This is one of my favorite photos of the boys!
We've officially received the first snowfall of the year with some accumulation. What a difference from Monday when we had temps in the 70's and then Friday and Saturday in the 30's with snow! What will the boys think?!?!?
My family (parents, brother, sister and their families) came for a visit today and we introduced them all to authentic Ethiopian cuisine at "Fasika" in St Paul. All of the kids were brave and tried everything.
Plane tickets are booked (we are flying Ethiopian Air out of Washington Dulles airport). It's a direct flight from Washington to Addis Ababa with a brief re-fueling stop in Rome. A 15 hour plane journey there, and a 17 hour plane trip back. Excrutiatingly long and the return trip will certainly be interesting with our 2 sons who do not speak English. We land in Washington at 7:20 am and can't get a flight to Mpls until 2:20 pm. Ouch! We will be so happy to be home!!
We have booked our lodging in Ethiopia and will be staying at "Ethiopia Guest Home". We are really looking forward to staying here and experiencing the Ethiopian culture from this perspective. The Guest Home was founded by another AWAA adoptive family and the funds generated from the Guest Home are used to further adoption and other ministries in Ethiopia. Please link to the Ethiopia Guest Home website for more information.
We are blessed to have shared the ups and downs of our adoption journey with a family only 30 miles away. The Hutchinsons are adopting 2 girls about the same ages as our boys - and they have shared the disappointment of repeated failed court dates. Their friendship and encouragement during this journey has been essential - and now we will be completing our journey together. Travelling, lodging (we are sharing the 4th floor at the Guest Home) meeting our children, and bringing them 1/2 way around the world to MN together! And to cap it all off, we will be meeting Duni in Ethiopia as she arrives with her family to reside in Ethiopia to further advance the AWAA Africa program from in-country. We have extended our stay by one day so that we can meet her and discuss future possibilities for involvement!
Meanwhile - the packing and planning continue in earnest ...
1 comment:
Yes, the flight is awful, awful. Both ways. Depending on your stance of drugging children... if I had it to do over, I would have lightly medicated with Benadryl. Especially our screamer child. If you disagree, forget I said anything. :)
On the way back with your boys on the plane, I recommend packing some injera, and taking their food trays from them and doling out one item of food at a time.
The unwrapping of every stinking little airline food, condiment, and utensil really confused our children (ages 9 and 6). I think on the whole flight they ate 2 crackers, 1 roll, and the injera we brought. They kept trying to order Coca Cola and the stewardesses kept trying to give it to them. We were (apparently) the only mean parents on the flight who made their kids drink juice or water. :)
Chris Gardner
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