Ice Skating!

We usually get one good weekend of ice skating on a nearby lake and this is that weekend. Asher got on skates for the first time and we caught it on tape. By the end of our time there he was skating (or walking around) on his own. But I think he liked eating snow more (as is seen here). Abby loved spinning and Caleb loved falling and Caroline enjoyed spinning and dancing on her skates. Grandma joined us for the fun!

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Fun with our cousins!

About a week ago we had a great game night with three of my nieces and the kids' cousins. They are Marlene, Marilin and Olga (hope I spelled them right, girls!). We had a great night eating and playing a game called I'd Rather. M, M and O are all from Mexico and speak English really well. We try our limited Spanish we have but we don't do them justice. We had a great time and enjoyed lots of laughter. Olga is now in Indiana, Marlene is still in town and Marilin goes back to Mexico for a few weeks. We can't wait to do it again but it may be awhile that we can get all three of them together. They all three have come to the States to find work. I'm so impressed with them jumping into things here.

Wrap a Baby in Africa!

Would you like to help wrap a Ethiopian Baby in a nice warm blanket?

On February 1st a fellow adoptive mom is hosting a blanket party here on her blog. Go down to the Great Blanket Party heading for her explanation. If you would like to help her wrap up a few babies, I hope you’ll come and help out. There will be a paypal link on her blog that day to make it easy for you to donate. Every penny of your money will go straight to Ethiopia. February 1st. Let’s see how many babies we can wrap.

He'sGot the Whole World in His Hands!

Asher's all time favorite book!

This is Asher's favorite page. He always wants to pause here.

That makes me wonder what he is thinking. He loves Brad so much

and his Dad is his most favorite person in the whole world. He kisses this

Dad and says that it is Asher's Dad. I'm guessing he only sees the

relationship, and I find this so interesting!

This is my favorite page and I can't wait til Asher understands that

God has EVERYBODY in his hands, both his family in Ethiopia

(though we don't know anything about them) and his family here.

My thoughts are often with his Ethiopian family and this gives me so much comfort.

On Ice!

We had a great time taking in the High School Musical on Ice. I know it can sound kind of hokie but the show was really good and it was amazing what they could do on the ice. We found the music in us and we were all in this together (except Asher - past his bed time).

My Flag Girl!

Abby tried something new this weekend and has a new love. When she came home from school with the flier to sign up for this color guard clinic, she picked up my swiffer and started practicing. After two hours at the clinic this is part of their routine that they learned. I think she has found yet another thing she loves but you can't do it for school till 7th grade so for now, she can attend clinics and summer camps and of course, twirl the swiffer. Here she is . . .

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Christmas and New Year!

Well, we had some wonderful time visiting with family these last three weeks. This is the reason I didn't update our blog. We were busy enjoying our time with Cathy, Greg, Ben, Luke, Mark, Todd, Beth, Marilin, Marlene, Olga, Emma, Evan, Josh, Aidan, Gary, Sarah, Alex, Mike, Jane, Rick, Josh, Jordan, Justin, Sharon, Drew, Alyse, Grace, CJ, Grandma Ewing, Grandma Shipley, Grandpa Shipley, Ben, Sara, Duke, Tim, Sharon and Courtney and many friends! So, you see I was a wee bit busy having fun. Because we had so much company we didn't do all the traditions that I was hoping to get to. We still had a beautiful Christmas surrounded by almost all of our family. We really missed seeing Walter, Connie, Nikk and Jeff.

Since I have over 100 photos of Christmas and New Years, I'll just pick a few.

Cousins playing Monopoly with electronic banking.

Cousins Chat!

My sis and I! She was a huge help!

Cousin game time!

Abby at Christmas Eve service.

Girls playing American Girl Game.

Josh and Asher in new PJs.

Todd and Beth's family from Mexico.

Ben and Sara and Duke from Tampa.

It's not Christmas Eve without a pageant!

So much went on and lots of fun stories so I'll fill you in as we get into 2008 here. I missed photos of our time with Uncle Tim and Aunt Sharon and Courtney. If you can send me some Aunt Sharon I'll post them :)!