Saturday, August 30, 2008

Wow What A Day!




Just came back from a night swim at the pool and had to share a picture. Can you tell we are in love! We all shared lunch together and yes.. pizza again. Our staple diet is pasta, pizza and machiatos! Off we went to Hana’s Home. It was exciting to see her new place which is much bigger and offers more space for the kids to play. I recognized so many faces from last year.. only now they are bigger. Surafel was amazing as a translator and explained to the kids what we would be doing. Thanks to all of you for the wonderful supplies. We were able to bring six bags of supplies, gifts and activities! We set up stations doing face painting, soccer, playing with the parachute/inflated beach balls, crafts and I washed feet and gave pedicures to about 20 girls. It was a privilege and pure joy to see the delight as I massaged their feet and painted their toes. Something I am sure most of them have never had the pleasure of. It’s common place for all of us to get our nails done and something we take for granted. The parachute was a huge hit with the little ones. Thanks to the Hardy’s for letting us steal theirs! The kids had an amazing day but honestly I know that my family received more from them than we gave to them. Tam and Maddy had a blast and were running around with ease and comfort with all the kids. We were also able to leave $1300 for Hanna to continue supporting the 160 kids that she is taking care of. She has now opened up two other centers in other parts of the country where babies and children are currently living in prisons with their mothers. What a work she is doing! All the kids were asking if we were coming back tomorrow? Of course I burst into tears as each one of them came up to hug, kiss and say God Bless You to each of us.

It is incredible watching Tam each day. He is talking more, singing and belly laughing with his sister. He has such a sweet personality and just keeps saying “May I please go swimming at the pool Mommie?” Stefan I commented on the change tonight as we put him to bed as compared to the first night. He was all grins tonight as he hugged his little dog and when I bent to kiss him and say goodnight he grabbed my neck and pulled me back and gave me a big squeeze. Tomorrow we are going back to his foster home to do some paperwork in preparation for our embassy appointment on Tuesday. We took a ton of pictures at Hanna’s but clumsy me I broke our USB port which downloads our pictures so I am not sure I’ll be able to send anymore. I was hoping to send some from Hanna’s. Thank you for all your prayers! Another prayer request is for Stefan as he was playing soccer with the boys at Hanna’s and fell on his hand. It’s pretty swollen and we are hoping it’s nothing serious. Don’t want to make any trips to the hospital while we are here.

Just came back from a night swim at the pool and had to share a picture. Can you tell we are in love!

Love to all of you...

Our First Day!





It was a long flight but we made it safe and soundly and with all 13 bags! Can you believe it! Our hotel room could not be more perfect! Lots of space for the extra bags and thanks to Edwin Miller we had a dozen roses in the room when we arrived. We all were able to sleep and woke up this morning with great expectation to see Tam! Our appointment was for 10:30am. We pulled through the gates and I could see him sitting on the steps and I watched recognition in his face as he saw me in the van. It felt almost surreal as we met him. He did not run into our arms or leap for joy but was very appropriate considering he has never met us and we are strangers to him. We spent some time at our agency’s care center learning a little more about him. Of course he got glowing reports. “Brilliant” was one of the adjectives used to describe our new son. I can only say that he is more precious than I could have ever imagined.

We had the privilege of delivering two photo albums for our friend’s the Huges who have two children in the same care center as Tam. We got to meet both of them and give them their albums. They are beautiful children who were so excited to learn that their friend Tam would only be living 10 minutes away from them.

We headed back to the hotel for lunch and Kara you will never guess who I ran into in the lobby! BeBe! He was our translator on our missions trip last summer. He then shared lunch with us and was great help with Tam at lunch in talking to him. We then traveled about an hour to the Adera orphanage where Tam was dropped off by his birth mother. It was obvious that Tam was adored by the Director and his wife and they admitted that he had actually spent more time in their home than at the orphanage. We brought donations, took pictures, learned more about Tam and I was able to leave a letter and pictures for his birth mother. We were so glad we went as it was touching to meet the people who had cared for him and had loved him so much.

After a very long day we headed back to our hotel to see yet another old friend, Surafel! He had come to the Hilton to try and find us and just as we were coming through the lobby from our day we ran into him. He shared dinner with us and was such a blessing as he translated so many things for us to Tam. We were worried about whether Tam knew any English? Well, he is reading Madeline’s chapter books? I think he is still shy to speak but I suspect he knows lots of English. He can certainly read and can beat Madeline in running down the hotel hallway!

We miss our sweet Bella and hope she is doing well! It’s late here so I am going to sign off by saying God is good! More to come tomorrow!


Tam slept through the night with out any issues although he looked a little nervous as we put him to bed. His personality has come out so much more today. He is so sweet and fun. He called me Mommie which made me tear. We suspect he knows way more English than he is letting on as he can read Madeline’s chapter books. When we ask him questions about colors, numbers, and body parts he knows them well. He is way ahead of where we thought he would be. He eats Ethiopian food for breakfast, lunch and dinner which consists of sponge like bread called injera along with a very spicy meat. I don’t think he has ever had any other types of food. We took him to the pool for his first every swim. How fun it is to see him experience things for the first time. It was a beautiful day today so we got to swim and they also have a park for kids where he had a blast swinging and sliding and teether tottering! We are back in the room now as he naps from 1pm-3pm? I think I am going to try it with Maddy! Maddy just peeked in on him and said he is sucking his thumb. Tomorrow we will be visiting Hanna’s to play with kids and deliver supplies. Please pray for Tam’s finger as he has a bad cut that is infected. He also has a severe cough so we started him on antibiotics the first day we picked him up to try and prevent possible anything serious from developing.

We had the pure pleasure and joy of being giving Tam his first ever ice cream. He has had so many firsts in just two days! Eating ice cream, riding in an elevator, trying fruit roll ups and going swimming. We are continually amazed at how much English he already knows. Today Stef went to work out and we walked by to say hello and Tam said “Sports club.” Who knew? Maddy and Tam are bonding like crazy giggling and laughing and racing down the long hallways in the hotel to our room. She told me today that “she loves her brother and that he is so much fun.!” I told her to give it a few weeks! Of course we are in the honeymoon period but loving every minute of it. Thinking of you all and so appreciative of your love, support and prayers!

Just wanted to share a cute picture of the kids together after racing down our long hallway to our room. Madeline let Tam beat her the first few times but no longer.

Blessings...

Thursday, August 28, 2008

We Are In Rome!


We just landed in Rome where we have an hour layover while they refuel the plane. The above picture shows our friend Bruce Hardy who graciously drove us to the airport, the porter and all of our r3 bags which totaled over 650 lbs of supplies ! Wow, we got everything on. Many thanks to Laura Didhardt who spent hours with me packing, weighing and tagging bags to make sure they were all under weight. Nine of our bags are filled with humanitarian aid thanks to many of you. We had two young boys in our neighborhood, Colin Wohlfert and Josh Kuzbell who really set out to make a difference. They decided to raise money and donations for an organization called AHOPE who is on the ground in Ethiopia caring for children with HIV where they have two orphanages. They care for these kids physically, emotionally and spiritually. They are doing an amazing work and will be so blessed by the 200 lbs. of donations that we are bringing to them. What a blessing! As I reflect on our last days before we left, I am thankful for so many people who made it possible for this happen. Kim Miller who so graciously hosted Madeline for days so I could pack and get things done! Our couples small group who came to our house after hours to sit in Tam’s room and pray for him and our trip. My Mom who has spent countless hours behind the scenes making meals, doing laundry, ironing (yuck) and loving on my kids. Thanks to all of you who have been so good to us.

Monday, August 18, 2008

A New Picture


We have a confirmed US embassy date of 9/2/2008 , confirmed airline seats and confirmed hotel rooms so it finally feels real! We depart on Wed, August 27 and will return on Saturday morning, August 28. Wow! What are the chances that anyone would have a contact to Ethiopian Airlines. My answer is that it was not by chance that our good friend Steve Johnson had a client with close connection to Ethiopian Air. Steve was so gracious and helped us secure deeply discounted tickets saving us over $1200.00. I love it when you see God meet needs so unexpectedly. I was also put in touch with an Ethiopian lady who works in Human Resources at Mclean Bible Church. Where does she live? Just moved to Ashburn and is willing to help us with translation and language when Tam comes home. What a blessing! It looks like the orphanage shaved his head! I cannot wait to get my hands on him. Now he just needs some new shoes!

Tuesday, August 12, 2008

14 More Days & Counting


We have a confirmed US embassy date of 9/2/2008 , confirmed airline seats and confirmed hotel rooms so it finally feels real! We depart on Wed, August 27 and will return on Saturday morning, August 28. Wow! What are the chances that anyone would have a contact to Ethiopian Airlines. My answer is that it was not by chance that our good friend Steve Johnson had a client with close connection to Ethiopian Air. Steve was so gracious and helped us secure deeply discounted tickets saving us over $1200.00. I love it when you see God meet needs so unexpectedly. I was also put in touch with an Ethiopian lady who works in Human Resources at Mclean Bible Church. Where does she live? Just moved to Ashburn and is willing to help us with translation and language when Tam comes home. What a blessing!