but since Ayana and Moses have come home, we've gotten a little collection. It's not much, but we have a few cute things, and its enought for them to have fun playing dress up with. Of course, they aren't the only ones! Me and Megan used to love dressing up too, and there are countless pictures of us dressed up (mostly as Jo and Amy from Little Women, or 
Laura and Mary from Little House on the Prairie- the only things we had were old skirts, an apron, and a couple shawls, so the options were a bit limited!) And Joshua still does love dressing up. His newest costume is this wonderful Jack Sparrow costume he's showing off here. 
He had just bought the compass, head band, sword, eye stickers, and rings, and I had helped him with his makeup (that was fun! :P) and the rest of it. He was really excited about it, but when he came downstairs, Ayana shouted at him, "Ayana no like it! Naughty Joshua!" He couldn't stay downstairs for long, because she actually started to get quite scared, but he couldn't resist posing a bit, and chasing people around with his sword! But for the most part, Ayana and Moses really enjoy their costume times, and as you can see, they look adorable as kittens and cows!
to play with our bunnies. In reality they're more middle aged rabbits or even seniors than bunnies, but we always call them "the bunnies", so they'll be babies in our minds forever! This wasn't the first time that Ayana and Moses have seen them, but we haven't gone out there to play with them for a while, during the winter. Ayana is still afraid of them, and Moses still adores them. Mine, called Calico is probably the gentlest of all of them (we have three, mine, Megan's, and Josh's) 
so she's the one we get out for visitors, or younger kids to play with. Little Brown, Megan's, used to be quite fierce, and would bite if you picked her up, but she's calmed down a lot, and is actually getting to be quite sweet. So Calico, and Little Brown were the ones out on the lawn, getting pampered (and pulled- Moses still likes to grab their ears and whiskers and try to pick them up). Ayana, however backs up, and runs away when they get near. What was funny was that she half screamed, ran away from them, up the stair, and into the house, grabbed onto my mom, and said to her, "Ayana see bunnies. 
Ayana like bunnies. Funny bunnies!" I'm not quite sure where that came from! But by the end, we got her to sit beside Calico, and pet her gently. She was so proud of herself, that she didn't want to go inside to dinner, and just wanted to keep on petting Calico. And Moses stood up in his high chair, turned around, and pointed out the window, saying, "Buh, buh".. we're assuming he meant bunny. :) So all in all, it was a fun time, and we almost cured Ayana of her fear of rabbits. Maybe we'll work on our friend's terrifying tiny baby puppy next. :D
Balanced on top of his tricicle, tying to ride it under the table, he had somehow managed to grab Ayana's hat out of the closet, and balance that on his head. He was very proud of himself for this daring feat. I think it was on Easter Sunday, so the colour of the hat matched perfectly with those nice painted eggs on the counter!
because yesterday he came up to me holding the hood of his jacket- not the jacket, just the hood- and patting his head. I asked if he wanted it on, and he looked at me very seriously, patted his head again, and said "Ow" (yes in Amharic). So I strapped it on him, and he trotted off grinning, to show everyone else his beautiful "ha" (hat). What made it hilarious was that his entire outfit was a diaper, and a bright blue hood.
Ayana also had a very cool "decoration" on her head. Her hair had been in little twists for a few days, and they were starting to get a little fuzzy, with hair falling out. So, when they were getting ready for their bath, my mom quickly took them out. The result was adorably funny! My mom showed Ayana in the mirror, and she grinned and laughed, and said to her, "Wow! Ayana funny!"
(in other words, we forgot!) So on Easter Monday, my dad took our basket of beautifully coloured eggs, and hid them around the living and dining room, with about 50% of them in plain sight, for Ayana and Moses to find. Ayana was a bit confused at first, but Moses got it straight away, and began picking up those eggs, and putting them back in the basket. 
With each egg he found, his grin grew wider, and in the end, he was shrieking with delight at each new discovery. Ayana finally got it, and loved it too, although in her excitement, she would find two eggs, take one in each hand, and bang them together, shouting, "Ayana found it! Ayana found it!" We quickly discouraged her from doing that too much, as about 2 out of every 5 eggs are now beautifully decorated with cracks and chips. :)
(hard) which is his way of getting people's attention, and doing the sign (baby sign language.. he only knows one word!) for "more". So then we would have to show him an egg, put it down, and let him go and find it again! He never grew tired of it, and was a bit grumpy when we told him that it was "all done". Here are a couple of pictures of Ayana and Moses having fun finding those eggs!
Looking at those referal pictures, and then watching her at church this morning, dancing with her new friends, or "helping" us on our treasure hunt, or eating a little hollow chocolate rabbit.. there's such a difference! And Moses was, and still is, just a baby, but you can still definitely see a difference from those first pictures.
Then this afternoon, after delicious french toast with strawberries, we all went upstairs to wait in my bedroom while my dad prepared some incredibly hard clues for our treasure hunt. Ayana and Moses got to help us, and loved the little jelly beans along the way with each new clue we found. When we finally reached the end, we each got some treats, and a new cd (Ayana and Moses got a few jelly beans, a card, and a little chocolate bunny). I got a Switchfoot cd, and I'm going to listen to it, as soon as I post this! :)
Moses and Ayana had to have a few TB tests and x-rays, to make sure that they did not have active TB. They had a skin test, and if they reacted to it, they had to have some x-rays. Whether it was active or not, they had to take meds, as children under 5 are more at risk that adults, once they have reacted to the skin test. Well, they did end up reacting to it, so my mom took them to a TB clinic to get the x-rays. We didn't expect them to have active TB, and were not surprized when the doctor said that they had latent TB, which means that they just have to take some meds, and will be fine. We also didn't expect the doctor to freak out about Moses' x-ray. We had a huge scare when the TB doctor told my mom that Moses' heart was "So abnormal" and he had "never seen anything like it before." I was so scared when my mom came home and told us that. I looked at Moses, dancing and running around, and didn't really believe that anything could be wrong with him, but when a doctor says something like that.. you usually listen! Thankfully, he went to a cardaeologist at Children's Hospital, who ran a bunch of tests, and told us he is completely fine. There had been some confusion because of a certain gland by the heart which is larger in children than in adults. But we were quite scared for a while. 
It was my mom's birthday, and she didn't really get to spend it all that nicely, as her and my dad were rushing around to Children's to get all the tests done. But there was a nice ending. So I'd just like to say again, thank-you to anyone who is reading this that was praying for Moses. It really helped! He's 100% fine.. which is quite easy to tell just by watching him for a few minutes... or for that matter, babysitting him for several hours. That can be interesting. :)
