One Month

Jonah has now been home for a month. Sometimes it seems like he just got here and other times it's like he has been with us forever. He has been wonderful. Sleeping and eating great and happy as can be. He is starting to crawl or trying to at least. JT loves him, they laugh at each other and entertain each other.

  Jonah has had more doctors appointments in the last few weeks than I think we have had in our whole lifetime. But he has been great through it all. Our house is a little nuts adjusting to having two kids but we are all doing great.

   We made a video for Jonah. We knew it would hard to make a scrap book for him, due to lack of time. (second kids gets shafted, we know!) so making the video was something we can give to him that captures our "Journey to Jonah." He will get his yearly photo album on his birthday just as JT has, but there was no way to get everything we have been through in the past three years in an album.

    Enjoy the video.

Make video montages at www.OneTrueMedia.com

Coming to America

     An overview- we will go back and be a little more specific about our trip but for now here is an overview of how things are going...

    We are home!  We love the USA. We were in Addis Ababa for most of our visit and went down to Awassa (the south) to  meet Jonah's mom. Awassa is what you would think of when you think of Africa. Hut houses, herds of animals, African villages and naked people! We loved it there. There was fresh air and Erin had her head out the window like a dog the whole time. Addis is the city. It smells of diesel fuel and fire burning from all the cooking that is taking place outdoors. Erin was nauseous the whole time.

     We spent time at the Horizon house and spent time with the other families as all the families came and went on their birth family visit. The plane ride home was made fun with the two other couples we traveled home with. We took up the whole front row of the plane and had bassinets for the babies. The kids all did awesome on the way home. Jonah slept, ate and laughed until we reached Dulles. As soon as we landed Jonah was officially a US citizen. We couldn't have been more happy to be home. Unless you have been to a 3rd world country and to Ethiopia you have no idea how great the US is. Even the poorest person in US is so lucky. Ethiopia is in the top ten of poorest countries in the world. That includes all of Africa. There was a couple on the trip with us who had been to several places in Africa and she still couldn't believe how poor Ethiopia was. The people are wonderful but the surroundings are not.

     Estelle, Al, JT, Meredith, Kiara, Taliya, Roney and Alani all met us at the airport. JT was happy to see us and looked at Jonah in confusion. He knew him on paper but there he was in the flesh. He was real. JT stared at him and when we got home we all just hung out. Erin took JT to Panera to enjoy some fresh food and we all enjoyed drinking water and having drinks with ice.

     JT has been awesome. We didn't really expect that. I guess we don't give him enough credit! He loves to help out and loves giving Jonah his bottle and taking baths with him. Other times he just ignores him, which is fine too.

      Jonah has been adjusting well. Other than the lack of sleep we are all doing great. Jonah went to the doctor. He is using a nebulizer and otherwise in in perfect health. He is wonderful. He is eating well but we know he is missing his injera and Ethiopian spices! He loves to  laugh and wants to be held a lot.

      We have enjoyed having visitors and we are not being too crazy about who holds him and other stuff. Some say to lay low and not to leave the house but that is not possible for us. Jonah and Erin enjoyed their first outing to the doctor and to Panera on Monday. We decided that the only thing we will be anal about is that we will be the only ones to feed him. We need him to know that we are his parents and even though it seems like he is easy going and we know he will go to anybody that is not good for kids who are being adopted. They need to know who their parents are and realize they are stuck with us forever!

      Enjoy the pictures.......

Jonah enjoying his first plane ride.

JT meets Jonah and says hello to Daddy.

Our Journey To Jonah at OneTrueMedia.com

Make video montages at www.OneTrueMedia.com

Ocean Isle/Trip #2

We just got back from our annual trip to Ocean Isle Beach, NC. JT was great in the car both to and from NC. We had a chance to stop in Raleigh and visit with Cindy, Ben and Carter. Teresa and Emily joined in for a pizza dinner. It was nice to see everyone. 

The beach was great as usual. The first day there as we were unpacking, Taliya informed us that "JT was doing something bad." As JT came out of the room he sported his new hairdo. He got a hold of Kevin's clippers that he left sitting in the bed. JT took it upon himself to shave his head. JT said his hair looked pretty and seemed happy with his work.We went crabbing and our skills were never lost. We caught 27 crabs in less than 2 hours and Jason cooked them as always and we all indulged in eating the crabs. JT improved on his swimming skills and after a few days decided it was fun to jump over the waves. He loved collecting shells as well. Hopefully next year he will enjoy the beach a little more. Kevin and I also had fun, although tired from having JT sleeping in a room with us and a tap on the shoulder each evening around 4am. He has not done that since we have been back home. We look forward to next summer and having Jonah join us.

Kevin and I head back to Ethiopia on August 14th. Our Embassy apt. is August 16th. At some point during the week we will visit Jonah's birth mother and family. We will be back on August 21st. 

JT has been wanting to "see" Jonah on a regular basis. (looking at his pictures) He kisses him. He will talk to us and say that we are going on a plane to Africa and Jonah will come home and sleep in the baby's crib. Kevin and I try to talk about Jonah a lot and JT helped me put some clothes in Jonah's dresser. As much as we do these things we both know JT doesn't really "get it." I don't have a big belly and we left him for a week and will be leaving him again. He did great with Estelle and Al but it was hard for him. He won't be visiting in a hospital to see a baby and we will step out of a plane with a 1 year old in our arms. Again, after leaving him for a week. He has had a hard time with Kevin and I leaving him now. That was never an issue for him. So we hope that this will all pass and once we get home and settled in, we can return to somewhat a normal life and JT will adjust as do all siblings. I do think leaving for a long time makes things very difficult. I have read many blogs and they seem to say the same thing and their older child adjusted after a few weeks.

We will be staying at the Horizon House for this trip and will not have Internet access. We will be in touch after we get home with Jonah!

Ethiopia- Days 5 and 6

The last two days were spent just hanging out at the HH. On Wednesdsay we had to check out of the hotel, so we spent the day at the HH and went out for lunch. At lunch Kevin and our new friend Victor, took a picture of our vaccine banner. The place where we got all of our shots is trying to get pictures of their banner all over the world. So it came to Ethiopia with us. We now get free vaccines for a year. When we got to the HH on Wednesday a lot of the kids, including Jonah, had been taken to get their vaccines. So when we pulled in we saw all the babies outside laying on the floor. Yonas stayed and hung for a awhile. Everyone at the HH loves the kids.

You can see in the picture there is one really sick child. He is 1 1/2 years old. He looks like a 2 month old. He has heart failure. If he were adopted when he first came to the HH, he would have been fine. He needed surgery and now it may be too late. A US doctor was going to be coming in the next few weeks and was going to see if they could get him back to the US to do surgery. At this point, he may be too weak to go through surgery. They take such good care of him and love on him just like all the other kids. Ethiopia does not have good hospitals and no one can afford the surgery. Hopefully they can get him some help.

Mulat came at 7:30pm to get us to the airport. We had a 10:30pm flight home. We said good bye to Jonah and left. The plane ride home was long and uneventful. We got back here at 8:30am. Estelle picked us up from the airport. We came home, got JT from school and went to Ruby Tuesdays for a much needed salad. We were not allowed any fruit or salad on the trip. JT seemed surprised to see us. We told him all about Jonah. He even tried on his new Ethiopian clothing.

We had a great trip. We just got a call yesterday from Wide Horizons saying we should expect to be back in the middle of August.

Jonah turned one on July 19th. We had pizza and cake in his honor. We can't wait to get him home!

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Ethiopia- Day 4/ Court Day

Day 4 was Court Day. You don't always pass court. We were told that the birth parents had all been to court a few weeks earlier. We knew Jonah's mother had shown up and relinquished her rights to us. But, if one little piece of paper is missing or not signed, you don't pass and then you wait again.

Mulat picked us all up. We were not allowed to have cameras so we have no pictures. We were told we could be in court all day. There were 10 families that had to go through. We saw a few couples from another agency sitting in the waiting room. They told us some of the questions the judge asked. When the first family was called in, they came out 3 minutes later. That was it. 3-5 questions and they were done. So then they called Yonas Ararso and in we went. She asked us the questions and that was it. We were officially his parents. The questions.... Why did you want to adopt from Ethiopia? How will you deal with a mixed raced family? Have you met Yonas? Do you understand that this is irreversible? That was it, we were parents of two little boys.

It took 45 minutes for all of the families to get through. We were amazed. Mulat took us all back to the hotel. A group us wanted to do some more shopping. Mulat came with us and took us to a "mall" and then we went for lunch. Then back to the HH for the evening. We spent time with Jonah and Kevin enjoyed playing some soccer with the guard.

Ethiopia- Day 3

Mulat picked us all up in the morning to do some shopping. He took us to one street and we had 1 hour to shop. We had to bargain for everything, which I wasn't very good at. The prices are so cheap I didn't really mind paying the first price they told me. But we did get the price down from where they started so we did well. We also got our shoes shined by two little boys. Our tennis shoes mind you. They kept saying, "No problem" when Kevin tried to explain that you don't shine tennis shoes. But we got the shoes shined and had some wet socks to prove it! They wanted to charge us 10 birr each, which is less than 1 dollar. (13 birr= $1) After he shined the shoes he wanted 20 birr each. So Kevin just handed him 6 US dollars and the kid looked like he just went to heaven.

Our shoe shiners.

After we went shopping Mulat drove us through the Merkato, the big market. He said we can't shop there because it's too crowded and there is a lot of pickpocketing that goes on there. We went on a Sunday which was a "slow" day and it was packed. They sold everything there. I really liked the chickens. People would buy them and carry them by the feet while they were still alive.

We then headed to a coffee shop. I only bought one bag but I did buy a toothbrush from a boy in front of the store. It is made of wood and I guess once you start to chew on it, bristles form and then you brush/pick your teeth with it.

After shopping we headed back to the hotel for lunch.

Notice the goats walking head on into the traffic.

Then we went to the HH for the evening.

One of the guards at the HH. He also make scarves.

Ethiopia- Day 2

We didn't do much on day 2. We went to HH in the morning up until nap time. We headed back to the hotel and ate lunch with 2 others couples and did some shopping there. We headed back to HH around 4 pm and stayed until the kids went to bed. Kevin taught a boy how to juggle. He was being adopted from a family that was there in the group before us. Here are some pictures......

Outside the HH. These kids were doing something with corn.

Ethiopia-Day 1

We survived the 15 hour flight over. We didn't sleep much at all and arrived in Addis at 8 in the morning. We got the hotel (which is very nice and just like any other American four/five star hotel) at about 9:30am. As we walked into our room the phone was ringing. I answered it and it was Mulat who is the Horizon House driver, he said he was

in the lobby. I told Kevin that I guess he just wanted to introduce himself to us. So, we dropped our luggage and headed downstairs. We were greeted by Katie and Reed who are from Florida and met Mulat. Then he said, "Ok, let's go." Kevin and I looked at Katie and asked what as going on. We soon found out that he was there to take us to the orphanage. After not sleeping 24 hours and just stepping foot into the hotel room, Kevin and I just looked at each other and laughed. So we got into a van filled with some other families. Some from Chicago, California and Minnesota. Off to Horizon House we went. (There are 10 families on the trip with us)

Driving- I can not even describe the driving. It is just best to close your eyes and not look. I have seen 1 stop light in the last 2 days we've been here and one time it wasn't even working. People are walking in the street along with the goats, donkeys, dogs and we saw one cow. The drivers just weave in and out and surprisingly we have not hit one living thing. It's just nuts.

Horizon House- Driving down an alley and 2 honks later, a gate is opened by a guard and there we were. There are two rooms. One for the younger babies and the other for the 1-2 year olds. We went in and I looked around at 6 cribs. Couldn't seem to find Jonah. Then the nanny pointed him out. I didn't even recognize him. He just came to Horizon House five days ago and they had cut off all his curls before he got there. So, we see a huge brown eyed child staring at us ,just smiling. Just like in his picture. He just sat and smiled and we picked him up. We spent about 2 hours there, just hanging out with Jonah and all the other babies. We fed him lunch, which he devoured, and then they all went down for nap. They are on a tight schedule. I love it!

We went back to the hotel to take a nap and then headed back to the HH (Horizon House) for the evening. They had just gotten a bath and Jonah smelled delicious. He has a runny nose and a few other minor issues that will be taken care of now that he is at HH. As the head nurse told us, "He's with us now, don't worry. We take good care of him." The nurse and nannies love Jonah and all the babies for that matter. The babies seem so happy and are smiling and love the nannies as well. The place is very clean and well cared for. After dinner, which he again devoured they all get ready for bed. Love the schedule! We said goodnight and put him to bed.

Restaurant- We went to an Ethiopian restaurant with 2 other couples. Everyone is great but we seem to be hanging out a lot with Katie and Reed from Florida and Robyn and Don from Minnesota. Again, down an alley way and the doors open to a really nice open restaurant. We ate, or should I say ordered ( I ate nothing!) Ethiopian food. I didn't like it all but. But they had singers and traditional dancing for 2 hours and it was great. We then headed back to the hotel for some much needed sleep.

Ethiopia- Lets just say that whatever you think it looks like, it is probably 100 times worse. Everything is run down and everything seems like it could collapse in about 2 seconds. We are not allowed to walk around without either of our 2 drivers, Yonas and Mulat or with the guard from HH. There is a bad perception here from Americans coming to adopt "their " children and slave trading and selling babies. Obviously that is not happening with most of us but it does happen and for our safety they want us with someone who can speak the language. Every single person we have met has been very nice. Yonas our driver is the best and has been taking us back and forth everywhere.

That's all for day 1. More to come.....