New Year's cheer for Taipei orpans

I frequent a couple of Taiwanese news sites, and came across this article I thought I'd share:
http://www.chinapost.com.tw/taiwan/local/taipei/2009/01/25/193591/Mayor-Hau.htm

Hope everyone has a wonderful Spring Festival! We plan on having some family over tomorrow for a homemade feast :)

We're having a boy!

I had my ultrasound yesterday and found out we're having a boy! We are excited :) Most likely his name will be Fox - we're still trying to think of a good middle name, so I'm open to suggestions. He is actually slightly larger than expected (I was exactly 19 weeks, and they said he's measuring 19 weeks, 4 days) and was VERY active during the ultrasound. The tech asked me if I'd had a lot of caffeine or sugar before coming in but nope, nothing of the kind. He was just doing somersaults and wriggling all over the place - really cute :) I made cupcakes with blue frosting for Chris and I to take to work this morning to tell our coworkers the news, which was fun.

Taiwan Fun Fact #4 - Vegetarian Restaurants

Chris and I are vegetarians, so I have been doing some research on vegetarian restaurants in Taiwan. I have been very pleased with what I've found! Taiwan (Taipei in particular) appears to be very vegetarian-friendly. Sometimes it is difficult to understand their websites (many are only in Chinese), but if you're interested, check out some of the links below:

This is a generally tasty-sounding place in Taipei with limited English:
http://www.easyhouse.tw/html/meal_01.asp

This is definitely a place we want to hit when we're in Taipei. I read a review of this buffet, and it sounds like a vegetarian's dream come true!
http://www.jendow.com.tw/all/allrestaurant01.html

This is a fantastic blog by a lady in Taiwan who does reviews (which is how I found the above buffet restaurant). This is a great site for ANYONE interested in Taiwanese restaurants - both vegetarians and non-vegetarians alike:
http://hungryintaipei.blogspot.com/

I'll probably post more as I come across them :)

Moved up on list!

I just checked ASIA's website (as I have a habit of doing compulsively), and noticed that we've moved up to slot #2 on the waiting list!! And this time it looks like we moved because someone ACTUALLY received a NSN infant referral! Or at least that's what the tables show - I'm hoping to confirm this. This is very exciting, since ASIA has not received a NSN infant referral in almost exactly a year. Since our little bio baby won't be born for about 5 months, we have about 11 months before we could actually submit our paperwork to Taiwan, even if we were #1 on the list. This makes me optimistic, however, that by the time we're ready to submit we'll BE #1 and will just have to wait for the next slot to open :) I'm certainly crossing my fingers!!

I'm pregnant!

Happy Holidays everyone! We have big news to share - I am pregnant! My due date is June 10th, 2009 so I am just over 16 weeks along. So far I've been feeling really good - not really any sickness, just occasional tiredness. I'm still not showing a whole lot, but I imagine I will be in the not-too-distant future! In a couple of weeks I will find out if the baby is a boy or girl, which is quite exciting. And no, this does not affect our Taiwanese adoption - we have planned all along to try to have a bio baby during the wait, and fortunately that has worked out for us. We're excited that our plans for our family are finally coming to fruition. I think I'm going to add another ticker to the bottom of my blog, so everyone can track my progress with me. :)

6 months

So it has been 6 months so far since we started our adoption journey (since signing our contract). I feel like we have made great progress moving up ASIA's wait list, and I'm excited to think about what the next 6 months will bring! Unfortunately we had to have our pet degu, Krillin, put to sleep over the weekend. He was old (7 or 8 years) and had suffered from strokes, so it was the only humane thing to do. We will miss him. We don't plan on replacing him any time soon. When we have kids old enough to appreciate a little guy like that we will think about getting another degu - I don't think I could ever get a hamster or gerbil after having had a great degu like Krillin.

Interesting Taiwan domestic adoption article

I came across this article and thought that it was quite interesting...it talks about the number of children who are abandoned, and how the number of domestic adoptions is decreasing due to financial woes.

http://www.etaiwannews.com/etn/news_content.php?id=765857&lang=eng_news&cate_img=49.jpg&cate_rss=news_Society