HAPPY 21 MONTH BIRTHDAY SAKARI!!!

We LOVE YOU so much...ALL THE WAY TO THE MOOOOON!!! :0)



And here is a video montage from Sakari's first Christmas at home...

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First Haircut, Long Road Trip Home and Coffee...

Well, we are back home...we rolled in around 1:30am today, our 12.5 hour trip ended up taking closer to 15.5 with stops for the dog, baby and meeting our great friends Greg and Christa in Albuquerque for a few brief minutes...then it was onto cleaning up dog puke and pee...I'll stop there. We had hoped to visit the Treat family while we drove through but things just didn't go as planned, so hopefully next time. The Treats have sweet Abel, who we got to meet and visit when we picked up Sakari last January. We are still pretty wiped from the trip, but overall the trip was great and our kiddo and puppy did very well! Thank you, Lord for the Little Einsteins...Sakari LOVES them! She goes...pat, pat, pat, pat, etc...and then puts her arms up in the air and yells "Blast off!" It's amazing - we love that she loves the classical music, the rhythm and animals.

During our last few days in NM, Sakari got her first haircut from Becca's Aunt Jody. Earlier that day, Becca flat ironed Sakari's hair and it's soooo long! We've posted some pics of the haircut and the straightened hair. We had to go and buy a luggage carrier to make sure we could fit all of the stuff we either bought or were given. I've also posted a pic of myself and Jack outside of the coffee house in Bernallio, NM on our way home - by the way, it's not just a funny pic...it's really good coffee!

We are home sweet home...and soon we will be asleep sweet asleep!

SSSSSMMMMMOOOOWW AKA SNOW!

Sakari discovered the joy of that white, flaky, cold stuff that falls from the sky yesterday here in NM! Today, her cousins got here and between yesterday and today - she's been loving it and eating it! She learned how to say snow yesterday and she's begun to imitate and mimic really well, sentences (that make sense) are right around the corner! Snow started out as "SSSSSSMMMMMMMOOOW!"

Road Trip for the Holidays!

So we are posting from Becca's parents home in Aztec, NM (near Farmington) - we left Thursday evening and drove all night with Sakari and Jack. The trip is about 12-13 hours and we drove straight through and our daughter and puppy are amazing travelers! They pretty much slept the whole time and were happy :-) Love it! The drive went by quickly and was enjoyable...something about hours and hours with no distractions turns me introspective. It was great, those who know me know I prefer to be around people but every once in a while a whole lot of nothing is exactly what I need.

Anyway, this is Sakari's first visit to Grandma and Papa's house - she was SO excited to see them and Aunt Christy! She has become very comfortable with them and it's neat to see how well she fits with us. A family of dorks. Haha! We love coming here because it's away from the normal routine and we find great shopping deals here! We eat, sleep, cook, eat, watch movies, shop, eat, sleep, do some dishes, watch another movie, grab some leftovers, nap...you get the point. It's so fun to get to come visit the family and also Becca's extended family (who haven't got to meet Sakari yet). Becca's sister, Dacia and her family, will get hereon Monday sometime. We've already taken some great pics and video, but I need to locate the card reader...will post pics of Sakari in the snow (eating some snow) and some other pics soon!

Merry Christmas!

A Year Ago Today...

We got the news that Misrak (aka Sakari Ava Misrak David) had officially became our daughter, as our case passed through the Ethiopian court system after 4 months of waiting!!! We had hoped to have her home before last Christmas, but that didn't stop us from keeping the tree up and presents waiting for her for when we got home the first week of Februrary...yeah, that's right...February! Sakari was too young at just 10 months to really grasp Christmas, but this year was SOOO fun! We went to see Christmas lights and we actually already opened all our presents as a family since we are leaving next week to spend 10 days in New Mexico with Becca's family. We love the lights, presents, shopping and all that, but most of all we want to instill in Sakari the true meaning of Christmas so that she will come to love our Saviour more than the side benefits and fun that the season brings. We are so grateful to have this treasure (Sakari) home with us this Christmas season...having her home has magnified our appreciation to God for this life that we live. Right now as I type, Sakari is playing with a remote controlled car...that well, she hasn't quite figured out yet and it's one more thing that causes us to laugh!! We celebrated Christmas Eve by opening one present and then Christmas the next morning by first opening our stockings, then we had a breakfast of custom created omelets while we read the story of Jesus' birth from the Gospel of Luke. Then it was on to present time...we always go overboard with presents, but we shop throughout the year and are usually done in October and wrapping presents is typically completed by the day after Thanksgiving. It took a present or two for Sakari to get into the swing of things but she adjusted just fine :-) We got her a kitchen set along with other fun things, but that was her big present and she loves it!!! We had so much fun and just reveling in the fact that our sweet girl was home with us. Her new "thing" this week is to pretend that she is conducting an orchestra each time she hears classical music.

Also, this past week we received Sakari's first blog book! For those of you who may not know, you can turn your adoption blog into a book through www.blurb.com - you can pick a format, paper choice cover choice, etc. It's basically incredible. We did our first book and called it "The Journey Begins" and it documents the adoption process from Day 1 until the day we left to go pick her up...we're going to do another one from the day we left Tulsa until her first birthday, then our plan is to do one for each year from birthday to birthday. We highly recommend adoptive families doing this, it's awesome.

To top off our "Christmas", we had the incredible God-orchestrated chance to talk with Sakari's nanny, Elizabeth on the phone via a translator. It was a very unlikely situation, but my Dad was on his way back from Ghana to visit his family in India and happened to have a 12 hour layover in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. He asked if we had any contacts there and if we wanted him to try and visit anyone. So, I contacted a dear friend who owns the Ethiopia Guest Home (www.ethiopiaguesthouse.com) and he got me his staff phone numbers...I emailed them to my Dad and he was able to get ahold of them. The staff of the Ethiopia Guest House was beyond exceptional and went the extra mile to help him with translation, transportation and even a chance to see and rest at the Guest House. My Dad raved about them and the home, so if you or anyone you know are going to be traveling to Ethiopia to pick up your kids, you must stay there! Once again, the beautiful, gracious Ethiopian people showed their hospitality and even though Elizabeth (Sakari's sweet nanny - they were seriously bonded!) doesn't work at the AWAA transition home anymore, they were able to find her and coordinated a rare and indescribable opportunity for us to talk with Elizabeth (with my Dad there!) Elizabeth was able to talk to Sakari and Sakari talked back to her...between us and Elizabeth, we were all an emotional wreck in the best sense! She never thought she would get to talk to her again, but through the hand of God we were re-united across the oceans. We are forever grateful to her. My Dad was able to get a few pics (will post when he returns from India) and also got to record some of their conversation. We can't wait until we can go back to Addis and visit her and the gorgeous Ethiopian people.

Now that you are teary-eyed and weeping (you'd better be...if not, you may just be the Grinch, haha!) - enjoy some of our "Christmas Day" pics!

A night of food and fun...

We hung out with some other adoptive families and cooked some Ethiopian food...Mimi from the "Queen of Sheba" in OKC came and cooked for us and showed us how it's done :0) Here are some pics from the fun and festivities!!

Christmas around the world and Christmas lights!!

so....our traditions of the Christmas season have begun...and this year is like it is all new since Sakari is home with us....here are some pics of our fun night :0)

CHRISTMAS AROUND THE WORLD...our church sets this up with booths from 40 nations and they have food and artifacts from each country with people dressed in traditional clothing...and they give you a passport at the door you can get stamped for every country you visit!!


Daddy and Sakari...


Sakari getting her passport stamped at Iraq...



Sakari enjoying food from the Virgin Islands...our good friend Louryse is from there and was feeding her...she LOVED it!!


Sakari sitting with Mrs Iru...


Our friends daughter holding the flag from the Virgin Islands in the parade of nations...



RHEMA CHRISTMAS LIGHTS...we then took Sakari to Rhema church to see their HUGE Christmas lights display...Sakari LOVED IT!!

I SEE THE MOON!

These words were uttered from our daughter's lips today - she communicates really well and though she is very verbal, the actual words coming out are taking some time...so today was a fun day when she put her first full sentence together (that actually makes English sense)!!!! I SEE THE MOON!

20 months old...and half her life :0)

I can hardly believe that Sakari is 20 months old...almost 2!! This also marks the moment that Sakari has been with us as long as she wasn't with us!!! So from now on she will have been with us most of her life!!! We are SO GRATEFUL for the amazing blessing Sakari has been in our lives. I have been thinking about how scared I was when we were on our way to Ethiopia...thinking our life is going to change... we are going to meet this little person and she is OURS she is coming home with us...all the CRAZY things that go through your head when you are about to become a first time parent...and then comparing that to how life is now...JUST NORMAL :0) Playing, laughing. learning, crying, singing and laughing some more...I feel so blessed and love the life that GOD has given us and could not imagine our life without this sweet girl!!


Here is a pic of the first day we met her...





And here she is this last week on Thanksgiving...