blessed by firsts.....

tea-time with cousin shayna

i made a special trip with aregash to target yesterday to get a halloween costume.  

we don't make a big stink about halloween, 

but we do dress the kids up and do a little bit of 

trick-or-treating.  

the boys have been talking about which costumes they are going to wear and having been trying them out around the house. 

never once did aregash ask why the heck they would put on such silliness and prance about. 

so we took this for granted.....

good little helper-cleaning up her tea mess

at target we walked into the costume isle 

and she really didn't even get as excited as i thought she would seeing all of the dress-up clothes.  

she finally asked,

"what this, mama? what this for?".

so i grabbed a treat basket off the store shelf and i told her how we are going to dress up in a costume 

"an outfit like THIS"--pointing to one on the rack) 

and we go to someone's house, 

knock on their door,

and say "TRICK-OR-TREAT!!"  

and then......they put candy in your basket. 

taking turns with the cinnamon-raisin bread dough

i don't think i've ever seen her eyes soo big. 

(you have to understand how little candy i let them eat).

she said "I wanna do THAT!!!!" 

and then she squeeled for the next 15 minutes while we worked through the costumes.  

i wasn't paying $30 for a costume...

and a friend we ran into reminded me that we could always put something together with the hundreds of outfits she already has.  

done.

so we settled on a bee "costume"....wings and antennas and a bow-tie.  

we have plenty to go with it.  

and really, she could have cared less what we chose--

she has her eye on the prize. :0)

injera....the breakfast, lunch, and supper of champions!

before we went to target i called dic. 

i started thinking about how this was a really big first.....

her first halloween.....

her first costume.....

and i knew he would be there if he could.  

no chance.

  soooo......i asked her if she wanted to call him and tell him what we picked.  

we walked down the isle of target with the speaker on and she told him the whole story. 

it was the cutest thing EVER.  

he put his speaker on at work too and his co-workers shared in the cute-ness.  

we could hear them giggling in the background.  

and every person we walked past at target had their day made.  it was a FIRST i don't think any of us will ever forget.....

especially aregash.

***before you watch***
~click on the pause button on my music~

(top right of page in pink)

aregash tells her big brother, cole, about halloween and what it entails.

she still can't sit still. 

such a great reminder of all of the things that are still so new and sweet to our little ethiopian girl......

she treasures these times 

and i am loving 

that i get the chance 

to be 

a 

part 

of all 

of

them.