Our Trip to Ethiopia--Part 6, Our Ethiopia Experience....Our Last Day...and a surprise!

This was our last day in Ethiopia.  I can honestly say that I wasn't ready to go home yet.  I was loving Ethiopia....I was loving being with Tihun.....I was loving being at Layla and I was loving spending time with all of the wonderful people I finally got to meet in person!  Susan, Chris and Ivy...Shelly and Melissa and their hubbies.....miss ya lots!  I knew I was going to miss all of the adoptive families that we met on this trip and also the volunteers/families that were a part of Susan and Chris's group.....and I would miss our awesome driver and friend Jamal.  What it comes down to is that we met a lot of really great people and it's sad that everyone eventually has to go their own way.

I was sad because I knew how hard it was going to be to leave our girl and I was also realizing how much I had become attached to Debritu...T's favorite nanny.  Debritu has the biggest heart for these kids, you can just see the love she has for them in her face when she is caring for them.....I LOVE watching that.  Just thinking about it makes me smile.  If I could have packed her up in my suitcase, I would have!  =)  Funny....I think there were a few adults I said that about!

We went down to breakfast and by this day we had pretty much given up on breakfast all together and just went for the macchiatos.  I'm not really going to write about our trip home so I will just announce it here.  We got into Chicago and IT hit me....and hit me hard!  As we were walking from the gate where we landed to the gate that we were going to fly out of, I saw the Golden Arches.....whaaaa.....can you hear the sound of heaven?! I mean.....I do not frequent Micky D's but I walked up to that counter, looked up in complete awe and within an instant decided that I wanted at least one of EVERYTHING!  Ummm...yeah....I refrained from that impulse order, but this feeling lasted for a good week after we got home.  FOOD!  Good 'ol American type food....even if it was Mexican or Italian....you know what I mean.  I just wanted to eat everything.  Not good.  I have since recovered....thank goodness. Whew!

So we spent the morning with the toddlers as usual and took tons more pictures and video of them.  We loved on Tihun as much as she would let us and then we left the same way as we always did saying our "Ciaos" and blowing kisses.  We were scheduled to go shopping one last time with our trusty Jamal at the wheel.  But before doing that we ran into Ivy and decided to jump into her car really quick and ride to her house with her.  I had the privilege of sitting in the back with Alazar....just about the cutest kid in the world.  They were actually planning on heading to the Hilton to catch some sun and fun in the pool so that's pretty much all A had on his mind.  We pulled into Ivy's compound and she jumped out to go unlock the front door and Todd got out behind her.  I started to open my door and Alazar pounced on me!  "NO"!  He screamed, and he locked me in.  Ummm.....guess he didn't know that all I had to do was lift the door handle??  It took me a minute to figure out why he so desperately did not want me to get out of the car.....apparently he knew if I got out, his trip to the pool would be delayed once again!  I somehow managed to get him and I out of the car and we walked into Ivy's house to get the tour.  Beautiful is all I can say.  Simple but elegant.....but that's Ivy, with a lotta sass thrown in for good measure!  ;)

We headed back to Layla to meet up with Jamal....we hopped out of one car and right into the other.  We went over to a place called Churchill street.  This was my favorite place to shop by far!  The first store I walked into, the store owner offered me a cup of coffee.....now THAT's what I'm talking about!  =)  I bought an armload of stuff from her and then we went down to the next store.  OH MY WORD....I was in heaven.  This store had every single thing I wanted/needed.  This is now my favorite store ever in Ethiopia.  I told Jamal that he'd better remember it so that I can go back there next time.  You should have been there, it was quite funny.  Here's me shopping like there's no tomorrow and three men just watching in amazement.  Ok...so maybe two men....Todd probably wasn't as surprised as Jamal and the store owner were!  I saw Jamal eyeing up one of the scarves that I was going to bring back for the boys and I asked him if he like it and he was so cute.....he looked just like a little boy at Christmas with that embarrassed smile.  I said do you want one, we'll get you one?  "No"....he said.  I said come on...which one do you like?  "Nooo.........the black one".......I thought I would die laughing....so cute.  So I had the store owner get a black one down and I handed it to Jamal.  He said "thank you" and put it right on....with a big smile on his face.

We had Jamal drop us off at our hotel so we could unload all of our things before heading back to Layla one last time.

It was hard to go back this time because I knew it would be the last time.  We spent time with T and also spent time with some of the older kids.  It really wasn't as hard as I thought it was going to be to say goodbye to Tihun.....I think this is because she's not a baby.  With babies, you can cling on to them for dear life and they wouldn't care if you were wiping your tears on their pj's.  She's also not an older child. With an older child, they would start the attachment process and would understand that you wouldn't be back for quite a while....and they would visibly show you how much their heart is getting ripped out by your leaving....that would be hard.

She is a toddler, they are a breed of their own.  Very self absorbed and preoccupied.  She didn't understand how much we loved her, she just thought we were one of the many "Moms and Dads" that come and go....and for some reason she got to be the lucky kid who got to have US assigned to HER!  Some day I will be able to wrap my arms around her and she will love me back.....until then, I just stare at her picture....

We also said good-bye to a few other kids and staff before we left that day.  It was a harder walk back to the hotel and this time it wasn't the altitude.  =(

We got to the hotel thinking that we would have time to take a shower before we had to load up our suitcases on the Kings bus that was headed back to the airport ....but our driver got there an hour early so we had no time at all to even freshen up before we had to start out on our 30 hour journey back home.  Yuck!  So we went approximately 50 hours without a shower because we had one at 6:30 a.m. and it was now 6:30 p.m. and we still had 35 hours to go!  I shudder just typing this.  Needless to say, by the time we got to Chicago I was pretty darn grumpy.....and then they announced that our plane was broken.  So we had at least an hour delay, if not longer.


But as you can see, we lived to tell about our incredible 8 day journey that took us to the other side of the world and to our kids......oops!  I think I just let the cat out of the bag!  Yep, you heard it right....we couldn't stand to leave a certain 9 year old boy behind so we called up our agency when we got home and asked permission to be able to add him to our family along with Tihun.  We are SUPER excited and can't wait to get them both home!  For those of you who would like to see him....here he is:

Yep...I'm a tease.....sorry, we can't share until we pass court for him.  =)

More news to come.....stay tuned!