Snowdwarf and monsters

The boys' first snowman! Okay, more accurately, snow-dwarf (It was too cold for the snow to pack, and mommy had a terrible cold and needed to go back inside).

A frequent topic of discussion when reading animal books, eating lunch on our animal placemats, or going to bed with our stuffed animals is whether or not a particular animal bites (hanya in Sidamigna). "Hanya tiger?" We have also declared that the monsters on their sheets and their towels are NICE monsters that don't bite. Instead they blow bubbles -- complete with goofy sound effects by Dave. The nice monsters do NOT bite, except they would bite an Embroma, the mythical hyena-like bogeyman that they boys seem to think live in the various sinkholes and caves in our local parks, if they ever were bold enough to come to our house! Just in case, Zenebe has taken it upon himself to become a monster to patrol the hallway...

The one "nice monster" that has occasionally been pushed to the point of biting, however is our poor dog Apollo. He hates the rolling cap game. And the rocket balloons. And the crashing towers of blocks. And kisses and petting when he is trying to nap. So sometimes he snaps those drooly jaws at the bouncing boys. Last night Amare excused himself from the dinner table by gingerly trying to sidestep Apollo, who was parked next to his chair awaiting morsels of mac-n-cheese to fall: "Hanya, hanya -- Apollo GRUMPY!"

Meanwhile, Dave is admonishing Zenebe for reaching over his water glass to eat his mac-n-cheese with his fingers. Dave gives a long explanation about using a fork and spoon, and the appropriate placement of water glass to avoid spilling (a frequent occurence), and using a napkin to wipe messy fingers..."Okay?" Zenebe looks up after the lengthy reprimand and asks: "Thank you?"

I love you...

One of the biggest worries in adopting kids is, naturally, will they bond with us, their new, strange parents? Our boys have virtually eliminated that worry from our minds, as they are full of hugs and kisses and love to snuggle. They also say "I love you, Mommy/Daddy," all the time. Of course, this is very sweet and endearing, especially when frequently accompanied by a hug and a slobbery kiss. However, we had noticed that the "I-love-you's" were a lot more frequent just before a request (like, "Big playground?") or just after an acquiescence ("Yes, we're riding in the car") or favorite food is served ("Banana?!?! I love you, mommy!"). And we wondered whether the actual meaning of the words are really understood, or simply their power to wrap your parents around your little finger.

The following examples suggest that perhaps the former is true much of the time:

We're feeding crickets to the geckos. Both boys are cheering on the geckos as they snap up the hopping insects. "Hanya [bite], gecko! Go!" As the geckos become satiated and their appetites and hunting behaviors wane, the boys are frustrated with the lack of carnivorous entertainment. Finally, Amare exclaims, in desperation to get the geckos to perform and chomp down on yet another unsuspecting cricket, "I love you, gecko!"

Amare has made an active past-time of rolling bottle caps on the floor. He spins and twirls the caps so that they backspin on the linoleum and roll right back to him. This naturally tortures the dogs, who are usually trying to take a nap in the best cap-rolling areas of the floor. We told ourselves three weeks ago that the novelty of the cap game would eventually wear off and he would choose to engage himself with any one of the gazillion more educational and interactive toys lying around the house. No such luck. The sound of rolling caps echos through the house morning, noon and night. Including this morning, when Zenebe had joined in the fun with his own juice bottle cap and they were rolling them to each other in the hallway. We are groggily getting dressed and overhear multiple exhortations to the bottle caps to backspin just right to return to their owners: "I love you....!"

Boy Story 1 & 2

Frog and toad

Wigwam

Linguistic hiccups

As you can probably imagine, the language barrier is the foundation of most of the familial conflict around here. To give you an idea of what our conversations sound like when we're all trying hard to hurdle that barrier, here's an approximate reproduction of our ride home from school via the bagel shop today:

Mommy: Zenebe, you have the hiccups!

Daddy: Drop me off here, I'll run in and buy the bagels and you can drive around the block and pick them up.

(Daddy exits stage right.)

Z: Hi-kaka.

M: Zene, do you have to go kaka?

Amare: 'Hicaca' [is] Sidamigna [for] 'blocks.'

Z: No kaka.

M: Oh good, because we have to drive to the house for you to kaka.

A: Amharic [for] 'blocks'….. ummmm…..'metaweha' - 'blocks'; 'hicaca.' Blocks, Mommy!

M: You want to play with the blocks at our house?

Z: No blocks.

M: 'Hicaca' sounds like 'hiccups' and you've got the hiccups.

(Mommy fakes an overly dramatic hiccup.)

A: Ah yes, 'hiko' [in] Sidamigna!

(Zenebe hiccups.)

M: Daddy hasn't come out with the bagels, so we'll drive around the block again.

Z: No, no blocks!!!!!

And here are some gratuitous photos of the boys wearing their new sunglasses (which they both were during this conversation) because they are 'veeEErrrrry' cool and they have only come off their heads (at our insistence) while sleeping, eating or bathing.

Magnets

At the orphanage in Addis Ababa, both boys would wake up early from their naps so that they could have first dibs on these cool magnetic tile building toys before the other kids crowded the playroom. In the first photo, Zenebe is proudly displaying his building to the nannies and all the other kids, from whom he violently defended his claim on the magna-tiles. His dear Aunt Kathryn just sent the boys their very own set of magna-tiles (so now they only have to wrench the prized squares from their brother's hands)! They have already had lots of nostalgic(?) fun and Amare made a duplicate church building (one of his favorite things to do around town is point out all of the churches, crosses and American flags he can see -- ha!). Zenebe's favorite creations are jet planes. Pretty much if he can get a set of wings on something, it's a plane and it will fly.

In keeping with the rest of the blogosphere, we felt our initial flurry of posts merited a long, uninterrupted break. But on the verge of the new year, we feel it's time to treat everyone to additional minutiae of adoptive parenting as a sort of parting shot for 2009.

The highlight of the holidays certainly must be the Christmas tree. We had high hopes for the tree harvesting excursion; surely a couple of kids raised in the African lowlands must cherish fond memories of bracing against the December cold in pursuit of the perfect Scotch Pine or Douglas Fir. Nonetheless, despite our repeated application of the word "tree" and animated gesticulation, the boys didn't seem nearly as enthusiastic as we about a Christmas tree.

We headed out the week before Christmas, arriving long after every other family had made off with the prized trees. The folks working at the farm greeted us with a quizzical look that clearly stated, "This late? Really?"

Really.

We homed in on the section reserved for the wonderfully fragrant, albeit rather prickly, blue spruce. Last year's tree had cost a fortune but smelled so wonderful that we decided a scaled down version would provide all the best holiday odors in a kid-friendly, pint-sized package. But again, our enthusiasm failed to rub off on the boys. Our repeated queries about which tree they liked best were met by absolute indifference, as if it somehow didn't matter which tree we arbitrarily selected to symbolize our family unity and the spirit of the holidays. As if!

After picking a suitable tree and convincing ourselves that the boys approved, we headed back to the shop to pay for our tree and sample the warm cider (not a hit with the kids) and hot cocoa (ditto). Approximately three milliseconds after entering the shop, Zenebe identified a suitable heinous decorative ceramic tree and promptly assisted it to the floor. The nice lady working the register was kind enough to halve the $8 price tag of the broken "decoration," but the difference probably still won't cover the lead containment costs associated with its final disposal.

Our long and indifferent tree hunting experience finally concluded, we returned home and set it in the living room, only to discover that a four foot blue spruce is remarkably less fragrant than its six foot counterpart. The boys quickly shed any pretense of interest in the whole tree affair and returned to their blocks. A pictorial comparison only seems fair...

The craptacular ceramic christmas tchotchke:

Zene's subsequent effort with the blocks:

Some small part of me wishes such coordination had been in evidence while tree shopping. But a larger part of me is the proud new owner of a ceramic holiday turd.

Xmas fun

Once we covered the tree is sparkling energy-sucking light-bulbs (since we can't ever remember to buy the LED lights in October, before they sell out of everything but the heinous blue ones), the boys warmed right up to our prickly "membrato" tree. They even helped hang ornaments, made cinnamon stars (with only one meltdown about who got to use the rolling pin first), cut out paper snowflakes, and even threaded popcorn-cranberry chains. The best part of that experience for the boys was the all-you-can-eat fistfuls of popcorn, and the best part for Emily was the look on Z's face when he tried the same all-you-can-eat tactic with fresh cranberries (after mommy's suggestion that they were not so yummy). Zing! Of course, all of that tree decorating and Christmas cheer was just a ruse to get them to refine their severely under-developed fine motor skills.

Christmas Day eventually came, not that the boys knew much difference from any other day of crazy new rituals and constant additions to the their growing stash of toys. Though the train tracks running around the glittery tree did attract quite a bit of attention. So did the fact that they were allowed to play in their pajamas, before breakfast. Dave's first Christmas turkey was a huge hit: "More - biwd - pleez!" Though much to her surpise (and secret delight), Emily's candied sweet potatoes were rejected outright, especially the gooey white things on top: "No yummy - Mommy eatee."