The Depot Minneapolis

This past weekend we took the boys on a weekend trip to a hotel, as it was part of our Christmas present to them! We love little get-a-ways like this and the hotel we went to was one we were at a couple years ago. Cameron loved it then and has talked about it since. It's an old train station turned into a hotel. It has a small kiddie indoor waterpark with a train in the middle with waterslides and water geysers coming off it! Perfect for their ages! The old train shed hooked on the hotel was turned into an indoor ice skating rink. Lots of train memorbilia throughout, which of course Cameron loved! Yes, I make my kids wear life jackets in ZERO depth water. And you know what, they LOVE them! That's right, not complaining because I'm a little over protective ; )

Happy little swimmer in his new swim trunks he got for his birthday this past summer!

Here come my little figure skaters! At least one is smiling.... not sure about Rylan, he was on his last lap!

Ummm, yes, he was that mad! He didn't like his ice skates, but he also didn't like that he couldn't be in the ice skating rink without them on! Try explaining that to a 2yr old! YIKES!

I love these little walker type things they give the little kids to help them stand up. I totally would have used one if they would have came in my size : ) It hurt my back to much to stay bent over that long!

He comes our little Guatemalan Ice Skater! If only his foster family could see him now!!! Rylan looked so cute in those little ice skates.

Whoops, we had a crash! I got a little out of order. I think this was about the time he had enough of this ordeal. Just not his thing yet!

As you can see we all really had a good time. We left after the lunch hour on Friday as Cameron had early dismissal that day. We got to the hotel around 4pm and checked in. We spend about 3 hrs by the pool playing and eating pizza. Saturday we look the light rail train/tram system over to the Mall of America. After a long day there, we came back and relaxed again by the pool. Sunday when we checked out the hotel we packed up the car and went back in to ice skate! Rylan liked his ice skates for about 20 min. After that, he was just mad because he wanted to be out by me and Cameron, but with his shoes on! Cameron spent the first hour or so spread out on the ice doing what looked like snow angels... it was SO funny! But after tht he started to get the hang of it. Me, I did much better than I expected. No falls, so that was a plus! John wasn't taking any chances and was the official "picture" taker. Regardless, but Sunday night we were both limping around the house like elderly people! Water slides and ice skating all weekend, we worked muscles that hadn't been touched in quite a few years ; )

Re-Adoption Day!

Thursday, January 15th, 2009 was our re-adoption day! Most people who know us but don't know much about this process have no idea what this means. The most common response is, your STILL NOT DONE? Can't blame them, I feel the same way! The things that we've had to do are almost ridiculous at times. The court hearing on this day we to basically to cross the T's and dot the I's in the State of Wisconsin. Our adoption was 100% finished and legal in Guatemala. There is a birth certificate on file there with our names on it, and Rylan's. So this formality is to get a State of Wisconsin issued birth certificate with all that same information, and to legally change his first and middle name. Could you imagine us trying to get a birth certificate from Guatemala every time he needed one in the future? I can't! Anyway, we have our post placement home visits with our adoption agency (the local one we used for our homestudy) and they gave us a glowing recommendation as parents. We did nearly the same thing with Cameron too. The only difference this time was in court I took the stand representing John and I. I was sworn under oath and answered a series of questions relating to us loving Rylan and being able to support him. You know, I almost wish biological parents has to go through some of this. There isn't anything that most people don't know about our lives now. We're an open book. You have to be to adopt! But you know what, it was worth it. Every agonizing moment from paperwork, to agency loss, to law changes, to you name it. Both my boys were worth every moment. I only hope that's the one thing they never doubt is how much we love them.

I have to admit, the picture on Adoption Day isn't just what I was hoping for. John has enough hair on his head and face you can hardly see him! Who can blame him, he works outside for hours on end in -30 degree weather! But still, you know what I mean. I felt like I had been drug behind a car. Rylan hadn't been feeling good and both kids were less than cooperative that morning. Rylan looks like he's about to punch the judge if he gets one step closer to us. At least Cameron and the judge look good! Oh well, that's the way it goes!

International Day - Festival Of Nations!

Friday 10/24/08 Cameron had International Day at school... otherwise known as a Festival of Nations. I took the day off work to volunteer specifically with his classroom. I am SO glad I did! He talked about this for 2 weeks he was so excited. He knew the day would be fun and he was so happy to have me with his class (not to mention he got out daycare before/after school). When we were getting ready to go outside for a short recess he brought me my sweatshirt and "helped" me put it on. Throughout the day he insisted we hold hands whenever possible. At lunch I had to sit between he and his good friend Lydia. Lydia and Cameron have been together at daycare since they were infants, so they know each other well. Everyone who passed by us (teachers and students) were quickly told "THIS IS MY MOM"!
Besides the highlight of getting to be at school with Cameron, the event was great! A local college had around 150 foreign exchange students come to our school (sponsored by the PTO). They set up each classroom to represent a different country. So we visited Korea, China, Thialand, Vietnam, Nepal, Sri Lanka, etc. Then at the end of the day they held an event in the auditorium that consisted of some singing/dancing with a fashion show. The room was packed with K-6th grade students and let me tell you, I have never seen such excited kids! They were interested in everything all day long. The participation was overwhelming to all us adults! While the dancers were on stage, all of sudden the kids started clapping along with the beat of the music! They cheered for every performance with such excitement!!! I was so proud of them all.
Well, the very last performance was a song called "Love in any Language" that apparently all the kids had been learning in music class. You should have heard all these kids! I had tears in my eyes and lump in my throat. Cameron was just belting it out!
You have to understand that we don't live in the most diverse area. There are a couple cities about 30-60 miles from us that are much, much better... but not our hometown. This is such an important age for kids to be taught to love not based on the color of skin. Love should know no language or color. I sure hope this clip I attached works for you all! The further along in the video, the cuter Cameron is!

Karma

I've been joking that we must have bad karma surrounding us lately... or some sort of ghost haunting us!!! The strangest things have been happening. Let me take you back over the last couple weeks surrounding the holidays.

First, two weekends before Christmas I put our Christmas tree up. We get a fresh one every year! I got the entire thing decorated and went to get ready that Sunday evening to head to Winona. My aunts house was on the Historical Society Tour, so I wanted to help with it. I came out of the bedroom from getting ready and John and Cameron had these weird looks on their face. They just pointed at the tree. I looked and almost every single light on the tree was out! I was SO mad. I really do my tree up so this was no easy task ahead of me! I even put the old, old, lead tinsel on. By the time I got done figuring out what was wrong, it looked like a squirrel had ravaged my tree! URGH.

Got that under control and went to Winona. It was 8pm and I decided I better get home. Went out to my car, it wouldn't start. Unbelievable. Thankfully I was able to take my mom's. The next day after John messed with it we ended up having it towed. A couple days later, a $550.00 invoice! URGH.

So a couple days later it's the middle of the night and I hear this horrible, loud, scary, crash! I jumped up out of bed and ran into the living room. My first thought was a deer came through the window (we live in the middle of nowhere so it's possible). We have an alarm system on and around the house though and it wasn't going off. I flipped on the light and what do I see? My 9' tall beautiful Christmas tree laying on our hardwood floor! I could have cried. John came running out, only because I did, he never heard the crash. So, at midnight we're picking the tree up and trying to secure it. Now on the tree this year I put some ornaments my sister-in-law (John's brothers wife) made for the kids. They were clear bulbs she put paint in. She shook them up and wrote their names on the front. Very cute! Well, one bulb had an excess of paint. Not a big deal, I double hooked all my ornaments because I wasn't sure what Rylan would do with my tree. Well, as John and I lifed the tree he asked me "what's that green slime dripping out of the tree". Confused, I said "I have no idea"! I stepped back and saw this bulb full of paint smashed on the floor and splattered everywhere. Before we noticed it, John walked through it, kneldt in it, rolled under the tree in it and slid himself further under the tree. When he stood up I laughed so hard I thought I couldn't breathe! It looked like someone beat him with a Christmas tree branch full of green paint. Of course he was in his undies so all this is made funnier by the fact we couldn't get the paint off him. What a mess!!!! URGH.

So a few days later that disaster is over. It's 4:45am and I'm up for work. I take my shower at starting getting ready at 5am. I let the dog out and shut the door when all of sudden every single smoke alarm began chirping and squealing in the house! It was the most horrible, annoying noise! Rylan began screaming immediately and Cameron was hollering with his hands over his ears. I was running frantically through the house worried there was a fire! I could find nothing. The best I could figure out as the steam from the garage (being warmer) met the frigid air from outside and set off the alarm in the garage. So I had to get a ladder and take the batteries out of about 15 alarms!!!! I got to the last one in the garage and was up on the ladder, with my bottom literally in the air, in my robe, wet and undressed when I see lights turning around right outside the door. Wouldn't you know it, it was the guy who snow plows the town roads! My gosh!!! I never moved so fast in my life! I got the last battery out and guess what? The alarms went into panic mode because they had been going off so long the battery didn't matter. They are wired into our house. So this has been going on about 20 min now. Finally I found the breaker in the basement and shut the entire system down and got the kids calmed down. What a start to a morning! URGH.

So now it's just a few more days later. We have an LP tank that fuels our home outside the house and we are on an automatic refill. They just come every so often and fill it up. Well, I don't know what happened but we ran out of gas! We woke up at 4am freezing cold! So John ran over to his parents, got our tractor, and hauled one of the LP tanks back to our house. He had to convert them over and we got heat going after about an hour of messing around. In the freezing cold both outside and inside the house!!! URGH.

The next night John is taking Cameron down to bed, as he fell asleep in our room. John falls down the basement steps holding Cameron! Thank God no one was hurt. In fact John did such a good job holding Cameron he barely woke up! I raced down to pick Cameron up and hauled him back to our bed where he stayed the night.... and John layed at the bottom of the steps nursing his rug burned bottom! It was pretty nasty looking and bruised all the way down his leg! URGH.

So now I've had my truck back for about a week or more and it was acting funny. I took it back in only to be told now it had some sort of leaking gasket, blah, blah, blah.... there goes another $470.00. URGH.

So just this past Sunday we came home from Walmart. We put my truck in the garage (it's a Trailblazer) and we unloaded what we bought. We never open just the back window, we always open the entire back gate. I was holding the door and John was carrying a tote in the house when out of nowhere the entire back window in my truck exploded! I mean glass flew all over our 3 car garage! Glass was inside and outside the truck! I've never seen anything like that happen, ever! So, thank goodness insurance did cover it... but there was a $500.00 deductible. URGH.

So that about wraps up most of what's been going on in our world through the holidays. Even with all that said, we had an amazing Christmas. We are so thankful and so blessed! We have our health, we have our family, and we have our faith that things will turn around soon.

It's SO Cold!

Wow, what else can I say except it is cold!!!! Schools all around the area are even canceled here tomorrow because of the dangerous temperatures. It's now about -10 degrees, without the windchill. Tomorrow is expected to be -25 degrees, and -35 or even lower with the windchill. It's awful. I can't tell you how sorry I feel for anyone who has to work outside. My husband and dad are garbage men, and frankly I think they shouldn't work! But you wouldn't believe how many irrate customers we'd have if we did that. I'd like to tell them to haul their barrels down the driveway to the truck and dump them themselves if they need it that bad. Heck, if they could stay in the truck it wouldn't be bad... but they can't! I also feel sorry for the animals outdoors, especially our cattle. I hope this passes really soon!
I can't believe how the time has passed since I last posted. I have so much to write about! I will have to divide it into posts so as not to start boring anyone!
Tomorrow is a BIG day for us! We have Rylan's re-adoption hearing!!! This means that we are going through the steps of adoption in the State of Wisconsin. We've satisfied all the requirements with post-placement visits, and our social worker submitted a report to the court stating that, and recommending the adopting of course! So tomorrow it all becomes final. His name will legally be changed and a new birth certificate will be issued in our state, with our names on it! I'm so looking forward to having this last step behind us. There are few more minor paperwork details I'll have to finish... but nothing major.
I planned to keep Cameron home from school to go with us. It wouldn't be complete without him! So in a way it worked out good school was canceled. He's had perfect attendence so far this year and I didn't want to see that ruined... yet I didn't want him to miss the day.
We plan to get some pictures tomorrow, and I'll be sure to post them. Wish us luck!