We're Home!

First of all, apologies for the lateness of this blog post!  The transition home has been quite challenging over the past few days.  Just an advanced warning that this post will be fairly long since we haven't written since just before our last bedtime in Hong Kong!

It was a huge blessing to stay at a hotel that was connected to the Hong Kong airport.  We woke up, packed our things, and 10 minutes later we had walked right up to the Delta counter.  After checking our bags, we made it through security with no issues and headed to our gate.  Several other adopting families were on the same flight, so Helen got to play with some new friends while we waited.

We boarded the plane on schedule and settled into row 31 for the long trek to Detroit.  We had upgraded to Delta's "Economy Comfort" section, and we even were able to secure the front bulkhead row.  What a blessing!  We had lots of legroom and Helen could sit on the floor to play from time to time.  Helen got a bit fussy throughout the flight, but nothing beyond what you'd expect from a typical one-year-old.  In fact, we're quite proud of how well she did!  She even slept for a five-hour stretch.  Mom and Dad, on the other hand, were awake the whole time.

Our flight landed at DTW and it was off to Customs.  We had to claim all of our checked luggage and go through the standard Customs line, and next we were whisked off to the immigration line to process Helen's documents.  Our family was third in line, and we thought, "this won't be so bad!"  Then we talked to the gentleman that was next in line.  He told us he had been standing there for 90 minutes!  They had one single agent working all permanent immigrations, and there were several adopting families now in line with us (and some kids screaming their heads off).  They finally opened up two more windows for all of the adopting families and we went through with no issues.

Next, it was off to another line to have our luggage rescanned and re-checked.  The agent asked us "What made you decide to adopt from a foreign country instead of the US?"  He was kind of gruff, so we thought it was a formal question.  We explained how we wanted to adopt a child as young as possible, which is challenging in the US.  We also explained that there are a lot of unknowns with domestic adoptions, and that there's a period of time where the birth parents can reclaim their rights and take a child back.  We also explained that we've always wanted to adopt and that there are millions of children out there that need a family.  The agent said, "Thanks, I always ask that question just for my own knowledge.  Congratulations!"  Turns out we weren't being grilled at all, but it was still a good opportunity to share with this gentleman.

We grabbed some bagels & coffee, and then it was off to our gate to head back to good ol' CID.... to the first assigned gate, that is.  A pretty huge rainstorm was covering Detroit, and all of the flight schedules were a mess!  Long story short, our flight to Cedar Rapids switched gates three times and got delayed twice.  We were on the verge of tears, because our flight was now taking off at the time we were supposed to be walking into the CID terminal!  After we arrived at the fourth assigned gate, we boarded our last leg home.

We must have had a good tailwind for the flight home, because it only took us about an hour until we were on the ground.  We walked through the terminal and were enthusiastically greeted by Ella and Myles!  What a wonderful family reunion!  We had honestly been pretty down in the dumps for the latter half of our time in China because we missed them so much.  People ask us what the most difficult part of the trip was, and we can answer with confidence that it was being away from our other children.  We were also greeted by some pretty amazing friends that came to meet us and Helen.  We'll let pictures tell the story:

That brings us to today.  It's Monday, July 30.  We've been home as a family of five for three days now, and as we said earlier, it's been a challenge.  We've been to Kenya twice, and Steve's been all over the world for work (Singapore, Paris, etc), but we've never experienced jetlag this bad.  So we've been dealing with two parents with jetlag, a toddler with jetlag plus adjusting to a 13 hour time difference after being on China time her entire 17-month life, and two other kids at home full of energy and bouncing off the walls!  Helen is having a hard time getting her days and nights switched around, but each night has been a little better than the last.

So, the past few days have been chaos, but it's a wonderful chaos.  Yes, we're exhausted.  Yes, we've had three nights with pretty much no sleep.  Yes, we just want Helen to sleep all night so we can get into the "new normal".  However, we're all safe, we're all healthy, and we're all together under the same roof.  We're HOME!  We know that Helen's sleep schedule will get on track.  We know that we'll catch up on our sleep.  Most importantly, we know that we're blessed beyond measure by a wonderful Creator that has brought three amazing welcome additions to the Adolphs family.

We'll end with a few pictures from Helen's first days at home as an Iowan. :-)