Days 5-6-7 (Wed-Fri)

Busy around here with Thanksgiving...hope all of your days were wonderful! It was a nice break from work for me and was great to be around the girls! Wow....I'm completely outnumbered!

Wednesday in Ethiopia was a lazy day, and by lazy I mean we didn't go anywhere. What I do NOT mean is it was an easy day. We hung around the hotel all day and she was B U S Y! I had the option to go back to Hannah's Hope, but didn't know if it was time for Juniper to see the special mothers again. We played with soccer balls in the exercise room, took pictures, and hung out on the porch with other families.

That night was the cultural dinner. I was a little hesitant to try the traditional cuisine, but I wanted to be able to tell Juniper (and Jana) about it when I got home. It was actually delicious. I wouldn't enjoy it for every meal, but it was a great taste of traditional food. It's not as spicy as Indian food, but the tastes are equally intense. Oddly enough, I hated Indian food before the trip, but we've had it twice since I've been home and I love it! It reminds me of my time in Ethiopia...

2 of the 3 meats were identifiable: chicken and goat....the 3rd remains unknown!
*UPDATE*: According to Andrew Zimmern, of the show "Bizarre Foods", the 3rd meat was most likely tripe (stomach). Oh wow.

The dinner started after Junie's bedtime, so she was warm and comfy the whole time!

Thursday was our final day in Addis. It was my 2nd favorite day of the trip because another family put us in contact with Ephraim, a local man who used to work for an adoption agency and now is a driver/guide. It was absolutely incredible. He looked at our paperwork (me and two other families, Jay and Chad) and found our kids all came from the same government orphanage! He took us there and we met with the assistant director who pulled all of our files and gave us more info about the birth moms, a complete tour of the facility, and a look at the day to day operation of the place! Incredible. While we were there, a van pulled up with 2 goats tied to the roof that had been donated by Hannah's Hope for the New Years Celebration. They were tied to a tree in a 2 foot by 4 foot patch of grass to graze until that night when they became the celebration meal! The government orphanages get funding from the government, but a lot of the support comes from agency orphanages like ours.

We drove around the city a bit and then back to the hotel to drop the 3 of us off and pick up my father in law. Ephraim took him back to the orphanage for him to see as well, then they went to a few lesser-known shopping areas. It was great. When we go back with the girls, I'll definitely do it again.

Cooking in the Government Orphanage

We said goodbye to some of the families leaving earlier in the day and then packed in the afternoon. We went by Hannah's Hope to say goodbye and get a few more pics of the Special Moms and Junie's room. The same little girl who was screaming because of me on Monday was screaming because she didn't want to leave me to be held by the Special Moms again! So...apparently we had bonded a bit!


We left for the airport at about 6:00 p.m. for a 10:45 flight! Yes, LOTS of time at the airport. Fortunately, we got right in and up to our gate. It was New Year's Eve for them (different calendar) so it was neat to see people out and about getting ready to celebrate. Even in the airport, the lounges and shops had long grass clippings spread over the floors and had coffee ceremonies going on! (Both traditional celebrations!)

Juniper slept almost the whole first flight, except when the flight attendant (is that the PC term?) made me take her out of the Moby wrap and facing her forward to put a pointless, silly, and completely unnecessary belt thingy that didn't offer any protection whatsoever. However, she did fall back to sleep and was just waking up as we were landing in Amsterdam. We were behind schedule, so the 6 hour layover was only about 3 hours. The airport is nice, so it wasn't too bad. I could send Jana pictures and video of Junie for a little sneak peak, which was great. They even had an art museum, so Junie and I got to see a real Rembrandt while we waited. Pretty cool.

Junie and I at the Amsterdam airport

The flight from Amsterdam to Minneapolis was a little tough. She was busy once again. Fortunately, everyone was great about it. We made it through customs in Minneapolis and I had just time to get my belt back on after the security screening (about 45 minutes because Junie was in the Moby wrap again!!!), walk to our next gate, and it was time to board our LAST flight home! The hour flight to Lincoln was spent wrestling her into a cute dress (Jana's term...) for her homecoming.

We had great friends and family waiting for us in Lincoln, and they even let Jana come to the gate to see her. (The first guy said no, but was shoved aside by a woman who said "Absolutely...I was adopted too." Amen!!!) It was so wonderful to see Jana, Paisley and Majil.

"Are you watching for them girls?"

"There they are!"

"Daddy and Junie are home!!"
thanks to Missy for the airport pics!!

Jana wasn't sure how Junie would take to her....


Apparently, just fine!


From that point until about 2 weeks ago is a blur. Just kidding....kinda.