A Week of Unwritten Stories

It is Friday.  Last Tuesday, I figured out that my cleaning lady was the one robbing me blind.  On Wednesday and Thursday, I tried to search for advice, considered moving, and tried to trick Miss S into thinking that I still didn't know her sneakiness.  On Friday, I decided to move, but the one place I looked at wasn't really sure if they would be ready to move into, so I spent the whole day looking at more apartments.  On Saturday morning, I packed up everything and dumped it into the new place, and the stealing drama got even more dramatic, but I am too much of a storyteller to let you know the punchline without telling the whole story!  On Saturday afternoon, we picked up our friend Diane from the airport -- the kind of magical friend whom we had never met in person.  We connected because she is hoping to adopt Hosta, whom I have been helping out at the orphanage, and I decided to go out on a limb and invite her to stay with us and she decided to go out on a limb and say yes.  We ended up being the kind of mutual blessing to each other and our children, that we felt like was ordained to happen.  Then on Saturday evening (yes, still Saturday!) we met with the orphanage director here, picked up Hosta for the rest of the weekend (!!!), and met with the program director from the U.S. hours before we had to catch a plane home.  On Sunday.... it's hard to even remember what happened on Sunday!  We had four kids in various stages of excitement and wildness, and we managed to put a few things in the cupboards from my very hasty move.  On Monday, the older three all went back to their schools, and Diane and Buttercup and I ran errands downtown, including meeting with the lawyer and picking up a month's worth of packages that Miss B had somehow forgotten to tell me about.  The post office was not quite as dramatic as last time, but it was still not a simple trip!  On Tuesday was the court date, which I have written about, and an incredibly long day.  On Wednesday, Diane and Buttercup and Hosta and I went to Hosta's village to meet with some officials there, which is also a whole story in its own right, and I will simply say that poor Emerson and Hibiscus ended up spending fourteen hours at school because we were stuck there, but we got some incredibly important things done.  Fourteen hours later.  So on Thursday we let the kids stay home from school and tried to do something a little bit fun before dropping Diane off at the airport, and then the kids came home and played in the yard.  With their new shiny plastic junk, because what is a better way to thank kids for surviving fourteen hour days than letting them pick out shiny plastic junk from the toy aisle? Then we had to bring Hosta back to the orphanage.  There were a lot of tears that day.

And today is Friday again!  What an incredibly long week!  There are at least two or three long stories I need to write, but today I am being dedicated and working at actually unpacking our house.  Or rather, the kids have been great at the unpacking and distributing, and I have been working at putting things away!  If today were Monday and I had a week of Buttercup-only days ahead of me, I would have felt like I made good progress,

but as it is, I'm kind of discouraged because today is actually the end of the week.  At least I got three loads of laundry washed while the power was on, and my washing machine has a child lock so I don't have to worry about buttons getting pushed all the time, and it plays a song when I start it and to tell me it's done.  A singing washing machine.  It's time to be grateful for the small things!