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Wednesday, November 28, 2007

Thanksgiving and Stuff

Sorry I have been behind on posting "real" stuff the last couple weeks. With our whirlwind Thanksgiving week and my 2nd job, most of the time I hardly have the chance to think straight.

If you would like to see some pictures we took at Thanksgiving, you can check out Paul's blog.

We left Medford, OR on Tuesday night at about 9:45 PM and arrived at Mom's house at 4:45 AM. (Note: Driving all night helps you realize you are not young anymore...) We were able to spend several hours visiting my dad on Wednesday (see picture on Paul's blog). I had not seen my dad since last Christmas, so it was very exciting to see him!

Thanksgiving day we drove up to my sister & brother-in-law's house in Everett. We had a wonderful time with family and AMAZING food! My brother-in-law, Alvin, does a great job with presentation, and everything tastes so good!

Although the trip was fast, I am so glad we went.

This year for Christmas, we are staying here in Rogue River. With my 2nd job, it will not be possible leave like we are used to. It makes me sad...it is hard living so far away from my family. It is much easier for the "1" to go see the "many". The problem is, the "1" can't afford to adopt a child and go see the "many" as much as the "many" expect them to. Does that make sense?

The dates are still a little up in the air, but my mom is planning a trip down here just before Christmas. I am really looking forward to that.

I am LOVING my Harry & David job!! Some people were confused, as they thought I was just working at the retail stores. Actually, the Harry & David headquarters, (Bear Creek Corporation) is in Medford, OR, just about 30 minutes from my house.

Last Friday & Saturday, I trained in a special class called "Blaster". Basically what I do is take business order spreadsheets filled in by businesses (small to VERY large), I format the spreadsheet and "Blast" it into the order system. You would be amazed at the generous gifts businesses give to their employees this time of year! And to think that some of these business have 1000+ employees!

We don't have any new information on our adoption at this point. As you can see from the ticker at the top, we have been waiting over 2 months for a referral. What is interesting is that there are families who have referrals from back on October 3rd and October 19th that are still not through the courts. The October 3rd group goes to court again on December 7th. It seems that there are some back-ups with the court and with the Ministry of Women Affairs. Please remember these 10 families are they patiently wait to bring their children home.


Love to you all!

Holly

2 comments:

Rebecca Caldwell said...

Hi West Family!
Praying for you guys as you wait for the referral of your precious son!

E said...

Holly,

Your travel dilemma TOTALLY makes sense! We've been living this for the last 10 years - we're the "1" and the "many" don't seem to get it most of the time. :) It's hard, but I no longer even bother with explaining it. If they don't "get it" by now, I'm not sure they ever will...though some really do seem to understand and are great about it.

The worst is that we can never take a normal vacation without people wondering why we're not there instead...maybe because we don't want to spend every bit of vacation money & vacation time in Phoenix. :) Note: We've been to Phoenix 5 times in the last year. So it isn't like we don't go often! Even when we lived really far away (in a place where travel anywhere was extremely costly), we still visited twice a year or more.

Okay, vent over. I think I'm a bit giddy at seeing someone else "verbalize" the same struggle we've had for the last 10 years. :) Sorry I went overboard!

I'm praying for you & Paul as you wait for your referral. I really hope it comes soon!!! We waited 11 weeks for ours, but (of course) the wait on this end has been much longer than we had hoped. I was really surprised when we got our referral - though delighted that it came earlier than I had hoped. And now everyone else is getting clogged up waiting for referrals and everything else. Hopefully, we'll all be getting some good news and seeing some really strong forward movement soon!

I'm glad you love your job & I wish you guys a really blessed Advent!

Erica