Ethiopia - 1st Trip - Day 4

Today was supposed to be a "sleep in" day; our first since we arrived. John and I had both gotten a good 9 hours sleep when the phone rang at 8 am. It was a call from an Adoptive Mom telling us that she just bumped into Almaz in the lobby and that Wass would be picking us up a 9 am to take us to HH. How delightful, seeing as how we weren't schedule to visit until late afternoon.

At 9 am Wass picked us up and we headed off to HH. John and I went up to Eva's room and all of the babies were awake.....except Eva. She was still asleep, wrapped up in the crocheted blanket I made for her laying on her huggybuddy stuffed animal that we had given her on the very first visit.

The Special Mothers rotate shifts every Monday, so there were 2 different mothers that we met. Special Mother Bette takes care of Eva.

As Eva was sleeping, the Special Mothers were taking the other babies outside for their "sun time". I thought Bette was either going to stay in the room with Eva while she slept or take her downstairs herself. But instead she had ME wake up Eva and carry her downstairs. Oh boy!! Here goes something! My girl was not happy at all to be woken up out of a sound sleep, much less by this lady who makes her cry every time she appears. She had a rough morning. I was not able to console her and she refused to eat. She wouldn't let me or her Special Mother feed her.She finally had to get her temperature checked. It turned out she had a low-grade fever and the doctor gave her some medicine. It looked like she was cutting a new tooth but we don't know for sure.

After Eva got her medicine, I let the Special Mother take care of her. I didn't want to stress Eva out any more that she already was. John and I just loved on all the other kids and played with them. Every once in a while we would go get a kiss. Bette was real good about always pointing out that we are Mommy & Daddy. I learned today that my daughter needs movement and music or being sung to in order to settle down.

At 11:30 we left HH and went into the middle of Addis Ababa to Mekush, an Italian restaurant. The food was wonderful and there is also an art gallery there. We were able to find a painting that is specific to the region where Eva is from. What a blessing! It's absolutely perfect.

After lunch we went shopping and had fun, fun, fun!! I should have had a list or something to work off of because I was so excited to see all of the African/Ethiopian stuff. Thankfully we didn't blow our budget :-)

We found out from the other families that there was a whole slew of shops down another street that we could have shopped at. I can't wait for trip #2! We spent about 90 minutes shopping and then Wass brought us back to the hotel for the night.

I hope Eva is feeling better.

Court day tomorrow!!