Not Quite Juno ~ Fabulous Blog!

I attended my first conference involving adoption this past weekend. I whisked myself off to Arizona late Thursday night in anticipation of not only going to the conference, but meeting someone that I only had the pleasure of talking to on the Internet. My stomach was full of butterflies and my heart was ready to explode as the 747 landed in Phoenix. I think it was the fasted flight that I had in my entire life! That pilot had somewhere to be because from the beginning of the flight he was in a hurry...his preflight address was like that of the fastest talking man, the pull away from the terminal reminded me of when I am late getting the kids to school in the morning and I fly out of the driveway, the flight crew was even scrambling to get to their jump seats in time for lift off! I thought it was rather humorous ... even when we landed and the speed of our turn towards the airport was only about 10 miles less than cruising altitude! (I swear I could hear the tires squealing from inside the fuselage!) No matter, I just figured that he knew I was meeting Michelle, the amazing voice of Not Quite Juno!

I squeezed a bit too hard when I first embraced her, almost embarrassed by my enthusiasm in meeting a stranger for the first time! We talked and talked and talked all the way to her house, then once there we talked all the way to 2:00 am! How thrilling it was to be hitting it off with a woman that I knew was someone I loved in cyberspace, but you never know what is going to happen in real life. Not only was she fabulous, but her entire family was fabulous as well! Just hit it off with her like I was hoping I would. We were very anxious to get to the conference so we set up shop in a hotel near the venue and waited, and talked, and waited and talked some more! Dinner at the LDS building on ASU campus was amazing! Great company, great entertainment fantastic speakers and can I tell you how D-E-L-I-C-I-O-U-S the homemade root beer was? Oh my, what a treat!

I could tell you all the details of how the conference made me feel, but I have to save that for two wonderful friends who have asked me to blog about it for their site. So I will just let you know that my weekend had some wonderful moments, and some heartbreaking moments. I am used to taking good with bad, and not that anything was bad about it, rather the heartbreak came when my beautiful friend Michelle got caught up in a moment that she was so looking forward to but left her with more questions than answers. My heart ached for her, wishing she could have more of what I have, more of what she wants from her adoption. I was in awe of her strength, her gratitude through her confusion and her ability to take everything in ... even though it was not at all what she expected.

She described her thoughts in a brilliant post that came from her heart yesterday on her blog (Clarity From the FSA Conference). She also shows what I love so much about her: That she can take anything and learn from it. So, I selfishly plug my friend and her blog because if you have not heard of her or read her before ... I think you will now! Thank you Michelle for reminding me that we are all human and we all need someone to help us through the storm. Soooo happy to have met you, thanks for having me! Annnnndddd......

Thank you to all in FSA of AZ who helped make last weekend happen! It was a wonderful two days filled with insight, friendship, love and advocacy for something that is so very close to my heart, adoption. I am a better person for going, I am a grateful person for meeting all the people that I came across there and I am just waiting for the next one that is close enough for me to attend!

Now, off for a few days to celebrate my wedding anniversary with my man and my boys! Happy Anniversary baby & VIVA LAS VAEGAS!!!!!!!!!