Adoption Buddies and Our Summer Bucket List

In the blink of eye it is already June 24th.  I’m not sure how that happened.  We have had so much going on this past month, and this is the first chance I have had to really write a blog post.  This weekend and last weekend were just as busy as the first part of June when Zoe’s birthmom was here to visit.  We had friends here from Boston; they arrived this past Friday night, and we were able to show them around our town a bit.  We spent a very hot but fun afternoon at the zoo and a very fun evening (just adults) at a baseball game.

Our friends, L and B, and trying to convert our little one into a Red Sox fan!  They brought her lots of gear to get her started.

The game was really fun to watch.  Our home team won, and they ended the night with an amazing fireworks display.  I have never been so close to fireworks before…exciting and yet a bit scary all at the same time.

Like I said, our weekends have been jam-packed.  Not only were our friends visiting, but I was helping host a bridal shower for my cousins on Sunday, so part of last week was spent helping my family get ready for that.  We also had a few get togethers with some of Zoe’s friends, and we even met up with a new group of friends through our adoption agency.  I had heard from our caseworker that some adoptive moms were starting a playgroup and were looking for others to join.  We spent part of Friday at a local park hanging out with them.  While the kids played, we parents were able to share our stories with each other.  It was a pretty neat day to meet other moms from our agency who have been through the process before.  We are planning on more trips and visits over the summer.

In addition to that, I got it in my head that I really wanted to take Zoe strawberry picking!  Yes, it’s actually on the summer bucket list I have posted on our refrigerator!   One of Zoe’s friends and her family had  just been, and I decided we had better do it before the berries were gone.   We went to one of our favorite orchards on Thursday and luckily they still had “lots ‘o’ berries.”

I loved how Zoe would step carefully over the rows and call, “Here’s a good one, Mommy!”  It was very sweet. 

I can remember picking berries with my parents, sisters, and grandparents; Zoe will have that memory, too. 

I am sort of writing in reverse…so I guess I’ll skip back to last weekend.  We celebrated Father’s Day by going to a local historical place that also had a car show.  It was right up my Dad’s alley. 

Zoe wanted to give Steve and my dad their gifts before we left…a handprint painting  and a photo collage for Zoe’s Daddy and a stepping stone for Grandpa’s garden and a pair of baseball tickets.  We made our own wrapping paper this year…pretty good likeness, I would say!

She looks like she’s grown so much when I look at that last picture…where has the time gone?

The day before Father’s Day was spent on a mini-road trip.  Zoe and I drove to our state’s capitol to meet up with our friends.  M met us there with her son C, and R met us there with her son M.  I am friends with M and R through an online adoption group.  I am beyond lucky and fortunate to know these two ladies and their little ones.  It’s amazing to me how even before we all met, we felt such a sense of connection to each other.  M and I and the kids had met a few times over the past couple of years.  The six of us got to meet each other for the first time last summer when we had a picnic and spent the afternoon at a splash park.

We had a picnic on the grounds of the Capitol building, and the kids had chased each other and checked everything out.  C  had a book about our state, and he knew all about our capitol!

We spent the rest of the day at a nearby zoo and explored the different exhibits…got to wander around, pet some goats, go for a pony ride, and see a white peacock, too!

We may have spied Spiderman nearby…the kids were slinging their “webs” at him! 

And at a few times throughout the day, the ended up hand in hand just like little buddies should.  I am so thankful for our friendship and the way adoption has brought us together.