Family Day

Family Day. Gotcha Day. Whatever you call it, it is just a made up holiday/tradition that a lot of adoptive families do. It can be celebrated whenever but these past two years we have decided to celebrate our Family Day the first Saturday of November. Both our kids became a part of our family around this time of year and November is National Adoption Month, so it works. We celebrate our kids' birthdays of course, but for adoptive families, birthdays are often times kind of... odd. On the day that my sons were born I don't have any stories or memories. I didn't even know my kids were in this world until weeks after they were born. Unlike biological families, our family didn't become a family at the birth of our children. So we get another day to celebrate, have fun, get presents, and eat bad food. That was today.

First up was a photo op.

Marcus' first day at our house, November 2006


Marcus, November 2007


Marcus, November 2008


Marcus, today


Will's first day at our house, November 2007


Will, November 2008


Will, today


Our local Guatemalan group (GPAFG) had an outing planned for today so we decided to do that for our Family Day. WQED Studios had the set from Mr. Roger's Neighborhood set up and we planned on meeting up with a few other families to attend the free event. As I suspected, because it was free and for just this weekend, everyone in the entire city showed up. We saw a couple families from the group but for the most part, all the separate families just jumped in line when they arrived and we ended up not being there together. The line was long. We were outside while we waited. It was cold. The dinosaur statue kept us entertained for about 2 minutes.


Apparently there was a whole lot of stuff going on inside. Not only could you check out Mr. Roger's Neighborhood, but Mr. McFeely was there posing for pictures and signing autographs. We waited. We waited some more. After that there was more waiting. At one point we could barely believe but there we were, in front of King Friday's castle.




By the time we reached the end of the set, two hours had passed. Will was getting whiny. The poor kids didn't have a clue what the hype was, particularly since they have only seen a few episodes of Mr. Rogers. I was bored. Greg was being a great husband and keeping his thoughts to himself. The kids probably could have made it as long Greg and I could keep coming up with creative ways to entertain them. However, I was done. Having fun wasn't supposed to be so much work. There was still at least another 30 minute wait before we got to hang with Mr. McFeely for a minute. I did think it would be pretty cool to get a picture with Mr. McFeely, but I also thought it would be pretty cool to get out of there. We got out of line, used the potty, and I snapped a photo of Mr. McFeely so someday I can show it to my kids and tell them all about how we were that close but I robbed them of the opportunity to meet him.


It was lunch time. We thought we would do something fun for the kids. We drove back towards our town and stopped at Burger King. We aren't fast food people. I think that is only the second time Marcus has had fast food and a first for Will. They both thoroughly enjoyed their meal of little nutritional value. We learned that Will likes pickles.

The Burger King has an indoor playground. Even though the day was shaping up to be gorgeous and we could have been outside, we figured it would be a fun place for the kids to play. Wrong. The playground said it was handicapped accessible which was just assuming because the able bodied children playing on it were having difficulties. Particularly my children. The only way to climb up was through these tubes that Will wasn't tall enough to get up unassisted. Marcus was scared of it. So scared that he had a total freak out and I had to rescue him and our fun morning ended like this:


We went home. Defeated. Our Family Day was turning out to be a Crappy Day. Two hours in the car. Two hours in line. A totally freaked out kid.

At least Will enjoyed his pickle.

During nap time I took the pup for a walk in our woods and did some yard work to hopefully reduce the damage done by the fast food. After nap we were ready to try to make Family Day a bit more fun.

During the time Greg and I spent in Guatemala, we purchased several small gifts to give to the kids throughout the year. It was present time! No one can get presents without a smile on their face!


At first Will thought he got popcorn.


Nope. A wooden train.



The trains were definitely a big hit. They were the only toy the kids played with for the rest of the evening. That was, the rest of the evening that we were home. We still had one more place to go.

Sarris'!! Sarris Candies makes the best chocolate, at least in my opinion. They also have a great ice cream parlor. We were headed for the ice cream. When I put the kids to bed tonight I asked them what their favorite part of the day was. They both said, "Ice cream!"





Out of the four of us, only one of us was able to finish all their ice cream. Guess who?


I was thinking that I had to take the pup for a walk around the neighborhood when I got home to make up for that ice cream. It didn't happen. Happy Family Day! Tomorrow is Diet Start Day!