In a previous “Un-photographable” post, I wrote about our road trip to Assala, to meet Ben’s family.

This week I am going to write about something that happened once we arrived in Assala.

I wish I had a photograph of the man that gave Ben the crackers.

As we pulled into Assala, we turned onto what must have been the “main road”. It was a dirt road, littered with boulders, rocks and pot holes. Chickens, donkeys, small half-starved horses and people of all ages and sizes walked up and down the middle of the road and covered the sides.

And yet in the middle of the... more

I wish I had a photo of us in our car on the way to Assala.

When we were in Ethiopia in February to get our son Benjamin (and which we didn’t know at the time, to meet our daughter Belane), one of the things we did was to travel outside of the capital city of Addis Ababa to the small town of Assala, which is about 3-4 hours by car south of Addis, and is also the town where our Ben was born and spent the first four and a half years of his life.

Our adoption agency arranged a car and driver (and translator) for the journey. We knew it would be a long and hot trip and had pleaded our case for a van, but when the time came to leave, we had a Toyota Rav 4 (which as the name implies,... more

It is the tradition of the adoption agency we used to adopt Ben from Ethiopia to have a “going away party” at the end of the week for all of the children who are going home to America with their new adoptive families.

The party is emotional…the kids know that they are leaving and the staff and other children know that they are leaving. The adoptive parents are often filled with mixed emotions…thrilled to be hours away from starting the journey home with their new child/children, sad to be taking them from the wonderful country of their birth. There are tears mixed in with lots of excitement. There is cake and soda and singing.

Throw into the middle of all this…rocket balloons.... more

I wish I had a photo of Benjamin’s first bath. It was back in February and he was five years old and it was our first night/morning together in our hotel in Addis Ababa. So far everything had gone well…he was happy and playing and eating well and sleeping well. I worried about the bath thing, because I wasn’t quite sure how he was used to getting bathed. I worried he would be shy to get undressed around me but I worried he was too little for me not to be in there helping him.

I filled up the tub with warm water and threw in some plastic cups. I called Ben in and motioned for him to get in. He smiled and rolled up his sleeves and started to wash his hands and arms, while kneeling down... more

I wish I had a photograph of the people, all of the very many people, in the children’s hospital in Vietnam.

Our daughter Maggie was eight weeks old when I made my first trip to Vietnam. She was outrageously small, had the wildest hair you have ever seen and ate slower than any baby I have every encountered, but seemed healthy overall. The absolute hardest part of Maggie’s adoption was that I had to leave my tiny, wild-haired, slow-eating baby in a crowded government orphanage and come home alone, and wait out a miserable six weeks before I could go back and bring her home for good.

Two weeks before I was to leave, my worst fears came true. We got a phone call and Maggie was... more

I have a lot of wonderful “Dad moments” in my head and in my heart…images of Josh at his best as a father (which is saying a lot). Many of them we do also have photographs of, but there are some that we’ve missed for one reason or another.

I didn’t have to think very long or very hard about what moment I would share for Father’s Day week.

I wish I had a photograph of Josh, walking down the road away from me, with Mercy on his back, that late-summer evening just a day or two after Mercy and Des came to stay with us forever. Mercy was nine years old, and was old enough to completely understand that her entire life had just been turned upside down. After nine years with her birth... more

I wish I had a photo of Yared, a 10-year old boy that we met at the playground in Ethiopia. Our entire trip to Ethiopia was moving and eye-opening and emotional, but meeting our new son aside, two experiences stand out as making the biggest impact on my heart, and Yared is one of them.

We were playing in the park with Ben one morning and several boys came over and joined our soccer game. One introduced himself to me and started showing off his English skills. He was tall and slender and had dark skin and beautiful eyes. His smile showed teeth that had suffered neglect, but was no less radiating. His clothes were worn and ragged and did not really go together. You could see that life... more

My un-photographable this week is not one that should make you cry or leave you feeling warm and fuzzy inside, or leave you feeling deep and reflective. Hopefully you’ll get a good laugh. It definitely is a MEMORABLE mental image from our trip to Ethiopia.

Let me preface this by saying I am no wuss. I am not afraid of bugs or mice or creepy crawlies. (Ok, I don’t like snakes, but I don’t think too many people really do.) I can kill a bug while talking on the phone and folding laundry and not think twice about it. My kids think it is really dang funny that Dad is afraid of spiders (Josh really, really hates spiders) and Mom is “the brave one” about bugs.

So, there we are in... more

I wish I had a photograph of the Amish couple that I saw in Nazret, Ethiopia.

Yes, an Amish couple. Josh and I were traveling in a Toyota Rav 4, (built, by the way, to seat four). There were six of us in the vehicle and it was SO hot. Your choices were open the windows and let in a beautiful breeze, but also get pelted like you can’t imagine with sand, dirt and exhaust, or, the equally unpleasant option of rolling up the windows and sweating. We altered back and forth between the two, leaving us hot, sweaty and completely filthy at the end of the day. We had been in the car for hours, and were on our way back to Addis, coming through the town of Nazret. I was looking out the window... more

I wish I had a photograph of the first minute I saw my Amanda Mee Yeon. Amanda was two years old and was escorted from Korea. After all of the drama and excitement and effort involved with traveling to Vietnam for our daughter Maggie, being able to drive to the airport to “pick up a daughter” was outrageously surreal.

I had been told that while new security measures no longer allowed friends and family to meet planes at their gates, that sometimes an airline would give special permission to an anxious parent waiting for their new child to come off of a flight to get through security and wait at the gate.

We got to the airport with our three sons and one daughter, along with... more