Got our Re-adoption Interim Order!

[Calantha]

We went to court this afternoon and got the interim order for Sam's readoption! Normally there is a 6 month waiting period in Illinois before you get the final decree, but they told our lawyer that because he was already adopted in Colombia in October, we can expect our final decree in late July! :bigok: We don't have to go back to court anymore or anything, just wait for the final decree in the mail. So, we're officially done with all the legwork for Sam's adoption! :proud:
We're looking at relocating sometime in the next year or so (the sooner the better!) In the mean time we plan to continue TTC. Once settled in to the new place, we'll probably get started up on another adoption if we're not pg (looking at China, Ecuador, and El Salvador, it might be nice for Sam to have a sibling of Latin American decent, and we speak Spanish much better since going to Colombia!).. if we ARE pg then we'll probably adopt again when that baby is a year or so old

Wow, I really like some of these new smilies... but errm.. some of them seem.. innapropriate, no?

[dna]

Hey Brandy

That sounds like a fabulous plan !

And congrats on the court stuff :biggthump thats a huge relief !

Sam will make an excellent big brother

Take care,
Amy

p.s. I have to agree with some of the smilies but I think we can all use them appropriately (or not)

[HISIRISHGEM]

Yeah....glad things are going well. I'm excited! You'll be locating for new employment?? Sorry if its TMI you don't have to answer if its too personal. Have you thought of an area?? We're thinking of moving when DH gets through with school Where to?? Have no clue. Somewhere where we can find a nice home thats not a fixer upper for a good price. Here they seem to have the old Sears build them yourself homes that they had years ago, and most are small and need to be fixed up big-time. Those start in the 140,000's . The newer nicer ones here are about 230,000 up to million dollar homes. the 230,000 one are what we would call middle class homes. Their nice but reaaaaaaaaaaaal expensive. ((sigh))

Are you renting right now or do you have your own home?? I think Next June we'll rent a two bedroom to adopt and then look for a home wherever Doug finds a job. Who knows, we may end up staying here two more years so he can get his final degree as a nursing Anesthetist. It would be cheaper. (sigh)

Yeah, some of them are innapropriate. I just won't use the ones that could affend someone.

[Calantha]

We actually spent the last few months just researching a lot of different places. DH is from rural Idaho, I'm from Chicago, so obviously our ideas of "the perfect place" kind of clash! We decided to compromise and go for a smaller city, closer to more of the outdoors kind of things he likes. We also want to get Sam a little further away from my family since they're a little.. shall we say, disfunctional? So, after a TON of research, we've narrowed it down to Portland, OR, Denver, CO or Minneapolis, MN. Well, the burbs of those places anyway. DH works as an IT manager and all three have lots of jobs. We have mutual friends in the Minneapolis area who have kids Sam's age. I have a friend in the Denver area who's been bugging me to move there for years, and Portland is a reasonable drive to DH's dad's house. All are smaller cities, but still with most of the amenities of living in the bigger city. Houses are somewhat cheaper in all three than in the Chicago area. We own our home now, luckily we got in before the property value skyrocketed in our neighborhood. We paid $130k for our home and are hoping to sell it for $160-180k. It's not a bad little house, but it does need it's share of work (leaky basement, needs new windows, needs serious landscaping help).
If you want to check it out, we used http://www.city-data.com/ to help us pick out places to investigate. We basically started by ruling out anything we thought was too big or too small, then we went through the crime data, weather, etc.

[HISIRISHGEM]

THanks that will help a great deal. Friends of ours bought a fixer upper and have had to shove lots of money in the home. So their going to build. Doug thinks once we get our finances situated in the next few months, we'll be looking into the costs of building a small log home. Don't know where, but he wants to get an idea of how much and then add land costs to it.

[Lisa67]

That is so exciting, Brandy! I know how exciting it feels to have all the paperwork done and you can just move on with regular life! lol

As for the smilies, yikes! I didn't een know there were that many in existance--but cool just the same!!

[HISIRISHGEM]

A sigh of relief I'm sure!

[BayGirl]

YAY! That is such great news for a such a loving family!

[stark tjej]

Calantha,
I am just going to put my vote in for Minneapolis as a fine city. I grew up in a northern suburb there and it is a truly wonderful place (if you can handle the snowshoveling and cold in the winter and don't mind wearing bug spray in the summer). The white blankets of winter and the toasty warmth of summer are sorely missed by me for now in Seattle-like rainy BC. All four seasons are beautiful!
ST

[~Traci~]

Yay!

Funny you should mention relocating! We're thinking the same thing and looking at some of those same places In fact, we're going to drive through NM & AZ during July 4th weekend b/c those are some of our places on our list. We have the same problem w/ what we want out of a city/town we live in

Go to www.findyourspot.com It's a pretty cool website!

Some of these smilies are a little crazy!

TTYL
Traci

[Calantha]

We went to Minneapolis in February to visit some friends who moved there a few years ago. They live in the south burbs, but we really liked it there. It's big enough to still have the big city feel, but it was also very peaceful compared to Chicago. We really liked the fact that everything was a little more spread out too, we're so tired of being all cramped up with neighbors right on top of us!
We're planning to visit Denver and Portland as soon as possible. The problem is, the money keeps getting sucked right out of us lately! The tivo box died and had to be replaced, got a parking ticket cause we didn't see the restriction signs they put up for 9am at 5pm, car got wrecked (we're ok, it was parked), back and forth to the doctor constantly cause he can't figure out what my body is up to these days, new a/c cause the old one wasn't working good enough, etc etc etc! It's only $188/pp for us to fly to Denver, so we may still get that in this summer, but Portland will probably have to wait till fall. I was hoping we might at least have our house on the market by fall! ARGH!
Oh well, all in God's good timing. Guess I can't really argue with it after seeing what He did with Sam
Traci, which places are you looking at? We looked at Albuquerque, NM, but decided against it because it's so dry. Sam and I both have eczema, so a dry climate is our worst nightmare!

[~Traci~]

We have a long list

We have to have it long and then weed out b/c we're completely different! DH wants to live in a small place but he just won't admit it yet

Arizona
Prescott, Arizona*
Payson, Arizona*

Colorado
Divide, Colorado
Grand Junction, Colorado

Montana
Dillon, Montana
Helena, Montana
Livingston, Montana

New Mexico
Silver City, New Mexico

North Carolina*
Asheville, NC
Boone, North Carolina
Salisbury, North Carolina
Morganton, North Carolina

South Carolina
Greenville, SC

South Dakota
Spearfish, South Dakota

Utah
Cedar City, Utah
Heber, Utah*
Springville, Utah
Grantsville, Utah
Tooele, Utah*

Virginia
Culpeper, Virginia
Roanoke, VA

Washington
Metaline Falls, Washington
Wenatchee, Washington

We're going to check out Silver City, NM definately over July 4th weekend. We may drive as far as Prescott & Payson, AZ. I love AZ. I was there for my birthday (June) about 6 years ago and I absolutely loved it so we're going back to visit! The problem is that I want as little snow as possible and DH loves snow. He also loves green mountains and not dirt mountains. He wants to be near water as well. I don't want to live in a place that has blizzards, hurricanes, tornadoes (we live in Tornado Alley but the last time our actual area saw a tornado was quite a while ago--we've lived in our house for 2 years and the only time the sirens have gone off is once/month to test them!), earthquakes, mud/landslides. That basically narrows down a few places but they're on the list anyway since we still want to check them out. For now we're looking for a vacation place where we can rent and then make sure we want to buy. Whatever we buy will still be our vacation home (for holidays & summers--DH works from home so he can basically work anywhere that has an internet connection and a phone) and then we'll retire in it. We also want some place w/ lots of land (over 10 acres).

I have asthma and I can't take the humidity much (I couldn't stand it in Boston--I could never breathe!). DH also can't sleep when it's humid out so we need to find some place that we both like and can live with!

TTYL
Traci

[Calantha]

We have a lot of the same issues. DH wants mountains, I'm fine with mountains.. if we can keep the snow from them! I LOATHE snow! DH loves it. DH grew up in a small town, I grew up in Chicago. Thankfully I've somewhat converted him and he's happy with the idea of a smaller city. We both made some compromises coming up with the "Final 3". I still have reservations about Portland, but I do think these three are the best compromises for us. We would like some land too, but I think we're looking for more of a quiet suburb kind of thing for relocating right now. Then we've talked about in a few years buying a few acres back in Idaho (where DH is from). We don't want to build at all, we just want a place where we can go pitch a tent and be alone with nature. Some really beautiful places in central Idaho (DH is from Northern but it's overrun these days).

[Lisa2008]

Congrats to all of you Brandi.

We are going through a relocation as i speak. we are moving to Vancouver. Dh is already there working, and i am leaving today with ds to meet him there. We are moving into an appartmenet, cause i want to live in the city.

It sounds like you have a lot on the go right now. i hope things come to you, and easily. good luck!!