One year ago today...

Us at the airport early in the morning...


Our bags before we left.

One year ago today Adam's dad picked us up and we left super early in the morning to head to the airport and make our way to Addis Ababa Ethiopia.

It's crazy to think at this time last year we were sitting in the airport in DC waiting to board our Ethiopian Airlines plane and head to our son.

I have done alot of reflecting this week. I always reflect about our trip but this week just more than normal.

So much was happening at once and it was so hard to process. I have to admit I am glad it isn't this time last year :) I was 10 weeks pregnant with Emery and we were headed to bring home our 3 month old baby boy. Wow, so much to process. It was hard to get excited about the trip as I was feeling terrible. When I am pregnant I have horrible morning sickness.

In DC we met up with other families that were in our travel group. Some of them were families that I had been following their blogs. It's interesting meeting people that you had been following along with. We sat for awhile waiting for our plane. I had a peppermint mocha from Starbucks. yum...Adam didn't get anything because we didn't want to run out of money...(read 2 paragraphs down)

While waiting at the DC airport we get a call from Adams mom saying that Hazel had thrown up. Great! My 2 year old daughter that I had never left (except for one overnight stay at a hotel in our same city) was sick and I was getting ready to be 8,000 miles away! All I could do was pray for her. I knew she would be taken care of, but she needed her mommy.

Also waiting at the airport we discovered neither of us brought our debit/credit card. We had lots of cash, but what if we ran out????? Luckily that did not happen! :)

It was such an exciting time with mixed emotions. Leaving our 5 and 2 year old daughters was tough. Being on a plane for lots and lots of hours feeling like I was going to throw up was not fun either! Luckily it only happened once. God really had His hand in this trip because I felt better in Ethiopia than I did at home. It may have been the adrenaline, but really it was, I am sure, God.

I cried when I left the girls that morning. They were sleeping. I am so glad that we had to leave so early. It would've been too hard leaving them when they were awake. I cried on the way to the airport, I cried when our plane took off, I cried when our plane took off from DC, I cried as we were landing in Addis. and I cried when we got into the van headed to our hotel. Yes, I did alot of crying that first day. I guess being pregnant and hormonal didn't help! :)

This past year had been crazy. So many adjustments for us in so little time. It's gone so fast and I am so grateful that it did. Now time can slow down again :)

I will post more reflecting on our trip on Zek's gotcha day December 13th. WE are having a little party just with our family and going out to eat Ethiopian.

Here's the post from one year ago yesterday... http://knowingnobounds.blogspot.com/2009/12/leaving-tomorrow-morning-for-ethiopia.html





flying to DC sunrise and the moon


Our departure time


Our plane