Our Final Day With Our Son

Saturday, May 10^th, we were able to see Jaden Biyagegn one last time before we left to go back home. It was a great surprise for us to be able to go again. Normally, the orphanages are closed for visitation on Saturday and Sunday. However, our driver, Abey, asked the director if we could come back again on Saturday. She said we could. We didn’t expect to see him anymore, but we were so grateful that he asked so we could see our little boy one more time.

On the way to the orphanage we stopped by the store. This is the same store where Anna Grace got sick. So Ashley and Anna Grace made Clint go in. We got a ball for an older boy at the orphanage, and we got a coloring book and crayons for the kids in Jaden’s room. When we got to the orphanage, the caregivers told us to wait in the lobby. Again, we didn’t expect them to bring him down to us, but a few minutes after we were there, they brought him down the stairs.

 Waiting in the lobby

Jaden does a lot better when he is in the room with the other kids. We are definitely okay with this. In adoption, if a child attaches too quickly this could be a concern. Also, we do not want him to be attached to us since we would be leaving for a few weeks. When he came down stairs, at first, he did not want too much to do with us. He wanted to go outside and walk around the courtyard area. After about 15 minutes, the caregivers told us to go upstairs with him. When we got upstairs, he stayed in a corner area for 10 minutes. We thought that he had enough of us, so we decided that we would leave him. We don’t want him to be distressed. We were telling the caregivers and the children bye, and that is when Jaden decided he didn’t want us to leave. It broke our heart because of what might be going through his little mind. We are so excited to bring him home, but it makes us sad to think about what he must be thinking. This is the only place he has ever known. He will never see these caregivers and his friends again. We know that ultimately he will be with us, and all will be well. But we do not want him to go through these transitional days.

 He loves his coloring book and crayons.

 Admiring our boy

Over the next few minutes we took full advantage of the time. Jaden pulled all of the colors out, and he would hand them to us one at a time. The nurse told us that while we were away he told them that he hugged and kissed “momma & poppa.” He colored with his little friends for a little bit. One funny note is that Jaden noticed Anna Grace’s braces today and was very interested in them.  It occurred to us that he probably had never seen any before. Ashley had to step out of the room for a few minutes towards the end of our time because she began to cry. She cannot bear the thought of leaving him for these weeks. As it started to rain, Jaden grabbed Clint’s hand, and said in Amharic, “Look Poppa, the rain is coming!” Ashley came back in the room, and we spent 5 minutes telling the caregivers and the children bye. Jaden ran up to each of us and hugged and kissed us over and over. This was so tough for all of us.

 Mommy's boy

 Hugging Mommy goodbye

 Kissing Poppa Bye 

Kissing sister goodbye

Right before we left, we studied his little face. We wanted to remember each detail about him. His beautiful big brown eyes … his charming smile … his perfect little lips … his smooth skin … his sweet little cheeks … his soft hands … we couldn’t quit staring at him. We were leaving a part of our heart here in Ethiopia. It took everything in us to not cry as we were leaving the room. We got in the car, and there was silence. No one could speak a word. Clint stared out the window of the car with tears flowing down his face. Ashley sat in the backseat of the car tears flowing down her face. We were emotionally drained.

As we were leaving out of the orphanage gate, we looked up to second floor of the orphanage, and we saw Jaden Biyagegn staring out of the window waving goodbye. Be still my heart! He waved … blew us kisses … and we left.

The time cannot come soon enough for us to return to bring him home! Lord, we pray you protect him. Holy Spirit, somehow would you let him know that his family will return to him soon and bring him to his forever home. We thank you, Lord, that You chose us, and we do not take it lightly the responsibility we have to teach him all about His Heavenly Father!

We love you, Jaden Biyagegn Smith! Your mommy and daddy will be coming soon for you!

Friday, May 9th

Friday, May 9^th…we woke up today excited to go see Jaden Biyagegn.  We ate breakfast at the guesthouse and headed out at 9:30 to see him.  When we got there they brought him down to the lobby for the first time.  He was out of his element and very distracted.  The three of us sat around awkwardly while the guard and our driver tried to get him to pay attention to us.  After quite a while, he finally warmed up and decided to sit with us a little.  It was “tea time” at the orphanage; their tea is so good!  We began sipping our tea, and Clint asked if he could offer Biyagegn some.  He started giving him sips, and he drank Clint’s entire cup!  He then sat in Ashley’s lap and drank her entire cup too.  It was hilarious and we learned the key to his heart is his stomach. J We knew this was our last visit, and we were starting to get a little sad.  Our driver Abey asked the director if there was any chance we could come back tomorrow.  It wasn’t our idea at all and to our surprise the director said yes.  We decided it was time to leave and said our goodbyes for the day.  As he walked up the stairs, he waved goodbye and blew kisses.

Drinking his Poppa's tea

Jaden with Abey (our driver)

Jaden with one of the older kids from the orphanage

Waving goodbye

We left from there and decided to have Abey drive us up Entoto Mountain, which is the highest peak over looking the city of Addis Ababa.  It was a beautiful drive and completely different scenery than the city.  We saw so many fascinating people, including these ladies that carried huge piles of sticks on their back.  Abey told us that these ladies do this every day.  They are such hard workers here!  We also saw a man with a pet monkey on a leash!  When we reached the top of the Mountain we saw a historic place where Menelik II dwelled and established his first palace.  We saw many people praying at the first Orthodox Church and toured a small museum.  Ethiopians are rightfully proud of their amazing heritage and history.

At the top of Entoto Mountain

Clint & Abey

Clint & Anna Grace (Ashley is not in it because she is afraid of heights, ha!)

Ladies carry sticks. Ashley and Abey racing up the mountain.

First royal palace

Second structure of the first Orthodox church

Ethiopian flag on top of Entoto Mountain

When we got down the mountain we went to eat at Island Breeze.  It was a unique little restaurant similar to Tommy Bahamas but much cheaper.  Food is very inexpensive here, usually around $5 per person. We ate and decided to call it a day around 3:00 pm.  We had our driver take us to the guesthouse and we rested and relaxed the rest of the day.  Anna Grace gets excited about going back there each day because it is the only time we have wifi, ha!  We are enjoying our time here but missing Chandler and Shelby very much.  It has been hard on them not getting to be here and meet their brother.  Ashley’s Dad has taken great care of them and we have not had to worry about them at all. We are so proud of their great attitudes and how responsible they have been! 

Some interesting things about Ethiopia:

• Donkeys, goats, horses and dogs wander around the streets. Some have a shepherd leading them. Others do not. Our animal-loving girl, Anna Grace, loves all the animals being around everywhere.

• In Ethiopia there are no lanes, and seems to be no traffic rules. All drivers use the horn quite often; however, it is not offensive as it would be in the USA. We are biased, but we have the best driver. Abey is a fabulous driver, and we will miss him greatly.

• There is a huge trash dump that we pass by daily. There are 100s of adults, children and animals salvaging for food in this dump. It is very heart-breaking.

• We needed to exchange a little more money for the rest of our stay so Abey brought us to the Sheraton hotel. We were blown away with how nice it was. It was comparable to the Ritz Carlton in Maui. The nightly rate is $400; it just didn’t seem right here in Addis Ababa.

• As you drive down the street, there are shops where raw meat is hanging to purchase.

• The people of Ethiopia are very precious. They all have smiles on their faces. We have not met one unkind person the whole time we have been here.

• It is very safe in Ethiopia. There is not much crime, and we have never felt afraid or in danger.

Court Day

Thursday, May 8^th… the date we go to court to make Jaden Biyagegn our forever child!

We woke up early to leave for our court date.  Our driver picked us up at 7:30 am, and we were off to court for our 9:00 time. The traffic was TERRIBLE trying to get there!  Actually the traffic is always awful, but this day was worse than usual.  We were almost late to court. Ashley did not show it, but inwardly she was stressed out. Clint asked our driver at least 5 times if it was going to be okay. Abey assured him it would be!  We finally made it in the courthouse and sat down in a small room with 5 other families.  We were sitting there about 5 minutes, until we were called in with another family for our court hearing. The Palmer family, from Hattiesburg, Mississippi, went in the same time as we did.  The judge asked us about 5 questions and then pronounced Biyagegn our child officially.  We held back the tears as we left the courtroom. We honestly couldn’t believe that was it!  We took pictures outside to celebrate and headed out.  We think we were there a total of 20 minutes…crazy!

 The Palmer family from Hattiesburg, MS was in with us having their court hearing too. 

We passed court! Praise be to Jesus!

Fasika is the Gladney in-country social worker. She is great with the children!

After court it was time to go see Jaden Biyagegn. All morning Anna Grace had felt really bad. She had been sleeping in the car all the way to the courthouse.  We decided to stop at a grocery store to pick up a couple of new toys for Jaden.  While inside the store, Anna Grace started feeling even worse. We were asking everyone where a bathroom was, but no one could speak English. Finally someone told Clint that the restroom was upstairs. So Ashley and Anna Grace got on the elevator to go to the restroom. From there, the situation got ugly… she threw up in the elevator. We came back down, and rushed quickly out of the store. We felt so bad for her. She threw up all the way out of the store. When she got outside, she continued to vomit, and all eyes were on us. It was quite the scene and Clint apologized profusely.

After we finished at the store, we left to go to the orphanage.  It was just around the corner. We weren’t sure how Jaden would respond, but he seemed happy to see us. He smiled when we came into the room. The caregivers told us to bring some toys with us, so it probably helped that we brought toys. J We brought colors and a coloring book. He loves coloring books. He called one of his little friends over, and they colored. He wanted to try each color out, and after trying each one, he would hand the color to Ashley. He is definitely the boss at the orphanage. He has an opinion, and doesn’t mind telling the other kids what to do. Another strong-willed Smith … why not?!

 Jaden loves to color.

 He loves his "Poppa"!

He loves Mommy!

 Sweet boy!

 He loved taking selfies!

 What a great personality!

 That face just melts our hearts!

Jaden Biyagegn and his Daddy

After coloring for a little while, Jaden got distracted playing with the ball we brought. Another child dumped out all his crayons. You should have seen his face, he was not happy. He put his hands up to his cheeks, and gasped. The caregivers told us that he kept saying, “for the love of Jesus.” He continued to say it over and over. Some of the crayons fell under the toddler beds. He moved each one of the beds to get the crayons.  After moving each one he then put each bed back perfectly.  He is a very resourceful child!  After all of this, we wanted to take some pictures with him. He LOVED taking selfies and would have taken them as long as we let him.  It was fun to see his little personality come out and how well he could work an iPhone! We were amazed that it only took him a minute to learn how to swipe form picture to picture. He would find a picture of himself, and he would say, “Biyagegn!” It was so sweet! The caregivers told him to kiss each of us, and after they said that it continued kissing Ashley and Anna Grace. He is definitely a doll!  One thing that Clint loved was that he could already catch and throw the ball. Clint would throw it to him, and he would catch it. Then he would chunk it back to him hard!

His laugh is contagious!

Watch him catch and throw. Made his Daddy proud!

After about 45 minutes, he usually reaches his limit. We sadly said goodbye. Every time we see him we are super sad to leave, but we tell ourselves it is only temporary. We cannot wait until we can bring him home with us permanently!

After visiting Jaden, we went to lunch at Kaldi’s Coffee. Abey, our driver, told us that this is the African Starbucks. The logo looked similar, and the ambiance was too. We got smoothies and coffee. It was a fun place to go and see.  Since Anna Grace had been sick we decided to go back to the guesthouse for the day.  We enjoy the guesthouse and we sleep a lot when we are there! 

Anna Grace loved Ethiopian coffee. She and Shelby our are coffee drinkers.

Tomorrow we get to go see Jaden again … we can’t wait!!

The Day We Met Our Son

Wednesday, May 7th, was the day that we have dreamed about for four years. We go to meet our son for the first time. We are excited. We are anxious. We are fearful. Many thoughts and questions were going through our mind. What will he think of us? Will he be afraid of us? Will he be scared?

We ate breakfast at the guest house. We had eggs … toast … pancakes. It was absolutely delicious. The staff at Bethel Guest House take great care of their guests.

At 9:30, we left for Hilawe Foundation orphanage. Hilawe is a government-run orphanage. Several adoption agencies have children in this orphanage. As we are traveling there, no one is speaking much.  We get to the orphanage, and it was so surreal. We walk into the orphanage, and wait in the small lobby area. The administrator of the orphanage came out, and told us that we can go upstairs to see Jaden. We walk 3 flights of stairs. Our hearts are pounding. We were still not talking.

 Waiting in the lobby at the Hilawe Foundation Orphanage (about to see Jaden for the first time)

Now, one thing that our agency told us was that Jaden will not know that we are his parents. We were prepared for this. We were sad about it, but knew that it was for his good. They do not want him to become attached to us. The main reason is that we will leave him here for a few weeks until we get our Embassy appointment. However, Jaden overheard his caregivers talking, and he knew that his parents were coming on this day. The caregivers said that he was happy all morning because his parents were coming. We did not know this until after we were in the room with him.

When we walked into the room, we heard one child crying. The child that was crying was Jaden. We didn’t know what to do or say, we couldn’t imagine all that was going on in his little mind. The social worker, Fasika, from the in-country Gladney staff, told us to play and talk to the other kids, and he will warm up to us. Ashley had stickers in her bag, and she told Fasika. Fasika took the stickers, and started giving them to Jaden to pass around. He very much enjoyed this task and put them on every child and caregiver. He is the oldest in his room and very much in charge. Fasika then told him to put them on “momma.” 

He put one on Ashley’s head and then gave her a kiss. It was such a beautiful moment.

After that he began to warm up to all three of us and even put a sticker on “poppa.” He played ball with Clint and has quite an arm. He has a contagious laugh and is a very happy child. He also seems pretty resourceful. Another child found Fasika’s phone and so he walked to her and offered her his sticker book. We thought that was really sweet until he took the phone in exchange. We all busted out laughing.

 The sticker Jaden put on his Daddy's hand. He put one on his Daddy's forehead, too.

We are allowed to stay with him for one hour each day. Towards the end of our time there he started to pull away and didn’t want anything to do with us. We felt like he had probably had his emotional limit.  So we told him goodbye and left for lunch.

One thing that we did find out when we were going to see Jaden is that we have been mispronouncing his name. His Ethiopian name is Biyagegn. We have been pronouncing it "BEE-ya-geg-nay." We found out that it is pronounced "BEE-ya-GEEN." Clint has had a hard time pronouncing it the right way.

For lunch our driver, Abey, took us to a great pizza place. We sat there trying to eat but felt completely drained emotionally. After lunch we went back to the Guest House and slept 4 hours! At 7:00 pm Abey picked us up to go to Habisha 2000, which is a cultural dinner restaurant. Our adoption agency set up a cultural dinner for us with another family. At the dinner, they sang and did dances from each region of Ethiopia. A great surprise was Scott Brown, Executive Vice President of Gladney, was here in Addis Ababa. The food and entertainment was amazing, and we had a great time getting to know Scott, Dereje (the in-country representative for Gladney) and the Ballew family from Texas. The ladies made Clint and Anna Grace dance and that was so entertaining as well.

Habesha Ethiopia Cultural Restaurant

We ate with Scott Brown, Executive VP of Gladney, & Dereje, in country Gladney representative

 The Smiths, Ballews, Scott Brown & Dereje

 The Smiths, Ballews, Scott Brown, Dereje & Abey (our driver who didn't make the first picture, ha)

We went to bed excited about what tomorrow holds. We will be picked up at 7:30 am to go to court.

The Road to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

Four years ago today the Lord began to stir in my heart the idea of adoption. I felt very afraid and unsure about what that would look like in my “comfortable” life with older kids. Keith Harmon preached a sermon one Sunday talking about when God calls you to something you just have to jump off the diving board. So, that Sunday we decided to jump. It has been a LONG emotional process but we finally can see the end ahead. I have not been good at blogging these past 4 years but I can’t miss this opportunity to give God the glory for all He has done. So, I will start today at the beginning of our journey to Ethiopia to finally meet our precious son.

A week ago today, Clint received a call from our adoption agency. We were so excited to get the news, yet frantic at the same time. Our adoption agency, Gladney Center for Adoption, called to let us know the Ethiopian court scheduled our court day for Thursday, May 8th, and we needed to be in Addis Ababa no later than Tuesday, May 6th.

It has been amazing to watch the Lord provide the perfect flight, accommodations and the ideal timing for my Dad to be in Arkansas to stay with Chandler and Shelby. Every step along the way we see God’s perfect timing, provision and love. What is he calling you to in your life? If He calls you He will provide all that you need.

On Monday afternoon, we boarded a flight to Chicago. From Chicago, we flew to Frankfurt Germany, and from Frankfurt we flew into Addis Ababa. The entire trip from beginning to end took us 26 hours.

 Leaving for Ethiopia at XNA airport

On the plane headed to Frankfurt, Germany

Addis airport

 In the car in Ethiopia

We got to our guest house, the Bethel Guest House in Addis Ababa, around 10 pm. Great room and great accommodations! We are so excited that tomorrow (Wednesday) we get to see our boy, Jaden Biyagegn Smith for the first time. This is the little boy that we have prayed for over the last 4 years as we have waited. This is the little boy that will forever be in our family. We cannot wait!!

A couple things to note:
• The kids and Dad Dad will not be surprised by this, but Ashley slept the entire way here on our flights. I guess she was catching on her sleep over the past weeks.
• We had to stop in Saudi Arabi for some people to deplane and to refuel … a little scary! Saudi Arabian officers came on the plane looking for open containers of alcohol and dirty magazines. They are both against the law in Saudi Arabi. Of course, we had nothing to fear, but it was just a little creepy.
• There is a call to prayer for Muslims from 3 am – 5 am and ear-plugs do not block the sound out.

Thank you all for your prayers, texts, emails, messages, support and love! We have such an awesome church and body of believers that are surrounding us.

We feel your prayers!