Embassy Surprise! ....and I'm off!

Thursday, August 11 2011


I woke up in the morning and looked at my phone for new emails... and to my TOTAL SURPRISE I saw this!!!

ENTOTO STREET

P.O. BOX 1014

ADDIS ABABA, ETHIOPIA

Dear  All God’s Children                                                                                                                                            Date: 11 August 2011

This office is ready to schedule an interview for the I-600 petition filed on behalf of the below applicants.

Case Number:

Family Name:

Interview slots are available Monday and Wednesday at 9:00 am or Tuesday and Thursday at 1:00 pm. Please select your 3 preference dates and send us an e-mail. We will send you a confirmed appointment date after checking our available slots. Make sure you get our confirmed appointment date for parents to come for their appointment.

The fee for the visa interview is USD 404.00 per applicant. If the family is adopting more than one child, who are not siblings, there will be an additional fee of USD 720.00 for the I-600 petition. You may pay in local currency at the current rate of exchange.

When communicating with this office, please provide agency name, child’s full name and case number exactly as shown in this letter.

Please note that the next available slot we have  is starting from August 15, 2011.

Sincerely,

 Adoption Visa Unit

WOW!! WHAT???!!! REALLY??!! YIPPPEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!! :)

We didn't even know our file had been submitted to the U.S. Embassy... so to read that we HAD CLEARANCE was such a SURPRISE! A HUGE BLESSING, and an ANSWER to prayer! ...and there I was at home alone crying and screaming with excitement and running all over THRILLED to death!!!  I called Erik, texted the Givens and quickly got a hold of Erica to make my flight arrangements!!!!
 
The night before I left to Ethiopia there was a BIG year-end softball party.  I decided to skip out on packing till later so we could enjoy some AWESOME friends, food and FUN!  ...Just before we were ready to head out - my friend John gave me a loaded squirt gun... Hmmmm... what to do? Definitely couldn't let a little FUN go to waste!! hehehe! :) Sooooo I gave Erik a gooood squirt down! ha ha ha! - after some struggle - I ended up in the POOL! FULLY CLOTHED! ha ha ha! Well... he definitely didn't get away with it - cuz I pushed his boooty in too!! :) We had a LOT of laughs and I'm sure were quite entertaining to our buds! ha ha! ...told everyone good bye and got our soggy bottoms in the car to head home and finish packing!!!

We loaded up FOUR 36 gallon containers filled to exactly 50 pounds each with donations from some REALLY amazing people to take to Betzatha (the orphanage where Mihret spent some time and desperately need the help). *** THANK YOU SOOOOOOOOOOOOO Much to ALL the AWESOME folks who donated a TON of diapers and formula!!! THANK YOU!!! ♥

Was I nervous to go alone? No. Not really.  I was looking forward to it... I knew Mihret may have trouble bonding to us right away and to be honest... I was a lil selfish - I wanted her to bond to me first, to look to me for her meals, attention, bathing...  and REACH for me. I wanted to make that connection first (sorry Erik) :) ... he had also just started a new project at work and was able to cart Mihret's BIG sisters around. :)

I think we got about 3 hours of sleep (okay maybe less) :) ... my plane left at 6:30 a.m. and I am compulsively early... so, I wanted to be there at like 3:00 or 3:30! :)  Well... the employees didn't show up till 4:00 a.m. ...and of course, we packed all the stuff in and stood at the wrong line... ha ha ha!  It felt like we changed lines we were in about 3 times before we finally hit the right one. We got a little nervous when they weighed all of our bags and the containers. 2 of them were over weight, so Erik helped me take a few things out and add them to another container.  United was not so kind to wave the extra baggage fee (even after begging and showing them AGCI's donation letter). Whatever. Totally worth it! :)  I gave Erik a big SMOOCH goodbye and I was off!!

...OFF to get OUR LITTLE GIRL and BRING HER HOME FOREVER!!!!