Wednesday, August 29, 2007

What we've been up to

This has been a busy month. We took Sananda to her first county fair, she loves going places and doing things, this was no exception. The animals were fun to look at and the lights on the rides at night made it festive. She had a balloon to entertain her until sadly she let go and we watched it sale away into the sky, but not before she kept bopping mommy in the face with it about twenty times. I promise that I had my husband attach it to us so she wouldn't lose it, but evidently it was not in the kind of knot that stays well. So, the balloon flew and then Sananda go to hold big sister Olivia's balloon which meant more balloon in the face for mommy. I also got to hold all the big blow up toys that the other kids won and they were fully inflated. Oh, and the bags of pencils and flyers that came from the 4-H building. I had quite an armful, daddy was too busy helping the others kids get rides and play games so he couldn't help too much.

The next weekend we attended an India heritage camp which was a lot of fun. There was some great Indian food catered in by an Indian resturant, activities, wonderful families to meet and crafts. I volunteered to help with the mendhi and ended up doing a design on me, plus a couple of cute little Indian girls.

We celebrated India's Independance Day (Aug. 15th) with sparklers and decorating our house with balloons and streamers that are the colors of India's flag. We just celebrated Rakhi, which is another Indian holiday where sisters make bracelets for their brothers and the brothers promise to protect their sisters. Then we all get Indian sweets to eat. I made Gulab Jamun, my husband said mine tasted better than the resturants. :) Opps, better not let them find this out. It worked out pretty cool cause for my boys school they were suppose to make a covenant with someone and this just fit in sooo perfect. It was so sweet to see Sananda and Olivia both give thier brothers the bracelets that we made. They gave the bracelets to them on paper airplanes, we got this idea out of a story we read in a children's book about an Indian adoption. It was a real tear jerker for me. My husband laughed at some parts of the book and said it brought back memories of waiting for Sananda. Why am I the one who always cries at these things?!?!?!

The India Children's chior was also in our area recently and it was wonderful. Another adoptive mom told me that she cried when she went to it. I thought I wouldn't cry, but the tears started coming the minute I set eyes on the kids in their little uniforms. I had to hold back the tears from then on. At the end of the performance the kids all around age 8-10(I am guessing here, but they really weren't very old) all came out to the audience and gave us hugs. So, if I hadn't been about to cry before I am sure that this would have done it anyway.

We also attended a local bible conference where a native of India was speaking. From what he said it sounded like he was from around the same area that the kids in the India Children's choir were from. I picked up a book, that he wrote, at the conference but noticed later that at the India children's choir concert they also had the same book out for sale. Anyway the book was really good and helped me to understand more of how India came to be the India that it is now ,and it addresses what can be done to help the Dalits and others of India to be truly free. It is interesting because I finished reading this book on India's Independence Day. The author is Vishal Mangalwadi and the book title is THE QUEST FOR FREEDOM & DIGNITY caste, conversion & cultural revolution.

If you liked The lion, the Witch and the Wardrode or The Lord of the Rings you may also like a similar book that they were plugging at the conference. It is called Conspiracy of CALASPIA, I have been thinking about getting the book but haven't yet. It was written by twin boys who were born in India, they were 11 years old when they started this book and are now, I think, about 17 or 18. I guess the book has gone through many drafts over the years. I think the boys were about 8 when they moved to another country from India, maybe sweden or England, I don't remember. I thought it would be really interesting to read something like this from someone who has a different view of things from another area of the world.

So anyway, my baby has become a real climber recently. This keeps me chasing her even more cause I am always afraid that she might fall. It was so cute the other day, we were outside on the steps and the "kitty" was sitting on the step below us. This was a huge motivator for Sananda to try and get down there, yet she didn't know how. She would move her foot over the step's edge but didn't know to bend her other leg to make her foot go down to the lower step. She tried many different ways, setting down and thinking about crawling backwards but just couldn't get it to work, and maybe scooting down to the lower step on her bottom but just couldn't quite do that either. Ok, this is the first time she has really tried so you have to give her lots of slack here. I guess I will help her work on this one so she can get down too.

Sananda is also getting some more teeth in and has been kinda whiny. I don't get much done but carry her around some days. She has the runny nose that goes with teething too. It is so sweet though when she lays her head on my shoulder and just wants to be held. How could a mom not like that?

Well, it's getting late and my baby is in bed, so should I be.