So Long One, Hello Two

Well, the littlest kid turns 2 today.  We’ll celebrate with an end of the bed present ( a fun little something for him to open to start the day), a grandparent’s lunch at our house, and some Happy’s choice time in the  morning and afternoon.  My guess is that Happy’s choice will look like this: park in the morning and pool in the afternoon, but we’ll see.  On Saturday, we’ll celebrate with some friends at a local park.  

As you’ve heard 100 times, I tried my hand this year at taking a daily picture of Happy.  The end result was going to be a video of Happy’s first year but when I went to put together the video, I was overwhelmed by the sheer volume of photos.  So, instead, I used all the photos to pick from and create this great round up of his first year- representative of the tears, the smiles, and the moments of Happy’s 2nd year on the planet in three minutes.  While we’re celebrating Happy’s birth, his birth parents, his delighftul addition to our lives, and all that stuff, we invite you to say goodbye to one and hello to two along with us!       

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t0iYPwnqhtk]

And for you clsoe watchers, yep, we were matched with Happy 2 years ago last week and today we’re celebrating Happy’s 2nd birthday.  How did that happen, eh?  Did we happen to have an all-knowing adoption agency director?  Nah.  Ethiopia operates on a completely different calendar system (it’s 2002 in Ethiopia) and, for many people in Ethiopia, date is not the guide that it is for us here.  Hence, there was no birthdate on record when Happy entered into care and the embassy doctor who chose a date for Happy’s birth several months after he was born, chose August 26th and that is what it is on his birth certificat.  We believe Happy was at least a week old when we were matched on August 22nd and so his actual birth likely happened at least 11 days before we celebrate his birth, but that discrepancy isn’t a significant stress for us.  In fact, we know families who have adopted older children whose actual age are four or five years different from what is on their birth certificate. It’s just one of those things that can happen in international adoption.   

A few friends took some of these photos so many thanks to Jodi Merck, Jane Campbell, Lisa Uken, and Jenn Kramer for sharing photos of Happy with us over the year.