June Wrap Up

The first week of June was the last week of school for us, but there wasn't much of a summer slow down when the school closed their doors.  If felt like things were off and running pretty much immediately.

All Jmo wants for summer is his two front teeth!

On the Monday after school was out daily 6 a.m. cross country practices started at the high school. Britton talked Jenna into running next year so now both Britton and Jenna are out the door by 5:50 a.m. every morning.  Jenna also has ballroom dance on Tues/Wed/Thurs mornings from 7- 9 a.m. so I'm usually running around trying to pick her up from XC and take her to ballroom while she changes her clothes in the back of the van.  Korinne has decided she would like to try ballroom, too, so her summer class is Tues/Thurs 9-10 a.m. In short our summer mornings are crazy and I think we are all excited for when school starts because that means we can "sleep in" until 6:40 a.m.  Ahh, sounds heavenly.

 Britton went on High Adventure in Moab on Tuesday, June 6th so he started his summer with a real bang.

The next week was Youth Conference for both Britton and Jenna.  (Adam was supposed to go, too, but we ended up flying out to Ethiopia in the middle so he had to miss). They went down to Manti for the pageant and were also able to do some service, too.  It was short and sweet but I think they had a lot of fun.

Just a few days after Youth Conference Jenna and Britton were at it again, but this time they attended a stay at home session of EFY.  It is a good thing they were home from 9 p.m. to 9 a.m. every night because this made it so they could meet their new brother AJ after we arrived home from Ethiopia on Wednesday.

The very next Monday Jenna left for girls camp.  She was sad to leave AJ, but still managed to have a great time at camp.

With AJ finally home we spent the rest of June close to home so he could get used to his new surroundings.

Jmo and AJ on their first morning together

AJ loved being pushed around the kitchen/dining room in the stroller and Jameson was happy to oblige.

At the neighborhood park

AJ wants to be outside 24/7 and that's no lie. 

Trying his very first PB&J sandwich. He liked it.

AJ is an adventurous eater and is willing to try most anything.  He didn't like fresh fruit at all when he first got home, but after trying it a few more times over the next week he decided he likes bananas and will eat other fruits as well.

Brothers.

The boys on (and under) the tramp. There was a lot of giggling and laughter.

Jmo and his new sidekick. 

AJ loves to get in the car while it is in the garage and play around.  Having a car is a novelty and he just can't get enough. Literally hours have been spent crawling around the mini van.  I didn't capture a smile with this photo, but trust me, there have been plenty.

A package arrived with a little present from my brother Mckay.😏

Looks like this shirt can be worn for years to come. 😉

Our first outing was to the splash pad and park with Aunt Jen and cousins Will and June.

Jameson loves the idea of having AJ around, but has really struggled with the big shift that has happened in the family.  In the first week of having AJ home Jameson really let us know that he was having a hard time sharing the attention with his new baby brother. The result? Pure chaos. We've always known that the real work starts when you finally get your child home but it doesn't make it any easier. So, how would I describe AJ's  first few weeks home? Really awesome and super hard all at the same time. Since it is really important to be with a new child who has come from an orphanage setting as much as possible I've had to let a lot of other things go and you can tell. 😊 I must say that it has definitely been an adjustment for me to have a 2 year old in the house again. Going from 4 to 5 kids is a big deal in and of itself, but instead of having a newborn baby who can't move or do anything by themselves, I got a toddler who doesn't stop moving and exploring, who puts things in the toilet and empties out cupboards while constantly trying to sneak outside when no one is watching. I'm sure you can imagine the scene. But even with all of the trouble I love my boys!

Look how peaceful they are when they are sleeping. Yep, AJ is a thumb sucker.

A week after coming home I took AJ down to the U of U clinic to have him evaluated by a Doctor that specializes in international adoptions. We ran into our neighbors at the clinic (they were there with their daughter) and they took this picture of the 2 of us as we headed down to the lab to get some blood work done.

How did AJ do? Well, I knew we were in trouble when he started screaming his head off when they simply had him stand on a scale to get his weight. Yeah, it went downhill from there. It was clear that his experience in Ethiopia with doctors had traumatized him. They had to take quite a bit of blood to run all of the tests they needed and it took 4 of us to hold him still.  Poor little guy.  After it was all said and done I went down and got him some juice and something to eat from the cafeteria.  After that I think he decided to forgive me.  In the end his labs results were good.  The only thing that came back positive was the test for Giardia, which we were expecting.  AJ is healthy but he does have to start from scratch on his immunizations. Ask me how excited I am to have to take him for a LOT of shots in the future??  I can pretty much tell you how it will go down based on his first medical experience in the United States. 

AJ has adjusted to his new life really well.  In fact, I would say he has done even better than I ever imagined he would.  He was taken from everything he has ever known and has been thrown into a white world with a different language and food and he has come up smiling and laughing and even dancing. He loves to snuggle and be held and has embraced all of us. He is hilarious and loves to pull funny faces and tease us. It is not uncommon for him to randomly start dancing mid stride.  He doesn't need music to bust a move, but if you do put some Ethiopian music on he will immediately stop doing whatever he is doing and start to dance.  I wondered what kind of behaviors we would see coming from an orphanage setting, but everything we have seen is 100% normal for a typical 2 year old boy and frankly after Jameson I can handle AJ's temper tantrums with one arm tied behind my back. 😁 He sleeps well and still takes naps, too. 

Just a few of AJ's many faces.

And that's our June wrap up.  Yeah, obviously we don't have a lot going on right now. We should really try to be less boring.