1 Week to Go.....

and counting. I'm ready to start counting the days now...... The last 7 weeks have flow by. We've been so busy trying to finish up the house, racing against the clock. I've looked back at how at the weeks have flown by. Today feels like it should be Friday. and honestly, I'm afraid the next 7 days are going to drag...like a child waiting for Santa to come.

We've started pulling together the stuff we need to pack: perishable food items for the plane, some humanitarian aid. Thanks to our wonderful church, Front Street Baptist Church , who supplied all of the diapers and wipes!!! My dining room table is starting to look like a packing table. I've hesitated to start packing until we passed court, for fear of having to unpack, like we did once before with Pickle's adoption, but I honestly have peace about our court date next week.

Last week, we received an amazing update with pictures of the kids. I stared at their picture on and off for hours and then days. It finally became real to me....I let myself get excited at the prospect of the reality of them finally coming home. It's been 5 1/2 months since our referral. We were wearing winter coats........today we are in shorts and flip flops. For many months, I had to shut my emotions down in order to get through the days and weeks. To watch others get court dates and travel before us was more than I could bear. It hurt so much. To love them so much, without being able to hold them was a form of torture for me.

And here we are, on the cusp of our court date. A myriad of emotions are running through me: anxiousness, nervous, excited, and a bit scared all at the same time. I just want to hold my babies.......and tell them in Amharic that I love them.

......and then I think of Coffeemom, who I haven't been able to get off my mind for days, and I somehow feel guilty (that's that Catholic upbringing coming back to haunt me!) for getting excited when they are now stuck in limbo. The court date is the final hoop you have to get through in international adoption, at least for Ethiopia. And yet, with that behind them, they are still left with feelings of uncertainty and the road ahead is unknown...new unchartered territory for international adoption. This road of international adoption is hard.....the highs are high and the lows are low. Unfortunately, you don't see the change coming either. Yet, in the end, when you meet your child(ren) for the first time, it all slips away.....until the next time. When, for us, the challenges and obstacles have been tougher than the first time. I ask myself all the time: God...what do you want me to learn from this experience????? So far, I can stand back and see how God has worked during the delays, but during those moments, we don't understand. We don't WANT to understand. Our inate mothering instinct works overtime and nothing we can do can change that.....

So, as time has slowed down, the house project still looms on. We are making progress by working til dark every night. David has taken time off work the past three days to try and get finished. I'm not sure if we'll make it or not, but we are close.....