Adam Sings in General Conference

A primary choir from Pleasant View and North Ogden sang at General Conference in October. It was the afternoon session. This was a major event. At the end of June we, the primary presidents, were informed that we would be picking some of the children in our ward to sing in general conference. They wanted children that were 9 years old or older. We were eventually told that we had slots for 9 children. So to make it as fair as possible I started at the top of the list and worked my way down. Adam is 10 and so he was on my list.

They had choir practices starting at the end of August on Sunday evenings. The practice began at 5:30 and ended at 7:30. They were very intense practices. Sister Vonya Watkins was the choir director and she came every sunday night to practice. Sister Watkins has written several primary songs and so it was a privelege to have her come. When the children arrived they had to check in with their stake and get a color coded bracelet. When they left that night they had to check out with the stake people....they wanted to account for every child.

It was a very special experience that I'm glad Adam got to have. Being able to perform in the conference center with the prophet in attendance was something he'll never forget.

A Fresh Start

It has been forever since I've updated our family blog! A lot has happened since April 1 2009! Wow, two years? I can't believe it's been two years! Let me tell you the major events that took place in two years time:

• Trent came home from his mission!


• My father passed away :(


• Sean left on his mission to Seattle Washington!


• Trent married Brandee Stokes!


• We got another puppy.....Griffin!

I'll try to catch you up on those major events in this blog as time goes by. I'll try not to let a week pass by without updating the events of our family......a fresh start!

Trent & Brandee Get Married!

June 2011

We have a wonderful new daughter in law! Trent has a friend named Jake Stokes. He has a sister, Brandee. He is 4 years older than Brandee, so Sean and Brandee are the same age. In fact they both graduated in the same year. He took a new interest in Jake's sister and started dating her. Well long story short......they are perfect for each other. He proposed and they got married on June 2nd in the Bountiful Temple. That was a wonderful day. The sealer they had in the Temple was so good. He explained everything they were promising each other and he made it memorable for them. After the wedding and pictures at the Temple we all went to Rooster's in Layton for lunch. The lunch was very tasty. We had a buffet with beef medallions, chicken cordon bleu, rosemary potatoes, salad and dessert. It was nice to relax and visit with all the family.

We went home after lunch and got the clothes that we needed for the reception. We went up to Eden for the reception. Brandee's family lives in Eden and the golf course has a great reception room. It was so pretty. You didn't even need a backdrop for photos because the colors outside were gorgeous! It was cold though....but you can't tell that by looking at the pictures! People started coming at 6:30 and never stopped! Seriously.....none of us in the line had a break of any kind! No bathroom breaks, food breaks or sanity breaks! It was amazing how many people came to support both our families. I realized that night how special it is to have the support of our family and friends.

It was a long day, but a wonderful day. It is nice to finally have a girl in the family! We all love Brandee!

Our New Puppy.....Griffin

April 2011


I don't know what I was thinking....."Tucker needs a playmate"......that's what I was thinking! So we looked into getting another dog. We found a breeder of tri-color coton du tulears that lived in Roy. So I called to see when she would be getting another batch of puppies. She said she actually had some that were 8 weeks old and ready to go to homes. So we decided to go looking. Okay....bad idea! When you are looking at puppies there is no saying no! So we looked, loved them all and decided to think about it. I had taken Trent, Brandee, Gavin and Adam with me the first time. The second time we went Kary came with us. We sat in the back yard and played with the puppies trying to decide which one we would want. What a hard decision! They were all so darn cute! We picked the one that kept coming up to Gavin.....we ended up naming him Griffin. Who could pass up that face? It has been fun to have a new puppy, but a challenge as well. Griffin likes to "play" with Tucker by biting his ears and tail! Well, Tucker isn't too happy with that! So we end up having to break up some aggressive playing between the two of them. Right now Griffin likes to chew cords and that has been fun to try to alleviate as well! I guess I asked for it! No complaining now!

Seattle Washington....here comes Elder Burke!

February 16, 2011

Sean went into the MTC on the 16th of February. It had been a whirlwind of a month because my dad had just passed away at the beginning of the month and we ended up going back to California for the funeral.

Sean was so organized. He was packing up his whole room and cataloging his belongings in a notebook. He took the notebook with him so that if he had to have something out of one of his boxes then he could tell me where to look. But he was up late the night before the MTC. We went to see the Stake President around 8 pm. We came home and he went down to finish packing. I didn't know till the next day that he was up until 2 packing and finishing his room.

We left early for Provo because we were going to go to lunch at the Brick Oven. He wasn't suppossed to show up at the MTC until noon. So we ate at the Brick Oven and had a very enjoyable lunch. There were lots of missionaries there and it was fun to see them all.

When it was time to head to the MTC....we decided to stop at the Provo temple and take pictures first. We tooks lots of photos. It was so windy that day, that in every picture my hair was flying! Finally it was time to take him to the MTC. That was really hard. We drove up to one of the numbered stations along the curb, got out of the car, unloaded the luggage and hugged Sean and said goodbye. There wasn't much time to say goodbye, that was why we went to lunch and to the temple first. After we hugged him, he grabbed his luggage and turned and walked away with another elder into the MTC. Okay...so I cried most of the way home. It was hard to leave my Seaner there. I knew I would miss him so much. Over the course of the next few weeks we would have "Sean" moments. We would be getting ready to leave somewhere and someone would ask, "Where's Sean?" Then we would remember he was gone. We went into a restaurant and the hostess asked how many and I gave her the wrong number.....another Sean moment. We slowly adjusted to having him gone...but it was hard. He is now in Seattle and loving his mission.

Dean Kentner, dad, passes away.

My father has had heart issues a major portion of his adult life. He had a pacemaker put in when he was about 50. I always knew that when dad died it probably would be because of his heart. Well he had congestive heart failure for years. I know when I saw my dad a couple of years ago he didn't look good. His heart was getting weaker and everytime he sat down he fell asleep. He had a hard time just going up and down the stairs. I knew it wouldn't be long before his heart completely gave out.
Around Christmas time my brother and sisters that live by my parents told me that dad wasn't doing good at all. January came and I wanted to go see my dad, but we were getting ready for a missionary to leave in February and I didn't know if we could do it. We had Sean's farewell in January and would have to plan around that. So I told Sean that if he wanted to go to California to see my dad that I would drop everything and go. I knew Sean probably wouldn't be able to see my dad again since he was soon leaving for two years to serve a mission. I knew that dad wouldn't last that long. So after a couple of days of thinking Sean came to me and asked me if we could go to California. So Sean, Adam and I left a couple of days later to drive to California. Gavin and Kary couldn't go so Sean helped me drive the whole way there. The day that we ended up driving we found out that dad was put into the hospital. He was having some reaction to medication and they wanted to keep an eye on him. So we got there late and decided to go to the hospital the next day to see dad. The few days that we were there we went to the hospital every day to visit him. My dad's lungs were beginning to fill with fluid and he had a hard time drinking water. If he drank water he ended up coughing and throwing up the liquid. The doctor thought that dad should go into a nursing home to recouperate from his medical problems. So reluctantly dad was moved into a nursing home. My dad always said he never wanted to go into a nursing home....that once you go in you never come out. He would say that he didn't want to die in a nursing home. So the doctors kept reassuring my dad that he would get better enough to go home, he just needed some interim care, care that my mom wouldn't be able to give him.
We went to see him while he was in the nursing home and he wasn't doing so good. They thickened his liquids so that he wouldn't have problems with fluids. But my dad would refuse to drink it. He kept asking for water and it was so sad not to be able to give it to him. One night while most of the family was there visiting, we asked the nurse if he could have ice chips. She brought some and dad loved it......but it wasn't a good thing for him. He would cough and cough after having the ice chips. At one point I was sitting by the head of his bed and he coughed so hard I could tell that he was going to throw up. I quickly grabbed a towel and let dad throw up into that. I could tell he wasn't liking feeling so helpless. I look back at that moment and feel so glad that I could be there to help my dad in that time when he couldn't help himself. After all the giving he had given to me over the years, that small act of helping him was satisfying for me.
The next day we came to visit dad again and I knew it would be the last time I would probably see him. The boys and I were leaving to go back to Utah the next morning. Again most of the family was there and alot of the time dad was not making sense when he spoke. He would say things like how mean they were at the nursing home and that he didn't get breakfast until noon....stuff like that. Then he would be confused and ask my mom if we were at my Aunt Pat's house. Pat is his sister. At one point before we were going to leave my brother Jim asked dad if he would like a Priesthood blessing. He said yes and asked Sean if he had ever been the "voice" of the blessing. Sean said he hadn't, and my dad then asked Sean if he would give him the blessing. You see Sean had only been an Elder for about a month at that point and had helped assist in a blessing, but had never given one. I could tell Sean was nervous but that he would do as Grandpa desired. As he was getting ready to do the blessing, my dad seemed to come out of his fog and talked to all of us about things. His last farewell to the family. He talked about how important it is to treat your comapanion (spouse) well and let them be first in your life. He spoke about how hard it has been for him to be "old" and somewhat "forgotten". He said that it is important to send a physical letter to those you love to thank them for things and to tell them you love them. Letters mean so much, he said. He told us how it didn't matter who gave him a blessing...someone with lots of experience or someone who has no experience (Sean). That the blessing is given through the power of God and that what is said can be worded many different ways...but it means the same. So finally Sean gave dad a blessing. Comfort was mostly the message he gave to my dad, and that the family can remember all the good times. He closed the blessing and then my dad told him thank you and wished him well on his mission. I gave him a hug and told him I'd be back to visit in the summer. But in my heart I knew that this would be the last time. Then all of a sudden dad was back in his fog and couldn't remember where he was or who had come to visit. I knew that my dad was given the gift of clarity right before, during and right after the blessing so that he could communicate the things to his family that he thought needed to be shared.
So we left the next morning to come back to Utah. We got home that night and got to bed late. I woke up the next morning and got the boys off to school and me off to work. I had received a message at about 11:00 am from my sister. I was at work so when I got a chance to check my messages I listened to hers. She told me that my dad had "coded" and they were taking him back to the hospital. I went home and called her and found more messages on my home phone. By the time I called back, dad had passed away.
The funeral was planned for that Friday. Back in the car, going to California......this time the whole family was coming. Even Trent and Brandee rode with us.
The whole funeral was so surreal. I knew this moment would eventually come, but I didn't want to say goodbye to my dad. I was also really sick during the funeral. The day I came home from California the first time I was getting a cold and cough. By the time we left to go back to California I had a bad cough and went to go get some codeine cough syrup before we left. That cold ended up lasting me a couple of months. I could not shake it.
February is a defining moment in my life. I think of my dad all the time and do feel his love. I just wish I could talk to him. I miss that.

Our new puppy Tucker

Our New Puppy Tucker!!

We were all so lonely after Scout and Sadie died. We started looking into getting a puppy but weren't sure what kind of dog we wanted. After some searching online we came across this breed, Coton de Tulear. It comes from the same family as a Maltese and Bichon Frisse. He is very cute and has very soft hair. It took us a couple of days to decide on a name....but Tucker it is! We got him at the end of March 2009. He was actually born December 14th. So he is 12 weeks old. He's not been housetrained so we are having fun with that right now!

Oh...he loves toilet paper!! He is just like a two year old! We have to keep the bathroom door closed or else this is what happens!

Our Sweet Sadie Passes Away

What a sweet little dog Sadie was. Her illness started around the end of January. She wasn't eating very well....in fact she quit eating and I was getting worried. I attributed this to the fact that I had just purchased new dog food and I thought she was protesting. I kept thinking that she would eventually eat if she got hungry enough. The last week of January while she wasn't eating she was spending a lot of time outside...just sitting there. She wouldn't come inside and it was really cold out there. I would coax her in and she would go right back out a couple of minutes later. On Sunday February 1st we went to church and came home. Of course she wasn't in the house and we made her come in. She proceeded to throw up and I told Kary that she looked like she was dying. She was looking like Scout did when he was close to dying. A couple of hours went by and after she threw up a few more times I decided to take her to the emergency vet. When the vet examined her she took blood samples and found bad news. From her blood she could tell that she had diabetes ketoacidosis. A pretty bad case of diabetes. She was also concerned because she was throwing up blood which meant that her esophogus was being affected. She believed that she had pancreatitis too. When an animal has that it can get to a state where the acids start eating away at the organs and whatever else it comes in contact with inside their body. She told me that we had a hard decision to make. If we decided to keep her alive then she would require probably 3 shots of insulin a day. We would have to do that the rest of her life...whether it be two weeks or 2 years. But she believed that with the pancreatitis Sadie didn't have long. Her breathing was not good and she looked like she didn't feel good. Kary and I decided that we needed to put her down because it was the humane thing to do at this point. Sure we could've kept her alive for awhile....but she could've lived in pain the rest of her life. I didn't want that for her.

Sadie was so lonely without Scout. After he died she kind of moped around the house and wasn't her usual self. She never knew any other life than with Scout. We got her when he was a year old. She loved sitting by him and grooming him. She is running and playing now with Scout. I truly believe that these two sweet dogs will greet me in heaven! I can't wait to play with them again. I know that there is a special place in heaven for our pets....I just know that a loving Heavenly Father would allow our pets to be reunited with tus again.

It has been lonely without our dogs. We will get another dog again. We just need to greive for these two first.

Adam's Baptism & Birthday Celebration

On January 3rd, 2009 Adam was baptized. His baptism was at 6 pm at our local Stake Center. He was baptized with another little boy from our ward Trey Worrell. He and Trey are friends and it was fun that they were baptized together. I spoke on the Holy ghost and Gavin said the opening prayer. Sean was a witness and Kary did the baptism and confirmation. So all of us were involved somehow. Trent wasn't here but he was baptizing a convert in The Netherlands on the same day. So we all were involved on his special day.

The Whole Burke family came.

Here is a picture of just the five of us...

We also celebrated his birthday that afternoon at Grandma and Grandpa Burke's house. I made a cake for him and we opened presents and everything. He got a pair of Heely's shoes/skates, a Nintendo DS game called Wall-E and a set of new scriptures with a case.

Christmas is coming soon! I can't believe it's already December and we are counting down until Christmas. I just had to put this you tube link in here for my favorite Christmas parody. I think you'll enjoy it! No snow yet here in Utah. My boys are so anxious for snow to come that they just can't stand it!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NQkF7fpw-wI

Scout

Our beloved pet Scout passed away on September 23rd, 2008. Over the fourth of July weekend Scout had some breathing problems and orientation problems so I ended up taking him to an emergency vet (on the evening of the 4th). The vet took one look at him and felt his abdomen and told me that he believed that Scout had a tumor in his belly. He gave me three options. 1-I could take him home and let nature take it's course and in a few days he would probably be gone. 2-I could have the vet do surgery, take the tumor out and see if it is benign or malignant. The operation would buy him time at the least. 3- I could just have the vet put him down right then. Of course my whole family was up on a mountain camping and I had to make the decision alone. So I decided to have him operate on Scout. Scout stayed the night and by the next morning he was able to come home. Two weeks later we found out that the tumor was malignant and he had cancer of the liver. They told me at that time that Scout would live about a month, maybe two if we were lucky. Our Scout was 9 years old. He was such a fun part of our family and we all miss him. Sadie, our other dog, misses him terribly. She has never known life without him. We felt extremely lucky that we had an extra 2 1/2 months with him. That last week of his life he started acting lethargic again and had no interest in eating or playing. He was breathing funny again so we decided it was time to let him go. That was a really tough day.

Claudean

Poor Adam!

First of all I'm sorry that it has taken me forever to post again on here. I'm going to try to be better at it.


In July we were all excited because we would be going to my family's house in California. We were busy getting packed and talking about all the fun that we would be having there. We had our plan trip set for August 4th. I would be flying out with the kids and then Kary would come later.


Adam was so social this summer! He was always playing with someone and going to friends houses or they were coming to mine. It was fun to see him open up so much. When we lived in Thailand he didn't ever want to leave the house!


On August 2nd Adam had a friend over and they were playing down in our unfinished basement. All of a sudden I heard screams of pain! I ran downstairs and found Adam laying on the floor next to the fooseball table and I couldn't get him to settle down. So I helped him upstairs and laid him on the couch. Come to find out he had been on top of the fooseball table trying to walk in between the bars. He had lost his balance and fallen off. His leg got stuck in between the bars...but then he fell to the floor. Now understand it was a friday afternoon at 4:00 pm. Kary had gone to youth conference the day before with Gavin and Sean. I took a look at Adam's legs and noticed that his right leg looked a little different than the other one. So I made a quick decision to take him to IHC instacare before they closed. I knew that if I waited too long than I would have to take him to the emergency room if he needed medical help. Five minutes away and $35.00 vs. 30 minutes away and $85.00. I decided to drive the 5 minutes and have them take a look at his leg. Well, they x-rayed his leg and it was definately broken. They put a splint on his leg and told me that we had to wait until monday to cast it because they wait for the swelling to go down. I started to panic....our flight was on monday! How were we going to get to California if we couldn't make the flight! They scheduled our appt. with the orthopedic surgeon for 8:00 a.m on Monday morning. It turned out that our flight was at 5:00 pm that evening! Thank goodness it all still worked out.
Here he is with his first cast! He wanted bright red and he had to wear shorts all the time. It was a good thing it was still summer and the weather cooperated with his wardrobe needs!
We borrowed a wheelchair from Kary's parents and that saved our life! We made it back from the orthopedic surgeon just in time to get ready for our trip to California. This would add an extra element of fun to our trip!

They Got Us!

We were trying to slide by under the radar at church. We were enjoying going to church with no responsibilities because we knew that would change as soon as we were given callings. Our church records finally came from Thailand to our ward here two weeks ago. I was asked to be Primary President and Kary was asked to be Young Men's President! Double Whammy!! I don't know if they think we are superhuman or what! All we can do is give it our best try. I am excited to be able to work in the primary. I love the primary! That is my favorite place to be! This next sunday will be my first week in there...but I've already asked the outgoing president to come in and conduct. I think the kids need a transition from outgoing to incoming. I think it will be better for the kids to have the previous president let them know about the changes and introduce the new presidency.Our shipment from Thailand finally arrived here on February 21st...Gavin's birthday. So we are still trying to unpack and get things put away. It's tough because we are in a smaller house here than we were in Thailand, so our furniture and things don't fit like they did in the house there! Needless to say we have made and will make many trips to Deseret Industries to give away the excess.On top of everything else this week I am sick. Bronchitis is wiping me out! When it rains it pours.
Posted by Claudean at 8:26 PM 2 comments

It's February and Still Snowing!!!

It has been the snowiest winter in Utah history since the 80's!! It has been snowing almost every other day for the last 8 weeks! Finally this weekend, Feb. 9th we have sun! But the weather people tell us that the snow is not over yet! Adam is absolutely loving the snow! He wants to go play in it every day. One day he came inside and declared that today was the funnest day in his entire life! That declaration came after just sledding on our little snow mound in the front yard! We've been over to the park a few times so that he can go down the "big hill". The first time we went to the park Adam came down the hill and ran almost head on into the swingset! What fun that is! He has since learned how to bail off the sled when it's needed.Sean and Gavin have also had fun at the park going down the "Biggest Hill". It's not huge, but it's funner than not sledding at all.

Back in Snowy Utah!

Here it is January 2008 and we are back in the U.S.A. Let me catch you up on a few things. First of all Thailand thinks Kary and I are too old to adopt and already have too many children! (What?) So much to our disappointment we won't be adopting from Thailand. The social worker we worked through kept making us believe that we would get approved to adopt and it would happen soon. Well, soon never came and we were finally told that if we wanted to adopt we would have to wait until we moved back to the U.S. and then send them an updated homestudy before they would continue the process. Just to do that and finish an adoption would cost us about $11,000. Yikes! We originally thought that we would come back here to Utah and foster/adopt. I'm not sure yet if that is the right thing to do or not. I would love to have a little girl...but I'm starting to believe Thailand may be right....I'm getting to old to take care of babies full time! Time will tell what happens next.Our foster baby Tara has adoptive parents that are trying to finish paperwork and get to Thailand to pick her up in a few months. Her adoptive parents live in Idaho so we will be able to occasionally see her. When we left we gave Tara to her adoptive Grandparents to be her foster parents. Her soon to be grandparents are serving an LDS mission in Thailand right now and with permission from the mission president they will be her foster parents until her a-parents will be able to come and get her. Everything has worked out so well for Tara. She is a special little spirit and doors have been opened for her to be adopted by Johnny and Kindra. Giving her up was the hardest thing I've ever had to do. I had foster babies before...but they only were with our family for a couple of months at the most. Tara was with us for a year! She was part of our family and it was heartbreaking to hand her over. Both Tara and I went through a grieving process. I think I'm still going through it. Tara will be named Jasmine by her adoptive family and I need to get used to referring to her by that name. Work finally agreed that we could stay in Thailand until the boys finished up their semester of school in December. So December 24th we flew from Thailand to Salt Lake City. We arrived in the middle of a snowstorm and it hasn't stopped since we came. Today, January 9th, we got 21" of snow and more is predicted to come tomorrow! Welcome to Utah!
Posted by Claudean at 4:47 PM 0 comments

Moving

Well we just found out that we are moving back to the United States in October 2008. I called Khun Angkana, our social worker with the DSDW to tell her and she didn't seem too concerned. So I'm not sure if things will work out for us to adopt or not. I guess I need to have more faith that things will. Kary and I are a lot dissappointed that work will not let us stay until December. They are being very "cost" concerned...not concerned for us as a family at all!We finally found a family for Tara and now we may have to leave before her adoption is final. That breaks my heart.

Our Foster Babies...

This little sweetie pie is our foster baby Tara. She is usually such a sweet calm baby, but today she has been quite fussy. I think she may have caught the flu that we have had around here this last week. Let me tell you about Tara. She was brought into our home when she was 1 month old. She has achondroplasia, dwarfism. She is very tiny. She is now almost 4 months old and she doesn't weigh more than 10 lbs. and she probably is only 17" long...if that. She is a very sweet baby though. She LOVES to be held. You could hold her all day and she'd be just fine with that. She sleeps better when you hold her, than when she's all alone in her crib. Her mom has given her up for adoption and I hope she can find a forever family through adoption. Everything else about her is normal...she'll just be short. My little boy Adam just adores babies and he has been so sweet with Tara. I do foster care through Holt Sahathai. They are a good organization. All of their babies that get adopted are cared for in Foster homes first, no orphanages. I got started doing foster care about 1 year ago. I heard about fostering one day when I was volunteering at the Pakkret Orphanage here by my home. After much thought and prayer I decided that I really wanted to help by doing foster care.


Our first baby was a little boy...Chayanut. We got him when he was 6 weeks old and had him for two months. We had to have him go to another foster home because we were going to the United States for home leave for 6 weeks and he could not leave Thailand. He was a doll! He was a crier though. In fact we nicknamed him, "Chayanut cry a lot!" It was very hard to hand him back over to Holt. On my way home from Holt I cried and cried.




Our second foster child was given to us after our home leave in August of 2006. She was a beautiful little girl named Pumiraht. We nicknamed her Lia. She was a real sweetheart. When she turned four months old her mom decided that she wanted her back. I actually got to meet the mom and it was good that she could take her back and raise her. It's always sad when the babies leave. I always seem to go through a bit of a depression...but I keep coming back for more. It is so rewarding to look into these sweet babies faces and know that I am helping to the best of my ability. They sure receive a lot of love in our house.
Posted by Claudean at 8:29 AM 0 comments

My Air Conditioning Finally works!!!!

We have lived in this house for a year and my air conditioning in my bedroom finally works right!! It was crazy! We would call our landlord and she would send out someone to fix the air conditioner, someone that she already has paid money to. Last week these same two guys came to fix the air and they were here for 7 hours! When they left they said the air worked. I went upstairs and did it work? NO! So the next day I called my landlord back and told her that the air was still not working. She sent the guys out again and they came back for another 3 hours. Again...they said it was working. But NO it was not! I've been so frustrated with this situation so I finally had my maid call a handyman from the Nichada office. He has done work for us before and he always can fix anything. So she asked him if he could come and see if he would be able to fix it for us. He came, checked it out and told us that he would be back on Friday (after work) to fix it for us. He came tonight and was here for 2 hours. Does it work? YES! I paid for it myself. It cost 2,500 Baht, which equals about 65 US Dollars. Boy was that worth it! Hot season is going to be upon us soon and I want to be prepared!

At least I'm starting...

Tuesday, January 23, 2007

Hello, Our family has lived in Thailand for two years now. People have often told me that I need to write down my experiences while living here. So, at least now I'm starting!Hopefully as time goes on I'll get better at writing these experiences down to share with everyone.I have four boys ages 19, 15, 12 (almost 13) and 6. We have always wanted a little girl and decided that while we live here in Thailand we should adopt our daughter! The Thai people have such a laid back attitude that this adoption is taking longer than I wanted it too. It took me a good 8 months to get all the paperwork done. In October 2006 we turned in our "portfolio" to the Adoption Center in downtown Bangkok. Of course turning in all the papers was an interesting process. Listed in their requirements of things to be done was a fingerprint/criminal check from the Thai Police. In September we went to the Thai Police Headquarters to get the fingerprinting done. We were told at that time that in order to get the fingerprints done we needed a paper from The Adoption Center stating that all of our paperwork was done and we were in need of a criminal check. Of course! It's not easy. It took us all morning to go to the Thai Police, Kary had to take off work for the morning, and all just to find out that we needed a paper from the Adoption Center First! Crazy. You would think that the adoption center would tell us that minor detail...but no, that's too easy! So the Adoption Center told us it would take 2 weeks to get the letter ready to be taken to the Thai Police. After two weeks were over I called the Adoption Center to see if we could pick up the letter yet. It wasn't finished yet! Another two weeks and we finally were able to get the referral letter and take it back to the Thai Police...Kary took yet another morning off work to finish up this step in the process. So it always takes longer than you think to get anything done! My next blog I'll tell you more of the adoption story. Gotta go for now...places to go..things to do!Claudean