A few pics from a few weeks ago....

You could have a promising career here as an English teacher. Just sayin

Exactly how scared, I'm not sure.


So, if I'm a disability, what do I do again?



What's your favorite kind of sand?

Well, we made it back home last night after a tiring 30 hours of travel from Ethiopia. We are not looking forward to the travel next time, but at least we will be able to take our little ones home with us after our embassy appointment hopefully in January sometime. The time went by so quickly last week!

Here are a few more pictures of Zac and Eliana at the transition home in Addis Ababa.





This is another adorable little gal whom we would have loved to take with us, but is going with another wonderful family.

A few pics of yesterday

Here are a few more shots of our time yesterday hanging out at the orphanage. Such beautiful children it breaks our heart that we cannot adopt more!

Check out her dimple! This is our beautiful Eliana.... we are enjoying spending this week with her and lots of her little friends!



Zac teaches Scott how to play ball in the courtyard of the orphanage. They have a nice grassy yard to play in, and the weather is beautiful here! We've been enjoying the sunshine and fresh air! Zac is friends with anyone who has food to share. :) He loves his caretakers, and follows them around and jabbers at them like only a one year old can. They give him lots of tender attention. We are really impressed with the ladies who care for these kids! (14 ladies for 24 kids)



So, I complain all the time to Scott about how skinny Aubrey is... so you know how blessed I felt to show up and find little Eliana in this healthy chunky condition!! She is a super sweet and contented baby! Her caretakers and the older kids at the orphanage all love her and hold her a lot. I haven't seen her cry, but she can definitely smile!

Our internet connection is spotty here, but we will try to post a little more when we can! Thanks to all of you who are keeping all this in your prayers!

Leaving in the morning

Well, we are taking off in the morning heading to Dubai to spend the night and then to Addis Ababa on Sunday morning. Carey's mom arrived today jet-lagged, but ready to hang out with her granddaughters for the week, and they were ready to have her. We are sure they will have a good time together after leaving a list of instructions! Living in a foreign country is even more difficult when you cannot read or understand! But Emily can help with the translation if Nana needs a translator.

We were not sure what to pack, so it feels like we are not taking anything with us. But I guess it is just for court, so as long as we show up, that is the most important thing. The next trip we will probably have to take more. We got everything into one suitcase this time, so we should be traveling light!

Hopefully we will post from Ethiopia . . .

Aubrey waving bye. Ha!

November cruising by

Well, we continue to have great weather these days. Here's Em playing out and about this week.


Hard to believe that it is already November 15. And in just 12 more days we will head off to Ethiopia for our upcoming court date, getting to visit Bangladesh and Dubai along the way to Addis Ababa. We will have like an 8 hour lay over in Dubai, but apparently cannot exit the airport due to an Israeli stamp in our passport from a trip 5 years ago. Go figure. So, from 9:00 PM to 5:00 AM we will have to try and sleep in the airport. We have only seen that they have a 5 star hotel in the airport for like $240 at the cheapest. So, I guess we will try and sleep in an airport seat if at all possible. Yuck!

But, we are looking forward to getting to meet our newest additions to the family, and see how much they have changed since we received their referral pictures several months ago! I am sure that they have changed quite a bit over the last 4 months. It will be such a blessing to begin to get to know them, even though they probably will not remember us when we go back to pick them up in a couple months. So many changes coming in their little lives. We are grateful the Lord has picked them out to be a part of our family.

Our little girls have been having fun playing together and I am sure they will enjoy having more friends to play with too once their little brother and sister arrive!



And then here are a couple more pics from last week's photo shoot.

a few hours of our Saturday....

These were all taken today... enjoying one of the last nice days we'll have for awhile I think.

This pic is actually from September. Aub was putting her arm around Scott like this any time he picked her up. She's getting her milk before bed, and decided to kick back and enjoy it. :)

The next post is a video of the girls enjoying things that were sent in a fun birthday package for me. :) Their first time to play with party ??? What ARE those things called??

A few October pics

This month, little A has picked up on the idea that cameras should always be "cheeeesed" at. So it is hard to catch her doing anything else if she spots the camera. She loves to make us laugh, and she is really good at it.

A friend bought these hair clips for Em. The sweet girl sat on the floor in front of me while I did her hair, and she didn't know I had put these in until I showed her the pic I had just taken. :)

Court Date!

We just got an email today telling us we have been assigned a court date of November 30th in Ethiopia!

It's so exciting to have a date when we know we can see our kids faces and hold them for the first time! It's like a due date... without the nausea, acid reflux, sore hips and stretch marks. (Now you know who's posting.)

We're going to Africa next month! I haven't been there in 12 years. Scott has never been there at all. I can't wait to embrace the sights and smells and sounds and KIDS!

It's been awhile since we've posted! We've had a busy month, which was made a little more complex by the death of our MacBook. We were not able to recover anything off the old hard drive, and are just now getting things functioning again with a new hard drive. But we are alive and well here!

Aubrey has been keeping us busy now that she is walking everywhere! Emily is pleased that her playmate is getting more and more skills, and the two of them seem to really enjoy doing things together.






I believe this is the first time in Aubrey's life that she has gone a full month without being called a boy. With this hairstyle, people seem to finally realize she's a girl. Pink means nothing in the culture here, but it seems hair style does. :) And check out that forehead. She definitely resembles her parents. We're a big-brained clan it seems.



Now that Aubrey has mastered walking and being feminine, she is up for the challenge of learning to read. :) I found these great English board books on the internet for cheap.... and they are delivered to my door for cheap! Hooray for online Asian shopping! (English children's books are just not for sale anywhere here, so this is a welcome discovery!)




There have been some really beautiful days lately, and we've been happy to go out of town for day hikes in this great weather!



Emily's a gigantic 3 year old, but still loves to have Daddy carry her. She now understands what locals say to her, and often uses the local language to ask people not to touch her. It's a survival phrase when mobs of people come at you each time you go outside! :)

We'll try to be more frequent with our blogging now that our computer works again. We did lose all our email addresses, so if you want to shoot us an email we'll get you back on our email list!

well worth your 11 minutes

The Dancer from Kensington on Vimeo.

fun July moments

Fun with Papa & Nana

We have enjoyed having Papa and Nana visit us for a short time! (Too short!) The girls have enjoyed so much being able to play with them and have them here to celebrate their birthdays. These are just a few pics of us out and about while they have been here, visiting local parks and going out to the countryside.