Wow we've been busy

The blog has taken a back seat recently as we have been busy with life! My mom and grandma came down and visited us this past week. We had a lot of fun.

We have truly been blessed by our decision to adopt from Ethiopia, as well as to use Gladney as our agency. If we had to make the decision again, we would choose Gladney. I have been meaning to post on our trip and just never ha\e. So here it goes:

If you live in the Houston area you might want to look into booking your own tickets. We thought you HAD to use a booking agency and realized that since we were in the Houston area we could just do it ourselves. For most of you, you will have to use a booking agency since it is to Africa you can't do it over the phone. For us it was a lot easier and cheaper. The only thing is you have to go to the airport to do this. We flew Emriates and LOVED it, we were treated so well the whole time and were blown away by their service. We had a place for Nataga to sleep that hooked into the wall, we were given hand puppets so he had new toys to play with, they gave us baby food, and baby essentials, they were always checking on us. The flights were good. I couldn't have been happier. If we ever fly that way again we would choose Emriates!

In Ethiopia we stayed at the Addiskidan Baptist guest house. My sister in law hooked us up and made reservations for us (you have to call over there to make reservations). We loved staying there. The people were nice and we had a blast. Plus we were able to see more of town since it was a while away from the Gladney guest houses.

I was so worried and had a hard time knowing our child was in an orphanage throughout the process. When we got there and I saw the care the kids received I would have felt comfortable to have had Nataga there months longer if I had HAD to. If I had known how well he was being looked after, it would have made the wait so much easier. I know his condition when he was brought in was AWFUL and honestly feel like he was nursed back to full health. I saw babies that had just been brought in, they were so sick and tiny. I could just see our son in those babies faces. It felt so good seeing them in Gladneys care b/c I knew that they would be like our little boy. They would go from the unhealthy condition they were brought into Glandey in, and go to a healthy child by the time their parents would come to get them. I was very thankful and owe so much to the women who work at the Gladney houses. They loved our baby and he is in excellent health, happy, and well adjusted. He is even ahead developmentally! When we picked him up his "Ethiopia mom" (the caretaker who looked after him the most) cried. You could tell she loved him and he loved her. Something that I think is special that Gladney does is they hire children who have been orphans themselves. They work closely with these children throughout their lives so they know who is trustworthy, etc. Gladney does a lot for Ethiopia's children even after they "age out" of the system. They really care for them! There were some other girls there that worked there as a job that just lived in Addis. All of the workers were EXCELLENT. I would love to spend an entire day/week with them and watch what they do b/c I am sure I could learn some pointers. They really impressed me and I can't say enough about that. I know several of the other families were surprised with what the care workers did also. Several of them remarked that their 18 month old babies (ours was much younger when we got him) helped get themselves dressed, helped when changing diapers, etc. I know they talked several times at how impressed also by how happy and well adjusted the kids were.

Traveling with a group was a lot of fun. We got to tour Addis with everyone and had time on our own to visit our child's birth country. It was important for me b/c I wanted to remember everything I could so I can tell Nataga about it some day when he gets older.

Okay well Nataga just woke up so I guess I'll have to finish this some other time.