Cat toys and Thongs

Maria, our house cleaner came by on Tuesday to clean our hovel. We are always excited for her to come over. She always comes in and plays with the dogs a bit. They think she only comes over to visit them. The cats all come out and say hi. She greets them and chats with me a bit while preparing herself to attack our mess. I'm just plain excited to have someone else clean up after me!

This week was no different. The dogs and I were excited to see her walk in the door. The cats were indifferent but still came out to greet her. We chatted about life as usual, while I worked on a shoot from the previous day. As I glanced up, I saw her grab a toy off the ground and start shaking it in front of Penny. Penny obliged her by batting at it a bit. She's been trying to win Penny over for a while.

I stopped working and glanced up to talk to her a bit more, when I looked at the toy. It looked like a mini octopus. I couldn't place it as any of the toys that we had. Then the cat caught one of the "tentacles" and I realized what it was. 

Me "Maria! Those are underwear!"

Maria "Ooh la la...why are there underwear in the living room?"

Me laughing "No, those are my sister's underwear...she stayed here for the weekend and she must have left them. Oh god I'm sorry!"

Maria "Oh well, I put them in the laundry."

Me "Nah, I'll just put them in an envelope and mail them right back to her!"

She was totally unfazed that she was using my sister's thong to play with the cat. She just walked back and put it in the laundry. Of course I thought this was too funny and sent off a text to my sister...

Me "Maria just found a pair of your underwear and thought it was a cat toy...so she was swinging them around for Penny to attack. We were cracking up when I told her what she had."

Lindsay "Now that's embarrassing. I'm so glad I wasn't there!"

Excited...and terrified...and excited

There have been a lot of ups and downs in our life lately, however, Mario and I are so excited to be starting on the next chapter in life. Kids and/or babies! With our inability to get pregnant, Mario and I have been talking about adoption for a while now. We are finally starting that journey! Fertility treatment and private adoption are off the table just based on cost alone. I mean, we don't need to go into debt just trying to have kids, when kids are expensive enough on their own. So, we are adopting through Los Angeles County.

I have spent the last year or so looking through websites, forums, looking at children up for adoption and just trying to educate us in general. A few months ago, we decided it's the time to get started. We have our finances under control and are saving up for a house. Mario is doing well with work and my business is better than it's ever been...and we are just plain ready to be parents! We have tried for so long to get pregnant and with my 38th birthday coming up, we decided there's just no more waiting. So, we called up for our foster/adoption orientation. It was a long wait for the appointment! I think we had to wait a month and a half...it felt like forever!

Last week we finally attended our foster/adoption orientation class. I was nervous and so excited! The class was great. There were a lot of wonderful people with big hearts. We left ready to get this show on the road and we even got certificates. Of course I took a photo and sent it out to friends and family. 

Of course, after our orientation, we were very excited to get started on our classes. So, today we were fingerprinted. Lindsay told me my days of crime are over...ha. Next week we start our classes. We kind of lucked out with that. There are only so many classes from now until July and only so many people allowed in any class. So, after our live scan today, I came right home to sign us up for classes. All of the classes were full...except for the spanish only class and fostering only class. Well, being the determined lady that I am, I called and emailed determined to get into one of those classes! The guy called me back and said I should buy a lottery ticket, because someone just dropped out of the class I really wanted into. Woo hoo! 

So for the next month and a half, Mario and I will be attending foster parenting classes. There are 30 hours of classes for the next 6 weeks. It really doesn't seem like very much instruction to prepare us to open our home to children, but we are eager and excited to get going and see where this new adventure will take us!

I'm sure it will be the hardest thing we've ever done, but we have lots of love to give!