Riddle me this...

Knock Knock.

Who's there?

I'm pregnant.

It was October 23rd and were having a nice, family dinner at home. I thought it was the perfect time to attempt another discussion about KT (Kid 2). Cody was vehemently opposed the first few times I brought up the subject of a second child because he was very content with just Frankie. He would say things like: "Why do you want a second when Frankie is so awesome? There is no way we will get this lucky again."

This last time I brought it up, however, he permitted me to plead my case.
I was good.
This is what I came up with:

1. I was not put on this earth to entertain Frankie. She needs a sibling.
His response: "What else you got?"

2. I can't imagine not having my brother to turn to when I need to complain about my parents. (Sorry, Mom and Dad. You know we love you, but sometimes we need to vent). Let's face it, no one-- and I mean NO ONE-- knows your parents like a sibling. There is going to come a day, inevitably, when Frankie is going to need a sibling who will really understand when she is seething mad at her Daddy, or when she has just had it with his idiosyncrasies. (She won't complain about Mommy though, Mommy is flawless).
His response to that one: "Umm...anything else?"

3. (This is where I got him). We're not that young now and I don't think it's fair that Frankie is going to have to deal with us all by herself when we're old bags of $hit.

It was a lock. I had him.
Now we just had to figure out what our next move was.

Did we want to adopt from China again? YES
Do we have 3-4 years to wait for a kid? NO.
Do we want to get on that roller coaster again? Not particularly.

How about adopting domestically or fostering to adopt? Hmm...both definite options... but then Cody blindsided me with a very interesting proposition:

"If we're going to do the infant thing this time around, why don't we just have one?"
I honestly hadn't though of that. At least not for awhile, but it was an option. A viable option. I knew I could probably do it and that everything down south was in working order, I just hadn't really considered it since Frankie. I honestly assumed we'd adopt again because our experience thus far has been so great, but what the hell? Why not? I'll try almost anything once. I was in. Let's give it a whirl.

We had no idea I was already preggo. That actually made the "trying" part kind of easy. I figure that because our China wait was so much longer than we had anticipated, this time we didn't have to wait at all. Oh, is that not how it works? Well, whatever--it made sense at the time.

Interestingly enough, things seem to have come full circle for the Coden family. Our original plan (some years ago) was to "have one and then adopt one, " and we tried--albeit for only three months-- but we did try. I'm not the most patient of people so when we decided it was time to start our family, I went see a fertility doctor. (Why not speed up the process?) We went to the doctor, I sort of lied and told him that we'd been "trying" for a year-- (OK, so it had only been three months, what's the difference?) he put me on some fertility drugs, I tried them for a few months, I got nothing.

During that time, I kept whining and talking about a baby girl in China and Cody eventually acquiesced saying we could start adoption proceedings. That was that. I was on a mission. In retrospect, it's a good thing we adopted first because the wait now is so long we probably never would have made it, or even tried. Frankie, you could have had a completely different life! Too bad...you're with us now, kid-- and if all goes well, you're going to have a little baby brother or sister to terrorize at the end of June.

Oh, and if you could wipe your dirty, sticky hands on that kid instead of me, I'd really be great with that.