Sharing Christmas

Making Christmas cookies is much more fun when you eat the flour too!

I see Mary and one of the Three Wisemen

Opening presents with Aunt Sandy at the Page Christmas




Are these Halloween costumes for next year? Cool bath towels! Thanks Aunt Sandy and Uncle Terry!

And not to be outdone, Landree gets into the act too!

The proverbial "kids table", Christmas Eve with the Kleins.

This bag ought to have LOTS of stuff in it since it's almost as big as me!

Wait! Carson still sees one more thing way down at the bottom of the bag!

Can you believe these two are twins? Cousins Merrick and Rowan.

These kids had more fun playing with the babys' toys than their own!

When I grow up I want to be a welder just like my brother, Channing!

Yeah, but Kali and Channing won't be the ONLY welders in the family!

Christmas morning with my two favorite guys ... Daddy and Monkey George!

It is so hard to believe that it has been 6 months already since Kali became part of our lives. I have started following some of the other Gladney Ethiopian blogs again and it's all coming back to me ... the joy of referral day; the excitement of traveling to Africa; the overwhelming anticipation waiting at the hotel for our daughter to be brought to us; the look of sheer terror and utter confusion on her face. Too many adjectives? How about the longing to be home once you have your child in your arms; the fear of not knowing what to do now that you have your child in your arms; the doubt and wondering if you've done the right thing; the dread of the long flight(s) home; the exhaustion once you are home; and then real life resumes. Except now there's an additional little person(s) in your life and now you have to learn about each other ... difficult, exciting, scary, rewarding, frustrating, and downright fun sometimes.

Being on the other side of the hill now, it's fun to look back and follow the blogs of the parents still climbing that hill ... and I mean that in the nicest of ways! We made it over the top and we're doin' great! That's not to say that it's all downhill from here ... we still have puberty, driving lessons, dating, and applying for college to get through!

I read an article in an adoption magazine some time ago that stuck with me. The author, the mom, seemed quite offended when people would notice her daughter of a different race and make comments, NICE comments, about her and completely ignore her other biological children. She wanted to scream back to these people, "what about these kids here ... chopped liver!?" I have to admit I've noticed that people pay much more attention to Kali than Carson and make comments about how cute she is ... but let's think about it for a minute. She does kind of stand out when we're all together. And she is beautiful, so I really can't blame them for saying so. If people notice this beautiful African flower in a lily white field, would I rather have them say something nice like "Oh how pretty she is!", or something nasty? No brainer! So, even though Carson too is a beautiful child, it doesn't bother me a bit when folks notice Kali and say something NICE about her!! As a matter of fact, in the 6 months that we've had Kali, we have not had one negative experience or comment from other people. Knock on wood ...

Not much of anything new to report on Kali. She is a normal little 3 year old girl ... she likes to wear dresses (especially the kind that swirl really big when she turns around in circles), she likes to mimic her brother, she changes her mind every other day about what she likes and dislikes, she likes to whine when she doesn't get her way, she wants to do EVERYTHING herself, and she wants to help you do everything too. Listening to her talk, nobody would ever believe that she didn't speak a word of English 6 short months ago ... she is a chatterbox deluxe! The most shocking thing that has happened ... she loves one of the dogs! Phoebe, our yellow lab, is her best buddy now. Every day before we leave for school, she leans down and gives Phoebe a hug and kiss. 6 months ago she was convinced that Phoebe was going to eat her! She's still afraid of every other dog she meets, from the biggest doofus dogs to the smallest puppies. One of these days she'll figure it all out and she'll probably grow up to be a veterinarian ... or a ballroom dancer so she can have all those cool swirly dresses!