Daily Progress

It's amazing how life can turn you in circles until you are dizzy and days have spun into months. Before you know it, the life you thought would never come, is an everyday adventure and the memory of the painful wait is a distant and dull past. It is hard to believe it was only a month and a few weeks ago that our days were empty and the house was quiet. It feels like a lifetime has past and that life is a world away.
Adjustments have been made and we are all learning one another more each day. The structure in home life has helped a tremendous amount. The girls are down at 7pm and up at 7am. They wake only for diaper changes as needed (maybe once a night) unless something has thrown off the every-day norm. The company of each other helps sleep come a little easier I think. The average 12 hours is fairly constant and the days are broken into various types of activity including an afternoon nap for them both.
The weather around here isn't the best (freezing temps are the norm this week), so that puts a stop to the idea of outdoor activity. I long for Spring when I can let the girls run in the yard and discover the nature that is around them.
Macie is learning English like crazy. Her vocabulary astounds me! She seems to learn a new word every hour. Ella is closely behind, but catching up and while her speech is very much at a young toddler level, the words get clearer every day.
Macie knows her ABC's well and can count to 20. She is tracing letters, learning colors, and English names for animals.
Ella is building block towers 6 and 7 blocks high. She is a dancing fool and has figured out (just this morning) how to put her trousers on without shoving both of her chubby little appendages into one pant leg. She decided some time in the middle of last week to turn "two". This was a mental decision that has brought on more than a few fits of pouting and temper tantrums over the last few days. Working through those has been tons of fun (insert sarcastic tone here), but it IS very cute to see that bottom lip pout out from time to time. Keeping a strait face is, at times, very difficult.
Both the girls change their cloths 5 or 6 times a day before finally deciding on an outfit that may or may not last the rest of the day. Often they will wander downstairs in wrong sizes, with wrong shoes on wrong feet and headbands wrapped around wrists (a very 80's rollar skater type of look). I plead guilty to all counts of blame on the clothing matter. I am a horrible example.
The girls are fearless. They love being active, being chased and learning new things. Both Ella and Macie have attempted to jump down the last 3-4 steps from their room to the main floor. Some attempt are successful, but far more result in a hard thump on the floor. Neither of the girls are big whiners when they fall. At most, they require a fix it kiss from mom and that's it. Tears are rarely shed and usually they figure out how to achieve their goal in a different way within minutes.
At the moment, both the girls are upstairs playing together (something they do very well right now) and I am staring at a house that needs cleaning. There are blocks on the floor, books and cut out shapes spread amongst them and three pairs of shoes that have all been on little feet strewn all about the room. There is an "Operation" game sitting on the side lines (the buzz of any failed surgery is great entertainment) and there are pots and pans with spoons laying around here somewhere too. Amazingly enough, there isn't any banging of the pots and pans, just pretend cooking and food consumption.
Some language tips for those we will see soon, you can expect to hear these words often around our house;
"B" (bee)= Eat
"Shuma" (shooma) = go potty
"Shinte" (chin-tay) = pee
"Ca-Ca" (caw caw) = poop
"Goebesh" (gobesh) = good, couragous
"Wa" = water
"Woosha" = dog
The above words are all Amharic that we still use on a regular basis with the girls, often in place of English. While this habit has changed (sadly) Macie used to raise her eyebrows if she was saying "yes" to something. I am assuming this is either cultural or something she picked up while trying to learn Amharic in Addis, but it was adorable and could easily be something that might be seen in other toddlers as well (for anyone adopting a toddler).
For communication reasons, we also used Baby Einstein's sign language videos with the girls once they came home. The video covers all kinds of basic daily needs and wants. The girls use sign language often now and and between the sign language and the basic Amharic we have gotten along quite well.
We have some days that are better than others, but I couldn't be happier or prouder of their progress and ours as a family.
As for Mom and Dad, we are hanging in there. Each day brings a new challenge and a new discovery about who our girls are becoming. I will write more about the whole progress of parenthood later. This entry is FAR too long as it is!
Hope all is well,
Beth