Marta's first day HOME!

We were all up at 10am, Tuesday morning. Marta got dressed and put her winter coat on as she was chilly. :) As we were hanging out in the kitchen looking out the window, I pointed down the street and told her where Mimi (Tim's Mom) lived. She asked me to help her put her sneakers on and before I knew what she was doing she flew out the door, ran down the driveway and down the street! She stopped midway to turn and wave at me, then kept running. She stopped at the first house and pointed, looking back at me inquisitively. I indicated the next one and she took off running again, rounded the fence and started up the driveway. Meanwhile, I was frantically calling Marie to alert her of her fast approaching visitor. We were incredulous and quite amused. As expected, Marie greeted her with the all of the warmth one could ever wish in a grandmother. Since I was still in my PJ's, Tim threw a jacket on and sauntered down to join her. This was our unexpected introduction to the adventurous and sometimes unpredictable nature of the little being that had just graced our lives. I must admit, I checked later with our attachment therapist as I wasn't sure this was a good or bad sign. Her response: "She had a destination. That was good. It's when they don't have a destination that you need to worry." Whew! :)

Marta came home with Tim shortly after, and then returned to Mimi's with Caleb once he had gotten dressed. They visited for a while and then met the family across the street. They have 4 children, two boys and two girls, ages 5-10, who have been anxious for Marta to come home, too. Marta was VERY shy and that's when we started realizing the disparit between how quickly she feels safe and comfortable with our adult friends but how frightened she is to interact with other children. Her fear of rejection runs deep--there is so much healing to be done...

About noon we finally sat down to eat breakfast. I was SO excited when she dug into the refried black beans I had made (and frozen) before our trip! "Rico," (Yummy!) she said as she gobbled them up! (Thank you, Carlos, for the recipe!!!) When breakfast was over, she started eating the leftovers out of the serving dish and ate every last bit of them. What a great feeling!

The afternoon was spent running amuck in the yard chasing bubbles with Caleb. Exuberance is a great descriptive word for Marta Alicia. Children are a gift from the Lord and each of them bring different things to our lives. One of the gifts that Marta is bringing to my life is living life with abandon. About 95% of the time, Marta is happy, happy, happy. When things aren't "right' in her world, the intensity of her fear is equal or greater, but it doesn't take long given the right support to come back to a place of joy. Living in the moment is something she does REALLY well!

By mid-afternoon she was asking to go visit "Tia" (Auntie) Kristin (Tripp) who had gone to Guatemala with us in December. She and I went to visit and Marta met her 4 children and husband, Ramsey. Again, Marta was very shy, but still wanted to hang out for a while. During our visit, we spotted a small pile of snow in the neighbor's yard. It wasn't very big and was quite soiled, but we ran over and played a bit in it anyway. She was VERY excited to finally see some snow! (She still hasn't quite grasped the fact that after all the pictures of snow we showed her and the months we talked about it on the phone that she has to wait a good 6 months or more before it will snow again!)

On our way home, we were passing Josh Cousineau's house (who she had met the night before at the airport). I pointed out his house to her and she said, "Let's go visit!" Goodness! It's SO unlike me to just drop in on anyone, so I tried calling their house and cell and got no answer. Just to satisfy her we turned around and went back to knock on the door. Low and behold they were all home! They invited us in and we had a GREAT visit for about an hour (see what I mean about gifts?). When we left, they gave her 3 DVD's in Spanish to borrow. Dora has been a GREAT hit--something she watches over and over during down time for comfort as much as anything. Thanks, Josh and Anna!

By 9:30pm we were all tucked in bed for a great night's sleep! One day down, a life-time to go! :)

Monday--homeward bound

Monday morning my number one priority was getting to the Embassy to get Marta's corrected Visa. Sonia, our translator, couldn't go with us as her car was in the shop, so I had detailed instructions. Her beau dropped the documents we needed off at the front desk of our hotel and by 7:45am I was off to the Embassy. I explained that I just needed to pick up a Visa and was able to talk my way to the front of the line both outside and inside. The woman at the window knew who I was and had everything waiting for me. Piece of cake, I thought, and headed out the door. As I left the Embassy I thought I was leaving through the door I had come in, so I turned right and started cruising for the hotel. Suddenly, I was being heckled by several men, "Wanna picture? Photo, Ma'am? Taxi, wanna taxi?" I just ignored them, and headed toward the left where I thought the hotel was. Suddenly, I realized that nothing looked familiar and I had no idea where I was. At that point, the men started walking toward me still asking me if I wanted a photo or a taxi. With a quick scan right and left in a desperate attempt to get my bearings, I confirmed I was lost. Fortunately, one of the Embassy guards whistled at the men and motioned for them to back off. I approached him quickly and asked where La Casa Grande was. He said he didn't speak any English, but when I repeated La Casa Grande he said something about "su cuarto?" (your room?) and I said, "yes." He pointed me back in the opposite direction. A bit shaken at how quickly I could end up in a vulnerable position I hurried back to the hotel, my little venture having only taken 10 minutes. :)

We had breakfast, finished packing for the last time and waited for the taxi. While we were hanging out I met a woman there who was adopting a gorgeous 3 year old boy with Cerebral Palsey. She had 2 bio children and this was her 8th adopted child! As we talked she spoke of two more that they were considering. She named off the 5 different countries they had adopted from, at first getting stuck at 4 and not remembering which was the 5th! :) Anyway, she lives in Ohio but is coming out to Maine for Mother's Day weekend to speak about adoption. Hopefully, she'll remember to email me the details so we can connect again. When the taxi came we grabbed one more photo in front of the hotel and headed for the airport.

Our attachment therapist had given us a great idea to take photos on our trip down to Guatemala and then put them in an album in reverse order so Marta could visualize the trip home. It was a wonderful idea and really helped a lot. Marta quickly got the hang of all of the security measures: take off your shoes and coat, put everything you hold dear onto a conveyor belt and watch it disappear into a machine. Walk through the tunnel and gather everything back up again. Then later watch as they paw through all of your beloved belongings and confiscate the water you JUST bought INSIDE the airport and then board the plane. It was really fun watching her take on this new experience. She is very intuitive and works hard to pick up quickly how everything is done. Inside, I explained all the buttons and which one not to push (the call button for the flight attendant) which I later pushed myself by mistake, ooops! :)

Marta did great flying, without sleeping a wink, of course. It wasn't until later when she was home and talking to her foster family that I heard her say she was scared. :) And who wouldn't be? She did seem a little nervous on the first descent (no ear pain, thankfully!), and Caleb livened it up with his mock (sign language) airplane crash which I quickly insisted he modify to a gentle perfect "Grandpa" landing (My Dad was a United pilot known for his smooth landings). Marta still jokes about it. :)

We had a quick stop in Atlanta where we were doing our best to hurry through Immigration, Customs. We had an additional step for Marta as this was the point at which she legally became a United States citizen! Bienvenida, Marta Alicia! By the time we finished everything we had 15 minutes to ride the tram to the opposite side of the airport for our flight. When we got off the tram we started running. Just as we were about to reach our gate I had this urge to check the monitor only to discover they had changed not only the gate but the terminal, too! So, we turned and headed back in the opposite direction running with even more determination. Back down the escalator, onto the tram, try to breath, off the tram, run up the escalator, down the corridor arriving hot and out of breath at the gate with only a few minutes to spare. Whew! This was NOT a flight we wanted to miss! Gracias a Dios!

Finally, we arrived at Logan Airport about 10:30pm. I called Barb to let her know we had landed. She was there with Marie (Tim's Mom) and her son Josh to pick us up. It took quite a while for us to get off the plane and it was quite a distance to baggage claim, much to their chagrin! We finally made it and Josh caught our initial meeting on tape. Thanks, Josh! :) We went to claim our luggage, only to find out that 3 of our suitcases didn't make it. We had Tim's and my suitcase and Caleb's suitcase, but not Marta Alicia's! Poor thing! She looked really worried and lost until I explained it would come the next day, then she was fine. What a trouper!

We had a great trip home in the van. Marta fell asleep right away, Caleb hung out with "Mimi" and then fell asleep on her shoulder (she had really missed him a lot, so she was happy camper), Tim and Josh talked shop and I bent Barb's ear processing the trip all the way home. We arrived at 2am to a house full of balloons, 1/2 floating on the ceiling and the other 1/2 covering the floor. It was beautiful and festive and just perfect (Thank you, Glenda!). We spent 2 hours exploring the house and her room together before finally going to sleep. What a feeling-our family of four finally HOME!!!!