Look who got the honor of greeting the Ethiopian delegation from the Ministry of Womens Affairs. On Monday Hannah and I traveled to Ferndale to greet the Ethiopian delegation from the Ministry of Womens Affairs at our adpotion agency, Children's House International. The delegation was here to meet with agencies across the U.S. and see how the children they place are doing. They also wanted to learn more about each agency's humanitarian efforts in Ethiopia too.
After Hannah greeted the delegation and gave each delegate a bouquet of flowers, we went to our hotel and hung out a bit and worked on some homework (we had to miss 2 days of school-Thanks Ms. Q!).
Monday evening, we went to a potluck for all the Ethiopian families and the delegates. It was fantastic! There was Ethiopian food and American potluck favorites too. I had to remind our Ethiopian girl to go easy on the Ethiopian food as she was busy loading her plate high. This girl CANNOT GET ENOUGH Ethiopian food. :)
We met several families. It was really neat to see our facebook friends in person. We got to meet Tracy and her boys, Zavion and Esayus. The boys are too cute and every bit the characters Tracy has shared with us all on Facebook. We also met new friends, Hannah and Maddy and got to spend some time chatting with our social worker, Kathy too. The highlight of the evening for Hannah was getting to see Abdissa again. Although she was so excited she was afraid he didn't remember her. So I told her to go over to him and ask him if he remembered Derartu (her Ethiopian name). She was right, he hadn't recognized her American name, but once she told him she was Derartu, his face lit up and he was absolutely astonished at how much she had grown since she left Ethiopia 5 years ago wearing a size 18 months.
We also got to speak with delegates one on one which was an awesome experience. One delegate complimented me on Hannah's hair and asked if I had done it. When I replied that I had she was very impressed. At least the 4 1/2 hours of braiding proved worth the effort and the complaining from a certain little girl. :) Hannah continued to impress the delegation by demonstrating her knowledge and ability to do Ethiopian dancing. Ethiopian Heritage and Culture camp has been great for teaching her dance, songs, cooking and etiquette. It is too bad though that not being close to Seattle that we aren't able to teach her more language. Although the delegates seemed pleased how happy and healthy the children are , they seemed a little sad that the children loose their Ethiopian language. Come on Rosetta Stone, when are you going to make an Amharic version?
After dinner, it was back to the hotel to swim in the pool which had to be the coldest indoor pool I've ever swam in. Hannie loved it! I did get her to agree to going in the hot tub after a half hour to allow Mom to warm up!
Finally it was bed time for some of us. Seems that one small child doesn't sleep well without the light on which means that two people CAN sleep on only 1/5th of a king-sized bed. Add to that, a child that reaches out to pat the Mommy every few hours to make sure she is still there and you understand why only one of us got some sleep.
On the way back, we stopped off to have breakfast at IHOP. It happened to be National Pancake Day so we got free stacks of pancakes. Score! After a 3 1/2 hour drive and a stop off at Grandma's we finally got home, ate a quick dinner and then raced off to a Girl Scout Meeting. Busy couple of days, but fun time with my girl. I'm proud of you Hannie and love you sweet girl!
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| Abdissa addressing the delegtion |
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| A thums up for Etiopian food! |
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| Hannah with the delegation and Abdissa |
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| Our new friend Hannah |
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| Our Hannah in her Ethiopian finery |
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| Maddy and the Hannahs with Miss Whatcom |
