What a weekend!

Wow, we had a GREAT weekend ... my recap probably won't do it justice...

Friday night we went with a couple from our Bible Study to an Ethiopian restaurant in Nashville. We were all up for it but didn't know what to expect. The men ordered the combination platters while the women ordered awaze tibs (beef) and yebeg tibs (lamb). The food came out and she explained all what the guys had and I still am not sure all what I ate since there were like 7 things. But, things I do know...

• I like Ethiopian spices
• The lamb and beef and chicken were all good ... especially the lamb
• I could not eat the hard-boiled egg in the Dora we't ... something about the egg covered in stew ... just couldn't do it plus had tons of other stuff I liked
• Injera ... good ol' injera. None of us could really get into it ... it was like a cold spongey flatbread/tortilla.
• Price was great for the amount of food you got
• Leftovers a couple days later are still real good.

All in all, it was a good experience and I know we'll go back. Thanks Amy and Kent for dinner ... it was very appreciated!

Saturday, I had the joy of spending the 70+ degree beautiful day inside doing taxes ... still not done yet :( We went to church Saturday night ... we are in the midst of the New Years series and they always have some unpredictable things going on during the series ... see for yourself...

CAMELS! Our friend's daughter wanted to get up close and personal with the camels. They also had llamas and some ostrich-like birds that enjoyed pecking at people!

She wanted me to feed the camel...

We then went to Snappy Tomato for supper. We heard that the owners were Ethiopian and we wanted to meet them. So we placed our order with this lady, got our food and sat down. That lady came out to clean a table and I asked her if the owners were Ethiopian. She said yes, and that she was one of the owners along with another Ethiopian couple. This was a total God night as they had pictures from their last trip to Ethiopia ... their daughter just happened to still have them. In talking with them, they informed us they have a non-profit that is helping southern Ethiopian families because not a whole lot of help goes there (rural, etc). Their ministry is Gospel For All. Sam and Vivian are the nicest people and I think they themselves support 17 children in Ethiopia. It is an unreal opportunity to meet them, get to know about their ministry, etc. What's even crazier is that Amber's coworker's in-laws go to their church and went to Ethiopia last year on the mission trip. Unreal the connections God makes for us! So, if you're around Murfreesboro, go over and visit Snappy Tomato!

On Sunday, we went with friends and their kids to hike at Fiery Gizzard. It was another amazing day outside and it was perfect. We hiked down to the waterfall, up to the ridge, ate lunch, and hiked back. It was just a great day ... thanks Kris and Beth for inviting us out!

We are blessed to have some great friends in our life. We forgot to take pics most of the weekend ... I know, bad blogger ... we have a few from hiking ... although Kris has most of them on his camera...

View of the waterfall at the start of our hike.

The waterfall after hiking to the bottom of it.


Our friends we went hiking with and their kiddos. Those guys impress me so much ... taking 3 kids under 4 hiking ... and their oldest boy was a champ ... he hiked the whole thing with us and loved it.

Kris with his 2 oldest hanging out in the hammock where we made camp to eat lunch.

On the adoption front ... we went today to the Vanderbilt International Adoption Clinic to get an understanding of the clinic, meet some people, etc. Everyone was very nice and we feel real comfortable with the clinic. The physical clinic is only open on Mondays ... so it's probable we'll do a conference call with the doctor but it was good to meet people in person and understand their processes...

Hopefully Kristi and Will along with us get our calls soon. They live probably 45 minutes from us and it's amazing to think our babies could be buddies over at Hannah's Hope and travel 7000 miles and be that close to one another...