The Spirit of Christmas

I've mentioned that Noemi is quite spirited, no?

I really didn't expect anything less from her.

Merry Christmas, baby. Mamma loves your passion.

Peace and Jolly

I thought I'd share photos of our mantle decorated for Christmas. We’ve had to forego all other decorations including a tree due to the furnace snafu, so our mantle feels a bit extra special this year. We are cleaning up oil soot again around the house after we had a second (yes—believe it or not) episode of our furnace poofing subtle yet invasive oily dust all over the house (hence my lack of posts in the last few weeks). Every square inch of the house was professionally cleaned by a team of folks through our home-owners policy, but now they’ll have to re-do much of what was already done. Many items can’t be saved, like window treatments, rugs, food and things that Sosi routinely puts in her mouth. Uh—that’s just about everything. We’ve finally figured out the problem with the furnace pump, but not after a few weeks of us pulling out our hair. Ahhh—trying to keep things in perspective…

Our mantle includes a Bolivian nativity that Donovan gave to me the first Christmas we were married. I just adore the round plumpness of Mary, Joseph and the Kings. Baby Jesus is nestled between them in a bed of evergreens. We also have a silver cross that we brought back from Ethiopia along with a painting from Ethiopia depicting a new Jesus surrounded by his family, shepards, animals and an angel. The best part for me is the holy top of the mantle combined with the sweet sentimentality of the lower half. My dear Aunt Kay, who is more like a grandmother to me, has knit stockings for all of the family members since before time. Her trademark is the angora that she uses for Santa Claus'’ beard—the older the stocking, the fluffier his beard. So, I have mine from 1976, Donovan’s from the year we married (1998) and this year Aunt Kay sent us a package with Noemi’s stocking. This was the first year I ever hung stockings; and I love them. And if Jesus gets wiggly up there on the mantel and looses his balance, Santa’s soft beard will cushion his fall.

Wherever you are, however dirty and disrupted your house, however anxious you are for your someday-coming baby, may you be filled with a sense of peace this Christmas…and maybe even a little jolly.

Back In the Saddle

I return to work tomorrow. If you had asked me about this a few weeks ago I would have teared up (ummm, and really I did); but I now believe the change is gonna do me some good. I love my job. I just feel a sense of disbelief that three months have passed. I do feel that the time was spent wisely—doing exactly what I was home to do—care for Noemi. I guess I just feel like the time slipped by without us getting to do as many of the casual “enjoyable” things as I had hoped. When I look back this has been an extraordinarily stressful, though magical, three months. Sure, the adjustment of just becoming a parent is nuts; but the extra junk heaped on felt like almost too much at times. I know in my heart that my time with Noemi was wisely spent. Getting her healthy (still working on some mystery rashes/sickness and ear infections) and teaching her that she is loved were my priorities. And that is precisely what I did. I suppose the little fantasies that I had in my head of spending more time with friends and family doing parent-like things like play dates, trolling around our farmers' market or going to pumpkin patches were just that—little unicorn and rainbow fairy tale fantasies. We did some of that, just not as much as I had hoped.

I have a feeling that I am going to look back on this period of life and realize that I was living an out-of-body experience. I suppose most new parents would say the same. But I have so many happy moments to hold on to; moments that I will always cherish as "the beginning" for our rookie family. I've learned that Noemi is strong, resilient, funny, eager, bossy, curious, joyful, engaging and persistent. Above all else, I've learned that she is just like her momma in many ways. When I was in Kindergarten my teacher told my mother that I would never be found at the back of the line in life. It is safe to say that Noemi takes after her momma in this respect. And so, my time at work will likely do both of these strong-willed girls some good. Noemi is ready to have her loving grandmothers care for her and I am ready to put on high heels and lipstick again. At least for 2 and a half days a week.

Last night as I was fixing Noemi’s bottle before bed I poured myself a glass of wine. She pointed to it sitting on the counter next to her bottle and said, “mmmmmmmm.” “Yes, baby,” I said “that is Noemi’s milk and that is Mommy’s milk—mmmmmmmm.” We have a mutual understanding of the good things in life--this girl cracks me up. I think we’ll be alight.

Advent's Blessing

Noemi was baptized on Sunday morning. We felt it symbolic to have her baptized on the weekend of her birthday and the first Sunday of Advent. Advent has taken on new meaning for me in recent years. As each year passed that I waited for a child I found new ways to appreciate the holy story of a beloved baby coming into the world (or at least tried to). I did not wait with great patience; but this Christmas I get to celebrate Advent from the perspective of the joy at the end of the waiting. We had a dress made for Noemi in royal blue (thanks to Illiakids), the liturgical color of Advent, to symbolize the beauty and blessing that emerges from waiting. Doesn’t she look so snappy with our pastor, Bill? We also bought her a cross while in Ethiopia to give her on her baptism day, but we didn’t put it on her knowing that it and the little shiny beads would end up in her mouth. I could barely contain myself as I watched Bill pour the water over her head and bless her. Of course she cried after the third pour left water rolling off of her curls and down her face—I found it perfect that she waited to wail until being blessed in the name of the holy spirit. What a glorious moment to see our daughter being formally welcomed into Christ’s family. My life-long friend, Carissa, stood as Noemi’s Godmother and the three of us took vows to raise her up to know that she is loved by God. With God’s help, baby, we will.

Carissa, me, Noemi, Donovan and Bill

Noemi stopped crying immediately after going to Donovan--we were all laughing at her drama.

Taking a break with her big cousin, Salena.

Her sparkly new Ethiopian cross

We were fortunate to have family and friends present for the big celebration. What a day filled with happy and fun. My mom made a lamb cake to commemorate the christening which is quite a tradition in our family. This cake, however, was the first brown lamb in our family. How does a brown coconut lamb with raisin eyes and a maraschino cherry nose not make you smile, come on!? Only for you, Noemi!

Sosi posing with Nana and the infamous lamb cake. Thank you, Nana!

Noemi Turns Toddler

How old is Noemi???

Noemi's first birthday was on Saturday. I can’t even believe it. She is like a three-month-old in my mind since we have only known her since August. We had a fun-filled day planned for our new toddler, but it got cut short when we woke up to our oil furnace having gone awry in the night and there was black soot everywhere in our home. Ugh! The kicker is that I had just cleaned the house from top to bottom (I hate cleaning) in preparation for her birthday party the next day and my shoulder had been dislocating like a hiccup, so gimpy me needed to try to clean with my Storm Trooper brace on. Lovely. We spent much of the day trying to get the soot off of the major surfaces so that the house was kid safe and clean enough to have our family descend on our home.

We didn’t let the day pass without taking Sosi to a funky little petting zoo in the heart of Lancaster County farmland—too funny. She got a total kick out of the donkeys, goats, llamas and even the hairy pig. We didn’t anticipate how cold it would be, so we spent some of the time allowing the goats to entertain us from the comfort of our car. It didn’t matter to Noemi—she had a ball either way…and we had a ball watching her ooooh and aaaaah over every oinking, quaking and bleeting thing. Love my girl.

Noemi was baptized at church on Sunday morning—I’ll post more on that later, but it was definitely a special morning for us. Noemi did great at her birthday party later that afternoon. She hung like a champ with all of her cousins, un-phased for the first time by the chaos. It’s been great to watch her become increasingly comfortable running with the big dogs and joining in on the fun of other children. She is growing in so many ways.

She also enjoyed chowing on cake for the first time--thanks to my cousin Alisa for her adorable monkey and heart cake baking talents!

The highlight of the party? The dog piñata that she picked out. I don’t think she understood that her beloved paper mache doggie would be beaten with a bat by her eager cousins. Happy birthday, baby!

Reunited and It Feels So Good

Whew! Where to start with the fun whirlwind that was our past week? Where else but with our visit from Sosi’s very first boyfriend, Mekonen Oren!

We were thrilled to have the Oren family spend a night with us en route from their home in Indiana to their family’s home in PA for Thanksgiving. It was so much fun to reunite with them after having spent some serious bonding time together in Ethiopia. Mekonen and Sosi were like little hams together again, laughing and chasing each other around the house. I swear those two are like an old married couple--or at least like the two old guys in the balcony on The Muppets. We miss Jon, Rachael and Mekonen already and hope to hang with them again soon! What a great way to kick off Thanksgiving.

Mekonen and Sosi in coordinating pj's at the breakfast table... just like an old married couple.

We love you, Mrs. Rachael!

This one will end up in the slideshow at the wedding, for sure.