Post #2.

Lexi and Daddy.

Piggy-back rides.

Post #1.

Lexi got her hands on my camera. Here’s the world through Lexi’s eyes:

The Laptop

Feet

Lines on the living room floor

Speak and Mazie (or at least part of them)

The living room ceiling - I think she was laying on the floor when she took this.

….go check out my sister-in-law’s etsy shop. Aside from all her play food, she also has some new produce that is sort of food, sort of a doll and very cute. Think Christmas shopping people…

Some of you may have heard that our wait for a referral has had another 3 months added to it. That doesn’t mean it still can’t happen anytime now but it means that more than likely we won’t hear anything until the holidays.

To fill the time I’ve decided to make a quilt for the baby. I made one for Lexi out of her baby clothes and I want to do a special one for the baby as well. So I am undertaking a pretty big project involving lots of people (including you, if you want to participate). I organized a group of about 15 moms who are all adopting from Ethiopia. We are each going to make 15 identical quilt blocks, keep one block for ourselves and then send 1 block to each member of the group. Then once we get all of our blocks we can piece them together however we want. The kids who come home from Ethiopia will all have a quilt with a common theme running through them (just like they are all from Ethiopia) but the quilts will be different in their own way - just like the kids are all different.

15 blocks is only about half of the front of a quilt. To piece mine together I would like help from family and friends. I’m modifying an idea I’ve seen a lot of other adoptive parents do. It’s from a tradition in China called a 100 Good Wishes Quilt. I was originally going to just do a 100 Good Wishes Quilt but I liked the idea of tying in some of Ethiopia as well.

If you want to be a part of the quilt, cut a piece of material (any kind as long as it can be machine washed) into a 12 inch square and send it to me. Pick a material that you like - something that could represent your family, you, your interests, you favorite color, a favorite flannel shirt you never wear anymore- and send it too me. I’d appreciate it if you’d include a note as to why you chose the fabric. I’ll save these and put them in the baby’s life book (side note: A life book is the adopted child’s version of a baby book). I’ll use all the piece I receive as a border for the quilt and to fill in the middle if needed. You don’t have to limit it to “1 per family” either. If you’ve got kids and want to do one for you, one for your spouse, one for each kid, go right ahead. If you want to do one as a family, go right ahead. I’m also planning on creating a page on my blog to post pictures of the squares I get.

If you’re a time line sort of person, I’d like to be able to put the quilt together over my Thanksgiving break, so if you could send it before then, that would be great.

If you need my address, just e-mail me or leave a comment and I’ll send you my address.

**Note: This is an open invitation for anyone who reads my blog. If we’ve never met but you feel like you want to do this, please do.**

Okay all my artsy/crafty friends (yeah, I’m looking at you Limor, Steph, Jaime), I need help with the baby’s room. I’ve got an underwater theme going in there with bedding, pictures and stuffed animals but I’m not excited about just painting the walls “water blue.” I want to think of a more creative way to paint but I’m not wanting to do a mural in there. I like the idea of a mural but a) I’m not that talented and b) if I’m going to do that, I’ll do it when my baby can have some input so I don’t have to paint over it in 5 years. I’m having a complete mental block on this. And I think the size of the room is throwing me off as well. I don’t want anything too overwhelming because the room is long and narrow, so it feels a lot smaller than it is.

Any ideas?

Tonight we took Lexi shopping for a pair of summer shoes. I get her shoes at REI because they hold up, their cute and I know they are good for her feet. First she tried on Crocs (in orange) which she liked because they were orange but we weren’t sure if they would stay on her feet. Then she tried on Tevas but we couldn’t find her size.  I was really hoping to find them in her size because she had a pair last year and they were great. Last she tried on Keens first in purple and then in aqua. She ended up choosing the aqua. While trying to fit her feet I realized that she’s getting really big. She didn’t fit into the toddler sizes. She’s officially in “kid size” shoes. And she and Kevin have matching sandals. I was hoping to find sandals that would look cute with a skirt or shorts but she really liked the Keens and didn’t want to take them off, so there’s probably another pair of sandals in coming soon. Or she’ll just wear these all summer (which is probably more likely).

The best part of the shopping trip? Getting to the check out counter and discovering we had a $45.00 dividend credit on our account. Free shoes (sort of).

Lexi loves to watch Veggie Tales. Specifically she loves to watch Junior Asparagus. She gets very emotionally attached to the small talking vegetable and has a complete and total meltdown when the show is over. She knows when the show is ending and starts getting teary-eyed and the lip starts to quiver and in a pitiful voice starts asking, “Where Junior go? Where Junior go? Junior come back! Come back!” Getting more and more desperate the closer the show gets to the end credits. When the credits do start to roll, the pitiful whimpering turns into a complete and total meltdown. Not the “we’re-at-Target-and-you-won’t-buy-me-candy” kind of meltdown. More the “I-am-so-sad-because-my-best-friend-moved-to-Australia-and-is-never-ever-coming-back” kind of meltdown.

Check out Limor’s etsy site, Ninja Eema, she’s got more cool stuff listed. And there is a promise of more stuff to come. I’m pretty excited about the play food.

We’re back from Kansas. We woke up around 4:30 this morning, left at 5 and got home just a little after 5. The trip home was pretty uneventful, except for the part when Lexi threw up in her carseat. And of course it happened just outside of Kansas City which meant 8 hours of traveling with that lovely aroma. Her carseat now smells like bleach.

Kansas was fun. I’m sure Kevin will be posting stories and pictures soon. He’s in the process of downloading his camera and I think he said he took over 300 pictures. He also scanned a whole bunch of his Grandma’s old family photos so I’m sure those will be up on flickr as well.

I always go to Kansas with the mindset that there is nothing to do. (And if you know where we were, there really isn’t that much around.) But every time we go we run out of time to do everything. We rolled into town around 6 pm on Wednesday, ate dinner and then opened Christmas presents with Kevin’s parents, Grandparents and his brother’s family. Thursday we celebrated Thanksgiving with everyone - aunts, uncles, cousins, grandparents…-. Thursday night we hung out, Kevin scanned pictures, ate more turkey. Friday we went to Uncle Junior’s house to visit and went out to dinner. Saturday we went to Kevin’s Grandparents’ house for lunch and to see more family. By the time I realized it, “nothing to do” had turned into “time to go home.”

Lexi’s vocab is ever increasing and she’s starting to retell stories of things she’s done or seen. And they get repeated about a thousand times for weeks after the event.

Some of her stories include:

“Papa. House. Coo Coo. Vroom. Vroom.” (That would be the story of going to Grandpa’s house, seeing his pigeons and sitting in his antique truck and “driving”.)

“Elsie. Ball. Bye.” (Elsie and Lexi played ball last Wednesday and then Elsie’s mom told Elise to say goodbye to Lexi.)

“Nomino. House. Ooh-lee. House. Sleeping. Shhhhh.” (Domino, the dog that lives nextdoor, and his owner, Julie, are in their house sleeping.)

“Ari. Mimi. Home.” (Her cousin Ari, Grammy, and Aunt Joanna went home after a visit.)

“See? Baby? Bath?” (She wants to watch the video of Caleb getting his first bath - again.)

She’s also started requesting things. Everytime it’s mealtime or snack time, if you ask her what she wants to eat, it’s always “hot dogs and cheese.” Tonight her request was for ice. When I started to fill her water bottle with ice water she started saying “no, no, water. Milk.” Then I tried giving her a cup of milk. “No, no. Ice.” Finally, I asked if she wanted ice in her milk. Yup.