"We're off"

That was the message I found on my e-mail this morning at about 6:00. Brian's brother and sister-in-law AND three-year-old niece are on their way back to China, along with a family friend who is going mostly to help with the three-year-old. They'll come home with one more person, just like they did nearly three years ago. Emma Mei will be coming home to stay.

We thought we would be less excited about this homecoming than we were the first one; heck, we've been through it once. But now that it's just about 10 days away, we realize we're no less excited than we were before. We're just more familiar with what this is like.

We always thought that their inability to have their own children was a kind of curse. I can't imagine, for example, not knowing how it feels for your baby to move inside you--feeling those flutters for the first time or having those tae-kwon-do kicks later on that wake you from a sound sleep. I wouldn't trade those experiences for anything, but somehow I don't feel as though Karen and Patrick have been cheated at all. Maybe, in some ways, they've been just as blessed. What an opportunity God has given them! And their reward is two little girls that they get to spoil and love, as do we.