Let the countdown begin: I have my court date for the adoption finalization on Oct 29, that's exactly 4 weeks from today. It's not like I don't feel like he's my son, or that I'm his father... but it will be nice to have it all be official so I don't feel like I'm a criminal every time I cross state borders and forget to inform my social worker!

In the meantime, our little guy is crawling, necessitating a trip to Babies 'R' Us and Home Depot to begin The Great South End Brownstone Gate Adventure. It was fun seeing other couples at the store with babies at the exact same developmental age (i.e. about to become dangerously mobile) and their recognizable looks of joy, confusion and near-panic.

The gates are slightly troublesome in our house because the staircases all have a curved banister on one side with a lovely veneer and balusters that I don't want to drill holes into... So I thought it required some woodworking creativity and I scavenged in the basement, found some lumber (mostly extra molding) from the renovations, and at Home Depot I planned on buying a simple hacksaw to cut the pieces down to size...but in the end I decided to by a low end TABLE SAW!! (see above) Next stop: You Tube to watch as many Table Saw Safety videos as possible. Then I read the instruction manual (which, I NEVER do). And voila! I was an amateur carpenter, still with 10 fingers, with a slightly shaken-up baby (the saw was VERY loud when I turned it on and it startled everyone) and a lovely gate between the kitchen foyer and the basement.

Unfortunately, I realized as soon as I closed it for the first time, that it would prevent the cats from reaching their litter closet... Back to the drawing-board...