Category Archives: Family History

Texas Fires Rage

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As many of you know, we live in Texas.  Luckily for us, we are not in the areas that have recently been affected by the raging fires on our parched lands:

In this photo, note the town of Kerrville at the very bottom of the image – we are located about 30 miles SOUTH of that town, in the hills.  The fires you see seem to be close, but they are all about 2 hours away from us.

In this last photo, the shading represents what has already burned and the direction the fires are going.

And this is a photo of the fire that hit the town of Bastrop, Texas this past weekend.  It has destroyed around 500 homes, but thus far, no deaths have been reported.

All prayers welcome for those who are living where these fires have struck!

Getting Kids Ready for Back to School

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I have already had a few meetings and responsibilites to take care of this week, so the kids can return to school on Monday.  We will have an 11th grader, an 8th grader, a 6th grader and a 5th grader.  OY.

Let’s just say I apologized to those teachers who had to have more than one of our kids during the course of their day 🙂

And it doesn’t help that the elementary grades post their supply lists but for the high schoolers, we have to wait for meet-n-greet night (which was last night) before we get their supply lists.  As if we have an endless supply of time over the weekend to get all of their back-to-school shopping done, as well as shopping for MORE supplies???  Crazy!

But, I want to take a minute to recognize our school’s teachers.  I have to tell you that meet-n-greet night is much more than introducing the kids to their teachers and dropping off their supplies.  It’s hugs.  It’s love.  It’s general caring about each individual student and the opportunities the teachers have to teach the kids something.  It truly warms a Mom’s heart.  I went to a much larger school (the kids’ school only has about 300 students from Pre-K through 12th grade), so we not only have students involved in their school, we have teachers who are just as involved in their students and all of them in the community as a whole.  It makes for a much more close-knit group of people that you really want to call your friends.

I’ll be here Monday, celebrating with an Irish jig (as such suits this partial-Irish lass) as the kids are carted off on the big yellow bus to their home away from home for the next 10 months!

Foster Homes Can be Forever Families

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Yadda, Yadda, Yadda, Blah, Blah, Blah – if you don’t know my history, please read up on it in my 100 FAQs because I get tired of repeating it.  🙂

Although I chose to leave my third foster home when I was 14, there were serious extenuating circumstances that necessitated my departure.  One of the big ones, apart from a very sad development with my foster parent’s natural family, was the opportunity to live with my mother’s brother – because they assured me I would get to spend more time with my loving Gramma from Tramma (she was my mom and uncle’s mother).  Her love throughout my childhood sustained me.  It breathed life into me.  It was the root of all things good.  Her love was the reason I was able to successfully survive being orphaned.

But, a couple of years ago, I reconnected with my third set of foster parents.  It’s been great.  My foster mother came and spent Thanksgiving with us last year, and we’ve communicated via email weekly.  Their home was the first foster home who welcomed me with open arms, told me they loved me before they even knew me and showed me how a functional family actually lived.

As an early birthday present, my foster mother sent me the funds to go to Iowa to visit them.  I left the two older girls in Kansas with my girlfriend from high school and the two younger kids and I headed north to spend five days with my foster parents.  The kids had a great time and loved being showered with attention from yet another set of pseudo-grandparents.  I got to visit with some dear friends and family, whom I haven’t seen in MANY years (let’s not count, m’kay?!).

My goal in going was not just to spend time with some good people, but to also show myself and others that I may have MS, but it won’t stop me from LIVING.  I had a few MS-related issues, but no emergencies and nothing we couldn’t deal with when I got home.

But, smiles on my own kids’ faces and on my foster parent’s faces were what set the heart-strings a’flutter.  It’s nice to be loved by others, and although some may know that type of love from birth – I had to find it as I matured.  I’ll take it.

Swedish Weaving Student Success

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When my third foster mother came to visit our family for Thanksgiving last year, she took notice of some of my pattern books for Swedish Weaving patterns.  I took her to my mother-in-law’s house to see some of the Swedish weaving that my MIL had done.

My foster mother was hooked.  She wanted to try it, so I sent home some of the pattern books and a needle.

We spent this past week with her and I noticed she had finished her first Swedish weaving piece:

So proud of my Swedish weaving student’s success!

Trip Down Memory Lane

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My apologies for my absence – I have been away from home for 10 days on what some would call a vacation.  If anyone has kids, though, they know that you never get a vacation unless you leave the kids at home!

While I get myself and my family acclimated to our summer schedule, I’ll share an interesting observation I discovered while visiting my hometown.  I lived in my third foster home, which was near the Des Moines river.  It was also down the road from a meat packing plant.  And right across the street from the city’s sewage treatment disposal plant.

This is a photo of the crossroads street sign right by the house:

Funny what you notice when you are 30 years older and have good glasses.  hehe