At last.

Hello!
We are here. We are surviving. A couple of days ago I would have written the words: barely surviving, but each day is getting better. Warning: this post will contain some complaints about the rigors of taking care of two infants. And like most IFers who cross over (however they do) I feel some serious guilt ever letting out a complaint here. However, in a nutshell:

The sixteen hour international flight was nothing short of the most excruciating experience of my life. It was my labor and delivery for sure, unmedicated all the way. You see, we stupidly expected to board the flight with two bassinets reserved which would allow the babies to have a real place to sleep, which in turn would give us a chance to sleep.

No such luck. Despite getting to the airport over three hours prior to our departure as instructed, the bassinets were already all taken. At this point we proceeded to tell the ticket agent to reconsider and change his answer. Ha ha. Which meant we boarded that sixteen hour flight with two sick infants with nothing to do but hold them the whole time. And they screamed. And they thrashed. And they were miserable. And I cried within ten minutes of taking my seat. I think I have some post traumatic stress related to the flight.

Our stopover in DC was only moderately better because, despite being extremely tired, the babies wouldn't sleep in the hotel room. I cried some more. So did DH.

When our DC to Austin flight was delayed we all freaked out a little more, and yup, more crying. It was the last flight to Austin and there was no way we weren't going to be on it. DH had me calling our travel agent and he promised to "pay whatever it takes to get home tonight"...I think he would have chartered a private jet at that point. Luckily the flight made and although it was overbooked we made it on board and landed in our hometown.... only to discover that DH's parents (who had our car with our carseats) were stuck in a horrible traffic snarl outside the airport. I had actually seen the lights and sirens from the air as we landed. They hadn't moved an inch in over an hour. So we made a camp on the dirty airport floor and waited some more.

Oi vey.

We made it to our first night in our own home at 1:00 am and proceeded to sleep 3 hours. Which made our grand total of sleep about 3 hours 25 minutes in three days.

Yes I know sleep deprivation is part of the deal. But suffice it to say we were overwhelmed. There were tears. There were moments of sheer panic, dread, and fear.

And then.

My dear sweet Pablo dog took a turn for the worse. He has been in kidney failure for a while, he is quite old, and we knew the end was near. But yet he persisted.

He is the only living creature besides DH who knew the depth of my IF pain. He patiently sat with me while I sobbed so many times, he gave me little nudges and licks but mostly he was just there, abiding with me in my darkest moments.

I'd like to think he held on just in time to see the human babies make an appearance in our lives before he finally felt he could let go and have a sweet release from this life. I loved him like a human and he will always, always be my first son, my original boy. But having to say goodbye to him the first day after we arrived home was excruciating and my heart is still broken.

These last few days have been a whirlwind. Every day gets better. I feel like now that one infant would be a breeze. Oh yes. But we are making it, bit by bit, breath by breath, hour by hour and sometimes minute by minute. They are starting to recuperate, we are getting well, too (seriously--I haven't been sick in years, but every single baby in the orphanage was sick so it was inevitable), and we are starting to find a little groove.

I have so much I want to say about our experiences in Ethiopia. About the orphanages. About the donations. About the surreal day I clutched my baby girl to my chest as DH clutched our baby boy to his in the back of a very old Toyota (there are no car seats in Ethiopia) as we made our way on the muddied, nearly washed out roads towards the US Embassy, where we raised our right hands and talked through glass on a little phone to an anonymous worker on the other side, and in five minutes they were ours....I want to talk about it all but for now, I will just leave you with a few photos for your viewing pleasure:

First pedi visit, my Mom came to help for the day (in case you're wondering who is behind the stroller)

Bob Stroller. No, we haven't used it, besides strolling in the house (it's over 100 degrees here) but check out my daughter's evil glowing eyes!

View from the top, bath time togetherness!

My sweet boy Pablo, in his healthier days.