Just wanted to wish everyone...

A very happy holidays! This evening we're heading to Norway for Christmas to show Sasha off to my dad's side of the family. It should be fun!

I'm bringing my camera and video camera, so I'll have a lot to show when we get back on the 30th!

Happy Holidays!!!!

Sasha

Before anyone calls Child Welfare, we honestly do not let Sasha drink soda on a normal basis. The way she reacted when she was granted a little sip from my mom's Fresca, though, was so funny that we had to let her do it again. The first time she tried it, she scrunced up her face and shook a little from the carbonation (she does do it a bit here), but in this video, she realizes that we're all laughing at her so she tries to be extra cute.

New Blog!

Check out my new blog! Here is where you can find all you need/want to know about my my Sweet Dreams Project, including statistics, upcoming events, and more!

http://www.sweetdreamsforahope.blogspot.com/ .

I also want to give a huge THANK YOU to Nikki for the incredible design!!!!

*Note: This blog will most definetely NOT take the place of this one! I'll be updating both faithfully :-)

Part 3!

Installment #2!

CHECK THIS OUT!!!!

Please meet Chris, a Korean adoptee commencing his journey to find his birth family. He posted on our agency's adoption forum, and my mom was really impressed and moved by the vblog he began to keep track of his progress. I, too, found the insight he revealed through his video eye-opening. I think the fact that he puts everything in such a postive light is uplifting. I often hear "horror" stories about adoptees resenting their adoption, and it's really refreshing to see someone who is not trying to find his roots out of spite or anger but curiosity. I talked to Chris through a private message and he was glad that I'm willing to answer any questions he has from the adoptive side, but I find that my window into his world is just as, if not more, valuable. I want to follow his journey not just for his sake (although I wish him the best of luck!) but also for Sasha's. As my mom said, this vblog is a lesson ALL adoptive families can learn from. I really want to understand how Sasha might feel about her adoption as she grows older, especially since there will probably be a time she'll be more inclined to turn to a sibling than a parent. Since I'm not adopted myself, Chris's journey will teach me a lot.

Without further ado, I introduce Chris. While his video journey is priceless to all adoptive partents/siblings as well as adoptees, I encourage everyone to watch and wish him luck on such a life-changing endeavor! I will contine to post Chris's vblogs as they are made.





For the record, I just want to add that the adoption situations that I'm personally connected to are nothing but positive. I have two friends who were adopted, one domestically and the other from the Phillipines. The one who was domestically adopted has had contact with her birth mother and talks to her quite frequently, and is pretty open about it and has nothing but good things to say both about her adoptive parents and birth family. My friend adopted from the Phillipines has not had contact, but her oldest brother was also adopted from that country (they're not biologically related.) The middle child of that family was biological to their parents. Her relationships with all her family members are very positive and, from what I can see, more or less the same. With both of my friends, I didn't know that they were adopted until almost a year after I met them.

All of this makes me feel, for lack of a better word, good about Sasha's future. I want her to feel connected to her home country yet completely comfortable in the one she was raised in, as well as with Norway, as the rest of us are. My whole family embraces many cultures- I want Sasha to be no different! (Speaking of cultures...we leave for Christmas in Norway on the 20th. She'll meet her paternal relatives for the first time and experience her third heritage. I smile at the fact that Sasha, born in Ethiopia, will soon be fluent in Norwegian and feel at home in a land used to snow and cooler climates. She'll certainly be an international girl!)

Ethiopia Trip Video

As I think I've mentioned before, I'm working on my Senior Interest Project to raise awareness on how others can help AHOPE. As part of my presentation, I created a short video of our trip to give people a (very small) taste of Ethiopia. Believe it or not, this took a lot of work, even though it doesn't look like much. I admit it's FAR from perfect since this was my first experience with a video camera, but I thought I'd give you a preview before I presented it. I do, however, pride myself in finding good music...I think it fits the video pretty well :-)

Enjoy!

(The video is posted at the very bottom of the page, since for some reason I couldn't post it directly onto the post. I had to resort to posting it in the template.)