This and That

First off I want to applogize for the color change on the blog. I am fully aware that I went from a nice lavender background to white with all sorts of garish colors blinding what few readers I actually have. I want the color palate to match nicely with my website. Anyway, I just want you to all know that I am working on it!

Now for the real meat and potatoes for today. I am going to share a few summertime photos in a mish mosh of suff going on here at Casa Pickles.

Yesterday was a sad day here in our little enclave. We had to say goodbye to the beautiful Elli who was the Au Pair of a good friend of ours for the better part of a year. She spent a lot of time with L & B and we all got profoundly attached to her. She is one of the best people I've met. Not only is she great with kids but she is a fun, kind, and lovely person to be with. Her time was up and she is headed back to her home in Germany. She will start University this fall and concentrate in Early Childhood Education. I have no doubt she'll be a great success!




Goodbye Sweet E! We'll miss you!


Next up- my tomatoes.... here they come. I grow heirloom tomatoes every year. All my plants have fruit already. In years past I have not seen much fruit start before August 1st but this year I seem to have plants that fruit much earlier! I am very excited.



And last but not least....I have fulfilled my motherhood duty of trying paper mache in my own kitchen at least once. And that is the way it is going to remain...JUST ONCE! I am glad to say I've done it but I am never doing it again. Well I guess I'll do it once more with Cici but man, not fun dudes, not fun. Not only was it messy but the glue that came in the kit was CRAP and nothing stuck together. Oh well. The kids had fun though.




This is what the kitchen looked like when they finished. It may not look so bad now but you should know that my cleaners had come that morning so I basically took a pristine kitchen and turned it into this.

Dual for a Dual

Did you know that some countries recognize dual citizenship and others don't. Yes, I am quite sure you knew that. Well SJ was born in England to English parents and lived there until he was 16 at which time his father asked him if we wanted to move to the US. The ever adventurous soul that is he is, of course said yes! So that is how SJ came to be on this side of the pond and thus how he met the love of his life, ME.

Now that we have children it has come to our attention that once a British citizen always a British citizen unless you do something like denounce your country or threaten the Queen. AND to boot, your children regardless of where they are born are also British citizens by birth. AHHH... now we're getting somewhere. Are your synapses firing yet??? Yes, my children are entitled to British passports through their father's citizenship. Now if your synapses are indeed firing AND you have had your coffee this morning you will have already realized that not only will they be entitled to live and work in the UK with said passport but they will also have access to the entire EU. Lucky, Lucky Dogs!


All you have to do is fill out an application and include the passport number of their British parent. HUM. This is where things go a muck. About four years ago it went something like this:

SPY "Sweetie, where is your UK passport"
SJY "How the hell would I know?"
SPY "Well what did you do with it when you got your US citizenship?"
SJY "Not sure, lets call my mother."
Phone call to mum who says she gave it to him when he moved out to go to college. Which pretty much means it is G.O.N.E.

So four years ago I started working on getting his birth certificate from England, filled out a lost passport claim, got identity witnesses to sign photos and forms, and filled out and paid for a new passport application. At the end of the 8 month ordeal of papers being mailed back and forth between here and England we got a letter stating they wanted further evidence of his US citizenship and identity. Photocopies of drivers license and passport along with more letters from people stating that you are who you say you are were now required. This is when the slow moving train went completely off track with 7 simple words from SJ, "Honey, I can handle it from here." About a month later I got a large manila envelope from the British Passport office in Washington, DC. I ripped it open thinking his brand spanking new UK passport was inside but alas it was all of our forms being returned with a letter stating that due to the fact that we had not followed up on their last request they now consider our file ABANDONED and have returned not only our paperwork but refunded our fees.

I was so angry I had to put the whole thing down for a few years. Then this spring I thought to myself, I have filled out paperwork up the wazoo for the adoption and jumped through so many government hoops that redoing the paperwork for his UK passport will be easy. Plus, I have most of those crazy British documents already on file for the adoption so why not take another stab. So in June I started the paperwork again, got all my witnesses testifying that SJ is who he says he is, and today I am mailing everything off. Will let you know when the hoop jumping starts again!

Encore!

AHHH I am a happy woman. Sj just booked flights so we can go visit my brother and SIL in their new digs. We will also get to see another John Mayer show with them. For the past who knows how many years the four of us have been going to JM concerts together each summer. As I mentioned in a prior post, we saw JM here on July 12th.(pics here) It was bittersweet. I loved the concert but got very sad that we were not with J & C. Luckily, J & C's seats are MUCH better than our seats were up here on the 12th. Like 5th row center good. Don't you worry, I'll be screaming like a 15 year old!

A Fresh New Look

Our website More Pickles just got a makeover! Finally I have a mac that has iWeb and was able to not only give the website a new style but also include tons more pictures. I've got a bunch of recent albums up now and will be adding a new one every day for a while. Visit us over there and keep checking back.

John

Everyone in our household is a huge fan of John Mayer. Even L as a baby at 18 months would say "more john" after one of his songs played in the car. He is affectionately just called John here. We go to this concert every summer and are part of the fan club. This year we are excited that 6 other couples are coming with us. I can't wait. I am even more pleased now that I have heard directly from John about what to expect!

Summertime strides!

We are very pleased to be a bubble-free household! B decided to kick it up a notch in the pool today and went from barely holding his head above water doing the doggie-paddle to a full on, horizontal, kicking with a splash, face in the water crawl. He is so funny that way. He literally in one moment will decide to do something and does it. He did it with skiing this winter too. I am so proud of him and unfortunately did not have my camera with me. Oh well.

Two Years!

Twenty four months. One hundred and four weeks. Seven hundred and thirty days.

No matter how you cut it is has been a VERY long wait and we only look to be at the half way point. That is a long time to be answering the question "Where is my sister?".