Moving Right Along

Well, life is moving right along for our family. It has been almost three months since we welcomed home Masamo and it is absolutely amazing to me how he has just blossomed.

We started out with another visit to the Land. Masamso recognized it as soon as we were there and as last time, had a wonderful time relaxing and playing all weekend long. Jason's mother even got to hold Masamo by the campfire singing "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star" to him until he fell asleep. Jason's parents are also having a large structure built over and around their trailer to protect it from the elements. Here is a snapshot of the progress that had been made when we were there.

We also had time to "seal" our trailer. Jason put sealer on the roof and then inside we sealed up every crack and crevice we could find that any little critter might use to enter our trailer. The kids played a lot and also had time for some quad riding. Masamo loves the quads and could be found over by them either sitting on them and/or trying to start them to drive himself around. He'll be ready to ride on his own (with supervision) before we know it!

I decided that this past week I was ready to try my hand at some Ethiopian cooking. Mind you, I chose the easiest recipe I could find. I ended up making red lentils and an American version of injera (a spongy flat bread that Ethiopian eat their meals with) along with rice. Once done making the lentils I gave Masamo a taste (being the expert of the group) and his eyes got very wide and he ran to his seat at the table to eat dinner! I took that as a good sign. He, Jason and I enjoyed eating the lentils and injera while the other three took their obligatory bites and then scraped their plates. Oh well, maybe it will grow on them but I will be trying more recipes in the future. Masamo deserves to have his heritage celebrated and this is just one way we can acknowledge it.

It has become a very common site around our house to have one or more superheros visiting our house. David got a number of costumes for Christmas and has of late been wearing them around the house. Here he is as (cue the music) Na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na, na,na, na, na, na.... BATMAN!!!

Masamo has been home for almost 3 months now and I returned to work (one day a week) the beginning of this month. I will go back up to two days starting in June. I was a little nervous going in, not for myself but for Masamo. Jason was home with him but I am the one who wakes him up in the morning and gets him ready for the day. However, when I called home at lunchtime Jason told me that Masamo hadn't mentioned me at all and was acting perfectly naturally. Well, so much for being missed! Actually when I got home from work I was greeted by a very enthusiastic Masamo who ran to me with open arms and was screaming "MOMMY!!!". He did this twice after I got in the door and it just made my day!

We have a new routine that Jason and I are trying to institute in our household, it's called "Family Cleaning Night". We've done it for two Mondays now without a hitch and hope it can continue for a long time to come. I've been finding it hard to keep up with my regular cleaning and laundry schedule since Masamo has been home and with my returning to work I have even less time to devote to it. Soooo, in order to deal with this Jason and I came up with a plan to divide and conquer. I have listed the regular chores I do and then we each pick one (or two if they're small and quick) and get them done all together at the same time. This takes us less than an hour to do and Masamo even getting in on the fun. Here he is helping me to vacuum.

This past weekend Jason went to Michigan with a friend to watch the SAE international competition. So, that left me at home with the four kids. We made the best of it though. Saturday was beautiful and so we headed to a new park and followed it up with ice cream!

Emily texting at the park

Emily finally decided to join in on the fun at the park!

A couple new things concerning Masamo.

I've decided it's time to try and potty train him. He has always done #2 for us and told us when he needs to go but I decided to put him to the test. I have been doing this with very low pressure on him. I simply put him on the potty and thankfully he has not once objected to sitting on it. I have been putting him on every hour and when he does #1 he gets rewarded by a few jellybeans (using up leftover Easter candy). We've only been at it for four days now but he is catching on quick. If he has wet himself he seems to stop himself and come and tell me and then finishes on the potty! I hope the progress continues, he seemed more than ready to take the plunge, he's doing great so far though!

Lastly, Masamo likes to help getting himself ready in the morning. One of the cutest things he does is to "fluff" his hair with his pick before I put his hair moisturizer on.

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I want echo what one of our fellow Ethiopian adoptive parents has said on her blog and say that I wonder what trauma Masamo has dealt with in his short life. How would any one of us handle having our entire world turned upside down? Having all that we know, all that is familiar and safe suddenly gone. Being told that no, our family will not be coming back, that we've been let go by them to be raised and cared for by strangers. Your trust in things ever being safe again is broken, life will never be the same. Those strangers look different, speak differently and the place that they take you, so far away from home, holds nothing that is familiar. You have to learn all new ways, eat new food, learn a new language. How would you feel in the middle of the night when you wake up? Scared? Lonely? Hopeless?


And yet, there is hope. There is a God who is watching over us. He has all things in His hands and HE is in control. He can heal the hearts of the brokenhearted, mend the broken trust of those who doubt, and give us a family and home that will never, ever be taken away. We hope and pray that God will heal Masamo's heart, mend his broken trust, and that he will become a part of God's family and someday go home to Heaven where he will be met with open arms and every one of his tears will be wiped away. God gave us this exciting opportunity to help just one orphan, to welcome him into our family, to make a difference in his life.


Every little smile, every hug, every kiss, every time I hear "Mommy" come out of his mouth gives me hope and faith that God will heal him.

"Never take advantage of any widow or orphan. If you do and they cry out to me, you can be sure that I will hear their cry." Exodus 22:22-23.


He has heard Masamo's cries, He knows his pain and his plight. He is the "Father to the fatherless, defender of widows — this is God, whose dwelling is holy. God places the lonely in families."Psalms 68:5-6.

Jason and I cannot explain to Masamo why his birth parents decided to let him go other than to give him the little bit of information they gave. Having been and seen Ethiopia firsthand we can testify that it would be very hard to raise a family in such extreme poverty. We do know that God has a plan for this little boy and our family has a front seat to see what God will do with this precious child.

Another week (or two) and it’s time for a new blog update! Here’s what’s been happening around our house!

The Zoo Redo!

We visited the zoo again! The kids and I visited the zoo again but this time went along with Jason’s parents. We did this on Earth Day when the admission was FREE after 5pm! Here are some pics from our trip!

A little bit of camping – In the LIVING ROOM!

We decided to do something different for the kids and on a Friday night (when Emily was away at a friend’s house). We spiced things up and camped in the living room! Jason and I set up the smaller of our two tents in the living room and were amazed at how quickly this went when you didn’t have to stake it down and put on the rain fly! We made the inside nice and cozy with plenty of blankets and bean bags and settled in to watch a movie. This was made complete with popcorn and drinks all around. We ended the evening by allowing the kids to sleep in the tent overnight. Jason and I stayed in the tent just until everyone was asleep and then escaped ten or so feet away to our own bedroom to sleep in comfort.

Emily’s birthday dinner

As is custom, we had dinner for Emily on her birthday. Instead of me cooking for everyone we went out to Bob Evan’s (Emily’s choice). We had a good time with family and Emily had a good time getting a lot of nice presents and cash!

Tractor Riding

Ella, David and Masamo each got a lesson in tractor riding! Masamo helped Jason mow the grass in the backyard and eventually fell asleep at the wheel. David had done the same thing at Masamo’s age; it was cute to see him snuggled up in Jason’s lap. Ella and David also each got a turn at driving the tractor by themselves with Jason supervising. I was going to include a video here but it wouldn't upload for some reason, maybe another time!

A visit to the “ribber”

We visited the small local river this past Friday night. Masamo pronounces it the “ribber” instead of river. We took a picnic of McDonald’s and then set off down to explore. Ella and David spent their time searching for fossils and had brought along a book bag full of supplies. This book bag included a notebook for taking notes, paintbrushes for dusting off dirt, magnifying glass, a dinosaur book to identify fossils and many other necessary items that were essential for their impromptu search. Masamo on the other hand just spent his time throwing rocks into to the river trying his hardest to make each rock splash as much as possible.

A project complete

The garage and front and back doors to the house are done being painted! This was a big project for me. I did have help (from my dad, my brother in law Scott, Jason and of course the boys) but for the most part this was my doing! I am proud of the work done and the final result!

Front door repainted (it's a very dark green)

The garage BEFORE the painting

The garage AFTER the painting!

Sibling bonding

I caught Ella reading to Masamo and David the other day and I had to snap a photo.

Also, if you didn’t know, I’m enjoying having a pair of sons at home. Here they are in their shirts that I just had to get for them!

Masamo

Here’s a video of just after Ella and David were doing their the tractor riding. I had the viewscreen on the video camera flipped so that Masamo could see himself being video taped. It just gives you a little glimpse of Masamo.

He has really picked up on manners. He didn’t want me touching a boo-boo on his foot the other day and when I was going to put on a band-aid on it he was saying “No thank you! No thank you!”

We’ve also decided to cut Masamo’s nap out of his schedule. He has been hard to put to sleep because he would be awake for 1-2 hours at bedtime. Since we nixed the nap he goes almost straight to sleep at the exact same time each night. I figure he’s getting the same amount of sleep either way!

Masamo has taken to singing, it's so cute! He was singing "Ashes, ashes, we all fall down!" from Ring around the Rosie BUT when he says it, it sounds more like "A** Sh**, A** Sh**, we all fall down!" It’s hilarious listening to him!

More on Masamo’s speech…. He’s a parrot! He repeats just about everything that is said around him, this includes inflection and tone! It can get frustrating when you’re asking him a question and he’s just repeating it back to you. Oh well, just part of the learning process!

One last thing, Masamo has learned to say “cheese” when I’m taking a picture so here’s hoping for more smiling pictures of him!