Live...

Houston...we have lift-off.

Our various adoption profiles are now "live."

As my lovely husband said in a recent post about this "going live" business (yes, I'm a little behind in reporting out to you about this latest development in our journey), "Holy cats!"

So, basically...now we wait.

This process of waiting to be selected could take days, weeks, or months.

Or even years.

Here's the strange thing: I'm actually OK with the waiting.

All of the running around and getting things together and writing like crazy and filling out questionnaires and getting my physical and securing letters of reference and blah blah blah. All of the adoption activities that have so overwhelmed us since May 2009 - that's the stuff that made my head spin and made me feel anxious and exhausted.

Waiting...this I can do.

Weird, huh?

I've visited the blogs of other prospective adoptive parents who actually have tickers that say, "134 days waiting for [Baby Name here] to come home"

Not for me.

I've been recording our progress in the "Becoming Plus One Timeline..." that hangs out in the right-hand column of this blog, but I won't be adding a weekly "still waiting" entry.

That would make me crazy.

I surely don't want to spend all of my energy focused on what hasn't happened yet. It took tons of energy and focus to get to this point. And with nothing else active to do, I just can't and won't sit around bemoaning how much time it's now taking.

Instead, I'm just going to focus on living.

On my life with Chris and how I can make ours a great life while we wait.

I'm going to try my very best to be in the present moment. And the present moment is not one that currently includes a baby.

Instead, the present moment includes a body that needs...quite a bit of work.

I'm the heaviest that I have EVER been. So to prepare for the very busy days of motherhood in my future (whenever that might be) I am now religiously hitting the gym and eating "clean" to get fit and healthy. My plan is to say a very permanent goodbye to my sedentary ways and the F-A-T that is literally and figuratively weighing me down. I've already lost some weight in the last few weeks and feel just wonderful.

The present moment includes a house that needs work.

Chris and I cleaned the public areas of the house pretty thoroughly two weekends ago in preparation for guests. Miraculously, we have managed to keep these rooms looking pretty decent ever since - a big deal for us as we seem to lean toward clutter bug-ishness (not by actual inclination or preference for clutter, but most often by being so tired from our jobs that we don't have the energy to clean up.) Today's task is for me to deal with the laundry in our bedroom (yes, we have numerous hampers of both clean and not-so-clean laundry waiting for attention...so NOT romantic in the bedroom!) and to tackle cleaning and organizing our guest room, which has become the repository for all things we didn't know what to do with while dealing with the mess in the public rooms a few weeks ago.

We also have some house projects that should really get done before the arrival of our little Schmoopie: new closet doors and closet organizing systems for our bedroom closets, new kitchen cabinets, putting in a toilet downstairs, painting out the trim in the upstairs, clearing out stuff from the guest room so that it can become the baby's room, etc. The things we certainly will not have the time or energy for once the baby is here.

The present moment includes the need for nutritious and tasty food for our bodies.

I have never been much of a cook - again, not out of inclination, but more because of lack of time and energy. The time/energy thing is still an issue since neither Chris and I have changed jobs. So I am currently working on developing strategies to plan and execute meals throughout the week so we don't resort to eating junk, ordering take out, etc. Hopefully b y doing this, we'll then be in the habit of cooking when we become Plus One. Can't feed the baby junk food or take out! I'm still not a great cook, but I'm trying and want very much to learn and develop a repertoire of tasty, healthy go-to meals. I've actually cooked a few good meals over the last few weeks and am planning to do more in the coming weeks and months.

The present moment includes the need to assess my career and where it's going.

I've been doing fund-raising in one form or another for coming on 20 years. The truth is that I'm pretty burned out. But I don't know what's next or how to get to what's next. So I'll be focusing some energy on this as well. I no longer want to do a job for which I have no passion. The wonderful organization where I work certainly deserves to have passionate fund-raisers. Of course, I will do my very best work while I am still there. I owe it to the organization and to myself to still put in my best. But I'm ready to move on and need to figure out just what that means and what that looks like.

The present moment includes the need for me to be creative.

"You haven't worked on your novel in a while," says Chris as he's leaving for work this morning, "I hope you'll take some time for yourself on your day off to be creative. Don't clean all day."

What a lovely man I married!

He's right, of course. I haven't been terribly creative since August because my job sucked up all my energy during my "busy season" (understatement...) And so perhaps I will re-visit my novel this afternoon. Or perhaps, when I've cleaned the guestroom - which also happens to be my studio - I'll get out my paints and get to some visual creativity.

The present moment includes the need to be patient and centered.

While I am very ready to be a mom, I'm not ready to spend the next days, weeks, months or even years lamenting the time that is passing by with no Little One. Chris and I have put everything into place that needs to be in place for us to become parents and it will happen when it happens.

Life goes on.

And even though I am not a mom yet and my guest room is a disaster and I'm fat and I don't like my job, I am surprisingly happy. I'm doing things to make positive changes in my life and in preparation for the arrival of the Little One. This is a good place to be while I wait.

In the present moment...