Happy Anniversary, Bill & Renee

One year ago today, in a lovely evening ceremony, Bill & Renee were married. By the time they came home from their honeymoon, we were on our way to Guatemala to bring home their newest nephew.
Congratulations on making it through the first year and all the firsts that came with it. We wish you many, many, many more happy years.

The First Week of School

Monday - I first took Rudy to his classroom. As soon as he saw kids and toys - he was off without a glance backwards at me. I had to track him down to say good-bye. I then went to find out about where I should be and was told they were considering having me and another teacher team teach rather than making another classroom for three-year-olds. I was taken to that classroom and introduced to the teacher and the aide. The class is very boy heavy and very active. They had just moved from another classroom upstairs and this was their first day in the new room so everything was a little chaotic. I pretty much spent the day interacting with the kids, jumping in to help when I could and just observing what was going on.

Tuesday - Rudy again very happily went off to his classroom. My day went pretty much the same. It's kind of hard to come in as a second teacher when the year has already started because I don't want to step on the other teacher's toes. But it's also frustrating because they haven't established much of a routine in the room and the teacher and aide often let the kids play in areas they didn't really want to open, just because it's easier than constantly telling them no. There are 2 boys who just kind of do what they want all day so I made it my project to at least get them to follow the same rules as the other kids. And if they didn't want to sit for circle - I at least made sure they weren't taking out toys. If they wanted to just wander the room I let it go.

Wednesday and Thursday were more of the same. Rudy is having a blast and everyone loves him. In my classroom we're supposed to have one of the other teachers come in and observe us to give us ideas about team teaching - how to split the day, etc. It didn't work out this week because of teachers being out sick, though. I also am having trouble with the Curriculum they use. It's called Creative Curriculum and I am a little familiar with it but I keep hearing conflicting things - we can't introduce letters until January, we can do them now if we want. So I can't get a handle on what should be done during circle (or what's permitted). All we're given is a theme each week - next week it's Our Homes and Homes Around the World. So I guess I have to try to base my circle time around that.

Friday - I got some sort of stomach virus and had to stay home. This is very unusual because in my 12+ years of teaching, I have called out sick maybe 3 times total. It was not a fun day. I expected to just have Rudy home with me but Paul was prepared to take him to school. I finally agreed to let him do that and it definitely turned out for the best since I spent most of the morning sleeping when I wasn't getting sick.

Next week we have 2 days off for Rosh Hoshanah. And in October there are 3 other Jewish holidays we're off for - not a bad way to start a new job - with some days off!

FFF- Silly Smiles

It's rare that you can catch a smile on camera from Rudy - he moves too fast- but here are some silly ones.
To see more go to Kiss the Frog 4 Me.

A Great Day

When I told Paul about the blog I had planned, his response was "That was a great day." Thus my title.
In my walk down memory lane of the time leading up to Rudy coming home, the last thing that had happened was we got out of PGN. Once the file is approved by PGN (essentially the Guatemalan government) there are just a few steps until you bring your child home. As usual these steps took us a longer time than necessary. First the approval gets sent to the city where Rudy was born and a new birth certificate is issued in his birth first and middle name and our last name. Then the file moves onto the US Embassy. Just as we got to this step, the US Government added a new step - a second DNA test. The first DNA test is done very early in the adoption process. DNA samples are taken from the child and birth mother to confirm that she really is the biological mother and has the right to give this child up for adoption. The second DNA test is only done on the child and it is to confirm that it is the same child who was originally tested. Once the sample is taken it is sent to a lab for processing, in our case this was LabCorp. The best part of all this is that LabCorp is very accessible and very helpful and customer service oriented and it was very easy to email someone at LabCorp and find out the status of our case. This step took an unusual amount of time because, while Rudy's sample matched, they weren't coming up a high enough percentage match - the US Embassy required a certain percentage (say 98%) and Rudy's was lower than that (say 95%). The very helpful woman at LabCorp told me there was no question the samples matched, they just needed to test additional areas to make the match percentage where it needed to be. Finally we received an email from LabCorp saying our results had been sent to the US Embassy and we were given the tracking information for the package.
If I remember correctly, the sample arrived at the Embassy in Guatemala late on a Friday. At that time, the US Embassy was supposed to issue a pink appointment (so named because it's on a pink sheet of paper) within 48 hours after receiving the results. We waited all of Monday and had heard nothing so on Tuesday afternoon, September 25, (a year ago today)Paul called the embassy and was told we had an appointment for October 9. That was a great day!!! It meant that we knew exactly WHEN we'd have our appointment and when the visa would be issued and when we could come home. The good news/ bad news of it was Bill & Renee were getting married on September 28. We had hoped all along that Rudy would be home in time to be there - it would have been a wonderful opportunity for the family to meet him. But at least by their wedding we had our travel plans made and we could tell everyone exactly when Rudy would be home - a relief after years of telling people we didn't know.

Crazy Week

Rudy and I both started a new school this week. Rudy was at a preschool that we really liked - it was about a minute from our house too, which made it very convenient for either one of us to drop him off or pick him up. A few weeks ago I went on a job interview for a teaching job - something I haven't done since a few months before Rudy came home. The opportunity was great AND we could reduce our childcare costs by half if he came with me. So we couldn't turn it down. So this Monday Rudy and I went off together to our new school. Our classrooms are right across the hall from each other and Rudy has already turned most of the staff into members of The Rudy Murphy Fan Club (which is fun to hear gushing about how wonderful my son is when he had a major meltdown/power struggle that morning that caused us to be running late). It's a further drive for me and instead of having time to myself in the morning when I could clean or do laundry, I now have none. And instead of coming home on my lunch break, I hang out in the halls and lobby of the Jewish Community Center. And instead of having some quiet time in the car, I ride with Rudy both ways almost every day. And I have no computer access all day, which really is killing me. So it's a big adjustment for me trying to figure out how to balance my time. It's amazing that it's only Wednesday. I feel like I've already worked a full week. And I haven't even mentioned what the actual job is like - I'll save that for another post. So if for the next few weeks my posts are fewer and farther between, you'll know why.

Go See Elmo

Yesterday we took a trip to Sesame Place. It's not too far from us, but the drive was even quicker than we expected. Rudy had a great time riding the rides, seeing the characters (he walked right up to all of them to say hi), and partially enjoying the Dan Zanes concert (he was tired and cranky by that time so he would've enjoyed it more if not for that).











I think Cookie Monster was his favorite character and he was a little disappointed that we didn't see Big Bird so we'll be looking for him next time.

These were taken as we were waiting in line for the concert to start. It was very sunny and warm and Rudy had almost hit the wall. So he kept wandering just far enough to be away from us. Here he found places to sit.




The video shows how miserable he was. "C is for Cookie" was playing over the loudspeakers and he had danced and sang the song earlier in the day. This is what happened when I asked him to do it again. (Our new camera has sound with video. Ny the way it's a Fuji FinePix J10, Reba.)

New Camera

We finally got a new camera. We had been using my Dad's for a while but since he's such a world traveler, we knew there would be times it wasn't available to us. So here are some random pictures we took while trying it out the other night.






This is the paparazzi picture - "No more pictures".

FFF- Hope

I have a very hard time with abstract ideas for Favorite Foto Friday (See FFF-Having a Ball for proof) so when I saw that this week's theme was "Hope" I thought a lot about how to approach it.


I HOPE that some day Rudy will get a chance to visit and appreciate his native country of Guatemala the way Paul and I have enjoyed and appreciate it.




We HOPED we would get to spend Rudy's first birthday with him - and we did - in Guatemala.


We HOPED Rudy would like his bedroom when he came home - he did - but it was in a different house than we originally planned, although the walls were painted the same.



We HOPED we wouldn't have to make another visit to Rudy - but we did - and had the best visit of all in Antigua.





We HOPED Rudy would do well when he got home and he did better than we could have ever imagined.

Cake and Parties

We spent much of the weekend celebrating Gram's birthday - to Rudy's delight since it meant cake at each celebration! On Friday we brought dinner over to Gram's and then sang "Happy Birthday" and had cake.




Then on Sunday we went to Aunt Pat's house to celebrate Gram's birthday with more cake and singing.



Rudy helping to open the presents...





Hanging out with Sean.




Rudy held firm all weekend to his belief that Gram was turning 4. No matter how often we asked he gave the same answer.

Happy Birthday, Gram!

Gram is Rudy's great grandmother (Paul's grandmother). I won't tell you how old she is, but Rudy's guess last night was 4! Rudy is very lucky to get to know her and she is just in love with Rudy!


I couldn't find a picture of just Gram so here she is with Paul's mom.

FFF- Dressing Up

We were told to pick our own theme this week. On Rudy's last day at his babysitter's they gave us a bunch of pictures from his time there and these were included.







Obviously he doesn't quite get what it means to be wearing this uniform!



And some old favorites .....
Last Halloween





Not exactly playing dress up but the outfit his foster mother dressed him in when we went to pick him up.




A future X Games athlete maybe?



You can see more FFF posts of all different themes this week by going here.


Also, note today's ticker at the top = exactly 11 months since Rudy came home!

Playing Games

Over the summer when Max was visiting, we realized that maybe it was time to get Rudy some board games. I went out a few weeks later and bought a memory game that matches two parts of an animal. It's very hands on because the animal parts are hidden under egg shells and the animal parts snap together to make the animal when you have a match. Rudy loves this game and we've played it several times. We also got Candyland - a childhood favorite of many. When Rudy first saw Candyland, he decided it was a road for his cars, and that's all we've ever done with Candyland since. When Grandpa was over the other night we pulled out both games, played the memory game and then Rudy and Grandpa played cars with the Candyland board. This morning Rudy told me he wanted to play a game so we went into the basement to get the memory game. He told me "not that one", so I took out Candyland. When we brought it upstairs he left everything in the box except the board and proceeded to create a game that involved an car and a helicopter driving around, flying and trying to escape from the 'bear' (the Chocolate guy on the board - can't remember his name). We even had to hide in another room at one point because the 'bear' was coming. Not shortage of imagination here!