Visit News

Hi everyone! This is Summer. Ever since I found out that I have a twin sister, I've been e-mailing Marigold and talking to her on the phone. Today, we were chatting online and she suddenly asked me, "Would it be okay if I come to visit?"

I was a little bit surprised, because we'd already talked about meeting and it was something we both really wanted to do. It seemed odd that she was asking me again. "Of course," I replied. "Like I said."

She typed back, "No, I mean, can I come visit right away?"

This startled me, but I replied, "Yeah, I'd like that."

"Great, I'll see you soon!" she told me.

Then there was a pause. Um... I was excited to see her. But I need a bit more information than that!

"Are you coming with your parents?" I typed.

"Nope, just me," Marigold replied immediately.

That seemed... unusual. We're only twelve! I know kids our age fly alone all the time, but not usually halfway across the country to stay with people they've never met! Yeah, she's my twin, but her parents have never even talked to our guardians.

"Your parents are going to let you?" I asked doubtfully.

"Sure, they don't mind," Marigold replied, again really fast.

I don't mean to judge, but that seems kind of irresponsible of them. Marigold hasn't ever told me much detail about the parents who adopted her, but what little she did say seemed positive. Would they really not care?

"I think Inna and Maia will want to talk to them," I told her, trying to be diplomatic.

"Okay," Marigold typed. "I'll have them phone."

Maybe it's just me, but that doesn't seem like she was exactly rushing to get everyone talking. I didn't see any point pushing it, though, so I just asked, "When do you think you'll be coming?"

"I don't know. Soon. Oops, got to go! Love you, Summer!"

I barely had time to type back "I love you too" before she went offline.

Now, please don't get me wrong - I'm really, really excited to meet Marigold. Something about this visit seems really weird, though. I hope everything is going to be okay. I hope she really comes... but that nothing bad is going on, too!

Love,
Summer

Two letters, and life changes

Hi, this is Summer. (I guess you could tell that from the picture anyway, huh?) Well, I got huge news today. I'm still really shocked, and I'm not sure how to process it.

Last year, on my birthday, I decided that I wanted to find out about my biological family. Maia wrote to the Toronto Children's Aid Society, which is the group that placed me for foster care and adoption, to see if we could get any information about them. I did get some, which is better than knowing nothing at all, but I was a little bit bummed that I have to wait till I turn eighteen to get my full identifying details.

I had pretty much just accepted that I won't be able to make much progress on my search until I'm an adult. So I was really surprised when another letter came from the Children's Aid Society in the mail today. I didn't think I'd be hearing from them again for a few years. I wondered if there had been some mistake, or if they'd found something else non-identifying that they could give me right away.

In my haste to open the envelope, I ripped it too hard and all the contents ended up on the floor. The first sheet I picked up was written by hand, and the writing looked like someone about my age rather than an adult. That seemed even weirder. Why would I be getting a letter from another kid through the agency that had placed me for adoption?

Once my initial moment of confusion had passed, I realized there was a printed covering letter in the envelope too, so I decided to read that first because it seemed like it was probably supposed to explain the handwritten letter. I flipped it over... and got the shock of my life.

The covering letter started with an apology. It turns out that I hadn't been placed for adoption by the Children's Aid Society itself - which I had just assumed - but by another group doing contract work for them at the time. That group had made a pretty serious mistake. I had to read the next line a few times before I could comprehend it.

I was not an only child in my biological family.

I have a twin.

This was totally shocking to me. I had no idea.

I figured that I might have biological brothers or sisters out there, because my first parents weren't all that old and they likely had more children after they lost custody of me, whether they stayed together or ended up with other partners. I was prepared to find out someday that I had siblings or half-siblings.

I wasn't prepared to find out that I already had a sister that I shared the womb with. In movies, it seems like twins have this magical connection to each other, but I never felt that. I never felt anyone who was that close was out there and missing from my life. I was totally blindsided by the news.

Twins aren't supposed to be separated for adoption. Even at the time, that was very much against policy. We should have been placed together. The letter went on to say that they're still investigating how it happened, whether it was a clerical error or whether my twin was already living somewhere else when I was removed from the home... and I'm sure that with time, I'll start to care about that. For right now, I can't even begin to deal with how it happened. I'm just trying to process that this is going on at all.

The other letter, the one that was handwritten, is from my twin sister. You don't have to be eighteen to know your biological siblings like you do to find out about your biological parents. I  haven't read my twin's letter yet. I want to, and I will soon.

I'm just trying to deal with the fact this is even happening. It's totally unbelievable! I wonder if she's very much like me...

Love,
Summer

An Agglomeration of News

Hi everyone, this is Summer! We're back from our trip. We had a wonderful time visiting Hungary, Croatia, and Italy. Our first stop was Budapest, then we took the train to Zagreb. From Zagreb we rode on a bus to Rijeka, then drove a rental car to Otok Krk (which means Krk Island.) We spent a few days at the beach on the Adriatic, then took another bus from Rijeka to Trieste, Italy, via Slovenia, then a train from Trieste to Venice. It was an amazing two weeks!

We plan to do a post that's just about our trip, including lots of photos, but Blakeney took loads and loads of pictures and we haven't had time to get them all uploaded, sorted by place, and captioned if necessary. When we do, we'll be happy to share it.

For now, though, we have some major news to share. I'm going to tell the small news first, though, to keep you in suspense about the big news for a minute or two more. ;-)

The small news is, I decided to enter the Little Miss Playthings contest! When it was first suggested to me, I thought it was some kind of beauty contest, and I didn't think that was my thing at all. It turns out, though, that it's actually a photo contest, with different challenges each week. It actually sounds pretty artistic and creative, and I think it'll be fun! I'm the contestant, but all my sisters are helping me.

Please go to Bean's site, here, to vote on the rounds. You don't have to vote for me, mind you. There are a lot of amazing photographers who have entered, and it's not a big deal to me if I win or not. I'm just looking forward to the challenge of it. A contest isn't any fun without voters, though, so please don't forget to choose your favourite photo each week for the next few weeks to come!

So yeah, that's the small news.

Here's the big piece...

While we were in Italy, Maia proposed to Gia, and Gia said yes. So we're going to have a wedding! We're all super excited and happy for them. They're a great couple, and I think they'll have many, many joyous years together. We're all eager to help them celebrate!

We missed you guys, but we had an amazing trip. Still, it's always nice to be home again.

Love,
Summer

P.S. I did my first photo shoot for LMPT today. I want my actual entry to be a surprise, but here are a couple of extra shots that aren't going to be entered into the contest. The other person in the photos is, of course, my sister Kiwi.

Vampire Politics

Hi folks, this is Bree, with an update on our vampire situation. (Not our resident vampires, but vampires in general as relate to us. I realize that with all the bloodsuckers around us - and I mean that "bloodsuckers" in the nicest possible way - it gets confusing.) 

As our regular readers probably recall, back in February we defeated a powerful group of ancient vampire bullies who called themselves the extremely pretentious title of The Elders. Defeated as in gone, gotten rid of, never to return again to mount a counterattack. We were, as far as we could tell, safe from them.

What we weren't quite sure was whether they were all killed by the fae army, or whether some of them slipped away in the mass exodus of vampire hangers-on who showed up hoping to participate in a bloodbath just for the sake of the bloodiness. (Vampires are not, as a general rule, particularly kind people. Clare, Tabitha, Cécile, and Marie-Grace are pleasant exceptions to the mean rule.) Real battles aren't like books or movies - they're confusing and chaotic, and you can't really keep track of what every single person is doing the whole time. It's easy to miss things, even big things like enemies running.

If some of them slipped away, we weren't sure what to do about it. Go after them? That seems kind of heartless, hunting them while they're down. On the other hand, if we just ignored them, they might grow strong enough to come back... not to mention the people they'd eat in the meantime. It was a conundrum - but one that was unexpectedly solved.

The remains of the Elder group sent us a messenger. How do these people always know where to find us? We aren't even home! But anyway, they sent a messenger. Three of the Elder group survived the battle, one of their leaders - although not the head honcho - and two underlings. To our even greater surprise, the remaining members of the Elder army sent not threats, but terms of peace.

They offered: To give up their pretensions of vampire leadership. Never to attack us again. To lift the orders of execution they gave their people regarding any of our family members. And... most surprising of all, they promised to stop eating humans. More of a win than we could have hoped for.

All we had to do in exchange was not kill the remaining three of them. Which seemed like a fair deal, since we didn't really like the idea of more killing anyway, and this would mean they wouldn't be dangerous anymore. It seemed like the best possible ending. There's no reason not to accept; it's what we wanted anyway, and if they don't keep up their end of the bargain we don't have to hold up ours either, so it's all gain at no cost.

However, we sent back one more term of peace: They have to let Gia stay with us, even though she worked for them.

They accepted that requirement too. They didn't seem to have a problem with what we were asking; they didn't actually seem to remember who Gia was when we mentioned her name. We had to remind them that she was their employee. They seemed indifferent to what happened to her and said we could "keep her" - which sort of makes her sound like a pet or a cheap souvenir, but at least they aren't coming for her. Clearly she means a lot more to us than she did to them. Gia seemed really relieved that her connection to them is officially terminated.

So ends our conflict with The Elders, I guess. No uncertainty, and no loose ends.

We still have vampire-related problems, though. There's a major power vacuum (explained in more detail in the linked post) now that the pretentious vampires aren't around to keep the crazy vampires from blowing their whole secrecy gig. 

We've been trying to get away from it all while we're on vacation, but we keep tossing around ideas for what to do. There's no leadership every vampire will accept - even The Elders, for all their violence, were ignored by most vampires most of the time. There's no one else we know of who could get a majority to listen. Certainly not us. Most of us aren't even vampires, for one thing, and they will want to be ruled by their own. Also, we're still kids, and running around trying to impose martial law on insane vampires isn't exactly a task we're eager to take up.

So... what to do?

We went round and round - finally Summer had what actually seemed to be a workable idea. What about some kind of vampire council, or parliament? There's no potential leader everyone would accept... but if every potential leader had some support, they could work together to make things happen. We'd be willing to take part, and we'll get the ball rolling - and we plan to lay some ground rules, like no killing humans. Not sure how well that's going to go over, but we have to try.

Finally, some stability is on the horizon - we hope - in the vampire corner of our world.

Love,

Bree

A Hopeful Sign

Hi, this is Bree. Blakeney and I are in Western New York. We got here safe and sound (although I got separated from Blakeney for awhile in the Toronto airport, which was scary because that place is huge) and are having a good and relaxing time.

Sorry we haven't blogged at all in a week or so, but we've all been crazy busy with family and holiday stuff.

I don't have time for a long entry right now, since it's Christmas Eve and we're going to church, but I just wanted to fill our blog friends in on some good news. :-)

Today when I was getting my clothes out of my suitcase, I found a pair of ballet shoes in there under my favourite flannel shirt. I was surprised, because... well, I don't do ballet. I would have no reason to bring something like that. I packed my own bag, so I didn't see why that would be in there, or how it got there. I guess it could be the dog, but April doesn't usually leave stuff so neatly, and I've never seen her carry two shoes at once. But even if it was April, why wouldn't I have seen them before this? I've been living out of this suitcase for days, and it's not that big - and the dog is back home.

I figured there was more to this, so I decided to take a closer look. When I did, I realized the shoes weren't a pair after all. The right shoe was slightly smaller, and the left shoe was significantly more worn. I flipped the side down so I could see if anything was written there; Fiona and Kaya write their names in their slippers so they won't get mixed up with their classmates' shoes, because the shoes all look kind of alike. I figured it was worth a try to see who they belonged to. 

I gasped with surprise... because the right shoe was labeled "Cecile" and the left one was labeled "Marie-Grace"! Our missing vampire friends!

I think this was a message. I think it's still too dangerous for them to show themselves - if someone else saw the shoes, they wouldn't realize it was anything besides the clothing I packed for myself, so it's less dangerous - but I think they're telling us they're both alive and safe somewhere. If they could leave something in my suitcase, they must even be pretty nearby.

We're really, really relieved. I hope they get in touch in person soon. For now, I think this is good holiday news. The other girls were right; it worked out in perfect timing for Christmas, just like a holiday movie!

Merry Christmas and happy holidays to all our friends! *hugs from all The Greens and The Roses*

Love,

Bree

All Better Now

Good news, everyone - Kiwi went in for her surgery today, and now she's home! :-)

Kiwi is doing well. She says she isn't too sore, and she can breathe a lot better with the bone in her nose fixed. She's still really groggy, though, and that's why I (Summer) am reporting on her progress instead of her. Kiwi has some pain pills to take, and she's supposed to take it easy for the next few days, but she's going to be fine.

We're all really relieved. There wasn't any real danger to Kiwi from the surgery, but medical procedures are always a little nerve-wracking. We're glad she's home and feeling better.

Tabitha seems better, too, now that she's sure Kiwi will really be okay. She still isn't talking about what happened when Cécile and Marie-Grace came over, but she's otherwise pretty normal again, and working hard on staying in control of herself. Tabitha watched The Dark Crystal with Kiwi this evening; I think it was good for the two of them to spend time together, so Tabs can see that all is truly forgiven.

Kaya and Fiona have been rehearsing hard for the Nutcracker. Cécile and Marie-Grace haven't been over again because they're all spending so much time at the dance school these days, but Kaya and Fi see them at practices, and have carried our hellos and good wishes back and forth. Once Nutcracker is over, we're going to spend more time with them.

So yeah, the main news is Kiwi. (No new developments, either good or bad, on the recent vampire issues.) Kiwi is feeling pretty cheerful, and wants me to tell you that she got to keep her hospital gown and hospital ID bracelet, because she's really excited about that for some reason. (She tells me that the reason is "Because it's cool!" Well, okay then.) I think she's looking forward to life being back to normal again. Kiwi doesn't like being laid up with an injury, she likes being active. She should be good as new in a few days, though.

Kiwi says thanks for all the concern and well-wishes, and she very is glad to be able to give her friends good news! :-)

Love,

Summer

A Letter and a Trip

Hey, this is Summer! I have two pieces of news to fill my bloggy friends in on. :-)

First of all, remember (or I will remind you...) how the day after my birthday, I asked Inna and Maia if we could find out about my biological family? Well, as I updated in the comments on that entry, Maia sent a letter to the Children's Aid Society that placed me for adoption, to see what they knew about my background. Yesterday we got a letter in response. I was pretty excited, but also kind of scared and nervous to find out what it said!

They sent what's called "non-identifying information," which basically tells me some things about my biological parents and why I was in foster care, without telling their names or giving information that would lead to figuring out who they are. I have to wait till I turn eighteen to get my full records... which I find kind of lame because my adult adoptive sister who has custody of me said it was okay. I can wait a few more years, though. It kind of takes the pressure off making decisions about meeting them if I can't yet anyway.

The coolest thing was it told me what my biological parents looked like. No pictures, but there was a description. As I already knew, my dad was black and my mom was white. I got my curly hair from both of them, and my amber eyes from my dad's side of the family. Actually it sounds like I look more like my dad in general. My hobbies are more like my mom, though. She liked writing and horses, too. One cool thing I found out was that my dad had been to college; I guess I just kind of assumed neither of them would have. They were pretty young, though, and they had some problems, including drinking and drugs, so they didn't take good care of me and I ended up in foster care. (They didn't abuse me, though, but I knew that.) My parents worked on a case plan for awhile, but they weren't able to get it together in time and they lost their parental rights. It didn't say if they were still alive or not, but they were as of when I was adopted, so hopefully their lives went better after that.

There was also information about my first adoptive family who sent me back, but I just kind of skimmed it. It was what I remembered. They were married, upper middle class, two other kids that they had by birth. I wasn't really interested in the details, but maybe I will be someday. Right now I kind of feel like if they didn't want me, why should I care about them? I have a new family now, that loves me. I set that part of the letter aside.

All in all, I feel pretty good about this. I found out some information, and it satisfied some of my curiosity. Someday when I'm older, I'd like to find out more, but I'm content for now. I'm glad I asked Maia and Inna to help me get the info.

Also, on a totally different subject, Blakeney is taking a trip to visit her parents and grandparents in upstate New York - and she's taking me with her! I'm so excited! I've never been to the United States before, and the other girls say there's a lot of cool stuff to do in the Rochester area. Blakeney's favourite restaurant in the whole world is in there - a really good Ethiopian place, and we don't have an Ethiopian restaurant here at all - so we'll probably eat there the day our flight gets in. Blakeney's parents live in a smaller town in the area, so we'll get to experience some rural life too. I'll try to post some blog entries from our trip!

Bree may get to go with us too. She really wants to, but she's trying to figure out if she can miss that much school. She's never been to New York State either, although she grew up in the United States, so for her it's not a new country.

Hopefully it'll work out. It would be fun to have Bree along! We would have loads of fun in Flower/Flour City, and visiting Blakeney's folks! Bree and Summer, painting the town red... not literally. I hope she gets to go too, but I'm on the trip for sure.

So that's our news for now. Hope life is good for our blog friends, too. :-)

Love,
Summer

Decision Time... Finally

Hi, this is Clare. I finally made a decision today. I'm going to let the family adopt me, and I'm going to be their official sister.

I know it probably seems weird that it took me so long to decide that. I've always liked them. They've always been nice to me. I've always wished I was a sister, not just a long-term guest. It was hard to say that, though.

For one thing, it's been awhile since I've been able to rely on other people. When my grandmother died and my family was arguing over who was going to be stuck with me, I kind of felt like I was never really going to be wanted. Even when the Greens said they wanted me to stay, it was hard to believe.

Also, I was worried bad things would happen to them because of me. I was worried they'd get hurt. I thought it would be better for me to run away so they didn't have to deal with my problems. I figured they'd eventually decide they'd had enough and kick me out or leave me for the bad vampires to find, so I should just cut my losses and make my own way before they could turn their backs on me.

When we got the threatening letter the other day, the family kept talking about what "we" were going to do. It was just assumed that I was staying, and they were going to protect me. It finally sank in, I guess. They already saw me as part of the family. I just had to decide what to do about it.

So... I decided I'm staying. I'm going to be an adopted Green. Finally. :-)

Love,
Clare

Six Months

This is the six month anniversary of our blog! Wow, can you believe that? A lot has changed in that time:

1.) There are two new sisters in the family, Bree and Fiona.

2.) Our neighbours became friends, then more like family. We found out they have some secrets, but we love them in spite of it.

3.) We met Clare, learned that vampires are real, and gained her as another honourary family member.

4.) We learned that we have powers we didn't even know existed.

5.) We got a dog!

There's one more thing, too, and it's related to Point #2 above. Lately we've been thinking how hard it'll be if we ever move, or our neighbours do. We'd really miss them. So we've decided (including our guardian and the adult sisters next door) that we're going to to keep being a big family. We're not just going to go our separate ways. We've all sort of adopted each other anyway - and now we've put it in words and made a decision. We're really happy!

Here's to six months making great blog friends! And here's to many more!

Love,
The Green Girls

Intervention with the Vampire

Hi, this is Bree. :-)

This has been a fun day for us. We went to Summer's horse show - she won four ribbons, and two of them were blue! We were so proud of her. Evelyn was in heaven (she loves horses) and I think she's going to be taking lessons now at the barn where Summer rides, too.

That's not what this post is really about, though. It's about our friendly local vampire.

Clare seems to be doing better since we rescued her at the park. She seems more relaxed, and she's living inside with us rather than out in the yard. She makes conversation, hangs out with us, and so on. There's one thing that worried us, though. She wouldn't commit to staying here. Whenever we brought it up, Clare would say she likes it here but she'll go if she feels she's putting us in danger. (Our guardian wants her to stay, too, but short of physical restraint there's not much she can do if Clare really gets desperate to go.) We don't want her to run again. We'd rather take the risk than leave her to face danger alone. The difficult part was convincing her.

The last couple of days, Clare has seemed more and more like she was resigning herself to leaving. She was careful to remind us she was temporary. I saw her looking up bus schedules online. We had to do something fast, or she was going to bolt. Sooner, rather than later.

After we got back from the horse show, told Clare I needed to talk to her privately. I was really nervous. Obviously I'm not scared of Clare, but sometimes I get really awkward and tongue-tied, and just stand there like a moron. I didn't want to screw this up.

Before I could lose my nerve, I blurted out, "So Clare, we can really do this the easy way or the hard way."

She looked confused. "Do what, Bree?"

"Look, we're not going to ditch you. Me and my sisters won't, and Blakeney won't. Even Inna and Maia are on your side. So this can really go one of two ways. You stay here, we defend ourselves as best we can, everything turns out fine and you lead a long, happy life. Alternatively, you flee into the wind, we follow you, we track you down, we defend ourselves and you although it's a lot more difficult since we're not on home turf, so we're in greater danger... then we bring you home, and on to the happy life. Those are the only options. You disappearing or us leaving you to your fate are not options. So really, the best thing you can do at this point is stay, and make it all less difficult."

Clare stared back at me. "What if I just run? You won't be able to find me."

I laughed. "Yeah right. They didn't let me disappear, and I wasn't easy to find. The distance of almost a whole continent didn't stop them. It won't this time, either. We're involved now. We're going to protect you, whether you like it or not. You just get to decide whether to make it easy or difficult."

"Why should I make it easy?"

I said the first thing that came to mind. "Because we have tickets to Cirque du Soleil tomorrow night. It's an early birthday celebration for Blakeney. If you leave, who's gonna sit in your seat?"

As soon as these words were out of my mouth, I regretted them. What the heck, Bree? There are a thousand reasons she should stay, and the best reason you can come up with is that you don't want to have to scalp her ticket? What is that? She's in mortal danger, and that's what springs to mind?

Sometimes I don't think on my feet very well. Weirdly, though? It seemed to work.

"You guys got me a ticket?" Clare asked in a small voice.

"Well, sure. You're practically family now, and the show is at night. We just kind of assumed. But if, you know... you don't want to..."

"I want to," Clare said quickly.

Getting her to stay at least one more day is a minor victory at best. One more step toward making her realize she's family, though? I think that may count for something.

Love,
Bree

School is out and summer beckons!

School is out for the summer for all nine Greens! The elementary school girls finished on Wednesday, and the rest of us were finally done yesterday/Friday. All exams, all papers, all homework... all done! It's very exciting.

Today we were supposed to have a picnic with our neighbours. (We should give them a pseudonym surname so we don't have to keep saying that. Maybe another colour to match The Greens!) The plan was to go to a park about six blocks from our house and eat sandwiches and salad and chips. There's a playground and a place to throw a frisbee, and our dog can run around. Unfortunately, it is raining! Maybe it'll clear up by supper time. We can hope. I don't think we're going to cancel either way, but we may have to eat inside at home. Better than nothing, though!

Now that school is done for the term, we should have more time to blog! Yay!

How about our readers - is your school done for the summer? What are you doing to celebrate?

Love,
Kaya and the Other Greens

Diggin' the Dancing Queens!

Hi! This is Kaya and Fiona, writing a post together! :-)

(The post title is from the the ABBA song "Dancing Queen," by the way.)

Kaya: So, the last two days have been our dance recital. We had our first performance Friday night, and the second tonight - Saturday.

Fiona: It went great! Everybody clapped!

Cast Off!

Today Evelyn got her cast taken off her broken (well, not really broken anymore) arm! She still has to wear a splint for a couple of weeks and go to a few physical therapy sessions, but no big bulky cast anymore. Ev is really happy about that. She hasn't been in any pain since right after it happened, but having a cast on her arm made it harder to play.

Because of the severity of the break, the doctors thought she would need to be in a cast for a few more weeks beyond this. When she went in for her routine x-rays to check her progress, though, it was a lot better than they thought it would be. Like, so much better that they did another set of films to make sure it wasn't a mistake. No mistake, though. Her arm just healed really fast.

We're very happy for her! I'm going to bake her some cookies to celebrate. Yay for a swift recovery!

Love,
Felicity

New Neighbours

A couple of hours ago, some new neighbours moved in next door. Kaya and Fiona noticed them when they were taking April (our new dog) out for a walk, and we decided we'd go help them bring in their stuff and see if they needed anything.

They turned out to be really nice. I think they appreciated the help because it was already getting dark when they got here. They said they had driven from the ferry (an hour and a half from the city,) so they didn't really have much choice about the time, because the boat schedule just is what it is.

Their family is actually a lot like ours! We were kind of surprised. They're sisters too. It's pretty obvious they aren't all biological, though, because they don't look alike at all. They aren't even all the same race... just like us! It felt like we had a lot in common.

The oldest two sisters are adults. Their names are Inna and Maia. (Inna has an accent; maybe Russian?) The middle sister is twelve, named Summer. The youngest is ten, and she's called Kiwi - but it turns out her real name is Caroline and Kiwi is just a nickname, because that's how she said "Carrie" when she was little and it stuck.

They didn't say exactly why they moved here, but it sounds like it was something to do with Inna's job.

So, those are our new neighbours! We decided to mention them in our blog because we hope to be friends with them, so we'll probably talk about them more in the future.

Love,
The Green Girls

We are a family that owns a dog!

Yesterday, we finally got our dog! :-)

We went to the animal shelter again yesterday, and they had just had a new dog brought in. She's a female, about two years old, of mixed breed. We can't tell exactly what breeds she has in her, but it seems like maybe she has some retriever blood mixed with something fluffy like a poodle. She's all white except for her black nose, with kind of longish and curlyish fur. Our dog is a little bigger than we planned - she stands almost hip height on the older girls - but our guardian said it was alright as long as we promised to take her outside a lot so she wouldn't feel cooped up.

When we came in the room at the shelter, our dog starting wagging her tail, and she licked all of our hands. She seemed to like us already! We knew she was supposed to be ours, and we felt like she thought so too. When we first brought her home she was more shy because it's a new place, but she settled in fast and now it's like she was always here.

The reason we didn't post about her right away is we had a hard time deciding on a name for her! When we actually met her, none of the names we had picked in advance seemed quite right. We still haven't decided for sure yet.

So now, we are pleased to introduce you to our new dog... soon to be named! We're so excited! :-)

Love,
The Green Girls

And then there were... nine! :-)

Yesterday, we asked Blakeney if we could stay home and keep Evelyn (and her broken arm) company while she was off school for the day to rest. Blakeney said no way; we didn't have broken arms, so the rest of us weren't allowed to miss time from our studies. We were disappointed, but it's fair. It's not like Ev was taking the day off having fun, either.

This morning, Blakeney said she had changed her mind and none of us were going to school. We all kind of exchanged looks, because we couldn't figure out the reason behind sudden shift in priorities from academia to leisure. Then she grinned and let it slip.

Today we got to go pick Fiona up! :-)

Instead of splitting up to bus or walk to our various schools, we all went down to the family centre to meet our new (well, not-so-new for Bree) sister. It was really exciting! We were giggling and talking and speculating the whole way.

When we met Fiona, she seemed really, really quiet. Bree said Fiona isn't usually that way; she was just nervous. Normally she's a chatterbox.

After some awkward introductions, we all went home, and showed Fiona her new room - she's sharing with Charissa and Evelyn. Fiona still didn't really say much, but she seemed to be doing alright.

At supper, though, she had a total meltdown. We couldn't really figure out what was going on. It seemed to be about not liking green beans, which is far from a huge deal. None of us could make much progress with her - until Felicity somehow managed to calm her down. I don't think even Felicity has any clue how she did that. We were all kind of awkward after the tantrum, but Blakeney told us that Fiona was just overwhelmed by being in a new place. Hopefully that's true!

Now that supper is over, things are going better. Fiona played Candyland with Ev and Charissa for awhile, and she seemed to have fun. Now we're watching The Princess and the Frog again because Fiona hasn't seen it and we still have the copy we borrowed. Overall, it didn't go too badly.

Finally, all nine sisters are here now! Yay! :-)

Love,
The Green Girls

Happy Birthday, Bree!

The Green Girls, reporting live from our sister Bree's slumber party! Happy birthday, Bree! Sweet sixteen today!

:-)

We've been having a really good time. It's actually a pretty big party, because Bree invited two of the friends she's been eating lunch with at school - Krista and Kelly - plus our family. (The other kids she sits with are boys, and you can't have boys at a girls' slumber party!)

We made pizza for supper, which was fun even though we ended up with a huge mess. We made four different kids of pizza, and it all tasted great. Then we made ice cream sundaes for dessert. Bree never eats much, but she had some and she said it was good, too. It was fun that we all worked on the food together, and since we all helped with cleaning up, it didn't take that long.

After supper we played games. For the occasion we had borrowed Trivial Pursuit, Risk, and Apples to Apples. Bree won Trivial Pursuit (fair and square; we didn't let her win even though she was the birthday girl,) Kirsten of course won Risk like she always does, and Felicity and Kaya tied in Apples to Apples. Josefina was a little sulky because she wanted to win that one too, but she got over it.

For presents, we gave Bree some new clothes, a set of Firefly DVDs, some books she wanted, a Great Big Sea CD, and a necklace we made for her. The necklace has a pretty painted bead with a bird of paradise on it; we explained that it was because we want her to feel happy in our house. Bree just said "thanks" but there were tears in her eyes, so we think it meant a lot to her. It seems like she liked all her gifts.

Then we popped popcorn - not that we really needed more to eat - and watched some Firefly episodes. Now it's time for movies. We're going to watch Fellowship of the Ring and Holes. If we're not too tired - and we're pretty wired! - we'll watch Labyrinth and Princess Bride, because those are the birthday girl's favourites.

Fun party! Wheeee! :-)

Love,
The Green Girls

Back From Florida and Bree Squee!

Hello, blog readers! After a vacation in sunny Florida, we are back in snowy Canada and back to our blog.

I, Josefina, will be reporting a little on our trip. I got picked to do it because I want to be a journalist and travel writer someday. So here goes.

Last Tuesday, we got up really early because we had to be at the airport by 5 a.m. This time of year, most flights leave our airport in the early morning. Before we got in the taxi, we got some good - but surprising - news. And by "got some news" I mean "Bree showed up on our doorstep." We thought she wasn't going to make it, but she did, with moments to spare.

Blakeney asked if she wanted to come to Florida or stay with our neighbours like we planned. We all kind of held our breath, I think. It seemed almost like... a make or break moment. Did she really want to be part of our family, or was she just going to be like a roommate? Now, rationally, we knew it didn't mean that. Maybe she would stay because she was tired, or overwhelmed, or wanted to set up her room... or just didn't have any warm weather clothes packed. We understood there were all kinds of reasons she might stay. Not because she didn't want to spend time with us. Not because she didn't want to be our sister. Still, we were all kind of tense.

Bree said she would go. :-)

We all had a really great time. We went swimming in the outdoor pool every day, and went to a couple of different beaches. Our favourite was a place called Honeymoon Island. We also went kayaking one afternoon, and another day we took a boat tour from Tarpon Springs, which is a little town famous for sponge diving and Greek culture. On Sunday night we went to see a belly dance performance, which was really cool and fun. We also ate lots of good food, and enjoyed being able to dress for warm weather. There were all kinds of palm trees and cool birds. It was really great!

It was a really good way to get to know Bree, going on a trip together. We were all pretty relaxed since we were on vacation, and we had a lot to do so there weren't awkward silences. By the time we came back, we all felt like sisters. (Which was good because we had a lot of delays because of weather on the flights back, and if we didn't get along by that point we might have cannibalized each other when we finally got to Toronto four hours late and none of the food places were open except Tim Horton's, and there was an enormous lineup to wait for our bagels. Just kidding about the cannibalism. Sort of...)

We came back in the snow, and tonight till tomorrow it's supposed to snow another 20-30 centimetres. We're not upset, though. We still have that post-vacation buzz. A change of scenery was great. We're glad to be home too, in a way, and the blog is back in business.

Bree says hello, by the way... from home, finally! YAY! :-)

Love,
Josefina and Sisters

Family Meeting

Hi, this is Kirsten.

Tonight Blakeney called us into the living room for a family meeting. We talked about it beforehand, and as far as we knew there was only one possible explanation. We were in trouble.

There wasn't any specific thing we thought we were in trouble for, but we're not perfect angels, so there could definitely be something. (Like the argument me and Josefina had over the TV.) The only times we really have family meetings are when we're getting a new foster kid, when something major is changing, or we did something wrong.

We couldn't think of anything about to change, and they wouldn't place a new foster kid with us at the same time as Bree because each kid needs time to settle in, so the only thing left was being in trouble. We were going to try to deny it, whatever it was, and if that didn't work, we'd have to apologize. We were prepared.

Turns out we weren't in trouble, though. Blakeney had some news to spring on us. Remember how Bree said in her post (I think she just called it "Bree's First Post" or something) that she had a sister she'd been visiting? Well, Blakeney called to see what was going on. Turns out that Bree's sister is still in foster care. She's waiting to be adopted but no one had applied to adopt her yet. See where this is going...? ;-)

Normally we wouldn't be getting anyone new here so soon, but this is an exception because it's best to keep siblings together if possible. It's possible this time. Blakeney says if we're going to be eight sisters,we may as well be nine.

Bree didn't say much about it when we told her on the phone, but we think she was crying. She definitely said "thank you" a lot.

So yeah, this was a HUGE surprise for us. We're getting TWO new sisters, not one. That's never happened before. Bree is on her way... and two weeks later, we're going to be welcoming Fiona!

Crazy, isn't it? :-D

Love,
Kirsten

I'm a vegetarian

This is Charissa. I've decided to become a vegetarian. I love animals very much and I don't want to eat them anymore.

Before I made the decision, I had to read about nutrition to make sure I could still get everything that I needed in my diet if I didn't eat meat. I found out that I still can! I just have to make sure my meals are balanced.

No one else in my family is a vegetarian and that's OK. I've just decided that for me, I don't want to eat animals anymore.

Your friend,
Charissa :-)