My 2 Ethiopian Girls: November 2008

Friday, November 7, 2008

We Play. We Dress Up. We Rock!

Brandon and Evan love to rough-house with Tigist ... she is so tough. And then she'll pout over a simple hurt feeling. She is just so cute!

She adores her brothers to no end!

Tigist has unlimited kisses for everybody

They play this game of how she falls into their arms. Not good to play at the top of the stairs, which she has already done ... and survived w/o a tear.

Pinned!!!!!! Yesssssss!

"Maybe I was a bit rough on him??"

"Maybe not! He's still moving"

"Noooo! You have to be gentle with me. I'm just a little girrrrrl!"

The stinky diaper move!

"Are you gettin' this Mommy?"

"Have you had enough yet, Brandon?"

My Aunt Kathy sent Tigist these shoes and ballet outfit. SoooOOO adorable!

"I'm stretching!"

"Stretching ... "

"Am I cute, yet?"

"Stretching ... "

Auntie Kelly and cousin Krystal sent Tigist this outfit. I just love this on her. Thank you Kelly and Krystal.

"Thank you Auntie and cousin!"

"I'm a Rock Star!"

I made this Chicken Curry dish that took over 2 hours. These are just some of the ingredients, but it lasted for 4 meals (leftovers) and the whole family loved it. The sauce was amazing if I might say so myself. Reeeeallllly good.

We Voted!

We voted early ...

Halloween With Tigist

Tigist had an absolute blast "knock, knock, knocking" on our neighbors doors. Here are a few pics our sweet girl ...

Brandon, Tigist and Evan

Mommy, Come!

"Daddy, make sure I knock on EVERY door, okay?"

Grace's door ...

Grace lives directly behind me

"My bucket is still not fulll ... let's go!"

"Where can I get some more of this stuff?"

Diane's front porch

Devil dog

Debra's porch

Then we went to a party at Leah and Kyles beautiful home ...

Saturday, November 1, 2008

Tigist Halloween

For Tigist's first Halloween experience, we walked her around the cul-de-sac where she was spoiled by being given more than one candy per house. She thought it was just the greatest thing to "knock, knock, knock" and someone opens the door with a huge bowl of candy, which she gets to stick her little hand in and grab at. She would repeatedly mutter "knock, knock, knock?" and run from house to house.

We had been invited to a really great party that was all decked out for Halloween. With 25 kids and 50 people total, Tigist was not short on some great fun. David and I just got finished going through her candy stash ... you know, it's important for her not to have too much of anything, right? (I left my camera at the party, so I'll post pics later).

This was her first American experience of this kind of fun ...

Welcome to our Site ... This is our Journey of our Adoption from Africa and our Life in Denver.

This journal (blog) is about adoption, our change of life from California to Denver and our little girl who we have adopted from Ethiopia. Our daughter came home to us after 9 months of tons of paperwork and she has come home to us on August 18th, 2008.

I highly encourage you to post comments at the end of any post if you'd like. I update every few days, so sign up to be emailed each time I post something new. It's a great way to keep updated.

So far, this has been an amazing journey. The adoption process is more "stuff" than you can imagine leading to what has been an incredible change in our lives. This journal is from my heart to you the reader and to our daughter whom we just recently met. It is also dedicated to the biological parents of our adopted girl who may or may not be alive. I do know that Tigist was placed in a safe place to be found by police, who then took her to an orphanage. In doing so, they saved her life! I applaud her Mother and/or Father's courage in the decision to offer their child a life full of opportunity. They decided to put her up for adoption by relinquishing her in such a way. This is such a touchy subject, yet very personal to both the biological parents and us. We will always honor them in the lives of our daughter...they will never be forgotten! That....I can promise.

Where we are in the adoption process....

We picked Tigist up in Addis Ababa August 9th, 2008. She is home, healthy and very happy!

We passed court on June 23rd 2008, traveled on July 31st, met Tigist on August 9th, and arrived home on August 18th.

What has changed is that we are not adopting two girls, which is what we started out attempting to do, but ended up with one amazing little 2 yr. old. Just another reminder how this process can be so unpredictable.

Why does our blog title says 2 girls...well, we sponsor a very sweet 12 year old girl in Ethiopia and have adopted another. So even though we weren't referred 2 girls as was the plan, the title coincidentally still applies to Our 2 Ethiopian Girls! One here, one there! We eagerly await the letters and pictures Fatuma sends us and we send letters and photos too.

The meaning of the Ethiopian flag

(adapted from a Yahoo group web posting and Unicef-Ethiopia)

Ethiopia is one of the oldest countries in the world, and the only African country that has no history of colonization. Upon their independence, many African countries adopted the colors of the Ethiopian flag - green, yellow and red - that became known as the Pan-African colors.

The official flag of Ethiopia consists of three equal and horizontal bands of green (top), yellow, and red with a yellow pentagram and single yellow rays emanating from the angles between the points on a light blue disk centered on the three bands.

The significance of the colors on the Ethiopian flag are interpreted to have a connection to the Holy Trinity, as well as the three main provinces of Ethiopia. The red stripe stands for power, faith and blood. The yellow strip symbolizes peace, natural wealth and love. The green stripe represents the land and hope.

The yellow pentagram on the blue disk, also known as the National Coat of Arms, is a symbol of the current government; it is intended to reflect the desire of the nations, nationalities and peoples of Ethiopia, as well as of its religious communities, to live together in unity and equality. The star represents unity of the people and the races that make up Ethiopia. The five rays on the outside of the star represent prosperity, and the blue disk represents peace.

My 2 Ethiopian Girls

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