Day 12: Wednesday, 6/1

Happy June 1^st everyone! I didn't realize the month had changed... another day closer to coming home. As you can tell, I'm missing MN a little bit. Jeff was nice and pulled out the first season of Modern Family for a little reminder of home. We hadn't gotten into the show until season two so it's like brand new episodes for me... and wouldn't you know it, the pilot was when Cameron and Mitchell fly back from Viet Nam after adopting Lily. It might have been a bad idea to be holding Grace and trying to get her to sleep while watching this show... my spontaneous laughing did not not settle her down. But dang, is that a funny show!

Our morning flew by pretty fast but that might be because I slept all the way until 8:00 am! I'd been doing most of the overnight feeding/changing while Jeff took the early morning shift – he's been up checking email for work around 5:00ish so it made sense. But last night I swapped with Jeff – sort of – he took the overnight shift and I was supposed to be up early but he let me sleep and apparently I needed it. Didn't realize how much.

But back to the story – so we hung out until closer to noon and when the cleaning lady finally stopped by, we figured we should get out and run a few errands. There have been a few things on our list that needed to get done at some point sooner rather than later: stop by Dr. Pinano's office to pick up Grace's immunization record which he was supposed to return to us, stop by the tourism office to find a good map of the area and an RMI calendar, and run to the NTA to buy more internet cards. We accomplished only one of those as both Dr. Pinano's clinic and the tourism office were both closed. Fortunately, we didn't have to walk as the Simmons lent us their car!

We decided to stop by Majuro's Best BBQ thinking it was late in the lunch hour so the plates (to-go cartons loaded with rice, slaw and macaroni/potato salad) would be ready and waiting as it had taken them about an hour to be made up last time. No difference this time – still about an hour of waiting. But to make things easier, we ran into Heather and her older son, Collin. We chatted for a while, both got our orders to go, then dropped them at the hospital to pick up some paperwork they'd ordered yesterday.

We'd been waiting to hear from Claudia about our visit with Emi today. She was supposed to call us this morning to tell us what time. Of course, where were we when she called and said they'd be at our hotel in ½ hour? Getting BBQ. So we headed home and Jeff snarfed his lunch while I changed Grace and then picked at my lunch a little. Around 3:30 Emi and Donna arrived. Donna also works for the CAA and volunteered to come for the visit so Claudia could attend to her regular job. Maddy, the person who'd normally handle all the driving around and visits has been in Hawaii for her oldest daughters high school graduation but will return on Saturday. We look forward to working with her.

Our visit went really well and we learned more about Emi's family structure that we'll be able to share with Grace as she gets older. I also learned that she and two of her daughters will be moving back to Ebon after we leave but we'll be able to reach her through her mother in Majuro. The CAA also would like us to email them when we've sent something to the birth family's P.O. Box in case items don't make it, they can tell the birth mom that we did send it and then we can figure out a better way to get things to her. We also found out that some of her family on Ebon do read English and can translate our letters. This is really good news – I feel more confident that items and news we send will not only make it to her but be understood.

We also wanted to make sure that Emi had whatever information about us she wanted to have so we asked Donna to ask her what the CAA had shared and if she had any questions about us or where we're from. Apparently Maddy normally goes through all this information with the birth moms before the adoptive parents arrive but because of her pending travel, she didn't get the opportunity to do so. I was really surprised to learn that when Emi and her family were told we were flying to Majuro, they didn't even know where in the U.S. we were from! Can you imagine being prepared to hand your child to a couple you know hardly anything about?

Donna expressed her (Emi's, I think) gratitude for asking the question – she does want to know everything she can about us. Maybe it's not considered polite to ask outright? She said her family has tons of questions so we decided to address the topic of us and Minnesota next week when we go to their house to meet everyone. Maybe we should tone down the subject of the Minnesota winters a bit, ya think? Since we didn't bring any photos (wow, can you believe I forgot?), I think I'll take some online time and download some from our server at home. Emi has gotten a kick out of my “photo album”... aka, Jeff's Mac Book Pro. I really wonder what she thinks of our attachment to technology?

I sense that we've got Emi's seal of approval. She commented through Donna – although I had to ask what she'd said – that she can see that Grace is bonding well with us and barely knows who she is anymore. While the first part is true, the last part most certainly is not. I think that the transition from Emi to us could not be happening at a better time. Emi is just getting to be more aware of her world and she sees us in it 24/7. She certainly seems to be doing well. I know that Grace will not know her birth mom as “mom” but we will make sure she knows who Emi is and that she comes to understand the selfless decision she made to ensure Grace's welfare. It seems to me that giving 4 more weeks to being away from home is trivial compared to that.