Happy Birthday to Khari!!!!

It snuck up on us, like all things seem to do these days with 4 children. Our little baby has officially moved from infant to toddler. I can't lie, I was not very happy receiving all of the "junk mail" from all of the formula companies proclaiming that the infant year was gone! So funny, because I remember when we were waiting to meet her, thinking about how eager I was to see her grow and to think about watching her learn new things and how it would go. But now I have realized that was dumb! It doesn't matter how long it takes her to roll, crawl, walk, because that means she is getting older. Yuck! It is always bitter sweet to me to watch one of my children become one year older, but now, I have two girls who mark their journey around the sun just three days apart. Khari celebrates her birthday on the 13th and Emma celebrates on the 16th. Talk about a crazy week!  We initially were told Khari was born in March, but when in Ethiopia for our visa appointment, we found out that she was actually a February baby. When we told Emma, she was sooooo excited. She said,"Oh, we can have birthday parties together!"  Needless to say, I insisted that we celebrate independently for the first year. First birthday parties are milestone birthdays in my brain. What a milestone we have to celebrate with Khari. Wow, I can't imagine how big of a first year she has had. My brain tries to wrap around that idea, and it just won't work!  Any how, we celebrated big time! While in Ethiopia I bought 18 gifts to give Khari on each of her birthdays while she is a "child".  For her first birthday I picked a small zebra. In my brain I was thinking, she should be able to hold this on her birthday. HA!!!! Not only did she hold that zebra! She chewed it, banged it, pushed it crawling across the floor, and threw it. We no longer have the small delicate bundle we brought home 6 short months ago! Needless to say the zebra is now living on top of her dresser in her room!!!  She has exceeded any expectations I could have ever placed on her.

Our group at the restaurant! 

       Now, where I was going with this zebra, I rather quickly spawned a plan for a zebra celebration. First, her outfit, then the cake. Oh what fun! She enjoyed herself! Not only did we have tons of family on hand to celebrate, but our wonderful travel companions to ET came to help us celebrate the big day! What  a blessing! So Saturday night we went to this great new Ethiopian restaurant in Knoxville and ran into our other buddy from Ethiopia! Then Sunday we ate cake and opened LOTS of presents!!!

So, can't wait to see what comes next in this chaotic thing we call life! Praises to God as the blessings are continuously flowing in our direction!
We felt so blessed to have the Freking family join us on Khari's birthday seeing as the two girls were together long before either one of our families could get there! I hope and pray that they will be able to keep that bond as they grow!

The girls enjoying all of Khari's loot! 

Not so sure about putting my hands in this cake!