Reflections and Rainbows

WOW!

June 2nd, 2006: Two years ago today, we received our referral for Austin and Logan. Precious! Precious! Precious!


June 2nd, 2007: One year later and I was a mess! May had been a whopper of a month for me last year. I spent the month of May ready to hop on a plane and foster my babies until we could all come home together. We had been on Barrios desk and our new "hired" lawyers informed us on May 8th that we had most likely been signed off on. This was HUGE because Barrios was leaving for two weeks! However, I needed confirmation so that I could fly out knowing I would get home in time for Mason's graduation (June 12th). Each day dragged on. My file (not surprisingly) hit some Bermuda triangle as it wasn't on Barrios desk nor was it at the window for pick-up. Early on the morning of May 23rd, I was told Barrios had messed up and only given me one "n" in my name. So my file had not been passed onto the window. Now, back up to Mr. B's desk to wait for the other "n."


During all of this stomach churning ordeal, I was spending every minute e-mailing Mason's teachers - ALL of them and basically "pulling" Mason across the Finish Line to graduate high school.

Each day....are we out of PGN? How many points does Mason need on this quiz and still be able to graduate? If we get out today, can I leave and get back before graduation? Will there even BE a graduate?

If we get out of PGN, will the US Embassy let us come home? So far, they had not approved anyone with our arrested facilitator. Families had flown down in Feb last year for their pick-up trips and the Embassy had basically "rescinded" (sp?) their pink slips. As per embassy style, they were tight lipped, were the cases in investigations? What were they looking for, etc? Or were all of our files being slung into a corner and ignored!?!

Can you say exhausting!?!

June 2, 2008: This year...I'm still exhausted! LOL

These little guys do not stop! Some Austin and Logan highlights:

They're kleptos: They've stolen. While shopping at the beach, they somehow manged to stuff some stickers into their stroller. Not discovered until we got home.

Cassie, these little stickers were coming to Maine, except that during the photo shoot, I turned my back for a minute, neigh a second and just that quickly, they were snagged and being used to redecorate our living room furniture! ;-( But take heart in the fact that two little guys down here in the south stole for you!

They're Evil Knivel understudies: They've both fallen down a flight of stairs (two separate incidences). They've both escaped the house and have made it to the street before getting caught (this happens on numerous occasions because apparently the command "Make sure the door is shut, please." somehow doesn't compute in male heads age 16 or over.) Austin has actually ran with a butcher's knife in his hand before it was successfully removed (and a new, higher tech lock put on the drawer). Logan has run with broken glass (from an outside tealight holder circa 2005. Who knew it was behind the bushes!?!) while gnawing on another piece of broken glass. None of the above stunts resulted in any physical, bodily harm...well, except to Mom's heart!

The infamous METAL knob from previous post.


Where the knob used to live before encountering Logan's head!

They're dancers. They follow all of the choreography. They sing. They act.

Oh, and they've recently begun Hitfest 2008 which was pre-empted by the ever popular Slapfast 2008. Luckily, Bitefest 2008 was shortlived. And I'm looking forward to the reintroduction of Hugfest 2007!

Overall, a good year. I can still feel the pain and misery of last year. Well, relate to it - I should say. I was miserable. Heartbroken. Stressed and crushed.

This year...I'm still on a high. Still rejoicing in having them home. Still marveling that I can reach out and touch them. Kiss their little cheeks and their little toesies.

(Well, at least kiss on them the 15% of the time that they're not in timeout!! Seriosuly, we are one Hit away from a 24 hour lockdown! And they all tell me Three is the "new" Two? What!?! Say it isn't so!)

We were coming home last night from a church picnic and we suddeny saw a Rainbow! I have not seen a bright rainbow in years! It was actually a double rainbow.

Gary and I hooped and hollared in the car, "Wain-bo! Wain-bo! Look, Austin and Logan a real Wain-bo!" Rainbow was one of the first words that Logan said without our actually teaching it to him. He brought a book to me one day and kept saying "Wain-bo" over and over until I connected it with what was one the cover, a rainbow!!

We called Mason and Evan who had left 30 minutes before us and told them to run outside to see if they could see the rainbow. When we pulled onto our street, this is what we saw:

The full rainbow...and it was right over our street. Awwww!

That's our house over there on the right. Right where the pot of gold is!! Awwww!

;-)