Friends of Orphans and Vulnerable Children

Friends of Orphans and Vulnerable Children
What could be better than an Ethiopian welcome, FOVC style?

Tuesday, December 14, 2010

TWO WEEKS & a birthday & some pictures!

Let me begin by getting this out of my system:

We are leaving in two weeks!!!!!!!
Ok, back to business.

Dave's parents came to town this weekend to (finally) meet Bereket and visit the rest of us. It was good to see them again!

Nana and Grandad and a bunch of grandkids (plus a grandschnauzer)
Amelia spent a lot of time trapping Nana in the bathroom with her!
Life has been so crazy and busy, we didn't tell Bereket that his (randomly assigned?) birthdate of November 29 had come and gone with a birthday party. Instead, we held a proper celebration Sunday night. Honestly, in our defense, he didn't know the date had already passed. And it was much better this way, with Nana and Granddad in town, and DAVE in town, and a house in which to celebrate, etc etc.

Note the semi-homemade birthday cake...that is my tray and we installed the candles!
With all the sprinkles and drizzles, the birthday boy was thrilled!
Yes, he's a boy, and yes, he's attracted to guns.
Brother and Sis together!
First birthday gift!
Yep, we're already sorry we bought the Nerf gun.
Abby the Techno-Sis assembles the PlayMobil hero set.
A boy and his dog!
A boy and his daddy!

The aftermath!
Finally, I guess I am dealing with my Mary and Martha issues. Trying to discern between what I need to do  (help my kids get to Christmas, prepare for our trip, pay attention to my kids, go to work, not ignore my kids, focus on the meaning of Christmas, take care of my children...do you see a pattern here?) and what I ought to do (create really fabulous Christmas cards and decorate the whole entire house for Christmas).

It has not been easy for me, but I am scaling way back on things that don't really, truly matter, in order to make time for the things that do really, truly matter. Many, many boxes of Christmas decorations remain packed away in the basement.


I'm trying to be more of a Mary and less of a Martha, but I'm not a Scrooge---we do have a Christmas tree!

And I think this Christmas time will be a really special one for the Howletts Six.

4 comments:

Shawn said...

Your new house looks beautiful! And of course your children are beautiful too.

Sharon said...

Holy cow-your house looked more decorated (and unpacked!) than mine does after 2 years! I love the pic of Amelia sitting in the box. :) And looks like Bereket had a great birthday!

michelle said...

Merry Christmas Howletts! Gosh the kiddos are getting B I G !

Unknown said...

you are invited to follow my blog