They Passed!!!!!!!!

Hi everyone, this is Abby updating the blog for the Busters because they cannot access Blogger in Ethiopia.

As you can tell from the title,
THEY PASSED COURT!!!!!!!!

THEY ARE OFFICIALLY PARENTS!!!!!!!

And their son is, after they first met him face-to-face, "tiny and happy and PERFECT!"

They also wanted to pass a few things along to waiting families:

"The hardest part is waiting in the room before getting called in. Most of the families were adoptive families but there were some birth families there as well and that was very hard. The anticipation of waiting to get called in was the hardest and seeing families going in and out. When it was finally our turn we only spent about 2 minutes in front of the judge. She was very nice and asked us about 5 questions and a lot of them it was clear she was looking for just a yes or no. She asked if we had other children, if we knew other families that adopted from Ethiopia, if we had met him, and if we understood this was final. It was maybe not even a full 2 minutes."

They hope to get their Embassy Date confirmed later today, and then they will know when they can bring home the little Buster.

To say that I am happy to be an aunt is an understatement, but mostly I'm just so grateful that two of the greatest people I know are parents, because they will be wonderful parents. And that little guy is now officially their son and part of our family.

They also say, "Please let everyone know that we thank them for all the support!! We are parents!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

CONGRATULATIONS, Busters!!!!!

Five Days

Can you believe in five days I get to touch and kiss these cute hands? It doesn't seem real.

I think our little guy likes to suck his middle fingers. Can you see in the picture how his fingers are positioned? Yes, this is how much I analyze photos of him. I was a thumb sucker for a long time so I am totally cool with the finger sucking.

We leave this Friday afternoon and are staying at the Yebsabi Guest House. We will meet him for the first time on Monday! I cannot even put to words what I am feeling right now.

I have had two very cool moments in the past few weeks that I want to document.

The first, was the night before our first court date. I was trying to fall asleep and of course I was failing miserably. I was indulging imagination and going through all the what ifs. I also was worrying about our little guy. Since he was so small when he first got to Gladney, I have known that it will take him a little longer to reach certain milestones because he needs to build up strength. Gladney gives us a monthly update that tracks his developmental milestones. I try not to worry too much about that stuff because I think he can catch up and will be fine. However, I REALLY wanted some pictures of him doing tummy time and holding up his head. I didn't have any and I just wanted physical proof that he could do it. So back to the night before our court date. I am wide awake and I hear my phone ding that I had an email. I went back and forth on whether or not I should get up and check it. I soon gave in and got up and checked my phone. I had an email from another Gladney mom, Amy H, with pictures of my boy. In the body of the email this is what she said, "He was very alert and also very strong. I have few pictures of him doing tummy time, and you can see how well he is able to lift his head." Oh my! I couldn't believe it. I downloaded the photos and there he was on his belly and was lifting his head. I was overcome with emotion and just pure gratitude. In a moment when I was worrying about something very specific I was immediately comforted. Amy said it best, "I love seeing God's hands in the little things." Life just blows me away sometimes.

The second moment was on Monday night when I went out with a lot of the adoptive moms in my group. We were all sitting at a long table and I was next to Abby, who brought home her daughter at the end of January. We were chatting about her daughter and she mentioned the name of the government orphanage where her daughter spent some time. We are with different agencies but it was the same orphanage that our boy spent a few weeks before he was in Gladney's amazing care. She was telling me that they went to visit this orphanage while they were in Ethiopia and that it was a very hard experience for her. Abby said they were there the last few days of January and she felt that the orphanage was low on food so she and her husband went out and bought formula and food and donated it to the orphanage. I paused and went through our boy's timeline and realized he arrived there just a few days after she left. I told this to Abby and we both looked at each other paused. She provided for him. Abby helped feed this little boy that will hopefully legally become our son a week from today. I was holding back the sobs at The Surly Girl Saloon in Columbus, Ohio about something that happened halfway across the world six months ago but that impacted my family in a profound way. I will never forget that.

I probably won't get a chance to update the blog before we leave on Friday so I suppose this my "and we're off" post. I have heard getting on blogger in Addis is pretty tough so I am hoping that I'll be able to get through to my sister and she can update the blog with news of our court date on the 28th. We certainly welcome any positive vibes and/or prayers you are willing to toss our way for safe travels and emotional strength for meeting and saying goodbye to our boy. I can't wait to tell you about it.

Much Love!

We Passed!!!!!!!

We passed!!!!! Did you hear me exhale??? What a relief!!

We leave for Ethiopia next Friday, July 23rd!! Amazing!! And we'll meet our boy for the first time on Monday the 26th. The countdown has begun. I CANNOT wait!!

Our federal court date in Ethiopia is July 28th and that will be the final step in making everything that we already feel in our hearts officially legal on paper. That is when I can show you his precious face!!! We are so close.

I have to say thank you again to all of you. All of your prayers, positive thoughts and encouraging words have meant so much to us. We love you!!!

Tulsa Baby Shower

I went to Tulsa a few weeks ago for my first shower and I am very proud of myself for not crying like a fool through the whole thing. I am such an emotional person and I worry sometimes that people won't take my tears as sincere because I cry so often. When I am touched, I cry. That is just how I am. And each and every time they are tears of gratitude and appreciation. I was careful to wait and read cards when I got home (especially my sister's) and when Maryfran got us a framed poem entitled, The Chosen Heart, I knew I couldn't read it out loud without breaking down so I passed it around for everyone to read. Baby Buster's nursery is definitely starting to fill with some very thoughtful gifts. Here are some photos of the shower.

I think Liz and I have known each other since the 6th grade. There is something about old friends that I find to be very comforting. It makes me think of the song we used to sing in Girl Scouts about old friends being gold or something like that. Very true.

My mom and Aunt Michele are looking very cute here I think.

My Aunt Mary drove down from Kansas City for my shower and my cousin, Ali, was there as well. Ali was one of my bridesmaids so I love that she was able to be at this other important milestone. One of the perks of being a mom-to-be at an adoption shower is that you get to partake in the drinks. I enjoy this part of the adoption shower probably a little too much.

Liz made these wish ribbons and each person who attended the shower wrote me a little message on a ribbon. I also waited to read all of those after the shower and I will treasure this forever.

Speaking of old friends, here are two more. Valerie on the left is one the craftiest and most creative women in my life. She seriously blows me away. If you would like to see the cuteness she whipped up for baby Buster then please go check out her post about my shower. Oh my.

This photo makes me laugh because I am sure if I went digging I could find a similar photo from our high school days.

Here are three ladies that can't wait for baby Buster to come home.

The 10 Years Ago Me

Our flights are booked. Wow. We decided to risk the change fee and go ahead and confirm our flights. For some reason the final week in July is pretty booked so we were nervous if we waited until the 15th we could get stuck with a pretty awful schedule. We are flying Lufthansa. If anyone else has traveled Lufthansa I would love to know how it went. Scratch that. Only tell me if you had a good experience because my nerves are already sky high so it is probably best I am just blissfully unaware. We also have our required humanitarian aid purchased and we just need to put it all in suitcases. I went to Target yesterday and raided the clearance rack for clothes. I had a blast. I tried to buy lots of different sizes and kept thinking that a family on the waitlist could get their referral and the child would be wearing something that I purchased. I was holding back the tears in Target. I couldn't resist and did buy an Ohio State t-shirt. Hopefully a die hard Michigan family won't receive a referral picture with their kid in a t-shirt stating that they are a future Buckeye. (I secretly hope they do.)

As Damon and I were emailing back and forth with the travel agent this weekend, I started to think back to the last time I traveled outside the US and realized that it has been 10 years. Too long! Actually, it was EXACTLY 10 years ago that my friend, Liz, and I backpacked around Europe for a little over a month. I had spent the previous year teaching English in Japan and had saved the money for this trip. As it turned out Liz was one of the hostesses for my shower a few weeks ago. Damon and I have traveled a lot here in the States but haven't been overseas together as a married couple. I have to say that looking over flight schedules did make me nervous about navigating the long flight and layovers, packing all the essentials, wondering where we will stay, etc. So I decided it was time for some positive self talk. I reminded myself that I am fairly well traveled and that I DO enjoy exploring new places. Obviously there is a lot at stake with this trip that I haven't experienced in the past and I have never been to Africa but this won't be my first trip overseas.

I pulled out my photo album from my Europe trip and took a therapeutic walk down memory lane. It really did help to look at those pictures and remind myself that there is an adventurous person inside of me. I laughed at our lack of a plan. We knew the places we wanted to go but just took each location day by day and when we felt it was time to move on we did. Many times our lack of planning resulted in some "don't tell mom" moments. On one of those occasions we arrived in Heidelberg, Germany really late at night and all the hostels we called were booked. We contemplated sleeping in the train station! Eventually we decided to splurge and stay at the nice hotel near the station instead. We ended up doing the same thing a week or so later in Prague. Not smart. Liz and I split ways after spending a few days in Austria and she went to Italy and I went to Paris a few days before my flight home. I spent three days in Paris by myself. Where is that Emily of 10 years ago? I still can't believe I did that. I had some extra money that I had set aside so I stayed at a small but nice hotel near the Arc de Triumphe. You could actually see it from my hotel balcony. One of the days I made friends with three older American ladies and they doted on me for an afternoon. I am going to add working on channeling that braver, more adventurous version of myself to my to-do list.

I scanned in some of my favorite photos of the trip.

Stonehenge - 2000

Baby Shower - 2010

Have we changed much? Please don't answer that question.

Delay

Well, we didn't exactly get the news we were hoping for today but it wasn't all bad. There was a problem with a piece of paperwork so they wouldn't issue an opinion. The in-country staff at Gladney is optimistic they can get it resolved quickly. So our new date to have our paperwork reviewed is July 15th. They also gave us a federal court date of July 28th! The federal court date is when we have to appear in court. That date is still somewhat tentative pending everything goes okay on the 15th but since Gladney is optimistic I am going to try and be positive as well. The caseworker also told me that we should go ahead and look into booking our flights because if we wait until the 15th then that will be less than 14 days notice. Gladney has asked that we plan to arrive two days before the court date so that means we could be in Ethiopia on July 26th, which is less than a month away!! A big silver lining in all of this is that we could be in Ethiopia at the same time as Amy and Joel! Amy and I have always joked about how awesome it would be to travel together and now it might actually happen. If all goes through then that would be a huge blessing! I'm also hoping some of my waitlist buddies will get news of court soon and perhaps several of us will be there the week of July 26th! A girl can hope and pray, right?!

Thank you so much for all the love that was sent our way last night and today. Damon and I are so humbled by your support and encouragement. Delays like this are tough because I just want to see my boy but all of you help make this roller coaster of a ride easier for me. Thank you!