Journey to our Beloved; 1st leg

Our adventure begins!  We had an amazing send off.  We spent the morning worshiping and getting prayed over with the ministry team at our church.  What a heartwarming morning. The rest of the entire day I felt complete peace!

Thus far we have traveled from Boise to Denver.  We had a bit of turbulence and Miss Emily says "our pilot is sure driving a little crazy"...oh, how I love this daughter of mine! From Denver we literally had to run from gate 90 across the airport to gate B22.  We heard them paging us and we still had several gates to go.  Emily's little legs were running just as fast as they could.  One of her shoes kept falling off and our carry on's started to feel really heavy. We literally arrived at the gate with only 1 minute before the gate would close. Whew!

From Denver we headed to Washington D.C.  It was such a blessing, a lady that we met who was seated behind us with her 4 year old son were super nice.  It just so happened that the row behind them was empty; Emily and her son Wyatt colored, did puzzles, and had fun.  We arrived 2 am shuttled to a hotel, woke up at 6 am and here we are in The Dulles Airport in D.C waiting to board.

Our next flight is with Ethiopian Airways.  This will be the LONG flight however upon arrival we will be in Ethiopia! After waiting 2.5 years it is time. We are about to meet the daughter that we have been loving from afar.  It is all so surreal and absolutely wonderful!!  We are on our way baby girl!

Each day I count my blessings. I have many things to be thankful for.  I have an amazing husband who has worked extremely hard to get us this far. He has been diligent, hardworking and faithful in pursuing his gift of photography.  Thank you Lord for blessing His work. I have a great family, dysfunction and all (just keeping it real), I have loving and kind friends.  Both nearby and many whom I have yet to meet but I hold them close in my heart.  I know I keep saying it over and over... but the love, encouragement and support has impacted me in such a way and it is beautiful.  God is showing me His plan and healing many hurts.  God is good and faithful.  I have been learning tough lessons about patience and trusting. Not fun at all, however I also know that through his refinement of my flaws and hurts I will become equipped to be a better wife, mother and friend. So Lord have your way with me.

Next post we will be from Ethiopia! Woohoo!

Love, peace and joy to you all,
Connie

Rick's Ramblings - Day 1 - Tue, 3/26/2013

After almost 3 years, we’re well on our way to Ethiopia to bring home our daughter, finishing this long journey.  A lot of people don’t understand our journey or what all it’s come to entail.  Someday we will share so much more of it.  It’s more than just choosing to be parents, so very much more.  It’s been an amazing journey and at times one that we weren’t sure what the end result would be.  It’s also been a journey of faith and one of God showing us His amazing provisions.  We wouldn’t be finishing this journey without His amazing grace and mercy and that of all of our family and friends who have sacrificed on our behalf.

Boise to Denver

This was a quick little jump on a smaller plane (4 seats wide) and we sat in the very back two rows.  We all had a great time.  Because of the smaller size of the plane we had to place two of our carry-ons under the plane in with the luggage.  It was a great flight with very little turbulence.  I had quite the chuckle when Emily had to use the tiny stinky bathroom within 5 minutes after take off, even though she’d just gone before boarding.  We also had the smoothest landing that I’ve ever experienced.  We had a great take off and flight with beautiful scenery all the way to Denver.  We landed 10 minutes early giving us almost an hour to get to our connecting flight.  Then it took almost 40 minutes to find a parking spot at the busy terminal.  It was like looking for a place to park at Best Buy on Black Friday.  We finally found an open terminal and were able to get off of the plane.  We found out our connecting flight was at gate 22.  I looked up and saw that we were at gate 88.  We had 15 minutes to run down the very long terminal to gate 22.  I had to wait for our carry-ons to be brought up to the boarding gate from the luggage compartment on the plane.  So Emily and Connie took off for the gate and Pop Pop and I waited for the extra carry-ons.  Once we got them we hurried off to our gate.  We arrived there with 6 minutes to spare.  However, Emily and Connie were no where to be seen.  They hadn’t already boarded, I had Emily’s boarding pass.  We didn’t see them as we hurried to the gate.  I asked them how long they would hold the plane.  She said they couldn’t hold the plane.  A little panic came to me.  I stayed with the luggage and had Connie paged while Pop Pop when running back down the terminal looking for the girls.  He found them with food in hand.  Connie decided to stop and get us all dinner for the flight, she arrived at the gate with about a minute remaining.  Nothing like cutting it close.  I was so thankful we all made the connecting flight.

Denver to DC

A little larger plane now (6 seats wide) and we’re sitting in the third to the back row.  It’s nice being this close to the restrooms when you travel with a couple of girls.  ;)  Sitting behind us is a mom with a 4 year old boy named Wyatt.  The very back row was empty so Emily and Wyatt sat in the back row.  Emily playing on her tablet and Wyatt on his.  They both kept sharing with each other and asking for additional assistance.  There was a little conflict between them here and there.  Emily being an only child up to this point and Wyatt being the baby brother in his family.  Emily not use to sharing and Wyatt always asking for things just to have them in his family.  It’s a fun dynamic and even among the occasional angst they are still having fun and working it out.  

After landing, we we’re so exhausted that we can’t wait to get to our hotel and get a few hours sleep.  But we couldn’t find our paperwork for our reservation.  Looking up the motel resulted in several with similar names.  God showed up again.  A shuttle from our hotel stopped by and the driver was so nice that he called the reservation desk and confirmed it was our hotel for us.  We were so thankful for his help and courtesy.  Once getting into our rooms we discovered that in the haste of last minute packing and a last minute decision to check one of the carry-ons, some items were checked.  We were missing basics like toothbrushes, change of clothes for two of us and toothpaste.  God provided again, the hotel had courtesy toothbrushes.  Finally in bed at approx 2am.  We have to get up at 6am for continental breakfast and to be to the airport by 8a.  

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