Immigration Law

I have always wanted to live in a warmer place. It appears I will be able to eliminate Arizona as a possible choice, thanks to the Bill currently before Governor Jan Brewer for her signature; which if not signed by tomorrow by default will become the law in Arizona.

I know illegal immigration is a sensitive subject, but I wanted to share my thoughts on the matter. What is alarming to me is the authority this Bill grants law enforcement to arrest and detain. If an officer has a reasonable suspicion, the lowest criminal standard in our criminal justice system, an individual is illegally in the country they can demand the individual produce documentation verifying their immigration status. If no information is provided or if the information cannot be verified with the federal government, the individual can, and more likely than not, will be arrested.

Now, I'm fully aware, a consequence of being married to a prosecutor, that detaining somebody based upon reasonable suspicion is not a new concept. However, we have always had the safeguard that prior to contacting us law enforcement have a reasonable suspicion that criminal activity is afoot. How on Earth can law enforcement form that reasonable suspicion? What does an illegal immigrant look like, what do they normally wear, do they typically drive certain cars, do they all engage in the same behavior, or do they live in the same places? The answer to those questions is obviously no. That leaves the very likely possibility that law enforcement will base their decision on whether the person is Hispanic or African or Asian or does the person speak no or very limited English, or even possibly does the person have an accent.

For those of you who know me, I meet both of those criteria. I am Hispanic and, although I worked very hard to eliminate it, I still have a Latina accent when I speak English. If I am driving down the road minding my own business I could very quickly find myself being confronted by a law enforcement officer who is demanding to see proof I am here legally.

I am a naturalized citizen of this Country and am proud of my citizenship, but I do not, nor is there any requirement that I do so, carry my naturalization papers with me. In this scenario I would be arrested and detained in the local jail until somebody provided adequate proof of my lawful status. If Carl was not easily available my kids would be placed with the Department of Health and Human Services and my car would be towed. Is it justified, that I, a United States Citizen, should be subjected to this merely because I don't speak perfect English or don't have the right skin color? That is what is wrong with this bill.

I do not condone illegal immigration and I commend Arizona for at least trying to do something to fix the problem. I do not believe fear is the answer. That is what I believe this Bill will instigate in people, to hate and fear those who have a different skin color or who don’t speak English correctly.

Is green day over?

Today, Joseph asked if Green Day was over and if green day was going to be happening tomorrow again because he really enjoyed it. Now as the wonderful mother that I am, I did not take pictures of our green day celebration. But we made green eggs and ham for breakfast, Joseph loved them but Taiyari just ate the ham.
We then got ourselves dressed in our green shirts, since we are a bi-cultural family with some Irish great-grandparents I thought it would be appropriate to have the boys wear green Cinco de Mayo shirts. That is the only picture we have just the shirts :(

To finish our day we had a great dinner with the 4 missionaries in our ward. We had: Chicken drumsticks in a lime vinaigrette and achiote, vegetable kabobs seasoned with cumin, roasted corn cobs, and for dessert we had the infamous rainbow cupcakes and we got the recipe from a magazine.

They were super cute even thou they took about 2 hours to make. The kids and the missionaries loved them. Carl had to go to church, and the kids and I stayed home to watch together the Princess and the Frog because the frog is green.

So that my friends, was our lovely Green Day!!!

Now I am thinking with this green day, that I might try and have a color day once a month like April we will have a yellow day because of spring, May we will have a red day because it is Carl's favorite color and his birthday is in May, and so on I will have to see how many colors I can make work for this idea :)

Andy and Joseph's birthday

We have been very busy celebrating birthdays for Andy and Joseph. Andy turned 7 and Joseph 4. We had cakes and ice cream and went to a fun center in Kearney. The kids had fun and we did too. I am still in shock to see that my baby Andy only has one more year before he gets baptized. He is trying really hard to memorize the Articles of Faith.

Here are some pictures for grandma. The boys would like to say thank you for all the birthday wishes and $ they got from grandma, Aunt Elle and Dest. They had a fun time picking what they wanted and were really excited.

Pine wood derby

Today we had Andy's first ever pine wood Derby. Thanks to his hard work designing the car and Carl's wood carving skils, Andy won 1st place and went undefeated. He was so excited when he won, but he never showed off or screamed as he saw his car win. He would stay serious, yet he could not help but smile to himself. He was so cute trying not to boast about how good he did. We are so happy to see him so excited to win.

Cub scouts

So, thanks to my husband I am a den mother for my son in cub scouts, I love seeing him do the stuff with the pack, but men, I really have no idea what I am doing. Anyway this past Saturday we went to our local museum to learn about how people lived years ago. He had fun and I was surprised at the stuff that our museum has. Here is a picture of Andy and the other two Tiger cub scouts :)



(the picture was taken with my cell so don't mind the poor quality and lighting)

New year and maybe more blogging :)

Just really needed to post this picture of the girls. They are very, cute together, Emma loooves to help me with Isabelle. She loves to feed her and hold her and make sure she always smiles. I am blessed.



They are wearing the clothes grandma Penny sent for Christmas, Thanks Grandma we love you.

Joseph

The other day I could not find Joseph anywhere so I finally looked in the changing station door and this is what I found:



Silly boy :)

Camping in the backyard

We had our first camping trip to the backyard, we slept out 2 nights and had a fire and smores. The nights were really nice to camp out and then to wake up to the foggy mornings. The kids enjoyed reading James and the Giant peach instead of telling scary stories, good memories.



Isabelle was just chilling on her bouncer inside the tent.



Taiyari couldn't wait for the bombones to cook so he ate half the bag before we had the smores :)



And Mom and Dad enjoyed sleeping with all the kids around them cuddling with them to keep warm :)

First tooth lost

Better late than never. Andy lost his first tooth back in July, we were fortunate to have Grandma Penny and Grandpa Norm with us that week so they were here to be part of such big mile stone for Andy. Thanks Grandma for helping pull the tooth out :)

2009 Utah trip

Here are a very few pictures of our 10 days in Utah, it was fun and really nice to see everyone. We love spending the 4th there. This was my second year as an American Citizen and I feel privileged to be able to be part of this special day.

The Air Force Museum in Roy or somewhere there


Isabelle sleeping :)


Andy and Emma doing the flight simulation


Tractor ride at Uncle Mike's


Just to end don't expect much blogging in the next few months, unless a super mom is willing to come and give me a crash course on how to keep clean house, cook, change diapers, play with the kids and find some way to get extra money for the family, then maybe you will see more from our family :)