At the end of August, we went to Sweden to celebrate the marriage of Fredrik's sister, Viktoria, to John. It was a lovely weekend, despite the fact that I arrived with a kidney infection (seriously miserable plane ride, thank goodness Kysa slept and was in good spirits, but fairly quick recovery once I got some antibiotics). The wedding gave us the opportunity to introduce Kysa to most all of her Swedish relatives. She showed everyone that she knows how to party by taking a power nap after dinner and coming back to the reception to dance until 1am. Sometimes jet lag can work in your favor.
We traveled up to Gothenburg for a few days and then took a train across the country to Stockholm where we stayed with good friends and Kysa enjoyed being around five other kids for a few days. I think she's ready for siblings! We had a fantastic time catching up with old friends and walking around Stockholm, Kysa became an official Swedish citizen and I quickly remembered what a GORGEOUS city Stockholm is and decided that we needed to move there.
I'm not packing my bags just yet....
Almost as soon as we touched down and had a chance to wash our dirty laundry, we spontaneously decided to made a quick weekend trip to New York. Here's why: Marcus Samuelsson (born in Ethiopia, adopted by Swedish parents, now lives in Harlem, and big time celebrity chef) held a benefit brunch at his home in Harlem to raise money for famine relief in Ethiopia. We had a great time and met other Ethiopian adoptive families, Ethiopians, Swedes...and generally enjoyed the company of an incredibly diverse, super-cool, BEAUTIFUL group of people.
We met Marcus and his wife, Maya. Maya claims to be from Ethiopia, but seriously, despite how gorgeous Ethiopians are, I don't think she's even from this planet...she's THAT beautiful. And gracious. We had a couple brief conversations, and after she kissed on Kysa, she actually thanked us for opening up our hearts to adopt. Wow. We enjoyed the food, drink and music, especially Kysa who hung out by the dj's table most of the afternoon. When Marcus gave a little talk near the end of the brunch he gave Kysa a shout out, calling her the "little blonde professional Ethiopian dancer." We left completely inspired and feeling so fortunate to be slowly, carefully and eagerly weaving ourselves into the Ethiopian community.
We spent the rest of our time walking around Manhattan. The weather was perfect and we literally clocked over 15 miles of walking in the three days we were there. We visited the Central Park Zoo, the Natural History Museum (Kysa now says "dinosaur" see video below), and we ate at some of our favorite spots, Bubby's and Caracas, just to name a few. Fredrik and I BOTH got homesick for our old city. New York, we miss you! But again, we're not packing our bags just yet.
We returned home, I unpacked our bags. I chopped off my hair (again), and then we repacked and we all headed up to Boone, NC were I spent 4 days training to be a doula. Though I still need to do a couple things to become certified, I am now an official "Dona International trained Doula!" Yippee!! While I was spending time in the company of several lovely ladies and two awesome teachers, Kysa and Fredrik spent time enjoying fall in Boone, and Kysa got to hang out with her grandparents. Great weekend!
Somewhere in the midst of all the travel we also got rid of our big couch to make more room for baby boy, I purged my closet.....Oh yeah, AND I attended a beautifully peaceful birth!
I'm not sure if all this travel, wishing to move to another country, or back to NY, cutting my hair (twice), becoming a doula, getting rid of furniture and clothes is related to the adoption. I'm not sure what other families have done to help cope with all the waiting, but we're obviously ready to embrace change. We're getting antsy. We're ready for a baby...
Given our present coping methods, if we don't have some movement soon who knows what we might do next. Move to Fiji? Matching tattoos? Take up family sky diving? We're open to suggestions...the more radical the better :-)
Om Shanti,
Allison
