We are back!

View outside of our hotel

Just a sneak peak!

Now that we have been home a few days and the jetlag is almost gone, I can finally update! There was no time for slowing down as we have returned to sick kids, cole wanting his training wheels off, and our pet rabbit that we adored passed away. It is never dull around here, but to say the least, we are so glad to be home and have treasured the time we have had hugging and kissing our kids that we missed so much! It has also been nice to return to American food. As much as we loved learning about the Ethiopian culture and the beautiful people, unfortunately, my stomach did not quite share the same love for the food. So to celebrate our return, we ate cheeseburgers and fries at "Five guys" on Friday and mexican food on Saturday night. Oh so good!

How can I even put into words how amazing our trip was to Ethiopia? Again, to be surrounded by such beauty and poverty at the same time. It was overwhelming at times the flood of emotions that would overcome us day to day. We stayed at a wonderful hotel with comfy beds, internet, restuarants etc... Then we look to either side at the shacks, mud, and hurting people surrounding us. It was crazy. The streets were filled with hundreds of people at all times. There were no stop lights or stop signs. The roads were always packed with taxis, bus, and people herding their cattle. If you do not have a horn, you can not survive on the road. The weather was beautiful and the sky was clear most days we were there.

We were blessed to be with another couple on the trip from CWA that also had traveled to meet their daughter. Ben and kari were such a blesssing and we are very thankful for God intersecting our lives through adoption and now we will share a life long friendship along with our daughters. We are amzed at how God has given them a heart for adoption. They have not had infertility etc.. but adoption is their first choice and we were able to experience them seeing their first child born through adoption! It will be neat to see how God will use their story to impact those around them.

To say the least we fell in love with Ally from the first moment we saw her picture and it came to life when we held her for the first time. We have said so many times how crazy it is and it just doesnt make any rational sense how we could be so bonded with this total stranger across the world. God is the only one who makes it make sense. We can not explain or make sense of it but just know that it is our blessing that God called our hearts to adoption and our daughter. lance looked at me on the plane and said" Thank you for being open to adoption and Im so glad God called us to this". The way lance loved, adored and bonded with his daughter continued to remind me of the incredible man I married. I am so grateful for him and this journey of life that we are on together.

Lastly, God continuously has brought to my mind the verse that he brought to me at the beginning of this journey, reminding me of the truth that Ally was not a coincidence, a mistake, we did not save her but God had her planned for this moment in time from before the foundations of the earth when he says in Psalms 139: 13-16 "For you created my inmost being, you knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made, your works are wonderful, I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. when i was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body. All the days ordained for me were written in your book of life before one of them came to be."