Endless Love

We feel the love and THANK YOU! We have been so touched by the support that we continue to receive throughout our adoption process. After we received our immigration approval we decided to share our news with everyone and were overcome with messages and calls of support. We are so thankful for the abundance of love and support which our daughter is already receiving.

"Smile at each other, smile at your wife, smile at your husband, smile at your children, smile at each other – it doesn’t matter who it is and that will help you to grow up in greater love for each other." ~ Mother Teresa

Dossier is now complete

We are still on cloud 9. Our dossier is complete and now in the hands of our adoption agency. The dossier will go to the Department of State for approval and then off to the Ethiopian Embassy in Washington DC. This process should take about two to three weeks and then our our dossier is off to Ethiopia. We have successfully completed another step in this beautiful journey of love.

“Everything has rhythm. Everything dances.” ~ Maya Angelou

I-171H

Oh the long awaited day has come! We checked our mail today and found our immigration approval, the I-171-H!!! We have been so patient that our excitement was over flowing. Our neighbors came out of their house to see what was going on....as I was jumping up and down and dancing in the streets while Pete was driving in circles! I know it sounds silly but we have been waiting for so long...WHOHOO!!!!! Now we can drop off the dossier at our adoption agency and begin the REAL wait. Oh happy day!

“Without leaps of imagination, or dreaming, we lose the excitement of possibilities. Dreaming, after all, is a form of planning.” ~ Gloria Steinem

Ethiopian Coffee

Did you know that Ethiopia was the birthplace of coffee: it is in the forests of the Kaffa region that the coffee bean grew wild. Click on this link to learn about the amazing story behind how coffee was found in Ethiopia. 

Ethiopia produces some of the most unique and fascinating coffees in the world.  The three main regions where Ethiopia coffee beans originate are Harrar, Ghimbi, and Sidamo (Yirgacheffe).

Ethiopian Harrar coffee beans are grown on small farms in the eastern part of the country. They are dry-processed and are labeled as longberry (large), shortberry (smaller), or Mocha (peaberry).  Ethiopian Harrar coffee can have a strong dry edge, winy to fruit like acidity, rich aroma, and a heavy body.  In the best Harrar coffees, one can observe an intense aroma of blueberries or blackberries.  Ethiopian Harrar coffee is often used in espresso blends to capture the fine aromatics in the crema.

Washed coffees of Ethiopia include Ghimbi and Yirgacheffe. Ghimbi coffee beans are grown in the western parts of the country and are more balanced, heavier, and has a longer lasting body than the Harrars. The Ethiopian Yirgacheffee coffee bean, is the most favored coffee grown in southern Ethiopia. It is more mild, fruitlike, and aromatic. Ethiopian Yirgacheffee coffee may also be labeled as Sidamo, which is the district where it is produced.

I wish that we could say that we have gone to Ethiopia to try their amazing coffee first hand...but instead we had to settle for starbucks. As we walked into starbucks to get our coffee we noticed the "Ethiopia coffee beans" on the shelf and proceeded to buy. We are waiting to open it until we we receive our I-171H and can start our "official wait."  We are eager for the day when we can experience a true Ethiopian Coffee Ceremony IN Ethiopia.

A little update on CIS

Well today we called CIS about our update. We were prepared to once again get our officer's voice mail, however we were lucky in that OUR officer actually answered the main phone line today. I almost jumped when I heard her voice (funny how I have only heard it a few times but already it has become distinct in my memory). When we asked about our progress and being #5 a month ago she proceeded to say "well I know I said #5 but I misinformed you. You were #5 in the second stack and your file has finally reached my desk today (meaning we were probably #5 in the third stack)." It was received with mixed emotions. We were thrilled to hear that we actually made some good progress over the last few weeks however we couldn't help but feel a bit frustrated with the initial indication of the placement of our file. After hearing the news I conveyed our appreciation for her work, both as a adoption professional and as an adoptive family. We have no doubt that she is working as hard and fast as she can (she is even working through the weekends). We figure this is what her desk looked like! We continue to focus on the journey and patiently await holding our beautiful daughter in our arms...when that happens all the wait will pale in comparison to the joy she will bring in our lives FOREVER!

"If we are facing in the right direction, all we have to do is keep on walking." ~ Buddhist Proverb

No news.....waiting patiently

“A journey is like marriage. The certain way to be wrong is to think you control it.” ~ John Steinbeck

We would be lying if we said we weren't thinking about our immigration paperwork and getting a little antsy. Although we had hoped to have our approval already, we are not letting our mood become negative and instead just focusing on the tasks at hand and planning for the future.

I have these two pendants hanging from my mirror and I look at them constantly. Today I was looking at the map of Africa and thinking about our journey of love. Is she conceived yet? How is her birth mother doing? How is their health? Then it came to me. Here I am feeling how hard it is to wait for paperwork approval when people in Ethiopia struggle everyday just to get their basic needs met. They have to walk several hours just to get to a road, they often don't have clean water, there are so many things that I take for granted on a daily basis. It humbled me yet again. I took a deep breath feeling the love we already have for this child and her culture. Some day...some day it will happen. It will happen when it is right, when she is ready and when we are ready...when it is meant to.


Once you make a decision, the universe conspires to make it happen.  ~Ralph Waldo Emerson