Tag Archives: Milo

Home from Ethiopia

Lexi & MiloIt’s hard to believe a few days ago I was in Africa. We made it home Friday afternoon with Milo and Lexi thoroughly embraced her big sister role.

A lot has happened and there’s a lot to say, but for now we’re doing OK. The plane ride home went surprisingly well (yay for the bulkhead!) and Lexi did great while we were gone. But by Saturday reality started to set in as Abby got sick while Milo spit up an entire bottle on me and Lexi threw a fit. The night and morning were a bit rough but by Sunday night I think we’re starting to get a handle on things. I hope.

We’ll have a lot more to say about everything, but that’s a basic update. It’s good to have the four of us in the same place.

Oh, and photos are starting to go up on Flickr (there’ll be many, many more).

We Leave Tomorrow

In less than 24 hours we’ll be on a plane for Ethiopia to bring home our son. It’s been such a long wait. And it’s almost here.

As the hours tick down, I love how all the extra stuff falls away and doesn’t matter anymore. My last day has been flittered away with random tasks here and there, none of which really matter. It doesn’t really matter if I heard the conference call my wife already heard a week ago. It doesn’t really matter if I write that blog entry today or not. It doesn’t really matter if I clean off my desk or not.

As I’ve told about everyone I can, you can follow along at our adoption site. My latest blog posts (if you come here you already know where to find them) will be there—many are just pre-programmed updates of what we’ll be doing each day— as well as my on-the-ground Twitter updates (assuming it all works).

I’m awash in emotion right now. I’m so excited to meet Milo and hold him in my arms. I’m eager to see his homeland and the country where he was born. I’m worried about Lexi and how she’ll do without us for 10 days (and how Grandma will cope with 10 days of Lexi). I’m expecting to be broken as the reality of this 19-month journey finally comes together.

Some things in life just wash over you, flooding you with grace and love and mercy and hope. That’s already happened so many times in this journey, but now we’ll be diving into it. Can’t wait.

A Week of Highs and Lows

If a week could suck, this one would be it:

  • Found out Milo has been sick for a week with gastroenteritis. He’s doing better, but the little guy doesn’t have much weight to lose (Today we visited a two week old baby who’s bigger than 4-month-old Milo).
  • Lexi threw up in her car seat on the way home from visiting said baby.
  • Friends went through another miscarriage.
  • Other friends in Sudan wait to see if they’ll be evacuated.
  • Confronted a family crisis and the related fallout.
  • A week of workplace drama escalated like a bigger/better party.

On the plus side:

  • Distractions abounded, including the flurry of a U2 album release (did you see them do the top 10 list on Letterman?).
  • I found out exactly how much the Federal government owes me (it’s like my own personal bailout!).
  • Mazie didn’t eat anything she wasn’t supposed to (well, except for the feet of a little plastic girl of Lexi’s, but that doesn’t bother me because Lexi didn’t put it away).
  • Ate at Los Cabos for the first time in months. Mmm… tasty.
  • Two friends welcomed healthy, happy babies into the world.
  • And best of all, I get to meet my son in two weeks.

Sometimes life is hard and messy and ugly, but there’s always beauty. In that sense, I’m an insufferable optimist. Life may not always be happy, but it is joyful.

When Regular Life Falls Away

Two weeks from today we’ll be heading to the airport. We’ll spend a few hours on the ground in Washington, D.C. (never been there before), and then fly across the Atlantic (never done that before). We’ll spend maybe 45 minutes on the ground in Rome (my first contact with Europe) and then fly off to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (yeah, never been there either).

If you noticed the trend, you could probably guess my international travel experience begins and ends with Canada. So this is going to be new and different. Plus that whole thing where I get to meet my son. It’s hard to put into words exactly what we’re feeling right now.

We’re excited. We’re stressed. We’re giddy. We’re tired. We’re overjoyed. We’re busy.

We’ve got a lot to do. Our to do list keeps getting longer, but we’re hacking away at it. It’s amazing how the things of everyday life begin to fall away as you realize what’s really important. Some of my side projects are being neglected right now. Other distractions I just don’t have the time for. I do still manage to find time for certain stress-reducing diversions (preserving sanity is a priority). There’s somehow time for tickling, laughing or just sitting with Lexi. What needs to happen does, and the rest falls away.

Continue reading When Regular Life Falls Away

Say Hello to Milo

Milo Looking at this New FamilyOur adoption case cleared court today and Milo is officially our son.

Woot, woot!

We’re obviously ecstatic. You can check out all the pictures of Milo over at Flickr. Many thanks to everyone who prayed that we’d make it through court OK.

From here they’re telling us it will be roughly 6-8 weeks until we can travel to Ethiopia and bring Milo home. Before today it was 5-6 weeks after we cleared court. I don’t know what changed that time frame, but I’m trying not to be bitter about it (It’s hard to be bitter on a day like today when we get the news, but I’m also tired of time frames always getting longer. I want to bring my boy home.)

I don’t know what else to say. We’ve been in this process since August 2007 (nearly 19 months now) and sometimes it feels like a labor that won’t end. But we’re getting close. So painfully close.

I wish adoption were easier. But I keep telling myself it has to be this hard and slow and expensive to make absolutely sure everything is in Milo’s best interest. And that’s worth it.

Update: OK, I’m still trying to tell myself that. But waiting sucks. This story of a kid crying for her adopted siblings made me bawl. It’s part joy, part longing, part aching—and part anger for the circumstances that make adoption necessary and the red tape so profuse. My head understands all that, but my heart doesn’t care.

Another Update: OK, the shifting travel times were apparently just a mistake. Forget 6-8 weeks, we should be able to travel in 4-6, which means late March or early April.