“Former orphans welcomed to new home: Cheers greet Bowen Island couple’s arrival with adopted twins from Ghana”
Read more of the Vancouver Province article…

It’s every adoptive parent’s worst nightmare. Legally adopt your kids… and then not be able to bring them home. For months. And be seperated from your other children at the same time. Your famaily is struggling to make it financilly and emotionally across two continents. But your heart is in two places.

We, like many other families, sent assertive letters  on behalf of the Bastin family to CIC, the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration,  the Canadian High Commission in Ghana… even the ambassador. Today, FINALLY, Andrea and Micheal brought home their twin boys form Ghana. Andrea was there for a year.

It’s a happy day for the adoption community – but it’s a day of warning, too. Keep your eye on the Accra High Commission, and be wary of processing any adoption paperwork there. I will state pulicly that I believe there are some anti-adoption forces or people working in that high commission, and there is need of reform. This shouldn’t happen again.

Keep in your hearts all the other families trying to bring Ghanian kids home. One special family is in ours.

In the Okanagan we have a huge fall fair – it’s called the Interior Provincial Exhibition. Apparently 150,000 attend the fair each year. That’s a lot! And it has been going strong for 111 years, which is another impresive number.

A few years ago, Jrock and I went for the first time, and swore we would bring our kids “when we got them”  (This was during the interminable wait.) Well, we got to take them on Sunday. Junk food, icecream, pony rides, carosel rides, jungle gym, petting zoo, animal exhibit barns, dog agility trials – whew! The IPE’s a kids dream come true.  We had a lovely time. We had to rush back because Jrock was working a night shift, but next year, a full day.

On a side note, both Jrock and I grew up spending substantial time outdoors.  He grew up on a farm (lots of cattle, but a few chickens and the like.) I spent a lot of time in the woods and mountains. Our kids are urbanites, though; we’re so aware that they are city girls. But we want them to feel comfortable with animals, and with quiet, and with nature. So we make sure we give them lots of opportunities to see farms and get out in the bush. And taking our time walking beside the creek in the mornings on the way to school, observing the ducks and muskrats – that’s important stuff. It may not be “every day” stuff, but we hope it’ll be “special stuff” and they’ll grow up to value some of those things like sustainable agriculture, and connections with nature. For an interesting read on the topic, check out “Last Child in the Woods-Revised: Saving Our Children from Nature-Deficit Disorder,” by Richard Louv.

Every since the girls saw Mary Poppins for the first time (we always watch movies from our huge VHS collection during hair time!) they have wanted to “go fly a kite.”

Yesterday, they got to try out their kites for the first time. We (adults, kids and dogs) went after Jrock got home from work and the wind was just perfect. Long after the small people scampered over to the playground, Jrock and I continued to fly. ‘Something you never grow out of, I guess!

For most families, school starts right after Labour Day. But for us, “school” (preschool) started September 1st.

We have a really great arrangement.. the girls go to a wonderful daycare / preschool facility that’s on my way to work. It’s in walking distance, it’s new and shiny, has great staff, and the makeup of the kids is really multicultural (Ethiopian x3, Zimbabwean, South African, Jamaican, Chinese, First Nations, Mexican, etc.) They aren’t even the only ESL kids. So it’s pretty great.

Still, it is an adjustment. I’ve been home more than I’ve been away the past year and a bit… I had a couple of consulting jobs, but nothing that took me away 9-5, M-F. So we’re doing the working mom thing for the first time. Jrock always works weekends but has Wednesdays and Thursdays off, so we’re paying for full-time daycare but they are actually only going M,T,T,F… so we can spend Wednesday as a family (until I work Wednesday night, anyway.) I’ll have the girls on weekends as well. It’ll be a bit crazy, but we’ll make it work.

The structure of going somewhere each day and having a more fixed schedule is welcome, though. The girls are exhausted by “school” but are happy to see their friends and teachers, and delighted to be starting dance lessons again. I have always worked a random schedule, but I’m doing my darndest not to take any work home with me. We’ll see how that goes! The pace is a little intense, though… I’m not used to working like that.

But I’m enjoying the walk each morning and at the end of the day with the girls. It’s our time.