The day that changed our lives forever

A year ago today we held our daughter in our arms for the very first time...forever changing our lives. We have been reflecting on how natural everything felt and yet it was still a leap of faith for us, we just followed our hearts...because from the very beginning we knew in our hearts we would be united with our daughter.

It was love at first sight!

Our daughter is truly the light of our lives, not a day goes by where we don't look into her beautiful eyes and tell her how much we love her, how special she is and lucky we are to be her parents. It is not uncommon to find us gazing at her in amazement, talking to each other about how truly blessed we are, she is a perfect fit for our family! We truly can't imagine our lives without her, yes that is cliche but it is also very true! She is not only beautiful but hilarious, smart, curious, courageous, stubborn and well we could go on. She is an extraordinary little girl who continues to amaze us each and every day. It is incredible to watch her progress and personality bloom over this last year! We see her continuing to light up the lives of everyone around her, she has that special something. WE are the lucky ones to be touched by HER light!

We love you Mawerdi, everything about you is perfect!

"And in the end, it's not the years in your life that count. It's the life in your years."

 ~ Abraham Lincoln

“While we try to teach our children all about life, our children teach us what life is all about.”

~ Unknown Author


Here is our blog post soon after our arrival from Ethiopia, which includes a very sweet adoption video!

A year ago today....

A year ago today we landed in Ethiopia, our hearts full of excitement and our eyes ready to see the country that we have been dreaming about for so long! The drive from the airport to the guest house will be forever etched in our minds, we were in disbelief that we were finally in our daughter's birth country...about to meet her for the first time!

The next two months would be filled with adventure, learning, and several life changing experiences! Ethiopia will always hold a piece of our hearts, until we meet again......

“The road of life twists and turns and no two directions are ever the same. Yet our lessons come from the journey, not the destination.”

~ Don Williams, Jr.

Celebrating Genna as a family

We enjoyed celebrating Genna with the Adoptive and Ethiopian communities last year, but this year there was an abundance of anticipation in the household to celebrate Genna together as a family for the first time!

This community, a mixture of the Adoptive and Ethiopian communities, is so very special to us. We were involved in this community prior to Mawerdi's arrival, and to now see her playing with her friends with such joy and delight and celebrating her hertiage together as a family...well it brings us unmeasurable happiness.

We were so excited to wear our traditional attire. Our dresses were picked out in Addis, Viv's especially designed and created for her.

Mawerdi loved being with her friends, dancing

and running around!

Mawerdi enjoyed making many new special friends!

Again, just like last year, the Priest from a local Ethiopian Orthodox Church said a blessing and special message to the families.

Sonja, with Enjoni Cafe, is such a wonderful source of connection for the Ethiopian and Adoptive Communities!

It was wonderful to see so many beautiful faces celebrating this special holiday!

And of course Mawerdi was eating as much Injera as possible...she has loved Injera from the start!

After a wardrobe change (lets face it, everyone likes to get comfy) she got back to dancing the night away!

We are so thankful for these amazing friends! Our girls are not only good friends, who always enjoy their time together, but they are also share so many things, including being born in the same town in Ethiopia! We are thankful to call so many adoptive families our friends...their passion for life, appreciation of family, and commitment to keeping the Ethiopian heritage alive in the household...we can't say it enough, how truly grateful we are for these amazing relationships!

“Truly great friends are hard to find, difficult to leave, and impossible to forget.”

-Unknown Author

A year ago

A year ago today we saw our daughter for the first time!

We love our Forever Family and continue to enjoy Our Journey of Love everyday!

Does the Journey ever really end?

Since today is National Adoption Day we thought that would be a perfect reason to enter a new blog entry. We had originally planned on stopping "this" blog when we came back from Ethiopia, instead creating "Adventures with Mawerdi" as a way of starting the next capture in our journey. However we keep coming back to this blog...we have been shocked to see frequent views of our blog from Ethiopia, there have been over 300 views from Ethiopia since we got home! It is surprising because most Ethiopians are prevented access to Blogger, either way it makes us smile. We hope people in Ethiopia see how happy and thankful we are for this amazing family! We have also received several emails from various travelers and adoptive families. It is funny how a personal blog created to document our journey would peak the curiosity of strangers. It truly is a small world out there!

Therefore, for a variety of reasons it has been decided that this blog. "Our Journey of Love", will continue in some form or another. We can't predict how often we will update this blog, however there are just some events that justify documenting. Our love for Ethiopia and for Mawerdi continues to expand more than we could have ever hoped or imagined. We know that we are lucky to be parents of this precious girl, we are thankful for our family everyday.

So what are the recent highlights?

We have since learned how to make Ethiopian food after attending an Ethiopian cooking class with other adoptive families.

Mawerdi tried injera for the first time at the 

Enkutatash celebration!

She truly did love it!

We also signed up to sponsor a very special girl through Children's Heaven, providing school and necessities for a year. This was always our plan from the beginning, continuing to give back to Ethiopia even when our daughter came home, but once again we were surprised at how much this decision has effected our lives and how we thinking about necessities.

We finally completed the re-adoption process in the State of Oregon which provides Mawerdi with an Oregon birth certificate! Despite the annual post placement report we provide Ethiopia until she is a teenager,  we can finally say that we are all DONE with the adoption paperwork, it is finally complete!

She lights up our lives and lives of all around her! She is a funny, curious, sweet, smart girl with a precious spirit, she is a special little girl!

We continue to keep our love for Ethiopia alive in our household and plan to return in a few short years. When we started this process we had hoped for an ongoing connection with Ethiopia, however we had no idea the opportunities we would be given on a regular basis to give back to Ethiopia or just being able to spend time with friends reminiscing about Ethiopia.

Mawerdi is truly our angel!

By adopting a child and helping them reach their potential, 

they help us

reach ours. An adopted child is not an unwanted child; to the contrary.

They are a child who was searched for, prayed for, cried for, begged

for; received by arms that ached, making hearts full. Love is meant to be shared." 

~ Author unknown

Our love for Ethiopia

Even though we can't visit Ethiopia as much as we would like, we still think and talk about Ethiopia on a daily basis and recognize how our time there was truly life changing in so many ways. Therefore we decided to start a new blog that discusses the current events and projects occurring in this amazing country! We feel that sometimes there is a disconnect between Africa and America, so we hope that through this blog people will learn more about Ethiopia's culture, current events and various organizations that are making a positive impact in this incredible country. If you are interested come follow along: Our Love for Ethiopia!

~Ahmesugenalew