Culture Camp and other summer fun

It has been a very busy summer so far, packed full of fun! We recently attended the East Coast Culture Camp and had a great time! What a pleasure to spend time with so many Ethiopian children and adoptive families (some old friends and lots of new friends). Some highlights of the camp were . . . sharing a dorm suite with 5 other toddlers + their families; listening to a panel of Ethiopian-American teens share their experiences on being adopted, growing up in the U.S., maintaining their culture, fitting in, and generally finding their way; shopping in the mini-Mercado; and the Ethiopian banquet complete with Ethiopian food and a live Ethiopian band. The environment was rich with thought provoking conversations and opportunities to share and learn from each others experiences. And the kids had a great time just playing together and having fun, barring the occasional melt down of course! Here are a few of the captured moments:


some soccer fun in the big field



The first annual "Road Race" in honor of the many recent Ethiopian runners winning medals and marathons



and the runners are off . . . now my girl LOVES to run so I was certain this would be a highlight of the camp for Little Miss, but as fate would have it something about the scene at the line up freaked my girl out and she insisted on being held. Okay. Had she simply wanted to be held it would have been odd, but ok. But no, she insisted on being held while running . . . that's right, I had to "run" the race (if you can call it that) while carrying Little Miss the whole time. Now it was a very short, little kid, race course, but that didn't stop us from coming in dead last. Seriously, 2 year olds were blowing past me! My sister managed to capture that on video (note video is conspicuously absent from this post). While it was certainly not what I had expected of the road race, it did give us something to laugh about!

Little Miss holding my, ahem . . . I mean her ribbon for running the race


just having some fun with sunglasses




getting decked out in her Ethiopian dress - ready for the banquet


Little Miss with Auntie enjoying the music at the banquet

Little Miss with her buddy and dance partner - how cute are they!

make it a trio - and it only gets cuter!

Little Miss had a blast dancing to the Ethiopian music. She loves to dance to begin with, but I have never quite seen her like she was this night. In the background of the picture above, you can sort of see the circle of Ethiopian teens and adults dancing together. When Little Miss understood what that circle was all about, she muscled her way passed the outer ring, and the next layer, until she made it into the center, and then began dancing like crazy. Once she made her way in I could barely see her anymore, but what I did see in quick glimpses was a very happy dancing queen. As we watched in amazement, I turned to my sister and said, "She's with her people!". What a hoot!


The campus grounds were lovely and we were very fortunate to have a fellow adoptive mom and friend, who happens to be a professional photography, take our picture!



The other summer fun . . .

Little Miss had her first experience at a big amusement park and she loved it!!











And when time has allowed (and because it has been so hot), we've been doing a lot of this . . .












And there is still more summer fun to come! We are blessed!