I Got My Butt Kicked at E2C

I went to an Empowered to Connect conference last weekend.
The following is an exhaustive list of things that I learned that I am making available to you...
the public at large.

Item 1:

I am doing everything wrong. 

This concludes what I learned at the conference.
Thank you for your time.

Seriously though.
Whew.
I know we all have our own issues....except for you perfect one's out there....hats off to ya....
and my "issue" is/has been/still working on it:

The "I have/am currently raising 4 bio kids successfully thus I can apply my same teaching and training techniques to my adopted kids and everything will be just dandy" mentality.
Um yeah.
Purvisied.
That's me.

Post conference....heck for that matter, mid conference at lunch break, and pre-conference at breakfast and post-post conference at the hotel I was blessed to spend the weekend with these amazing women.

That's Stacie. 
And Jennifer.
And Lori. 

We laughed, we cried, we stayed up past our bedtimes and we ate a lot of really good food.

And like all good adoption events it just wouldn't be complete without randomly running into blog friends. Love that! {And seriously go check out her precious cuties that she just brought home. Ohmygoodnesssosweet.}

And above all else we spent time processing what we learned during this emotional weekend the way all red blooded American.....or Swedish.....women should
by going to Ikea afterward. 
Holla.

Because let's face it.
Nothing says "You've just been Purvisied" better than a hot cinnamon roll and purchasing more things than you can possibly fit in your suitcase for your return flight home....ahem....Jennifer. 

In all seriousness though, I think that conference should be part of every pre-adoptive parent's training. It was eye oooooopening.
I think know I learned more in that two days about the development of babies and children's brains than I ever thought I'd know and how that subsequently effects their behaviors. Whew.

Wowzer.
The mountain us adoptive parents are facing makes me keep my eyes on the Cross.
Which is good.
Cuz....ya know.
That's just where they need to be anyway. 

There were some moments that made me and a few others say what-what? Mainly in regards to the size of families...... but alas we won't get into that here. My sweet friend Dawn who was also at the conference has done a series of posts and I'm sure you can find others that also previously attended a conference and felt the same say what? I don't entirely disagree with what was said in this regard.....but I don't entirely agree either. Just food for thought, I have my own only halfway processed musings on this but it's midterms for me this week
thus my thoughts consist of things like
"Ohmyguh-racioushowtheheckdidIthinkIcoulddoallofthis." 

I am however, off now to figure out how to change my ringtone to the Downton Abby theme-song.
Cuz there's always time for that.
And then I am going to design a t-shirt that says:
"I've just been Purvisied."
Look for it at a Stuff-Mart near you coming soon.

And maybe I'll get my words together on my thoughts on big families after midterms.