Library Photoshoot

When our local public library (Matt's employer) needed some models for a photoshoot for a brochure to parents and guardians, they invited our girls to be a part. We got some pictures of Mommy reading the girls one of her favorite books (Ferdinand the Bull) and Ababa helping the girls pick out a movie. Here are some of the best shots from the shoot:

Call Me

Last week in the leadup to Kentucky's game against Mississippi State, some MSU students posted the cell phone number of Kentucky player Demarcus Cousins around campus, and he received a large number of nasty phone calls and texts from some Mississippi State fans.

Well, Cousins got the last word on the court (19 points, 14 rebounds and an overtime win). After one nice dunk, Demarcus looked at the MSU student section and mouthed "Call me" (seen here):

The girls saw the replay of the now-famous "hand phone" on the news the next evening, and they thought it was the funniest thing they'd ever seen. They were doing their own little hand phones all night long. At the request of Aunt Buffy, here they are:

And the video:

Little Olympians

Castles in the floor

You'll notice the girls hair is no longer "straight". The back of their hair started curling back up after one day so by Tuesday, I gave it a moisturizing mask and then a good wash. I think all the treatment from Friday really dried it out because they were both complaining about how itchy it was. The girls were a little sad to have "frizzy" hair again, but we bought some new headbands yesterday which helped them be excited again. Their hair does look shorter now, but also much healthier.

Chloe & Essie

The girls were very proud of themselves today for building a castle like the one on the bag that their foam building blocks came in. Mom was very proud for them for learning how to see something and then copy it. This is a recent skill.

1st Haircut

Yesterday, our neighbor Theresa came over to give the girls their first haircut. We started at 12:30pm and ended at 5:00pm. It was quite a process! The girls were troopers and are loving their "straight" hair. I can tell already it won't last long, but they love it for now. The process was pretreat, wash, dry slowly with a straightener attachment, straighten with flat iron, then cut. Oh yea, and then do it again on the other twin.

Pretreating our hair with a homemade mask of olive oil & honey

Time for Essie to get a wash

Essie not liking the straightening blow dry

Before the blow dry and after

Essie checking it out in the mirror

Time to break out the movie to help us sit still

Essie's not quite sure about this whole hair thing

Our best Mr. T impersonation

Before & after cut

Chloe's turn!

Chloe REALLY did not like having her hair dried.

Time to start cutting

Love the "I'm so ready to be done with this" look

Chloe's all done!

A few twist by mommy for Essie while we wait for Chloe

Finally all done, but had to finish our movie

Essie's twists lasted less than 2 hours and she wanted them out so her hair could be down like Chloe's.

This morning, we awoke to MAJOR bedhead

Wilmore Adoption Support Group

Last night, we had our monthly Wilmore Adoption Support Group meeting. This meeting marked the completion of 3 years of meeting as a group. (Cydil, you were right, our first meeting was in March 2007) While we've had various families join our group at various times, this tends to be our "core" group. And the best part is all the families in this picture are in the process of adopting for the second time.

Kinnells, Bathjes & Waggoners

Other fantabulous news is that some old friends from high school sent us a check yesterday to help with our boys' adoption. Last week we also received a check from some friends from college. Praise the Lord! What a blessing! I haven't talked to these friends in several years, but they have been following our blog and wanted to help us on this next journey. Thanks, guys! (you know who you are!) We still have a long way to go financially, but it has been so encouraging to see the Lord providing.

Trust in the Lord

The girls sang in church this morning with their Wed. night kids group. The nice thing about going to a small, country church is you get front row seats to video tape your kids when they sing. =) After being a little shell shocked at the beginning, they managed to pull themselves together to try to remember the choreography. This was after all only the 2nd time they've sung in front of church and the first time the house lights were off so they didn't really see all the people watching them. I videotaped in 2 segments because we just have our camera that takes short videos. I missed the intermittent dance break, which Chloe really got into, but you can get the gist of it in the second video.

HAIR!

Our Saturday night ritual is dinner, bath and hair. I'm getting much faster doing the girls hair, about 30 minutes each. Now that it is a bit longer, I can fit each head into 6 pony tails, although Essie has made it adamantly clear that she does not like the back of her hair in pony tails because it hurts to sleep on (I don't blame her). Tonight, Chloe decided to work on her dolls hair while I worked on her hair. The doll she chose is actually one of my dolls from when I was a child (yes, I had many dolls of color as a child). "Mr. Bubbles" is his name but that sounds so wrong these days. Chloe loved to have a doll with hair like hers, although she did say it was very hard to comb its curly hair (I can relate).

Adoption #2 Update

Our agency rep. just got back from Ethiopia last night and sent us some new pics of the boys today. We had sent photo books and shirts for the boys. She said they were excited that she found them a family. She got to take pics to several boys who have recently been matched with families. She said there were about 8 other boys who came up to her while she was there and asked her to find them a family. Ugh! break my heart. Anyways, she thinks the attorney in ET has the boys paperwork in order now (she's double checking with him today) so that our case can be submitted for a court date. It usually takes a week to be assigned a court date and court dates are being assigned 4-6 weeks from the time they are submitted. So we could be looking at a March court date. If we pass court the first time (remember it took us 4 times with the girls), Matt could be traveling April/May. Of course that time line could be sped up or slowed down because after all, we are dealing with an international adoption here and we all know how timelines go for that. Other good news is we received a $2,000 grant this week. Praise the Lord!

All by myself!

Yesterday, Chloe surprised me by picking out clothes for her AND Essie, while I was cleaning up from breakfast. She had everything laid out on each of their beds, including 'foundational garments' and sweatshirts. While I'm wasn't quite sure about her pink, Minnie sweatshirt with the coral pants, I can't find any shirt to go with those pants either. She gets bonus points for picking a Mickey sweatshirt for Essie to go with her Minnie sweatshirt. She had even made her bed without me fussing at her. My daughters are growing up!

Today, we were working on our letters with the help of our Leapfr*g letter sound thingy (can't remember the exact name of it). Essie put in "Q", to which the machine said, "Q says qua". I said, "oh, Q is a hard letter (to think of a word for)." To which Essie replied, "Q like quiet!" I said, "Essie, you're right!" To which Chloe responded, "quiet, like when Ababa is snoring in the bed and Mommy says, 'Ababa, be quiet!'" The girls speaks the truth in love. =)