Memories....

One of my favorite pictures of Eden..one of the few smiles I got from her!

My friend Crystal told me about a blog. http://thebeautifulfeet.blogspot.com/ I knew I shouldn' t have looked, but it is too late now! This is a story of a family who is adopting form Sierra Leone. The mother with the 6 children are living at Family Kingdom in Freetown, Sierra Leone. As I read her posts, I was transported to June 2005 and my time in Freetown! We would go to Family Kingdom to get a coca-cola light (aka: Diet Coke!) As I think back on it, it really seems like a dream! Did I really go there? Did all that really happen? I e-maled Juli (the author of the blog) and I will be anxious to see if I hear back from her.

I have to admit that reading her blog made me wonder yet again if we did enough! Should I go live there for 6 months? I could do it! She makes it sound so wonderful! She is there with 6 kids, and she makes it sound so easy! I could do it with 4 kids, right? Good thing my mom isn't invited to read this because she would have just dropped dead of a heart attack just reading that last statement!

I miss Eden so much. I thought time would make it easier, but honestly I miss her more now than I did when I first came home. The feel of her wiry hair under my chin as she sat on my lap...the look of her dark hand laying on my white arm....her contagious laugh when I would tickler her...that one time that she called me mommy.....how proud I was the first time she handed the gum wrapper ( she LOVED gum) to me instead of throwing it down on the floor! The time I took her into the bathroom at the hotel and turned the water on for her to wash her hands, not thinking that she had never seen running water! She was fascinated and stood there just turning the water off and on!

God, protect her! Hide her from the evil that surrounds her in her homeland. Strengthen her grandmother and provide for their needs. My heart breaks for her, but I know you hold her in your hand and you have covered her with your feathers! Thank you for that comfort!

The last picture of us taken right before I left for the helicopter. She was sick this day and spent the whole time in my lap!

The first time mother and daughter met!