Update on life at our house

Well, it's getting to be that time of year. Really, a favorite time of year as all of the family events come up--Thanksgiving, Christmas, football games to watch, all of it.

At our house it's a tough time too though. Destiny was adopted as an older child--and as a result holidays bring up a lot of grief and sadness for her. It begins on October 7th every year--her brother's birthday. It's like a fresh wound each year (we were reminiscing recently that this was the first Halloween she's been with us and not grounded). She grieves the loss of her siblings, and she has anxiety about the unknown--what is he doing now, where is he, does he remember her, and does he think she's forgotten him? There's little we can do except be supportive to her and try to give her some space.

Holidays similarly--Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas--even Superbowl Sunday bring up memories of how she's spent those holidays before here. Holidays are an amazingly sentimental time. You remember the good and bad that comes attached with the date.

Melat will have similar grief I think but there's so little here that is at all similar to Ethiopia that I don't think the pain will be as great. (We do see a brief flash of it each time we visit an Ethiopian restaurant though).

Its times like this that I wish I could "fix" it all for my kids, but I know that this is theirs to deal with, and that the very best that I can do is to support them in their grief.

Destiny's been acting out on her grief and her frustration that either A: we're not parenting properly in her opinion or B: the world is entirely unfair to all preteens, most especially her (likely a combination?). We had a long talk today about how she really needed to leave the parenting to the professionals. That while we have simple rules in our house, contrary to her belief, it is *NOT* fair to enforce them all swiftly and to the greatest extent with little sister, who doesn't have the skills or language to absorb all of her worldly expectations at once.

Destiny sees this as a grave injustice and a few times has attempted to take matters into her own hands--which hasn't been working out well for her--further reinforcing that the entire world is completely unfair to all preteens, especially her.

This too shall pass.

We saw a little streak of this subversiveness recently, as we've finally settled on Melat's name after much consideration and debate, shes' been named "Melat Elizabeth" (after Rob's sister, and because it sounds really good when shouted loudly across our condo).

We've been trying to teach Melat her new name, but she doesn't know "Elizabeth." Destiny, preying on this, made the effort to teach Melat (on the sly) that her new name is actually "Melat Garbage." Which Melat was OK with, because she knows the word Garbage.

Eventually, little sister figured out she'd been pranked, big sister spent a little "thinking time" in her room, and mom and dad had to spend a little more time trying to figure out what to do with two kids who are too smart for their own good.

I don't think Destiny meant anything by it other than an opportunity to get a little jab in at little sister who's been stealing the show being just a little too precious. I think Destiny is discovering that perhaps she's "grown out" of cute.

It's an awkward place after growing out of cute while still growing into "mature."

Keep Destiny in your thoughts and prayers as she grows into her "big sister" role. We've seen her come so far in the past few years that it's sad to see her slip into old insecurities, but we know she'll come back with a little more time to get used to things. (It's only been a month after all).

Great video about HIV adoption

This is a TV show called "Facing Life Head On" and outlines what it's like to adopt HIV+ children. It's really beautiful. Carolyn is an aquaintance of mine via the adoption blogs. She's also the first person who was able to bring us a photo of Melat smiling while she was at AHOPE. While Carolyn was at AHOPE with one of her kids, she spent some time playing and hugging on Melat for which we're eternally grateful!

Amazing Story

Have you seen this amazing story? It comes with interesting timing--at the same time as the death of Dr. Micahel Chriton (one of the best novelists of all time, and the author of Jurrassic Park). The link is here it's about how a mouse, dead and frozen for 16 years has been successfully cloned. Now scientists want to try it with a mammoth.

Rob and I were talking about this, and he brought up a point perhaps only Rob could think of (What the &%#&#)* will they artificially inseminate with a mammoth?) Nobody wants to carry a mammoth... that's why there was never a Mrs. Snuffleufagus.

Missing Ethiopia

This daylight savings time thing is for the birds....

For us Northwesterners the winter (the part of the year between September and July) is just too long and dark. I realized this thinkinig about how bright Ethiopia was all the time. When I started thining about it (driving home today in the dark at 4:30PM), I realized that it being on the Equator has normal daylight year round, and being at such high elevation, while it still gets hot, doesn't get crazy hot like so many other parts of Africa....

Sunshine---nature's antidepressant.