from HOMe to HOME part One

Because the last leg of the journey to bring Christabel HOME...and the beginning of our journey as a family of 6 are W-A-Y to long for one post, I have decided to brake it up into a few parts.

Today...part One: getting there & having our sweet girl in.our.arms!!

The last leg of the journey HOME began on January 7th. This happened to be Cam's 40th Birthday. I think he would agree that, as far as birthday gifts go, going to Ghana to bring home the daughter you have been fighting for for 16 months is a pretty amazing gift :]

We were excited to have our girls bring us to the airport

Last photo as a family of 5

And after a uneventful check in & security screening we were on.our.way! Anyone who has taken this [or any] international flight knows that it is a brutally long trip. Many hours stuck in a seat that is too small & no real way to get comfortable enough to sleep. But that is enough about that. It was pretty easy to forget about being uncomfortable knowing that at the end we would be reunited with our sweet Christabel!!

So. 3 flights & 27 hours later. Having visited Minneapolis & Amsterdam, and having seen this beautiful sunset...

we landed in Accra!! Which was far warmer & humid then our starting location :]

We made it through customs without a hitch. Retrieved ALL of our luggage. Exchanged our money for the week. Walked outside to find our welcoming party. And we were checked in to our hotel and off to sleep by 10pm.

Our first night was spent at the same guest lodge that we had stayed at during our first trip in August. We were given the same room & they all remembered us & asked "are you here to pick up your daughter?".

It was certainly good to be back in Ghana!!

We woke early for breakfast. We enjoyed the beautiful morning out on the balcony with memories of our meals with Tate & Tiarra back in August. We listened to the same birds singing...and the same women sweeping. We watched the same man come past with his empty cart...heading off to fill it with who knows what.

Our balcony view @ East Legon Guest Lodge

Our driver [Kofi] and our social worker [Esther] picked us up at 8am to head to the Bethany office for orientation and to get all the documents we would need for the visa appointment.

It was nice to reunite with the team in Ghana. But we were looking forward to getting to HOMe to see Christabel, so we headed back to Accra to nail down our accommodations for the week. [there was a misunderstanding about our reservation which prevented us from being able to stay here our first night]. We got it all worked out. Hauled our luggage up to the room. Made a quick stop at the mall for lunch [where we happened to run into Stacy & JohnBull Omorefe, the couple who run the organization that Tate & Tiarra volunteered at last summer, we were unable to meet them last time because our trip was too short, so...because God is BIG we, of course, ran into them at the mall!]

And...we were finally on our way out to HOMe!

Early afternoon we pulled up in front of the gate! We did not know if Christabel would remember us. And if she did, would she forgive us for leaving her the last time we were there? We were greeted by Pastor William...and we headed inside just as they were getting set up for lunch. Christabel was a little shy at first...but by the time she was done eating she was her bubbly, smiley self :]
We stayed for a few hours. We had decided to not take Christabel to the hotel with us right away. We wanted her to be able to get to know us on her terms and in her environment. We were both tired after our 27 hours of travel. So we headed back to get some rest for day 2.

Mercy & Christabel [aka Chipmunk] eating lunch

Our accommodations [the Pentagon Inn] were AMAZING! We were so glad that we had found out about this hidden gem. Most hotels in this area are very pricey...the Pentagon, however, was super reasonable! Less than the place we stayed last time [and that place was reasonable too]! One big plus to this place...HOT WATER! We did not have that last time...so after showering we settled in for the night.

Pentagon Inn

Saturday we ate breakfast at our hotel. Kofi & Esther picked us up and we headed back out to HOMe. All the kids would be there today. We were looking forward to seeing the boys that had been at school the day before. Things are a bit a lot louder with the boys home. The place was hopping when we arrived! We became jungle gyms for several children for the next few hours. We showed them pictures from our first trip & they loved looking at the pics of our dog on our phones. We took pictures of each of them...and some videos as well. We wanted to have these for Christabel. We hope that she will remember them & they will reunite someday [be it in the US or in Ghana]! After several hours we again headed back to the Pentagon [with a quick stop for dinner]. We had one more night to catch up on our sleep before we were bringing our sweet girl to stay with us for the rest of the trip.

Sunday started with breakfast at the hotel & we were picked up about the same time as the day before. We headed out to HOMe to pick up Christabel!! It happened to be one of the little boys birthdays, so we were treated to a special snack & we sung "Happy Birthday" to sweet NaNa Yaw!!

Birthday Boy!!

We packed Christabel up [and when I say that I mean we picked her up because she had only the cloths on her back]. We left HOMe knowing that we were coming back to say our final goodbyes on Thursday. We headed back into Accra to get dinner. We are pretty sure that this was the first time Christabel ate dinner at a restaurant. We got a little adventurous and found a restaurant that was suggested by one of the Ghana adoption pages we follow. It was new to our driver & social worker as well...and it did not disappoint! A lovely little Italian place with an even lovelier outdoor eating area called MamaMia's! Christabel tried pizza for the first time...but mostly shared chicken with me.

We headed back to our hotel. Christabel took a bath...which was hands down the cutest thing we had seen in Ghana. She got right down to business. She grabbed the cloth, asked for soap and washed herself from head to toe! She was a bit surprised that we just let her play in there for a little while :]
She was, of course, super excited about the new pj's that she got to wear. She LOVES new things. Her favorite saying became "is for me?" which we heard every time we would open a suitcase!

We put in a movie & climbed into bed & she fell right to sleep with no issues!! Monday was going to be a big day. We would head to the US Embassy bright and early to sit & wait for visa approval!

stay tuned for part Two: Visa Day & exploring Accra