New Jersey Part 5: Ocean City

 One night during our stay we drove down to Ocean City to enjoy the boardwalk and maybe watch the making of some saltwater taffy.  The summer before we adopted Ellie, we spent a week in this town and I knew she would love the attractions.

 I think Ellie's favorite thing about the beach is the abundance of hermit crabs.  We had to stop and look at each and every cage.

Ellie's 2nd favorite thing about the beach are all the seagulls!  Still as much a bird lover as ever!

One thing I didn't remember about Ocean City (probably because I didn't have a child at the time) were all the amusement park rides.  We told Ellie that she could choose ONE ride so she and I took a turn on the giant ferris wheel.

Reni wanted to take a turn walking the boardwalk.  This might be as good a time as any to talk a little bit about Reni's "shoes" which you can see peeking out under his shorts in the photo above.

Sometime this spring I noticed that Reni would take plastic drinking cups and stick them on the bottom of his right let.  He'd walk around the apartment stomping every other step like a pirate.  Then one day he found the IKEA kids' cup and it was a perfect fit. A little more flared at the top and shallower in height than most cups so his leg fit all the way in, they suctioned on much like a more sophisticated prosthetic leg and distributed his weight off the bottom of his leg to the soft tissue on the sides. After months of trying to figure out what Reni could wear on his legs outdoors without tearing up his pants or skin, including some (hot) woolly-but padded, slippers that stayed on with a pair of suspenders worn under his clothes, all it took were a couple of cups from a $2 set of plasticware.

Nathan took a 2nd cup and cut out an opening in the back to accommodate the extra length of tissue on Reni's left leg and now he had a pair.  All that remained was for Nathan to add some foamy rubber to the bottoms for traction.  One of the cutest things I've heard Reni say as we're getting ready to go out the door is, "Where my shooos?"

Finally, no trip to the boardwalk is complete without food for which the category "junk" was invented.

New Jersey Part 4: Hangin' with the New Jersey Cousins

(Note: These photos were all shamelessly swiped from Aunt Melanie's facebook page)

A visit to Port Republic also includes getting to see Nathan's Uncle Paul, Aunt Melanie, and cousins Elizabeth and Paul.  Their home was one of the highlights of the whole trip for Reni and Ellie as you'll see below.  All you need is a few animals and a ball!

Ellie was SO enamored with Elizabeth's collection of about a dozen hermit crabs.  After we left, she kept asking if we could go back and see "Clair Bear" (one of the crabs).  Ellie kept telling me, "It's not stealing!"  I wonder what she had in mind for Clair Bear!

I think this was Reni's first real interaction with a crab outside of a cage.

Thanks, Paul and Elizabeth, for entertaining our kids so well!  We all had a great time visiting your home!

New Jersey Part 3: Meeting Grams and Pop Pop

The whole point of our journey to New Jersey was to introduce Reni to his great-grandparents and give Ellie another memory of these relatives she has only seen a few times.  We met Pop Pop for lunch before driving over to the nursing home where Grams resides.

Showing Pop Pop where to find his nose

Give me five!

GIANT COOKIE!

Grams wasn't quite ready for us so we took a few photos under a shade tree out front

Yes, those are traces of her cookie in her teeth

Ellie was fascinated with Grams' skin

M&Ms are universally loved!

Ellie told Grams a story (and seemed to really entertain her) and Reni showed off his walking skills (though not as keen to wear his legs as we might have hoped).  All in all, we had a really nice visit and are so glad for the opportunity.

Celebrating 1 Year Home!

Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.  James 1:17

One year ago today Nathan and Reni, along with my Dad, made their way to bring Reni home to the States.  It was a loooong day of travel that culminated with a great airport arrival, a portion of which Uncle Jack recorded here:

A little more than four months after learning about this sweet little boy, after a flurry of activity to prepare our home for a second child and a nail-biting wait to renew our home study, fingerprints, and immigration paperwork to qualify for special needs and meet our  insanely optimistic travel dates, a month-plus of hot Albanian summer memories & experiences in a city called Elbasan, and a mere few hours before the start of another academic year at Asbury, Reni was home and we were a real family of four.  It was a wild ride!

Today we meet with our social worker to put together our 12-month post placement report for Albania.  It  feels like we have reached the end of that "newlywed"  phase.  Not that the honeymoon is over -- if anything, it's so much better and gets better every day!  But now that we enter Year Two, the grafting wound has healed, the bond stronger and more secure. Reni has changed for having a family and we have changed for having a son and brother. The introductions of our new son to our family and friends from far and wide is mostly complete. And we have many new people in our life as a result.

Today we remember the past year and give thanks. God is good!

New Jersey Part 2: Reni's 2nd Birthday Party

Sunday night, about 24 hours into our stay in Brigantine, Mom & Dad Waggoner, along with Rebecca, joined us.  After they settled in and we all ate supper, we had a little celebration in honor of Reni's birthday (which was actually the day before).  He has caught onto the fact that birthdays are a big deal and every time he says "birthday" it's with gusto and two raised fists in the air!  Earlier in the day we had picked up a cake and candle at a busy Italian bakery a few blocks away.  He smiled while we sang to him and did exactly what he was supposed to do, blow out his candle.  Then we all dug into the cannoli cake -- yum!!!

 I love the image below of him licking some swiped icing off his fingah (talking like I'm Italian)

Ellie was quite happy that she got a gift or two herself.  The Croc kickboard was very appropriate for her!  Thanks, Mom and Dad!

 Yay!  Noisemakers!!!

All in all, it was a great little party.  As Nathan said, "at least this year I didn't have malaria!"
Click here to see Reni's 1st birthday party (July 2010, in Elbasan)

New Jersey Part 1: Reni sees the ocean for the first time...

On July 30, we arrived in Brigantine, New Jersey.  We stayed in room about like a hotel with a bed, futon and small kitchen.  The kids were great helpers in unpacking our cooler.  We really brought more than just Diet Coke...

Brigantine was a really nice, quiet community.  Reni was THRILLED that our room had a view of the fire department.  When he wasn't playing with toys in the room, he was standing on this bar stool, waiting for them to move the trucks.

Somehow we convinced them to swim in the rooftop pool our first evening, but come Sunday morning, they wanted to go straight to the beach...

I think these photos say it all (and this was what Reni did every time we went to the beach).  Run out into the water, wait for a decent wave to approach, then try to outrun it back to shore.

Next up... Reni's birthday

Crawling back out from obscurity...

I think this might very well be the longest I've gone without posting on this blog!  There are oh so many reasons, and should I start to go into them, my Dad would just interrupt me, wag his finger, and call me "Queen of Excuses."  Nevertheless, I feel a bit of an explanation is due...

Since Reni's birthday, we've slept in 5 states: Maryland, New Jersey, Virginia, Kentucky, and Illinois.  We've put a lot of miles on the van and made a lot of great memories (including some good moments in the car, much to my surprise).Over the course of the next few days I'll be posting on our time in New Jersey, Reni's birthday, introducing Reni to his Great-Grandparents, a visit to the National Zoo, family photos, a family reunion, and painting Ellie's new classroom...

So for those of you who've been faithfully checking the blog to make sure we're still alive or that something catastrophic didn't happen to us -- I don't really have any good excuse.  Our vacation was a time of great rest, which we really needed.  But during that rest I also got out of the habit of taking photos and posting and once one does that, well, then it's really hard to get back into that routine (much like exercise, I think!).  Not to mention, as you very well know, whenever one is away from home and work, it takes twice as many days to catch back up again!  As of next week, we should reach that mark!

Ellie has commented in the last 24 hours that our parking lot is seeing a LOT more activity (as in going from 2 cars in our lot every day to half a dozen a few days ago, to overflowing today).  Students are returning to campus and with that comes schedule and routine.  That should whip us back into shape and out of summer mode quite soon, just as we're catching up from taking time off!  The Waggoners are back, busy and posting!  Thanks for following our journey!