It comes with great relief and happiness that I can say we safely made it through our first major holiday with Noah. Not that is wasn’t without questioning glances and extensive Amharic commentary from him, but for the most part he rolled with it. Along the way he helped forge some unforgettable moments.
On the subject of Turkey:
This past month of school the subject of turkey was figuratively on the front burner. It took Noah a little time to realize that a turkey wasn’t a chicken and it wasn’t a duck and so for the first week or so he would call a turkey a ‘chuck’...the combination of chicken and a duck. Once he got the terminology figured we were ready to move on to introducing the concept of Pilgrims and their roll in the life (or death as it is) of a turkey. He found it fascinating that the men pilgrims would go out with their guns and shoot the wild turkey and the women would pluck and cook the bird. So... for several days leading up to Thanksgiving Noah would proudly state that Jeff was going to go turkey hunting. As he tells the story he takes his hand to his neck and mimics a knife cutting off the head of the turkey. Jeff would always stand behind Noah sheepishly smiling as I agreed that would be a very very cool thing for dad to do. So Thanksgiving morning arrived...and Noah’s face showed the excitement that should only be reserved for a child on Christmas morning. Today....his dad is going to cut the head off of a turkey. Instead of setting Noah straight by showing him a wrapped turkey in the fridge Jeff proudly displayed the turkey going into the oven plucked AND headless. Noah’s face dropped...tears filled his eyes...he thought HE was going to be able to be the one to cut the head off the turkey. So the family lost a little in translation of his Ethiopian excitement leading up to Thanksgiving day...none the less Noah still thinks his dad is so COOL for being a turkey hunter.
Praying at church:
We were at church Sunday and Noah knelt down to pray. With Noah everything is loud...and it’s not like our family doesn’t stand out in a crowd anyway. So Noah knelt in the middle of St. John’s church, eyes closed tight, hands clasped in prayer, palms together and he started his prayer on the high end of the volume scale, " I pledge allegiance to the flag, of the United States of America...." Hannah was mortified...because once again I say...Noah is loud so everyone around us heard. She was begging me to make him stop...I just couldn't. He was soooo sincere.
The Concept of Christmas:
The wonderful thing with Noah is he does have a comprehension of the true meaning of Christmas...that it is about the birth of Jesus. He was raised Orthodox Christian by his family. The questions about a tree in the house...and who is this Santa Claus and what does he have to do with Jesus, well that’s another story. On Sunday...Hannah, Noah, and Sam were putting up the nativity scene. We don't put out the baby until Christmas day because...well...that's when he was born. For the month of December Mary, Joseph and the various animals are just hanging around waiting for the signal from above to plop the baby in the hay. So there sits an empty manger...much to Noah’s displeasure. Sam slyly takes one of the sheep while Noah isn't looking, turns it upside down and lays it in the manger....legs pointing straight up to the angel on the top of the stable. Now Mary and Joseph are kneeling in prayer to a sheep that looks like rigor mortis has set in as IT lies away in the manger. Noah in the mean time had gone out to find Jeff to bring him back to show him the 'beautiful' baby sleeping, thinking I was going to bend on his argument that the baby must be put in the manger right now. Noah is not short on dramatics. So...when he came back in with Jeff and saw not Jesus but a sheep in the manger his eyes doubled in size and his voice rose and these are his exact words, "goodness gracious me...no no no baby in bed!!... Sheet (sheep)...no no no!!" Long story short...Noah knows the story of Christmas and that is making this season much easier to move forward with. Now the Santa thing...still not sure how I am going to approach that.
Pop Culture:
Right now Noah’s favorite past time is watching the classic cartoon Jonny Quest. He engages so much into it that he has renamed our dog, Duncan, Jonny’s dog’s name, Bandit. Last night he has asked if we could start calling him Haji, (Jonny’s faithful sidekick who is usually seen wearing a turban.) He’s starting to quote lines from the cartoon...and for the most part they are surprisingly in context to what we are doing at the time. We took him to his first movie last week, to see Madagascar 2 and since then every chance he gets he likes to break into song and dance from the movie... “I like to moj it, moj it...I like to moj it moj it...I like to MOJ IT.”
He keeps us giggling daily...his innocence and vitality are so refreshing.
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