Our Travels Have Ended

Another awesome trip is done and I'm now up to my elbows in laundry, unpacking, dusting, etc., etc. However, I had to take a moment to share some of the details of our trip and will share more over the next few days.

First of all, for all families who have adopted from Guatemala, please put GAFE on your calendar for the summer of 2011. I can't even begin to tell you how wonderful this event was. It started Friday evening with a Meet n Greet. It was a room full of families with their beautiful children enjoying some snacks and drinks, meeting each other for the first time or reuniting with old friends (Josh & Nicole). I was able to meet a couple people I met on Facebook and realized while talking to one of them that I had read her blog while they were in process of bringing their daughter home and immediately felt like I knew her and her entire family. Got to love "blog world."

Saturday morning we gathered for a buffet breakfast before involving ourselves with the many break-out sessions, crafts and/or shopping the vendor tables along the hallway. For a moment I felt like I was back in Guatemala trying to decide what Guatemalan goods I wanted to bring home with me.

That evening, everyone enjoyed a buffet dinner and the DJ provided some great music so everyone could hit the dance floor to work off some of the calories :-) I have to say that one of the highlights on the dance floor was the long conga line that the kids formed. I think that conga line went on for about a 1/2 hour and gave us all some great photo ops. What beautiful kids!!!

Granted this is just a little taste of everything that happened during GAFE, but again let me encourage all Guat adoptive families to make every effort to try to attend in 2011. I don't think anyone would regret going. Lili was certainly enjoying herself.

And what's better than sitting on daddy's shoulders to dance.

I'm not sure it was quite as enjoyable for daddy's shoulders though.

And Lili got to see her 'future' husband again.

Believe it or not, these two are only 2 weeks apart in age, but her little boyfriend, Joe is a peanut. Also, notice how she is pretty much pulling him along. It's a match made in heaven :-)

On our way to GAFE, we stopped in Pennsylvania so I could meet one of my blog/email/Facebook/phone friends, Emily. For about 2 years we have been following each other's blogs, have chatted via email several times and spoken on the phone a few times. We were finally able to confirm that we existed in body and were able to see the each other's girls in person. Emily and her husband own a dairy farm, so we took a little side trip and got a tour of the farm. Lili was in cow heaven. Dave and I also enjoyed the tour and I learned quite a bit about cows and dairy farming. Granted, not enough that I'm ready to go buy land and start my own dairy farm, but it was educational none-the-less. So, thanks Emily for taking the time to meet us and show us around the farm.

There is more to post about our trip, but it will have to wait for another day.

Adoption Friends

Dave, Lili and I are leaving Thursday for our drive out east to attend GAFE. We've gone to St. Louis twice to get together with other Guat families for a weekend, we went to Myrtle Beach last October for Guatoberfest and now New Jersey for GAFE. Our main goal for these trips are to provide Lili the opportunity to be with other children adopted from Guatemala and for us to visit with friends we've made along the way and to hopefully make new friends in the process.

We have the same goals when Naomi comes home and in an effort to reach that goal, I'm in process of working with some other ladies as we plan the first ever Toukoul Adoptive Families Reunion next summer. Toukoul is the orphanage that Naomi will come from in Ethiopia.

I've said this before, but adoption has opened our eyes and touched our lives in ways we never imagined. We have made life-long friends through Lili's adoption, many who have become much more like family than friends. Although our journey to Naomi has taken us down a different road, the journey is proving to be as rewarding as we meet new people and start to build new friendships along the way.

So, to all of you who I've met through blogging, on forums, chatted with via email or Facebook, thanks for being my cyber friends and I hope that one day I'm able to sit down in person with each of you for a visit. To those who I've had the privilege of meeting in person, I look forward to the day when our paths cross again.

Quote:
Each friend represents a world in us, a world possibly not born until they arrive, and it is only by this meeting that a new world is born.
Anais Nin

Travel Clinic Visit

We decided to get started with our travel shots for our future trip to Ethiopia, so on Tuesday Dave, Lili and I headed to the travel clinic, met with the doctor and receive the first of several immunizations. Since we have several months before travel, doing it this way gives us the opportunity to spread them out instead of getting several at one time.

Before the we met with the doctor, one of the nurses came in to take our vitals. Lili closely observed what she was doing and decided to give mommy the once over. (Photos were taken with daddy's cell phone, so they aren't the best quality.)

Pulse is good.Yep, throat looks good.

Mommy is okay for shots today!!!

Of course it was a bit confusing to have the examiner sitting on the examine table, but she is a little bit height challenged right now.

Dave and I received the first of the 3 Hep A/B series and Lili received the first of 2 Hep A series. Lili will need 4 more, I'll need between 5 & 6 more, and Dave is the big winner needing between 6 & 7 more before travel. Thus the reason we're starting now!

Super Birthday Sunday

There were no big birthday surprises for me today, which is okay. Instead, we loaded our bikes and the bike trailer and headed to Constitution Trail in Bloomington, IL for an 11 mile bike ride. Yes, we are really enjoying our bikes and Lili seems to be enjoying her bike trailer. She has her own water bottle and we take some books, Elmo and anything else that may help keep her occupied. Typically she just sits back and enjoys the ride though.

Other than enjoyment, we are hoping that our bikes will help move us in a downward direction in weight and an upward direction in health. We are also working hard to prepare ourselves for a fundraiser in Wisconsin this September. It's called "Ride for Autism" sponsored by ANGEL, Inc. which is a non-profit organization that provides grants to pay for therapies & treatment for children with Autism. http://www.angelautismnetwork.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=67:madison-spring-green&catid=34:current-events&Itemid=74

Assuming we have Ryan's current situation resolved before the 'ride' we will drive up to Wisconsin so Lili and I can participate in the 15 mile family ride while Dave participates in the 38 mile ride. We will not only be helping a great organization, but we'll also be working toward our health and fitness goals.

Anyway, back to our day. After our bike ride we went to lunch at one of my favorite places, Qdoba. Yes, I'm a cheap date :-) After lunch we headed to Barnes & Noble in search of some bike trail books. We didn't find them there, but Lili walked out with two new books.

Book 1 - "The Colors of Us" by Karen Katz is an awesome book which teaches children that there are many different shades of brown skin and all shades are beautiful. Karen uses wonderful descriptions such as "Carlos is a light cocoa brown. And Rosita's skin looks like butterscotch." Granted, a 2-year old isn't necessarily going to understand those descriptions or the message of the book, which was proven to me when I read, "Look at everyone's legs, Mom - all the different shades" and Lili proceeded to point and talk about the shoes on each pair of feet. LOL!!! I'm sure the fact that she owns more shoes than any child should has nothing to do with her interest in shoes :-) However, my goal at this point is to introduce her to as many different topics as possible and eventually she'll pick up on the true message of the books when she's older.

Book 2 - "I'm a Big Sister!" by Ronne Randall & Kristina Stephenson puts a positive spin on becoming a big sister. I've been trying to purchase books about becoming a big sister in an effort to help prepare Lili for her future job as a big sister. I'm guessing we have somewhere between 9 and 10 months to get her ready, so I'll be buying more books and having more and more conversations about Naomi and how Lili is going to be a big sister.

Now we're home for the day and pretty much taking it easy at this point. Lili and daddy decided to play a little guitar hero and Lili decided to really take it easy.

Biking, reading books and guitar hero can really wear a person out!

Searching the Internet

Okay, I will admit that I've primarily used Google to do the majority of my Internet searches. Yes, my hubby works for Microsoft and Google is a competitor, but I was using Google prior to his employment with Microsoft. However, yesterday I decided to tread new waters and tried out http://www.bing.com/. I can honestly say that I really do like Bing more that Google. It has a really cool feature that allows you to hoover over a result and will give you a pop up box with more detail on that site which truly saved me a tremendous amount of time. I can't even tell you how many times I would click on a Google result only to find that it didn't have the information I was looking for.


So, that is my plug for Bing.com. Try it out sometime to see what you think.


Why did I need to use Bing.com? We found out yesterday that the agency providing services to Ryan is discharging him. Not good news 'at all.' I spent pretty much all afternoon searching for and contacting agencies in an effort to find an agency that can/will provide services. My efforts were met with some success as we do have a meeting with the director of an agency a couple hours south of us. We don't know if this is the right agency for Ryan, nor do we know if this agency will ultimately want to provide services to him, but at least they are anxious to talk to us and that's a good thing.


One a brighter note, here are more photos for your viewing pleasure.

Lili wanted me to take her picture so she could see it. This is a mixture of smile and her saying "see it."
Lili checking out the leopard skin at the zoo. The leopard died of natural causes and it was a great education opportunity.
Mommy and Lili entertaining ourselves with the camera. Who knew it would be so much fun taking pictures of ourselves and then looking at them. I think we took about 15 photos, but I won't bore you with all of them. There are some goofy girls in the Weeks' family!!!

New Adventures in Dallas

We always look forward to visiting the Dallas area because we are able to spend time with family. This visit had some added pleasure for us due to some new experiences.

Like Memphis, it was hot which for us meant indoor or water activities were in order. So our niece and I took Lili to a local water park for some cool fun. This was Lili's first adventure to a water park so we immediately headed for the children's play area. There were slides, rope ladders, steps and water galore. Lili was a bit overwhelmed by it all and stuck close to mommy. When I say she stuck close to mommy I really mean she clung on to mommy. She was watching everyone and everything with curiosity, but wasn't feeling it at all. Then it happened. The very large bucket at the top of the play area, which had been filling with water, tipped and out poured gallons and gallons of water. At this point Lili was done. Really, she looked at me and said "done." I explained to her that we were not done and were going to stay and play in the water because it was fun. I don't think she believed me and after the very large bucket tipped a second time she was sure it was NOT fun and we decided to move over to the other side (away from the bucket) in an attempt to interest her in playing. Unfortunately, all she could do was keep her eye on that very large bucket and panic when it tipped, so we moved on from the children's play area and headed toward the 'lazy river.' This was a much calmer area, but I wasn't convinced she would find any comfort here either. However, because I want Lili to experience life in all it's glory we found a couple inner tubes and hopped in. She wasn't sure at first and kept her serious face on as we floated down the 'lazy river.' We went around once and she wanted to go again, so we went around a 2nd time, then a 3rd. She got off the inner tubes and decided to move to the shallow area where we could sit and let her play. She still wasn't completely sure that the water park was all that fun and then we moved to the rocky area with the little waterfalls and she was hooked. The 'lazy river' was fun. She began to splash, jump, and kick in the water. She enjoyed a few more inner tube rides and realized this really was a fun place.

Our next new adventure was something I had looked forward to ever since we decided to take the trip to Dallas. For the first time we were going to try Ethiopian food. Our niece and her husband are future adoptive parents, also adopting from Ethiopia, and had found some good food at a restaurant called "Queen of Sheba." To say we enjoyed it would be an understatement as the following picture will prove. We put a big dent into our meal. To my delight, Lili dug right into the injera and absolutely loved the lamb dish and yellow peas.

The only thing we weren't fond of was the spinach, but everything else was very yummy and I'm anxious to get to Chicago in the near future for more Ethiopian food.

It was also a joy to meet another adoptive family while at the restaurant. They just brought their 'adorable' little boy home from Ethiopia a month earlier and he was obviously thrilled to be enjoying some Ethiopian food.

Our other fun experience was a boat trip on Lake Lewisville. This was Lili's first time on a boat and we just weren't sure if she was enjoying herself or not. This was the expression on her face during the majority of the ride.

What's very interesting is that whenever anyone asks her about her vacation she perks up with excitement and says "boat." Apparently her expression didn't show her true emotion about the boat ride and she did end up falling asleep, so she obviously was feeling comfortable and relaxed.

The boat ride was not a first for Dave and I but we did get to experience being pulled around the lake on an inner tube, which was a new experience for both of us. Boy was that fun! Boy did my muscles hurt for the next couple of days. Who knew that would be such a work-out?

Lili and I also got to experience "Sam Moon" while out shopping one day. For those who live in the Dallas area or have been to "Sam Moon," you understand why I say 'it's an experience.' I was searching for hair bows and clips for Lili and this was definitely the place to go. Wow!!!

Our week long vacation to the south is over and now we're back home and into our usual routine. In a couple weeks we will be taking off again and heading east to attend GAFE (Guatemalan Adoptive Families Event) in New Jersey and then onto Boston for a couple days where we will enjoy some time with our good friends Josh, Nicole and Sergio (or Joe as Lili calls him). In case you can't tell, we really enjoy traveling.

Lions and Tigers and Bears, Oh My!

Day 3 in Memphis was spent at the Memphis Zoo. I like zoos, Lili likes zoos, Dave is just not that much of a zoo fan. However, I think the Memphis Zoo may have actually won him over a bit. He even commented that he would go back to the Memphis Zoo next time we were in Memphis. That is saying a lot folks!

Actually, a visit to the zoo was up in the air until that very morning. It had been so hot since we arrived that no one seemed to be overly anxious to walk around anywhere in the heat. Fortunately, it cooled off a bit and I'm so glad we decided to go. We were impressed from the moment we hit the entrance and there was as much work put into the landscaping of the zoo as there was to the habitats for the animals. We didn't make it through the entire zoo, but I have a feeling that we'll be back to visit someday in the future.

Obviously I broke out the camera and gave it a work out. And then I took pictures of the cutest animal in the zoo.

We walked by the carousel and Lili was convinced that she needed to ride. I was a bit skeptical that she would enjoy it, but she proved me wrong.

She was not at all happy about the end of the ride, but we had to move on.

As you can see, she's still not happy about leaving the carousel. Maybe the petting zoo will cheer her up.

That did the trick.

Our day at the zoo was a lot of fun, but we needed some rest so it was back to the hotel for a nap and some swimming before dinner.

Dinner was BBQ again and this time it was at a place called Corkey's. We hit 3 different BBQ establishments in 3 days and we all agreed that Corkey's was the winner. I had the brisket which was very good and the rest of the adults had the ribs. Lili enjoyed some sausage and cheese, but wasn't very interested in the chicken tenders or fries. Dessert was banana pudding (not one of my favorites), but apparently it was really good as well.Yum, ribs!!!Yum, banana pudding.

Our trip to Memphis ended and it was off to Dallas. Stay tuned for more photos and some new experiences for the Weeks' Family.

Graceland

On our second day in Memphis we made our way to Graceland. It wasn't that we necessarily wanted to go, but it was just one of those things that we felt we had to see at least once in our lifetime. Sorry if that offends any Elvis fans out there.

In my humble opinion, Graceland is way over-rated and way over-priced. Standing in the heat didn't make the visit any more enjoyable either, but again, if we're in Memphis we have to at least visit Graceland and then cross it off our list of places to see.

So, we purchase our tickets and are told which group we're in. Lili is getting fussy, which isn't a good sign and since we have some time we set off to find something to drink. There we purchase our first souvenir, a Graceland water bottle. Dave also finds some Skittles in the hope that Lili a sugar fix will cheer Lili right up. It worked to a point.

It's getting closer to tour time so we make our way outside and wait for them to call our group number so we can stand in line. After a 15 or 20 minute wait we hop on a small bus for a drive across the street to Graceland where we get to stand in line for another 5 minutes waiting for the group ahead of us to enter. We then made our way to the front porch. Yes, the very porch Elvis stood on. We were given our instructions . . . .

*No flash photography - Not a problem because Lili has to be held during the tour so taking pictures just isn't a real possibility.

*No video taping allowed - Again, not a problem because Lili has to be held during the tour and I didn't bring the video camera.

*No food or drinks inside Graceland

*No stroller inside Graceland - Thus the reason Lili has to be held during the tour. If I didn't hold her she would be the child climbing on all of Elvi's furniture in Graceland. Of course then I could take pictures. LOL!!!

We then entered the front door. Now prior to our trip to Memphis Dave learned a little piece of trivia that they don't share on the tour. Elvis died in one of the bathrooms at Graceland and that bathroom is directly above the entry. So now we're standing right below the place Elvis died. Yes, that's a bit morbid I know.

We begin our walk through the house, which back in the day was quite the place. However, by today's standards it really isn't much at all. The house is small in comparison to some of the other homes we saw in Memphis. Of course they don't allow anyone to tour the entire house. Only the first floor and basement are allowed to be seen, so the true size of the house isn't really known.

The one part of the tour I did enjoy was going through the trophy house. It was fun looking at all the gold and platinum albums and finding songs that we know. That truly was a little walk down memory lane.

The pool looked nice as well, but Lili had a lot of trouble understanding why we couldn't go for a swim.

After Graceland we headed to our next BBQ food stop, Neely's Interstate BBQ. Again, it was ribs for everyone except Lili and me. Lili went for the hot dog and fries and I chose the pulled pork sandwich and onion rings. The consensus among the rib eaters was the ribs were better than the ribs at Rendezvous, but the BBQ wasn't that great. There was much discussion about how nice it would have been to have the Rendezvous BBQ sauce and the Neely's ribs. My sandwich was good, but the onion rings were some of the best I have ever had. So good in fact that a 2nd order was placed for the table. Neely's was also the place that started me on my "sweet tea" kick.

After lunch we headed back to the hotel for nap time. We got the guys and Lili down for their naps and my sister-in-law and I headed out to find souvenirs to take home. We had searched for some at Graceland, by like most tourist places everything was pretty expensive. We wanted to find some cheaper Memphis t-shirts. We managed to find some at a Walgreens down the street from the hotel, but finding much of anything was hard to do. I did managed to get t-shirts for 2 of the boys and me, but that was all I could find. We still had another day though so maybe we would have better luck tomorrow.

After shopping we headed back to the hotel and decided to go for a swim. Lili was just waking from her nap and wasn't quite sure what she wanted at that point, but we knew we needed to have some exercise and the pool was the best place for that.

Swim time was over and it was time to get cleaned up and ready for dinner. We decided to skip BBQ and set off to find one of Lili's favorite foods - fried chicken. We had seen a place on the Food Network or Travel Channel called Gus's Fried Chicken and had to try it. Let's just say that Gus's got a thumbs up from everyone in our group. It was very enjoyable and I can honestly say it was the best friend chicken I have ever had. I typically pull the crust/skin off the chicken before I eat it, but it was so good and all the skin was removed before breading and frying. If we ever get back to Memphis, Gus's will be on the list of places to stop.

Up to this point I hadn't done a very good job in the picture taking department, but I did have Dave try to get one photo on the way to Graceland.

The van was moving and he didn't get the camera centered, but the sign says "Elvis Presley Boulevard." At least it was a start :-)

Home Again, Home Again Jiggity Jig

What a vacation!!! I'll spend the next few days posting about our trip. We just did too much to cover it in one post.

The drive from Central IL to Memphis was pretty uneventful. Like usual, Lili was a great little traveler. She was always happy to get out of the van and stretch her legs, but was just as happy to get back in and keep going.

We hit Memphis around 2:30 p.m. It didn't take us as long to get there as we thought it would which was really nice. What wasn't so nice was the 104 degrees on the thermometer when we arrived. So we checked into our hotel and proceeded to put on our suits and make our way to the pool. Now, had the water in the pool not been so warm, it would have been much more refreshing, but it was certainly much better than the air temp.

After a couple hours in the pool we decided to get cleaned up and hit the first of 3 BBQ establishments on our trip. Everyone should know that I'm not a big BBQ fan. I like BBQ sauce and I will eat some of the meats, but my least favorite of all BBQ meats is ribs. Therefore, my report will be primarily from the perspective of my husband, my sister-in-law and her man.

Our first try of Memphis BBQ was a restaurant called Rendezvous. I believe Rendezvous was named the #1 BBQ restaurant in Memphis, although I'm not quite sure who gave it that ranking. Rendezvous is located in downtown Memphis and the entrance to the restaurant is in an alley. Obviously, few people have trouble finding it because there were people waiting outside for their name to be called. The wait was anticipated to be about an hour and my initial thought was that the food must be awesome because people are actually standing outside in the heat for the food. We chose not to stand outside, but instead made our way upstairs to the bar area. Every table there was taken and Lili wanted nothing more than to run around. That, of course, didn't happen and she actually handled it pretty well. We spotted a table that opened up and headed that direction with Lili in my arms. However, a few guys also spotted the table, looked up and saw us with a small child and proceeded to sit down at the table. At this point I'm not quite sure how I feel about this place or the people there. However, a few minutes later, another table opens up. Score!!! We sat patiently with some cool drinks and got comfortable for the wait. To our surprise, they called our name within about 20 minutes and we were off to partake in our first BBQ feast. Our waiter comes to the table to take our order and we all found ourselves wondering if he enjoyed his job at all. Getting him to crack a smile was quite a task, but Lili managed to get a little smile out of him by using her manners of "peas" (please) and "tank" (thank you). After getting our drinks we placed our order. Ribs for everyone, but add some chicken to mine. We really didn't wait long before the food arrived and I began to pull meat and sides from my plate and give them to Lili while everyone else dug into theirs. The general consensus was that the food was mediocre which was the opinion of everyone in our party. However, 3 of the 4 adults at the table gave the BBQ sauce rave reviews. I was told it was spicy and I don't always do spicy well, so I chose not to try it. I have no doubt it was good though because it was the topic of conversation during the rest of the week.

After dinner we decided to walk around downtown Memphis for awhile. The highlight for Lili was all the horses lined up just waiting to pull their fancy carriages around the city. Lili was given permission to pet a couple of the horses and a bonus was the dogs that rode along with a couple of the horses.

We went into the Peabody Hotel to check it out. Wow!!!! What a hotel. I had no idea it was so big. We did get some ice cream from a little ice cream shop at the hotel though and Lili threw pennies into the fountain.

After dessert we headed back to the hotel to retire for the evening. Our vacation had begun and Day 1 was a nice start even though I had not yet managed to take any pictures. Oops! I tried to make up for it during the rest of the week.