Jost's California Family Birthday Party

Baby J's 2nd Birthday

I can't believe it, Jost turned 2 this past Wednesday. I took the day off from work and we visited his new preschool (he'll start early next year) and had lunch with our dear friends Christie and Kim. Then, we went to Dreyers Ice Cream for their free birthday scoop. Enjoy the pics from our adventure. We're having a California family party tomorrow and Seattle party next week, I'll post from both!!

Hola!

We just got back from 5 days in Mexico. It was great! All we did was hang in the pool, lay out, eat good food, and bond as a family. Jost learned a new word while we were there "bar" (there was a swim-up bar at our place and Jost liked to order coconut slushies). Not sure if I should laugh about Jost requesting to go to a bar or if I should be embarrassed. :) Here's a couple pics from the trip!

Jost's First Halloween!

We were in Seattle for Jost's first Halloween (my sis is having a baby like NOW and she had a shower). The weather was perfect - crisp, partly sunny and not too cold. Jost was a train conductor and surprised all of us with his willingness to wear the hat part of his costume!

Baby Got Back

Jost dancing with the help of a LOT of sugar (we had cake for dessert)!

Sugar Overload

It was my birthday last week and Nick got me some great sweets from one of the best French bakeries in the bay, La Farine. We decided to let Jost have at it. Here is the photographic evidence. BEWARE - it's not pretty, but it's pretty funny!

YIKES! No posts in a month!

Here are some pictures from the last month. Baby J is getting HUGE. His new favorite words are - "Nooo", "PISSA" (translation: pizza), "Yes", "Gee" (for Boobers Magee our beagle), and "whastis?" (translation: what's this). I also had to add a picture of Jost's friend, Sefan. She is the cutest princess ever!

No Nap

This is the hilarity that was Jost at dinner tonight after having no nap (because we were celebrating Enkutatash in San Jose - Ethiopian New Year). It's pretty funny. And I am egging him on the whole time!

Boom Boom Pow

Jost and I were hanging out the other morning listening to some tunes. I played a variety of selections to see if I could entice him to break out his dance moves. He actually did dance to a Salt N Pepa song, but I was an idiot and didn't tape it because I can be technologically challenged. At any rate, he did a couple cute bootie bumps to "Boom Boom Pow" from the Black Eyed Peas. It's short, but sweet. Enjoy!

It's August and FINALLY feeling like summer

It's been a pretty cold summer in the Bay Area thus far. Unlike the sweltering temps in Seattle, we've been chilling (literally) in the 70ish zone. My tan from our trip to the midwest is a distant memory and we actually contemplated turning the heat on in our house last week.

On a brighter note, Jost started swim lessons this past week at Mills College. The first day we got there half the kids were in full body wetsuits. Nick and I thought this was kind of odd - I mean it's an outdoor pool and it was kind of brisk at 5:30pm, but wetsuits? Really? Then, we got in the pool and immediately wished that we had the foresight to also have a wetsuit for Jost and for us. I thought about trying to take one from one of the weaker looking kids, but that seemed wrong and unkind. So, we powered through the lesson. Jost is definitely into the pool. He thinks it's cool to be passed back and forth between Nick and I. He also thinks it's funny to watch all the parents making weird faces and noises at their kids in a vain attempt to get their kid to blow bubbles. Jost, on the other hand, is above blowing bubbles. He would rather practice his back stroke or butterfly. Well, not really. Mostly he just wants to play with toys in the water and cling to my neck when I attempt to submerge his head. Overall, he's doing a really great job. What Nick and I don't understand is why we are paying $85 for lessons when we get about 10 seconds of instructor time per lesson and basically screw around in the water and sing songs? At any rate, it's fun to get in the water everyday and it's finally warming up here so I will no longer have to contemplate stealing from children when we resume our class on Monday.

I don't have a waterproof camera so we don't have any pictures of Jost in the pool, but I am posting a picture of him at dinner with me and Auntie Kim from last Thursday. I think his smile is so large because I am holding a bowl of ice cream while taking that shot. It would be like my smile if someone were dangling a pair of Manolos in front of my face.

At any rate we are going to enjoy swimming lessons, eating dinner outside and having fun as a family. :)

Brand new Jost dancing video!!

Jost loves "Mercy" by Duffy. Check out his slick moves!

Picture of Midwest Vacay - Minneapolis style

Pictures from Midwest Vacay - Michigan style

Midwest Vacay!!

I just realized I am super lame and haven't written anything for like 1 month. Part of the reason is that we just returned from a 10-day trip to my grandparent's cottage in Michigan and to visit our dear friends in Ethiopia.

My grandparent's cottage is really fun and very authentic - there is a large moose head with about 15 points on the antlers hanging over the fireplace. There is also only 1 bathroom for 6-8 people, so you can imagine the number of matches that are strategically used on a daily basis. Anyways, we flew in to Detroit and drove the 4ish hours up to Onekama (small town on Portage Lake - which flows into Lake Michigan). Jost, as usual, was a super traveler. We were able to spend 5 days with my parents, my grandparents (my mom's mom and dad), as well as my aunt and her family, and 1 night with my uncle and his family back in Detroit. It was fun for Jost to get to know his great-grandparents and aunts and uncles and cousins. He loved playing with everyone (especially his cousin Grant who allowed him to use ALL of his cool toy trucks. I thought Jost was going to pass out he was so excited). It was also an opportunity for him to eat whatever he wanted (blueberry pancakes, hot dogs, ice cream) because 1) this is the midwest and there ain't a lot of fresh greens and 2) how am I supposed to tell my mom or grandma not to spoil my kid? I figure since Jost had to hang in an orphanage for over 1 YEAR, then he deserves some extra processed food and sugar.

We flew from Detroit to Minneapolis to visit our Ethiopian travel buddies - Melissa and Amy and Melissa's daughter Sefan (also known as Jost's future wife) and Melissa's husband Ryan as well as their 2 sons, Aidan and Elijah. I wasn't sure what to expect in Minneapolis since the sum total of my knowledge about Minnesota consisted of watching the show "Coach" and the Mall of America. We stayed in downtown Minneapolis and it was really cool - tons of art galleries, a LOT of places to go out at night. Melissa, Amy and I went to the Beyonce concert on Thursday night which was a total blast. Then, we went to the Mall of America on Friday (definitely worth the trip). A bonus about shopping in Minnesota is that there's no sales tax on clothes. That meant I could spend even more money because I was actually saving money by not paying tax (this logic did not go over well with Nick). On Friday night we went on a charity pub crawl downtown to raise money for a local children's hospital. We also got to meet my internet adoption friend Sarah, whose daughter I visited in the hospital in Addis. Sarah and her husband Terry came for the crawl and we all had a good time.

Saturday consisted of a trip to the Como Zoo and an awesome BBQ at Melissa and Ryan's house - we even toasted smores over an open fire in their backyard. Jost was so pumped about eating marshmellows. Nick, of course, was mortified by Jost's sugar intake that night, but I didn't care. Jost LOVED to play with Aidan, Elijah and Sefan as well as Sarah's older daughter Nerys (Baby Soly is too little to play, but she is adorable and loves to watch the kids).

All in all we had a wonderful trip. The only bummer was that we flew Northwest Airlines - bad choice. Nick could barely move the entire flight because the seats were so crammed together. Additionally they charge you to check ANY bag on every flight. I added up all the baggage fees and we paid an additional $225 by the time we got home. What a crock of poo (Jost is repeating everything these days so I am trying to tone down my "colorful language").

I will put pictures of the trip up on the next post!

Away we go...

Since Jost hasn't had a chance to visit my hometown of Seattle, we decided to fly up for a long weekend to kick it with Papa J (my dad), Nonny (my mom), my sis, my bro-in-law, and the "little bun" (my sis is pregnant, due in November). Jost is a pretty seasoned traveler, so our short flight from Oakland to Seattle was a breeze for him. I am sure part of this is because we ALWAYS buy him his own seat. We would feel bad for anyone who had to sit next to us with Jost on our lap writhing around like a snake on crack. Undoubtedly anyone with the misfortune to sit in our row would have snack shrapnel, excess milk and/or drool on them by the time the plane landed. So, we feel that it is imperative to all of the people on the plane who may potentially sit next to us to just sack up and buy the ticket to maintain order and peace on any plane we fly.

Seattle is not exactly known for its great weather. Last year we went up there around the same time as this trip and thought we were in a time warp when we got off the plane. We had left the Bay Area where it was sunny and 80 degrees, then got to Seattle where it was sleeting (this may be a slight exaggeration) and 50. This trip, however, the weather has been much more cooperative. I forget how breath-taking the Pacific Northwest is when it's nice out. This is why when people visit during good weather they feel compelled to move here - it's like they are drunk off of the beauty of everything. Then, fast forward to November, December, January, February, March and most of April and you can see why Seattle has such a high suicide rate. 

Anyways, we are having fun up here. Jost is probably having the most fun because he has no less than 4 adults watching his every move at all times. Jost burps and he gets attention "Oh my, someone has the hiccups". Jost farts and he gets attention "Ooops, someone is smelly. That is so funny" (insert grandparents laughing and picking Jost up and kissing him). I fart and my mom looks at me like I have lost my mind and says, "That is really inappropriate, Sarah". Jost better get in ALL of his best farts, hiccups, poop, and barf because in a couple more years no one is going to be clapping when he takes a massive dump on the floor - "Great job Jost, look at your pretty poop!! Whose the best baby in the whole world? Who is so smart?" (how smart do you really have to be to take a crap on the floor anyways?). I am thrilled my family loves my kid so much and he seems pretty thrilled with the attention. But, no one is so thrilled that they offer to change a diaper. I guess that's the best part of being a grandparent - all sunshine and happiness and no shit allowed. :)

Family Photos

A week ago we had family photos taken by the fabulous Jen Molander (if you live in the Bay Area I definitely recommend working with her). Below are some of our favorite proofs. Which one should we use as our 11x14 photo that we will get professionally framed??

Yogurt...

...all over Jost's arms, hair, eyes, cheeks, lips, teeth, eyelashes, hands, fingers, pajamas, and our dogs.

A glimpse into Jost's past life

Yesterday my dear friend Trisha emailed me a couple pictures that were taken of her daughter, Meron, when she was at the Kunkeet Orphanage in Addis Ababa. She thought the baby to the left of her daughter was Jost and she was right. I was so thrilled to get these pictures since we only have 3 pictures of Jost from before we adopted him. At the same time I was/am so sad. I feel like we missed out on his chubby, cute baby phase. I wish I could have held him and loved him and made him happy. This is compounded by the fact that the old orphanage he was at, Kunkeet, is being closed because of unethical practices and because a baby died there due to their negligence (this happened while we were in Addis, in fact). We have a fundraising video from our agency and I didn't realize it, but Jost is all over the video. I thought he was initially only in a 3 second clip, but he is featured many times (for those of you who have seen the video, he's the adorable baby in the white outfit). I am pleased to have more of Jost's past to be able to share with him. In fact I showed him these pictures and he pointed to himself in the picture and then pointed to his chest, as if he was saying, "That's me, Mama!". He also pointed to Meron which makes me think maybe they were pals. It's all adorable and endearing and heartbreaking.

I wonder if Jost will be on "America's Best Dance Crew" or something...check it out!

a little dancing on sunday night after dinner

I did not prompt him to do this. Seriously!

Back from the land of Aloha and Don Ho

We got back from Hawaii on Sunday night. Since this was our first trip with Jost there was definitely a lot of trial and error involved. I will elaborate on the errors so other people don't make the same mistakes we did with their children. Here goes:

1. Do not book a flight that involves waking your child up at 5:45am. This makes your child grumpy, which makes his parents grumpy, which makes the day LOOOONG and exhausting.

2. Do not forget to bring your diaper bag. Leaving it on the dining room table will do you no good when you are no longer in the continental US.

3. Buy milk at the grocery store when you are staying in a house with a lot of adults. Beer, wine and vodka are not appropriate beverages to serve a baby.

4. Make sure the crib your baby sleeps in does not face a full length mirror. This may cause your baby to laugh, scream and stare at themselves for 45 minutes when they should be taking a nap.

5. Do not ignore a big poop when you are driving from one side of Oahu to the other. If you wait to change the poop once you reach your destination your baby will have shit all over his legs, on his clean and expensive Pumas, on his mom and dad, and on the rented car seat. NOTE: salt water does not remove the smell of poop, so don't think dipping in it will help you.

6. Not all babies like the ocean or sand. If your baby does not like either, going on a beach vacation may not be the best choice. Go somewhere like the Grand Canyon or Missouri.

In all seriousness, Jost had a really fun time. He mostly hung out with his dad because I was doing wedding/bridesmaid stuff a lot. The picture in this post was taken by the lovely bride, Kiera, at Kailua beach only 200 yards from where Nick and I got married in 2003!

A Couple Cute Pics from Hawaii