Boulder: Day Two

After waking up and getting everyone ready for the day, we headed back over to The Anderson's where I made sure that I got a picture of Grandpa and Holden wearing the "Grandpa's Sidekick" shirt.

Fletcher enjoyed the activity of blowing up space shuttles for Aaron's Graduation Party. I think he liked the fact that Avery would bury him in them and he loved the fact that he could throw them in the air.

He also got to build towers and knock them down.

After play time and visiting with the family over a waffle breakfast, we headed to Pearl Street and walked around and looked in a few shops. Fletcher played in one area as well.

Here is Jesse, Jackie, Tony, Anna, Holden, and Fletcher on Pearl Street.

Here is Holden in his favorite place on this entire trip.

Here are Budd, Amy, and Jackie.

After wandering around Pearl Street for a bit, we headed over to Oskar Blues Microbrewery in Longmont, just outside of Boulder. Our table shared a flight and we had some pints with our food. Fletcher missed his chance at the small glasses because he was asleep in the car, catching a short nap. Then he and Jesse joined us.

So, taking a step back...something happened on Pearl Street while we were walking around. Now, if you need the backstory to understand this (from my perspective), read about the adoption story here.

So, anyway, we are walking down Pearl Street and all of a sudden half of our group stops, so Jesse and I turn around and see that my parents have run into someone they know. Well, long story short...Jackie recognized her oma (great-grandmother) on Jon's father's side. With her oma was her grandfather...Jon's birth father.

Hopefully you understand the significance of this interaction. For the first time in decades my mom is talking with the father of her son that she gave up for adoption. For the first time ever my sister, dad, and I are meeting him. The interchange was pleasant and genuine, although sort of awkward. (In the adoption piece I mentioned above I shared how I always felt like it was something that needed to be addressed with Jon and my mom first and then us...well, this was great, but I guess I had felt like Mom and Dad would face Andy first and then introduce the rest of us.) Regardless of how I imagined it going...it was wonderful...in my opinion.

I thought it was great that they were able to have a couple minutes away from the entire family to meet and greet a bit and I thought it was nice that Jon wasn't put in the middle of the re-introductions of everyone. Which made the next gathering all the better!

After lunch, we went back to the Anderson's to hang out and eat dinner. More introductions were made with some of the visitors and everyone just seemed to enjoy conversing for awhile. Strangely enough, nothing felt awkward about the situation (for me). Now, for the key players involved, possibly, but you really wouldn't have known it.

Out of all the conversations, my sister and I had to mention this one to each other. Here is my dad speaking with Andy. This just shows how wonderful my father truly is. This just proves that he really can carry on a conversation with just about anyone. Granted, he never had a personal relationhip with Andy, but naturally I'm sure he was concerned and caring for my mother all these years and had felt some sort of connection to the situation by way of empathy.

Here's another couple that my family is quite fond of. Jon's adoptive parents. My parents say they did a fine job raising Jon and my mom was glad to have known he was in good hands all these years after the reunion between she and Jon. I wonder what it felt like though for them, seeing his birth parents and their families included on such an occasion. Hopefully they are able to embrace it as it comes, like I think the rest of us are doing in our own ways.

And here's the couple that brought it all together. After years and years, they were the ones that decided to take the steps and search for Mom and later, Andy. They are the ones that opened their house and lives to all of the families to join as one. I'm glad they are in our lives!

And, the other side of the story lies here with Jon's birth father and his wife (who happened to go to the same small high school and was in the same class as my mom and Andy). They were super nice to us and really enjoyed Fletcher. At the end of the weekend, Andy made a point of telling us that we always have a place to stay if we are ever in their area.

I don't think things always turn out so well in situations like these, but I sure hope everyone feels blessed that it's worked out for us this way so far and should only get better. Stories like these are made for the movies.

Aaron even shared how interesting it was that all of these people came into town for the weekend to celebrate his graduation. While we were all hanging out, he was in the background preparing for the annular solar eclipse that was supposed to happen the next evening.

We spent a lot of time at the Anderson's chasing Fletcher around and trying to keep him out of certain things and playing with other things. Thank God the Anderson Kids are fabulous with him, because he loved them and we loved their help. Here he is playing with bubbles!

And finally, a quick sidenote...For those of you that know my sister, Amy...she is engaged to this great guy, Budd. So if you're wondering why he's mentioned in so many posts or seen in a bunch of pictures, it's because he's soon to be my brother-in-law. This was the first time we've seen them since she got a ring on her finger. Woohoo!