Reconnection and Snowy Moments

 Hey!  It’s Christmas in, let me see, 6 days. Woah, talk about sneaking up on us. I’m quiet here as I feel much of what I have to say is redundant, my emotions, the transitions, etc.

Brief Update: We are living at Amy’s parents house on a lake and appreciating the beauty each day we are there. Jon hopes to travel to Ethiopia in January, I will stay home with the kiddos. I am not a good pregnant woman. Sure, I definitely rejoice at the miracle God has created inside of me and marvel at each stage but I’ve had just about enough of this little one up in my ribs. We had a family road trip and I tried to keep my sighing to a minimum. :) The girls and I are plugging through school, most days joyfully, besides new math concepts, not a lot of joy there. Tiger sits up, says “MAM” when he is starting to get upset and when he is playful, “dadadadada”, enough for us all to about die of his cuteness. 

The other day as we were traveling and all a bit glum, Tiger started to babble. After about 30 seconds, J said, “I don’t feel so sad anymore” and we all agreed.

This really deserves its own post, but if you have been reading since the beginning of the blog, you may recognize this family (well, maybe if the lighting was better ;)). When Jon and I first traveled to Ethiopia to pick up the girls, to our bewilderment, we realized while we had researched every possible facet of adoptive parenting, we forgot to actually learn a thing about how to keep an infant alive and happy. The girls were very upset by the whole transition as well and as we were staying in a guesthouse with other families, two families heard the cries (of the kids, not ours, well, maybe ours) and came to our aid. The Armstrongs had a set of twins at home and were bringing home another infant, who happened to be an incredibly happy baby, so they stepped in and restored sanity. 

Here are the three kiddos, lives forever intertwined, meeting again. I’ll have to get a picture of them together as babies on here. So cute. They were living in two different care centers together before our “Forever Family” days.

So glad we were able to visit and share joy in new members of our family. 

And we are able to experience so many moments we’re accustomed to missing and it’s amazing. 

Baby line up at a family event in age order.

And the SNOW. The girls haven’t let it rest and they are old enough they go to the bathroom before the snow clothes and stay out for so long I am worried they’ll freeze.

Carefree on the ice.

Marveling at God’s creativity

And the ice is perfect and see-through, leading to many discussions about the cold world underneath. I watch from the windows. 

I am smart (or is it boring?) enough to remember how cold it is outside! It’s strange as it’s Ethiopia’s warm time, so glad to experience both. 

We wish you a Merry Christmas and so much love!