Family letter

The other thing I did this weekend was write a letter to the boys' family in Burji. "Humbling" is not a word I use a lot, but sitting down to write that letter was definitely humbling. After deleting the boys' names, I made a word cloud out of the letter. I like that "family" and "always" are the most used words.

...and we have an embassy appointment!

Tickets are confirmed. Our embassy appointment is on April 30. We fly to Ethiopia a week before that, to complete the family visit to Burji before going to the embassy.
As before, we are hugely grateful to our generous family member who provided our tickets through frequent flyer miles.

So close now

Yesterday we received this email from the U.S. embassy in Addis:
"This office is ready to schedule an interview for the I-600 petition filed on behalf of [..]."
Which means our case cleared the embassy.
Which means the rest is a formality, a chance for us to appear at the embassy and express any concerns about our adoption process.
Which means we can go pick up lijochachin, our children.
We don't have an embassy appointment yet. We have reserved plane tickets based on our best guess for when the appointment will be, and we are waiting for the go-ahead from WHFC to confirm them.
I have a million things to do. I am able to do some of them. I finished clearing the weeds out of the garden today, because I don't want our kids to think we're bad farmers. I did some of the enormous amount of work left to do in the house. I did a lot of sitting and staring into space. Because that needed to be done, too.
Lijochachin. Innime'tallen!

a few updates

Some updates and thoughts from the last few weeks:

• We've received two emails from the U.S. embassy in Addis so far, and we're hoping to get THE email within a week. 
• I think about Trayvon Martin and Florida law enforcement every day.
• This month's 10% Challenge went to Ethiopia Reads, in honor of Liz.
• There are some other big changes coming up in our lives. I'll be blogging about them once the answers to basic questions are something other than "I don't know."
  

Good news!!!!!

We got the email we have been waiting for! All the Burji children have been released. Our agency appealed directly to the Minister of Women, Children, and Youth Affairs, and she stepped in and ordered the regional and local government to stop illegally holding our children. Five weeks after our court date, the children are finally on their way to Addis. "Relief" does not begin to describe what I'm feeling.

In terms of when we can bring the kids to the United States, the estimate is the same as it's been, two to four months. When the boys arrive in Addis, the countdown can finally begin!

Yay!!!!!!!