A Gets Teeth Capped / Museum of Art / Fort Worth Zoo / Wildlife Safari / Papa's Farm / Dinner with Friends
Thursday 3rd - A visits the nutritionist and Dr. Partap. He is slowly losing weight and gaining height (so we are going in the right direction), but we still have a ways to go.
Saturday 5th - Melinda and I go to Tapestry Adoption and Foster Care meeting held at Irving Bible Church. We always learn so much from these.
Sunday 6th - We had dinner with the Brooks family at our house. Lots of fun and laughter and getting caught up with what is going on with them. They finally get to meet A & X.
Monday 7th - A undergoes oral surgery for capping 8 rotting teeth. There was a lot of sugar in his diet prior to coming to stay with us. He now matches X since X has 12 capped teeth. At least the dentist was kind enough to make them white porcelain caps. Evidently, STAR Health insurance that the kids use only pays for silver caps. For foster kids, his office personally pays the difference so they don't have a shiny mouth. Of course they have to put him out since he would have been impossible work on a 2-year-old's mouth without knocking him out.
Friday 11th - Drive-in Movie (one the kids can watch) the animated feature "Rango" with Johnny Depp. It was very odd, but a nice story.
Saturday 12th - We have the brilliant idea to take the DART Train downtown instead of driving to the Dallas Museum of Art. Our reasoning: the kids like trains and this will be a new experience for them. It most certainly WAS an experience. Little did we realize, the 12th was the annual Irish Festival downtown. The trains were packed going downtown with some people already drunk by 10:00 when we were on the train. A single mom who evidently does a lot of museums with her little girl suggested that we get off a stop earlier than we were scheduled to and then jump on the old-fashion trolley, Ooh...fun! (the other option we thought was just to take a bus from the next stop). We got off where we were supposed to and had to walk a quarter mile or more around the underground train station trying to get to the exit (lots of construction). When we finally emerge from underground, we walked to the nearby trolley stop. It appeared that we had JUST missed the trolley, so we waited for the next one due to come 19 minutes later. It never came. No problem, there is another one in ANOTHER 20 minutes - it never showed. Jack called DART (since they handle the trolleys). They claimed they were showing there were no delays and should have been there. Another 20 minutes went by (59 minutes from when we got there) and no bus. In frustration, we are about to go back underground and just go home. As we start walking away the trolley finally comes. He tells us that the other trolley broke down that morning and he was the only one running. Odd that DART did not know about it!
So we take the trolley 20 minutes to the Dallas Museum of Art (on par for the course, we get off too early and have to walk a few more blocks). The museum was great. While we went there on "Family Day" (they had lots of kids activities and crafts), it was the actual art that X most got into. He loved anything that was three-dimensional (e.g. sculptures, Indian masks, statues). After a very long day, we decided just to walk back to the train stations and skip the trolley. We were shocked to find that we were a mere four blocks away! After 1 hour and 20 minutes trying to GET to the museum and we could have walked there in 10 minutes. Oh, well... now we know.
If we thought it was crowded on the train getting TO downtown, going home at 4:00 after all all-day Irish (drunk) fest was horrible. Melinda and A got to sit down after someone gave up their seat. X had to stand the majority of the way and I finally got to sit down one stop before we got off.
It is important to note that I was in the Army for four years and yet I have never heard as many "f-bombs" during a single hour as that long ride home. Every 20th time or so someone would note that there were young children around. Ironically, the loudest drunk claimed she was a kindergarten teacher. We actually became concerned that they kids would repeat some of what they heard (and then we would have to explain where they got that language), but it never became a problem.
Monday 14th - Fort Worth Zoo! We had been building up to this for the last three weeks. This was the day that X finally got to see a real dragon. When made sure that he completely understood that it was NOT like the fictional huge fire-breathing dragons, but rather 7 to 9 foot long Komodo dragons. We watched a few videos and, when we finally got to see it, he did not appear to be the least bit disappointed. We got to see rhinos, giraffes, elephants, penguins, kangaroos, birds of prey, meerkats, lions, tigers and bears (oh, my!) Perhaps the coolest parts were feeding the parakeets in the free-flight area and the Museum of Living Art (MOLA) that holds all the reptiles and amphibians. The train ride took quite awhile to get on and it is very short, but it was still lots of fun.
Tuesday 15th – Friday 18th in Nacogdoches and Papa’s Farm in Lilbert. Going to the farm means riding the golf cart, riding tractors, getting to pet baby chickens, running around in the fields and woodlands and then lots of games with grandma.
Saturday 19th – “South Pacific” Chorale Concert. Some family friends of ours, the Chiu’s are members of the Dallas Sea Sky Choir. They have an annual concert that Melinda and I enjoy attending. The vast majority of it is always sung in Chinese (since the choir is 100% Asian), but they always have a theme. It was very entertaining and educational. X and I were the only ones to go since A was feeling “under the weather” and very cranky.
Monday 21st – back to the dentist for both A and X. Everything is on track for healthy teeth and gums.
Wednesday 23rd – fun in the local park for both A & X. There are great rock walls to climb and awesome other playground equipment where we go. Often Melinda will come by at 3:00 and then I will stop by after getting out of school. The kids get an average of 1 ½ hours to play at the park. It wears them out and sets them up for dinner. They love it and it is super for socialization and recreation skills.
Thursday 24th – Family Night Out at X’s school with Melinda and X (Jack stayed home with a slightly sick A). They had fun in the classroom.
Friday 25th – We had dinner with one of X’s friends and their whole family. There were delicious burgers and wonderful dessert. Of course there was lots of totally wild yelling and screaming (in fun) with four kids under 7 years old!
Wednesday 29th – Already planning for 2011 – 2012 school year, it is time to register X for kindergarten next year.
As you can see, it was a very, very busy March 2011!
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