We had a long weekend and rolled in late last night after a few days of visiting M’s sister in a neighboring state. I’m exhausted but had a great time. Beyond a day boating and a floating the river excursion I think a good time was had by all. There was always gourmet food to be had, lots of laughter and many good memories made.

M and I were particularly smitten by our niece who, like Gem, is an April ’05 baby. We were glued to every little thing about her. We compared their weight and height (niece is 3 pounds heavier and 2 inches taller) and had to take turns holding her and discussing building up our arm strength. We watched her intently as she ate, walked, talked, smiled, cried and everything in between. I tried not to make the cute thing feel like she was being stalked, but it was interesting being around a little baby the same age as Huong. M felt that is was hard because it made him want Gem home that much more. I was struck with what everyone has already been telling us, that age group is still very much a baby—although mobile.

All in all we are just very anxious to meet our daughter for the first time. Even before our referral, M and I had discussed the possibility of fostering Gem in Viet Nam while we wait for her official Giving and Receiving date, after which we could bring her home a week or so after. Its not a matter of us trying to go over and speed up the adoption. Our whole purpose of going would be to ease Gem’s transition into our family by having an extended period of time to get to know one another. I would also like to spend as much time as possible in Viet Nam to experience more of our daughter’s birth country. While we also pray for Huong’s health and well being in every prayer, it would additionally be wonderful to physically be apart of that. I don’t know for sure what we’ll do. Our agency is looking into it for us and we’re still pondering the idea. Although M can work a bit remotely, I’m not sure he could leave work for a month or more. We couldn’t leave before we got all our paperwork updated anyway, so that may put us a month or more out if we were to do it. At any rate, its something being discussed at our house.

My trip to M’s sister’s also saw me walking away with a souvenir of new running shoes. We picked some up and I’m planning on hitting the track tomorrow morning, bright and early. I’m hoping to start running three times a week as well as eating better. Wish me luck.