Friends, sunshine and 14 months!

Alex, Kate and Levi at Sunshine Park

Alex turned 14 months last Saturday (April 22nd). We had a really fun day as it was the monthly Ethiopian Kids Community gathering. We were able to spend time with many of the families who we got to know through the adoption process. It is so great to see how everyone's kids are doing! Especially the children we met while we were in Ethiopia.

Today Alex and I had a picnic and played at a park with Kate and Levi (adoped the same time as Alex) and their mom, Amy. It was a perfect day for a picnic!

In the last month, Alex has:
- begun to move much more quickly. He runs as fast as his little legs will carry him!
- picked up a lot more signs and has begun to to add words to his "hi" such as daddy, mama, ball, cat, hat, hot, dog, knock, and bye. Alex also has a very expressive and drawn-out, "wooah" and "wow." He uses these frequently when he is excited about something. It usually makes people laugh when they hear it the first time!
- learned how to pick a brown m&m out of a handful of raisins. :-)

13 months...and counting

Alex turned 13 months on March 22nd. I'm not quite sure what happened to March. I just looked on our digital camera and we didn't take a single picture for the entire month! Oh, wait, I remember what happened with March... Mr. Toddler Alex began to explore every inch of the house and began to enjoy his new-found independence! During Alex's nap time I've been wiped out, so taking pictures, let alone posting blog entries, didn't really seem that crucial.

Alex's latest accomplishments:
- He is walking everywhere...and fast!
- He "gets" sign-language. He had been doing just a few signs but now that he understands what he is doing, he's been picking up lots of new signs. Tonight, during dessert, he did the "more" sign and then the "please" sign so he is even learning how to put signs together!
- He talks a lot. We can't understand most of it but he has a very clear "hi" which he says often; to us, to people in the store, in falsetto when he is talking on his phone (which is really just his fist up to his ear).
- He eats big people food now and especially likes vegetable soup, grapes, stawberries, pineapple and entrees with lots of flavor. I've been adding red pepper flakes to my cooking. If food doesn't have flavor he tends to spit it out.

We are very thankful that we made it through the winter with Alex not getting sick. He had a cough during late fall, but other than that he has been really healthy all winter!