Finally Friday

It is indeed finally or final Friday before our trip to Addis Ababa to get Amari Roza. Jill has packed ten times already I think. I haven't started, although Georgiann has begun organizing little piles of things for me. Our tickets are secured and seating assignments made. Our hotel room is reserved. Nothing left to do but be ready by Monday noon and begin our journey.

We will trade our homes for a 4 wheel one engine home for about 2 1/2 hours, then a 1o wheel two engine home for about 16 1/2 hours, then a (I am speculating here) a 4 wheel 1 engine taxi or hotel van, and finally a "355 sq ft room with a balcony offering a mountain, garden or city view, decorated with original artwork, and a desk. Special touches may include daily newspaper, mineral water, chocolates, flowers and fruit."

Not sure if I will post anymore before the trip, so your thoughts and prayers will be greatly appreciated. We are hoping to update at least Jill's blog while in the country, but might not post pictures due to uncertainty of the Internet connections.

Thanks for your interest so far. This journey is just beginning.

Christmas 2007

This is the latest picture of Amari from Addis Ababa. Jill and I are getting pretty anxious to see her.

This is Madison at our house for Christmas. Soon the two of these will be together a lot.

Christmas Eve 2007

This is Jill, Madison and Ollie at our house the night before Christmas 2007. Georgiann and I and all of our children and grandchildren were in church tonight for Christmas Eve service, except for Amari Roza. Little Amari is still in Addis Ababa waiting on us to come and get her. But that will be soon now. One week from tonight we will be in the air and headed east towards Rome.

Madi is beginning to talk a lot. Nothing we can quite understand yet, except for mama and dada, which only Mommy and Daddy have heard. But she laughs and giggles and smiles and has so much personality. She is such a beautiful baby. We are so amazingly blessed to have a grandchild this beautiful. Everyone kept telling me it would be this way, and I knew it would, but it was just hard to really imagine it until it happens.

We hope to have more pictures tomorrow of Christmas when we will all exchange gifts and have a Christmas meal together. This may be the best times of life for this family of ours. I remember when I was very small and how Christmas was with my family, then we married and it was just Georgiann and I and our children. Now it is Georgiann and I, our children, and now our grandchildren. Soon the focus will shift again to the next generation. Life is that way.

We pray that your Christmas is filled with the love of family, friends, and most of all, Jesus.

Link to Jill's Blog

This is especially for the Harrisonburg FCN choir members who may have been frustrated with the link to Jill's blog not working in my email. Her blog is http://www.jillsexp.blogspot.com/. The leading h was left off the email. Sorry for any confusion. You can also click her link on the left side of this page under Blogs I Monitor, Amri's adoption process.

We do leave a week from tomorrow, celebrating New Years out over the Atlantic. As Jill says, hopefully not IN the Atlantic.

Your thoughts and prayers are greatly appreciated.

9 Days

We are at 9 days and counting. I am excited. Jill is freaked. Mom is worried about DC traffic and driving in the dark. Daniel doesn't say anything. Cassie has her nose in the air. Kids turned out fine, animals are stuck up.

I wanted to work on the bathroom downstairs today, but needed to take Daniel to the vet. Took him to Sonic for his first Sonic burger. He didn't really say, but I think he enjoyed it. Did some Christmas shopping. Still a little more to do on my part. No sense in getting in a great big hurry I'd say.

Some pics just for pics sake. My truck license plate describes my philosophy of life. Our bodies are only loaned to us, and if I can benefit someone else with it or parts of it I'm all for that. I encourage you to look into being an organ donor as well as donating your body to science. Check out this web site for more details. http://www.sciencecare.com/.














Christmas decorations are up at the Catlett house, have been in fact. This will be Madi's first Christmas and we are so excited to be a part of it. As mentioned earlier in both blogs, Jill and I will be able to celebrate Mari's first Christmas with her.

Thanks for your interest, thoughts and prayers. Pray for Jill that she won't freak out too much.

Black is the Cat

Here is Cassie in her alter ego. I have always wondered if Cassie was from the dark side, now I am convinced. She seems to be very anti-Christmas here, and the way she often runs around the floor batting at and tumbling with things that apparently only she can see, leads me to believe she is in communication with....the Dark side.

On an entirely different note, I am considering trading my PIII for a Shuttle XPC system that supports an Intel Core 2 Duo E4500 LGA 775 Dual-Core CPU. I would jam in 2GB of ram with a fast video as well with plenty of on board ram, and I think I am going to stick with XP Pro instead of, in the words of a friend of mine, Veeesta. Anyone out there have any knowledge of this system/CPU combination and want to warn me of any peculiarities?

I am planning on moving my wireless hub to my study so I can go wired to it from the Shuttle. I think some of the speed problems I am incurring now may be bandwidth limitations on the wireless part. And I really want a wireless Logitech trackman wheel. I absolutely have to have a track ball. Can't work in graphics without it.

Couple in a desktop firewire DVD burner and I'm all set. One day I'll upgrade this 15" FP to a 22" or 24." Then we'll be in high cotton. I hope that isn't a politically incorrect faux pax. I am sure the term dates back to slavery days. Cheers to all. Stay tuned for news of the Addis Ababa trip.

Daniel

I haven't featured Daniel in some time, so I thought I'd include a couple of pictures of him. And a couple of pics from Georgiann and my trip to Charlotte, NC to help with Operation Christmas Child. I have no recent pictures of Cassie. Unlike other cats in the family (there are 6 other cats in the family, Sam, Micky, Jack, Chloe, Potter and Maestro) Cassie doesn't seem to grow. So if you've seen her at all, just remember that. If you haven't, she is totally black and small.

More trip info

Well, providing there are no more changes in travel arrangements here is our schedule for flights:

Monday 12/31/07 Ethiopian Airlines Flight # ET501
Depart Washington Dulles 8:3oPM ~ Dinner & Breakfast served
Tuesday 01/01/08
Arrive Rome Fiumicino 11:15 AM Flight duration 8 hrs 45 minutes
Depart Rome Fiumicino 12:00 PM ~ Lunch & Dinner served
Arrive Addis Ababa Ethiopia 7:40 PM Flight duration 5 hours 40 minutes

Tuesday 01/08/08 Ethiopian Airlines Flight # ET500
Depart Addis Ababa 10:15 PM ~ Dinner & Breakfast served
Wednesday 01/09/08
Arrive Rome Fiumicino 2:35 AM Flight duration 6 hours 20 minutes
Depart Rome Fiumicino 3:20 AM ~ Breakfast & Lunch served
Arrive Washington Dulles 7:20 AM Flight duration 10 hours

Or, 14 hours 25 minutes going over besides time on the ground, and 16 hours 20 minutes coming back. Not as bad as I thought. Detroit to Amsterdam to Nairobi was 20 hours more or less.

Stay tuned.

Granddaughter 2

Here she is. Amari Roza. Beautiful, huh? Jill and I leave for Addis Ababa Ethiopia December 31, celebrate the New Year somewhere over the Atlantic, return January 9. Your thoughts and prayers for our trip are greatly appreciated. God is allowing us to bring a precious piece of Africa into our hearts and lives to love as our own. It is a dream come true for both Jill and me.