Thanksgiving 2011

We had an amazing 13 day trip to the east coast for Thanksgiving (and for work for me).  I could try and describe it, but just enjoy the photos instead:

What's Goin' On?

Life continues - and thats about it in a nutshell.  Davy continues to become a part of our lives.  We've been home now a full month.  She's definitely changing - physically and emotionally.  We've learned for instance that quiet shy Davy is a freaked out Davy.  Now that she's comfortable with us and the house, she's opened up, both good (giggly, fun) and bad (screaming, non-sleeping).  And we're figuring out the whole "being a parent" thing, which is even trickier than we thought (and, I'll be honest, a bit tedious at times).

What else?  I've started traveling again for work - 5 days in Toronto to visit the home office, plus a day in San Jose this week.  Next week i'm off to a conference, then at the end of the month I have to be in Utah.  I have to admit, I quite like traveling, but it is hard with Davy home (and Lisa taking the brunt of kid duties).  We're still sorting it out and I know i'll overall travel less more likely, but for now since i was on hiatus, I'm stuck with several trips keeping me on the go.

On a side not, I had an awesome little rental in Toronto - a tiny lil Fiat 500, which if you get the chance, i recommend driving.

Lastly, I did have an article published on FierceIPTV a website covering the industry of my daytime job, online video.  Check it out if you get a chance.  I've also been blogging a little bit back on theVideoUprising, so check the recent Hulu post as well.

Very rambly, but hey - you get what you pay for kids....

seriously, how can you not love that face?

Go read lisa's site for the whole scoop...

Where in the world is (er, was) Andy?

I added a new continent to my roster this year - Africa. Have, of course, been expecting this to happen, but it was still both great and amazing for it to happen not only once, but twice. For those who don't know the back story, we have been in the process of adopting a baby from Ethiopia for the past 18 months or so. In January of this year, we were finally matched with a beautiful little girl (that story is really told best here). That began the nearly 6 month long breath holding process of waiting for an Ethiopian court date (first trip) then US Embassy date (second trip) which would lead to us eventually bringing her home. That has finally happened and July 2nd, we arrived back in Portland with Davy Beach, our 7.5 month old daughter.
As part of this whole process, we basically spent a month in Ethiopia. We were there for 15 days for our first trip - partially for the court trip and to meet Davy for the first time, then spending a week road tripping around the country seeing what it was like. We were then there for 12 days for our second trip to take custody and have the Embassy appointment. We didn't get to see very much on the second trip, but the first more than made up for that, as we wound up traveling around about 3500 km over the course of the trip.
As with any trip like this, its tough to sum it up - especially one as important to us as this. Suffice it to say we were blown away by what we saw. It was wonderful to see such a different scenery, to meet a gracious, welcoming people, to witness such an ancient culture in person. We loved the places we saw, the food we ate, and the people we met during our travels. And this sentiment is compounded by the fact that we will now forever be tied to region by our child. We want her to understand where she is from and as part of that process we needed to see at least some of it ourselves. You cant "know a place" in such a short period of time, but even the brief glimpse gave us a lot of perspective we hope to someday share. And, of course, we'll someday return there with her to see it (if she wants) but until then, she'll experience her first home through the stories, photos, and things we brought home with us. To see more of the photos from our trip, check out my Flickr account or the albums on facebook.

try as I might

Just like everybody wishes they could be a better person, I wish I could make myself write with more regularity. And it's not like things are going on worth discussing - in fact, there is plenty to review since the last post way back in January. You already know the highlights if you follow me anywhere else in the social media world, but if you have somehow missed the story, here it is....

Earlier this year we were finally match with a child from Ethiopia. We started the adoption process back in October of 2009, so we we're rightly very excited to finally be match and move a step further. For those familiar with adoption, you know the path is neither straight forward, nor identical to anyone else's. After several more up and down waiting periods we got first a court hearing (and our first trip to Africa) as well as embassy hearing (and second trip). We brought our little girl, Davy Beach, home just 10 days shy of her 8 month birthday and have spent the last three weeks (hard to imagine it's only been 3 weeks) learning about each other and suddenly being a parent.

I'll see about putting down some more thoughts in e coming days, both on her, this process, our nearly month long stay in Africa, and, of course, something about work will likely slip in to (I do still have a job, after all....)