July 9th we officially passed court in Ethiopian and our son is officially ours!!!
Our trip was wonderful. We got to spend several hours with our boy every day we were there. It was wonderful seeing him again and seeing how he has grown this last year...which isn't much...he is such a little guy for his age :) That first hug was so precious as we have been waiting almost a year to squeeze him again! When he saw us around the corner he got a huge grin ear to ear...that look was priceless! He quickly in his broken english asked where the kids were and was a little disappointed that they were not with us. We then shared with him the videos the kids had made for him. He loved that and watched them several times throughout our stay there :) Towards the end of our trip he made a video for them which is absolutely adorable. (I posted it on my facebook if you haven't seen it)
We fell in love with the country, people and food. There is something about Ethiopia that draws both Daniel and I deeply. The weather was amazing there and our time was great exploring the city and meeting people. Several times on our stay we requested to skip the next thing on our itinerary and to stay at the orphanage to be with our boy and all the older kids. They are not supposed to let us, but they did! :) Our time together consisted of laughs, playing soccer, hugging, looking at pictures from the last year and trying to understand each other. Our boy was in wonderful spirits the whole time, that just seems to be his personality. It was fun watching him interact with his friends and to share the things we brought for him. We brought him a hat...he gave it away. We would give him a piece of gum, he would manage to share it with several friends. That is how the children are, giving, loving and all about the community they live in which is each other. He was not sad to see us go, it was way harder on us. He has seen this process with so many kids...the parents come, they go and then they come back for good. Again, our son has been in the orphanage since he was 3 years old...he has seen this process for 6 years. Praise God it is finally his turn to go!
We toured several orphanages while we were in the country and I have so many stories from there, some good...some very hard. Let's have coffee sometime and I will tell you more. One of the best stories was when we visited the orphanage that Wondimagagne used to be at. They have moved him since he is closer to coming home to the US to an orphanage they call a transition home. When we visited his old orphanage we did the whole tour like normal from the infant room to toddlers to where the older children stay. This day when we arrived the older children were at school. School is a one room classroom that has lots of dirt, very few school items but lots of smiles. We opened up the door and saw a dozen beautiful faces smiling back at us and then they all lit up and starting speaking in English...Wondimagagne's Mama and Papa they shouted! They shouted this over and over...our son had carried our pictures around this last year and so every kid knew who we were! It was one of the most surreal moments of the trip. It made our hearts skip a beat. I loved that he was proud of us and his new family and that he had hope this last year that we were coming back to get him. It was a fun time with those dozen older kids that day. One girl was having a birthday so they were celebrating in the way they could. The kids were making her cakes with playdough...I could of stayed in that room for a very long time. I felt like we belonged because of the way their smiles, hugs and laughs invited us in. Later in our trip we spoke with the nannies and they told us all the kiddos stay up at night in their triple stacked bunk beds and talk about who has a family and who does not...I am so very thankful that my son got to be one of the ones who did, who had the hope of having a family and I can't wait to see our future. We know we are not done on this crazy journey of adoption and adoption awareness. I pray God uses us again to bring a child or children home and that he uses us to help others do the same and that we can partner with folks here and there to change the reality for many children.
One last blessing to share...we met several families on our trip who were doing the same thing. It was great to be with so many other whose hearts were aligned for adoption! We got to see several families meet their children for the very first time!!! Now that was an experience full of tears and pure joy. Something etched into our minds deep. We met a few families we will stay in touch with forever. Just an added bonus on this amazing adventure.
We have so much more to share about our journey but we wanted to highlight our favorites and we look forward to returning soon. Please pray we receive our US Embassy date soon to go get him! On the average it is about 45-60 days after you pass court, but as anyone in the adoption world will tell you...there is no average!
Please feel free to ask questions about our trip, about adoption about supporting us and others. We are glad to share! We are still hard at work trying to raise they last amount of funds to bring him home. Due to circumstances beyond our control we are starting from scratch but we KNOW God will provide. If you feel led to support us and adoption and want to assist in bringing our little boy home you can go to the donate button on the top of this blog that says DONATE. God Bless!!!
Our trip was wonderful. We got to spend several hours with our boy every day we were there. It was wonderful seeing him again and seeing how he has grown this last year...which isn't much...he is such a little guy for his age :) That first hug was so precious as we have been waiting almost a year to squeeze him again! When he saw us around the corner he got a huge grin ear to ear...that look was priceless! He quickly in his broken english asked where the kids were and was a little disappointed that they were not with us. We then shared with him the videos the kids had made for him. He loved that and watched them several times throughout our stay there :) Towards the end of our trip he made a video for them which is absolutely adorable. (I posted it on my facebook if you haven't seen it)
We fell in love with the country, people and food. There is something about Ethiopia that draws both Daniel and I deeply. The weather was amazing there and our time was great exploring the city and meeting people. Several times on our stay we requested to skip the next thing on our itinerary and to stay at the orphanage to be with our boy and all the older kids. They are not supposed to let us, but they did! :) Our time together consisted of laughs, playing soccer, hugging, looking at pictures from the last year and trying to understand each other. Our boy was in wonderful spirits the whole time, that just seems to be his personality. It was fun watching him interact with his friends and to share the things we brought for him. We brought him a hat...he gave it away. We would give him a piece of gum, he would manage to share it with several friends. That is how the children are, giving, loving and all about the community they live in which is each other. He was not sad to see us go, it was way harder on us. He has seen this process with so many kids...the parents come, they go and then they come back for good. Again, our son has been in the orphanage since he was 3 years old...he has seen this process for 6 years. Praise God it is finally his turn to go!
We toured several orphanages while we were in the country and I have so many stories from there, some good...some very hard. Let's have coffee sometime and I will tell you more. One of the best stories was when we visited the orphanage that Wondimagagne used to be at. They have moved him since he is closer to coming home to the US to an orphanage they call a transition home. When we visited his old orphanage we did the whole tour like normal from the infant room to toddlers to where the older children stay. This day when we arrived the older children were at school. School is a one room classroom that has lots of dirt, very few school items but lots of smiles. We opened up the door and saw a dozen beautiful faces smiling back at us and then they all lit up and starting speaking in English...Wondimagagne's Mama and Papa they shouted! They shouted this over and over...our son had carried our pictures around this last year and so every kid knew who we were! It was one of the most surreal moments of the trip. It made our hearts skip a beat. I loved that he was proud of us and his new family and that he had hope this last year that we were coming back to get him. It was a fun time with those dozen older kids that day. One girl was having a birthday so they were celebrating in the way they could. The kids were making her cakes with playdough...I could of stayed in that room for a very long time. I felt like we belonged because of the way their smiles, hugs and laughs invited us in. Later in our trip we spoke with the nannies and they told us all the kiddos stay up at night in their triple stacked bunk beds and talk about who has a family and who does not...I am so very thankful that my son got to be one of the ones who did, who had the hope of having a family and I can't wait to see our future. We know we are not done on this crazy journey of adoption and adoption awareness. I pray God uses us again to bring a child or children home and that he uses us to help others do the same and that we can partner with folks here and there to change the reality for many children.
One last blessing to share...we met several families on our trip who were doing the same thing. It was great to be with so many other whose hearts were aligned for adoption! We got to see several families meet their children for the very first time!!! Now that was an experience full of tears and pure joy. Something etched into our minds deep. We met a few families we will stay in touch with forever. Just an added bonus on this amazing adventure.
We have so much more to share about our journey but we wanted to highlight our favorites and we look forward to returning soon. Please pray we receive our US Embassy date soon to go get him! On the average it is about 45-60 days after you pass court, but as anyone in the adoption world will tell you...there is no average!
Please feel free to ask questions about our trip, about adoption about supporting us and others. We are glad to share! We are still hard at work trying to raise they last amount of funds to bring him home. Due to circumstances beyond our control we are starting from scratch but we KNOW God will provide. If you feel led to support us and adoption and want to assist in bringing our little boy home you can go to the donate button on the top of this blog that says DONATE. God Bless!!!
All Christians have been adopted as children of God and freed from the law. To adopt a child is to follow the lead of God who has adopted so many. God use us and thank you for making us yours and letting us follow in your amazing footsteps of love.
But to all who believed him and accepted him, he gave the right to become children of God. John 1:12
Pure and genuine religion in the sight of God the Father means caring for orphans and widows in their distress and refusing to let the world corrupt you. James 1:27
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