Moving Right Along (Again)...

This isn't me. I think this person is under the age of 10. But this is what I feel like! I don't think I realized how much the decisions we were making were weighing on me. I feel free!

We had our official orientation into the Ethiopian program this morning. Not too much is different between the Ethiopian program and the Guatemalan program. The biggest difference lies in how the children come to be at Hannah's Hope. In Guatemala, Hannah's Hope truly is an orphanage, where many children who are not available for adoption live until such a time when they can leave for one reason or another. In contrast, HH Ethiopia is more of a transition house than an orphanage. They hope to not have any child living there for more than one year. The children come to HH from government run orphanages, and they come based on the fact that our agency believes they can be placed with a forever family.

When we go to pick up our daughter, we will have the opportunity to not only spend time at HH, but also at the government-run orphanage where she initially was taken. That will certainly be an amazing experience!

Another interesting fact is that, in Ethiopian culture, a child is given her father's name. So when our daughter gets her documents to come into the U.S., her name will be David _____ Lyons. The "blank" will be whatever her given Ethiopian name is. So, if her Ethiopian name is Amaya, her passport will say David Amaya Lyons. David's not sure about this, but I've assured him that I'll get the readoption done here in the U.S. as soon as possible so we can get "David" out of first place in her name! For insurance purposes, until that happens, she will be known as David. Hilarious. That ought to be real fun for the insurance company to deal with!

For now, we need to update some portions of our dossier. Thankfully, the Ethiopian dossier is a breeze compared to the Guatemalan dossier. A few updated documents and we will, hopefully, find ourselves back on a wait list. I hope our number will be nowhere near as high as it was on the Guatemalan list (or, should I say, as low).

We simply cannot wait. I was in Old Navy today and found a onesie that was pink and said, "I was worth the wait." I wanted to buy it so badly, but I had no idea what size to buy AND I fear that by the time she comes home, it may be hotter than blazes here again and no place for a child to wear a long-sleeved anything!

Stay tuned!