The Scam

Hey everyone...just wondering why Shelly's picture still pops up everywhere, and every month of the year, we're reminded that Charlie's birthday is July 31st...

Two extra

The county Social Service system is undergoing a lot of changes. When we started Foster Care it seemed the only placements available were teenagers who weren't getting a long at home. Now, 25 years later, they are inundated with young children whose parents have been picked up for one reason or another. When we went to the shelter there were 9 kids running around the livingroom, all under the age of 5. The county is desperate for quality homes. We decided to just give this a try. The placement may last as short as two weeks, as long as six months. It is really different for us - ages 3 and 6, with Dawn almost 8. Charlie is home most days so I think we can make it work. I'm warning the Valine girls, if Charlie calls you during the day it's because he's a stay at home dad now. Funny, the best time of my life was when my own kids were 4-6-8. All this fun and they still pay us $1 per hour per kid! Here they are holding the flowers April sent Dawn for Valentines Day.

Save the Date

Not that we expect you to come to Buffalo AGAIN, but we thought it would be advantageous to announce the unofficial date (which will be made official at some point when I see him again) for Shannon and my (Alice) wedding - September 26th, 2009. Don't worry; those of you who have already been to Buffalo for weddings multiple times will receive some sort of "yet to be determined" fabulous award, should you choose to attend. We had a hard time picking this date between babies (Naomi and Paul are due on September 19th) and the fact that Shannon's family are all midwestern farmers who can't leave town in October (harvest season). Since we didn't want to wait until November, the 26th of September was our only option.

Shannon will be moving to Colorado in another week and a half to take a job in Boulder. We're really excited about living in the mountains. Hooray for Estes Park being close to Boulder and the fact that there's a family reunion there next year!