Four. . .

. . .years. . .

Since I came back from lunch to find that I had a message from the travel agent our In Country agency uses and she wanted me to call back because she had our dates and we need to get on the visas and plane tickets and Moscow hotel reservations right away. . .

Since I called our agency, with shaking hands and numb lips, and confirmed that, yes, we did in fact have travel dates and a Court Date and that yes, we were going back to Russia to get Aidan!

Since I began the excited/happy/freaked out mad dash to get the forms filled out and sent with our passports to get said visas processed and plane tickets purchased and reservations made and emails sent to our In Country coordinator and thousands and thousands of dollars in clean unmarked bills from the bank. . .

Since we began making lists of what we wanted to bring followed shortly by lists of what we knew we needed to bring, closely followed by lists of what we knew we could bring weight wise. . .

Since we started to allow ourselves to imagine what it might be really like to hold our son, to rock our son to sleep, to watch him sleep in his crib, to play with our son, to dress him in the cute outfits that people had bought for him. . .

Since we began the process of putting our private lives on hold for a month and my professional life on hold for three months. . .

Since the last February 29th--a day that I used to not like at all because it was just one more day added on to the winter that I am usually ready to end at this point but which is now one of my all time favorite days!

But, wait!!!!  Hasn't Aidan always been a part of our lives???? 

Happy Leap Day!