A day in Chicago

Jason and I went downtown today, saw Wrigley Field, the Sears Tower and walked around a bit. It was a great time.

First Work Snow

Here is our First snow of the season.. It's all down hill from here.

Sending Christmas Cards

One of the cool parts of my job is the gross numbers of kids that pass through my doors. On any given day I have over 650 men and women who cross my path. It amazes me everytime I ask for an artist, an athete, or someone who can sing or just about anything, because I get it. My kids come from all over the globe and every backround. Today's picture is a picture made by my students for Christmas. Our building is named after the USS Cole DDG-67 and for the Men and Women who gave their lives for their country. The assignment was take this 10 foot tall piece of wood and paint a Christmas card for the base contest. What you can't see is the Solar Christmas lights on there that really make this card good. Our contest is this week and I'll get pictures of all the cards and post them for you to see. I do hope we win.

On the homefront, my least favorite time of year as a kid was today, report card day. I am happy to say Lindsey and Emily made the honor role with all A's and B's. A great day for a very proud dad.

Dog's Life

I wonder what she does all day. how much can one dog sleep in a day? Really..

First Duty Day in the Bag

Well after 8 months of not standing duty I had my first duty day yesterday. Not very exciting but I'd rather have it that way. The real excitement is at my building, my kids are building a Christmas card. 12 feet tall. Details and pics to follow.

CYA.

Please Help my friends.

This is a mirror from a friend of mine. Please read it and contact your representatives. Adoption is difficult and can suck for couples. Help make someone's Christmas and put this family together. They've been trying to adopt a little girl from China for a very long time and they've hit another snag in the process. In a nutshell, can you write a letter for them? I'd appreciate it

Details:

As you know, we have been waiting to adopt our Molly for years. Now we finally have our referral and we are caught in a paperwork disgrace that is keeping our daughter in an orphanage for no other reason than red-tape – poorly administered red-tape at that! We were supposed to bring Molly home in September, but we are still waiting for our US visas to travel. It is the US holding us up – NOT China.

We are writing to ask for your help. In hopes that it will make a difference, we asking friends to please help us execute a more aggressive letter writing campaign in order to try to get things moving. We have been in touch with our Congressman, Senator and the Governor in Maryland as well as the Chair of the Subcommittee on Immigration, Citizenship, Refugees, Border Security and International Law. Some have been more helpful than others, but no one seems to have been able to make a difference so far.

If you could please bring this matter to the attention of your local representatives in Congress and in the Senate, it might have some impact. This link provides email address: http://www.visi.com/juan/congress/. We know that a lot of local officials are in transition at the moment, but this information should be good for the next couple of months.

If you have time, we’d also like to ask you to please contact the Subcommittee on Immigration, Citizenship, Refugees, Border Security and International Law. Zoe Lofgren is the Chair (address below + email on her website. http://lofgren.house.gov/). Here is a link to a list of committee members: http://judiciary.house.gov/about/subimmigration.html. Please note that Randy Forbes is from Virginia (http://forbes.house.gov/zipauth.html) and Anthony Weiner is from NY (http://weiner.house.gov/).

In hopes that it will simplify the process for you, I’ve also included a basic ‘form’ letter that you can feel free to alter in any way (below).

I know I’m asking a lot of you in your busy lives. We can’t thank you enough for your help and look forward to sharing happy news soon.

Katharine and John


Suggested Information for Letter

I am writing on behalf of my friends John and Katharine Curtin and their daughter Molly. Thank you in advance for your help with this most important matter.

The Curtins are in the process of adopting a child from China. After a very long wait, they finally received their referral for a beautiful little girl from Hunan Province who is currently residing in the Chenzhou orphanage. Her Chinese name is Chen XiDi and her American name will be Margaret XiDi Curtin – Molly.

They were supposed to take custody of their daughter on September 2, 2008. However, they cannot travel without approval of their I-800A (Application for Determination of Suitability to Adopt a Child from a Convention Country). Although they were already approved for an I-600A (the ‘pre-Hague’ version of this form) they had to file for the I-800A when they moved to Maryland in June 2008.

Even though they have a child waiting for them, no one will help them expedite their application. Worse yet, they have had no feedback at all since they filed their paperwork and the adoption community continues to hear about long waits and bureaucratic hold-ups. This all means that their beautiful little girl is left sitting in the orphanage when she should be home with her own loving family.

Every extra day that a child spends in an institutional environment contributes to developmental delays and complicates the transition once they are placed with their adoptive family. The longer Molly is waiting in the orphanage, the more difficult the adoption process will be for her. There are also concerns about her health since many of the babies were hospitalized last winter during the snowstorms that resulted in power losses and loss of heat for 8 days. If this resulted in asthma, as is apparently common in this region, she may need treatment. And now, as you may be aware, there is a major health crisis in China that endangers all children – tainted baby formula – which is causing kidney stones and even deaths.

Please help our friends bring their baby girl home.



Subcommittee on Immigration
The Honorable Zoe Lofgren, Chair - Subcommittee on Immigration, Citizenship, Refugees, Border Security and International Law
102 Cannon House Office Building
United States House of Representatives
Washington, D.C. 20515
Telephone (202) 225-3072


Other officials we have contacted:
Maryland State Senator
The Honorable Barbara Mikulski
503 Hart Senate Office Building
Washington D.C., 20510
Phone: (202) 224-4654

Maryland Governor
The Honorable Martin O’Malley
100 State Circle
Annapolis, Maryland 21401-1925
410.974.3901

Congressman for Maryland’s 8th District
Congressman Chris Van Hollen
1707 Longworth H.O.B.
Washington, DC 20515
Phone: (202) 225-5341

Cold and Fun

Today is a day to remember all of those who have gone before us to defend freedom and democracy around the world. I hope that if you reading this you took time to remember someone who served in the Armed Forces or Department of Defense. With the silly season behind us of who is going to lead our country behind us we need to concentrate on the future and how we can get this great country back to wear it once was.

Anyway I got up this morning to go to the girl's school to Participate in a salute to the Military and found that we had our first frost. By my math it was my first frost in 3.5 years. Sure it gets cold in Florida but not this cold, and by Chicago winter standards I have been told this is nothing compared to what is coming.... Anyway, Ice on the car, and we went to school and then breakfast with our friends and then I went back to school where I was the guest speaker to the 4th and 5th grade class. I had planned to speak about the Military and the history of the day today, but it became a 45 minute Q&A session with questions ranging from where was my favorite place to have I ever killed anyone. I assured everyone that I am not a killing type and my favorite place was the Straights of Magellen in South America.

The best part of my day was how happy Lindsey seemed that I came in. Making her proud is better than anything I could ever do. I stopped down to the caferteria and saw Emily and came home. What a great day. Tonight is Lindsey's first Cheerleading event, the boy's team has the season opener tonight. I am very excited and can't wait..

ID Please

My baby has reached another plateau in her life... No not that one, she got her Navy ID. When depenents turn 10 they get an ID card. We celebrated by seeing Madagascar 2 and Emily puking at 0300. Fun weekend ahead..

Happy 10th Lindsey!

Sorry it's been a few days, work is crazy from time to time. The party went well, Keylime cove was great. There was a mix up with the room but they did the right thing and upgraded us to a 3 room suite. The girls all seemed to have fun, and we loved the water park. More this weekend

2nd Place

Well we won the first game of the playoff but lost in the finals to a team that could be best described as the 1998 New York Yankees. They did not allow a goal this year and did not loose a game. We lost 1-0 on a goal with 30 seconds remaining. Good hard played game. Now it's off to the party.

Chris