They're Home !!!

Well, the big day finally arrived on Saturday, October 18th - Cory, Elkin, Norma and Libby arrived back in Portland after an exhausting three day frenzy in Bogota of court appointments, passports, doctor visits and visas.  They literally did not know if they would be leaving Friday night until just a few hours before the flight so they really had to scramble to get packed and to the airport on time.  The kids did just awesome on the flights and were in very good spirits when they arrived in Portland.  Many thanks to Brett for capturing it all on video and thanks to everyone for all your support through the long process of getting our kids home.  

Yesterday the kids got to see the ocean for the first time.  Cory took them to Libby and Will's house in Manzanita for the weekend while Papi goes to work for a few days.  I hope to have a few pictures to post of their first encounter with sand soon.

Big News!

I was just on the Skype (computer video conferencing) with Cory, Libby, Cass, and the kids, when the phone rang at their hotel. It was David (Lucia's son) calling to tell Cory that we are finally getting our appointment with the judge today for our final decree (permanent legal custody of the kids)! To say that was exciting to see unfold on the video was an understatement! Wow, after six weeks of waiting out the strike, it seemed like this day would never come. Thank you all for your thoughts, prayers and kind words of encouragement throughout this ordeal, it's meant a lot too us all.
Cory has been in Colombia now for just about eight weeks and has been doing an incredible job with the help of Cass, and Libby the last month. Two months of chasing kids around the mean streets of Bogota. Nothing quite prepares you for that, but Cory has done an incredible job and has maintained a smile on her face through it all.
So the great new is that after the final decree is in hand there are only about four more days of paperwork and appointments to get the kids their passports and US Visas. That means that everyone might be home by the middle of next week. Today is a very good day!

The Strike Continues...

For those of you that are following our blog, sorry I haven't posted recently.  

On Friday we received news that the strike was over and the judicial workers would be back to work on Monday  October 6th.  Well, we all got pretty excited, but the bad news is that this was an unsubstantiated rumor which turned out not to be true. 

 So the facts are Colombian President Uribe met with representatives form the striking workers union, ASONAL, twice over the weekend and are still unable to come to agreement after 33 days on strike.  They have a large protest rally scheduled for Tuesday the 7th, so I doubt anything will happen until that is over.  

If we had gone to Colombia 5 days earlier we would have got our day in court before the strike began and all been home several weeks ago.  Oh well.

Cory and the kids seem to be holding up pretty well.  They have moved about 3 hours out of Bogota to a small town called Villa de Leyva.  They are in a nice little hotel with a pool and lots of activities to keep the kids busy. After putting in an all star effort, Cass will probably be returning home next week to be replaced by Cory's 'lil sis, Libby.  Libby is full of energy and is a master of the Spanish language so she will be quite an asset to our team.  

I'm home biting my nails and checking the Colombian news every few hours while waiting for resolution of the strike.  Before I left Colombia I joked with Cory that they'd be home by Thanksgiving, let's hope it doesn't take that long! 

 Think happy thoughts and say a prayer if you are so inclined that this is all over soon and our family can be reunited here at home.