Preparation continues...

One thing that many adoptive parents prepare for their child(ren) is a backpack of special items for them to enjoy on the trip home. The older the child, the more "sacred" these backpacks are to the child as these could quite easily be their very first possessions to call their own.

I was a little shocked by that when I saw it first hand. I shouldn't have been, I guess. Keeping possessions separated at an orphanage would be an impossible task. But, coming from a Western world-view where one of the first words is most children's vocabulary is "MINE", it was surprising to see.

In Wondimu's room, for instance, there are about 12 children. There is one large dresser which houses all the clothes for all of the kids. The first day we met Wondimu we dressed him in a new outfit we got for him. The next day we came back and saw a different child wearing those clothes. The other kid looked really cute, too.

All the toys are shared and they all fit in one medium sized tupperware. We noticed that a couple things we sent to Wondimu in a care package were apart of the pile of toys. We were happy to contribute.

The little toddler beds line the wall and so Andy & I asked which one was Wondimu's. The nannies pointed to one, so we began taking pictures of the bed and immediately felt some type of funny endearment and attachment to that bed. Well, when we came back the next day, Wondimu was fast asleep in a different bed!

The bed we thought was Wondimu's. Ha!

HE HAS NO CONCEPT OF POSSESSION...but neither did the early church, evidently, so he's in good company!

This week, Caedmon and I had fun buying some stuff for Wondimu and beginning the process of putting his backpack together. These are the items I plan to include in his backpack:

• toy trucks/cars
• books
• plastic animals
• balloons
• bubbles
• playdough
• stuffed animal
• photo album with pics from our first trip to Ethiopia as well as pictures of our family here in the States

Another big project this week has been organizing all of Wondimu's clothes (i.e. Caedmon's old clothes). We live in an apartment without very much storage space, so it's been a little tricky. We only have one dresser in the boys room and it is pretty full with Caedmon's clothes, so here's what I came up with for Wondimu.

You gotta work what ya got!

Still praying for the September 1st Embassy appointment so we can bring our precious son home to his forever family! Wondimu, we miss you every minute of every day.