Happy Family Day Chase!

Today is Family Day for Chase. It was one year ago that Chase came to live with us from a couple who didn't understand him or know how to train or teach him. Chase was mildly abused by these people, and luckily they gave him up before they did any real damage. It took a bit to teach him the rules of behavior, but with love, patience, and an understanding of who the real pack leaders are, Chase is a pretty good guy. Plus, Chase and Ripley are more bonded together as brothers then any dogs I've seen.

The Boys can be a good example of adoption to the baby. Two brothers, from different parents, that came to live with us and became a family. The baby will have this example and feel some camaraderie even if they are dogs and not humans. The Boys can teach Finster that adoption is a good, normal, positive thing.

Now, Family Day. Once we do finally adopt, it will take about six months before the court will finalize the adoption. Gregg and I have decided that we will celebrate the anniversary of that date, when it finally comes, as Family Day--the day we legally become a family. The baby will know he or she is adopted, and will have a special day to celebrate our family union. It will be a holiday no one in the family has but us. Kind of neat I think!

Happy Family Day Chase!

So, can they all fit in one closet...?

This just in...

NEW YORK — There won't be much "livin' la vida loca" for Ricky Martin these days _ he's now the father of twin boys. The Latin superstar had the children via a surrogate mother, and the babies were born a few weeks ago, according to a statement from his representatives.
"The children, delivered via gestational surrogacy, are healthy and already under Ricky's full-time care," said the statement. "Ricky is elated to begin this new chapter in his life as a parent and will be spending the remainder of the year out of the public spotlight in order to spend time with his children."
A representative said there was no further information on the details of the children's birth.

Gee, see how easy it is for straight people?

Papa & Daddy to the Rescue

Strangely, there is a question we've been pondering that no one has asked us yet. It's one of the first things we thought of when we started Project Baby. With two dads in the house, who comes running when Finster yells "Daddy"? Yeah never thought of that did ya? At first I'm sure we'd trip over each other to see who gets there first. After a bit when you realize it probably means dirty diaper or some other disgusting situation, I guess we'd stare at each other to see who blinks first. So we needed a solution to this problem. Gregg suggested we make Finster call us Mr. Garland and Mr. Heptig. No. Daddy and Cracka? Um, no. How about All Knowing Master and Whitey? Vetoed.

We started searching around to see what other dads did to fix this. Some were Dad and Daddy. Too confusing. Some used a word from the language of their background. Der Pater and Shaka Zulu? No, too difficult. We decided on Papa and Daddy. Gregg's had a nickname of Papa to a few close friends for a long time, and well, I just like Daddy. So Papa and Daddy it is. We're trying to get The Boys to respect this, but typical Labs, they just respond to who has more food.

Adopt-o-bama

Note to self: This is not a political site, this is not a political site, this is not a political site...

Or is it? I guess the test would be to throw out the main subject of this blog to the political winds and see if anyone cared:

A journey of two men (and two Labrador retrievers) in their quest to make their family whole by adopting a baby.

Hmm. Yes, I think we might get some blow back on that one from a certain political faction. I had mentioned a few posts back John McCain's views on homo adoption. He's against it. In the spirit of fairness, what are Senator Barack Obama's thoughts on allowing gay couples to adopt?

We have to do more to support and strengthen LGBT families. Because equality in relationship, family, and adoption rights is not some abstract principle; it's about whether millions of LGBT Americans can finally live lives marked by dignity and freedom. That’s why we have to repeal laws like the Defense of Marriage Act. That’s why we have to eliminate discrimination against LGBT families. And that’s why we have to extend equal treatment in our family and adoption laws.

I’ll be a president that stands up for American families – all of them.

Once again, this is (of course) not a political blog. But there comes a time when you have to ask yourself, who is looking out for my family? Who really stands for family values? Who knows that there are real people, real kids, real families that are impacted by these political decisions? It's great to have beliefs one way or another. But you are affecting real lives. I think we know the answers to these questions.

Let's just go bowling

Sorry I haven't updated in a while. Nothing's happening worthy of reporting. The court as our home study in hand. I did find out that they have to make a decision by November 9th. November! Well glad they're not in any big rush. To take our minds off things, we've been trying to ignore the adoption. We've been getting back into bowling, and watching some Olympics. (What genius at Nike came up with those coverall suits for the swimmers? What happened to Speedos? Kill joys.)

So let's all just keep waiting...Tick Tock...

Darkest Before the Dawn?

OK, the title of this post is a little dramatic. Maybe even over the top. But hey, I'm gay, I can be dramatic if I want to! But I have a reason. I've really not discussed the giant pot hole on the road to adoption that we could possibly hit. As you know, we are still waiting for our home study to be approved by the court here in Arizona. But I haven't addressed what happens if the home study is not approved. Well what if? If the judge denies our petition to adopt, we'll have to wait until next year and then start all over again. That's an entire year wasted. I guess if we were in our twenties I wouldn't care so much, but yesterday I turned 41 and Gregg is 42. Now being vain, gay, and well, gay, I have to say we of course look fabulous. However, I've been hoping to be daddies before 2010. Also, I just can't wait another whole year. Don't forget, once the home study is approved that just means we can start waiting to get contacted by a potential birth mother. So you could be looking at over a year or longer.

Today I called our Arizona social worker Windsor to see what was going on with the home study report. She said she's already turned it in to the court. However, two hitches. One, we've been assigned a new judge who Windsor knows nothing about. She was very familiar with the last one, but has no history with this one. So we have nothing to judge the judge with. (Is that a dangling participle, ending a sentence with "with"? I have no idea. Interesting though huh? OK not really.) So that starts stuff running through my mind. The biggest thing is, what if he's a Christian? If he is, we could be screwed. Funny how through this entire process the thing that I'm most worried about is what if someone we need along the way, someone who could either move this process along or stop it in its tracks, is a Christian thinking they are doing God's work and keeping a child out of the hands of heathens. If you're reading this and you're not gay, I'm sure you think this is a stretch. Well let me tell you it isn't. A judge can approve or deny a home study for any reason and that's final. There is nothing in Arizona law that says a gay person can't adopt a child, but the judge doesn't need a reason. Personal prejudice can be an unspoken reason to deny a home study as long as they don't say it is. (Another dangler? Dunno.) On this new judge we don't have a clue.

Second worry is that out of the five references we've asked friends and family to complete, only three have come back. Windsor says this is the only thing she's got as a concern (she's not worried about the judge thing, but then she isn't gay and has not seen the unspoken bigotry I have). I'm not going to say who didn't respond to our requests, but I will say I'm a little disappointed. We picked the five we thought would be the best ones. This is the most important thing we've ever asked friends/family to do and two of them blew it off. Maybe not, maybe not, I don't know. But I guess I expected a little more. Anyway, Windsor said we could just give her phone numbers and she could do interviews that way. So we'll inform those people and I guess do that. I've started thinking of backup references just in case.

So, your thoughts? Am I being totally gay about this, or do you think I should be worried? Gregg is telling me to just relax, everything is fine, but that's what boyfriends are supposed to do. What do you think? And feel free to tell me I'm being a fag about it if you think it fits, cause that will probably make me feel better. Just tell me the truth!

Dry Run

Sunday August 3rd was our nephew Noah's third birthday. We celebrated it at my parents house. It was a fun day. As we were getting ready to leave, his brother Ethan started grabbing onto my leg and saying "I want to go home with you Uncle Bobby!". Now Ethan is five, and a really great kid. He loves his Uncle Bobby and Uncle Gregg. He's a little, shall we say, "gun shy" about staying somewhere away from his parents. He's also a little afraid of dogs, especially big ones like The Boys. The Boys love kids, and would never hurt them, but they do get a little excited when guests come over. If you're five, short, and excitable, they'll love you to death. Loving you to death means knocking you down and licking your face and trust me, Labrador saliva is not very tasty. Since getting licked in the face is how I usually wake up in the morning, I'm kind of a slobber connoisseur. Anyway, Ethan promised not to change his mind in the middle of the night, and not to be afraid of the dogs. To his credit, he kept both promises.

The visit went really well. Gregg and Ethan played an online game, something about penguins (no, not Tango again!) and then we watched some Boomerang. If you don't know, Boomerang is a channel from Cartoon Network, and it plays all the old cartoons we watched as kids, like Space Ghost and Johnny Quest. Ethan was fascinated by cartoons he never heard of before. He was a little offended that Thundar the Barbarian ripped off the light saber and called it a "sun sword" but hey, no one said they were original. We let him sleep in the other room, and I told him some bedtime stories before we both fell asleep in there.

Next morning, at 7am, the first words out of his mouth were "What game should we play first?". I was about to get a lesson in five year old time management. It seems you go from one game to another, without stopping, until it's time to go to bed. So we played Chutes and Ladders, helicopter, threw parachute guys off the second floor balcony, XBox, and this candy grabber game all before ten o' clock. We took a quick time out for breakfast (Trix) and to feed the animals. Then it was off to the park to go on every swing and climby thing they had, and then back home to take The Boys out for some morning tennis ball playing. Did I mention a spin with the remote control car? All while talking non stop. We would have gone in the pool, but now it was time to go to Dave and Busters at Tempe Marketplace.

D & B's was pretty fun. We played a lot of games, won a lot of tickets, got some crappy prizes, and had lunch. I guess I knew we did a good job because Ethan didn't want to go home. I was out of energy so yes, it was time to go home! Thank goodness we're getting an infant. They don't start talking as soon as they're born right?

Website Feedback; With Poll

OK we finally have something to do. Here are some comments from our IAC counselor regarding the greggandbobby website, http://www.greggandbobby.com/:

1. I like the main picture. I'd like to see a 4x6 original before we decide. Do you have any others for us to choose from?
2. I checked out the website. It is very nice. Just a few suggestions:
= I might reduce the size of the photos so that each page does not need to be scrolled down to see. Less scrolling has more visual impact with less effort.
= the large pictures are also taking some time to load and we have a lot of memory on our computers. Again, smaller pics might load faster, especially on a slower computer.
= I would replace the pic of Gregg's birthday party on the main page with something else as this pic just duplicates the main shot. Perhaps a picture with Bobby's nephew (African-American) (like the marathon shot in another section).
= Our Story, I would move the pic of the house (and reduce the size) to the bottom of the page and move the others up. They are more important pictures than the house pic.
That's about it. Nothing I've mentioned is crucial. Just suggestions to enhance what is already a very nice website.

OK so I have to say that I agree with just about all of this. I've actually stressed a bit that our site is a little too "white". By that I mean I think we need to showcase both sides of our family a little more equally. We just couldn't find any other real good pictures with Gregg's side. We'll have to work on that.

I'd like some more input on the site, so I'm hoping some of you can comment on it below. Let me know if there's something you particularly like or think should be changed. Do you agree with Lane's comments above? What about the pics? I want to hear any suggestions you may have, so please comment away!

(Actually, if you have comments about Those Two Daddies as well, I'd love to hear that too!)

Firetrucks and Birthday Cake

Today was a nice day. Two of my sister Suzanne's kids, Timmy and Christina, have birthdays that are two weeks apart, so they always combine the two into a summer party. They do it up nice for the kids and all the cousins. This year my brother in law managed to get a fire truck parked in his driveway. The kids had a blast on it, climbing around on it, blowing the siren (man that sucker is LOUD!), and honking the horn. The truck was full of water, so my brother Dennis and brother in law Keith manned the hoses, while some of the kids climbed on top of it and worked the water spout. The kids all had fun with the "water war" and everyone and everything was soaked! They had a great time at the party. Not sure about G, but I know I feel a little tinge of loneliness at kid events lately. I can't wait for our little one to be here to join in the reindeer games. Arrh this takes soooo long! Well at least our adoption coordinator Lane from the IAC is back from vacation. He's going to look over our website next week and let us know what he thinks. We've had it up a while and I keep tweaking it because I wanted it to be perfect before sending it out to him. With any luck this damn home study from our Arizona adoption agency will get approved soon and we can finally get in the book. My birthday is coming up in two weeks and I can't think of a better gift then that!

Sadly, there were no actual firemen at the party...sigh.

Cheering Myself Up -- With Cool Baby Gadgets

I'm so bummed today. Last night I called our local Arizona Adoption Agency, the one that is doing our home study. Our last visit was on June 6th, and so I called so see if they've heard anything back from the court. Well, they haven't even sent it to the court yet! Argh. Windsor wasn't there so I didn't' get to speak to her directly, but man, how long can this take? The court gave a deadline for everything to be submitted by September, so technically, it could be another six months before this is approved and we're finally on the books. It's just all so depressing.

To cheer myself up, I've created a list of Must Have Items for our new baby:
(Click on the names for more info on these wonderful products!)

The Baby Mop

What a great idea! We just had laminate flooring put into the den, and I hate cleaning it. I'm thinking baby spit dribbles out the mouth and removes spots as Finster crawls along. Turn him over, use an upholstery vacuum attachment on his belly, and send him on his way again. If the floor is really dirty we'll get him hopped up on caffeine first. With two dogs that shed a lot, this is better then a Roomba.

The Daddle

OK on second thought this one maybe isn't such a good idea. It will only come out when Grandpa or Uncle Dennis comes over to visit. There's actually something kind of creepy about this thing, and I think teaching Finster the best way to get what he wants is to give his daddies a good kick in the ribs might be a bad idea. Strapping a saddle to a grown man's back is too kinky for a toddler if you ask me. Head over to Rik's blog for that stuff. (Note to Finster: The safe word is "Daa Daa".)

Po-Knee

What a cute name. Saves your kid from the brain trauma the rest of us suffered while bouncing on someones shins. Still you'd look incredibly stupid using it.

The Snot Sucker

I think this one requires some practice. First, I'm sure Finster will enjoy having a plastic tube shoved up it's nose. Second, get too enthusiastic about clearing his sinus passages and you'll need some fresh mint mouthwash. Plus, what happens if you sneeze while using it. I suppose Finster will end up looking like one of the Coneheads from Saturday Night Live. But nothing's too good for our baby, so I'll let Gregg use it.

Baby Tattoos

We know Finster might get teased or bullied cause it has two dads, but if we cover its body with Baby Tattoos the other kids in pre-school will know our kid is a hardcore bad ass. They'll think twice about teasing Finster cause they'll know with all those tattoos they'll end up being the bitch. Teach him to carve a shiv out of a lego, he'll rule the playground.

Zacky Infant Pillow

What better way to know when Finster wakes up then to have a pair of disembodied hands scare the living shit out of it? Screams of terror can be heard all over the house, so we'll be alerted when Finster needs us. So what if it instills a fear of intimacy or watching the Addams Family, we'll be there for Finster when he shrieks.

Metallica Lullabies

This would be Gregg's choice. I'd rather hunt around for Cher Lullabies but oh well. I guess any baby raised by an interracial gay couple might as well be prepared for meeting Satan in the afterlife, so this will be a good introduction.

Bucktooth Pacifier

Yeah, we're totally getting this. Keep us up till all hours of the night? Poopy diaper changes for years? Lugging around tons of crap wherever we go? Sure we want to do that, but damn, doesn't this help to make it a little easier? Why wait to ruin his life when he's a teenager when we can start now. Life lesson #1: Sometimes Finster, people aren't laughing with you.

For Your Consideration

Mr. McCain, who with his wife, Cindy, has an adopted daughter, said flatly that he opposed allowing gay couples to adopt. “I think that we’ve proven that both parents are important in the success of a family so, no, I don’t believe in gay adoption,” he said.

--NY Times, July 13, 2008

Just an observation, no more, no less.

Ahh Sugar...Oh Honey Honey...

(Give yourself extra points if you know where the title of this post comes from heh heh.)

Just a quick post...Today is a special day for me and Gregg; it's our eleven year anniversary. I'm not going to write some sappy crappy "Oh we're so in love, and birds are singing and the flowers are blooming" post. (Well Little Mickey the parakeet actually is chirping at the moment, and the orchid plant is opening flowers for the first time in about two years but all that is besides the point.) We don't really have any special plans today; we're going to dinner at D'Vine Wine with Charlie and Michelle tonight but otherwise that's about it. Last year for anniversary number ten we through ourselves a party and one of our gifts was a spa weekend from Charlie and Michelle and my sister Tricia and her husband Keith. That has to rank about the best gift ever. So this year will be low key. We went bowling yesterday, that's the extent of our celebration. Being together this long is one thing that helped us make our decision to adopt. We've gone through a lot over the last eleven years, and our relationship just keeps getting stronger. Making this change to our lives is a huge step but it's the natural progression. Besides, a few years from now we'll have little Finster to serve us a badly made anniversary breakfast in bed.

And another thing...

Two posts in one day that's a record. Just a quick side note. I mentioned a while back about a gay couple that was matched with a birth mother on the IAC site. As of yesterday they are out of matched status and back in the book. I guess it didn't work out. I don't know why. I hope it was their decision. I hope it didn't get all the way to the hospital and then the birth mother changed her mind. I know these things can be full of glitches and I'm still trying to mentally ready myself for all the horror factors like she changes her mind at the last minute; finding out she's strung out on Drano or who knows what; wants a ton of cash until the baby's born; on and on and on. The road ahead can be smooth or bumpy, I just have to know that as long as we have each other we'll get through it and become Daddies.

Geez that's sappy...sigh.

No bottles, no cribs, no problem?

So far this is a nicely sanitized baby free blog isn't it? No messy diapers, no sonogram pictures, no doctor's appointments. No contractions, baby showers, rattles, or birth mothers. Just me and my weird rants or comments. So far everything is very clinical and business like. I feel more like I'm applying for a line of credit then adopting a baby. In fact, we haven't even done any "baby" stuff, except buy a few subversive children's books. Well and a tiny stuffed frog I saw at Target. It was just so cute. I put it away in my nightstand drawer for now. Thing is, I just have this kind of empty feeling inside, like I'm waiting for something but I don't know what it is. We still have not heard from the state on our home study approval, we haven't gotten our website approved by the IAC yet, and our letter isn't finished (started?). It's all paperwork and legal stuff. Every time I see another form to fill out about background checks or racial questions my eyes just roll back in my head and I want to just disappear. That same feeling I get when the hubby says we have to go grocery shopping. (Luckily it annoys him so he's stopped asking and just goes by himself...ka-ching!) I just want to get past all of this and start worrying about actual baby stuff. Worry about getting a call and meeting the birth mom. I'm not thinking about any of that right now because it's not a current possibility. Maybe I'll change my mind later, but right now, I can't wait to be worried...

US of A....Best--Country--EVER!

Today is the Fourth of July, Independence Day in America! Happy Birthday to the greatest country in the world. For 232 years she has stood as the best hope of the world, and may she continue to be so. We have problems here for sure, but it's still the best place in the world to raise a child. Many other countries of the world wouldn't even consider permitting Gregg and I to adopt a child, and I can't tell you how often I am reminded how lucky I am to be an American. Little Finster is going to grow up with the spirit of this country in its blood. We'll make sure he knows American History, and develops the same love of land and country we have. We've already bought the entire "Schoolhouse Rock" video collection. We remember watching those as kids on Saturday mornings. So for the 4th, relax and enjoy one of my favorite American history ones. Ha, Gregg and I still know the preamble by heart and it's because of this cartoon!