I know it’s ridiculous how long it is taking us to write about our trip. But the truth is, this day, day four, has been the most difficult to contemplate writing about. It was a big day for us; in fact I would consider it the pivotal day of our trip. Therefore, I’ve decided to break it up and write about our birth family visit separately, so that I can give it the time and focus it deserves without writing an amazingly long blog post.

On Sunday morning, we met downstairs bright and early to begin our journey southwest from Addis to the village where Josiah was born. We enjoyed our time in Addis, but it is a big, bustling city with lots of congestion and pollution, so as we headed out of town we were so excited to leave the city and smog behind us and venture out into Ethiopia’s beautiful countryside.

All my attempts to describe the beauty of Ethiopia seem inadequate, so I’ll just let you see pictures, but even they barely capture the breathtaking landscapes we viewed during our five hour drive south.

Even out in the country, there were always people on the road, walking in groups or alone. Sometimes one or two children would be herding livestock. Whenever we stopped, children would come up to the cars, obviously curious about all of the white people traveling through their country.


Every hour or so we would drive through a different village. We could tell if the village was predominately Muslim by the mosques on either end of town. It seemed that the villages alternated between Christian and Muslim. Since it was a Sunday, when we drove through the Christian villages, we would see all of the people walking home from church.

About half way through our trip, we stopped in a larger village for a bathroom break. We made friends with a couple boys who watched us from the edge of the parking lot.

I was fascinated by the young children that we saw out by themselves. Sometimes they would be guiding cattle, but often they were just walking around, sometimes escorted by their older brothers and sisters, but rarely with adults.

The further we drove, the more beautiful the landscape became, until finally we arrived at the village where Josiah was born.

We checked in to our hotel where we would spend one night. It was a pretty nice hotel, by Ethiopian standards, but no running water. Since we were only there for one night, this wasn’t too much of an issue. We were already used to using bottled water to brush our teeth and hand sanitizer to wash our hands. There was a huge bucket of water by the toilet. When we needed to flush the toilet, we would scoop water out of the bucket with a cup and pour it into the toilet until it flushed.

We had only a few minutes to settle in before it was time to load up again to go to the Holt Intake Center offices to meet Josiah’s birth mother.

I am so thankful that Holt arranged this trip for us. If we had left Ethiopia without getting out of Addis, I feel like we would have left without seeing the real Ethiopia. This day was such a blessing to us. This was the day we fell in love with Ethiopia. These images, the children, the landscape, the villages, will forever be close to my heart. I hope and pray that I will see them again.

Friday, July 24th finally came; meeting day, the day I had been dreaming about and imagining for a year was finally a reality. We met the rest of our travel group in the lobby of the hotel. It was fun to meet friends in person that I had been chatting with online for several months. We were all antsy to get next door and meet our kids. First we had an orientation meeting with some of the Holt staff. Again, we were blown away by the kindness, grace, and beauty of the Ethiopian people. The Holt staff is so warm and friendly, we immediately felt comfortable with them.

After a brief meeting, we were given our name tags and taken next door. We were told that before we met our kids, they wanted to give us a tour of the facility.

The Holt Care Center is so beautiful and clean. Outside of being with their own loving family, I can’t imagine a better place for these kids to be.


They took us into the rooms where the children sleep and play. They have the kids divided into different age groups, and there are nannies assigned to each group.

We saw a few children as we toured the center, but I knew that we hadn’t visited Josiah’s room yet. As none of us had yet seen our kids, we felt sure that they were keeping them in another room until it was time to meet. After viewing the first and second floor, they took us up to the third floor where there were a couple more baby rooms.

There were quite a few of us, fifteen traveling plus the staff that was giving the tour. Somehow as we walked up to the third floor, I got in the back of the group. As the group crowded into the last nursery, I could hear them ooh-ing and ahh-ing. It seems one family had seen their baby. I couldn’t see into the room, but I listened as the new parents greeted their baby. Then the director asked if anyone else was adopting a baby. “Mary Beth and Casey,” someone answered. “Who is your baby?” the director asked me. “Marefu.” “Ah, Marefu is in here,” she invited me in. “Can you find him?” she asked.

What??? Pick out my baby from a group of eight or nine, in front of all of these people?!! Didn’t she know that we had only gotten a couple decent pictures of him, and who knows when they were taken or how old he was then? Suddenly everyone moved out of the way to let me in. There were cribs lining the walls of the small room. A few babies played on the floor, but they weren’t mine. I began to feel panicked. What if I got it wrong? What if I picked out the wrong baby in front of everyone? I noticed there were name tags on each bed. I started looking for “Marefu.” “Don’t look at the name tags” the director called. What? He may be in a bed with a different name? To make it even worse, Ethiopians have no qualms about putting boys in pink, and all the children are so pretty that is often very hard to tell if they are boys or girls.

I cheated. I looked at the name tags. When I found him, he wasn’t at all what I was looking for, but I could tell that he was our little Marefu. Here’s what I was looking for:

Here’s what I found:

There he was, lying in his little crib. He seemed happy and content, if not a little surprised to suddenly see this white face staring down at him. I picked him up. They had him dressed in a huge fleece jacket. I felt like I was hugging someone in a parka, like I couldn’t really get to him. Soon Casey was at my side, taking pictures and stroking his head.

To be honest, the whole thing was so surreal. I don’t know how long we stood there looking at him. The rest of the day is a blur to me. I know that we took turns holding him for a while, and that at one point a nanny brought me some cereal to feed him. He seemed happy with us, and barely cried the entire morning.

At lunch time, we left him to return to our hotel. We ate lunch at the hotel and had another meeting with staff about our upcoming embassy appointment. Later that afternoon we were able to return to the care center to see our kids. This time we walked around the center with him some. It was fun to see the other families and meet their kids.

The whole day seemed to fly by. My memory of it is somewhat blurry, like memories of our wedding day, or the day Caleb was born. I know what I did, and I remember the events of the day, but the reality of what was happening and the emotions that follow were so overwhelming it was almost numbing.

When I look back on this whole adoption process, this day, meeting day, will always be the day we jumped off the cliff. I thought boarding the plane was jumping off, but that was still part of the climb, a long, hard, steady climb. This day, the day Casey and I held him and looked into his eyes for the first time, will always be the day that we held our breath and jumped.

I’m going to try to write about each of the eight amazing days that we spent in Ethiopia. We landed in Addis Ababa on the morning of Thursday, July 23. After working our way through the Visa line (much shorter than we expected) and customs, and retrieving all six of our bags, we were met in the terminal by one of Holt’s drivers, Dawit. What a kind and friendly face to be met by at such an anxious moment. Dawit was so warm and hospitable, exactly the kind of person you would like to meet in a foreign country. In our experience, we found that most Ethiopians are warm and friendly; it didn’t take long for us to fall in love with these beautiful people.

He drove us from the airport to the Union Hotel. Casey and I were nearly silent the whole way; there was so much to see and take in. One of the first things that struck me about Ethiopia was the beautiful landscape. No one had told me what a beautiful country Ethiopia is. Green mountains and rolling hills are everywhere.

We were also overwhelmed by the number of people. Addis is a city of over 3.5 million. Everywhere you look there are people, and donkeys, and goats that are spray painted pink (we never figured out why), and cars, and buses, and shops. All this congestion and absolutely no stoplights or stop signs. There is lots of honking and waving, but we never saw anyone get mad or lose their temper. Somehow we always ended up where we were supposed to be, but there were a few times I had to close my eyes as we passed uncomfortably close to a bus or crowd of people. Their buses are about the size of a fifteen-passenger van, but they can crowd an amazing number of people into them. Thankfully we never had to experience that.

Our hotel was right next door to the Holt Care Center where Josiah had lived for the last several months. It was hard to drive by the building knowing that he was in there but we couldn’t see him for another day.

We were very pleased with our hotel room; it was big and comfortable, very clean. We could definitely recommend the Union Hotel to anyone who is staying in Addis. Usually the electricity was out during the day, but I think that’s pretty normal for Ethiopia. Casey and I got a little chuckle out of the toilet paper instructions that were over the toilet. What are the quotation marks for?

After catching up on our sleep for the next few hours, we visited Kebetsehay Children’s Home, which is a government orphanage in Addis for children birth through 13 years old. We went to visit our sponsor child, Bete, but when we got there we found out that Bete had recently been adopted by a German family. Hooray for Bete! We were sad that we didn’t get to meet her, but so, so happy to hear that she now has a family. We still had a great time playing with the kids. We brought a huge duffel bag of donations for the orphanage, medicine, school supplies, soccer balls, etc. The kids were naturally very excited about the candy, bracelets, and stickers we passed out.

Casey made friends with a couple of the older boys, while I had a little girl following me around most of the afternoon. I probably spent the most time in the baby room. The little babies were so beautiful. It was evident that the nannies at Kebetsehay love the children very much and were working very hard to care for them, but they are still in great need. The babies lying in cribs will break your heart. There was one little baby who was crying when I walked by. I tried to comfort her and offered my finger for her to hold. She held on tightly and quieted a little, but every time I tried to walk away she would start crying again. It was so hard to finally pull away after standing by her crib for about thirty minutes. Sweet, sweet, girl. I pray that God is providing for her every need right now, and that she will have a family some day soon.

As we were starting to say our goodbyes to all the sweet kids, it began to rain, big, splattering drops. During the rainy season in Ethiopia, big thunderstorms blow in and out with little warning. As we drove back through the Mercato, Africa’s largest market, on our way back to our hotel, we watched as water filled the muddy streets. Some people huddled under shop awnings, and some just walked through the rain.

We were glad to have a quiet night, since we had so much to think about from our day at Kebetsehay. During our dinner at the Union, we were able to visit with one of the other Holt families, Jeff and Bethany, along with Bethany’s aunt Robin. Most of the families wouldn’t arrive until later, but it was nice to have the chance to get to know Jeff and Bethany and hear about the several days that they spent at a children’s home in Hosanna, Ethiopia earlier that week. Jeff and Bethany have a son from Ethiopia who is almost exactly the same age as Caleb, and they were in Ethiopia again to adopt their daughter.

Needless to say, Day One in Ethiopia was a very blessed and full day. We went to bed exhausted but ready to meet our boy in the morning!

Mary Beth and I arrived in Addis this morning to be greeted by our friendly driver, David. He took us to our hotel and gave us some tips about Ethiopian culture and some other very good practical advice about our stay.

After checking in at our hotel, we called one of the field coordinators who works for the organization that we sponsor a child through. He picked us up to take us to visit Bete (pronounced Betty) and also bring some gifts to the other children at the orphanage.

When we arrived at the orphanage, there were many children outside swarming one of the caretakers who was passing out candy. It was out of control! At that point, we decided it would be better for the staff to pass out our gifts for us in an orderly manner. The children seemed very happy to receive their small gifts (candy, stickers, and bracelets).

Later on, we found out that Bete had been adopted by a German family! Praise the Lord! It was a little sad that we did not get to meet her, but we are so overjoyed that she now has a family of her own!

After giving the children their gifts, we went into one of the baby rooms at the orphanage. I will never forget all of the children lying in their cribs in this room. Some of them were only six months old, but they could hold their own bottle. They’ve obviously learned that skill to help them survive. I think I will remember these children’s faces for the rest of my life.

One of the things that seemed to be a big hit with the older kids was taking pictures of them. I would take their picture and then show it to them on the camera display afterwards. They LOVED it! This was really the best way for me to bond with the children, since we couldn’t really understand eachother. This was how I met my two new friends: Brook and Musa.

I saw Musa standing a few yards away from me and I motioned with the camera to see if he wanted me to take his picture. He smiled bashfully and I snapped a shot of him. Afterwards, I told him my name and we shook hands.

I saw one of the older boys, Brook, standing quietly on the steps looking on at all the commotion. I walked over to him, took his picture, and we shook hands. He had one of the brightest smiles I’ve ever seen.

During the rest of our visit, these two boys never left my side. Musa would reach down and hold my hand, and I would put my arms over their shoulders. I could tell that they were soaking it all up.

Eventhough I was only with these boys for less than an hour, I could realize how much they long to have a father. My heart aches for these millions of Ethiopian boys that will grow up without one. I wish we could adopt all of them, but God has a special boy picked out just for us.

Tomorrow we will meet Josiah for the first time. It will be an honor to be called his ‘abaya’ (father). Thanks for all your prayers and encouragement!

We finally got our travel dates! We will be meeting our baby boy on July 24th, and hopefully be home with him on July 31st.

Please continue to pray for us. I’ll be posting more soon.