First Parent Teacher Conference

So today Mom had her first parent teacher conference because one of the kids got caught beating another kid up. Care to guess?





Yep, it was Ms. Addis Fitsum.

She has become "increasingly violent" at school and was caught "standing over and pummeling Ashton today." Aww my little prize fighter!!

Hahah

The only thing that gets more looks than dropping off your 1 year old Ethiopian sister at Parent's day out? Taking her with you when you walk your 4th grade Ethiopian brother to his classroom.

iiiiits one week till my biiirthday!

Happy referral day Adda!

I think I have located a baby girl thet can be referred to you to be Eyerusalem's little sister and I will try to attach her info to you!

The new baby's name is Fitsum and her birth date is July 10, 2007.

Today last year, we first got word of a little baby named Fitsum. Thank you Shimiless for giving our family the funniest, silliest, smartest, craziest little kid I have ever met!!

Jackson?

So since Anteneh came home he has been toying with the idea of changing his name. He really really liked the name Jackson but one of his best friends just happened to change his name to Jackson. Well last week Anteneh was finally like okay I am Jackson. Which is really confusing because our dog is named Jack. But anyways we might have a Jackson instead of an Anteneh because his friend is now Benjamin. Even though I am all for him keeping his name, it is SO annoying when people say it wrong, like even his teachers at day camp didn't care to pronounce Anteneh properly. And he is so shy about his English that he will never tell someone they are saying his name wrong. Well that's really all that happened this weekend. Lots of back to school shopping, Addis has been a terror playing with razor blades and broke glass.

Happy

Today I am Happy! Anteneh was up and ready to go to school when I got up (a first!!) He helped me get Addy ready and was playing with her while I got all her school stuff together. Last night he emptied the dishwasher UNSOLICITED!! We went out and ate, and Addis was acting horrible, and he kept giving her bites of his food to keep her placated. It was really sweet to see him actually care about Addis. I think that maybe seeing Josh and his other friends made him homesick but also made him compare how we live to how they live. Like that Josh has a dad and a brother while Anteneh only has girls in the house. Josh's mom's car has a tv in it ( as i was told 4 times) while mine doesn't. It must be so so strange to just randomly come into a family.

This morning is going much much better! Anteneh was up at 6:45 when I got up and he gave me a hug. He is listening to his new Amharic cd we got at the orthodox church in St. Louis. The song on the slideshow below is on the cd. Now that I am not just livid towards him, I can acknowledge how sad and homesick seeing all of his friends must have made him. He can go back to Ethiopia, but he will never GO back. And all these kids that banded together as family will NEVER be that close again. Maybe they will see each other a few times a year and get to call once a week. I am really trying to be more understanding of his feelings today which is a lot easier when he is more understanding of mine.

better for now

Thank you everyone who has had such nice words for us. It really does help to know that you aren't the only one who wants to just scream out of sheer frustration sometimes. Today Mom and I had a lot of heart to heart about how miserable and depressed I was feeling today. I cried a lot, I screamed even more and now have a migraine from hell. Mom was crying when she picked up Anteneh and I think it finally hit him that he is making us miserable with his stupid acting out. He came home and started cleaning up and apologized to me. We will see how long this lasts but I think things are okay for at least a day or two. Now on to the pictures.

Make photo slide shows at www.OneTrueMedia.com

update

I will do a st. louis update later but for now I just wanted to let everyone know that we are having a really really hard time with Anteneh. Please don't let this scare you, I think Anteneh is having a MUCH more difficult transition than the majority of other kids. Not to say we have it the hardest or anything but after visiting with Shimiless, it seems he is REALLY acting out, being very very disrespectful and all together a horrible kid. I just don't know what to do. I am really tired. Tired of being treated like a servant who is nothing more than a stupid joke. Tired of being treated like crap. I am tired of getting up at 7 to wake him up only to be ignored the rest of the day. I know we have only been home 5.5 weeks but I think things are getting worse rather than better. I am constantly ready to snap and mom and I got in a huge fight last night over nothing. School starts in two weeks and something has to change.
Please realize this is my venue to vent my frustrations. Don't think that because you are adopting an older child this will happen to you. Even if your child is at the same orphanage Anteneh came from, chances are their transition will be a lot easier. Our problems are stemming from Anteneh's ideals that he is the cutest thing in the world, everyone should give him presents, clean up after him and he should have free reign of the household.

St. Louis

Here we coooooooomeee

ahhh two weeks without a pout and tonight, we got one! Not quite sure what about? the movie? not liking dinner? whatever it was, he apologized, ate his dinner (3 hours later than us, and he liked it) and wasn't too much of a pain this time. Here's to a pout 3 weeks from now! BTW, Karen, there was NO shoulder shrug.

And to the movies we went

Guess who is sick again? hmmm ADDIS! So instead of going shopping, out to eat and all together fun family saturday time, Mom decided that I should go see a movie with Anteneh. We decided to go see the Mummy returns movie because 1. it has jet li, anteneh's favorite, 2. it has sword fights, anteneh's 2nd favorite and 3. I liked the first 2. So when we get there I bought him a coke and candy bar even though I am against buying that overpriced crap. We went early to get the best seats for his first theater experience. And sat there. And sat some more. And then some more. The kid would not talk to me. AT ALL. During the previews for the new James Bond movie, which has a lot of the same components that makes a movie an Anteneh favorite, I said I would take him to see it and he said maybe. During the entire movie, I was being all lovey, trying to explain some things that might have confused him, and over all just being a nice sister. He finally admitted that he didn't want me to go with him. He wanted mom. Which is great that he is bonding to her, he loves her, she IS his mother. But good god boy, I was not about to stay home with the monster child when she a 102 fever. No thanks. I guess my point is, I was not expecting to be isolated by my brother who is jealous of my sister. And that I am sure I looked like a loser/pedophile trying to hold hands and whisper to a preteen that looks nothing like me. that is all for now, I am off to play with the baby who NEVER isolates me, if anything she favors me in things like naps, extreme beatings and hugs.