I just got back last night from a 4 day power trip to North Carolina. Bella's grandma was going to visit relatives, and we tagged along. The mountains never fail to amaze me. The creeks running over stones, rough waters peaking in white foam over sharp rocks. Some areas the water meandered slowly around curves, while just around the mountain bend, it appeared to pick up speed and race to the next jut in the mountainside. Beautiful. Brought back alot of memories of our years in Coleman Falls, Virgina, living in a caretakers cottage at the base of the Blue Ridge Mountains.
I said power weekend, because the drive is over 13 hours one way, we visited with relatives for 2 days, and returned home the next. One thing I always enjoy about road trips is the hours of conversation you can have with the passengers. Some of the time Bella would sing at the top of her lungs, drowning out the words between her gramma and I. Then she would fall asleep, mostly content in her car seat with paci blanket in hand. I inherited Gramma with Bella's adoption, a first in our home of many adoptions. It's interesting to actually have biological information on a child not born to us, and it's fun to get to know how we are connected to others. An extended family. A new world we didn't ever think of 3 years ago as being possible.
Adoption does that. Opens you up to other people, other situations. Makes you think about things you would never consider otherwise. We want to shy away from these connections sometimes. Some conversations make me uncomfortable, and I find out things about her birth mom that I will have to explain someday. I pray that she will make better choices in the years ahead, because one day Bella will run into her, and I hope it can be a positive experience, not one that will cause her fear or doubts about where her life may have been had she not joined our family...
Then I think again about the current homestudy. Our caseworker said she was recommending that we are allowed to adopt two Ethiopians this time. That was our hope. As she completes the paperwork that we need to send to the Ethiopian government, I wonder how the picture of our family will unfold to the authorities there? Will they be assured that we will love the children they place here as if they were born to us? We intend to. Will they think we can provide to the best of our ability? We will. Will they recognize our home as one of laughter, growth and family times? It is. Will they agree with the social worker, and when can we begin this process of remaking and adding on to our family? We are ready.
So, where does the Steak come in?? I will try to give the shortened version here.
Our school is doing conferences this week, so several days are 1/2 days, which also means several days the kindergarteners have no school. Today was one of those days, and being that I just traveled from 8:30am to midnight yesterday coming home from North Carolina, and the morning needed to start out slowly so I could catch up...
Tommy doesn't understand S..L...O...W...and he hit the ground running. By noon I had cleaned the livingroom twice, chased 3 little ones out of the mud in the back yard, chased the dog (oh yeah, we got a dog...) in from the back yard, and picked wet fun fruits off the newly cleaned carpet in the livingroom. While I was doing that, the little ones were destroying the diningroom....so, at 11:30, I decided a trip to Taco Bell would break the cycle, and give me a reason to leave the mess for later. In the plan making stage of getting out, the kids needed a bath to get the mud off, they needed to get shoes on, and get into their car seats. We grabbed a half loaf of bread, knowing that we could also feed the ducks at the river while we were out. A party was forming now. Picking up our taco's first, we headed to the riverfront. Of course our town has a huge (house-high) boulder that marks the site of our historical place in this world. The kids promised they would be good if we could "climb" big rock after we fed the ducks. The party was expanding. After duck feeding, chasing pigeons and eating our taco's, we climbed big rock. It was a Kodak moment, especially rolling down the big hill in front of the big rock. The only way I could persuade them to leave the historical site was to promise we would go "deer hunting." Our version includes driving slowly down the back roads of town, towards the old Indian cemetary, looking intently for wandering deer. No such luck today. So we ended our excursion with a quick trip to the grocery store. Emotions were still high, energy levels no where near the downslide yet. I promised each a candy bar if they were good (well, sometimes a bribe like this works well) at the grocery. I was pleased to find steaks on a great sale price, so I picked up extra packs for the freezer. Out to the van, and we were on our way. We stopped at gramma and grampa's house for a minute, and that's when the steak incident happened.
Talking briefly with the grandfolks was enough time for Tommy, Mere or Bella to open a pack of cold steaks, but I didn't recognize what was happening at the back of the van until Bella pushed a hunk of steak at my face in her dirty hands, and said "Look what Tommy did!" (He denied it all.) It took me a minute to recognize the red meat in front of me was not road kill, or the catch of the season but the steak I had just bought. My dad was laughing til he nearly fell down, mom looked surprised, and the little hands held tight to the fresh steak that was going to be supper....
If I had thought of it, another picture would have explained it better. But suffice it to say, all in all it was a successful day off of school. And tonight we are going for pizza, after all....
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