Gentle Years

Eva turned eight last weekend and had her party this weekend.  She was thrilled to explore Toys R Us for the first time and to get all kinds of presents.  She was happy to have a party.  And she had a few meltdowns.  The girl can go into a sulk in a split second.  I wonder if she might be an actress someday because she truly embraces every single emotion.  Whatever it is, she does it 100% (and fortunately, most of the time it's very happy and adventurous). 

She had her favorite foods-fruit, chips, and later-ice cream cake.

It snowed a couple of inches the night before the party, so the kids were stuck inside, but overall they seemed to have a good time.

I have other photos from my small camera, but we can't find the cord to download them, so I guess they'll just have to wait.

Now, on to Aidan.  He was quite miserable before February vacation-he hated Eva and wished she had never come to live with us (though he didn't actually wish her back to China).  He said she stole all of his friends, got him in trouble and everyone always believed her, and that life was perfect with just his parents and himself before she came.  So there was daily fighting, sulking, being mean, etc.  Then over vacation there was a transformation that became brother and sister vs. everyone else and occasionally it was Aidan and RB vs. Eva, but there was less of the out and out refusal to accept her.  (They play very well when they are alone, of course)  We're still working on that and I imagine we will be for a long time.  My little brother always had my first two nephews around and it is not easy.  Aidan finds it especially hard because he's very needy emotionally and more shy than Eva.  She's a pretty happy-go-lucky child  (except for the occasional body slumping sulk and tears) and she's pretty confident.

One good thing happened last week, though; Aidan said "I love you" to his father and when asked if he loved me, said, "Yuh."  He has never said I love you to either of us before.  When asked if he loved us, he would say that he loved Mangus, the dog.  That was safe.

My next sister up would have been 63 on Thanksgiving Day but we lost her to a stroke in 2004.  She loved Thanksgiving. She was also an artist-talented in many mediums.  This is our first Thanksgiving without Mom, and she was an expert seamstress.  So this post is about arts and crafts and the holiday all rolled into one.

Still, it was a day of celebration.  We met at our daughter's house and our grandsons had made these adorable placemats.  MB broke his left arm so the turkey print is his right hand and then his brother, RB, wrote our names on each card.

After the meal we came home and after a nap for me (I'm sick with a cold) the kids and I made new Christmas stockings for them.  I bought blanket material years ago and cut out several, making each one unique, but once sewn they were too small.  These two will have plenty of room!

Here are the before photos:

Here are the finished products:

So the kids helped with cutting the pieces out, pinning them, and ripping out the basting.  Each chose the ribbon they wanted, both wanted jingle bells, and Aidan really wanted his name painted on, but I have no paint for cloth so I surprised him with the A, which made him just as happy.

I was with my sister when her daughter was born.  She has always been a special girl.  In high school I had her in both economics and AP US history class as a student.  Sometimes we would ride to school together.  Recently she graduated from college and this fall she will be married.  Sunday her brothers' wives threw her a bridal shower.  Here are a few pictures of Angela (who I call Angie-babe) at her big event:

The good for you side of the food tables

Being greeted by her college friend from New York

Her high school friends (the first three were my students as well)

Youngest female at the party-CB, our granddaughter

Digging in.  This was an adorable basket from her friends where all of the gifts were numbered and had to be opened in order.  They had things like gas relief, earplugs for snoring, etc.

Contest to dress the best bride with toilet paper.  Our group won when we dressed my sister-above-though the desert look on Emmeline was good and Savannah added big balls to her bosom-outrageous!

Our first grandson graduated from preschool!  A big deal because he has gone to this daycare/preschool since he was six weeks old.  This summer he will attend five weeks of half day summer school at our local elementary school and get off the busy at our house to spend the rest of the day with me and Aidan.  Here he is with his best friend (they have both been together since they were infants) and then making some of the goofy and sweet faces that he has a talent for.

We had a birthday party on my mother's porch for her, even though she is gone.  She would have been 83 years old.  The eight of us living nearby gathered with her best friend and my cousin who is like a sibling.  Here is her cake, the view from her porch, and my two younger sisters.

Today my oldest kids and Aidan and the grandkids went to Storyland (Little Baby was working).  Here are some shots from our outing.

I don't go to the parade on Memorial Day that often.  But when I realized that we were just sitting around, I told Aidan to grab his shoes and we'd race two towns over to catch it.  We made it just in time.

Then, because it was a perfect summer day-hot and breezy-I took Aidan and my niece to swim.

My posts have been limited over the last few months by both computer issues and lack of time with Mom dying.  So this post should make up for that.  Here are some of the things we've been up to lately:

My lovely niece, Angela, graduated from Plymouth State University with a degree in business/human resources management.  She is already employed at a nearby college and the party was at her house.

Aidan had a good time celebrating!

I decided it was a good opportunity to take a photo of some of our Plymouth State alumni, then realized I could have been in the shot, too.  Angela is on the left (the graduate), Audrey got her BEd and MEd there, Eryn got her masters in counseling there, and I got an MBA there.

The next day we went to Audrey's bakery....

...to give her feedback on her deli the week before the actual opening.

I even got a picture of my "little" sister Ruth (three years younger-Audrey is one year younger).  Ruth is usually behind a camera so it's hard to get a shot of her.

Then we went to a Crossover ceremony....

...where Aidan went from being a Tiger Scout....

...to being a Wolf scout

Just in the last two weeks we've gone from this-so warm that the kids were playing with squirt guns even while there was snow on the ground......

.....to this-two inches of snow mixed with sleet and hail that made driving Aidan's birthday guests to and from the party a dangerous proposition.....

...to one day later-Easter egg hunt....

....to a day of intense heat yesterday (and still 70 degrees at 10 at night)-with enough wind for kites...

...to balmy weather this morning that has now turned to rain.  In New Hampshire we always say, if you don't like the weather, wait a minute and it will change :-)

Aidan was probably up at 7:00 this morning.  At 9:00 he asked when it was going to be Easter.  I said, it is Easter.  He said, yeah, but when is it going to be time for Easter?  I asked what he meant, and he wanted to know when it was going to be time for him to have his Easter basket.  It was sitting on the counter, he had looked at the contents, and then for two hours he hadn't touched it because he didn't know that it was okay to do so.  This is his third Easter with us, but that just goes to show you that adopted children are different.  I was floored.  He was happy; he dug right into the chocolate bunny (which he requested) and put quite a bit of it away before we left for church!

It is snowing out again-this time a beautiful, fluffy, steady snow that will result in half a foot-perfect for the last day of Massachusetts school vacation, and then we'll get our road back.  Friday we got a foot and had no school, starting our break a day early.  Here are the boys playing outside.

Yesterday was a very exciting day!  Have I mentioned how much I loooove Scouts?  It's so wonderful to have Aidan involved in something where God & country mean something, where good deeds are the goal, and where the boys are not competing with one another but are practicing fraternal cooperation.  He had his first badge ceremony.  Here he is with me pinning the badge on him.

This is the Tiger Scout group lined up alphabetically.  Our first son is just short of 6'2" and Aidan is expected to be the same height or taller than him.  It's not really obvious in this shot, but he is far taller than the other boys.

In our pack, the badges stay upside down until a good deed is done, and then they can be affixed to the shirt right side up.  Aidan did his good deed after the ceremony by helping to put the chairs away, even though he didn't take them out :-)

But the fun wasn't over with this award!  It turns out that he was one of the three top sellers for popcorn.  So he got a pin for his lapel, which of course he couldn't leave alone and by the time we left the back had rolled off into one of those places where little things hide for decades.  He didn't find it quite as exciting as the Wal Mart gift card that came with it, anyway!