A Visit to Asheville

We got back last night from our long weekend in Asheville.  We really had a great time visiting the Williams family.  As usual, the girls were all really excited to see each other. 

After seven hours in the car, we were all happy to be there, and after relaxing a bit, we headed down to the town center in their neighborhood for some brick oven pizza.  Of course, the girls (except Lyla) wanted to do sleepovers together, and after they “went to bed” the adults enjoyed time to hang out and catch up.

          

We all got to see Ryleigh’s soccer game on Saturday.  This is her reaction after she scored a goal.

Yeah, Ryleigh!

After the soccer game and a great lunch at 12 Bones, we went apple picking. 

You know you’re in NC when the sign at the apple orchard says this…

We got some great apples, and then got the tired girls home.   

     

While Mark and G were golfing on Sunday, Shen and I got a performance from the girls. They put on quite a show of singing and lip synching. There’s always plenty of fun to be had even just hanging out together doing nothing special. That evening, G taught Mark (who is NOT from the South) how to make grits.  What is this world coming to? 

Even though we head to leave on Monday morning, we made the most of the time we were there and had a lot of fun together. 

The big days didn’t stop there.  After the weekend fun, Nina started at her new school today.  She did great and loved it. Her new school is much different (in a good way) than her old school, and we really were glad to get to our neighborhood school this early in the year of being in overflow.  It was a big day for her, so we’re all very happy that this transition has started off so well.

Thanks!

Just wanted to send a big thank you to Trinity for posting information about the dress collection for Jane ON HER BLOG.  I'll be dropping by her house in a couple weeks to pick up any dresses collected from her friends and blog followers, and the plan is to send all the dresses up to NY in that last week of October. 

I told this to Trinity, and I'll post it here too, that I've been really excited about the generosity of the women who have come in contact with this story and who have decided they can do something to help.  I know that not everyone has dresses left in their closet, and some may want to help and aren't able, but it's been great to see that those who are able to help have stepped up in a great way to help another woman who we don't know but can relate to in the way of just being a woman who wants the best for her life and her family.

We just got back from a great weekend in Asheville visiting Shenley, Garland, and the girls.  Thanks, Shen, for the two dresses you sent home with me.

Also, when we got home from our trip, there was a package of dresses waiting from Danna, Shen's sister-in-law, so thank you so much, Danna!!!

Sister Update

After a string of some cold and rainy days we’re enjoying the beautiful weather of fall.  It’s been sunny and great for being outside.

On most afternoons, Lyla loves racing scooters with the boys up the street.  Surprisingly, she keeps up with them.  She’s had a few wipeouts from going too fast, but no matter how many times we tell her to slow down and be careful, she goes right back to riding super fast.  We think we have a bit of a daredevil on our hands.

When she’s not outside, Lyla loves playing with her cars.  She’s started a little collection and has been using her allowance money lately to get more. 

As for Nina, I got a call yesterday afternoon from our neighborhood school saying that there was a spot open for Nina there now.  Since we’re leaving tomorrow for a long weekend in Asheville, her last day at her current school will be today.  She’ll start at her new school next week.  We were at the overflow school for just over a month, and while next week will be a big transition, she’s excited, and I’m thankful that it’s happening now rather than later in the year.  One exciting thing is the mascot of her new school is the Labrador – a perfect fit for our dog-loving Nina!

Awesome

I got a text from my brother yesterday saying that his friend, Julia, gave him seven dresses for the collection to send to Jane.  He brought them over last night.  Julia, I have no idea if you will check this blog or not, but if so, thank you so much for your contribution.

Then, I went out to check them mail today and got two more dresses in the mail!  These came from Shen and G’s good friend, Heather, from Gloucester Point.  Thank you so much, Heather. 

Our stack of dresses is growing!

Nice…

So, Mark was looking at the blog last night and says to me, “Wow.  That’s pretty bold to put that picture of yourself on the blog (the one in the teal dress).”  What’s he trying to say?  Would he not have found me and my teal dress attractive all those years ago before I met him?  I told him that I’m humiliating myself for a good cause.  He’s just lucky I didn’t retaliate by posting some of the old school photos of him I have.  I’m above all that…or am I?

                                                    

We make a nice pair, don’t ya think?

It’s a good thing we didn’t meet for a good long time…

The Bad and the Very, Very Ugly

It took me a little while to find these old pictures.  I should have just given up, but I thought that wouldn’t be quite as much fun.  So, for the “bad” dress…

It was 1992, so I’m making that my excuse.  It was in the days when Jessica McClintock was still cool – all you early 90’s prom goers know what I mean.  I was a sophomore in high school when I wore this dress, but I still have it because my mom gave me a bag of old stuff from their house not too long ago, so this dress along with the next one were part of what I had left behind.

Now, for the very, very ugly dress.  I’m just hoping that Jane has use for teal sequins, because that’s all there is to this dress.  Nina and Lyla love a book called Harry By the Sea.  It’s about a dog, Harry, that goes on a trip to the beach with his family.  He goes for a walk on the beach when a big wave comes from behind and crashes right on top of him. The wave rolls back, and Harry was left floating in the water, completely covered with seaweed.  “He didn’t look like a dog anymore – he looked like something from the bottom of the sea.”  That is what I equate this dress to.  People see Harry and scream, “It’s a Sea Monster!”  and, “It’s a Sea Serpent, it’s a Bushy –backed Sea Slug!”  All things you might want to shout when you see this dress…

I hope Jane can find something useful to do with it. 

BTW, Thanks, Sandra, for the dresses you dropped by on Friday! 

The Good, the Bad, and the Very, Very Ugly

Like I mentioned in the post yesterday, I’ve found three dresses so far.  I think I have another, but it might be buried in my closet.  Today, I’ll post pictures of the good.  I didn’t think it was fair to not submit my own photos to the contest, but I have to dig through a trunk in our garage to get the pictures from the “bad” and the “very, very ugly.”  I could have just put them on and taken a recent picture in them, but when I wore them my hair was much shorter and there was a small curling iron involved, so I can’t quite re-create just how awful it all really was.  You’ll have to check back tomorrow for the bad, and hopefully the day after that I’ll have the evidence (and the courage) to post the very, very ugly.

For the “good” dress, I think Jane will be thrilled to get this one.  I was a bridesmaid in the wedding of my best friend, Paula, nine years ago.  The fabric is beautiful and shiny, and there is tons of material to work with.  Paula is beautiful, and her wedding to Jeff was beautiful.  No surprise she picked beautiful dresses for us to wear.  I hope Jane enjoys this one.

Best or Worst Dress Contest

It starts by reading THIS quick column by Nicholas Kristof.  It will take you less than two minutes. 

Kristof followed up on his blog about a very practical way to actually help Jane.  Here’s where I know I can help, and I’m hoping to enlist the help of some friends.  Kristof writes this…

“I’m sure some readers will want to help Jane and her family, by digging out any old fancy dresses you may have in your basement. Her specialty is buying used wedding dresses or bridesmaid dresses on the second-hand markets of Nairobi (typically donated in the U.S. and then send in bulk containers to Africa), and then cutting them up and turning them into two or three children’s dresses. Finding this raw material is tough for her, and hours of prodding the used clothing markets in Nairobi may turn up only one dress. So when I mentioned to her that readers might have some dresses they’d be happy to send her, you should have seen her face light up.

The television documentary company that I’m working with (we’re filming a PBS documentary of “Half the Sky,” the book about empowering women that I wrote with my wife, Sheryl WuDunn) has agreed to accept parcels at its New York office. The company, Show of Force, will then trans-ship the dresses to Nairobi, paying the shipping costs and customs duties (which can be considerable), and get them into Jane’s hands. I hope to be able to run a follow-up blog item down the line with photos of Jane and whatever you send her.”

I’ve already found two prom dresses and one bridesmaid dress that I can send to Jane.  I think I can dig up some more.  If you’d like to get an old bridesmaid dress or prom dress off your hands, mail it to me, and I’ll send them to Show of Force’s NY office to be sent to Jane.  I won’t put our address right here on the blog post, but if you don’t have our address, email me (amandabeth2@gmail.com) and I’ll send it to you, or if you’d rather send your dress directly to NY, then I can give you that address also.  (I just thought sending them one big box of dresses might be easier for them than multiple boxes of single dresses.) 

Here’s where I’d like to make it fun.  If you have a picture or take a picture of yourself in the dress (the more hideous the better) and send it to me via email or mail, I’ll post it on the blog.  I’ll donate a new copy of Half the Sky, along with a Freeset poppy print wine bag to the one with the best photo.  The contest starts now!

*****Note: As of 10/13, the contest was updated a bit.  Check the more recent post for the latest.

                                   

Note:  For those concerned about the impact that sending used clothes to Africa might have on their garment industry potential, please consider Kristof’s perspective: 

“There are legitimate doubts about the value of sending things to Africa. The shipping and customs costs, while born in this case by Show of Force, tend to be considerable, and they’re one reason why shipping old stuff is rarely an optimal solution to poverty. In addition, shipping clothing tends to lower the price of clothing in Africa, which undermines local manufacturing. One reason there isn’t much of a garment manufacturing industry in Africa is that so much used American clothing already ends up there and is so cheap.

That said, there’s no significant market in Nairobi for wedding dresses/bridesmaid dresses that your clothes are going to undermine. And while this may not be the most cost-effective solution to the global problem of poverty, and it certainly isn’t a systemic solution – well, Jane will be thrilled.“

Visitors

Heading into the weekend, we were looking at quite a busy weekend.  The family picnic dinner at Nina’s school was supposed to be Friday, our community Fall Festival was supposed to be on Saturday, and we were going to have P and Jeff visiting with Abby also.  Due to the forecasted weather (that ended up not being bad at all), all got canceled except our visitors, thankfully.  P and Jeff were coming into town for a wedding, so we got to visit with them and got sole babysitting rights of Abby while they were at the wedding.   Abby really enjoyed playing with the “big girls” but the big girls seemed to have just as much fun playing with Abby and their old toys that they hadn’t seen in awhile.  As always, it was great spending some time with P and Jeff, and we’re glad we got some time with Abby too!

   

      

Fuzzy Weekend

This weekend, we had Fuzzy Bear visiting from Nina’s class.  You might remember something similar from Nina’s preschool, Konrad, the squirrel who visited us for a week.  Similar to Konrad’s visit, we took Fuzzy Bear with us all weekend, and documented some of our adventures in a notebook for Nina to return to school tomorrow.  On Friday night, we had invited a few neighbors over for smores in the driveway, so Fuzzy Bear took part.

Fuzzy Bear accompanied the whole family to our church’s chili cook-off on Saturday afternoon (but he stayed in the car), then he went with Nina and I on our date night Saturday evening.  On his last day with us today, Fuzzy Bear came to the tennis court to watch Nina hit balls.  I think he had a pretty good weekend. 

   

If Nina Were President…

After her bath this evening, Nina and I were having a conversation.  She was saying that school was pretty boring and why do they have to go every day.  She asked me if I could let the kids skip going to school.  I told her that it wasn’t up to me, and she asked if it was up to the teachers.  Trying to short cut the possibility of other questions, I said no, that it was up to the people that make the laws like the President.  Her response to me was, “Why do guys only rule over our states?”  to which my answer was maybe she could be the first female President.  She said she didn’t “know everything about things” yet, but when I asked her what rules she would make if she was president, this was her list…  By the way, I wrote out the rules the way she said them.

Rule #1:  Be careful with fragile things

Rule #2:  Don’t knock stuff in other people’s houses when you’re acting like an animal

Rule #3:  Kids have to go to school but not on the weekends (I found it interesting that she didn’t change this rule even when this is what started the conversation)

Rule #4:  Do not pull someone’s hair

Rule #5:  Put on bug spray before you go outside

Rule #6:  Don’t go crazy like a lion or tiger – have control of yourself

Rule #7:  Brush your teeth before you go to bed

Rule #8:  Don’t go creeping in someone’s house at night

Rule #9:  You can’t go crazy about treats when you want them

Rule #10: The best thing I want to be as President is to have people obey God and respect him

Catch and Release

After a week of rain last week, we’re making the most of the sunny days that we’ve got now.  Today felt hot and almost summer-like this afternoon, so after picking Nina up from school, the girls got a snack, and we headed straight outside.  We were out riding bikes with another girl on our street, then the girls wanted to head over to the pond and try their hand at catching turtles or fish.  We still save our bread to take over to the pond, so we went back home to get our bread and our nets, then we walked over to the pond.  After almost an hour of trying (using bread pieces to try to coax the turtles and the small catfish over) we caught several turtles with our nets.  Unfortunately, my camera battery died, and I didn’t have pictures of the girls with the turtles, but they were very excited to catch them.  The turtles, however, were not so excited to be caught and were very anxious to get back in the water.  I was surprised at the patience all three girls showed waiting for the turtles and fish to get close enough to try to catch.  The two older ones wanted to stay even longer to try catching more, but Lyla was hot and thirsty, so we decided to save up some more bread and try again soon.

Kindergarten Communication

It’s a fact that males and females communicate differently.  There are all kinds of theories about male communication styles versus females, the number of words men speak a day versus the number women speak, etc..  Just so we don’t think those styles take a long time to develop, I thought I’d give an example to support we just communicate differently – from the start. 

Nina came home from school the other day and as I was asking her about her day, the bus ride, etc., she said, “Mom, today on the bus a little boy just peeked around the seat and said ‘I like you’ to me then disappeared back in his seat.”  I started laughing, and she asked me why I was laughing, and my only response was that boys can just be funny sometimes.  I didn’t tell her that she’ll have a lifetime of trying to figure out how to communicate with boys.  I did ask her what she said back, and she said “Nothing because he just disappeared in his seat.”  Well, I really can’t blame the kid, I happen to think she’s pretty cute too!

Labor Day Weekend

Even though the weekend weather was a bit dreary, we ended up with a good afternoon on Sunday to enjoy a cookout with our friends on the street, then we spent Monday at Baltimore’s Inner Harbor visiting the Children’s Museum.  You can view the slideshow to see the pictures and read the captions.

		Labor Day Weekend VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

Lyla Update

Since the previous posts have been about Nina and Kindergarten, I thought I’d give Lyla a little exclusive post.  Lyla might be our resident 3 year old, but she has big ambitions.  She is dying to be scuba girl.  Maybe one day she’ll be a female version of Jacques Cousteau, but for now, she’ll settle on going around the house with her flippers, a snorkel, and a diving mask.  When she’s not playing scuba girl, she can be found raiding her sister’s room, trying to get into the refrigerator or pantry for snacks, or outside riding her bike or scooter.  She’s recently decided that the 3-wheel Razor scooter she was riding was too little kid, so she rides the 2-wheel scooter like all the big kids now.  She’s quite the little daredevil when it comes to trying new things, and we’d say she’s really gotten over her shy phase these days. 

The way she talks is still so cute and the cause of many smiles for Mark and I, but she gets self conscious, so we have to be careful to not make her feel bad.  She substitutes a ‘y’ sound for ever ‘l’ sound, so she’ll say her name is Yy-ya, or she’ll say she wants to read the book about the Yittle Yammie (little lambie).  She also substitues the ‘f’ sound for ‘th’ so one of our favorites was when she was memorizing a verse in Thessalonians (a mouthful already), she called it Fessayonians.  It’s very cute to us though.

She still adores her sister, and loves to play with her most of all.  She’s adjusting well to her new routine too, and even though she misses Nina while she’s at school, I think she’s enjoying a little 1 on 1 time for a few hours.