Our local news did a nice story about "Binyam's Big Trip".  I really enjoyed talking with the reporter about the book and why we decided to write it. 

Local photographer writes children's book: wlfi.com

Check out Binyam's Big Trip!

Did you notice there's a new page on our blog? Go ahead ... look at the top of the page. See the link to "Binyam's Big Trip - Children's Book"? Don't be shy ... click on it and it will take you to Mark's latest project. It turned out really cute! And now we're ready to share it with others. We've got a limited supply at the printer. They should be ready in about two weeks. Any profits we make will be used for travel expenses for our adoption and to make a donation to several programs in Ethiopia when we travel. Simon loves to read it -- he nearly has it memorized already! And we are very grateful to our friends who read it with their children and gave us excellent feedback to refine the book.

Feel free to share with other families ... and thank you for considering purchasing our book!

New Favorite Movie

Guess who has discovered Monsters Inc? Yep -- and he loves it. A fun video of Simon imitating Sully getting in shape to keep up his scare record.

Learning Amharic

We've been trying to learn a few words in Amharic with Simon. It's very basic -- numbers, animals, people, simple phrases, etc. We're hoping to keep Amharic 'alive' in our family. And we're especially looking forward to another gathering at the Ethiopian church in Indy next month. They will soon be starting language classes and we are so grateful for that connection. Here's just a short video clip -- it cuts out before Simon can say good-bye -- but it gives you an idea of what we've been working on.

Why We Didn't Buy Expensive Furniture

I know we haven't had a very rough winter but it has been cold for a long time now. Cold enough in the evenings that our little Ethiopian doesn't want to go outside very often or for very long. So our living room, aka the play room, has become Simon's gym and the furniture his trampolines. This was how he spent Sunday evening ... showing us his jumping skills.

It must have helped to burn off some energy because he slept in his own bed all night for the first time in probably 6 months. Too bad I woke up at 4:30 and couldn't go back to sleep because I wondered why Simon hadn't come to our room. Guess I should have tried furniture diving too.

Game On

Mark and I had free tickets to this afternoon's Purdue men's b-ball game vs. Michigan State. If you follow Purdue b-ball at all, you know this has been an up and down week for the team -- beating Illinois and then a few players getting into some trouble. This is always a big rivalry game and today was no exception.

We thought it was so fun to see our friends Chris and Brian in their very exclusive seats for the game -- I told Chris to be ready to catch a stray ball or even a player! How fun would it be to sit that close?!!? They had a great time.


As you can see our seats were up a little higher than Chris and Brian's -- we were at scoreboard level. : ) Yeah, that's the final score -- not the outcome we hoped for.

My favorite player, Robbie Hummel, making a foul shot. He had a great game today.

We didn't do much to celebrate Valentine's Day this year so this was kind of our date to celebrate. We're grateful to Debbie and Les for watching Simon so we could get out for a few hours AND, we're thankful to Jana for letting us park in their driveway. Thank you, friends!

Not much of the season is left but we'll keep cheering on the Boilermakers, whether they are NIT or NCAA bound!

Big Boy School

Simon just finished his second week at a new daycare, or as he calls it, Big Boy School. As we looked ahead to Mark going to school full-time next year, we knew that we would probably have to make a daycare change. But we were spurred on by an encounter at the local mall play area where we realized that other children are starting to point out to Simon the differences in/about our family so we thought it was time to seek a more diverse environment for Simon. So on February 6, Simon started his new Big Boy School. It was not an easy decision and it hasn't all been smooth sailing. Any major change in Simon's routine usually means rough evenings/night time. His night terrors reared their ugly heads a couple of times and he's been more prone to dinner time meltdowns but at the end of this week, I think he's starting to adjust. He has a ton of fun during the day and willingly runs in the door each morning. But it was really awful to know that subconciously he was grieving for his first sitter and his buddies.

First day of Big Boy School

But I think we're over the hump of adjusting to his new school. He is starting to have some friends and tells us their names. On his first day there, he introduced himself to everyone as Batman. (Mark was Robin and I was Spiderman. And he's never seen these cartoons!) This week, he started by introducing himself as Super Grover and two days later had morphed into Super Simon. We think he's pretty super for handling the transition as well as he has.

With the new school came new rituals. Monday is book day; Tuesday is crazy clothing day; Wednesday is Show-n-Tell; Thursday is music day; and Friday is movie day. The school had a Valentine's Day party this week and we were so proud that Simon wrote his name on 20 cards!

Signing Valentines

And as you know, Valentine's Day fell on a Tuesday this year, which was designated as pajama day at school. (???) Have I mentioned lately that Simon likes to choose his own clothing? My little budding fashionista. He chose to wear some of his Christmas/Santa jammies. On Valentines Day. And talked about egg hunts the whole way to school. : )

With his Valentine "kites"

Gotta love that imagination of his! You never know what Simon will come up with next. That's the latest from here. We're happy to see the sun up when we leave the house in the morning and daylight while we're eating dinner. We're looking forward to spring and being able to play outside in the evenings. Mark took a CPR class tonight and is continuing to do well with his two classes. And we're looking forward to a Sunday afternoon date at the Purdue b-ball game. No news on Little Ailor 2 ... just hoping that news will come by summer time. (crossing our fingers!)