365

These are recent photos

from our first days together

5 days home

Wow, so this time last year we were in Ethiopia meeting the kids, it is so surreal!! Truly, I cannot believe it has only been a year, just 365 days. It seems like it was just yesterday, and forever and a day ago all at the same time! It amazes me how much things have changed, how much I have changed in just 365 days. I wrote a journal in Ethiopia for the kids and will add in a few excerpts of our first days with the kid, it was an amazing and life altering trip, and one I would not change for anything in the world, except maybe Julianna getting sick all over the couch and me trying to catch it to contain the mess(good mommy that I am, I then made her barf into a plastic baggie;)!!

We went to see Bethlehem first, I was so worried I would not recognize him at first- but Jon picked him right out of the crowd no problem. He is so cute - and so big!! He gave daddy a kiss and hug but was completely fascinated with Julianna, he could not stop staring at her!! Of course since she is sick she really had no interest in hugging or loving on him, so finally he turned his attention to mommy and came in real close for a cuddle right way. He even offered kisses and when I gave him a raspberry he had a little smile. then we got to take him with us to see M.B., so cool!! For this Julianna stayed in the downstairs sitting room with Tia (after barfing on me and the couch) while mommy and daddy got to go find our little girl. We found her in her class room, she immediately walked over and hugged daddy and Bethlehem, then mommy and I got a sweet smiley hug and took them both outside into the yard to play and swing. That was fun - Mia Birtu is cute and ticklish, and is thrilled when daddy carries her, we went inside to see Julianna after awhile and Mia Birtu softly kissed J while she was sleeping. Then we got down to really playing - we looked at movie boxes and named characters and animals with the accompanying sounds. Gabe Bethlehem liked to stack movies up and push them over. Mia Birtu is so very loving of her brother and always tries to pick him up or pull him along - but when he hit his head I told her he was "ishi" and I scooped him up. He buried his head in my shoulder, shuddered and whimpered a minute, then stopped. A bit later the boy who l=hates naps and fights them terribly, he fell asleep in my arms, so sweet and cuddly.

Later that afternoon:

We got to go back and see Mia Birtu, she came running up to daddy and was all smiles and showing off the green smiley face sticker I had given her earlier. We pulled out the Barbie and she liked that and thought it was even cooler when she found out her clothes came off. Barbie had a "jacket"(MB word), and "panties" (another word she used, and great curly hair. We then talked about "baby Barbie's" hair being long and curly, MB's hair long and curly, mommy, daddy hair short and straight, and daddy has white hairs, HEeHeeHee(MB giggled a lot over this)!!!

I will post more of our first days later in the week, but it has truly been such an amazing and inspiring year!! I cannot imagine my life without these two little souls, none of us can, and really don't want to, they are amazing, funny, silly, sweet, infuriating, smart, sassy, cuddly, and just plain wonderful, we are so blessed!!