Saturday, May 29th - HOME AT LAST!

Our 12:00 flight to Columbia was a breeze. This is it, minutes away from our family of SEVEN being together for the very first time. We headed down the escalator in the airport and were greeted by Kelly, Tucker, Brady, Cooper, and John. Cooper was so excited, jumping up and down in anticipation of meeting her new brother. Scott was very shy and had his head down while he was being greeted by all his new family - but there was a smile on his face. Cooper was asked by John what she thought of her new brother and we have her on video saying, "I love him." After waiting a while at the baggage claim, Tucker and I head back upstairs to see where my bag might be. It was in Greenville and not Columbia - who cares! I've got the little baggage that I want - let's go home! Scott is "eat up" with cars (machinas) and boy was he thrilled to climb up into John's big Toyota Sequoia machina. He sat right next to Cooper and quickly became comfortable with all of us. Every now and then he'd look back over his shoulder and smile at Tucker and say Tucker's name. Feels pretty strange to fill up a big SUV with just our family. What were we thinking?

Seemed like Christmas around our house when Scott arrived home. He ran from toy to toy while out in the carport, hopping on scooters and the little tike and Barbie car. He must feel like he has died and gone to heaven. The boy is WIDE OPEN when it comes to playing. He rides the little tyke car straight down the hill into the shrubs and trees. Oh my, little boys are different than girls - even than a tom-girl. Inside he is greeted by Shelby our Maltese and is fine with her. Every toy he sees, he stops to play with and then carries around his favorites as he goes from room to room. He has been wearing a red, white and blue star necklace of Cooper's since he got home.

How sweet it is to sit at our own kitchen table in Greenwood, SC with our 5 kids and my mom who came for dinner. IT IS OVER. We are HOME and our family feels complete (minus Kelly's husband who stayed home in Raleigh!) Scott's first meal at home went well. We are just putting a variety of foods in front of him. What he likes he eats a lot of. Other things that must look strange to him, he doesn't try (yet). Ice cream was a hit (chocolate cake, not so much).

It's hard to put these two 5 year olds to bed because they are already enjoying each other so much. I'm loving seeing all these toys being played with, things that Cooper has lost interest with - until now when she sees her brother all excited about them. Bath time, into P.J.'s, teeth brushed, in the bed, say our prayers, kisses and "Ya tee bya lu blu"/I love you and, can you believe this.... we're done. Scott is asleep in minutes and Cooper is not far behind him. Some of Scott's past orphanage routine/training needs to stick around. This is sweet!