Remember me?

Yes, I am still alive.

No, we don't have a referral yet.

We are surviving and trying our best to find happy distractions.

I will post here occasionally, but after the adoption is all over and done with, I will probably shut this blog down... working on priorities. Would much rather be sewing than blogging, sorry. Not that I don't love you all.

My sister, who loves me, bought me an early birthday present of a Flickr Pro account (that so does not mean I am any sort of "pro.") So check me out there. http://www.flickr.com/photos/gratzmom/

Love to you all!
Kelly

Think about something else...

What isn't lovely= The adoption waiting game... We are currently #4 on the list I believe. One of the families in this area received their referral (the call from the agency that basically says, hey, we have a child that we think matches your family) a week or so ago and I was really hoping that meant we would be coming up soon too. There were 2 more referrals this week, but not us. We are getting closer, but the wait is tough. I keep telling myself how good we have it, because our wait is most likely only going to be 3-5 months (we are almost at 3 months right now since our dossier was approved). China is currently a 2-3 YEAR wait from application to bringing a child home. Haiti is around 2 years, so I will not complain. We will most likely have our little one home before the end of the year and we didn't start the process until Feb. of 2007. Every time the phone rings during the week, my heart stops a little. I am very excited and the anticipation can get intense at times. So I am trying to think about different things.

What IS lovely: 4th of July with family and friends (and no pictures because my batteries died as the parade started and I didn't have time to put new ones in for the rest of the day). Our house is right on the parade route, so we have decided to have an annual open house sort of party. The front lawn is open for parade watchers and then we do a potluck style lunch after the parade and hang out in the back yard by the river. Canoe rides included for free. Everyone usually goes home late afternoon for some rest before fireworks. Then we head to Curt's office parking lot to watch the fireworks. I am sure I have said it before, but I LOVE our small town.

Flowers:

Black Poppy (from my lovely sister) Bee Balm ( I like to call it the Bad Hair Day Plant)
More Black Poppy


Queen Anne's Lace (a weed to some people, but not me)

My Crazy Family :



If you click on the pictures to make them bigger, you will see that Curt is breaking a water balloon over poor, little Abi's head. Too which she responded "that's cheating Dad!"


Perfect weather and time to do what I love. So far today I was able to laze around in bed reading a good book, fertilize all of my plants, watch the fishing and water balloon fights that Curt and the kids were enjoying, take pics of my beloved flowers, and type this post. It is only 10:30. We still have blackberry picking, some baking, HGTV watching, and grilling out at Curt's parents. All in all a great day. Hope for some sewing tomorrow and we will call it a perfect weekend.

Hmmmm, what should I blog about?

First there was the wedding for my Dear Friend/Sorta Daughter, Natalie. I was in charge of decorations and flowers but ended up sort of being the wedding coordinator. It was crazy and chaotic and the tornado whistles were going off as I ran in the house to take a shower 45 minutes before they were supposed to walk down the aisle, but it all turned out wonderfully and I am so happy for Natalie and Pierre.

My funny wedding story... The bride really wanted fish on the tables for the reception and in the vases on the alter (sorry, no pics of that, too busy to take pics, grr.). We agreed that Betas are expensive, so we would just do 4 Betas and the rest would be cheap goldfish. I picked up the fish at the pet shop and asked the guy if it is ok to put the Betas in a bucket and the goldfish in another bucket until the day of the wedding. He said sure. Well, he must have misunderstood me because I brought the fish home and put all the goldfish in one bucket and all 4 Betas in another bucket and then went outside for a few minutes. When I came back in, the water in the bucket with the Betas was splashing all over and they were shredding each other's fins. I screamed and grabbed cups from the cupboard quick. As I was scooping the fish out, I said to them "if you can't play nice together, then you can't be in the same bucket, " and told them they were grounded. I think I need some serious help. I am disciplining the fish now. They all lived and now I have a funny story to share and a word of warning to other ignorant Beta owners out there.

Last weekend we had a very large, very successful rummage sale and all the work and mess that goes with that. This week, I am trying to get back so some sort of routine and get my house back in order. I think we are almost there. My husband promised to help me do the floors tonight and I have to dust upstairs yet and then my house is somewhat clean. I neeeeed to weeeeed the gardens, but that will be done a little at a time over the next week or so. Now on to the pictures...

I dropped off a van load of stuff left over from the rummage sale at St. Vincent DePaul's and came away with 2 vintage pillowcases to make bags out of and a brand new pair of red, Mary Jane style Keds (for $3.25) and some clothes for the girls and some videos. :)

The garden is growing nicely and the girls have been feasting on fresh peas. We don't even bother to cook them, just eat 'em straight off the vine.

First Galardia bloom of the season. Again :)

Trying to enjoy summer as much as I can. I made the "to do before the baby comes home" list and it isn't pretty. We are currently #7 on the waiting list (as far as I know), so we should hear something in the next month or 2 and then will hopefully travel before the end of the year if things go well! Yay! I guess that is all my rambling for now.

Gardens

Like I said yesterday, we went to Rotary Gardens on Emma's birthday to take some pictures. Emma loves to use my camera and I thought maybe I could get some decent pictures of the children, not to mention, this is one of my favorite places on earth to go. I did get SOME decent pictures of the girls, but most of them were either of them running away, doing flips or being goofy. I love that my camera does a decent job of capturing action because their facial expressions are always best when they are moving quickly. At least the flowers were cooperating.

7 Years Old

Emma turned 7 on May 22nd. I can't believe it, but it is true. I know every mom says that they can't believe how fast their kids are growing up, and that is true, but it just seems to me like 7 is no longer a little girl. 6 still seemed little, but 7, not at all. We have decided that the kids can have a "friend" party every other year, so this year was just a family deal for her. That was very difficult for my social butterfly to handle (no worries about socialization for this homeschooler...she creates her own social opportunities everywhere we go). On her actual birthday, Curt took the day off of work and we headed to the Madison Children's Museum and lunch at Pizzaria Uno's on State Street. We had to be home by 1 for daddy to head off to his last track meet. The girls and I rested for a bit and then we went to the Beauty Shop for Emma to get her first "big girl" haircut at the beauty shop (I have always cut their hair up to this point). Then we went to Rotary Gardens in Janesville to take pictures. Aunt Mando was able to meet us there. I will do a separate post just of garden pics another day. We ran and played and had too much fun and then headed to McDonald's for supper (her choice, certainly not mine). Then it was home for full facials with make up and everything and manicures. We finished the night by curling up on the couch and watching Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman on DVD (perfect!). On Saturday we had the fam over for Emma's party. She chose a Luau theme this year. I made her a dress and we had some basic decorations and of course the cake. Super fun birthday for a super fun girl. She said it was all perfect, even though she was scheming right up to the end on how to get some friends here too.

In her birthday outfit.

Big Girl Hair Cut!

This one shows her personality perfectly. All dressed up fancy, but ready to build something too.

Looking 17, not 7.

My mom bought Emma a model rocket kit for her present (at Emma's request). Daddy spent several hours with them on Monday assembling and firing the rockets. Good thing we have a before picture, because 1 rocket is pretty much burned up and the other one is evidently orbiting the earth and never returned.

Our "Luau" cake, designed by Emma, decorated by mom and Mando.

New Bag

I have been volunteering to do some pattern testing for Kathy at Pink Chalk Studio, now also of Pink by Post. The latest (and my favorite so far) is this great bag that she calls the Mail Sack. I tested it in March and she released the pattern officially last week. This is my original version, made from her original pattern with no alterations or corrections. There were some small alterations made in the final version of the pattern and I am planning on making the final version in more neutral colors ( I have been dressing to match the bag). It is the perfect bottomless bag. I took it to a track meet last week and had an umbrella, sunscreen, sunglasses, a water bottle, a fleece pullover and all my usual notebooks, wallet, pens... in it. I found the bag easy to make and learned some new techniques with it. Kathy does a great job of writing instructions in a way that seems conversational instead of formal and technical. She is also amazingly generous and kind, so go visit her sites.
The outside view. It is made out out hoarded Amy Butler and Heather Bailey fabrics with matching linen.
The inside has a zipper pocket and 2 other pockets for sunglasses, etc.

It is meant to be worn across the body sling style. Unfortunately, this is the only picture I have of me wearing it that way. You can see it in the reflection.

vacation

The first weekend in May, Curt had a computer geek conference to attend in St. Paul, MN. He was going to be gone for 4 days and the business was paying for a room and none of his partners were going with, so the girls and I decided to go along. I knew we were not going to be able to see Curt much or spend much time with him, but we would be able to do some fun stuff and it would be better than staying home by myself with the Hoodlums (as I like to call them). It worked out that My Mandy was able to come with also and spend part of the weekend with us and part of the weekend with her husband's brother and his family. We stayed at the Crowne Plaza (way out of our league) which is happily situated on the Mississippi River and very near many great sites. We were within walking distance of the Minnesota Children's Museum and the Minnesota Science Museum and only a short drive from Grand Avenue (shopping!) and Como Zoo. Our 4 days were quite full and fun. If you ask the girls, the best part was the hotel pool and watching Chronicles of Narnia in bed on hotel cable. If you ask Mandy and I, the worst part was no TLC, HGTV or Bravo on the hotel cable! When Mandy posts pictures, I will link to her Flickr, because she was the main photographer of the weekend, but here are a few of my shots.

Face painting the Children's Museum. Notice my really cool bag in the mirror reflection. I will post about that later today or tomorrow.
My little scientist. Her only hope for the Science Museum was that she would be able to wear a lab coat and goggles like a real scientist. Wish granted. We got to scrape cheek cells and look at them under a microscope.

Como Park Zoo/Amusement ParkOur Hotel from across the river (the dark grey building). We had an amazing view of St. Paul and the river from our 12th floor window.