Our trip to Ethiopia was ALL things! ……Here are a few words to describe it….

Amazing, awing, breathtaking, eye-opening, so sad, beautiful, gracious, overwhelming, astonishing, shocking, miraculous ….

We arrived on Christmas Eve and spent most of that day adjusting to the time change, we visited with a family that arrived a day earlier and waited for another family to arrive on Christmas day.

Christmas day 2010 is a day we will never forget it! God so graciously answered my prayers for a new memory for Christmas this year being our first Christmas morning without my Dad…My heart will forever hold the beautiful memories of my Dad, I miss him terrible, but I know that I know that I will see him again! And for that I am grateful! My gift this year was huge… sweet memories of Christmases past united together with new memories to treasure in my heart as the day we first held our sweet girls. (This is where the word awing came in)

Each day we spent hours playing and getting to know them better. Little (B) is beautiful and spunky. She has a mind of her own and LOVES to talk, she couldn’t be any cuter! Little (T) is gorgeous and sweet. She is playful and reserved, just darling! Both of them had us laughing. It was surreal…

Court went well, the judge seemed wonderful and it took all of 5 minutes. We are still waiting for the official word. We are waiting for our letter from MOWA to officially be the forever parents of these two precious girls. Please keep all of us and this process in your prayers…

This “wait” is the hardest “wait” of all… Can you imagine leaving your child half a world away? I knew it was going to be hard but that’s a HUGE understatement.

As I thought and prayed this morning this quote came to mind and for me on this side of adoption it has never been so real……….


"Orphans are easier to ignore before you know their names. They are easier to ignore before you see their faces. It is easier to pretend they're not real before you hold them in your arms. But once you do, everything changes." David Platt

Everything has changed! My heart has been opened in a way I never knew before. I feel a longing and a sense of urgency I have never felt before. I have questions I never had before, I saw things I never saw before, I felt things I never felt before……..”Everything changes” is pretty much right on!

Praying for Godspeed to bring our sweeties home….

(can’t show faces until we get the official word)