Chicago meet up....

I had such a great time this past weekend. Let me start by giving you a little history lesson before I talk about our weekend...when A and I started our adoption journey I wasn't sure whether or not to join any support groups. I joined a support group on B.abycenter in 04' during our IVF days and I met a great group of girls who I still talk too. However no matter what group I joined I always seemed to be the one left with empty arms. Joining an adoption group was scary to me b/c I didn't want to be the one left behind....like always. I kept thinking of shiit that could go wrong, not getting approved - what if the social worker decided we were bad people and did not approve us, or how about not being able to come up with all the money we needed, what if a BM didn't pick us b/c we didn't live in a nice enough neighborhood.... There were so many negative thoughts going through my head, it was hard to get excited about adoption, let alone to get excited about joining a support group.
In October of 07', I just happened to hop on an adoption bulletin board. I noticed a new thread inviting any and all newbies to join. This thread was started by Eileen, after I read her initial post I knew right away that I had to join. We soon realized there was a great core group of girls posting and we've been supporting each other every since.
I love sharing my deepest fears and highest highs with these girls. They have become my lifeline. When I feel alone in this process, I turn to them and they are always right there to give me great words of advice and all the support I could ever dream of. It is a joy having women in my life that truly get what I'm going through.
I had to look back through our thread to find out how the 'Chicago Meet Up' came about. We started to kick around the idea in January of this year. And somewhere along the line we actually made it happen. There are 7 of us that are regulars on this thread and maybe one or two that just pop in every now and then. Out of the 7, 4 of us made it to Chicago. It is a trip I will never forget and it is a trip that I'm so glad I went on! I met some amazing people this weekend. Hopefully we will do it again and this time we will all have our children.

Here are a couple snapshots of the weekend.

Our kitchenette ~



Our bedroom with a king size bed....nice ~



A group photo, this was taken on our way to Shedd's aquarium. Unfortunately it was so busy we never made it inside, however we did get to go to the Chicago Field Museum.


(from l to r, J her son B and daughter M, also her husband M, Col and baby Chylar, who you can't see :( and Gord, Eileen and of course Me, G and A.

A view from the museum area, Navy Pier is in the distance.



At Chicago's Field Museum ~


from l to r, Chylar, Col, Eileen, J, Me and B

We also went to Lincoln Park Zoo.

This pic was taken on the bridge entrance to the zoo.



G and M posing near the gorilla statues. G didn't look to happy.



This is G's expression



after he seen this...



Daddy and G at the zoo ~



I love this picture ~




G loved the zoo! I can't wait to take him to the John Ball Park, our local zoo. And we also have tickets to Binder Park Zoo, which I believe is in Battle Creek, MI.
We really did have a great time. I'm so blessed to have met some wonderful friends, who share our same journey.


I'll end it with some fireworks. We went down to Navy Pier Saturday night. I caught the tail end, they were very good. In Chicago fireworks are on display every Wednesday and Saturday night. Sad thing is they are almost as nice as our 4th of July display in my hometown.



Love,
D, A and G