Oh 2012 how great,beautiful, amazing and hard were you?!!!! Reflecting on this last year we have so much to be grateful for. So many things to bring smiles to our faces.
We are finally getting into a great groove of being a family of 5! Wendem has been making HUGE strides in so many areas! Growing in trust of us which completely transforms our house, growing in confidence which totally helps him in school and socially and of course his English is improving amazingly which helps everything. Communication makes things so much easier! He is really picking it up, people are amazed to know he has only been home 4 months. I feel like he is finally coming into himself. The Wendem we are getting to experience now is giggly, enthusiastic, grateful and just plain silly....yep he is a Herzog alright! He recently conquered one of his biggest fears....the school bus. When he first arrived he was down right adamant that he would never ride one of those, even if brother did he was just too darn scared. Well one day a few weeks before Christmas break he came home from school and declared he was ready. I about fell over but I jumped on his energy and called the bus folks. They don't allow parents to ride the bus for lots of reasons but I did convince them to let Chase ride with him for the first day. Sure enough Chase rode with him, showed him the bus transfer protocol and he was off. (He rides a bus, gets to the hs here and switches buses both ways.) Now he is an old pro and riding the bus to school and has even rode it home. Yahoo!!!
Just as many new mothers fill a baby book with babys first words and funny toddler sayings I too am doing the same. Here are some fun things our little man has said:
*When talking about his homework and the top of his page he said, " I wrote on the upstairs of my paper and teacher helped me on the downstairs" (bottom) :)
*He wanted to play with a friend from school the other day but I told him I didn't have his friends phone number or address. He said "Mom just ask the lady in your phone to give you directions like before when went to Yibis house, she tell you how to get to Ryans." I just cracked up! I tried to explain to him that we had to have a address before the nice lady could give us directions, thanks MapQuest!
*We were at the mall as a family visiting Tay at work and he saw the photo of Santa and wondered why in the world Santa would come here. I asked him if Santa ever came to Ethiopia, "nope, his legs would get too tired to walk there." LOL!
*I was folding laundry the other day in the dining room where he came and promptly turned the light off in the room. I said I need that light on, he then asked me, "Do you have money for that light mom?" I think he is listening when we tell the kids to turn the lights off in a room eh!
The list of these are forever long but these are a few of my current favorites. I love the way he says "little and really" in his cute Amharic accent.
Wendem many days is a mini-Chase, he just LOVES big brother and those two have so much fun together. We are constantly impressed with Chase's love and energy for Wendem, we often find them wrestling or watching movies like old pals :)
Wendem loves music as does the rest of our family, he loves to dance and sing even if he doesn't know the words ;) Some of his favorites range from Chris Tomlin to Flo Rida. Like I mentioned before, a true Herzog;)
Here are some other fun things to reflect on that we are grateful for this past year!
God brought our son home after a long 13 months of waiting and fundraising!! We pushed through some hard adjustment times but we hung in there and now things are better than ever. Not to say we won't ever have rough times again but we have finally got into a smooth groove as a family of 5.
Taylor Dawn graduated high school and started college which she is loving. We can't believe she is 18 now!!!! She is smart, beautiful, funny and fun to watch grow into the woman God created her to be. All I can say is watch out world! She has been working at the mall for a year or so now working at Orange Julius and Chattys. She loves the barista part of working so just recently took a job at up and coming CoffeeHouse here in downtown Bozeman that she will start in a few weeks. She will graduate from the Esthics school in April and plans to work in her field along with the coffee house and then is looking into going to MSU this fall.
Chase is loving 7th grade and realizing his true passions and talents. I can't believe he just turned 13, really two teenagers in this house! This year he laid down his 9 year soccer career for focusing on music. He loves playing guitar, singing and making music on the computer. He and his best friend Karen tried out for the talent show this year. With over 60 plus acts and only 20 chosen they got in and will be performing at the Emerson in the show later in the month. I can't wait!
Our house is full of love, laughter and big extremes. You might catch us chatting about college financial aid or what would be a good snack for a second grader....the joys of having kids 10 years apart! As most of you know if I had my way I would graduate one and bring a new one in ;) Now my hubby on the other hand doesn't agree, although we do not think that we are completely finished though...we know we may do this addition thing once or twice more...but God's timing is perfect and we will know when that is. (I am petitioning for a girl to even things out!!!;)
2012 brought a lot of work, pain, joy and peace as does each year. This year though we are especially thankful for God's provision in our lives. His hand was all over our adoption of little Wendem and you never had to doubt if it was His plan, it was and He provided for us ever step of the way.
We are so grateful for all of you who journeyed with us and continue to do so! Praying 2013 is an amazing year for us all. God Bless!
Lots of Love, The Herzog 5
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