Tidbits

We switched sleeping arrangements again last night.  Letting Ella sleep with Greg in the big bed and I slept in twin, letting Mekdes have her own space in the toddler bed.  But Mekdes didn't want to sleep in the bed by herself and crawled in with me.  I'd been wondering if we were overwhelming her with affection so it was great to see her initiating being close to me.  Bed time has been especially fun, and a little wild.  Ella and Mekdes get very silly, tickling each other and laughing as they pretend to be asleep or hide under the covers together. More and more of Mekdes's english comes out as she gets comfortable with us, last night she kept saying in english "please sleep, please sleep" and laughing. This was teasing me for the first night when she was sleeping next to me and kept playing with every pen or i -pod on the night stand.  I'd kept saying in Amharic "Mekdes, you need to sleep, please" 
after the girls finally settled down last night and all was quiet Mekdes's little voice said "ewedeshalu Ella" and Ella said "ewedeshalu Mekdes" back, starting an Ethiopian- Waldens like goodnights around the room.
 
Ella is so excited about having a little sister that she'll follow Mekdes around and get overly excited whenever Mekdes learns a new english word or washes her hands on her own after using the bathroom.  It can be a bit hard to watch Ella call
Mekdes a few times and be ignored or want Mekdes to play and Mekdes just wanders off, we're trying to explain Ella that Mekdes isn't used to all this attention or being a family (and she really is doing exceptionally well)
So yesterday afternoon it worked well that Greg and Ella went to visit our sponsor child at her home while Mekdes and I went to the Bethany offices  to get her passport, by time we got back to the guesthouse Mekdes was running inside calling for
Ella and "da-deee" (love how she says that!) and in the evening Ella played ball outside with another family as Mekdes spent a long time playing with my hair and talking/singing with Birtukan. 
 
Birtukan and Nesibu's beautiful children are now singing for us so I'm going to go enjoy the fun.
Give Bini extra hugs from me, miss him so much!  The nannies in Awassa totally remebered him, when I pointed to his picture on the wall they said "oh, Biniyam Ajullo" and when I showed them pictures of him now they got "his nanny" and she kissed the photo album and they all seemed very joyfull to see him so big. 
 
I also got scratched by a monkey in Awassa, Greg had me a bit  scared about Rabies for a bit, but I'm pretty sure I'll be fine.