An Exciting "Walton's Style" Morning...

Our morning was very exciting!! After a sleepless night - who knows why?! Seriously, I wasn't worried about this interview or anything!! Anyway, after a sleepless night, I stumbled bleary eyed down to my computer to read my morning email with my coffee. What nicer way to wake up than to 'get together' with my adoption friends!

There in my In Box was an email from the Assignments lady at CBC. We hadn't heard back from them the day before and so weren't even sure the interview would take place. It was 8:15 am and she wanted me to call her as they had lined up a cameraman and needed to coordinate times. So I did.

She confirmed we were still good with it and said she would get back to me. She asked what time I thought would be good and I told her that I did NOT want to go on camera with a bedhead and sleep voice!! *grin* She laughed and said she would give me an hour and a half!!!! Whoa. I had to hustle. We went into overdrive and finished tidying up right before the man arrived.

In the meantime, the reporter called me and she was awesome. She was so thankful that we would let them come and spend time with our family. She told me what questions the camera man would be feeding us and we knew it wasn't going to be so scary!!

I was worried they would get into the legalities and politics, and I know nothing about that. I just know we hope that Bill C-14 will bring our girls home sooner! That is all we care about. Plus the fact that it is breaking news - moment by moment, right now. Nobody really knows what this is all going to mean until Citizenship and Immigration Canada tells us. We are just hopeful.

I was sending three of our boys off to Church. I figured I would send the busy bee 8 year old and the big brother to keep an eye on him, plus our 11 year old wanted to go see his friends. I knew I would keep the 2 year old here, and the four year is just so darned cute that I told him all he had to do was *smile*. And our 14 year old was kept home so that he could take the toddler when we needed to do our personal interview.

Well, that plan went out the window!! *laugh* It turned out that the reporter wanted to do a Christmas Family Story for the News Hour and wanted all of our family doing all kinds of fun family Christmas activities!! The funny thing is everything you see in the pictures is what we do in our normal life - just not all within two and a half hours on a Sunday morning!! So here you will have a glimpse of what life is like in a family of six children!

They enjoyed the busyness of it all and were very cooperative.

When the cameraman arrived the boys were outside on our skating rink. They were having a country boy came of hockey. He thought that was a great way to begin. Well, the mother that I am, of course I was out there taking pictures of him taking pictures, so that I could put them in our daughters' journal! He liked that, so at one point he videoed me taking pictures of them. Obviously don't have a picture of that as I am holding the camera! *grin*

Biggest and Littlest Boys (Colt 16, Briton 2)

Briton is Learning to Skate Already!

Hockey on the Home Rink

After he filmed the boys playing hockey for a while we all came in and got on with some Christmas gingerbread house decorating. Our boys thought that was wonderful!!! They had already been given their allotment of sweets for their house (on Friday) and now they were being asked to add more candy to their houses!! *LOL*

Camera Set Up - Boys Decorating

Now you can't see this, but it was fun to watch this camera man at work. Dane (14) decided he did not want to be an actor this year. He had gone out for some auditions and decided it was not for him. Cassidy (11) loves to be in the camera and actually, Chasing Christmas (his Christmas movie debut) was shown on tv again today. The funny thing was the camera man would decided on a part of the action and zero in on it. Poor, good natured Dane. He got to be the centre of attention at one point and the camera zoomed right in on him building his house!!!

Speaking of this boy - he came downstairs in his camo pants and an old grey t-shirt. I said to him, "You're not going to wear that, are you?" He said, "Support our troops!" LOL!! Colt comes down later and says, "Mum, can I come down in my cadet uniform? The cadets would LOVE that!!" LOL! I *think* he was joking?!

While he was filming the boys (re)decorating their houses Ray was in the livingroom reading to the little ones and so he decided to make that his next stop.

Daddy and His Little Boys

During the course of his filming, obviously life had to keep happening, so he took advantage of seeing the kids in their elements - doing stuff that is regular to us, but 'nice' for their Christmas story. The little boys were working on a Christmas puzzle. We try to buy a St. Nicholas puzzle every Christmas, so they have something new to work on during the holidays.

When the camera man was filming the little ones were arguing as to who could put the puzzle pieces in. I told them they had to 'act' for the cameraman. To which they both replied, "But I don't want to be an actor." I then said, "Don't you want to see yourself on tv?" Cooper then looks at Austin and said, "I want to be on tv! Austin don't you want to act? Then you can be on tv. " So off they went. Perfect little boys, happily sharing the building of the puzzle. *smile*

We told the reporter that we didn't have a referral for our girls yet, but we did have a beautiful reminder of what we had to look forward to - our rug of the African children. It is a constant reminder to us that God will be faithful and our girls will come home. He loved the picture.

Colt and Cooper Showing 'Our Girls'

Dane and Cassidy Checking Out Christmas Presents

The funny thing is our boys have a lifelong rule that "you don't touch the presents under the tree or the Grinch will take them." We have this rule because we want Christmas to be about when we hand out the presents, not shaking and rattling and ruining the suprises that someone planned for another person. Our children *know* this law!! *laugh* And yet, they were asked by the reporter to discuss and handle and talk about the gifts!!

Now obviously the general public will see this footage and not know anything about how it was filmed, but you all do!! *grin*

After the reporter had finished talking to the boys they went off to play, nap, or watch a Christmas show, and then Ray and I had our interview.

Our Interview

So we sat at the table and there were questions he asked us: How long had we been waiting to adopt; why did we choose to adopt; what were some of the hoops we had to jump through; what were the difficulties in the process; who were our girls and what were their names; how would the new legislation change things for us - how would it affect us; where would our children be next year?

The only thing I focussed on when it came to what were the difficulties in the process was the waiting. I explained that when we got a referral picture of our girls it would be up to another eight months before we could bring them home. The hardest thing in this whole process would be the waiting once we had seen the girls.

As far as who our girls were: we told them what our request was for and that we hoped to incorporate our names with the names they already have.

Regarding the new Legislation - we are sincerely hoping that the time lines will be shortened. We have read that no medical will be required and we can only pray that this will mean less paperwork and quicker processing.

He asked us what was the holdup. I said that adoptions from Ethiopia were picking up since China was taking longer to complete adoptions. I knew that to bring home a child from China to Canada was much quicker, once the referral had taken place. This could be because they have so many children coming from there that the process is more streamlined. As Ethiopia becomes more popular we can only hope that things will become quicker. I also stated that children coming from Ethiopia to America were coming home shortly after their court dates.

How long would it be before our children are home with us? We believe by next Christmas, but are hoping that with this new legislation it will be even sooner. We can only HOPE!

Overall, it was a very good interview, and he said that out of all the footage he filmed there will probably be a 5 minute segment. The reporter told me that our story was the main part. We shall see. You know how those cutting room floors go!!! Now let's hope that this coverage does good things for us all!