Speedstreet 2011

We live in Charlotte, NC home of NASCAR.  In May, Charlotte (really Concord, NC) hosts 2 NASCAR races on two consecutive weekends.  In between, they have a rather large street party in uptown Charlotte.  We love to go (during the day) and collect all the free food samples, look at race cars, get our picture taken with characters and cars, and just people watch.  So, here is this years fun...the first round (many of the pictures take awhile to shop up online).

Declan's Lego Game

Declan is kind of infamous at our house for coming up with his own rules to games.  At times it can be a little maddening because you can never keep up or figure out how to play a game....until now.  He recently built a game board from his Legos and came up with rules that make sense.  He is playing here with Terefech. He won which he oddly seems to do most of the time we play.  Maybe he has an inside track on the playing of the game.  I am constantly amazed at his creativity, thought processes, and his ability to keep us all on our toes!

One year May 15, 2011

On May 15, 2011, we had officially been a family of four for one year.  We don't really have a name for it yet.  People often call it "gotcha day" or "family day."  I was calling the day Terefech had to leave Ethiopia and came to be a part of our family but Terefech thought that was a little silly and way too long.  T day was my other offer.  That one might stick.  We'll see.  If we don't ever name it, think we'll be okay.

We gave Terefech the opportunity to plan the day.  We talked about what an important day it was, both happy and sad.  Happy because we love having her as part of our family but also sad because she had to leave everything she knew behind.  In my readings, several times I have read that adoptive families look upon this day as only one of celebration and not acknowledging the loss that their child suffered on that day.  We have spent the last week discussing our trip to Ethiopia, the events that took place there, looking at lots of pictures, and just generally talking about how this all feels.

Terefech chose for the 4 of us to go to Riverbanks Zoo in Columbia, SC for the day.  It has several types of penguins and she loves penguins.  For dinner, we went to one of the Ethiopian restaurants in town.  That always makes her happy!!!  

Notice the butterfly on the hat!

We discussed throughout the zoo that when we go back to Ethiopia we will definitely need to go see the animals that are native to Ethiopia.  

Awesome to see the young giraffe getting a drink by putting his legs out to the side in order to get his neck down there.  He or she got a drink and then looked at us all like, "What are you looking at?"

Declan often reads things to Terefech and was so good at the zoo about telling her facts about the animals.  She hates that she can't read!

Stinky flamingoes

Declan trying to chat with the gorilla.

Drinking Tej, an Ethiopian honey wine.

Terefech's souvenir from the zoo, a Rockhopper Penguin known for their abilities to hop up the rocks.  Pictures by Terefech

Surprise!

We have had a surprise in the works for the kids for about a month.  This past Wednesday we had a super busy day with school, drum lessons, a work picnic for Rich but we just couldn't wait.  We even got them to look the other way as we came up the driveway (we have a detached garage in the back so we didn't want them to see the backyard). 

Here they are seeing the playset.  I cannot seem to get my pictures rearranged so sorry they are out of order!

They were so surprised with their new playset.  They both had smiles plastered across their face.  They both were so disappointed in themselves that they hadn't figured out what was going on.  It has been the center of our life for many days now!

Strawberry harvest

We have had an incredible strawberry harvest this year.  We have gotten more strawberries than we ever imagined.  It is making up for the lack of spinach and lettuce we are getting.  Last year we were overflowing with spinach and lettuce, this year, barely any.  Learning the hard lesson of growing your own food.  But we are loving the strawberries...way better than the ones you get from the store.

Camping for Mother's Day

We spent Mother's Day weekend at a campground in south Charlotte.  Nope, we didn't venture too far from home and it is was only for one night but we had a great time.  This was our "we hope the kids love this" try at camping so we fed them their favorite foods and tried to do things they would think were fun!  I think we succeeded

Rich got a hammock for Christmas and it is one the kids favorite toys now!

Hiking out to see Lake Wylie

Strongman Terefech

There was a playground very close to our tent site.  They had a blast!

The tent was up in no time.

Beaver dam we found on a hike.  No beavers sighted though.

So enjoying their Mother's Day pancakes.

By far probably my favorite moment of the weekend.  Declan reading Terefech a story.

We are excited to do it again.  We are hoping we can camp at the beach this summer.