The McDaniel Memoirs

Wow . . . not much more can be said about our day!! We started the day with a “paperwork party” where we filled out the rest of the needed paperwork for our embassy appointment on Wednesday, where we’ll apply for Isaiah Tamrat’s visa. Then we had lunch and orientation with the in-country director of our agency. It was a nice lunch, and very informative talking with Duni.
THEN, it was time to go to the transition home to meet our children. Pretty much all of the buildings here are surrounded by gated walls, usually with barbed wire on top. When we pulled through the gate, there was a nanny shoeing some kids off the front porch. Our mouths nearly dropped open – there was Isaiah Tamrat!!!! It was just a glimpse before the nanny hurried him back inside, but we knew it was him! Then we all got out of the vans and waited outside. The nannies bring the children out to their parents one at a time in alphabetical order. We had already arranged with each other who would take whose pictures so that everyone got pictures of their special moment.
It was amazing! He came walking down the steps and we got to pick him up and hold him and hug him and kiss him! And he gave us that same look that we’ve grown to love in all of the pictures taken by other adoptive parents, kinda like “who are you?” ;o) He is definitely very reserved at least for now – taking it all in! And he was giving EVERYONE that look, including the in-country staff that he knows! So many amazing moments from today!
A few of our highlights - he wouldn’t respond to us or anyone. Understandable in this situation, of course, but we still tried to find out what he wanted to do. It seemed that all he wanted to do was for us to hold him, but we weren’t sure if that was just because he was scared. So I decided to try to give him a granola bar . . . first change in expression . . . he scrunched up his little nose ;o) Apparently granola bars are NOT a favorite ;o)
Then we met with the dr. that works in the transition home. He had to get down off my lap for the dr. to show us something, but as soon as they were done, he inched back to my lap ;o) Then, he was very tired so we sat out on the front porch where he fell asleep on me ;o) No matter what we did, though, we couldn’t get a smile until . . . and all you who know Joe will LOVE this one . . . Joe took him to the little b-ball hoop and had him drop the ball he was holding through the hoop ;o) It was hilarious to watch him actually try not to smile, but we got a few out of him. And then a special moment, but not fun, was leaving again. Joe put him down and he didn’t want to walk away. Joe asked the nannies to tell him that he’d be back, so in Amharic they said “Daddy will be back.” Joe said his expression seemed to “drop” and the nannies said he didn’t want to leave us ;o)
Wow, tomorrow, Lord willing, our luggage is supposed to arrive, and then we go to pick up Isaiah to bring home with us – we can’t wait!!!
I’ll try to post some pics with this post, but I apologize in advance if it won’t go through.