5 weeks later

Esteban, man of leisure, riding in the car

Won't a carseat be a rude awakening for him?

We had a fabulous weekend in Villa de Leyva! Villa de Leyva is a small town in Boyaca province, north of Bogota, much of which dates from Spanish colonial times. It has stone streets--I hesitate to say cobblestone because that implies smaller stones of regular size. Because of the uneven-ness of the streets, it was NOT stroller friendly, so Esteban spent all his time in the BabyBjorn. Villa de Leyva is in/near the Andes Mountains, and we saw people there wearing the traditional braids, with the short brimmed hat and wool poncho. We went to an amazing market on Saturday morning. This wasn't a tourist market--it was the market you go to every week to buy your produce for the week, and anything else you might need.

The mountains were close enough to town to touch them. The air was clean and smelled sweet and fresh. It was colder at night than Bogota, which made the sun feel even warmer. It rained every day we were there, usually in the afternoon.

There are many more photos from Villa de Leyva, and a separate album of pics of Esteban and Bogota here.

We were sad to come home to Bogota because that meant that Grandma Dawn was leaving early Monday (yesterday) morning. Where did the past 3 weeks go?

And it did indeed happen, Grandma Dawn left. Esteban and I survived our first two days alone together. I have to admit that I've been spoiled by having someone to help with the bottle-washing, bottle-preparing, bath-preparing and clean-up, and generally a second set of hands to close the door when mine are full, etc. We'll probably just be in a groove when my brothers Peter and Patrick arrive next Monday night to help out for a week.

We have been in Colombia for 5 weeks now, and received Esteban 5 weeks ago tomorrow. We had a little scare about our process this past week when we realized that the U.S.'s participation in the Hague Adoption Convention treaty went into effect on April 1. (You can read more about this on the USCIS website.) We were pretty sure that we would be okay with the US part of the paperwork, but Colombia was another questions. We found out today that, as far as anyone knows, we're fine with our Colombia paperwork as well.

I also heard from our liaison today that the court has accepted our paperwork, which means that our paperwork is all there and in order. This is the first of three steps about which we will receive notice. If things go smoothly (and that's always a big IF in Colombia) we could have our final decree in about 2 weeks. Keep those prayers and good thoughts coming!

Okay, and last but NEVER least, the Esteban update. He'll be 6 months old on Friday. I had to have Julien send me some bigger clothes because he's grown so much. He tried pears today and liked them, so now he eats pears and bananas. He thinks Skype is great fun and likes to pound on my computer casing (mimicking my typing?). He has mastered rolling from his tummy to his back, and less-quickly (for now) from his back to tummy. He has a new fascination with tags, and he figured out today how to take his hat off. He likes other babies and toddlers, whether or not he realizes that he's one too. And he thinks the camera belongs to him, no matter which side of it he's on--he likes having his picture taken, and he likes looking at the photos on the screen on the back. His soccer kick continues to improve.