One smile makes everything worth it!

Today was a really nice Sunday. Sami didn't fall asleep until after midnight Saturday night, and she slept until after 8 a.m. Sunday morning. I fed her cereal and a bottle, and when Steven woke up I made French toast for the two of us. After that, Steven took care of Sami so that I could make my deadline for the catalog I needed to have edited by Monday. I had expected to be up all night Sunday night completing it, and was pleasantly surprised to be done with by 4 p.m.

In the evening, Steven went to watch Wrestlemania, as our brother-in-law ordered it and invited a few guys over to watch it with him. Right now, I am home with Sami and our two dogs and two cats. Sami is sleeping on the couch next to me as I type, and every time I glance over at her my heart feels as though it is literally melting. Sami really seems to be enjoying baby food, and I think that so far bananas are her favorite. They are extremely messy and gooey, but it's still so cool to watch her eat real food.

On Friday, Elizabeth's parental rights were officially terminated! Our attorney has submitted a request for a court date to finalize the adoption, and we are waiting to hear back about that. There is a 30-day minimum waiting period between the termination of the birth parents' parental rights and the adoption finalization. So at this point all we know is that the earliest the finalization will take place is early May, but it could be later, of course. Then the next step is to have Sami converted. And then we can plan her baby-naming, which we're still hoping will take place during the summer. Also, our social worker completed her post-placement report about us after visiting us with Sami, and it was so beautiful that it brought tears to my eyes about the wonderful things she thought of our new little family.

On Monday morning, Sami and I will be going to our regular Mommy & Me class, followed by our hour-long drive to return the edited catalog. My mother may be joining us for that drive, as it is near the kosher market and we both want to do our Passover shopping for the eight long days of keeping kosher for Passover.

Speaking of kosher, Steven and I have decided to keep a kosher home. I was brought up in a kosher home, and am feeling the need to give that to Sami, too. We also talked about how it's been so important for us to convert her and give her a Hebrew name at the baby-naming ceremony, so why not carry that into giving her a Jewish life, starting with growing up in a kosher home. So beginning about one month ago, all the food in our home has been kosher, we have been separating meat and dairy, etc. And Steven has given up ham, which he loves, but still did it with no complaints. The only thing I have left to do is set up our two sets of dishes, silverware and pots and pans, for meat and dairy, as one of the main rules of keeping kosher is not mixing meat and dairy products. I plan on doing that this week. I know it will be a lot of work, but we both feel committed to making it work.

Aside from that, Steven and I have both been working hard. I met with the author for whom I am editing a book, and signed a contract with him. I expect to have his first few chapters by Wednesday, and will be getting to work on those. In addition, I accepted the telecommute editor position of a business trade publication. The job will start in about eight weeks, as the publisher is revamping the publication. The job pays VERY little, but I will be able to work from home, and the publisher has promised that as the magazine pages increase, so will the amount of money I will earn. I am friendly with a woman who used to work with him on a previous venture, and she said that he is very sincere about that, and was always very good about "sharing the wealth" when he had success. As for Steven, he has been working hard at his day job, in addition to accepting a lot of side jobs and often comes home after working all day just to work on other projects at night. We are not in the position right now to turn down work, so we are doing the best we can to balance work, parenting and time with each other.

Sami does not nap much at all during the day. She takes a few naps, but they usually do not last longer than five or 10 minutes. But she is now sleeping eight to 10 consecutive hours at night! She is really starting to play now, shaking rattles, holding stuffed animals with delight, and grabbing at the items that hang from her activity mat. She's really becoming quite a character, with her own personality. She also does a lot of baby-talk, and looks so serious about whatever she is trying to tell us. She can also sit up in her boppy pillow now. She still has her bad days of course, in which she screams and cries and makes doing anything else aside from holding her almost impossible. But of course it's all worth it when I see her smile, and then I forget about the screaming moments.