Houston........We have lift off!!!

Amy, eldest sister of the Flaherty girl trio, here. I will be updating here as often as possible and hope to have updates from Beth and Kate from Ethiopia.

The first phase of their travel has officially begun! They left for Logan Int'l Airport at 4:00 a.m EST thanks to our dear Uncle Hank! Their first flight was to Dulles and left at 6:00 a.m., they left Dulles at 9:30 bound for Rome (refueling) and then on to Ethiopia.

They are due to arrive in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia tomorrow morning around 8:30 a.m.

Until next time.....

My Bags Are Packed, I'm Ready To Go

Unlike the song I'm not standing there outside my door, but only because it's too early to leave for the airport but if I could I would. I got everything packed, including my backpack and each bag is under the 50 pound allowance as instructed. So this will be my final post without Grace in my arms. If I can send e-mails from Ethiopia I will and my sister Amy will post while I'm gone. I'll be back in 9 days with my Punkin Grace!

Never A Dull Moment!

In less than 48 hours I will be on a plane heading to Ethiopia and in less than 72 hours I will be meeting Grace for the first time. If I were capable of doing a cart wheel I would do one. I'm not packed and I should be panicked about that but I'm not. I have a million things to do and I should be worried about how I'll get it all done and I'm not. What I am is joyful and grateful and blessed. And hopefully that will carry me through to get done what needs to get done.

There's been a slight change in my travel partners. My step-mom Judi and my sister Kate were supposed to travel with me but just Kate is coming now. My dad had a minor stroke on Sunday and while it looks like he'll be OK, we just can't have Judi leave him now. Luckily, Judi caught the signs so quickly and got him to the hospital so fast that they were able to administer him medication to stop the stroke. She saved his life. His speech is fine, he's walking around and complaining about the food so all in all, he's doing well considering. We'll be sad not to have Judi with us but we all feel much better knowing Dad will be in great care with her here.

I got word yesterday that we will definitely have a birth family visit so I'm really thankful for that. I am not sure which relative we will meet with but I'm just so happy to have the chance to meet any of her family members. We'll travel down to the Sidamo Region on Tuesday, have the meeting and stay over night and then return to Addis on Wednesday.

Well, that's about it for now but any good thoughts you could send out for clear travel on Friday morning would be appreciated. We don't have a lot of leeway for weather hold ups coming out of Boston so here's hoping that the weather will be good.