The countdown

Thanks for checking in!  This part of the journey is more difficult than we thought.  This is physically painful.  They say…”This waiting time for your embassy appointment is the hardest part”.  Boy, are they right.  So Momma always said if you don’t have anything good to say about (insert what-(US Embassy)-ever here), then keep your trap shut”.  We cannot gripe too much.  Our case isn’t even to the embassy yet.  Things ARE moving along as you’ll find out below…it is just hard without our little guy here.  Alrighty then, moving on…

We passed court December 6.  Week one passed during the blur of returning home from Africa.  We ran on an adrenalin high over there, but that first week back home, didn’t exactly provide the same type of rush.  Week two passed on December 20.  One more week down…??? to go.  We received the Official Court Adoption Decree after week two.  This is one of the major milestones to be covered along the way of setting up our Embassy appointment.  After week three, we received his new birth certificate where yours truly are named as his parents!  Yes sir, we have some progress.  Next up?  Clear the medical visit and receive his passport, and then his case will be submitted to the US Embassy for their review.  Hopefully his case will be cleared and we can submit our embassy appointment options and finalize the embassy trip.

More about the waiting… during the summer was so easy.  The homestudy, mountains of notarized documents, the I600A?, Biometric fingerprints?... all a piece of cake.  I-171H?  Ditto.  Even the referral and waiting for a court date…no problem-o.  There was no little boy standing in front of our mind’s-eye looking at us with those eyes.  We wake up on the morning and start thinking that it is 2:00 or 3:00 in the afternoon.  Is Wondi okay?  Is he out in the court yard enjoying the beautiful African sun?  Is he watching some airplanes?  Is he hurting, sad or happy?  We ache to hold him and tell him he is in his forever family’s home.  We are doing some rearranging in our bedrooms and closets to get ready.  We imagine him walking around the corner and flashing that electric smile at us.  We pray for his safety and health everyday.  Fortunately for us, we receive pictures from other travelling families and can see new photos of him at the Care Center.  They help to a degree, but ZOWEE – he got a haircut!  Is it the no hair thing that has to grow on us or should the hair just grow?  Remember that electric smile.  More to come later folks!

The last day & travel home

Our last day in Ethiopia was (again) a beautiful sunny day.  It was tough to play along knowing full well that we were not going to be back to visit the Care Center in the morning... =(    Wondi came out in a deep blue zip up jacket with two pockets which perfectly held two rubber balls each.  He was quite talkative today.  Today's activity primarily centered around the yellowish slide - had to try to teach him how to slide down that thing.  The first few runs were pretty conservative.  He soon started to pat his belly which meant I needed to hold his tummy as he travelled down.  Each trip down the slide was a bit more daring than the last.  At the bottom, he would let out an, "Ahhhhh" like after a refreshing drink of ...something refreshing.  He was yapping all the way back to the bottom of the ladder.  I had NO idea what he was telling me, but he sure was talkative.  By reading his hand gestures, we got along pretty well I'd say.  He'd climb half way up and point at the bottom rung which meant, you climb up with me white ferangie.  He wanted me to go down with him which proved to be a great photo-op.  We said a prayer together as a family - asking for these next few weeks to pass quickly, for God's Will be done here, lifting up Wondi's care givers and the other children in the Care Center & their adoptive families. 

We held each other and rocked him back and forth in the shade from the warm sun.  He rested his head on my shoulder.  It was so peaceful... he drifted off to sleep.  That was our good bye.  When he woke, we were gone.  He had his picture book zipped up tightly inside his jacket.  Tucked away close to his heart.  We told him that we were his momma and pappa, but how can you explain that we are going away for 40 or 50 blasted days ...   aaaaauuuuuurrrrrrggggggghhhhh.  This stinks.    

So now we are home back in Oklahoma, but we would leave tomorrow for another 36 hour one way trip around the world to go get him.  There are five hurdles to be cleared before traveling back for the embassy visit and bring him home.  This all could take anywhere from five to ten weeks best we can tell.  Bout the best we could hope for is to travel sometime in late January.  WAY too far away if you ask me, but that is the way it works...my rules would be different.

Dec 7, 2011

12.7.2011 Went to the Care Center early today. Wondimagegn came strolling up to us. The Care Center only let the adopted children out in the court yard today so the parents could have more one-on-one time with their children. We have a blast playing with all the children, but it IS chaos...so it was very special to have these two hours just together. Wondi's imagination is captured by airplanes. The Addis airport is near the flight path and he gazes up in the sky as they fly by. Sometimes he'll softly say, "Aroh-plain". As I held him, the Care Center Director encouraged Wondi to give me a kiss on the cheek. He smiled and leaned over and planted one on me. Jenae kissed him. There were kisses all around. I leaned him back and held him in my arms not like a baby but similar. He broke into a huge smile. It was like a secret spice had just been discovered. So sweet. We parade around the court yard with him riding on my shoulders. As we pass under the clothes line, Wondi snaged off a clothes pin. He gets down and starts to remove the two wooden pieces from the metal spring. Before I realized it, he crossed the wooden pin pieces and began to fly them around like an aroh-plain. Pipe cleaners were the treat of the day. You guessed it, there were pipe cleaner aroh-plaines too. We played soccer together - passing the ball back and forth. The highlight of the day was around the large metal slide. He climbed up only so far and stopped. He had no intention of sliding down...way too high. But we gave him a ball and he was encouraged to get to the height that he could roll the ball down to Jenae at the bottom. Jenae would skee-ball roll it back up to him. Grand fun! Wondi would put up his fingers and say one-two-three with Jenae as she prepared to roll the ball up the slide. I suppose it was two hours we were able to spend with him, but it went quite fast.

Tomorrow is our last day to see him until our embassy visit when he can be brought home. Goodness, it was tough to leave him today...can't imagine what tomorrow will be like. We will leave for the airport around 7:00 PM (10 AM Thursday morning Oklahoma time). The flight is scheduled to leave Ethiopia at 11:15PM. We are currently scheduled to arrive in OKC at 9:08 PM Friday evening. If we can, we may attempt to catch an earlier flight into OKC, but must wait and see.

Thank you for all your thoughts and prayers. Please pray for these children and the people of Ethiopia. God Bless

Court, the milestone point of the trip

12.6.2011 Court...

Started out early morning...somewhere around 11:30 PM last night Oklahoma time. Like summitting Mt. Everest, you start out the night before and enter the Death Zone...okay, it was nothing like that. Our coordinators got us to court early before the masses. We were one of the first family groups to enter the Judge's chambers. We answered her questions. She informed us that this was irreverseable and everything was in order and done. Just to be double sure, after we left the chambers, I asked our coordinator if that meant we "passed court" and she whispered, "Yes, congratulations". I wanted to lose it and give out a bunch of screams and YEH-AHH's! but contained myself given the strict code of silence mandated in the chamber waiting room.

Okay, wait a stinkin moment here...I specifically asked about this moment during our Court Webinar...how will we know if we "Passed Court". This is a BIG deal and I wanted to make sure it didn't quietly sneak by me..."Oh, you'll know" was the response, "I don't want to give it away, but you'll know..." So I am thinking bells, tamborines and drums, dancing ladies - maybe a big GONG. There were no bells. There were no tamborines. There were no drums. No dancing ladies. There was no GONG...I wish she would have given it away because I just about missed this big hairy deal.

WE PASSED, WE PASSED, WE PASSED!!!!!!!

After a quick change of cloths and a drive to the Care Center, we spent the rest of the morning in the beautiful African sun with the children. Stickers were the treat of the day. We gave Wondimagegn a small photo album with pictures of us and the girls. Also included is one where he is waiving to the camera in the Gambella orphanage. His eyes went over and over the pictures one by one. For the first time we were able to tell him that we were there to become his parents. That we were his new mommy and daddy. We introduced him to his sisters. He pointed to us in the pictures then one by one pointed at us. The last pic was of Hannah holding a fish she caught in a local farm pond. His eyes lit up and he pointed right on the fish. I asked him if he liked fish. His eyebrows raised as if to knod yes. I asked him if he likes to eat fish...again his eyebrows raised. Precious...just precious

We took many pictures and those kiddos learn about digital cameras amazingly fast. He wanted to see the back of the camera to see the pic. I continued scanning through thge photos so he could see some of the street scenes on the way to the Care Center. He brightened and spoke more when he saw the outside pictures. We have no idea how long this grieving process will take. How long will it take to erase memories that create nightmares. To fill the void with joy.

We ate dinner with an adoptive mother picking her son up for the embassy visit and leaving later this week. Her 5yo son was so well behaved, so precious sitting there using a knife to spread butter on a roll. He was a pro by the second butter pattie. =) He enjoyed his first Orange Fresca. He was free, he is loved - it was awesome.

PEACE - OUT!

Upon Arrival

12.3 &4.2011 Yesterday we traveled to the Care Center later in the afternoon. Our little guy was supposed to get into Addis about 2:00 by plane. Upon arrival at the care center around 3:30, we went looking through the children trying to spot him. He wasn't there. Seemingly another peculiar delay. Just then someone beeped outside the gate and in drove a silver car. Our company's in-country coordinator got out and opened the car's back door. Out stepped our sleepy little one. Of course, then he was immediately confronted by two bawling white ferangies (foreigners) all get'n up in his business. "Go away" was the look we got. It was precious. We played with all the children in the court yard for two hours. He knew a few of the other children from his time with them at the rural orphanage. We knows he gives affection by the way he reacted with Mr. Yilma, who travelled with him from his orphanage. Our little guy gave him a kiss on the cheek when Yilma left for the evening. The older girls immediately began taking care of our Wondi (Levi) and enjoyed saying his name. We thought it was cute when we wiped his nose with tp...the older girls said, "soft". Thinking it was a complement and how nice it was to be wiped with a soft tissue, we laughed. Well the joke was on us. Today we purchased a book that converts simple English and Amharic words and soft means toilet paper. They were making fun of us because we were wiping noses with toilet paper!!! Well no wonder he gave us no smiles...

This morning we went to the Care Center and out to the shopping markets in the afternoon. The older children were in school so our time was concentrated on the younger ones. Today's treats were rubber balls. What fun! Yesterday's festivities were paper airplanes and blowing bubbles. We got a smile and maybe even a laugh out of our little guy. He especially liked seeing himself on the video screen and photos of himself. "This little piggie" with his toes made him laugh and show his beautiful teeth. It is uncomprehensible the grief and heartbreak he suffers. This will be a long journey full of many small steps.

Court is tomorrow. Everything has gone so smoothly for this entire process and we pray for that to continue. There are possible roadblocks that could still come up, but hopefully that will not be the case. Pray for the other families here also, that all things will work out for them as well. One thing that stuck us on the flight into Addis is that so many people were either on an adoption journey or coming for missionary work. You'd kind of look at them or they'd look at you and say something like...are you adopting (while twirling your finger around in the air, like right)? Pretty awesome. This week we have been running around with two other families in the same stage as we are. It has been so awesome to share this experience with them. Very much a blessing and a praise.

Yesterday's troubles are in the past. Not intending to be that deep, really. We ate out away from our Addis View Sunday night and that was NOT recommended. Lewis paid for it yesterday morning, but everything passed and is now fully recovered. Didn't need to be searching out IV bags of fluid in Ethiopia for crying out loud.

That does it for now folks, check back after a while for future posts...

12.3.2011

12.3.2011 Today we went to the orphanage even though our little guy wasn't there. We have been told that he is to come into town tomorrow around noon and we can see him then. We are anxious and unsure of why it is taking so long for him to get to Addis. Hope to find out more tomorrow. The orphanage was filled with beautiful little children. Another family (with us) met their new daughter for the very first time. It was a special moment and we felt privilaged that they shared that moment with us.

Made it to AFRICA 12/2/2011

We made it.  Thank you for all the prayers and thoughts - we could feel them throughout the past two days of traveling.  Whew are we ready for a break from the airplanes.  Do we have some stories to tell about the events of trip.  Arrived to the Addis View around 11:00.  Everything going well so far.  Tomorrow we plan on going to the Care Center and see Wondi for the first time.  Pray that everythings goes well.  Stay tuned for more posts soon.  IF i am lucky, I will try to post pictures.