Alice in Dutch Wonderland

 Oma Leslie gets killer deals at a secret Disney store only for employees and their families so every year she gets the honor of picking out Ravenna's Halloween costume. This year Oma picked out a very appropriate for our curious girl, Alice in Wonderland. Ravenna has never seen the Disney film but she has been to Dutch Wonderland. Whenever anyone would ask her what she was dressed up as she would say very confidently "Alice in Dutch Wonderland" who also evolved into a princess.

Despite the post hurricane cold weather she had a glorious Halloween celebrated with songs of "Three Little Witches", recitations of "Five Little Pumpkin" finger plays with the felted wool pumpkins she made in her Waldorf school and, of course, trick-or-treating until her "bones hurt." From her stash she got to pick four candies ("Because I am four") and the rest went to the dentist for his annual candy buy back and to daddy for his annual "I like to visit the dentist" candy gorge-a-thon.

Mom had some candy too but it unfortunately it ended badly. Curious to try the Nestle chocolate covered peanut confection "Goobers" I made the terrible mistake of actually eating them despite the fact that they smelled like farts. I write this only to warn you from making the same mistake I did. Nestle is evil, just stay away.

Michaelmas

To celebrate Michaelmas, the feast of St. Michael, Ravenna's Waldorf kindergarten class made capes and crowns. The capes are silk dyed with marigolds and the crown is wool felt and yarn.

Michaelmas, which occurs on September 29th, right around the Autumnal equinox, is celebrated as a harvest festival and has great significance in the Waldorf tradition. In a letter sent to parents to explain the festivities Ms. Wendy, Ravenna's teacher, wrote,

"St. Michael, by way of the earthly St. George, becomes an archetype of heavenly courage and inspiration. We are not alone in our efforts to meet the dragons of cold, hunger and darkness--be they physical or spiritual. Courage, honor and goodness are spiritual gifts given every human being if one gathers his or her inner forces, cocoons him or herself to enkindle warmth of heart, and lights the lamps of positivity and hope within."

 A few weeks beforehand the children see a weekly puppet show of St. Michael and the Dragon to familiarize them with the story. On the day of celebration the children had to conquer an obstacle course and "fight" a dragon. They dressed as "Star Children" with golden capes and and star crowns and "care for all things good and true."

Jumping up and down to show me how the cape works.

 When asked about the day Ravenna said that she got to be brave and was a hero. How's that for a morning's work?

Watch Out World...

Andrew has a scooter!

This was our answer to the one-car dilemma. So far so good, except for when it rains. Ahem.

The First Day

 Today Ravenna started preschool. We are lucky enough to have a lovely Waldorf school near our home where Ravenna can explore and grow in a warm, gentle environment. She is in a mixed-age kindergarten with children from ages 3-6 which allows her both to learn from and teach her classmates.

 She doesn't look too excited but believe me, she was.

This is Ms. Wendy, Ravenna's teacher. Look at that classroom! I wish I could show you all the cool stuff there is in there (there is even a climbing tower with a slide!). Everyday Ms. Wendy sets up the room to be a little bit different and creates opportunities for imaginative play to evolve. Today she had a few balance boards draped with sheep skins and covered the climbing tower with a cloth just like the blanket forts of yore. 

In the basket next to Ms. Wendy you can see that she is working on some kind of yarn project. She will sit in her rocking chair and work on a project while her assistant teacher whips up a batch of millet muffins and the children play. The idea is that the children will either be interested, or not, in what the adults are doing and the children can, and often do, join in if they are so inclined.

It's Fair Season!

Yay! We love the Elizabethtown Fair! It is definitely the best way to end the summer. Held the week before school starts this is especially so because it is often our last opportunity for time with Andrew before he gets back to the endless grind of lesson plans, grading and sleep deprivation.

This year we decided to go all-out. Andrew said "My parents were lame. They had four kids and we never got to go on any of the rides," so Andrew decided to let Ravenna go on ALL of the rides that she was tall enough for.

Getting ready to ride the roller coaster; a little bit scared.

Daddy is happy

She loved it!

Ravenna had a blast and Andrew had a blast watching her. I went on the Ferris Wheel with her and couldn't wait for it to be over. I am getting seriously paranoid in my old age. When we boarded the rusty, creaky ride I noticed a sign saying that the ride was last inspected in 2008. 2008?! Every time we would go up the shaking and grinding sound would get louder and more pronounced. While I did try to enjoy myself, mostly I was sitting up there fearing that we would plummet to our deaths. Happily, that was not the case but I will not be riding again next year.

A trip to the fair is never complete without a trip to the petting zoo and this...

Homemade rootbeer in a homebrew bottle. We got a  lot of weird looks about this one.

Ravenna's First Disney Visit

I like to think I grew up at Disney. Some of my earliest memories are of going to Walt Disney World when I was two years old. Growing up in Southern California, going to Disneyland was almost a yearly event for most of my childhood, and when we lived in Orange County it became almost a weekly event. My siblings and I knew Disneyland better than we knew our own hometown. Many of my happiest memories, including becoming engaged to Andrew, were made while at Disneyland.

 My family is obsessed with Disney! My dad worked there as a teen, as did my brother Aaron, and now my brother Chris and my sister Rachelle currently work there and love it! There are definite perks to being a Disney employee, particularly if you are a relative of a Disney employee. When daily tickets to the park are now close to $100, those "get in free" perks are a definite blessing.

For years my brother Chris has been asking me to bring Ravenna to California so he could get her in for her first visit at Disneyland. When my Nana passed away at the end of February after a long and amazing life, our trip to California for the funeral provided the opportunity.

I cannot say enough about what a great place Disneyland is to visit. Yes, it is very expensive but at least for the price they do a great job of making the visit memorable. If you have food allergies, for example, the employees will bend over backwards to try to meet your needs. The firework show is so magical it brought me to tears.

Ravenna was tall enough to ride most of the rides which was a lot of fun being able to take her on my favorites but wasn't so great when she got totally soaked on Splash Mountain. The poor girl was sobbing, "I do not like that ride!" as she walked past all the people waiting in line. It was so sad but funny at the same time. Luckily I had thought to bring her some extra pants and underwear so a quick run to a shop for an overpriced t-shirt and voila! All better.

Look at that face!

Watching Ravenna experience Disney for the first time was very special for me. Having so many happy memories of one place made seeing her delight in it all the more touching. Seeing her rock-out at a cover-band concert in Tomorrowland was one of the highlights of my life. What a wonderful time!

Thank you to, Rachelle, Chris, Oma and Opa for helping give us such a perfect Disney experience!

Foster Parents No More?

Multi-tasking

I haven't wanted to update this blog because I wasn't sure what I would say about this very sad part of our lives. I knew that I couldn't skip over it but I needed time to process my feelings. I wrote a blog post in February indicating that it had become extremely difficult to be a foster parent and that we had considered putting in our notice to have the baby removed but that we had felt inspired that God wanted us to keep him in our home for the time being. Unfortunately that time was very short as we did end up putting in our notice only a month after publishing that post.

Our reasons for doing so were many but NONE had to do with our ability to care for and love sweet Baby J. I am deeply resentful of the foster care system in our country and I could talk on and on about terrible caseworkers and guardians who didn't give a thought to what was best for the child instead doing what was easiest for them. BUT I am not going to because when I do I am filled with anger and pain. I can however easily and gratefully praise the diligent and caring workers at our agency who tried so hard to make our placement work. They believed that our home was best for the baby and worked hard to keep it that way. In the end it was our call and on the last day of March he left our home. What it came down to was the stress was too great and it was negatively impacting our family's mental, emotional and physical resilience. 

We appreciate the love and support extended to us throughout the 10 months that Baby J was in our home. THANK YOU! He is such a special baby and I pray continually that he will attach well in his new foster home and that our Heavenly Father continues to bless and protect him so that he can grow up in a safe and loving home.

Many people ask us if we will continue to be foster parents and the answer right now is, "we don't know." We are currently "On Hold" at our agency so that we will not receive any calls until July. I don't know how we will feel when July comes around. We can only wait and see.