Why China?

Even before six Gosselins (ok they are Korean and only 1/4 part), I always loved little chinese girls. They are so supercute !!! Another cute baby I can think of is Meg Ryan's Daisy (pictured on the left), she is such a cutie. They are so lovable. I always wanted one (or two) and there is so much known about chinese adoptions it almost looks familiar.

I am also fascinated by the idea of taking a trip to China. I am fascinated by pretty much everything, but right at this time, this trip tops it all. I am fascinated by a vision of taking that long flight, land in the city with signs I will not be able to read, by the lights at night, tons of people rushing from here and there, taking a bus or train or plane to another provice where my daughter will be waiting, meeting her for the first time and fall in love instantly, taking her to Beijing, work out all the papers with the embassy and take her home.

I am just fascinated.

I am, though, worried about prejudices, something I lack myself. I already touched that subject with sil, and she was horrified, even asking not to bring another asian to this country (sorry that's unfortunately her exact words). I was hurt. On top of that, one thing I really despise, are the prejudices. No child is better then other, and it doesn't matter whether she comes from Russia, China or Mars. She will be ours and our daughter. We are not going to adopt a child depending what others like, but what we like and what we want. And we will love her regardless what others think and I really hope for their own sake they will like her too and accept our decision without any prejudices.

Widgeon Creek

It's really hot here. I am a huge no-fan of summer and I am really suffering (here, add the frustration I was going through plus a period cramps and pain) I was in north Alberta in February with -37. What's wrong with that !!!

We squeezed in a little kayaking trip to Widgeon Creek on Saturday, just to relax little bit and get some break. It was nice.

So we will be adopting a baby !!

We have finally decide to try and adopt a baby. My husband finally agreed and now he's as excited as I am !! It was not an option for him but finally he saw how heartbroken I am and started seeing the good side of this. Now, the thing is that I want to have a little Chinese girl (I always wanted, even before Six Gosselins!) He says that I never wanted, cause I never told him.

But, since he wouldn't hear of adoption in general, why would I go to details ? It doesn't mean I didn't want one. I really do and I always wanted.

I am really fascinated by the idea of hopping on the plane, fly to China overnight, pick up our daughter, spend some fascinating time in there getting to know her, her country and do the paperwork and then bring home the most beautiful baby girl ever and grow a really good person out of her. So I am going to start looking into it and hey, if you want to help, I have lots of really nice handknit accessories and scrapbook albums for sale in my stores !

Given it takes about three years, she is not even on the way, but my daughter may be born in October 2010 !!! (they adopt 10 months old babies out the earliest)

Farmer wants a wife

I don't know if anyone watched this show, but it's pretty much like a Joe Millionaire, except the girls know upfront. I only watched the first and last episode and I have a very strong feeling I haven't missed a thing. He is presented with a bunch of city girls, gives them tasks like collect eggs and catch the pigglets and whoever impresses him, is safe for tonight's elimination and cannot be voted off the farm island. At the end, there is one lucky bachelorette who this handsome bachelor anounces his love via a flag dragged by a an airplane over the what seemed like gathering place for the village people in the middle of the corn field (it could the the village downtown, too) with hundreds of neighbours watching. Very romantic.

What really got me though was the Editor's spotlight in the TV week. I rarely read those, but this one I couldn't resist. It says: Who will farm-hunk Matt choose a bride now that he's whittled down the bevy of the city gals to the final two? And more importantly, why would anyone possibly care?

Breastfeeding? You're disabled.

When doing some research, I just came accross a website, which has different cases which were brought to court. One of the cases was about a lady in Ontario (I believe), who asked her work to accomodate her to be able to breastfeed her baby. Although this case happened in early 90' and lots of things has changed since, it still includes some very present issues.

This lady asked to have your working hours shortened by 1 hour, which was denied even though she wouldn't get paid, and they were in constant hiring mode (which shows that hers would not be the only vacant place in the company and her leaving one hour earlier would not be the only problem this company was having). Next, she tried to ask to at least be able to finish at 4 pm the latest to get home in time (doable, but brings lots of stress, like traffic, delay at work etc) to feed her baby at 4.30 pm. For the record, he was born with a heart problem and breastfeeding was recommended as long as possible to build up his immunity.

So back to her work, instead of simply accomodating this very simple request of a breastfeeding mother, they gave her a really hard time. They advised her, that she has to get (lots of) medical notes from her doctor, and basically turned her case into disability. She had to be going to the doctor and her papers were sent to a insurance company her work had a Disability contract with.

So when brought to the court, the judge had some very smart conclusions: Breastfeeding is not a disability and such as she shouldn't be harassed and her work shouldn't demand medical notes. It was a gender discrimination, as breastfeeding only occurs with women, not the men. Then her company pointed that this lady never submitted any proof that her baby was sick and needs breastfeeding.

What does it matter if the baby is healthy or not? World Health organization has been working so hard for the last 4 decates to promote breastfeeding around the world, yet a huge company in the heart of Canada doesn't respect it? Anyone has a right to breastfeed her baby should she choose to do so, healthy or not. It really does not matter.

Unfortunately, these days, the companies demand absolute flexibility from the employees, but fail to accomodate their simplest requests. They employ incapable supervisors and managers who do not know what to do so instead they make their own rules to show their power. And that is still happening in many, many companies around the world.

If you would like to read the whole case (its very long) you can at:

http://www.canlii.org/eliisa/highlight.do?text=breastfeeding&language=en&searchTitle=Search+all+CanLII+Databases&path=/en/ca/chrt/doc/2007/2007chrt7/2007chrt7.html

When I'm glad I'm home alone

Look at this mess !!!

We're next !!

Today, I had to go to the store. When I picked up all my stuff, I walked towards the cashier's. On the belt, there were four things already and a lady walks fast from behind me. I saw the stuff, no big deal, I assumed, that she needed to pick up something else. However, what happened next, was just weird.

She held her baby, barely 2 years old. When she saw us coming towards the cashier's, she loudly (too loudly) told to her baby: Don't worry Emily we're next !!

Emily had no idea who's next, yet alone worried. There were no other people in the store, so even if she'd have to wait, it wouldn't be a big deal, as I had one single thing. Plus I did see that she already has stuff lined up and I didn't mind wait for her till she gets to the counter and just pays for her stuff.

This lady had a very strong feeling that she was next, even though she left her place in the non-existing line up but did not nicely ask should she see that someone is threatening her civil right (noone was). Why would she tell to her baby that they are next the way those who this information was intended for, would hear, I don't know. What does it teach the little girl, though is to never talk directly to other people to let them know something, instead, find sneaky and indirect ways to do so. And all that will eventually lead to many other behavior problems.

How Willow got her yard back

We got new neighbours. They seem nice, but they have two small dogs (don't ask me what brand, all i know is that they are white) and they bark a lot. That makes it chalenging for someone with two cats who think they should live outside !! Especially Willow, she spends her days sitting by the door and meowing unhappily. She knows her pink leash and gets so excited when I shake it, she knows what's to follow ! She is one really brave cat.
Until the dogs run out. Then, it's a whole different story. Willow used to freak out, hiss, run home. The dogs happily stood on their part of the yard, shaked their tails and barked their lungs out.
But enough is enough, she thought. So instead of defence, she adopted a brand new approach: she froze from fear and didn't move a bit. And boy did it ever work !!! The dogs shut up, stood still, and thought of what to do next. Then the neigbour came and ordered them (i hope it was them) to stop being nosy. He commented: what a good cat, she won't even move !
Duh !! How could she, she (as mentioned above) was frozen with fear. And that was it for the dogs. They lost interest and retrieved back to their home. And my cat? As soon as they were out of sight, she got up, released a very happy purr and went on to mowing the lawn.
So that's how Willow got her yard back.