Mundane Monday

Strutting her stuff with her sidewalk chalk. I love her, A LOT!

Dear Sandhya, someone loves you a lot! I hope you can pronounce his name, because I can't.

Dumpster across from the park that Shortcake normally plays in every day; the park, not the dumpster. Note the bicycle rickshaw that comes to get the trash and haul it away. Sorry earth, but a lot of my daughter's diapers are probably in there. Cloth just isn't cutting it anymore :(

Learning to play cricket in the park with some friends. These two boys are really sweet and patient with her. They are best friends, the same age, and have the same name. I'm sure it gets confusing!

Little miss INSISTED on putting on her swimsuit before going to have breakfast with friends. Mommy insisted on at least putting a skirt over it. She was not happy. Mommy won.

Here's to finding beauty in everyday life. Happy Monday!

Good Morning!

I saw this in the tailor shop neighborhood the other day. He's on top of another little shop there. I have no idea how he got up there...

Mundane Monday

I have been inspired by a couple other bloggers to do a regular (weekly, hopefully) post with pictures from a day in my life. I used Instagram on my phone since I always have my phone with me.

I sure am thankful for sesamestreet.org!

If there's one thing I've learned in India, it's this, blow dry your hair NOW, because you never know when the power will go out :)

I'm not completely dressed without my toe rings. One on each foot means that I'm married.


This is Mark's friend Sid in Friday's newspaper. He's an actor in the local film industry. I guess you could say it's our state's version of Bollywood. Several states in India make movies locally since there are so many different languages spoken here.

Who told her it was OK to get this big, this FAST?!

Construction going on next door to our building. They are breaking up a big boulder to lay a foundation to start building a house. It's LOUD. It's interesting to watch. Shortcake loves to sit and watch them work. They work hard. In the really, really hot weather. The other day one of the workers had a pet monkey on a chain. I have no idea where he got it. Shortcake got to see it. She thought it was pretty funny. Her favorite toy is a stuffed monkey that she got from her aunt on her first trip to the zoo while we were in America. Here, the zoo comes to us!



My most favorite meal in all of India! Steamed dosa, it's sort of like a pancake made of rice and lentils served with this spicy lentil and vegetable soup called sambar. It's delicious. It's pure vegetarian. It's actually considered a breakfast food. I prefer it for lunch but I could eat it anytime because I love it that much. This steamed version was invented by a very popular local movie star. He's a big deal around here. Steamed dosa is a big deal to me :)


We made a quick stop at my favorite local grocery store to pick up some ingredients for dinner. It has just about everything I need to be able to cook a meal for my family. Qmart, I love you!


Shortcake got an Easter package from her grandparents. In it were two bags of what used to be M&Ms. Sadly, American M&Ms are not made to withstand the Indian heat. They ended up in one solid block by the time they made it halfway around the world to our doorstep. They still taste AWESOME! You just have to have a knife to chip them off before you eat them :)


Happy Monday!

TWO

Shortly after my previous post about not having a time frame for how much longer our adoption would take, we got one. Not the one I was hoping for. We were told that it's going to be TWO years. This is not what we were expecting to hear! We were really hoping that it could be sooner. It seems like such a long time, but when I look back on how long we were waiting for Shortcake, our little miracle, it now seems like nothing. It was all worth it. I'm sure that's what I'll say when the next two years of our lives have come and gone. Looking back, when we hold our new little one in our arms, I can't wait to whisper in his or her ear, "you were worth it all!" Makes me think of this little lovely. I'm sure every mother feels this way. I already feel this way about a baby I haven't even met, who now with the new time frame hasn't even been born yet. I felt this way about Shortcake the minute we found out she was on the way. They are worth it all. Whatever it may include, sleepless nights, endless paperwork, having my fingerprints taken more times than your average criminal. I know it truly is worth it.

On a happier note, to go along with the theme of two, here are two of the cutest little things I've ever seen :)

Love this girl! Love those piggytails! Love that her friends at the park picked flowers and stuck them in her hair! Cuteness!!!

Tailor Made

One of the awesome perks of living in India is really cheap tailoring. Which I love because if you get a shirt home that doesn't quite fit right, no worries!

Here's the outside of the tailor shop that my friends and I frequent. It is tiny, probably 8 feet by 8 feet, maybe. Those big things in the window are air coolers filled with water. They work a little better than a fan and a little worse than an AC and take up lots of space and flood your living room floor if you forget that you are filling it and leave the water on too long. I'm speaking from experience...

This is our tailor. His last name is Romeo. I don't know how romantic he is, but he's got sewing skills that pay the bills. His sewing machine is manual, not electric, meaning he has to pump a foot pedal to get it to work. I'm sure it's the best option with all the random power outages here though.

Here is Mr. Romeo with his dogs.
They are always laying in the floor of his shop.
I wish I could remember their names...
I will call them Montague and Capulet to stick with the Shakespearean theme of this post.

Konked!

I am convinced that there are some things that you can ONLY see in India...

Taking time to smell the flowers...

We are in the process of adopting a baby from India. We have been in the process for nearly four years now with the various starts and stops that come with the territory. I'll sum it up for you: fill out paperwork, wait..., fill out more paperwork, wait..., more paperwork, more waiting. That's about the gist of it! Is it worth it? Absolutely! Has it taken a lot more work and a lot more time to finish than I ever imagined it possibly could? Definitely. But it's still so worth it!


So we recently got some great news (I mean really, really great almost too good to believe news) along with the usual news concerning our adoption process. First the great news, we were granted an extension to our future baby's immigration permit on our first request. This is HUGE because we would not have been able to continue our adoption if we hadn't received this permit and it was a one time chance. So we are breathing a huge sigh of relief. And for the usual news, more waiting! Till when? We don't know... For how long? No idea! Have they given you a time frame? Yes, but it was three years so you can see why that no longer applies!

The upside to all this is we have plenty of time to stop and smell the flowers. Which is just what Shortcake wanted to do over and over on our walk the other day. No more paperwork (that I know of) for at least another few months and we just wait...easy, yet hard all at the same time.