I Heart Kearns (for the most part)

Our little house - funnily enough, one of the window panes in the front window was recently broken by the kids, which makes it all the more Kearns :)

We have lived in our house for 5 years!  This might not sound like that big of a deal if you've lived in the same house for many years, but it is definitely a milestone for us.  The longest we lived anywhere else was in Logan for 2 1/2 years while we were going to school.  So when we bought our house we told ourselves that we were going to be here for 5ish years (because that seemed like an eternity) and then probably move.

Now that the 5 years are up, it's pretty obvious that we're not going anywhere anytime soon.  Between adoption debt (almost finished with it!) and just how much we are willing to pay for housing, it's not in our financial best interest to leave.  But besides that, the area has definitely grown on me.  Don't get me wrong - there are still plenty of things that irk me about where we live, but they don't bug me as much as they used to.   Or maybe I'm just emotionally investing myself for the long-term since that's what it looks like it will be.  Either way, for the past few months I've been mentally tallying the pros of living where we do.  And as I've been seeing the good, it's pretty evident that Heavenly Father put us exactly where our family needed to be.  Who knows what will happen in the future and where we might go, but  right now I'm seeing the huge blessings our little family has been given by living here.

So here are some of the specific things I appreciate about our quirky neighborhood, in no specific order:


Proximity:
Our house is right across the street from the elementary.  As a one car family, this has become a can't-do-without.  And with the school right there, our street is one of the first to get plowed during the winter.  Next to the school is a park where we spent what seemed like half our waking hours during the summer, and the church is around the corner from the park.
The library is within walking/kids biking distance during good weather, so that has been our twice a week outing.

School:
The elementary staff has A LOT of experience teaching kids whose second language is English.  The ESL program is well established, and Tam tested into it and began receiving services within a week of being enrolled in school.  Because of the economics of the area, our school is a Title I school so the preschool is free(!), and just across the street at the school.  I don't think we would have been able to swing preschool this year if it wasn't at our elementary, just because of the transportation dilemma of one car.

Racial and Cultural Diversity:
I don't know the exact numbers for our entire neighborhood, but the school enrollment lists only 30% of the student population as white.  The racial and cultural diversity is obvious by the stores and restaurants, and by the churches in the immediate area.  The churches are what I noticed the most when we first moved in.  Within a mile radius there are not only multiple LDS congregations (in English and Samoan), but a Samoan Methodist Church, a Catholic church with services in English, Spanish, and Vietnamese, and a Baptist church with services in English and Spanish.  The LDS ward that we attend is a pretty interesting demographic, where there are a whole lot of older white people (80+ years old) who are the original homeowner group, and then a smaller group of younger families that is more diverse.  Last year at our ward Christmas party the teenagers and some of the primary kids acted out the nativity story, and as I watched I realized that of the ten or so kids up there, there were only 2 who were white kids born in America.

Wonderful People:
I think this is something that can be said about most places, and I didn't see it as much at first because our neighbors tend to be a bit rougher around the edges, but as we've gotten to know them they are some of the most caring and giving people I've ever met.  It seems like people here just aren't as worried about what others think about them, but are very welcoming and quick to be kind.

Kate turns 4!

Kate had been looking forward to her birthday for quite a few months now, partly because she understands the age upgrade thing now, and partly because she had her heart set on having a pinata at her birthday party.  We were more than happy to make her pinata dream come true.  Seriously, that was her only request for her birthday.  And it was so fun!  The kids helped fill the pinata (with leftover Halloween candy:) ), and then when Grandpa and Grandma came over to celebrate with us Kerry hung it up in our carport.  Kate got the first turn with it, then the boys each got a turn before it got destroyed.  The kids had a blast.  This was definitely a tradition where the boys didn't ask any clarifying questions about why we were doing this.  As we were telling them about it earlier in the day, their reactions were more of "This is the best idea EVER!"

Best Day of Yeb's Life: permission and encouragement to hit something

After the pinata, we went in and Kate opened her presents, and then we sang happy birthday, Kate blew out the long awaited four candles, and we ate cake and ice cream.  The frosting on the cake might have been radioactive judging by its color, but when purple is the favorite color of the birthday girl, that's what you end up with.  It was really cute, though. :)

There must be something magical about being four years old, because Kate has some newfound confidence in her abilities to do things.  The next day at the park, Kate declared that she could go across the monkey bars all by herself "because I'm four now."  Sure enough, she just went right across.

The Pinata Afterparty

Time for Hair

Everything in our life was affected when they boys came home 7 months ago, including the time needed for Kate's hair.  We adapted by getting some girl time in at bedtime so I could detangle and style her hair while Kerry put the boys to bed, and then as our schedule normalized a bit hair time happened in the evening after her weekly hair wash.  Styling her hair is something that I love to do, and we've gotten to the point in our family where there is space for things:  emotional space for everyone to relax just a bit, and more space in our schedule that used to be completely taken up with simply meeting basic needs.  So I've been putting a little of that time toward her hair routine, and trying out some new and more complicated styles.

I decided I wanted to try yarn twists, and Kate was all about the idea when I showed her a picture of the style that had some colored yarn.  What little girl doesn't want pink woven into their hair?

Detangling after showertime

It was pretty time intensive, partially because I was doing it for the first time, but it turned out really well.  We'll see how long we get out of this style.  I'm hoping for 3 weeks.

All Finished!  She is thrilled with it!

Tam's First Day of Kindergarten

First Day of Kindergarten

When the schoolyear started back in August, we briefly thought about enrolling Tam in kindergarten.  We talked to the school and explored what options there might be as far as him going to school just a couple days a week, but it didn't pan out.  And it wasn't the end of the world, because Tam just wasn't ready to go 5 days a week, so we figured we would revisit the decision after Christmas.  As Thanksgiving got nearer, we felt like he was ready, and decided to enroll him after the holiday.  

After submitting the enrollment paperwork, Tam was assigned to a class, and he and I went and met his teacher after school.  I had heard that all the kindergarten teachers were good, so I wasn't really worried about that specifically, but I was still definitely worried about making sure that his teacher understood where we and Tam were coming from.  I wrote up a letter explaining some things about Tam and gave it to her, and she introduced herself to him and showed him around the room.  He was so excited, and kept repeating that this is "my classroom".  

So far Tam has been excited each day to go to school, loves singing a Christmas song they have been learning, and likes to tell me what things they learned.  He has been especially thrilled that there is computer time at school, and proud of himself for listening to the teacher during computer time instead of clicking on whatever random thing he wants to do.  He is obviously very far behind academically, but we're not worried about him catching up as quickly as possible.  He is a smart little guy who learns quickly, but has been dealing with much bigger issues so far.  The academics will come as he is exposed to them and masters the language.

Halloween 2013

Our Halloween celebrations really began last weekend when we went to the Pie Nighters annual Halloween party, a group of friends from college and their little families.  There are quite a few little kids now, and so there were plenty of fun kid activities.

There was a treasure hunt complete with a treasure map, brought by our friends who were all dressed as pirates.  The kids loved it!

Then they got to shoot glowing balloon ghosts with PVC pipe guns and marshmallow bullets.  Tam really got into this one.  Yeb was all about this too, but didn't have the dexterity or patience to load the bullets, so he just ate the marshmallows and hit the ghosts with his gun.  Meanwhile, Kate was scared by all the balloons getting popped by Yeb, so she hung back a bit.

Then there was plenty of time for the kids to play while the adults chatted.  As we were leaving, both Kerry and I practically cried tears of joy that we had been able to bring our little family to something like this, and have it work out so well.  The kids all did fabulously, and there really wasn't any fallout the next day.


Yesterday we decided to make the day as laid back and normal as possible to reduce the anxiety that sometimes comes with exciting stuff.  Kate went to preschool, and had a blast wearing her costume and doing all the fun activities they had going on.  The boys and I had a regular morning, and then after an early dinner we carved pumpkins, then the kids got their costumes on and we went trick-or-treating to a couple of our close neighbors, then to the trunk-or-treat at the church.  The kids all did so well, and were excited to get candy.  We headed home and got them to bed, and were shocked that the day was so stress free for the kids.  It was about as perfect as we could have hoped for.

This is what Kerry wore to work yesterday!  It's actually his high school band
uniform (circa 1970s), and still fits, although I had to hold the keys and phone
when we went out at night because the pants were a little snug. :)  Kate
ended up thinking this was cool, but when we took the picture in the
morning she was just weirded out by how big his hat was.

General Conference October 2013

So as general conference came around, I realized that if we were going to even have a prayer of listening to any of the messages, I was going to have to do some major prep in advance.

 Let me try to explain how excited I was to listen to general conference: For the last 5 months neither Kerry nor I have really been able to get much out of our church attendance because we have either been at home with the boys (before they started coming to church) or we have been going with them to their classes, then simply surviving sacrament meeting at the end, praying that nobody has a major meltdown.

 It's been getting a lot better, but we've just been on our own to keep our testimonies from withering.  So I looked forward to conference as a major opportunity to be spiritually fed.  Somewhere along the mental line I latched onto the fairly unrealistic idea that if I put enough effort into having activities for the kids, they would somehow morph into not 5 and 3 year olds and instead sit and listen quietly.  Yeah, not so much.

Sunday morning, when things were going much more smoothly (and occasionally quietly)

The good news is that after having my unrealistic expectations shattered on Saturday, we made a different game plan for Sunday that ended up working out pretty well for the kids and us.  And, miracle of miracles, there were even a few moments where kids sat and listened!

Soccer!

As the schoolyear rolled around and it was apparent that Tam wasn't quite ready to start kindergarten (we'll revisit the decision in January.  Please pray that he'll be ready! :)), we decided that he still needed some sort of activity that was his own.  We signed him up for rec soccer, and made it into a family activity.  Twice a week for a month we packed everyone into the car to go see him play. 

This is what happens when everyone wants to be picked up at the same time.

 I was a bit worried that the 2 younger kids would be bummed that they didn't get to play, too, but they were fine.  They actually enjoyed hanging out on a blanket on the sidelines and playing with matchbox cars or whatever else they decided to bring to entertain themselves with.  The actual soccer experience for Tam was par for the course, but it seemed like he had fun, so hopefully he'll be excited to do something like this again.  What really motivated him was the fact that there was juice after each game.  And he enjoyed sharing his treat and drink with all of us and making sure that everyone got a sip or a little bite.  He really is such a sweet kid!

Practicing her hair skills during the game

Kate's 1st year in Preschool

I'm really playing catch-up with blog posts, because this is really news from 2 months ago, but Kate started preschool and is loving it!  She only goes 2 days a week, but that is perfect for her (and me) right now.  She was pretty excited to start school, and after a couple weeks of getting to know the other kids at school and getting used to the routine, she's done fabulously.  Kerry's work schedule makes it so that he gets to walk her across the street to school, and then the boys and I pick her up before lunch.  She likes to talk about the songs they sang, whether they went out to recess or not, what they had for snack, and about her friends at school.  

My Priesthood Session Notes Before & After Adopting 2 More Kids (by Kerry)

April 2013

Robert D. Hales - Armor of God

Ted R. Callister - Priesthood

 Story - priesthood in a boy same as in man

 Greater Trust, Greater Expectations, Greater Training

 If you want revelation, do your homework

 Entitled to revelation, duty to rescue the lost, allow to teach

 Do not get released with your leadership skills still in you

Create leaders at camp & in the ward

David L. Beck - Ministering

 Story of Shy Johnson

 Start in your home - attitude when asked to help

 Story of Gladwyn

 We are always priesthood men. Ministering is not just something we do, it's who we are.

Dieter F. Uchdorf - Titles

 4 Titles that apply to all

 Son of Heavenly Father

 Satan would have us define ourselves by our sins, not his divine nature(toddler learning to walk)

 HF rejoices in our attempts to become more like him

 Disciples of Jesus Christ

 Healers of souls - our first and most important duty

 Heirs of God

Henry B. Eyering - Gospel to all the world

Thomas S. Monson - Teach All Nations

  The challenge is to be more profitable servants

  To Ensure Success

• Search the Scriptures with diligence - Alma 17
• Plan your life with purpose
• Teach the Truth with Testimony - story of Bro. Pollard
• Serve the Lord with love

Today have I increased in knowledge, faith, love? Story of Craig Sudbery

October 2013

Repentance - think of how many good things come from things being broken. Broken soil to wheat, broken wheat to bread, broken bread to sacrament

Pres. Uchdorf

Story - You can do it now!

Worldly sorrow leads us further into

(Pretty sure I blacked out at this point, because the next thing I remembered was the closing song :) Oh well, there's always the conference Ensign to look forward to...

Parenting on Steroids

Our family life has evened out dramatically in the last month or so, but it is still ridiculously hard.   Let me tell you about my morning:

I spent the majority of the morning dealing with meltdowns or cuddling with kids who had just come out of meltdowns. 

I scrapped the applesauce making plan in favor of watching an extra long Bob the Builder show and then taking the kids to the park.

After getting home from a much needed park experience, I started making sandwiches.  Yeb came in the kitchen naked, wanting to wear a red cape instead of clothes.  I explained that a cape is worn in addition to clothes, and he ran off to find clothes.

Meanwhile, Tam and Kate were pretending to play the piano with the children's songbook on the stand.  I asked them not to play with the book because kids tend to rip the pages inadvertently, and because there were some pictures resting on the front of the piano waiting to be hung, and I didn't want them to be bumped.

About a minute later Yeb came in with some clothes for me to help him get on, and I realized he didn't have his diaper on.  When I asked him about it he said it was poopy.

After shuttling him to the bathroom I was mid-wipe when I heard a crash of breaking glass.  I knew that it was one of the pictures.  I yelled for everyone to stay exactly where they were so no one would get glass cuts, and frantically got Yeb diapered. 

I came out to find shattered glass, and I couldn't help but tear up as I cleaned up the remnants of my birthday present, and teared up even more as Kate apologized.  

I got the vacuum out to take care of any tiny glass pieces, only to realize that one of the prongs on the vacuum plug had gotten bent between yesterday afternoon and today, badly enough that it won't go into the socket.  Fortunately we have 2 vacuums, so I pulled the other one out and took care of the rest of the cleanup.

I went to find Kate to make sure she knew I wasn't mad at her, just really sad, and as I was talking to her and carrying her in to eat lunch she started crying because she was sad, too.  I realized that she was poopy, too, but decided to let it ride until after lunch.

During lunch Tam made a point of asking if I was okay and giving me hugs.  I called Kerry to cry and tell him what happened.

There are more and more instances where I feel like the challenges we're dealing with in a given situation are regular parenting challenges, but most of the time there are added layers of trauma, stress, and attachment. It pretty much feels like parenting on steroids.

Sealing Day: Glad we didn't hire a photographer

So about a month ago Kerry and I looked at each other and both realized that the boys were probably ready for us to go to the temple and have them sealed to us.  For anyone who isn't LDS, we believe that families can be together forever.  Marriages (sealings) performed in the temple will continue on after death, and any children born before that sealing or who are adopted after are sealed to their parents.  Kate was sealed to us after her adoption was finalized as a baby, and although the boys adoptions were finalized the minute we entered the US, they just weren't ready for us to take them to the temple right off.  Heck, we couldn't even take them to the park without serious advance planning, 2 parents and unavoidable meltdowns.

So we were super excited at the idea of finally having them sealed to us.  We thought out what we could to do increase our chances that everything would go smoothly that day.  We arranged with the temple for my mom to stay with the kids during the time before and after the actual sealing ceremony so that there would be an adult they would know with them, we tried to prep them as best as possible during the couple weeks leading up to it, and we planned a very relaxed get together for afterward for all the family members who were coming (at my parents' house so we could escape if needed).

The best laid plans.... let's just say that the sealing was probably one of the loudest and most exciting the Jordan River Temple has seen in a long time.  Yeb had a meltdown, poor kid.  We were planning to take pictures afterward, and got one shot of the whole group, and one shot of just the kids, and then called it a day.  On our way to the temple that morning we realized that we should have arranged to have a photographer to take pictures afterward, but with how it played out it would have been wasted money.

Here is the photographic evidence of our happy eternal family:

I'm trying to look all "happy calm mother" while dealing with a tantruming 3 year old, everyone else looks nice, and my grandpa's face tells the whole story: this family is crazy.


This is both of our families.  Notice the look of death on Yeb's face.

And here are the children who were excited to smile for pictures.

For about a week after this whole thing, I was half expecting to get a phone call notifying me that the sealing wasn't valid due to one of the members of the whole thing not actually wanting to become part of our eternal family.  Now that it's been a couple weeks, we're starting to be able to laugh about it more, and we're still really glad that we did it when we did.  Looking back there are a few things I wish we had done differently leading up to the actual day that might have upped our chances of success, but we did our best with what we knew.  And after a couple weeks of thinking about it, I really don't think that another month or 2 would have made a big difference in how the day turned out.

Even though it was more exciting that we meant for it to be, being sealed was a really good thing for our family to have happen. A lot of progress has been made overall with attachment, bonding, and adjustment, and we didn't want to put off something this important any longer than we needed to.

And now we have a VERY eventful day to remember as a family.

Becoming Friends

One of the best things in the past month or so has been seeing Kate and Yeb become friends.  Kate's only 7 months older than Yeb, but when the boys first came home they didn't connect right off.  Not surprising, between the language barrier and the huge overall adjustment for both of them.  But now they've slowly become each other's preferred playmate.  They both really enjoy pretending and are able to play independently for a sizable amount of time, and both of them kind of need downtime to play each day.  I know most kids do, but it's like they NEED that downtime, because if they don't get it we have stress.  It's kind of convenient that the two of them need playtime to unwind, and Hey!, there's another kid right here who also wants to play!

Just Austin (aka Kitty Food)

Over the 4th we went down to Kerry's sister's house, and the kids LOVED playing with their friendly little kitten.  There were multiple times where I thought how nice it would be to have a cat, but then there's the perpetual dilemma Kerry and I have had about pets, which is whether the pets will indoor/outdoor or just outdoor.  Our yard is too small to have outdoor only pets with a good conscience, our backyard is not yet fenced, and I really don't want to have to deal with potty training an animal when I'm still working really hard to keep the house at housekeeping baseline.  So I dismissed the idea as something that might be great for an unspecified time in the future.

We got home late on the 4th, and we were trying to get all the sleeping kids in the house and into their beds without them waking up traumatized from all the fireworks (Kearns residents take their firework celebrations very seriously, and then with the arial fireworks legal this year it was like being in a war zone), when a stray cat who was also freaked out by all the noise ran in our open door, through the house, and went under our bed.  Kerry got the cat out, and after getting the kids all in bed, he sat outside with the poor cat and fed it tuna fish.

After asking around, we found out that the cat really is a stray, so we kept feeding it, and it's stuck around.  It's the best of all worlds: I don't have to worry about a litter box because as of right now the cat stays outside, but the kids LOVE having it (him? her? I should probably find out) around to play with and feed.  There aren't tons of people outside during the day in our little section of the neighborhood, so whenever we're outside playing or the kids are riding bikes, the cat comes to hang with us, and in the evening when I'm watering the garden or Kerry and I are relaxing on the porch it comes and sits with us.

We started calling the cat Just Austin from a Backyardigans episode, but he is also referred to by Tam as Kitty Food.  The funny things about learning a new language.  I think the ideas of animals and feeding them are too intertwined right now for him, but it cracks me up when he's chasing the long suffering cat around trying to give it some attention and yelling "Kitty Food!" at it.  Kate, meanwhile, just wants to have the cat sit on her lap for more than 2 seconds, which doesn't happen very often, and Yeb likes to watch it eat, but then gets sucked back to playing with something that has wheels.

We Survived Camp and All We Got Were These Orange Hats

I'm trying to catch up on the major things that have happened in the past month, so this is another that happened mid June.  Kerry runs a week long boy scout merit badge camp in Blanding, and I've always gone, too.  After Kate was born we brought her along while both of us staffed, but this year bringing the whole fam was out of the question.  The boys had only been home for 6 weeks, and kids being away from home for 10 days is rough even in the best of circumstances.  We decided for the survival of all family members that it would be best for Kerry to go alone and for me to stay with the kids.  Fortunately, my mom, sisters, and Kerry's sister Nancy all pitched in big time to ensure that survival.

Seriously, it was really rough, and by the end I couldn't believe that we made it, but I know that Heavenly Father cares a lot about the experiences that teenage boys have at that camp and that it was important for Kerry to go, and I know that He seriously helped me out to be able to deal with Kerry being gone for so long.

 Needless to say, we had a countdown calendar in the kitchen for when Kerry would be back, and by the end we were all SOOOOO excited to see him again!  The kids woke up Sunday morning to find him home and he gave them all this year's camp hats.  They were all pretty excited about them.  I was excited that Kerry took care of the kids that morning so I could sleep in (till 7:30, but hey, that IS sleeping in these days).  Lesson: Glad we made it, also glad that next year the circumstances will be vastly different so that hopefully the kids and I can come, too.

4 Teeth Pulled

Before the dentist...

This happened way back in June, but I just barely uploaded pictures from our camera, and wanted to make sure to mention this.  Tam had some major dental work done, including having his four top front teeth pulled, and did amazing with it all.  He was ridiculously excited that just he and I were going to the dentist since he already knew that the dentist's office is a magical place with nice people, stickers and prizes.  I felt guilty enough about it to try and prep him about what was really going to happen during the visit, including showing him his rotten teeth in the mirror and mimicking pulling them out, but even that didn't dampen his enthusiasm.  He started looking slightly nervous when we went into an individual exam room at the dentist's instead of the open group room used for regular cleanings and x-rays, but was still happy to be there.  It wasn't until the dentist numbed his whole mouth that he got really unhappy about the situation, but he still held really still and did what the dentist asked him to.  5 fillings later they were ready to pop those front teeth out, and it went surprisingly quickly.  I was planning on him taking it easy for the rest of the day, but 20 minutes after we got home he wanted to ride his bike, and then was ready for a popsicle.  After one lesson of how to use his back teeth to bite harder things, he hasn't had any problem eating, and his speech hasn't been affected, either.  Now he just has a mischievous smile to match his mischievous personality:

....After the dentist

Going to Church Together

We got to the point as a family where we felt brave enough to bring the boys to church!   For the past few weeks we've all gone together, which has been so wonderful after a couple months of having to switch off with Kerry depending on who was teaching what lesson or was in charge of something.  For now Kerry and I are going with the boys to their primary classes, and hopefully before too long the boys will be comfortable enough that they won't need us to stay with them the whole time.  We're just so glad that overall they're doing great with the church routine, and since there are so few kids in our ward (there were 4 total the first Sunday we brought them), they get to participate like crazy and get a lot more attention than in a bigger primary.  Besides a meltdown from Yeb the first week, lots of wiggles during 3rd hour sacrament meeting, and a potty accident on the upholstered bench today, things have gone remarkably well.  We figure those things are pretty much par for the parenting course for a family with 3 young kids.

Besides the excitement of going with the rest of the family to church, the boys are very motivated to be able to wear their church clothes on Sundays.  Tam acted like life couldn't get any better when I took him shopping and he got to try on clothes to see if they fit.  Fortunately, we had been given some church clothes that fit Yeb perfectly, but we still had to get shoes and socks for both boys, and clothes for Tam.  thanks Granna and Grandad for outfitting them with what they needed!

Language fun at 5 weeks all together

So it's officially been 5 weeks since the boys have been home, and even though life is still definitely stressful and hard, each week has gotten a little easier, the boys have continued to settle in, things have settled down a bit, and Kate and the boys are starting to show signs of liking each other. :)

It's been really fun to see the boys learn English, and right now they are able to understand a lot of what we say.  The day to day phrases and words are very familiar to them now, and they're saying all those in English. When there's something out of the ordinary we're able to get the point across with our limited Amharic, basic English words that they know, and gestures.



Here are a couple specific language things I don't want to forget:

- We sing "I Love to See the Temple" with the kids each night, and Tam and Yeb have learned it, with it slowly morphing into more English and less Amharic sound-alike words.  Their current version includes "I love you too ah tampo", and "to listen and to play".  We did a lesson about temples last Sunday with them where we showed them pictures of temples and our wedding pictures, and Tam especially got really excited about it.

- Both boys like to pray before meals.  Yeb's prayer has degenerated into a yelled "Amen!!", and Tam says a memorized prayer in Amharic that makes me smile.

- Kate has gotten into learning Amharic words that the boys use all the time.  She now refers to bread as dabo, calls cars makinas, and will use the Amharic words for shoes, socks, ball, and hat.  However, the one word she learned first was Ababi, which is Daddy, but still pronounces it "O Poppy".  It cracks me up!

- The Amharic words for hat and open are very similar (gofeta and gofia).  When I was outside with the kids and the boys were riding bikes for the first few times, I had to really stress that if they wanted to ride a bike they had to wear a helmet.  But I used the wrong word, and I think that's part of why there were so many meltdowns about having to wear helmets.  Poor kids.  Looking back I can now recognize that the confused looks they gave me at first were the language gears in the brain going into overdrive trying to reorganize the meanings of those words.  Yeb still refers to his helmet as "open".




Something super fun right now is watching the kids start to enjoy being together.  Kate and Yeb are starting to hit it off, where they will play together and think the same things are interesting and funny.  They have such different personalities, but somehow they've started to click.  They'll chase each other around, have picnics with blankets and play food, and yell simultaneously for fun.  Tam's sense of humor and fun is a little older than Kate and Yeb, so a lot of the time he kind of is doing his own thing. I've gotten a lot better this past week at keeping him busy helping with things around the house so that he doesn't get bored and into trouble.  He is such a helper!  I feel like maybe I should feel a little guilty about having help out as much as he does, but I don't.  It sure beats constant negativity from both of us when he gets bored, and instead he gets praise for all the work he puts in.  What I really need to do is make a picture list of tasks that he can do so that self start on them if he wants.  Which probably won't happen anytime soon because life is still too busy and a little too crazy.

I feel like we're inching toward normal a bit more each week.  From day to day it doesn't feel much different, but there really has been a ton of progress.

Starting to find the new normal

So the past few weeks have been hard.  We knew that they would be, but no amount of preparation helps you become more ready for sheer exhaustion.  We're so grateful for all the support we've had this pat little bit.  Just knowing that people are out there praying for us has made a huge difference.

We survived the 15 hour flight from Hades where we were seriously very close to walking away from luggage and children at the endpoint, and either Heavenly Father took pity on us or the boys realized they were THIS CLOSE to making their parents truly snap, because they both slept during the last 2 flights home.  Looking back, I have no idea how we all made it home safely, and it reaffirmed our prior feeling that our family is now complete, because we are not going to repeat that experience any time soon.  

The current update is that both boys are doing really well.  We're still working hard on attachment, and on the boundaries in our home, and thinking back to two weeks ago just amazes me at how far we've already come.  The boys have made so much progress, and overall it's getting a little easier to manage life each day, which is definitely progress for Kerry and I compared to when we first got home.

Kerry and I are starting to experience moments where this parenting and family thing is actually fun again, which is weird, and gives us hope that those moments are the new normal that we're working toward.  Their personalities have been coming out full force this while time, but now we're starting to appreciate them more and more.

The part of this whole thing that has been the hardest has been watching Kate try to deal with all the changes and challenges that have been happening.  She really has done so amazingly, but it has been so hard for her.  The boys have required a lot of attention this first little bit, and learning to coexist with 2 new brothers has been difficult.  I've been so proud of how much she's been willing to share and help out.  Even with all the difficulty, there have been plenty of moments where she has a blast playing with the boys, and enjoys being silly with them.  We've been trying really hard to carve out some Kate time each day so that she gets some one-on-one with one of us.

The medical update is that the boys are both really healthy and within the normal ranges for growth and health.  Since there's no immunization record, they just have to start from scratch, and they've been champs with all the shots.  We're also having them tested for any other possible bugs, and Yeb is currently being treated for lice.  Yuck.  The boys also had their dental appointments today, where we found out that Yeb has wonderfully healthy teeth, and that Tam will have a premature pumpkin smile after having his top four front teeth removed soon.  It will be so nice to get all this initial dental/medical stuff out of the way!

We have hardly any pictures of the boys because any time the camera comes out there is an inevitable meltdown, so we've avoided bringing it out at all.  We need to get going, though, because I really do want pictures of this stage of our family.

Thanks again, everyone, for all the love and support!

Still At Extremes

After suffering from some over scheduling yesterday and the resulting meltdowns and other behavior, we decided to take it really easy today, and overdid it a tad. The only outing we had planned was to go to the airport right after breakfast to get the luggage, which left the ENTIRE rest of the day unplanned. Of course we had a few ideas of things we could do here at the guesthouse, but in reality we were sadly underprepared. The critical error is our reliance on parks and other outdoor spaces that we have such awesome access to at home, so killing an hour or two isn't that hard at home, but there just aren't places like that here. To try to keep ourselves from going insane, we ended up going for 3 walks to various destinations (or with no destination), colored with chalk, played with balloons, played in the hose that was running when we came home from one walk, played soccer, hide and seek, tinker toys, Legos. and Yeb got a good nap this afternoon. Despite all that, we still suffered the effect of some boredom.

The guesthouse is in a nice residential part of Addis, where the streets are cobblestone, the outside of people's gates has some trees or other foliage, and the people we met while walking around seemed more well to do than most of the city. Our 2nd walk of the day was to search for a little store that sold soccer balls. Our big mistake was to take the double umbrella stroller that we brought for the airports coming home, but we thought it would be fun to let the boys ride in it. As we were leaving the guesthouse I realized that I hadn't ever seen any strollers here in Ethiopia, and yep, as if we weren't already very visible, the stroller pretty much made us into a circus act. Both boys were really excited to ride in it, but as soon as we got outside the gate Tam was embarrassed and insisted on walking, and then commenced to make fun of Yeb for being in the stroller. Fortunately, Yeb was still waking up from a nap, and couldn't care less. After we found and bought a soccer ball, Tam decided he wanted to ride, too, until a passerby made a disparaging remark about strollers, and then Tam wanted nothing to do with it again.

After buying a ball we went down a quiet side street to kick it around, but after about 5 minutes the boys seemed ready to go, and as we started heading back to the guesthouse we realized that there was piece of wire wound in one of the stroller wheels. We stopped to try to get it put, and after about a minute a young teenage boy came up and asked if he could help. Pretty soon a whole bunch of his teenage friends were gathered around, with them and Kerry all trying to get the wire out, and a couple of them kicking the ball around with Tam. They were such good kids! They were able to fix it after about 15 minutes with the help of some pliers one of them borrowed from his house, and we were sad to say goodbye. The funny thing was the actual conversation I had with one of them where I had to explain the purpose of the stroller, and where he politely tried to hide that he was perplexed about why anyone would need such a thing.

The day ended with us walking to the little store to buy some snacks for the trip home, where we as ones that the price of snacks and juice was going to be a lot cheaper than mental health treatment if we stayed put all evening. After buying some cookies and mango juice awe sat on the ledge next to the sidewalk and ate them and watched cars go past. The highlight (for me at least) was watching the boys reactions when a man herded a cow down the sidewalk right in front of us. They seriously had no idea what to think, and we had to convince them they weren't in danger. The weather was beautiful, people were out and about, and he sun was starting to set, and it made me really sad that we're leaving tomorrow. On the other hand, living out of a hotel room long term isn't tempting, and we sure miss Kate and are excited to get home to her and family!

Panic Attacks On Airplanes

When we were on the really long flight from DC to Addis there was an older Ethiopian woman who had what I can only assume was a panic attack. We're talking a couple hours of full out panicked screaming. The flight attendants did what they could for a while, and then they paged for a medical professional to come help. It didn't seem like it helped much, though, because she didn't calm down for quite a while. Well, today Kerry and I felt a bit like a medical professional stuck on a 13 hour flight with someone having a panic attack. Not the entire day was like that, but we had our embassy appointment and a lunch with Yeb's birth mom, so there was a lot of time where we couldn't gear what we were doing as much to the boys, and it showed.

However, there were some really good things today. Tam came up and gave me a hug and a kiss today, we walked down the street to the little store and bought ice cream bars and had a blast seeing the boys eat ice cream for probably the first time in their lives, and Kerry and the boys wrested before bed. It was also fun hear the boys jabber to each other in Amharic and laugh together.

Another fabulous thing is that Yeb really is potty trained! We only brought diapers for him, and after yesterday's fiasco I don't feel bad having him wear one, but he does a good job of telling us when he needs to go, and is pretty independent about it. Wahoo!

Now for the grunginess. We didn't end up getting our baggage today because between the embassy appointment and lunch with Yeb's birth mom, we figured the boys had had enough running around. Which means that by this evening we were feeling very gross, and hand washed clothes to tide us over till first thing tomorrow when we REALLY have to go get the luggage. It also means that my hair has looked amazing without bobby pins, blow dryer, or curling iron that are all in the bag. Oh well.

Gotcha Day

Yesterday was absolutely wonderful, but much different than planned! We arrived in Addis at about 8 in the morning, but spent the next 2 hours getting out of the airport. Between being at the end of a long line for tourist visas, and then a big luggage hassle, it just took forever. The suitcase that has all of Kerry's and my clothes didn't arrive, but is scheduled to get there this morning, so that's on our to-do list after our embassy appointment. As annoying as it is, I'm just so glad that it wasn't the suitcase that had all the boys' stuff in it. Kerry and I had a change of clothes in our carryon, and we were able to go down the street to a little store and buy a few toiletries that we couldn't do without for a day.

After going to the guest house, we called the agency to check in and see what the plan was for the day as far as picking up the boys. We were told before we left that Yeb's orphanage did a farewell party for kids when they got picked up, so we decided to get Tam first then go to the party and pick up Yeb. We brought traditional clothes for the boys that we were going to change them into before they left their respective orphanages, and just envisioned it based on what we knew. Like everything in life, it didn't turn out at all the way we thought. The agency driver picked us up and asked I f we could swing by Yeb's orphanage first because there was an infant that was going to be moved to Tam's orphanage. We figured we could talk to the orphanage director or the nannies about the party plans for later, so that was great. We got there, found Yeb, but there were no party plans, and since there weren't, they told us we could take Yeb with us right then. Since the driver was waiting for us with a nanny and the baby they were taking to Tam's place, the photo op with traditional clothes went out the window. We went to Kibebe Tsehay, Tam's orphanage, and waited for a few minutes while they got him up from a nap and got him ready to go. We played outside while we waited, and I had time to realize that Yeb looked about 10 pounds lighter than last trip because he was wearing underwear instead of a cloth diaper. However, that realization somehow didn't lead to the thought that he would need potty breaks, or that he probably needed a potty break NOW due to his consuming a bottle of water during the drive. I'll blame it on the jet lag, which we were starting to feel.

Tam was led out of the building he had been napping in, and he recognized us, and seemed happy to see us. His orphanage doesn't do a goodbye party or ceremony, so we snapped a few pics with his favorite nanny and piled into the van. I think the car rides were a highlight of the day for both boys. The level of excitement they had is bout the same as American kids at Disneyland, minus the Disney meltdowns. Not joking.

Right after we started driving back to the guest house I thought that Yeb was asking for his water bottle, so I gave it to him, but would find out about 10 minutes later that he had really been telling me that he needed to go potty. Oops. Tam spent the drive alertly looking out the window at all the cars (again, imagine Disneyland excitement here), Yeb fell asleep sitting up next to me and I was finally able to convince him to lay his head on my lap. Kerry and I were really feeling the lack of sleep, and Kerry slept most of the drive, and I fought it, too. By the time we got to the guest house, it had started raining. We groggily piled out of the car, and I tried to get my brain to figure out how to get Yeb out of the car And into the guest house without getting pee all over the only clean shirt I had at that point. We knocked at the gate but it took a few minutes and a few more knocks before someone let us in. We stood there waiting, in the rain, without talking because we were all so tired, and then Yeb, who was fortunately standing on his own at that point, went pee again. It ran out of his pants and somehow flowed directly into one of his high top shoes without laces. We're talking halfway full here.

So whenever I hear a story like this I usually look at this moment in the story as the rock bottom moment, or the sad part that is the flip side to the happy ending. But standing there as a family (minus Kate) In the rain with a shoe full of pee just made me so happy, and was much more like a wonderful beginning to the story of the boys joining our family. Kerry and I just laughed like crazy, and then got in the guesthouse and got those boys all cleaned up.

The rest of the afternoon and evening went really well. The boys were both ok with us giving them lots of loves, and the communication factor that I had started to stress about wasn't a problem, either. Between gesturing, pointing, and facial expressions, we all seemed to be able to figure out what everyone else meant.

Bedtime went a lot better than expected, too. Kerry rocked Yeb to sleep, and Tam wanted to lay down on the big bed with us, so we all piled on and fell asleep. Kerry woke me up about a half an hour later so we could put Tam in his bed and get us ready to go to sleep. Everyone slept really well. Yea!

On Our Way...

Well, we're officially our way to get the boys! The sad news is that it's the middle of the night
and The flight we're on doesn't have reclining seats. I didn't know that was possible, but it's reality, which means that my neck is sore from trying to lay my head on Kerry's very bony shoulder, but alas, no sleep. The irony in this situation is that Kerry was adamant about us staying awake until we leave Washington DC later in the morning so that we'll be on Ethiopia time when we get there, while I was more than happy to sleep as soon as we left Salt Lake. At the moment however, Kerry is the one sleeping while I am trying to kill time in my ridiculously upright seat.
The last couple weeks since we found out both boys had cleared embassy have been both exciting and nerve wracking. We've been consistently alternating between happiness and excitement, panic, and sheer exhaustion. Kerry had a crazy work week, and I was trying to get everything done for us to travel. Of course we're super excited to go get the boys, but all of a sudden we've also been faced with realizing that these boys are no longer just theoretical. The strangest moments are the ones where we've had to think past the travel stage, like this week when I made doctor and dentist appointments for them, and the many things that we've done that were the "lasts" before we're a family of 5. Just before my dad came this evening to take us to the airport, we realized that the next time we were at our house, the boys would be there with us. That was a surprising and wonderful thought. Realizing that I will soon be wrangling 3 children in sacrament meeting on Sundays by myself somehow didn't give me the same warm fuzzies. I'll just have to con someone to sit with me, which, now that I think about it shouldn't be too hard considering how cute the 3 kids in question are.
We've definitely been feeling panicked about whether we're prepared enough to parent these boys, but the good news is that the closer we've gotten to actually leaving, and especially now that the stress of preparation for travel is over, all I can think of is how wonderful it will be to get to go get them, hold them, play with them, and start the process of getting to know them!

Springtime, Easter, And The Pinterest-Worthy Campout That Wasn't

It finally feels like spring, and even with days like yesterday and today where the weather is wet, I can't complain because at least it's not snowing.  Plus there have been a lot of really nice warm days where we've been able to enjoy being outside.  Kate has been riding her little bike everywhere during the past week since she got it, and has been pretty disappointed when I've had to tell her that the grocery store and Grandpa and Grandma's house are too far for us to ride a bike.  

In honor of spring, we decided to do a family cookout and campout last Friday night.  Our paper shredder broke quite a while ago, so we needed a good excuse to burn the shred pile.  We put a fire ring together with broken cinder blocks that we dug out of the backyard last summer, and got a fire going.  We cooked hot dogs, and Kate loved helping with everything.  I have to say, as ready as I am for us to tackle the backyard this summer, there have been moments the past few years where it's been kind of nice to just do what we want back there without having to worry about logistics.  Build a fire ring?  Sure, no problem.  Pick a spot.  Seriously, anywhere.  It probably helped that backyard looks the nicest during the spring when the layer of small bright green weeds can still pass off as faux grass.  I'm sure this feeling of benevolence will be short lived as the weather warms up and the backyard returns to a sunburned wasteland. :)

After we ate, Kate played on our dirt mountain for a bit while Kerry and I sat and chatted, and then we slowly added our shred papers to the fire.  Kate thought that was pretty awesome.

We headed inside, got Kate ready for bed, and then set up our tent in Kate's room for us all to sleep in.  It's still too cold to sleep outside, and our backyard isn't fenced in, so we planned to do an inside campout.  It was all so cute: Kate was in her jammies, we had laid out blankets for our beds, Kerry read her the bedtime story in the tent, Kate thought that life was amazing and was so excited to sleep in a tent.  

But the happy pictures that you see are where the fun stopped for the evening, because Kate didn't go to sleep till 1am.  We had forgotten that she had inadvertently had a late nap, which guarantees a rough night for her.  So that was sad.  We were all zombies the next day.    Fortunately, by about 11pm we scrapped the tent idea completely in favor of having everyone sleep in thier own beds.  There was no way that either Kerry or I wanted to go to bed late plus get kicked all night by a little girl who probably wouldn't be sleeping very well.  We'll try the campout again another time, because it would be really fun, but next time we're going to make sure that Kate is very tired by bedtime.  

In other news, we repaired our main bathroom a couple weekends ago!  It crossed my mind to take before and after pictures, but I thought better of it because then I would have solid evidence of how bad it's looked for so long.  It has needed some attention since we moved in 4 years ago, but has been one of those things that you stop noticing about your house.  However, it got to the point where we were legitimately concerned about the easy access kids have to large chunks of paint that were peeling off one section of wall, and we got fed up that more than half of the tile border that went around the walls had fallen off.  After a full day's work and 2 tubs of spackle, it was ready to repaint, and turned out really well.  The only thing we have left to do is figure out how to attach the new trim to the bottom of the walls.  Those same sections of walls are now made up almost entirely of spackle, so we're not sure if nails would work, and in other sections it's the original plaster, so we're still deciding whether we can nail it on or if we need to look at maybe gluing it on.

We also enjoyed celebrating Easter this past weekend.  We did an egg hunt with our friends the Bowles, and then on Sunday we had Easter baskets, church, and then dinner with my family in the evening.  Kate was all dressed up for church, and I tried a new fancy hairdo on her that turned out well.

She was feeling all cute, as evidenced by her new pose:

Notice basically the same pose later that day:

And these are just a couple random pictures from the last couple weeks that I loved.  :)

Oh, just a quick update about Tam and Yeb:  Both their cases have been submitted to the US embassy, and Tam's case cleared within a week.  That means that his case is DONE!  Now we're waiting on Yeb's case to clear, which will probably be a little longer.  They will be interviewing his birthmom, and from the information the embassy sent us, it sounds like the interview appointment slots are usually filled about a month out.  What this really means is that we have no idea when this will happen, but it feels like it's getting closer!