Travel Dates are Here

Some skilled guys and gals will be piloting us to Ethiopia real soon from a cockpit like this.  We have an appointment at the US Embassy in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia on 6/21/2010.  This is huge.

Amber has been on the phone for 2 days with numerous travel agents, trying to find the best and cheapest itinerary possible.  Unfortunately, we're traveling in probably one of the biggest vacation months there is.  The rainy season is just getting started, and those who can are getting out of the country for a few months.  The quotes we have so far are pushing $3k per person.  We're also learning that additional baggage charges are prohibitively expensive, especially if you're originating a flight out of most of Europe for some reason.  I think we're probably looking at leaving on the 17th, returning on the 25th.  Please pray for a good flight itinerary on a good airline for an unbelievably cheap price to come together for us.

Donations for the orphanage and transition home are starting to collect, which is really great.  We fully intend to pack as light as possible for ourselves so we can bring as much as we possibly can to Ethiopia with us.  There's a donation-collection-party being organized by Amber's sister Brittany this week.  That's so cool.

We got to share a little at church this morning.  We were interviewed for about 10 minutes, while an Eleora slide show rolled on the screens.  I hope it was encouraging to somebody today.  Amber did a great job expressing all the important things about our adoption story and how God has really stretched us through it all.

Burden Me

The past couple weeks have seen more than their share of drama.  In a nutshell, we learned that our fingerprint paperwork for our Chinese adoption ended up at the US Embassy in Ethiopia.  It took almost two weeks of constant emails and phone calls to the USCIS, the NVC, Senator Boxer, Senator Feinstein, and Congressman Campbell, but the issue finally got resolved.  Of course, Amber did nearly all of the legwork.  She even had to drive to the USCIS office in LA and spend a day giving stone-cold office workers the guilt-trip showing them pictures of our little girl who can come home to us if only they would DO THEIR JOB.  It worked.  The right paperwork reached Ethiopia days later.  Awesome!

Now for the real topic of this post.  We want you to burden us.  Burden us down with donations to hand carry to Ethiopia.  Donations to meet real needs of real orphans.  We will hopefully be traveling to Ethiopia in a few weeks, and we plan to take as much cargo as we can handle with us.  It's way cheaper and way more reliable to be a "mule" and pay the extra luggage fees to get donations to the orphanages and transition home than it is to ship donations.  So this is a call for donations to take with us.  There are some specific needs that have been expressed by our agency:

• TOOTHPASTE (we already have over 150 toothbrushes)
• DEODORANT
• HAND SOAP
• CLOTHES PINS
• BOY'S UNDERWEAR (sizes 6 and under specifically)
• TODDLER-10 YEAR OLD UNDERWEAR (boys & girls)
• SIZE SMALL SCRUBS FOR NANNIES ("5 for 10" stores have deals)
• BABY WIPES
• SOCCER BALLS & PUMPS (for the street kids)
• BABY BOUNCER SEATS

It would be a great problem to have if we had more donations than we could possibly manage.  If you're interested in dropping off some donations, please drop me (Bryan) a line so we can work out the details.  

Introducing Eleora Marije Booy

Our adoption petition passed the court process in Ethiopia last night!  She is now legally our new daughter!  We've chosen the name Eleora Marije Booy.  Check out the little slideshow we put togheter last weekend.  I'll post more details later, but it looks like we might travel to get her sometime in July or August.


Create your own video slideshow at animoto.com.

THE CALL

Yes indeed.  Every parent that has already experienced the international adoption process knows what I'm talking about.  One of the biggest milestones in the entire adoption process is the day when you get that call from your agency to announce the details of your child referral.  Today was that day for us! 
Our coordinator called Amber first, then the two of them called me.  When I got the call, I was in the midst of another super-busy afternoon.  I hit the answer button on my phone, and initially thought, "D'oh!  I don't recognize that phone number.  I should have just let that go to voicemail. Oh well, I have to answer it now."  I was immediately hit with the significance of the call when I heard the lady's voice on the line congratulating me that this is my referral call.
Our coordinator gave us the essentials.  Amber had the presence of mind to ask a few good questions.  I mostly just listened and took notes.  Afterward, Amber and I chatted.  She was so blown away she had to stop baking the cookies she was working on.  She couldn't work the oven timer any more!  All my office mates were watching me take the call the whole time.  I felt like I was on stage.  Weird.  It was cool to share the moment with them though.  We're pretty tight.
Unfortunately (and this pains me to say) we can't divulge most of the details of the referral.  I know!  That stinks, right?!  Privacy laws are strict, and I don't want to do anything to endanger the adoption process for us or her by being stupid on the Internet.  I can share that she is a really healthy 2 month old baby Ethiopian girl.  We do have 2 pictures of her, and she is SUPER CUTE.  I'm being objective, and you'll have to trust me on this for now.  We have all kinds of medical reports that all say she has no health issues, which is awesome.  She's obviously being fed WELL. :D
I'm pretty floored that she is so young!  I was totally expecting a referral for a child near the older end of our requested age range since young babies are in higher demand.  We'll be getting her just at that baby sweet spot (from a dad's point of view), when they're beyond that boring infant stage when they just eat and sleep.  Sure infants are cute, but dad's like to INTERACT!  I can't wait to share more details about her, but I'll have to wait a few weeks.  Travel dates are dependent on a lot of variables still, but let's just say 2-4 more months for now.  Totally stoked!  Thank you, Jesus.

We are ON DECK!

This is a really good sign!  We received an email from our adoption agency last Friday, officially putting us "on-deck".  What that means is that our family "could receive a referral within the next one to three months".  Yes, they're giving themselves a lot of latitude, and we're trying not to get too excited, but we have had numerous friends who received their referrals within days of receiving an "on-deck" email.

We're noticing quite a few referrals for kids from our agency once again.  That's good to see, because it says that a lot of the weirdness we saw in the weeks following the Haiti earthquake seem to be behind us now.  Unfortunately we're almost definitely going to have to travel twice, but at least adoptions are moving forward.

Stuff is feeling even more real now.

-bryan

Tortuga Reviewed on "Take It From Me"

Our hat company, "Tortuga Clothing" has generally gone through cycles of interest and activity.  Right now it seems to be hitting a high point in both.  We are currently participating in a product review / giveaway with the blog "Take It From Me".  They kindly invited us into the deal, and we're very pleased with all the feedback and interest.  Even though I managed to add about 30 new hats to the Etsy shop, there are still another 40 or so to post.  I really should market that shop better than I do.  Maybe this will give me more incentive to do just that, as well as the other fundraiser idea...T-SHIRTS.

I've already started talking with a silkscreener, but the initial momentum has died away.  If any of you wants to try their hand at a t-shirt design, feel free to contact me.

New Releases at Tortuga Clothing

tortugastyle.com

I'm finally getting around to posting new stock on our Etsy store for Tortuga Clothing.  I actually took new photos for all the new hats some time ago, but life gets complicated and the next thing you know...too much time passes.  So without further adieu, we're releasing a few new designs that we think you'll love.  

My personal fave is the Cali Beanie, which we have several color / stripe combinations to offer.  

We're also introducing Kitty Mitts to complement the Audrey Beanie.  These fingerless gloves are constructed of the same yarn as the Audreys, so they make a good combo.  

You'll notice in the new photos that we actually have heads modeling the new designs.  Each of the 3 heads was hand painted by either Amber, Audrey, or Halina.  I also added an actual banner design to the Etsy store.  It's not exactly what I had in mind, but I struggled a bit with the free online design tools.  Don't get me wrong, I think Aviary is great.  I just don't have a lot of skill with it yet.

I'm hoping the weather stays cool for a while longer to inspire the world to wear our beanies and support our adoptions.