how big it's grown but friend it hasn't been too long it wasn't big
I laughed at her and she got mad, the first day that she planted, it, was just a twig
Then the first snow came and she ran out to brush the snow away
So it wouldn't die
Came runnin' in all excited, slipped and almost hurt herself
And I laughed till I cried
She was always young at heart, kinda dumb and kinda smart and I loved her so
Once I surprised her with a puppy
Kept me up all Christmas Eve two years ago
And it would sure embarrass her
When I came in from workin' late 'cause I would know
That she'd been sittin' there and cryin'
Over some sad and silly late, late show

And honey, I miss you and I'm bein' good
And I'd love to be with you if only I could

She wrecked the car and she was sad
And so afraid that I'd be mad but what the heck
Though I pretended hard to be
Guess you could say she saw through me and hugged my neck
I came home unexpectedly and caught her cryin' needlessly
In the middle of a day
And it was in the early Spring when flowers bloom and robins sing
She went away

And honey, I miss you and I'm bein' good
And I'd love to be with you if only I could

One day while I was not at home while she was there and all alone
The angels came
Now all I have is memories of Honey and I wake up nights and call her name
Now my life's an empty stage where Honey lived and Honey played
And love grew up
And a small cloud passes overhead and cries down on the flower bed
That Honey loved

And see the tree how big it's grown but friend it hasn't been too long it wasn't big
And I laughed at her and she got mad
The first day that she planted it, was just a twig

A Big Thank you

I sent a thank you card to my biodad today. He sent that duck picture and book for Christmas for J and I was touched by it's deeper meaning. I thanked them for being kind and gracious to us even though it was strange circumstances that brought us all together. He wrote back and said he loved us and his son asked for my e-mail so he could correspond. I wrote back that I didn't mind at all and I think we really clicked the first time we met (just wrote yesterday how much we had in common.)
Then he sent me a card tha read
I think of you three often and marvel at how a mistake I made in my youth turned into something wonderful!
Isn't that sweet?

Nature vs. Nurture

It's so strange what is picked up and what is genetic. My half brother and I have the same sense of humor. It was so weird the first time we met we really just clicked. We just joke back and forth so easily and I think it freaked out my biodad. He is so sweet and really cares about me, he asks his dad all the time about me and the baby. Is it wrong to say he's gorgeous too? Of course I got some of that--haha.
I have more similarities with my biodad's family than with my biomom's clan. My biodad's side and I all love rasberry and sour things....and my half sister and I have a weird thing about not letting anyone else use our pillow. AND----we seperate our foods - they cannot touch.

Now, on the other hand....I also have my Adad's walk and much of his sense of humor. I have a lot of my Amom's manerisms and everyone says I look so much like her.
strange.............

Call me Nancy Drew

For years I would take the bits of information i had from my "non-identifying" information and search for my biomom. Before computers this was NOT an easy task. I was nineteen and I was niave about what people would/could and would/could not tell me. I think the first thing I did was go to the hospital that was on my ammended birth certificate. I asked them for my file from my birthdate. They were gone in the back a long time and then came out to tell me there had been a fire and all the records had burned up. (is this the answer they tell them to give all of us when we come in? I've heard this numerous times from other people in different cities). Then I called the doctor that was on the birth certificate. He was old but still in practice. The cute little lady recepionist was sweet and after I told her what my mission she changed and told me the files were too old and had already been destroyed. Then I called the maternity home that was in our city...of course they couldn't give me any information but I thought I would try. I called the newspaper and they told me all babies born in the sixties had to be listed in the paper within two weeks of birth. I went to the main branch library in our city and looked through the microfish but my name wasn't there - then after going home and thinking about it - I realized it wouldn't be under my name now - it would be whatever name my biomom or the hospital gave me. I went back and began writing down every name in that fourteen day period - there were SO many. I didn't write down boys names and the ones that sounded foreign or "ethnic". But that was still ALOT of names (I live in a big city). I still have all of those somewhere. It didn't help. I called or went to the churches in which the biodad was a member to see if they had a roster from that year. There were so many other feeble/misguided attempts at the search. When the internet began to get popular I would register on any adoption registry that came out.( At the beginning there were only two). This was all in a ten year span.
When, through an investigator, I finally had a name I could not stop the search. I had grown to love the search, like a game with no ending. I didn't want it to end. I had a name and went back to the library to look at the census...to follow the families - could this one be it? could this one? I made a list of five and followed them, where they moved, who lived in the house - they were great books telling what the father did and the ages of the people in the house - great....but I hit dead ends....still I loved the game.
When I finally found my biomom I kept looking for something to search....what more could I find out? I didn't want it to end.....weird I know. It was a let down in a way. I found her, the searching was over.......I missed it.....did I want the search more than the reunion?
When she told me who the biodad was I began my search again...I went to his high school and got his picture out of the old yearbook...looked up alumni info and found out his address, number , how many kids he had, his business. Before I contacted him she told me it could be someone else and I began my search for him. I called him all the way across the country and he assured me it wasn't him. She told me then there could have been another - she was so embarrased. I went to HIS old highschool and got a picture - it COULD NOT have been him - i didn't look like her and I sure in heck didn't look like that hairy ape. So, I kept searching and finding out little things.....I love the search.
They called me Nancy Drew - I can find out so much with just a little info...I love it.
For a while my searching was done - I missed it. Now I know J's biomom and biodad's names I find myself searching again....to know more. I found some things I can't share but I'm doing it again.....please someone give me someone or something to look for.........!!!!!!!! Nancy needs a fix!!!

A New Year

I can't believe Baby J stayed up for the new year! I thought about her biomom and was praying she is safe and at peace (want to say happy, but I think it's too soon for her to feel happy on a holiday). While off work I wrote her a long letter and just poured out my heart --woman to woman. I wrote that I think about her often and know she must be feeling low. I wanted her to know she wasn't alone, since she doesn't have anyone to talk with about it. I encouraged her to see the councilor so she can talk about her feelings and I made sure she knew she would not be forgotten. I thanked her for her letter (handwritten-for which she apologized) and told her I'd rather have that so J will be able to see her handwriting. I also wrote that she needed to go to college because she must be smart because she passed that on to baby J.
My only fear is that she will not live long enough to see baby J grow up and become a woman. I know there is not that much contact (her choice too), but it would have hurt me to find out my biomom was not living after all those years and finally finding her.
.
Last year on January 1st I was writing on another blog and this is my entry for that day:

I started thinking again about how you really fall in love with your children and i found this on another site - it was so touching:

I don't care if they are biological or adopted, I think it really is a process and it really does not happen overnight. I have heard all kinds of things on boards....from worries that they won't bond to an adopted child like a biological child to no worries that they will bond to a child and that it will happen instantaneously. I think what bonds you to a child is experience. It is not the biological tie. I also think you need to be somewhat prepared to not instantly bond with your child as it is a process.We fall in love with our children through shared experiences. We fall in love with them through caring for them through all their sleepless nights and sick days and the times that they fell down and got "owies". We fall in love with them for teaching us about ourselves and selflessness. We fall in love with them for their goofy laughter and spontaneousness and their ability to bring our young selves out. We fall in love with them for their compassion and innocence. We fall in love with them for their openness...for their chance to be little, to be young, to love life to the fullest.

I couldn't believe when I read we didn't get our profile out until January 23rd last year and we got "the call" on May 26th. That is unbelievable. Most people are waiting years and we had only a few months.
.
So, a new year. I don't see how it can top last year for us.

While We Were Waiting

While we waited the last few years I had this quote on my desk at work...
it got me through many difficult days.

“My concern is that many believers apparently feel God owes them smooth sailing or at least a full explanation (and perhaps an apology) for the hardships they encounter. We must never forget that He, after all, is God. He is majestic and holy and sovereign. He is accountable to no one. He is not an errand boy who chases the assignments we dole out. He is not a genie who pops out of the bottle to satisfy our whims. He is not our servant - we are His. And our reason or existence is to glorify and honor Him. Even so, sometimes He performs mighty miracles on our behalf. Sometimes He chooses to explain His action in our lives. Sometimes His presence is as real as if we had encountered Him face to face. But at other times, when nothing makes sense- when what we are going through is ‘not fair,’ when we feel all alone in God’s waiting room - He simply says, ‘Trust Me.’”

James Dobson