Another Blog?

Some of you may be asking yourselves why I am starting yet another blog when I do such a lousy job of keeping our family website up to date. GREAT question. . .one that I have asked myself many times during the creation of this blog! There are several reasons actually. The first thing that prompted me to create an additional "home" in cyberspace was the need for a place to vent my overabundance of emotions and neurotic ramblings regarding all things adoption. Let's face it, adoption (particularly international adoption) is a very long and emotional process full of enough ups and downs to cause just about anyone to need some valium! This blog is my valium! When we created our family website shortly after receiving the news that we were expecting our triplets, we did it with the purpose of keeping all of our friends and family up to date on the happenings of the Rieben Family. I would like it to remain a place where friends and family can come to check in on all of our many adventures as a family without it becoming adoption heavy (which it has been of late). While I will, of course, continue to update our family site with the progress of our adoptions, I would like it to remain a snapshot of the "big picture" of our family.

Hand in hand with needing a specific outlet for the spillage of adoption events and emotions, I also wanted to create a specific space where I could share our experiences with others who are currently going through or are contemplating, international adoption, particularly adoption from Uzbekistan and/or Ukraine. After riding this roller coaster for almost 8 months, I have learned just how vital it is to have people who you can relate to, who have "been-there-done-that," to help you through the process. It is my hope that through our experiences I can be a support to others in similar situations.

For those of you just tuning into our adventures, I intend to "go back" and explain just how we came to find ourselves adopting two little boys with special needs from two different countries simultaneously with 2.5 year-old triplets at home (and believe me, you will definitely want to stay tuned for this)! Until then, please feel free to drop by our family website to "catch up!"