Blog Introductions

Well after completing her entire adoption and receiving many requests for a blog my Mom has finally decided to start one. So...I guess technically it isn't an adoption blog but a family blog. You can read all about life with 7 kids, the two youngest of which have been home from Ethiopia for 1 month, and 1 grandson (who I must add is the CUTEST KID EVER...and by "ever" I mean EVER)!

Talcott Family Blog

Although I have made this introduction before I also wanted to throw my sister's blog out there where you can read all about her daily work and life in Addis Ababa.

Emily's Blog

Happy reading! Hope you love my family as much as I do :)

Separation Anxiety

I made a big mistake. When we met with our social worker a couple weeks ago I told her we felt our bonding was going really great but I had just one wish. I wished that Elias would show a little bit more distinction toward me. Elias obviously prefers me to strangers but around other family whom he was comfortable with I didn't feel like he showed a preference toward me. Lesson learned - be careful what you wish for.

My poor little guy has been experiencing some severe separation anxiety for the past couple weeks. He is one smart kid and he caught on to my M,W,F morning routine and he knows it ends with me walking out the door. I get him from his crib, change him, and go stick him in bed with Daddy while I finish getting ready. As soon as we come near the bed he starts crying. Not just a small whimper but a heartbroken cry with big tears to go along with it. The second I pick him up he stops. It has been torture walking out that door while Elias sits with his Dad crying and holding his chubby little arms out begging for me to come back. It's also not any easier then the first morning it happened. Since this started happening Elias has been much more clingy than usual. He fusses when I leave the room. If he can't see me and I'm not talking to him his fuss turns into a wail.

I wanted to give an update on our bonding/attachment. I know it is different for everyone but I wanted to honestly share how we are doing. We are completely smitten and more in love than I thought possible. Truly, our experience has been beyond easy. Well before we left for Ethiopia I loved Elias. I did have doubts as to how I would feel about him when I saw him in person. Not doubts about loving him but I wondered if it would feel like he was my son right from the start or if it would feel more like babysitting.

From the second we laid eyes on that screaming baby I was overwhelmed with love, pride, and a feeling of protection. Immediately I felt possessive of my baby boy. This was my son and I didn't care if he screamed for the next 18 years - I wanted to be holding him and trying my best to comfort him. Almaz was shocked and pleased with the reaction Brian and I had in a difficult situation but we just couldn't deny the feeling of an immediate connection. We had a rough couple days with Elias but there was never a second that I felt distant from him. Even when I realized I didn't know how best to comfort my sick child, he truly felt like my child.

Throughout the adoption process I never really felt like an expecting mother. It was distant and always seemed so far away. Once we saw Elias' photo we started the process of connecting. The second I saw him in person I immediately felt like a mother - his mother. It was as if my heart knew that well before the beginning of time we were meant to be together. Elias fits beautifully into our family. Brian and I are constantly awed at the vastness of the feelings we have for him and the sense that we have always been together.

Psalm 127:3 "Sons are a heritage from the Lord, children a reward from him."

8 Months

Thanks for the new outfit, Great Grandma Stalker, I love it!

8 Things We Love About Elias:

1) How he reaches his arms out for me when he is with someone else and wants me to hold him
2) His laugh
3) The way he sits mesmerized when his Daddy plays the guitar
4) The sweet feeling of him falling asleep in our arms. Many nights we playfully argue about who gets to rock him to sleep and we always argue (sometimes playfully, sometimes not so playfully) about whose turn it is to carry the sleeping baby in from the car. He is just so precious.
5) How Uncle Alemu can always make him smile
6) His baby talk in the morning
7) How much he loves to be held
8) His love of the outdoors

Elias turned 8 months old yesterday. He is so BIG! Twice this weekend when compared to a 2 year old he weighed the same. He fits perfectly into 12 month shirts right now. Pants are getting to be a bit more difficult. Although he has a very large belly he has a pretty small waste and 6 months pants still fit him around the waist but they are getting too short. If I bump it up to the 12 months size pants then they are a touch loose on the waist but doable; however, they are too long. Oh well. Either way my baby is looking like a big boy instead of a baby.

Time has gone by so quickly. We have now been together 7 weeks. Crazy to think that when we got him and people asked how old he was we said, "6 months" and now we have to say, "8 months."

At 8 months Elias is growing even more into his personality. He is smiling and laughing more often, although he still spends a lot of time with his content and observant gaze (especially when around a lot of people). He still does not have any teeth although I am thinking one will probably show itself in the next month. I'm not the best judge at these things since I lack experience but his gums are turning a lighter shade of pink and he still drools and bites things non-stop.

Elias' latest trick is rolling over in the bathtub so he is on his belly. Then he pushes himself off of the foam mat and slides to the end of the tub. He proceeds in kicking his legs and splashing his hands. He can't quite understand that splashing the hands is what makes the water splash onto his face. He acts mad at the water and then keeps splashing.

Elias has no interest in crawling. He can scoot a little but really he just does a 360 turn and moves backwards a bit. He has never been on all 4s and is not even close to figuring out what the knees need to be doing in order to crawl. He does love to stand and will walk if you hold his hands.

Still no sign of "Mama" but Elias does love to mimic. His latest is saying, "Mmmmmmm" when he eats. I didn't even notice I said "Mmmmm" with each bite I gave him until he started copying me. He eats everything we have tried to give him. His standard foods right now are yams, bananas, apples, mangoes, peas, green beans, carrots, and avocado. He loves to suck on french fries and nilla wafers. He likes crackers and rice puffs although I don't give him that many snacks yet since his little belly can only hold so much.

Elias is a wonderfully happy baby and the joy of our lives! We love you Elias!!

Ethiopia Day 7 (Thursday)

Day 7 in Ethiopia is the day most families from AGCI leave. Due to our tickets none of the families in our travel group were leaving until Friday and we stayed until Monday. We took this day to go shopping. Emily came over to babysit while we headed out for what ended up being something close to 5 hours. At breakfast we asked about checkout time. We were told anytime was okay. We planned on checking out after shopping and staying the night at Emily's place. Turns out check-out was at noon so we ended up staying at the Union one more night since we were going to be charged anyway.

Our three groggy boys after a sleepover

Playing computer games in the lobbyWe took off and headed to the Halie Selassie store that Traci knew of. It had awesome jewelry. I was so glad Scott and Traci had been to Ethiopia before and knew of some great places to go. The Federal High Courts where Elias became our son!!

Donkeys walking down the roads were a standard sight

Street children walk along busy roads trying to get food

This was the biggest intersection we saw. There were at least 10 lanes. Brian took a photo of the Federal policeman on his cell phone. The guy got mad and quickly stood up and brandished his weapon at us. It wasn't until we pulled into some shops 2 driveways down that Brian realized that might have been a really dumb thing to do.

The Ethiopian calendar is 8 years behind ours. Their millennium celebration plaza was still up since it just became 2001.

Brian thought it was great that the local brewery was called St. George's.

Brian loved all the English Premier League fans.

After shopping for nearly 5 hours we headed back to HH so the others could pick up their children.

Then we went back to the Union where Scott had arranged a coffee ceremony for us. I was so thrilled that he made such an effort to do this because it is such a huge part of Ethiopian culture and something most AGCI families do not get to experience.Elias had a piece of popcorn during the coffee ceremony. He wasn't a big fan of his first "real" food.The coffee ceremony was beautiful. They burn frankincense during the ceremony and I really enjoyed that smell. Everything was great until I saw the cockroach scurrying in between the cups. Eeewww. Oh well. I also learned quickly how to say "little sugar" which is "tinish suquar" because oh my word! they put like 5 teaspoons of sugar in those little cups. These diet coke taste buds can't handle all that sweetness. It is customary to have 3 cups. I was able to drink 2. The funniest part of the whole thing was they usually grind the beans with a mortar and pestle. Most of us there knew this. When the waitress who was doing this for us put the roasted beans in a bowl we were all wondering what was going on. Then we heard the high pitched whine of a blender in the kitchen. The waitresses at the Union don't speak the best English and so Scott just started mimicking the sound of the blender and we all busted up laughing when they realized we knew they were taking a short cut. They were embarrassed but laughed it off and kept using the blender.Our travel group

After the coffee ceremony we headed to the CCI transition home where Emily lives and works.

Israel and Alemu's bunk bedsThis was the calendar Emily made them to count down the days until our arrival and Mom and Dad's arrival. We thought this was so sweet.

These are the views from Emily's bedroom

In this area of town each house had a fence which was topped with either shards of glass or barbed wire.The shint-a-bitIsrael showing off his Spiderman jammies that Mom and Dad sent him.

A beautiful end to a wonderful day

7 Month Photos

Ethiopia Day 6 (Wednesday)

Day 6 of our trip had only one thing scheduled...birthparent meetings. Our appointment was at 10am. Before Brian and I had been matched with a child and what turned out to be well before Elias was born, we prayed for his birthmother. We prayed for strength, courage and health. We prayed she would have comfort and peace as she faced such a difficult decision during this huge life changing event. We prayed that she would personally know the love of Jesus. Another thing that we hoped and prayed for was that our son's birthmother would want to meet us. We thought this would be so special and important to our son later in life.

When our appointed meeting time arrived we walked to HH. We got there and she hadn't arrived. We played with the children. We watched the special mothers dote over Elias.

I took photos and video around HH.

The front doors

The living room where we watched him sleep

The stairs leading to the hallway where we first met him and his bedroom

The first place I bathed him

The first place I changed him

I got yelled at for taking video and Brian took photos of me getting yelled at because he thought it was hilarious. Meanwhile, it was 10:15am. We continued to work to stay distracted while we became more and more anxious. Another 15 minutes passed. Still, despite being a 1/2 hour past our appointed time I remained hopeful. We had prayed for this day and I so desperately wanted this for my son. After 45 minutes I looked to Almaz in desperation asking her if she was going to show. Almaz said, "she probably will." Probably was not promising. I thought that I could not pass any judgement if she had changed her mind as I might not be brave enough to face my decision had our roles been reversed. Then we heard a knock on the gate.

Immediately I had butterflies in my stomach. Elias was with a special mother (in a bouncy seat, go figure) and I bent down to pick him up. I looked over and saw her walking toward me. It was obvious I was the one she was there to meet. As she walked closer Almaz stepped in. They exchanged words in Amharic and then she pointed to Elias as Almaz nodded that yes, this was her son. Instantly the tears started flowing down her cheeks. As Brian walked to join us my heart was completely broken. I handed Elias to her as we walked into Almaz's office. Elias started screaming so she handed him back. When he instantly calmed in my arms a wave of guilt rushed over me...I knew her heart was aching.

We presented her with a letter Brian and I had painstakingly written. Almaz started to translate until Elias' birthmother could take it no more and asked her to stop. She said she would try to read it later. Then I gave her the photo album I had made for her. She looked at each page and as she did so we all cried. Although we needed a translator to communicate, no words were necessary. Adoption reflects joy, pain, sacrifice, loss, hope and love. In a few brief moments we all experienced these emotions at a level so intense it was shocking to our systems.

I will keep the details of our conversation private as Elias' history is his to share but I got what I wanted out of this meeting. It was extremely difficult. At one point Almaz who was translating looked at Brian and I and said "you guys are a bunch of cry babies" as she reached for a tissue to wipe her own eyes. Our meeting was short and I didn't ask many questions at all. There were and are a lot of things I would like to know but it just wasn't the right time. What I wanted was to be able to look my son in the eye and tell him the truth. I got that.

Elias,
I saw her, I touched her, I hugged her, I held her, I spoke to her, I cried with her, I looked her in the eyes and I know she loves you.

We hung around HH for another hour or so. Once all the families had their meetings it was back to business as usual. We all met with Almaz to pick up our children's passports and visas. Since we had done the cultural dinner the night before we were now back to a situation where it was early afternoon and nothing else was planned for the day. We were all getting so sick of hanging at the hotel. We wanted to go shopping but the van wasn't available. We ended up walking back to the Union where we decided we would chip in and hire a couple taxis and have Emily be our tour guide.

Traci stayed back with the older kids. Brian had been planning on going but ended up having a headache and an upset stomach. After such an emotionally exhausting morning it was really no surprise. Brian stayed back with Elias, Alemu and Israel while Emily took the rest of us adults shopping. We went to the textile market by Entonto Mountain very close to the U.S. Embassy. We got great deals and had a lot of fun.
Then we went to the shops near the post office which ended up being the same place the others had gone the day Brian and I stayed behind. I picked up a lot of touristy type stuff there. After a couple hours we headed back and had dinner at the hotel.

Emily had to go back home because she had kids to take care of but Almeu and Israel decided they wanted to spend the night with us at the hotel. Brian and I fell asleep while the boys watched Spiderman (big surprise). At one point I woke up to someone yelling in Amharic. It was Alemu yelling at Israel to move over because somehow he ended up lying diagonally when they were squeezed together on a twin bed. At that moment I remember being overwhelmed with love and joy. Here we were in Ethiopia. My son was sleeping in between Brian and I and my brothers were a few feet away acting just like brothers should. In that moment, life was perfect!