Referree

So one of the roles of a mom is referee. Thought I'd document a couple ridiculous ones from this evening's drive home from daycare...J: The sun is shining in my eyes, hurting my eyes.
E: Don't look at the sun.
J: Yes, I'm looking at the sun.
E: No, don't look at the sun, it hurts you eyes.
Mommy: You really shouldn't look right at the sun.
J: Why?!
Mommy: Because it will hurt your eyes.
E: Yah, it hurt you eyes.
J: (After looking away for a few minutes) Mommy! My eyes don't hurt.
Mommy: That's because you're not looking at the sun.
J: Oh.

(looking at the clouds)
E: I see a dragon.
J: No, you don't see a dragon.
E: (ignoring her) And a dinosaur and a tractor.
J: No you don't, there aren't any clouds.
E: Yes there are - right there.
J: No there aren't... Mommy, why are the clouds moving?
Mommy: Didn't you just say there weren't any clouds?

A few more Birthday Pix!

From today's festivities with the family.

Presents! A Barnes & Noble gift card and some clothes.






Not my best work on the cake decorating, but it was sure yummy! I'm glad Debbie was watching me put the candles on - I almost stopped after 8 candles!






And notice the fanciness! The blue hair streaks are from hair mascara she got at Claire's, along with the peace-symbol clip-earrings with about half of her birthday money from Grandma/Grandpa S. The blue feather hair clip and the pink streaks further back in her hair (although they look purple because her hair's dark, but hard to see in the photo), were from her purchase last night at Justice with a gift certificate she'd gotten previously.

Happy Birthday, Kaylen!!!

My big girl turned 9 today! I can't believe she's 9 already! It seems like only yesterday she was 3. I'm so proud of how much she's changed in that time - she has sure grown up a lot!

The birthday celebrating really started 2 days before her birthday - with us having signed up to bring treats to Bible study on Thursday night. I had made red velvet cupcakes with white chocolate cream cheese frosting - they turned out deliciously!

On Friday, I sent Cosmic Brownies to school for birthday treats. Yes, our school does not allow home-made treats. Because of student allergies, treats have to be either ordered from the school 2 weeks in advance, or they have to be purchased and individually wrapped, and in the original package so the ingredients can be examined. (Although it makes things less individual, I am a little glad about this, because I don't have to worry about the best baker-mom competitions, or baking 2 extra batches of cupcakes to get the 28 required for such large class sizes, but I digress...)

I picked up Kaylen and three of her friends from school Friday afternoon for a birthday party/sleepover. My van has never been so full of chatting and giggling! Oh boy, was I in for it! They disappeared upstairs for a while, until I called them down to have them make their own supper - pizza! While it was baking they gave Kaylen their gifts - Barbies, music, a mini pillow pet, and nail polish and remover - what more could a 9-year-old ask for?!?

After pizza and the red velvet cupcakes I'd saved back for the friends party, we headed downtown for the Winter Jam concert. They had fun while we stood in line waiting for the gates to open. We found some pretty good seats, and watched the pre-concert concert, which was good, because the girls were not too excited to have to wait another hour after we'd waited a half-hour in line already. I got them a silly light-up spinning toy for them to share, and also popcorn and pop to share. They enjoyed the 1-hour pre-concert concert, and about the first hour of the actual concert. Then they started getting bored. I got them to hold out another half-hour. Kaylen waited and see what the next band was, but since it wasn't Jaime Grace, they weren't willing to sit through any more. So we forewent Peter Furler, Jaime Grace, Sanctus Real, and Toby Mac, and came home early.

They had ice cream and played for a couple hours. Shortly after 11, I was ready to head up to bed, so I asked them to do the same. They basically just moved their chatting/giggling upstairs to our guest room, which is across the hall from where Josephine was sleeping and next-door to where Elijah was sleeping. After about 45 minutes of more chatting while getting on PJs, getting beds/sleeping bags situated, brushing teeth, cleaning ears (one girl had newly pierced ear), drinks of water, and multiple reminders from both Jock and I, they finally quieted down... or at least I think -- I was settling down by this point too.

At 12:06, one of the girls got everyone up again, nervous because she couldn't find her phone. I "innocently" asked her if there was a reason why she needed it. (Her mom had warned me that she usually doesn't make it and wants to come home during sleep-overs.) I reassured her that I was sure in the room, because I saw it not too long before that, and it wouldn't have gone anywhere, and that we'd find it in the morning when we picked up the sleeping bags and clothes. That's about the last thing I remember, so either there was no meltdown, or the other girls helped her get through it.

Everyone was up by around 7, which was when I heard Elijah and Josephine playing the typical annoying little siblings - quite well. Of course, Kaylen was annoyed, but her friends weren't, which made it all the worse for Kaylen. She survived though. I sent the girls downstairs to play, and sent Elijah & Josephine to watch Clifford and Curious George in bed with Daddy. After a breakfast of French toast, berries, and apple juice, they played some more, watched most of the rest of the Smurfs, and then the girls headed home.

Back to just our family of 5, we had a quick lunch of left-over homemade pizza and the last 4 red-velvet cupcakes, and then we ALL took naps. :)

After naptime, it was time for more celebrating. We gave Kaylen her gifts from us - another Barbie and more music. We loaded the kids and the CD in the car, and the kids had a dance party in their seats, listening to Victorious on the way to supper...


...at Biaggi's - YUMM!!! We beat the rush, which was nice, with three kids in a nice restaurant, and being slightly under-dressed.


After supper, we headed to the mall, where Kaylen spent her Justice gift certificate that she'd been holding onto for a few months (we don't get to the mall often!). We also had grabbed the mail as we left the house, and Kaylen found some birthday money in there (Thank you Grandma & Grandpa S!!!), so she spent about half of that at Claire's while Elijah & Josephine hit the mall's playplace. We also wanted to stop at Target too, but we were all tired, and running out of time, so we returned to our dance-party van and headed home to get the kids to bed not too much past their usual bedtimes.

Once the kids were in bed, I got Kaylen's birthday cake in the oven, while Jock set up a new game he got for Christmas. We finished 2 rounds, and by then the cake was done and cooled, so Jock helped me make the frosting, and then worked on dishes while I frosted the cake. Tomorrow after church, I'll decorate the cake, so it'll be ready for the family party we're having at noon -- yes, more pizza and cake! Then the kids will have Awana at 5, to finish out the busy birthday weekend!

Tidal Wave

I was looking online for a poem today that I'd heard a while back, and I came across this article.

What she says about the emotionals... the tidal wave is more how it hit me today. No reason that I can think of, just was a rough day. I was at work, so I held it together as best I could, but wow!

It started when I ran a quick report this morning for a coworker. I had to put in today's date, and that's when I realized what day it was. Almost immediately after that, I got a text from my sister, saying, "Love you". I completely lost it!

Then I saw a post on Facebook about mom. Then I saw another post on Facebook about a completely unrelated post - actually someone who also was at work trying to hold in tears of joy about her adoption progression, wishing it wasn't unprofessional to cry at work. Well, too bad. Luckily when a couple people came by to talk to me, were times when I was holding it together.

Thanks to friends who sent thoughts and virtual hugs.

I miss her so much! I love you, Mom!

Referral!!!

Well, "soon" turned out to be 3 business days. We got a call from our agency on Wednesday with our referral information. I think she tried to call around 8:30 our time, but I had a meeting from 8:30-9:30, so I missed her call. She called Jock, and told him she had our referral - but they decided they'd better wait so I could be on the call too. So he called and texted me to call him back and had to wait almost an hour. I checked my messages as the meeting was starting wrap-up, and saw this:





<---This was my response.



I called him as soon as I was out of the meeting, and he called our agency back. He apparenlty told our agency person that she could give him the info and he'd pass it along to me. She said, "Are you sure?!?" and he realized that was a bad idea. He did ask if it was for one or two children, and it's for 1. I asked them to give me about 5 minutes to get back to my desk, as I was as far away as possible in the next building over for the meeting. She called both of us and conferenced us in together, to give us the details. Then she said she would sent them to us via email - she had them ready to go, and they'd come in 3-4 emails, because there was a lot of information.

We received a very complete social/family history on the child, the child's birth certificate, parent/child DNA test results, a medical report complete with measurements and lab results, and a psych report on the child with developmental information. Also included were about 20 photos taken since arrived at GLA, and a recent video so we could see a bit of the child's development in action. (I don't know if this is a difference in working with an agency, or just a difference in the organization in the orphanage personnel/paperwork, but I'm very impressed with the amount and quality of the information we received. With our last adoption we received a one-page document at referral with very brief answers on social history, DOB, and labs, and one photo - and no birth certificates until after they were home!)

Oh sure, like I would be able to concentrate on my work the rest of the morning! I tried, but not very successfully. I was able to get some things accomplished that afternoon though, after I spent lunch going over the information we'd received. My manager, not knowing much about the adoption process, asked jokingly how long she has to get one of my coworkers up to speed on my projects. Ha! I told her a year or a year-and-a-half.

Jock and I also went over the information at home that evening, after the kids were in bed. We didn't think there was any question, but we did keep praying over that stack of papers and photos over the next few days. Saturday we printed the referral acceptance paperwork and headed to the bank to get it notarized. Then we had to head to a basketball game, so it'll go in the mail Tuesday, since Monday is a holiday. I assume it'll arrive in Michigan yet this week, and maybe take next week for it to be forwarded back to the orphanage. Then it'll start through the Haitian government adoption processes.

So, I know, you just want the details...

It's a boy!

He is 16 months old right now, and his name is James (for now - we will likely change it when he arrives home). We're told he often can be found with a goofy, mischievous grin on his face - Jock said, "He'll fit right in!" He was brought to the orphanage in late June, so if you search GLA's blog, you'll find a photo of him and his mama there. It sounds like he had a fever the day he arrived, so that's not a very good photo of him.

Here are a couple better ones, taken in november:
We are praying the adoption process moves along quickly.

Referral "Soon"

We've been waiting quite a while for our referral, since our dossier has been in Haiti for 3 1/2 months. Last Friday, we had a conference call with our adoption coordinator at our agency. We had asked her if there was anything in our paperwork that was holding up our referral. We were concerned because we'd thought, from GLA's blog, that our child preferences matched the children that were available at the orphanage. We knew that it could be held up until December, because of the orphanage director traveling, but were starting to get discouraged that it was now early January and we'd heard nothing.

She told us there was nothing delaying us in our paperwork, and that she thought it would be coming soon. We pressed her what she meant, and she hesitated a bit, then just repeated that she's spoken with GLA, and that it would be... "Soon". Hmmm.... Soon is rather vague, but all we had to go on, so we continued praying over our referral process.

Our adoption coordinator was going to be out of the office Jan 9-27, but she assured us that her being in Africa wasn't going to hold up our referral - they would continue to be processed by other staff in her office if they came through during that time. She said when it comes through we'd get a phone call.

Oops!

I had one more post on our Disney World vacation, but I couldn't get a video to work, so it didn't post on time. I tried the videos again last night, but they wouldn't load, so I went ahead and posted photos instead. But, it's posted under the Jan 10th date, so you'll have to scroll down to check it out.

Disney World, Part VIII

Friday, we headed back to Hollywood Studios for a half day. We had an extra magic hour in the morning for early opening, so we got up early to make the most of it, knowing we were going to only be there half the day. We got there even before the early opening, and were some of the first people through the gates. We went straight to get in line for the Jedi Training Academy. We heard it filled up quickly, and from the schedule we needed to be in one of the first two time slots to make it work in our schedule. When we got to the front of the line, the man in front of us couldn't sign up because the rest of his family wasn't with him in line. When it was our turn to sign up, we got the last three slots for the last time that worked with our schedule - phew!

We then took a quick ride on the Star Wars ride before taking the kids over for their Jedi training. The kids had a great time, and it was neat watching them frame the story with the kids up on stage training with the Jedi master... that is, until they cued the loud scary music, and Darth Vader came out. That was it for Josephine. The other two actually got to "duel" Darth Vader, which was cute. All three got certificates for participating.







Next we went back to visit the characters that our kids were took cranky to stand in line for our first day at HS (and to cool off in the air conditioning :).







We all thoroughly enjoyed the Beauty and the Beast stage show, which we had missed the first day at HS.












Then we had time for one of the several-daily episodes of the American Idol Experience, which basically was where 3 park visitors compete by signing one song for the judges. The winner of each of that day's episodes gets to come back for the last one of the day, where they compete against all that day's winners. Apparently the winner of that last show each day gets a special invitation to a real American Idol audition. We had buttons at our seat so we could vote for which of the three contestants we liked the best, so that was kind of fun.

That was it for Hollywood Studios - and all the Disney Parks for this vacation. So we hopped on a bus to take us back to the hotel for a final afternoon of pool/beach time, before a late dinner in our room, then packing for heading home, and a fairly normal bedtime.




The kids were asleep before the 9:00 fireworks at Magic Kingdom that night. Actually, I was too, but I wanted to enjoy them, so I opened up the curtains all the way, and watched the fireworks from bed.


I would sum up the Disney World experience as "Magical", as it's supposed to be, right? :)




---


Saturday Morning, we were up around 3:00 am, as our bus for the airport picked us up at our hotel at 4:00 am for our 7:00 am flight. We did grab a bit to eat from the airport Burger King. Our return flights were both on time, so we arrived to the Des Moines airport to Jock's mom waiting for us with our van.

We got back to our house around 1 pm, and having been exhausted from the week and having already been up for 11 hours, we slept for 3 hours, then went out for dinner at 4 pm, then we were all back in bed for the night by 7 pm. Sunday we had time for laundry, homework, and relaxing before getting back to work/school/daycare on Monday.

Disney World, Part VII

We went back to Magic Kingdom for a half-day, to hit a few things we'd missed the first full day, and also re-do a couple really fun ones. We had 1 Extra Magic Hour in the morning, but the only things open that early hour was Fantasyland and Tomorrowland. So we did a little shopping, and then headed over to Tomorrowland so Jock could go on Space Mountain with Kaylen.

I took Elijah and Josephine to Stitch's Great Escape while we waited. (Don't do it - it's horrible. My shoulders were sore for a while after because of the things that come down to hold you in - which really didn't even have any purpose since it's not even really a ride, you don't move at all, just watch Stitch moving around - are supposed to stop when the sense your shoulders - yah right - when they bang on them! Also, it was dark and loud and scary. I wouldn't have been too upset as Josephine was scared of several rides we went on (at least the first time), but Elijah was scared too.)

Then we all did Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin for a second time, before heading to Frontierland for two last rides. As we walked past the front of Cinderella's castle, we caught the end of the Dream Along with Mickey show, with several characters and princesses. Josephine was so excited to not only see the castle again, but the princesses along with it. :)

After riding Splash Mountain and Thunder Mountain Railroad, it was about time to go. We caught the monorail back to the hotel for lunch and naps.









Then we headed over to Downtown Disney, where we shopped at Goofy's Candy Co., World of Disney, and the LEGO Immagination Center, before meeting Jock's uncle for dinner at Rainforest Cafe.




The kids really enjoyed Rainforest Cafe.







Josephine was a little scared at first by the thunder and the gorillas we were seated right next to, but she got used to it, and we all had a great dinner. :)

Disney World, Part VI

We spent Wednesday at Hollywood Studios. We were getting pretty worn down from the past few days' activities and from being up late at Epcot on Tuesday, but they didn't open until 9:00, so we made it just shortly after opening.




We'd been given a tip to go straight to the Toy Story ride, as the lines are long, and we may not be able to get Fast Passes. When we got there, the line was already at about 40 minutes, and the Fast Pass return times were for 2:30 pm. So we decided to get in line. We waited about an hour, but had fun waiting in line, looking at all the giant games/toys in the room. You've gotta love the Tinker Toys box bigger than you, the Shutes and Ladders and Scrabble games on the ceiling, the Barrel of Monkeys hanging all over, and the Mr. Potato Head entertaining you while you wait in line. And don't forget the 3D glasses!

When we came out of Toy Story, there was an Army Man out on the street, so we had to get a picture with him.

We went on the Star Wars ride next. We'd been told that it's randomized so there'll be a different story line every time. There was a fairly short line, so we went twice, but it was mostly the same every time - just a different character narrating, and a different person on the ride that was featured - Kaylen was the suspected spy the first time we rode!


We grabbed 3 Fast Passes for Tower of Terror, and 2 for Rockin' Roller Coaster. But, the Tower of Terror line was very short, so they just went immediately instead. Daddy, Elijah & Kaylen went, and apparently, Kaylen was really scared, but Elijah wasn't because he wasn't listening to the story line. Josephine and I didn't even try. We had a snack while we waited.

Then Kaylen and I used our Rockin' Roller Coaster fast passes - the timing worked out perfectly. It was a fun ride. Kaylen was excited, but then when we were about to get on, she almost chickened out. I told her we weren't backing out after waiting our turn, so we went, and she loved it. Jock, Elijah & Josephine got ice cream while they waited for us, and we joined them when we got back.

When we were hot and tired of walking, we headed back to the stunt show. They showed us the tricks and then described/showed in slow motion how they did them. The guy on fire has several layers: fire retardent, coolant, fire retardent, then a gel that would keep the flames going on him - then there were people placed with fire extinguishers to put it out after a certain number of seconds. Then they showed what the tricks actually look like when they put the clips from different camera angles together in a movie. It was pretty neat, and I was glad that they incorporated a little bit of Cars with Lightening McQueen and Tow Mater.

When we came out of the stunt show, we were bummed because we wanted to go see some characters and get some photos. But none of them were available at 2:30. So we looked for the Narnia ride/exhibit, but it wasn't there. Apparently they were either renovating it or making room for something else, even though it was still on our maps. :(

Then we realized the reason that everything was closed - all the characters were getting in position for the Parade! So we stopped to watch the Muppets 3D show first - we had just enough time. It was a cute show.







When we came out of the Muppets, we found a spot to watch the parade, and really enjoyed seeing lots of characters from some of our favorite Disney movies, and dancing to the parade music.
























After the parade, we headed over to the Animation Studio, where we saw a brief presentation about how it all started, then got a few photos with characters who had returned from the parade. We got a good photo with the Incredibles, but the kids were tired and grumpy, so we skipped Pooh and got a horrible photo with Mickey.

We then went to have a drawing lesson, which was fun. Here are the results, attempting to draw Rapunzel from Tangled. Elijah didn't participate, but the rest of us tried. Can you guess whose is whose? You might be surprised! (Clockwise from upper left: Kaylen, Jock, Josephine, Lisa.)


We didn't take a break and do naps in the middle of the day, so we were exhausted by about 5:00! We also planned to return to Hollywood Studios for a partial day on Friday, so we headed back to our hotel early evening for a normal bedtime.