The Orphan Train, an excellent read....

 I’m the world’s worst about reading trashy fiction, I mostly read silly, vapid romance novels with the same ending, time after time after time!  I seldom read anything of substance, and never read men authors.  Okay, so I’m pretty hopeless when it comes to literature, but for some reason this book appealed to me and it was excellent. .  If you want something this summer that isn’t exactly light reading, but extremely interesting, give this a try.  

Then Google "Orphan Train", even though this book is fiction it does reflect on a difficult time for our country and you will find a lot of interesting information and photos of these children on the trains.   It’s so sad, but in a way, we have come full circle, with all of these immigrant children being flown to foster homes all over the country.  Think how frightened they must be.  Instead of Orphan Trains, we now have Orphan Planes.

Here’s the synopsis:

Orphan Train is a gripping story of friendship and second chances from Christina Baker Kline, author of Bird in Hand and The Way Life Should Be. Penobscot Indian Molly Ayer is close to “aging out” out of the foster care system. A community service position helping an elderly woman clean out her home is the only thing keeping Molly out of juvie and worse...

As she helps Vivian sort through her possessions and memories, Molly learns that she and Vivian aren’t as different as they seem to be. A young Irish immigrant orphaned in New York City, Vivian was put on a train to the Midwest with hundreds of other children whose destinies would be determined by luck and chance. Molly discovers that she has the power to help Vivian find answers to mysteries that have haunted her for her entire life – answers that will ultimately free them both.

Rich in detail and epic in scope, Orphan Train by Christina Baker Kline is a powerful novel of upheaval and resilience, of unexpected friendship, and of the secrets we carry that keep us from finding out who we are.

Abby's Summer Visit 2014...

Abby has been here this week for her summer visit and we’ve had such a good time.  She’s such a funny little girl, she giggles until she hiccups, she sings, she dances, she’s the most precious little soul.  

The last time we visited her she showed me her Strawberry Lip Smackers, and I showed her my Cotton Candy Lip Smackers that I always carry with me.  She wanted me to have Strawberry, she wanted Cotton Candy, so off to Target we go and thankfully they had both, this was high on her priority list this visit, both of us having the same ones.

She’s very girly these days, my friend Trish’s granddaughter Hayden came to play, and Abby proceeds to put on every piece of jewelry she brought with her, including her tiara, flower and several flower clip-ons that you can’t see because they are on her ponytail.

The jewelry didn’t come off after Hayden left, we went for our evening ride on Milly in full regalia.  Oh, she had so much fun that night, waving to everyone we met on our ride.  

She took one of my shopping bags and she was carrying it around with all of her “treasures” in it.  It was enormous, big and bulky and it kept slipping off her shoulder, so I went into my closet and gave her one of my purses and a matching makeup bag.  It was a big hit and I taught her how to wear it across her body like a messenger bag and it went everywhere with her, even to bed.  Poor Lindsay having to deal with the bag, I don’t think this child and that purse will be soon parted, she just loves it.

See what I mean, it was always with her.  We were at McDonald’s in this picture where we went every single day of her visit for lunch because she wanted the Happy Meal.  She only ate the fries and drank the apple juice, and freely admitted the only reason she wanted to go was for the toy, but it was fine with us, that’s what Grandparents are for, to indulge their grandchildren.

Here’s she’s wearing a Railroad Engineer’s cap, watching Netflix.  She quickly learned how to queue up her movies and shows, she has her own Abby profile and was an avid Barbie movie fan.

She and P-Pa were buddies, they had so much fun with Lego’s.  I don’t know which “kid” enjoyed it most.  And there were also lots of trips to the woods on Milly, because the pirates came again this summer, and put treasures daily in the treasure chest hidden in the rocks.  I have video of this, but that’s for another blog entry.  It's so exciting for her, this ongoing treasure hunt that we do every summer, more about that later...

She’s a chip girl, tells everyone that Lay’s Classics are her faves, but she does love Ruffles, too.  We were out for a drive, saw a Lay’s truck making a delivery, and of course, P-pa had to turn around so that we could get a picture.  She was so excited to take her picture in front of the truck, it was one of the highlights of her trip.

We took her and her ever present bag to the river one evening after bath time.  She loved sitting and watching the boats and wanted to know how we could get down there and get on a ski boat.  The slower boats held no interest for her, she liked the fast ones!

One day we went to the park with her ever present bag and her Happy Meal.  

She loved the ducks, named them all and fed them an entire loaf of bread.

And that was our week.  A whole lotta laughter, a whole lotta giggles and smiles, and most important of all, a whole lotta love.  

Bye for now sweet Abby, see ya’ round a donut...