One Year Ago Today

One year ago today I got on a plane and landed in Port-au-Prince, Haiti.  I experienced that marvelous ride in the back of an open truck up the mountain and I arrived with my mom at GLA where I met Mackenley.  I have loved him for months, but today we met face to face.

I went to check on him after lunch and when he saw me his legs and whole body flew over the side of his crib and to me he ran!  Ready to keep playing!  

The first picture I posted on FB of Mack and me <3

Oh to know what he is thinking!

Grandma or Mama as he affectionally calls her and Mack on our first day with him.

It was a terribly difficult wait! Each step along the way was painstaking.  Yet it was just one year ago, 365 days ago that we met and now he has been home for 3 months and one week!  It doesn't seem that long now and I can't remember not knowing him, loving him, caring for him and being "mommy."

Thank you Lord for this beautiful, painful, redemptive journey that you have set me on!

Anyone from Minnesota?

I don't think I have it in me to write a book right now, even though have that amount to write....I have been doing a lot of thinking about the people I have met along this adoption journey.  Two years ago on a huge facebook page called Adopting From Haiti, someone posted, "Anyone on here from Minnesota?"  I took the risk to respond.

She wrote, "Is there anyone on this page adopting from GLA who lives in Minnesota?"

Today the daughter of this person is one of Mack's favorite people in the world.

I have met 100s of people on Facebook who are adopting from Haiti.  I have had teens I mentor talk to me about internet safety.  :-)

Before Mack came home these people provided the best support and encouragement.  We are going through the same process.  They get it when no one else does.  For a time, I felt God put people these people in my life for me.

Did He?  Yes I think so.  I am beginning to see though that two years ago he already knew that my little boy was going to need the comfort and friendship of this little girl he dearly loves.  So I responded to a facebook post and now a little boy and a little girl who lived in Haiti at the same orphanage live twenty minutes away from each other in Minnesota.

There are several families here in MN.  Then there are families from all over the US and Canada with kids Mack loves. Sometimes we FaceTime.  Most of the time we look at pictures and his face lights up as recounts each child's name.

I look forward to what these relationships will mean to him as he grows into the man God has created him to be.

This weekend we spent time with five other families.  So fun and also something that could just make me cry cause I'm like, WOW God, you care SO very much!  It's amazing!