Normalcy

Well....we have been home with our sweet Jhonatan for 3 months now and the word I would choose to best describe our new family is normal. It probably seems like an odd choice when bringing an 11-year-old boy who spoke very little English from Colombia into our family but it's true. It feels normal. Jhonatan has made a fantastic transition into our family. Sometimes I forget that he has only been here a few months. His English is improving at an unbelievable rate and he is perfectly comfortable having conversations with anyone he meets in English. Our girls have also been wonderful through this transition period, with only a few "annoying brother moments" ;). Jhonatan made new friends right away and even went to soccer tryouts after he had only been here for 3 days! Here are a couple of pictures of him from his first game...



Everyone has now been in school for 2 weeks. Ginny and Cassie are loving being 7th graders in their second year of middle school! Eva started first grade and is excited to do more reading and writing. Tess and Jhonatan are both in fifth grade. Tess, as always, loves school and is excited to be in her last year of Elementary school. Jhonatan has had a wonderful start to his first year in US schools. All of his teachers are shocked by how quickly he is progressing with his English. He is writing in English and even volunteered to be the first in his class to read his writing project! I love walking my 3 elementary schoolers to school and especially love watching Tess and Jhonatan wait for each other outside their classroom doors at the end of the day (they are in portables and their door are directly across from one another).



To some, I'm sure our rather large and noisy, multicultural, transracial, adoptive family seems a tad bit unusual but for us life feels normal and thank goodness for that!