Home...

A few pictures of our home coming and being at home:

Settling in as a family of three

I have had several people tell me they checked the blog everyday while we were away...so sorry I did not get a chance to post. It was hard to even get a chance to check or send a quick e-mail. There was one computer at the guest house, and six families staying there on the same schedule. So everyone had about the same free time to use it. I just decided to not make using the computer a priority, although I wish I'd had the chance to share some of our experiences. There are tons of stories to tell.

Since we have been home, we had a good day and then a few bad days. Our happy smiley baby, got mad and was crying all the time, not eating and not sleeping. A trip to the doctor revealed he probably has a virus...hand foot mouth disease. Pretty common illness for kiddos and hopefully it will pass quickly. We all had a much better night last night and Melke is seeming better this morning...even though it's only 8:30am, we've been up since 4am, and he's had some happy playtime this morning.

As Daniel is heating up lunch for him and I, yes, lunch at 8:35am and the baby is napping, I am going to try to get a few pictures posted here.

Meeting Melkamu...we had a sick baby when we got to Ethiopia. He had just been in the hospital with a pneumonia. He was not feeling well the first few days we got to meet with him in the care center. I was a bit sad they had to shave his head while he was hospitalized.





Daniel putting him in his bed, at the end of our visit.

The child care center in Addis with the hotel next door


About town and with our very awesome driver for an afternoon:

Amsterdam

I had the best chocolate tart is the organic food market when we got into Amsterdam on Saturday. It was most delicious. Saturday after getting into the city, we wandered all around. Yesterday (Sunday), we again walked all over town and went on a canal boat ride/tour and to Anne Frank House. Today we plan to rent bicycles and ride to the Van Gogh Museum and perhaps another art museum. I am tired...tired...tired. I am hoping I get over this jet lag. I always have it and struggle for a few days...or several days. Tomorrow we leave for Ethiopia and should get to Addis Tuesday night. Then we will have a few days to get acquainted with the city and people before we start working with Holt and meeting our little guy on Friday. I hope to be adjusted to the time zone then and feeling more like myself and less like a zombie.

Conversation...

...with the crazy neighbor:

"Well, where isssss this baby?"

"The capital of Ethiopia, Addis Ababa."

"Who HAADDD this baby?"

"You mean who birthed him....a woman in Ethiopia."

"How old is she?"

"Ummm....in her early thirties I guess."

"Well, I want to know why you didn't use the Boys and Girls Society like our neighbor the lawyer? They have a vvverrryy nice boy."

"You mean so and so (I'll leave out names)...because we wanted to adopt internationally."

Insert VERY skeptical look....


It dawned on me a few minutes later after she was gone...I think, she thinks we have some dark, scary secret and people would only adopt internationally if they couldn't adopt domestically.

Some people are very strange, but I am sure she thinks the same about me!!

Eight

Eight days...eight days until we leave on our journey to Ethiopia. According to the old plan we would be meeting our son tomorrow, as far as plan B goes we will be meeting M two weeks from tomorrow. We got some updated pictures yesterday and were just delighted as ever to see the most handsome, healthy, glowing boy and BIG too.

It's amazing that no matter how much time you have, when it gets down to the wire there are always a million little things to do still.

Used stroller, new car seat, borrowed Pack'n'Play



We'll see how it goes with a little boy in our bed...if not we have back up.
I am sure Daniel and M will sleep fine. Little M will probably even add to Daniel's chorus of snoring and active dreaming. I'll be the one sleeping in the crib.



Packing



Piles of little clothes



Still packing


Cupboard of little people things



Our book and toy collection
(Don't worry, i'll be sure to pick up the dangerous screws that are on the ground and the dangerous vitamins that are on the shelf.)

Checking off my list...

Car Seat - Check
Finally purchased today after much researching, looking, (and agonizing). It took Daniel 2.5 minutes to decide between the 3 options I was down to. I just couldn't decide!

Stroller - Check
Happened to check Craigslist today and found a stroller I could walk to, to check it out. I felt a little strange strolling home an empty stroller, but it seemed to work well. I hope it's as easy to push with 21.5 cute little pounds in it. We got updated measurements today and M is 20.4 pounds (I figure he'll gain another pound before we are home this time next month.)

Adding to the count down

We are adding to our count down to travel to Ethiopia. On Tuesday, we were down to nine days until departure to begin our journey to meet M. Today, on Thursday, we are at 21 days. We got an e-mail Tuesday night, stating that our travel group had to be postponed. We were quite shocked and disappointed. Wednesday we were just ready to be given another date to work towards, but it was a little iffy in the morning when we talked to the agency. It looks like, we are just going to be delayed two weeks and that we should just be leaving two weeks later....July 30th. I am not feeling totally confident that we will be traveling then, but that is where is stands now and we were able to change our tickets to the new dates.

So, despite plane tickets, hotel reservations, time arranged off work, house and pet sitters...we have had to reschedule all of that. Having two extra weeks isn't the end of the world, I just need to use them productively so I am more ready when the time does arrive. We can't complain too much, as the group leaving before us, got a call the night before they were scheduled to fly to Ethiopia and were told they wouldn't be able to go. That would be very, very, very upsetting.