TGIF

It's Friday!

Since I'm home all summer, it seems weak to say "TGIF", but I am thankful for the weekend nonetheless. It means Jimmy's home and, as of late, we've had less going on during the weekends than during the week. The weeks continue to be full of appointments for our foster daughter and summer fun. This week we added a rush hour hit and run accident to the mix of "fun"- Jimmy is fine, thank God, but his car is not.

Let's focus on more fun things... in keeping with TGIF, here are a TWO things I'm thankful for today...

1) Olympics! I love the competition, the athletes' stories and even the cheesy/inspiring commercials. I also love all of these crazy moms who have time to make cool Olympic activities that I can then steal/borrow. I just stumbled on to this 3 Dinosaurs blog that has a bunch of Olympic themed kid ideas. Thank you, Mrs. 3 Dinosaurs Super Mom, for sharing!

2) Church camp/lake week! Next week our foster daughter is going to church camp. I'm super thankful for the student ministry crew who has welcomed her and supported us so much already. I am thrilled that she feels comfortable enough to go! So she has a week of playing in the lake (it's a former Kanakuk Kamp so there is every kind of fun activity there) and hearing good, encouraging, challenging teaching. And I get a few days at my parents' lake house with the boys, which leaves my hubby as a bachelor at home. I know, must be rough. I think it will be a good week for all!

P.S. We got more postcards this week- Colorado and South Dakota. Have you heard of the Corn Palace in South Dakota? I had not and was intrigued! We watched a video about it on the internet and Samuel was pretty impressed. Thanks, Mary and Erin!!

Post card lessons...

We have started receiving post cards and Samuel loves getting the mail. We have a map and are putting up the post cards around the map with string between the card and the state on the map. We've had some very simplistic geography and history discussions so far. Thanks to those helping us- you are making learning fun!

Here are our first two post cards- thanks, John!

John is a friend from my high school days. I met him when Manu, my AFS (foreign exchange) sister from Brazil, dated him. He is partially to blame for my love for the Spanish language and travel. Samuel loved the Postagram postcards with pics of Chip- John's childhood stuffed monkey (I think that's what Chip is??) visiting the places. I know I'm a "late adapter" when it comes to technology, but the Postagram ap is pretty cool! When you sign up you get 5 free postcards, so if anyone wants to send us postcards using the ap, that would be awesome, too! You can use your own photos that way :).

And our second two postcards came from Liz in New Jersery. Liz and I were roommates during a study abroad program in Seville, Spain. We became fast friends and travel buddies. Muchas gracias, Liz!

I have no idea why Samuel posed like he's going to karate chop me, but it was the best we could do :). Thanks again for the help!

P.S. Update on the hair crisis (with our foster daughter) I referenced in the previous post- I am not lying when I said the hair was stressing me out! I almost kissed the stylist at our appointment on Saturday for doing some super cute and stylish braids that will be perfect for the HOT weather and church camp. Hair crisis averted... at least for now. We got more tips about how to handle it "natural". Thank the Lord, seriously.

Hair Conundrum

I had a few stressful moments this week totally related to hair. Sounds ridiculous, right? I have an entirely new respect for African American women who wear their hair natural. As a foster mom, it is important to me that our kiddo knows that she is well cared for and that others can tell this as well. For a preteen girl, this includes having cute hair, so I am determined to learn and get this right!

For the first few months, we had microbraids- recommended to us by an African American woman. The braids were pretty, but expensive ($220!! and another $50 to get taken out) and also a little rough on her hair. Upon taking them out, I got nervous. So I dutifully signed up for the "ethnic hair care class" offered by Children's Division. The teacher of the class was very informative. I took copious notes while casting my fear of looking stupid to the wind and asking lots of questions much to the entertainment of the others in the class. Jimmy's comment was "I learned one thing. This is really complicated." The class focused on natural hair care and not getting hair relaxed to avoid chemicals and to help hair be healthier and grow more. So my initial plan went out the window and we decided to give natural a try. All was well until the first shower when I realized what kind of curly hair we are dealing with. Yikes. So I jumped into action... and we watched the entire movie Slumdog Millionaire while I combed out hair and tried to help her tame her locks.

Thanks to the class and a friend's recommendation of the website Chocolate Hair Vanilla Care I have purchased all of the right products, but I'm still nervous. We are not good at styling and I have to say that the two trips we've made to salons have been a bit intimidating. I'm the only white girl in the room and I'm asking lots of questions. I understand the stylists I'm interacting with may not be used to this dynamic, but I'm trying to communicate "I care about this girl and I want to learn to do this right!" It's just a little annoying when I get the vibe that they don't care to help much! I am not deterred and have been asking for advice from African American women I know and even some I don't know!

Just another learning experience in this foster parenting adventure!