Walking Off Snowdon (for Kate and Alice)

The Trail, originally uploaded by j david.

Kristen has been doing most of the posting of late, so now that I see a question I can answer, I'll jump in. Kate and her daughter Alice live in Wales. Kristen and I visited the country this spring, before we learned of Kate's blog (Journey to Motherhood, at left- very much worth visiting). Kate asks in a comment, where we spent our time.

I had a conference in Cardiff, and Kristen met me there. We spent a day or two in Cardiff and headed north. This is the path off of Snowdon, Wale's highest peak. We were wimpy tourists and took the train up the mountain (yes, it's a mountain-Hillary trained there before he climbed Everest). We really enjoyed the walk down. One gets a sense of why in this photo.

We also visited Bodnant garden (will post photos later), toured Conwy Castle, and got soaking wet walking a drover's path. It is an absolutely lovely place. We finished our trip in London- which was fabulous too.

How We Spent the Summer

We inaugurated the Summer Season with our second annual Bike the Drive event. This year was a little more grey and wet, but still exhilarating! For this event, Lake Shore Drive is closed down to traffic from 5:00 am to noon, and is opened to bicyclists. There is a northern route up to Montrose Harbor and a southern route that goes to the Museum of Science and Industry...we've been partial to the southern route. Check it out...






After we finished the ride, we did what often do these days, we visited Millenium Park and in particular our very favorite fountain...

This fountain was designed by a Spanish sculptor, who wanted to create a work that would be interactive for visitors to the Park.

Exito!





May 30 @ Wrigley
We spent Dave's birthday at Wrigley Field this year, watching the Cubs get thrashed by the Marlins. Two home runs while I was buying hot dogs...HOLY COW!!! We had awesome seats--just past first base, five rows from the dugout. Happy Birthday Honey!



























Dragon Boat Festival
In June we journeyed down to Tom Ping Memorial Park in Chicago's Chinatown for their annual Dragon Boat Races.

The Dragon Boat Festival, or "double fifth," occurs on the Fifth Day of the Fifth Moon, and marks the arrival of summer. Dragon Boat racing has become BIG SPORT around the world. The US HQ of dragon boat races, it turns out, is Portland, Oregon, where Uncle Erik and Auntie Charlotte live (and cousins Jan and Bjorn). We think Uncle Erik needs to hang up his kayak and give it a go...


Learn more about Dragon Boat Festival.

Signs that we're getting closer...

We received a surprise letter in the mail yesterday from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, U.S. Department of Homeland Security. The notice said that our Advance Processing Application has now been forwarded to the American Consulate in Guangzhou, China.

Now, it's been so long since we sent in our dossier (see ticker), that neither of us can remember what this means. Except we think it's a sure sign that we are getting very close to a referral.

The letter brought a smile to our faces. Our hearts quickened. After almost 2 years of waiting, we imagine that our long journey to our daughter, and parenthood, might actually come to a wonderful, fruitful end.

Ergo, after a long, slow summer, it's time to catch up with the postings. We've been busy this summer with chinese holidays, prep of a little girl's bedroom, and readings on adoption, Chinese history, teaching children philosophy, etc. So fasten your seatbelts, we think the end of 2007 may be eventful. Details to follow....