Saturday, September 30, 2006
Guess what?!?!
Joe’s coming home!!!
And that is how the messages went for pretty much a day and a half. Having traveled that route just three weeks previously, I knew precisely where he was the whole time he and Bobby, Christy and Catie were traveling. I was very excited.
Joe and the big three landed about 20 minutes late and then managed to come through customs without incident to find Adam (one of the single guys we’ve adopted) and me excitedly waiting for them. OK, Adam wasn’t that excited but I was!
Bobby had asked me the day before they left the US to go measure the drum heads, he was in a music store and wanted to get new ones. For the summer his drums, which are usually on the stage at the school (thank GOD!), had been stored in the crawl space under the stage. I, not knowing this, went down the hill to measure them in a DRESS! Millie and Claire brought out the smaller drums but I had to go in after the bass drum myself because it was wedged under there pretty tightly. I measured them (accurately, thankfully) and called him back at the music store to give him the information along with a very important request – CHOCOLATE!!!!
Bobby, bless his heart, handed me 5 Hershey’s Special Dark chocolate bars as soon as he saw me at the airport. I LOVE that young man!!!! Even better than the chocolate – is this really Cyndi ‘chocolate SPEAKS to me’ Canner saying this??? – better than the chocolate was a hug from my 16 year old son!!!!!!!!
Loving him as much as I do I still made him ride in the back of the van. We packed 3 adults, 2 teenagers and 1 Catie in our Dodge with 6 suitcases, 2 bins and 6 carry-ons. I had taken out the middle, 2-person bench and then moved the 3-person bench forward. Actually, Bobby volunteered to sit back there next to the rear door because he didn’t want to share the bench with Adam and the girls.
I’m so glad they’re back and we are a complete family again!
Guess what?!?
JOE’S HOME!!!!
And that is how the messages went for pretty much a day and a half. Having traveled that route just three weeks previously, I knew precisely where he was the whole time he and Bobby, Christy and Catie were traveling. I was very excited.
Joe and the big three landed about 20 minutes late and then managed to come through customs without incident to find Adam (one of the single guys we’ve adopted) and me excitedly waiting for them. OK, Adam wasn’t that excited but I was!
Bobby had asked me the day before they left the US to go measure the drum heads, he was in a music store and wanted to get new ones. For the summer his drums, which are usually on the stage at the school (thank GOD!), had been stored in the crawl space under the stage. I, not knowing this, went down the hill to measure them in a DRESS! Millie and Claire brought out the smaller drums but I had to go in after the bass drum myself because it was wedged under there pretty tightly. I measured them (accurately, thankfully) and called him back at the music store to give him the information along with a very important request – CHOCOLATE!!!!
Bobby, bless his heart, handed me 5 Hershey’s Special Dark chocolate bars as soon as he saw me at the airport. I LOVE that young man!!!! Even better than the chocolate – is this really Cyndi ‘chocolate SPEAKS to me’ Canner saying this??? – better than the chocolate was a hug from my 16 year old son!!!!!!!!
Loving him as much as I do I still made him ride in the back of the van. We packed 3 adults, 2 teenagers and 1 Catie in our Dodge with 6 suitcases, 2 bins and 6 carry-ons. I had taken out the middle, 2-person bench and then moved the 3-person bench forward. Actually, Bobby volunteered to sit back there next to the rear door because he didn’t want to share the bench with Adam and the girls.
I’m so glad they’re back and we are a complete family again!
Guess what?!?
JOE’S HOME!!!!
Thursday, September 28, 2006
And the battle begins ...
After a hectic, yet much needed, visit to the US a subset of the Canner family has returned. It is interesting to me, Cyndi, that you can feel the oppression as you enter the country. It’s not the weather, though that was a bit sticky when we arrived late Friday night. It’s not necessarily the people, they are friendly enough. It’s the general feeling of something hanging over your head.
Welcome back to the Muslim world. Welcome back to a land of great beauty, to a people with great amounts of hospitality … to a place without hope. Read up on Islam and you will find that while there is a God, there is no relationship with Him, there is no hope.
Traveling here was fine, we spent longer at the security check-point in Baltimore than I might have liked. Oh, that poor woman who was counting people coming through - I don’t know what the magic number was but I won and she had to send me, with two children, to the special security line. We walked through the blower machine where it puffs air at you and I was sent to a special chair where I had to point at, but not touch, my carry-ons. She wiped my computer, the inside of my computer bag, and the inside of my purse with a little piece of cloth and then fed that cloth into a machine. I’m guessing the machine was looking for a residue of some sort. She also looked carefully through my computer bag and purse for containers of liquid, gel, or paste, but I was prepared having been alerted by Mom (thanks) to not carry anything like that.
The rest of the trip was without incident, our flight from Philadelphia was delayed, our hotel stay during the long lay-over in Frankfurt was fine, and our final flight was smooth. I will tell you, though, that there has to be a way for all of us to get the kid’s meals on the plane. My meal was fine, chicken with rice and steamed veggies, but theirs was chicken fingers, mashed potatoes and veggies. Not that much different you might be thinking, but it was the side dishes that were better. They had fruit salad (mine was tired looking lettuce), pudding for dessert (mine was some sort of fruit cake), they received a candy bar (none of that for me) and colored pencils and paper (no fun stuff for me to play with).
The girls traveled amazingly well, slept well both on the planes and in the hotel, enjoyed their time in the play-place at the McDonalds in the airport, colored with the aforementioned colored pencils. They charmed many and several people asked if they were twins. Oh, and Millie’s clarinet arrived in fine shape as well (we were amused to see it through the X-ray machine).
OK, so this is old – but hey, at least it’s a post – I’ve been shamed by all my blog-stalking friends (thanks guys) to get this thing moving again.
Please post comments so I get the positive reinforcement I need to keep up with this.
Welcome back to the Muslim world. Welcome back to a land of great beauty, to a people with great amounts of hospitality … to a place without hope. Read up on Islam and you will find that while there is a God, there is no relationship with Him, there is no hope.
Traveling here was fine, we spent longer at the security check-point in Baltimore than I might have liked. Oh, that poor woman who was counting people coming through - I don’t know what the magic number was but I won and she had to send me, with two children, to the special security line. We walked through the blower machine where it puffs air at you and I was sent to a special chair where I had to point at, but not touch, my carry-ons. She wiped my computer, the inside of my computer bag, and the inside of my purse with a little piece of cloth and then fed that cloth into a machine. I’m guessing the machine was looking for a residue of some sort. She also looked carefully through my computer bag and purse for containers of liquid, gel, or paste, but I was prepared having been alerted by Mom (thanks) to not carry anything like that.
The rest of the trip was without incident, our flight from Philadelphia was delayed, our hotel stay during the long lay-over in Frankfurt was fine, and our final flight was smooth. I will tell you, though, that there has to be a way for all of us to get the kid’s meals on the plane. My meal was fine, chicken with rice and steamed veggies, but theirs was chicken fingers, mashed potatoes and veggies. Not that much different you might be thinking, but it was the side dishes that were better. They had fruit salad (mine was tired looking lettuce), pudding for dessert (mine was some sort of fruit cake), they received a candy bar (none of that for me) and colored pencils and paper (no fun stuff for me to play with).
The girls traveled amazingly well, slept well both on the planes and in the hotel, enjoyed their time in the play-place at the McDonalds in the airport, colored with the aforementioned colored pencils. They charmed many and several people asked if they were twins. Oh, and Millie’s clarinet arrived in fine shape as well (we were amused to see it through the X-ray machine).
OK, so this is old – but hey, at least it’s a post – I’ve been shamed by all my blog-stalking friends (thanks guys) to get this thing moving again.
Please post comments so I get the positive reinforcement I need to keep up with this.
