blessed {court trip week 2}

I've been dreading writing this post. The "we're home" post. Somehow it makes it seem so final to put it in words. Like maybe if I don't document it all we can just teleport back to Ethiopia! It's so hard to be back, but it is good to be home. Back to familiarity and family and friends. It's just hard to figure out how to do "normal" without him here. After everything we have seen and experienced, how do we just come back to our luxurious life as if nothing ever happened? I feel incomplete, and a little irresponsible for just living my everyday life without even considering Eliyas. I wonder what he would want for breakfast, will he sleep in? Only a couple months until I find these things out, I hope!

Let me try to recap the last week+... we left off with our trip to Entoto Mountain. It was a sweet time with Eliyas just being a family outside the walls of the orphanage. We fit so perfectly and naturally like we had been doing this family thing for the last 9 years. Over and over, we just keep thinking how blessed we are. We are so thankful God entrusted us to be his parents. He is such a gift. It was neat to see him taking in all the sights and surroundings. 

We spent the next couple of days soaking up time with Eliyas. We learned that he is amazing at any sport or activity he tries. His hand-eye coordination is awesome. He is good with a football, soccer ball, marbles, basketball... we think he will be great at anything he tries. It's so fun to watch him play. His smiles and facial expressions are priceless. He is so expressive. We were savoring our time with him as we knew it was coming to an end all too soon. Our flight was scheduled to leave Monday night, July 29th, and we were both dreading it. 

We got to talk to a man who worked for our agency who said he was the first one to meet Eliyas when he came to the orphanage. He was telling us how amazingly smart and mature he was from day one. We have been thinking the whole time, wow this kid is SO smart, but it's always nice to hear it confirmed from someone else. He told us how Eliyas first came to his office, he opened up his laptop, went straight to Microsoft Word and starting typing his name and his friends' names. He couldn't believe it! We have also been surprised at how well he can work all of our electronics. I keep asking him if he learned it in school but I haven't gotten an answer yet! He also told us that he is such a sweet and friendly boy, is very adaptable, and is very good at expressing his thoughts and feelings. He said because of his personality and characteristics he really thinks he will have a pretty smooth transition coming to America. This was encouraging to hear, but we are expecting and preparing ourselves for some hard days ahead. We are praying that the Lord will prepare his heart for the changes ahead and that God will direct our steps to making it as smooth as transition for him as possible. 

Wiping my tears, such a sweet boy

Monday finally came around and it was time for us to go. We struggled the whole day, we were heartbroken to leave our son. We told him goodbye that afternoon and just didn't feel right, of course, about leaving. As we were saying our goodbyes I was crying, Eliyas pulled toilet paper out of his pocket to wipe my tears. We joke that he probably saw all the tears on the first day and knew he needed to be prepared on the last day. :) When we got back to the guest home we debated staying a little longer or staying through till embassy, but at the last minute decided we better just get in the van and go to the airport. As we were packing our things Chase realized he didn't have his passport or jacket that his passport was in. He must have left it at the orphanage. This was after 7PM and we knew that the doors get locked at 7 and the kids went to sleep, so we knew we weren't going to be able to get back in. Plus, having to go to the orphanage would have been an hour+ detour from the airport and we wouldn't have made our flight. At that point, we just thought we would try to get a flight out a few days later.

We were more than thankful for some extra days with Eliyas. When we went to see him the next day and he ran to us and jumped in Chase's arms, I don't think he had done this before. He was so excited to see us. We were so glad for this bonus time with our sweet boy. We were still trying to get on a flight for later in the week, but were surprised to find out there wasn't a confirmed flight until the 21st!! Neither of us were upset about 3 more weeks with our son, but it was starting to get old living out of a suitcase and eating out every meal. We were told we might be able to get out on standby sooner so we just checked in with the airline every few days to see if we should bother coming to the airport.

In the meanwhile, Eliyas learned how to give eskimo kisses, played lots of football and soccer with Dad, ate a few hamburgers and pizzas with us, and we all just enjoyed the extra family time together. We got to go along to get his passport done at the immigration office (we didn't stand out at ALL there :)) and went to some doctor's appointments with him that we think are for his medical clearance for embassy. We were glad to see these things started so soon! Progress in the right direction!! 

We celebrated Chase's birthday while we were there. That morning, I told Eliyas that it was his birthday and asked if he knew how old he was, he quickly replied, "26!" He asked us on the first day how old we were, and I guess he remembered that Chase was 25. Wow, smart boy! We went to Makush Art Gallery for lunch and picked up a couple of paintings of Harar, where E is from, and had popcorn and cereal for dinner at the guest home. We both wanted something familiar, that wasn't pizza or pasta. We thought we would just be eating a bunch of Ethiopian food while in country, but every restaurant pretty much had pizza, pasta, and hamburgers! Eliyas loves all of those things too, wasn't expecting that! :)

Later in the week, we called the airline again to check on the waiting list and they told us we could get a confirmed flight out at the end of the week! We were hesitant to leave our son, but we knew Chase had to get back to work if someone was going to pay for the next trip to bring him home! We soaked up every last minute with Eliyas and thankfully this goodbye wasn't quite as painful. He has seen the process happen enough to know that families come, and then they go for a while before they come back. I think he was starting to get confused about why we were still there! As hard and terrible as it was to leave, we were comforted knowing that the Lord's timing is perfect and that he is in really good hands. We were so pleasantly surprised by the orphanage he is in. It is very clean and organized, and the children all seem happy and healthy. The director, nannies, and other workers are all really amazing people. You can tell they love those kids and work hard to provide a safe and loving place for them. We are so thankful for these people that have taken care of and loved on our son.

We missed home, familiarity, a schedule, a home cooked meal, surprisingly enough, the Texas heat, and our beds. Having spent 2.5 weeks in Ethiopia I hope I can say I learned some patience, heck, we had to spend 3 hours at the airline ticket office just to get our flight out confirmed! Our driver was with us and laughed that we should be glad we were getting to experience what they have to go through just to get a plane ticket! I told him I should come back a much more patient person. :) 

We both learned a lot on this trip. Neither of us had ever left the country! It was quite the experience for us, we learned a lot about ourselves. I learned that I am a little more high maintenance than I thought, that I need to learn to go with the flow more, and that a hot shower isn't a necessity. I also learned that the amazing man that I married over 7 years ago, is an even more amazing father. He was loving, affectionate, caring, patient, and just the right balance of everything. I am so blessed to do life and family with him, and I can't wait to spend the rest of our lives as parents. It was a fun, emotional, exhausting 2.5 weeks together- we haven't spent more than 5 or 6 days off work together since before we were married, it was some sweet time together!

After a 15.5 hour flight, (that I slept 10+ hours of, PTL!) we had a long layover in Dulles and were able to get out and see some of DC! We have never been there before, so it was fun to be able to see some sights! We visited Arlington Cemetery where Chase's grandmother is buried, had lunch in Georgetown, had a DC Cupcake, saw the White House, Washington Monument, and did a LOT of walking. We finally made it home and crashed. Now we're getting things ready for him to come home, and praying that it is no more than 9 weeks. We already miss him like crazy, I don't quite know how I'm going to make it 9 weeks! It helps to know we're not alone. Our agency has a great community that is supportive and helpful throughout all the stages of the process! We are so thankful for the friends we have made along the way. 

We appreciate your prayers during this final waiting stage, the hardest part. Please join us in prayer for the following:
- That Eliyas' little heart is comforted and calmed throughout these weeks. We pray that he knows deep down he is loved and has a forever family and that we are coming back as soon as we can.
- We pray the Lord would start preparing his heart now for the change that is about to take place.
- That we would wait well- always relying on the Lord and trusting in His perfect plan & will.
- Pray that everything that needs to take place over the next 9 weeks happens on time with no hold ups. (We are also praying for a miracle, that he would clear quicker than 9 weeks! There is a certain test that has to happen that takes a minimum of 9 weeks to get the results on... we would love for this to happen quicker!)

Thank you for all your love, support, and prayers for all 3 of us. We have definitely felt them, please don't stop now!