Sela’s Mother’s Day Program

She had to write a recipe for what she thought was my favorite food/dessert.  She chose chocolate donuts with coffee .  I had to laugh when I looked at the 2 moms next to me and they had vegetable salad and carrots and broccoli!

Lucy’s Preschool Program

She told me afterward that she was “a little nervous” about being in front of all those people, but you couldn’t tell a bit!

And we’ve all been loving the sunshine!

2 months

Wow, hard to believe that Joah has been home for almost 8 weeks!  He is doing well, and I feel like we are all adjusting to our new normal with 3 kiddos.  Each day (and night!) still has it’s fair share of challenges, but I think that’s probably normal.  He continues to make progress in many ways.

A couple things about our Joah –

He LOVES this glow-worm.  He calls it his “Mimi”.  It’s pretty sweet. . .although part of me wishes he would have picked a quieter object of attachment!

He has made it his mission to remove all of our cupboard door pads.  Here’s the pile he has accumulated.  If he can’t pull them off, he bites them off.  Crazy kid!

And Lucy has some big news. . .

she learned to ride without training wheels!  Go Lucy!!

Sela has been talking about wanting rollerskates for a long time.  She finally bought some today with her birthday money and practiced for 4 hours!

She was determined!

And one last picture of all the kids

(we’re still working on that 3rd smile )

love him :)

Happy Easter!

This was about the best shot I got today.  Yes, really.

Might have had something to do with Lucy waking up at 4am wanting to go find her Easter basket!

no more patches!

Lucy had her vision recheck this week and was doing great~each eye was seeing 20/20.  Which means. . .no more patch time for this little girl!

She gives 2 thumbs up

week one

We’ve been home just over a week now. . .and to be honest, I’m not sure if things are easier or harder!  Sleep is getting a little better.  We’re gradually figuring out what he is willing to eat.  But we’re also getting to work through some 2-year-old tantrums!  The girls are realizing that sometimes it’s hard to have a little brother!

In the midst of all the hard stuff, however, he continues to keep us smiling and laughing like crazy .  And we continue to pray that his little heart and mind would keep trusting us.

Below is the typical face I get whenever I’m trying to change a diaper, change his clothes, give him medicine. . .and I have to chase him around the house.  He thinks it’s hilarious!

He also seems to love music.  He was playing the piano today and just singing away!

And a picture of the big sisters, who thought it would be fun to do face paint while Joah was napping today.

This past week has been incredibly hard, but so very good.  Joah is doing great.  He has such a fun personality and is always cracking us up.  We love to hear him sing in Amharic (which unfortunately probably won’t last long).  Since he is used to being around only women, it has taken him a little longer to warm up to Daddy.  But we’re making great progress.  My arms even got a nice long break today from carrying around this 27 pound boy!  The girls love to play with him and chase him around the house.  We are all still quite exhausted and adjusting in many ways, but we’re doing well.

Here’s a few more pictures from our trip and homecoming.  Joah was very attached to one of the nannies at his transition home, which is something we were so thankful for, but it made for a very emotional time when we left.

Joah playing the drum at his going-away party

And since we’ve been home. . .

We love this little boy .

we’re home!

We made it home late this afternoon and we’re exhausted!

I’ll post more about our trip soon, but quick wanted to share one picture of the kids all together.

Joah is coming home!!!

Most of you have probably heard our great news that Joah is coming home!!!

We are so thankful.  God is so faithful.

Next week will be exactly one year since we got our referral for Joah.  Thought I’d share one of the first photos we received.

We’ll be there soon Joah-boy!!!

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With our trip to Ethiopia, we celebrated Sela’s 6th birthday a little early.  She chose a trip up to the American Girl store.  And loved every minute of it!

Sela & Kate

Lucy & Max

Happy Birthday 6-year-old!!!

Character Day

To celebrate the end of the school’s “reading month”, Sela got to go to school dressed as her favorite book character.

Meet Heather, the Violet Fairy

The girls have been so into these fairy books lately–the rainbow fairies, the sports fairies, the fun day fairies, the party fairies. . .

Sela comes home with new ones from the school library each week!

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And a quick update on Joah:

We mailed off our final documents with the requested evidence this past Tuesday.  It should be delivered to the US immigration office in Nairobi sometime in the next 12 hours.  Right in time for the weekend unfortunately!  But we have heard that the office is reviewing these cases fairly quickly and we should hear next week sometime if we have cleared!