Homecoming

Its hard to believe we have only been home one week. Its been a LONG week. In a good way:) Last Saturday we brought Aven home and she is now part of her forever family! She did great on the 18 hour plane ride (supposed to be 17 but we spent an hour on the runway...lovely). She slept probably 12-13 hours of it.....We cant really ask for much better than that. There were some moments I wanted to cry....when she was crying and it was impossible to entertain an almost 1 year old in a 2ft by 2ft space. We did get a bulkhead seat with a bassinet for her to sleep on. SO thankful for that! Aven got us alot of attention and alot of perks while traveling with her. We got to skip to the front of 3 security lines and even got into the first class lounge while we waited to board our flight. Not bad.

We had a 4 hour layover in DC. We set up camp in a quiet corner and let Aven play, eat, and change clothes while we wait for our short flight home. We finally made it to RDU around 1:30 after 23 hours of travel. Aven was a trooper! We were greeted by some dear friends and family! The boys didnt even let us get off the escalator before they were running down the hallway to greet us. They set off the alarms and voices came over the intercom telling them to STOP! It was quite chaotic, but so sweet. They would not let their sister out of their sight. Every time I would try to stand up, Levi would pull on my leg and tell me to sit back on the floor so he could see his sister. Our dear friend Courtney of Always Autumn Studios took pictures at the airport for us! We are so blessed to have these moments captured!

 

  

Our first week at home has been better than I thought. Aven is extremely attached to me, which I am SO thankful for. Brian is slowly winning her over. And she loves the boys as long as they keep their distance. She doesn't love the fact that Levi wants to be in her face all of the time, but she lets him know when he is too close! She is sleeping like a champ! 12 hours at night without a peep and 2 long naps during the day. I am not sure how that all happened....she never even took time to get used to the time difference. She jumped right on a schedule the day she came home. Pretty shocking! But I will take it:) I woke up sick the morning we got home, so between adding another child to the family, jet lag and being sick, I have been extremely thankful for sleep! Aven is not thilled about strangers. She doesn't like anyone but Brian and I to touch her or hardly talk to her.  She's already getting better with that though, and I keep reminding myself that just a week and a half ago she was taken away from everything she has ever known. We could not be more thankful that Aven is home for Christmas! Praising the Lord for this 14 month journey where he taught us so much!