Becoming a family

As an adoptive parent, our family's milestones are different than other family's. Do you remember when you realized you were pregnant with your first child? I remember where I was that August day when I got the call that a committee of social workers had voted that my hubby and I were the perfect family for an adorable little two year old girl. I'd waited at home all day on pins and needles for the phone call but I was positive that it wouldn't go our way (others hadn't), When the social worker called to give me the good news my momentous first words were "you're kidding", she then spent several minutes explaining that she wasn't kidding.

Another big milestone was the day that the adoption was actually finalized-9 months later. Usually adoptive parents are permitted to be at the signing of the adoption decree but our social worker discouraged it, so one day we came home from a fun family day and found a big packet of papers in our mailbox...It turns out that we'd been legally Peekaboo's parents for several weeks. The date of our finalization was June 10th, and we were at the Oregon Coast that day, as a family. While digitizing some of my old negatives I found the photos we took that day. Our first official finalized family photos...and we didn't even know it then.

Here's another milestone. The day Peekaboo was finally blessed and given a name. A tradition in our church. It was a big deal. We held the blessing at our home and invited friends and family. It was pretty tight in there. I remember nothing much from that blessing because I started to bawl the moment my husband spoke her name. We only have this one picture of the day because I didn't realize that I was out of film in my camera.

Here's one of the last...one of my favorites. Peekaboo kept her distance from my hubby, a lot.... she bonded initially with me but didn't focus much on my Johnny... I took this picture because it was a time when he was working on the computer and she walked up to him and wanted to be on his lap. We had other pictures of them together, but this is the first where she 'chose' him. It was a special moment.

Creating a family is an intricate, delicate experience regardless of how it is formed. What are your memories of your milestones for your family?

Pico De Gallo

Gee, I sure hope I spelled the title correctly.
this is one of those posts that I'm mostly doing so that I remember.

Our tomatoes this year are yummy! This year I'm not ready to can our surplus so I tried to think of a favorite option. My answer was pico de gallo. I found a recipe to make pico de gallo (peeko-de-guy-Oh)several years ago and I make it each summer. It's always a huge hit. I tinkered with the recipe and made my own variation. The pico can be frozen although I don't know for how long since we always eat it so fast. We love to eat pico de gallo over top of spice fish or salmon, personally, I like it with poached eggs.

Here's my recipe: for future reference
4-6 small early girl tomatoes or 2-3 larger table sized tomatoes- chopped in nice big pieces
1/2 cup white onion (or even a walla walla sweet)- diced
1/2 cup red onion- diced
1 small jalapeno or 1/2 of a large (I like to scrape the seeds out of one half, and leave the seeds to the other half)- finely dice
3-4 garlic cloves (to taste) finely chopped
1/2 cup diced cilantro
1 tsp salt (optional)
3 tbs sugar (or splenda- optional)

Mix everything together and then let the pico sit for at leaste 2-3 hours, best after 24 hours....This recipe is so fantastic with a little black beans and salmon...yummmmmmm!

P.S. I'd like to show a picture but the pico I just made is already gone. Hopefully more tomatoes turn red soon so that I can make some more.

P.P.S....you can use canned/drained diced tomatoes. but it's not as good.

Do you remember 9/11?

As the anniversary of 9/11 approaches so does TV and news footage reminding us all of that awful day. It's funny how the footage brings such strong memories to the fore. I remember that day clearly. It was my daughter's second day of kindergarten. She was 5 1/2 years old. We'd gotten up early as a family to have family prayer. My daughter was getting dressed in her bedroom and I was cleaning our shower. My hubby called me with news that he'd heard on the radio that a plane had hit one of the twin towers in New York. I remember laughing, imagining some little prop plane type thing being too stupid to see that tall tower. Of course I was sad for the loss of life but anything devious was beyond my imagining. So, I turned on the news and began to watch and was horrified to realize it was a full sized airplane. I remember sitting there brushing and braiding my daughter's long silky hair while the second plane hit the other tower....I remember the moment when I realized that the world I grew up in was not the reality that my daughter, this precious child chattering and eating breakfast would inherit. I remember seriously debating NOT sending my daughter to school, but I didn't want to frighten her. I remember taking her to soccer practice later that day and standing at the sidelines with all of the other shell shocked parents, all of us wanted to protect our children from the violence that was erupting but we knew we wouldn't be able to. Now, our children are in their late teens and the reality they've inherited is a world of war and fear and division. I feel sad.