If you build it he/she will come

We bought a crib yesterday - hooray! We didn't realize it at the time but a crib is just about the most tangible symbol of a baby that you can have in your house. So all this time we've been working on paperwork and talking in the abstract about "someday," and making lists, but now it's subtly different somehow. Now we can walk by the room and peek in and see THE CRIB. And there is only one reason for it to be in that room. Wow. It's kind of shocking. Every time we walk down the hall and see it, we look at each other and giggle (ok, I giggle, TubaDad smiles). I don't know what the crib says to TubaDad, but you know what it says to me? It says "hey, this is really going to happen." And that's saying a lot. Anyone who's been through the adoption process or infertility or problem pregnancies - you know what I'm talking about. And you know how much that means. By the way, we didn't buy the crib at one of those high-falutin' baby stores like you might imagine. Nope, this little prize came from a lengthy browse on Craigslist.org where we saw a listing for a solid oak crib that had some neat detailing. We emailed the seller, then went to see the crib, and it just felt right. It wasn't the first crib we looked at, but this one was well taken care of and it was obviously loved. TubaDad said he wanted it because he could tell the seller was proud of it. He gave us all the original instructions and a quick demo (bless him!) and we trotted home to assemble it. Here we are, triumphant with our shrine to baby sleepdom.