Mostly, I Flattred things in November. Here’s what:

• Diane’s Craftypod blog.
• Isaac Watson’s website, The Ambidextrous Brain. Isaac writes about creativity and crafty business, and I adore him.
• The Fiber Escape Studios blog.
• Creative Commons.
• The Knitty blog.
• Craft Social, the monthly Twitter chat.
• Lisa Clarke’s post about making crochet hook handles out of polymer clay.
• The animated film Sita Sings the Blues.
• Brain Pickings, one of the best sources of content curation in all the land.
• iHanna, Hanna’s fabulous crafts blog.

I also bought the first few episodes of Diane’s Craftypod 2.0 podcast. And I give a monthly PayPal donation to support the hilarious geek webcomic Hijinks Ensue.

What I Flattred in November is a post from Kim Werker's blog.

The time of year when I’m reminded we will never outdo our Halloween costumes from 2008.

Never to Outdo is a post from Kim Werker's blog.

A few weeks ago I started an email newsletter. Did I forget to mention that here? Shame on me.

I call it a curated cornucopia of creativity crafts and cleverness.

See, I got into a fun little habit after the baby arrived and I started doing most of my perusing of the internet on my iPhone – I started emailing myself links to articles or nifty tidbits that I wanted to remember to revisit when I had more attention to spare.

By the time Owen was four months old, my inbox was bursting at the seams. Too much to read, too daunting to sift through, no time to blog it.

So I started Kimagination Station Internet Funtimes as a way to kill several defenseless birds with one handcrafted stone.

1. I’m cleaning out my inbox! (Slowly.)
2. I get to explore a new way of being in touch with you. (Specifically you. And you.)
3. I have an excuse to continue sending myself links, because I still internet-peruse a fair bit on my phone.
4. I want to see if an email newsletter is maybe a good way to keep you up to date on things like upcoming events I’m participating in, news about stuff I’m working on, book info, etc.
5. Most importantly, I get to hope very sincerely that these wee bits of funtimes enrich your day, too.

Take a peek through the first few issues, and subscribe, eh? And if you enjoy it, tell your friends!

Kimagination Station Internet Funtimes: Subscribe Today! is a post from Kim Werker's blog.

Last Thursday afternoon we learned we’d been chosen to adopt a baby the next day. I’m sure you can imagine the frenzy of the following twenty hours. I’ll tell you all about it another time; it’s a pretty dramatic tale as your imagination has certainly already concluded.

So last Friday at around noon we met our six-day-old healthy baby boy. Yes, your math is right – the Jewish couple is adopting a Christmas baby. And we brought him home on New Year’s Day to a house full of family and friends who fell in love with him as quickly and fully as we have.

Meet Owen William Piper Werker. He’s a chill, expressive little dude who likes neck nuzzles and Simon & Garfunkel.

We’re going to lay low for the next couple of weeks during the 30-day revocation period during which the birth mom can change her mind. After that, I’ll tell you loads more, and will by then be a little more used to our new sleep schedule, which will render me more capable of coherent blogging and discussion. For now, if this is the first you’ve heard about adoption from me, you can read what I’ve written about it over the last year.

Now it’s now about time I finish the little baby blanket I started knitting months ago. Thankfully I have only a few more rows to go. I figure it’ll take me a week, at this rate.

Happy New Year!

Happy New Baby Year is a post from Kim Werker's blog.

But for now, I’d like you to properly meet Cleo. You’ve seen photos over the years, but you couldn’t possibly tell how funny she is from them. See, she talks like a Wookiee. (Yes. Using the command “wookiee” to make her speak would be like telling Chewbacca “dog” to make him bark. Whatever.)

And she learned to go away all by herself. That’s because she was hyper as a puppy, and very annoying, and we were constantly asking her politely to get out of our face. Then one day we told her to go away and she did. Also, she doesn’t like sitting or lying down on wet ground. An inconvenient quirk, living in Vancouver.

So tell me. What’s your favourite of your dog’s tricks?

Meet Cleo. Properly. is a post from Kim Werker's blog.

Perhaps all those incongruous metaphors paint a picture for you.

I miss you.

So I’m whining publicly in an effort to get things going again. There are things I want to tell you about, but they’re all jammed up in my head and they can’t seem to squeeze their way out yet.

In an effort to not only whine at you, I’ll show you a photo I took in my old bedroom when I was staying with my parents earlier this month. It’s a diagram of how HIV infects a cell. It’s pinned to the back of my old bedroom door. I made it, oh, seventeen years ago. My parents have left it exactly here all this time. As the poster board yellows, it’s nifty how much (more) the white-out stands out, eh?

Rip the Bandaid Off! is a post from Kim Werker's blog.

I haven’t had much time to myself in more than two weeks and I’m starting to go a little Dr Jekyl on my usual, though admittedly quirky, Mr Hyde. On top of that, though I’ve kept the Twitter at my side, I’m feeling out of touch with all of you. So help me keep my sanity, hey? Drop me a note in the comments and tell me about something creative that’s got your brain buzzing, or tell me a story.

Ok, here’s that catch-up. Dear, bulleted list, it’s been so long.

• My father’s surgery was a great success. The wonders of modern medicine! The feats surgeons can perform laparoscopically! Anyway, he’s a little lighter in the internal-organ department, and there’s no sign of cancer. My parents got to meet the principle investigator on some studies that are funded in large part by the Lustgarten Foundation, which is pretty cool. We’re all feeling very thankful for those studies, and for the opportunity my dad’s had to receive early screenings for pancreatic cancer. He may deny that while he sits in his uncomfortable crankypants recovering from surgery, but in a few days I imagine he’ll be climbing ladders to sing it from rooftops. Tevye, watch out.
• Speaking of the Lustgarten Foundation, the Pancreatic Craftacular is going strong! Twenty crafty business are donating proceeds, and I’ve heard from some who have been very touched by the notes they’ve been receiving from customers who have been touched by pancreatic cancer. I’m touched, too, by the stories and by our community in general. In my imagination, I’ve been hugging you every day is week. Also, keep your eye on this here blog for a nifty blog event coming up.
• I love Montreal. Love love love. Being there at this particular point in my life highlighted for me the growing discontents I’ve been brewing about Vancouver. After a very long honeymoon period in my lovely city, I’ve come around to agree with what pretty much every non-native I’ve ever met has said about the place: The people are friendly, but they’re really hard to get to know. I want to grab Vancouver by the shoulders and tell it to lighten up. To chill out. To laugh, dammit, and do it a little louder. Vancouver may have that west-coast, outdoorsy vibe that presents the illusion of people being chill. But really, there’s an undercurrent of intensity that isn’t actually very welcoming. It’s intimidating. And I think that’s dumb. Montreal has a vitality (dare I say it has that je ne sais quoi) that’s contagious. Maybe I’ll try to be more French when I get home. I’m sure it’ll break through that British stoicism if I start kissing everyone I greet. I’ll end this rambling now, but be prepared for more musings about it as I ponder and explore.
  
• The wedding in Montreal was about the happiest, danciest, loviest wedding I’ve ever been to. I danced in four-inch heels till well after midnight, and ten days later the balls of my feet are only now beginning to feel normal again. Good times. Want glam? Ok.
  
• I want to punch Tom Robbins and his stupid, self-indulgent clever sentences in the face. I spent two weeks trying to read Even Cowgirls Get the Blues, and eventually had to take a deep breath and give up. I want to know what happens to those lovable characters, but not enough to slog through those damn words. This is a book better off tweeted, one cutesy clever sentence at a time.
• My brother and I went to Baltimore Comic-Con last weekend (this was before we started hurling insults at each other, which is what happens three days into every visit). It was RAD. I met Joel from Hijinks Ensue, fell in love with David Mack (his work, his work, which has nothing to do with him being totally sweet and also adorable), and otherwise had a blast in a room filled with costumed people young and old.
  

  

  

Okey dokey. I wrote half of this on my laptop and half on my iPad and who knows how disjointed and poorly laid put it is.

Dispatches and Catch-Ups is a post from Kim Werker's blog.

Northern Voice, by Reilly Lievers (CC by-nd licensed)

I didn’t much enjoy attending the Northern Voice personal blogging conference last year, but I decided to give it another go this year, for several reasons. First and foremost, in the last fifteen months I’ve met a lot of local bloggers. So I was more comfortable in the community than I was last year, and I knew I wouldn’t be compelled to stand in a corner feeling shy and confused. On top of that, I decided to pitch a talk. My talk was rejected, but I was asked to sit on a panel instead. So I felt like I got a cookie, even though I actually wasn’t too jazzed about the panel concept (I just said “jazzed”. Why? I have no idea). More on that later.

So.

The Great

Northern Voice is ostensibly about personal blogging, not about blogging for business, and many of the sessions were very much about the personal. Two, in particular, really hit that nail on its head. Kimli Welsh‘s talk on Overcoming Social Anxiety, or “How to Win Friends and Influence People (in 140 characters or less)” was outstanding, and I’m not just saying that because she’s my friend. Her talk was great because she told her own story, and she told it with honesty and with humour. The full room laughed with her and nodded as they related to her stories about being so anxious about socializing that she’d bail on plans more than half the time. The “how to” part was about how she started to overcome her anxiety by changing the way she thought about socializing, and about how she used social media in ways that helped her achieve that. Nothing technical, all social.

The second nail-hitting talk was Steffani Cameron‘s on How To Screw Up Your Personal Blog. Again with the honesty and the humour, and this time also with some tears. How did Steff screw up her personal blog? She went through some serious personal shit, that’s how, and she did it publicly, and then she made some bad choices when it came to the basics of blogging (she changed her URL without redirecting, and stuff like that). There was no how-to at all in her talk, yet I think it was one of the most valuable and educational off all the ones I attended.

One of the themes of the conference (no, I don’t actually think the organizers ever actually said the conference had a theme) was about finding your voice. Kimli and Steff certainly reiterated what I hear was said during Monica Hamburg‘s and Dave Olsen‘s session called, ba-dum-bum, Finding Your Voice. I missed that session because I made the regrettable decision to attend the Copyright and Online Expression talk instead (more later on how bad a decision that was). The chatter on Twitter, however, indicated the voice session was very much loved and adored.

I spent a significant part of the first day of the conference in what Zak Greant likes to call “the corridor track” (or something to that effect). I wasn’t interested in some of the topics and I was very much into catching up with people, so I did a lot of chatting and catching up.

After lunch (oh my, the food was yummy) I went to David Ng‘s talk on Good Science: It Takes An (Online) Village. He talked about science and culture! Hallelujah! It was a great presentation, and the project he’s heading up, Phylo, is awesome. David was also all over Twitter, starting conversations with people both in tweets and in person. He shot me a tweet after our Fibre Arts Online panel asking if I’d want to chat about possible science projects, like knitted human organs or crocheted animals. He’s about to go on sabbatical, but I’ve made a note in my calendar a few months from now to drop him a line to see if we can’t cook up some crafty science projects.

I was more of a joiner the second day of the conference. I hopped from session to session happily, despite being painfully overtired (thank you, Cleo, for waking me up at 5:30 that morning). Chris Messina‘s keynote address was perfect. It was to the point and smart and well-delivered and thought-provoking. And, unlike the first day’s keynote which I couldn’t understand because of the insane echo in the room, I could hear Chris loud and clear. It was a very good start to the day. In fact, I believe I stood up after his talk and mumbled for a while about how I wish the overall level of discourse about blogging would raise up to the level Chris started us out at.

Then, the sessions, starting with How (Should) Journalists Use Social Media. This was a paired session, which is a format I’m going to complain about in the next part of this post. But half of it was great, and that was the half presented by Lisa Johnson, who’s a reporter with the CBC. Lisa’s a great speaker, and her presentation was informative and useful. It was useful because the way she uses social media as a reporter is relevant to personal bloggers. Both because she really gets it, and we can all learn from people who really get it, and also because she looks for stories and leads and information from the people she follows. And the people she follows are, you know, people.

Then there was the sex panel. Northern Voice 2010 will mark that point in time after which I’ve hung out with sex bloggers. And hanging out with sex bloggers has severely fucked with the very natural and well-considered boundaries I keep when it comes to what I talk about publicly online. The reason it’s fucking with me so severely is that in private, I talk about lots and lots of things I never talk about online, using language the likes of which might shock you despite my using the word fuck three times in this paragraph. And talking about these things and in that manner with other people who spend as much time online as I do may end up shifting my boundaries a little. Only time will tell.

Anyway, the panel, A Four-Letter Word Called Sex, was good. Steff reiterated a point that blew me away from her solo talk the first day, which is that when we share our fears and insecurities with each other, it makes it easier for everyone. Nobody’s a freak when we’re all freaks. And dude, we’re all freaks.

Our panel on Fibre Arts followed the sex talk, in the same room, which was really maybe not the best of scheduling decisions. It was like a television station leading into Mr. Rogers with Deadwood. But anyway, I had a really good time doing the panel, and I think Felicia Lo and Mandy Moore did, too. People asked lots of great questions, and I had some fun chats with folks afterward, too. And hey, check out the totally wicked visualization Rachel Smith did of our session!

Fibre Arts and Social Media, by Rachel Smith (CC A-NC licensed)

I was in the right mindset after our panel to attend the one on Art and Social Media (in a different room; see my above note on television programming). It was a good panel. I love hearing about how artists and performers use social media, and how publicists use it to benefit all. It wasn’t so much a personal blogging session.

Tod Maffin podcasting cartoon, by Rob Cottingham (CC A-NC-SA licensed). Click for a larger version

Last, the session I found most valuable of all, Tod Maffin‘s on Awesome-izing Your Podcast: Secrets from Radio. Radio is my favourite medium and always has been. And though I’ve dabbled in podcasting, I’ve been stuck on exactly the thing Tod focused on in his talk: podcasting is different from broadcast radio, but most podcasters treat it exactly like radio. Podcasting is far more personal, even though radio can be very intimate. My brain expanded as he highlighted qualities of outstanding radio shows and explained how those qualities make for good podcasts. He’s a great speaker and a fabulous presenter, and in my opinion this session alone was worth the cost of admission (admittedly, as a speaker my admission fee was waived. Whatever).

And finally, a note on moderated panels. All moderated panels should be moderated by Darren Barefoot. Every one. Even if we have to clone him. Darren does the following when he moderates: he introduces the topic; he introduces the panelists; he sets out the rules for Q&A; he keeps the discussion moving at a good clip; he works some serious browser magic to bring up relevant websites, pages and information so it shows up on the big screen while the panelists are talking. Darren didn’t moderate our panel, and that makes me sad.

The Meh

The venue wasn’t great. It was gorgeous and friendly and open and fun to be in, but the sizes of the rooms weren’t well distributed (two of the four rooms always seemed to be over-capacity and therefore either uncomfortable or inaccessible), and the atrium used as an auditorium for the keynote speeches has terrible acoustics.

Speaking of acoustics, I’m going to weigh in on the child-friendliness of the conference by saying one thing only: Being child-friendly does not mean being disruption-friendly. I couldn’t understand whole swaths of what Chris Messina said because an adorable baby was cooing loudly on the other side of the echo chamber. Yeah, I’m also that cranky ass in a movie theatre who gives the evil eye to the people with the screaming baby who chose to ruin a movie for dozens of people instead of hiring a babysitter. Parents who bring kids to grown-up gatherings are responsible both for the joy people find because of it, and also for ensuring their experience isn’t disrupted.

Ok, enough of that. Let’s talk about panels. As I said, panels moderated by Darren Barefoot are amazing. Our panel wasn’t moderated by Darren, and I felt like we were kind of tossed to the wolves. So we moderated it ourselves, but it would have been great not to have had to do that. Especially because, since our panel was fabricated by the organizers and not based on a pitch, we were pretty much counting on them to frame the topic. For example, at one point I said, “I’m not sure if it was intentional, but a lot of speakers have mentioned the importance of finding your voice, and that’s just as important in crafts blogging,” and the moderator said, “Yes, it was intentional.” Good thing I’d been able to attend the entire conference to that point to get the right impression.

Good vs. not-good moderation aside, and going back to what I said way back in the first paragraph, here’s why I wasn’t jazzed about our topic to begin with: Knit blogging ain’t a new phenomenon, and nobody who’s not a yarn freak knows or cares much about “fibre arts”. I would absolutely LOVE to attend or participate in a panel on hobbies. Everyone’s got a hobby. And every hobby has a place online. Everyone’s got some niche interest even if it’s not a hobby, and every niche interest has a place online. That, in my opinion, is a far juicier topic for a personal blogging conference. It’s one that has the potential to appeal to every attendee, not just the few who know something about a given niche.

Why, you might ask, didn’t I suggest that to begin with? Mostly because of two things. First, it seemed to me this topic was a sealed deal; if I chose to pass on it they’d find someone else. Second, I don’t know the organizers and I don’t know the culture of the committee. I don’t know how flexible they are or how fluid their ideas might be. If I had it to do over again, I might have suggested we talk about the topic further, and talk about ways to make it relevant to any conference themes and to as many attendees as possible. In my opinion, our session should have either been about hobbies online and hobby blogging, or about how aspects of the online yarn community and blogging practices might be appropriated or adapted by other hobbyists (things like craft-alongs, the Ravelry community and database, the online community surrounding yarn bombing, the brilliant #craftsocial Twitter events, etc.). The latter isn’t suited to a panel, but rather to a presentation.

I also think it would be great (though time-consuming, yes) for a conference organizer to meet with a fabricated panel before the conference, or at least before the session. I should have suggested this before our panel but I didn’t think to, this being the first conference panel I’ve been on. We three panelists got together a few weeks ago, but then we realized we didn’t really know what to plan for. So we enjoyed our coffee and cobbled together some topics we thought would be interesting to cover. We ended up just doing a Q&A-style talk, which worked great because the attendees were so chatty and great. If we’d had a shy group, it would have been awkward and possibly full of stinking suckituge.

Don’t get me wrong – I love that I was able to participate in Northern Voice as a presenter. Since my previous experience I’ve come around to see the great value in this conference and I was proud to be a small part of it. I’m aware that my bellyaching might not exactly endear myself to the committee that will choose speakers next year, but I’d rather give what I hope is constructive feedback and not be invited to speak again than to sit on my hands.

Enough about that. Let’s move to the other half of the journalism panel. As I said, Lisa was awesome in the way she made her presentation relevant to a conference on personal blogging. Kirk LaPointe, managing editor of The Vancouver Sun – not so much. His shpiel about print not being dead is relevant, but not the way he talked about it in the context of Northern Voice (or, more specifically, he didn’t talk about it in the context of Northern Voice) (unrelated, nihilism doesn’t mean what he seemed to think it means).

Now, Kirk’s splendid smack-down of Vancouver Observer editor Linda Solomon, while entertaining, did highlight a topic I think would be perfect for a conference like Northern Voice: how bloggers and traditional media (should) do their special dance. It’s not an original topic, but I’d love to see it done well.

It seems I can’t put off that copyright talk any longer. It was awful. I deliberately missed a session I’d been interviewed for (Monica had asked me and others a bunch of questions about how we found our voice) so I could go to a session on my favourite topic. Bad decision. The copyright talk was terribly organized (no topic sentence, no stated point), the collage films they showed were great but weren’t shown with any copyright-related commentary, and the law talk was boring. Note to Northern Voice organizers: Please revisit this fascinating, confusing topic again! And soon!

Finally, some further wee notes directed more to organizers than anyone else:

• Themes tying the talks together – please be open and specific about them.
• Themes in general – please decide on some before the call for pitches is announced. As a speaker, I’d love know what the focus is on so I can come up with a brilliant idea for a pitch.
• Paired sessions. It’s great to get two-for-the-price-of-one, but it would be even better if those two people planned a joint talk rather than splitting things up.
• Please allow time for people to move to a new room between sessions. Three minutes, even, would be a godsend. Oh, make it five and we’d have time to pee!
• Yes, I’m more than willing to put my time and any relevant skills where my mouth is as I sit here making demands.

The Ugly

Huge thanks to Kimli for including some Mighty Ugly dolls in her swag bags. I had a very good time talking with people about the Mighty Ugly project, and it was very cool that my interview with Sheryl MacKay on North by Northwest (mp3) aired the morning of the second day of the conference. In fact, as it was airing, I got a tweet from Cathy Browne saying she was listening and wanted to meet me, and I replied asking if she’d be at Northern Voice (not knowing she’d actually be presenting, too). And then she ended up having dinner at my house with a fabulous bunch of other people, which was the best end to that Twitter story, EVAR.

And oh, that dinner. I made new friends, got to know old ones better, and I very much enjoyed decompressing in the most absurd of ways at the end of a conference I definitely plan to attend next year.

Hi Cynthia!, by Mike Browne (CC by-nc-sa licensed)

Northern Voice 2010: The Great, the Meh and the Ugly is a post from Kim Werker's blog.

I have some opinions about how-to/DIY-oriented video shows*. Some strong ones. And having just watched Diane’s inaugural two-minute video, I’m compelled to shout to all the world that she’s nailed the three most important rules I think MUST be followed to ensure the healthy progression of how-to video into the modern era:

1. She’s unscripted. Thank the gods! Know what makes for awful how-to video? Reading. People rarely sound natural when they’re reading, either from a script or a teleprompter. And unnaturalness means I want to change the channel or close the window. Goodness, it’s boring. Diane’s a natural in front of the camera, and her unscripted chatting makes it feel just like that, like she’s chatting to ME.
2. She’s online. In my opinion, the future of how-to television is online. Low(er) budget, less rigid formatting, more relaxed, more sharing, more interacting, no scripting. (Of course it also needs to be a great concept, well-organized, well-shot and lighted adequately. All of which I’m sure Diane will nail.)
3. The video is short. In the scheme of online how-to videos I’ve been chewing on for over a year, no video is longer than six minutes. Diane’s sticking to two. It’s fabulous.

That’s all. I just needed to say all this in something longer than a tweet (obviously).

Go watch her video.

*Yes, I’ve spent some time on some. I’m heavily critical of my work on them, too. The thing I’m most critical of? Not seeing myself as myself. In my opinion, a how-to show’s only worth watching if the people on it are REAL. And not boring. Two key things.

Sister Diane Started a Video Blog is a post from Kim Werker's blog.

Still, we really are nearly approved, and I’m itchy to talk about it.

Over the last several weeks we completed the final major part of our application to be approved to adopt: the home study. As I think I’ve said, this isn’t what you might think it is if all you know about adoption you’ve learned from sitcoms – a social worker doesn’t show up at our house unannounced, looking for stray toxic chemicals, neglected pets, and dusty baseboards.

Here in British Columbia there are particular requirements for the home study. At least one meeting has to be at our house. The social worker has to meet with each partner separately at least once (if you’re applying as a couple, which obviously we are). There’s a minimum length of time she had to spend with us. There are particular topics we had to cover.

We ended up doing all of our meetings at our house. We talked about all manner of things: our relationship, our childhoods, how we came to decide to adopt, our work, our hobbies, our friends and family, our religious and spiritual beliefs and practices, our anticipated approach to parenting, and more. We adore our social worker, so these conversations were completely stress-free and enjoyable.

And now she’s writing up what will essentially become a dossier about us. Once the agency approves it (and there’s no reason they shouldn’t), our file will become available to birth mothers creating an adoption plan for their child.

In sum, we’ve completed our application. It took about six months. It can often take longer, but our flexible schedules allowed us to take the first four-day workshops that were offered (they’re only offered a few times a year) and to schedule our home-study sessions in a fairly concentrated period of time. (If you’re itching for me to jog your memory about the rest of the requirements, here’s the paperwork bit: initial application, four references, forms from our doctors, criminal history checks from every state or province we’ve lived in since reaching the age of majority. I think that’s it. It doesn’t seem that daunting from this side of it all.)

What happens once we’re approved? We wait to be chosen. Hopefully we’ll be chosen soon. And as you can see from the photo, above, I’ve been struck by an inclination to knit (and crochet, and maybe even to sew).

Which brings me to a note about superstition, and another one about cause and effect.

A note about superstition: I may not practice the religion I was born into, but its culture is my culture. And part of Jewish culture is a (usually) healthy dose of brutally practical superstition. Jews don’t have baby showers before a baby’s born. We hold off because of the slight-yet-devastating chance of something going horribly wrong. Of course, we attend baby showers when they’re thrown for other people (though I admit I’m often uncomfortable due to my congenital superstition; I do my best to hide this from pregnant people at showers).

The superstition goes so far as to demand that no crib be set up, and no baby items be kept in the house. My in-laws will hopefully be game to keep a box in their basement for us. When I finish the simple hoodie blanket in the photo, I’ll leave it at their house. Now, yeah – if it’s years before we’re picked, we may need to add a second box.

The only thing we’re going to purchase ahead of time (aside from, um, yarn) is a car seat. Because it’s possible we’ll become parents on a day’s notice, and I really don’t want to have to go shopping when I otherwise will want to focus my full attention on freaking out. The car seat will live in my in-laws’ basement, too.

Jews have a natural baby-shower-like milestone when babies are eight days old – the bris (circumcision) or baby-naming ceremony. We will have what I’ve begun thinking of as Day 31. A birth mother has 30 days from the birth of the child to change her mind about making an adoption plan. I think this is a very good thing. Still, as an adoptive parent, I imagine that 31st day will be one of unanticipated emotion (or, perhaps I’m anticipating it now…). That’ll be when we’ll want to celebrate.

A note about cause and effect: Based on some comments I’ve received (by the way, every single comment has been enthusiastic and supportive. I love you all for that), I feel I must clarify that the baby that will come into our lives will not be a blessing (a joy, a wonder, a momentous change in our lives for which we’ll be forever grateful and loving – yes, it will be all of those things to us). There will be nothing supernatural about their coming into our lives. In fact, this baby will join our family only because their mother spent months and months of her life agonizing over the best decision to make for them both. Her decision will come about for her own reasons, and that we’ll become parents because of it, that we’ll rejoice and feel lucky and overwhelmed, that we’ll be overcome with emotion, all of that will not be a blessing. Our joy will come from her pain, no matter how happy we’ll be. Unlike getting pregnant, having kids through adoption means some people will grieve while we celebrate.

Ok, now it seems like I’m ending this post on a downer. I don’t intend to. I just don’t want to gloss over the hard parts because the happy parts are so shiny and cute.

I’ll distract you with thoughts of baby knitting! It’s so small and quick!

Nearly Approved: Adoption Update is a post from Kim Werker's blog.