Week Two

Maria loves to look at the photos on our blog and gets so excited whenever she sees "Arlo!"

Grandpa and Grandma Kammeraad arrived on Tuesday night! 

Yes, Carlos still has to go to school while in Colombia - but with Mama!

This week has flown by!  On Tuesday morning we had our ICBF interview with the Defender of Minors.  It was at Los Posingos.  We weren't sure how Maria would do going back there, but it went well.  She did recognize her caregivers and seemed happy when they came up to her and gave her kisses, but she didn't reach for them or pull away from us.  She didn't seem nervous at all that we would leave her there, she just seemed comfortable with how everything went. 

While we were waiting for the Defender, we played in this little room with some toys that we brought, talked to Isabel (our rep), and met another couple who are adopting a sibling group of four girls.  At one point two of the caregivers at LP came in and brought this adorable yet sad and shy little girl into the room.  They said that she and Maria were best friends.  They arrived at LP on the same day and are only a day apart in age.  They've been together since the beginning, always in the same room, in the same group together.  Her name is Natalia.  They brought her right over to Maria and the girls just stared at each other.  It was so sweet and so sad at the same time.  I asked Isabel if she's been matched with a family yet, and she said that she hasn't because she isn't eligible to be adopted yet.  My heart just broke for this precious little girl.  My prayer is that God's will for her is to be in a loving family soon, whether that is biological or adoptive.  I wish we would have taken a picture of her.  Hopefully I can when we go back for our tour in the next week or two.

The interview with the Defender went really well.  She only asked us one question, and it was to Carlos.  She asked how he felt about his little sister.  Carlos told her that he didn't like her!  We knew there was a very good possibility that he would say that, and luckily the Defender chuckled and just asked him why.  He explained that she knocked over a tower that he built and she poked him in the stomach with a toy.  She told him that Maria was probably just trying to get his attention and wanted to play with him.  She had a nice little talk with him about playing with her and sharing and things like that.  And then we all signed some papers (yes, including Carlos!) and that was it!  Now our case has officially begun, and will brought into the court system.  We haven't heard anything from Isabel yet as to what court our case is in yet, but we're optimistic that it went in this week.

Although, things may be slowing down here a bit due to the transportation strike that is happening in Bogota right now.  It started on Monday.  It has something to do with the fact that the government wants to buy out public and private buses, but they are only willing to pay a fraction of the worth of the buses.  As you can imagine, the bus owners are very upset and refusing to sell.  They've gone on strike and now the general public is outraged of course because so many people rely on buses to get around.  There have been riots and demonstrations, all on the south side (which is not where we are staying, so no worries!)  There have been reports of violence, such as rocks and bottles being thrown at taxis and their clients.  So, we've all been advised (almost forbidden) by Isabel and Katya (the hotel owner) not to go anywhere near the south side of town, or to  travel anywhere where we'd need to be driven through the south side of town.  We are all now looking up places to visit that are only north of Bogota until this strike ends. 

In other news, Kevin's parents arrived safely here on Tuesday night!  It's been great having them here.  They'll be here for two weeks.  Kevin unfortunately has to leave on Saturday morning, but thankfully they'll be staying with us for so long afterwards.  And then yesterday we confirmed that my sister Natalie is coming to visit for a week the day after Kevin's parents leave.  I'm so excited!  She lives in Los Angeles and we only get to see each other once a year if we're lucky, so we're both very much looking forward to this time together!

Tomorrow we're going to try to go somewhere just the six of us.  As this will be Kevin's last day with us, we want to do something all together that will be something he will really enjoy!  I'll update again this weekend!