The Richardsons

We arrived in Brussels safely this morning. Annie is doing well with Auntie Amber or as she's been calling her Daddy Amber. Here is a picture of her working on a calendar we gave her to keep track of the days we'd be gone. We plan to do some sight seeing today and then on to Africa tomorrow morning. We are getting anxious.

The St. Paul Pioneer Press wrote an article that appeared in this morning's newspaper. It's very nice and we're very appreciated to the PP for this article. WCCO's Turner travels to Liberia to fulfill a promise BY AMY CARLSON GUSTAFSON Pioneer Press Article Last Updated: 06/28/2007 06:36:49 PM CDT This week, Sue Turner will make good on a promise she made to herself more than a decade ago. Turner, a 34-year-old WCCO-TV reporter, has wanted to adopt a child from Africa since she studied abroad in the country during her college days. On Thursday, Turner and her husband, Scott Richardson, left for a 10-day trip to Liberia where they would be introduced to their adopted children, Emanuel, 4, and Abigail, 7. Before she headed out of town, we talked to Turner about going to Liberia, the adoption process and adding onto the family, which also includes the couple's 2-year-old biological daughter, Annie. Q. Why did you decide to adopt from Liberia? A. "We wanted to d...

The Liberian Struggle: A Country Torn Apart Sue Turner Reporting (WCCO) The Twin Cities has the largest population of Liberian immigrants in the country. However, they come from a country ripped apart by war, struggling with basic needs such as water and electricity. Thousands of them are scheduled to be deported this fall. When Georgette Gray came to the U.S. ten years ago, she thought everyone knew what was happening in Liberia. At that time, most Americans didn't even know where Liberia was. The country of 3.5 million people in western Africa is coming out of a 14 year civil war that devastated its people, its economy, and its infrastructure. GO HERE to watch the rest of Sue's story on WCCO today .

Well, they say nothing worth doing is easy. We've been waiting for two years for this day, so you can imagine our level of disappointment. We arrived 1hr 15min before our flight was scheduled to leave...but due to American Airlines' incompetence, we still were not able to make our flight. We're going to go out to dinner together, something we don't get to do very often anyway...and try to keep our senses of humor. It's difficult when there are two orphans waiting for you...but we'll get there. Our New Itinerary Friday, 29Jun Lv Minneapolis 1200N Arr Chicago 115P Lv Chicago 430P Arr Brussels 740A (Sat) (spending the day enjoying the sights of Brussels, Belgium. And no, there were no other flights into Monrovia before July 1st!) Sunday, 1Jul Lv Brussels 1040A Arr Monrovia 550P Our return flights will remain the same.

We're off. We can't believe it. Annie got to Oklahoma City safely (long story short, Scott missed his flight, every flight was booked he had to drive her to Kansas City to meet his folks half way, Amber came to OK today to get her, Thank you Richardsons and Amber for doing all that!) The next time we post, the pictures will NOT be of us!! Stay tuned, the real journey is just beginning! HOORAY! Thanks everyone for all your well wishes, it means the world to us.

We will be doing our best to upload some video to the blog while we're gone. But we will put all of our videos on our newly created YouTube account. You can find us at http://www.youtube.com/liberiankids

We finally finished it! This is A & E's new room. What's that you say? The rest of the house, packing???? Uh, yea...it's not like we're leaving Thursday or anything.

Today we celebrated Annie's birthday. Her actual b-day is "July 1st in the summer" (as she puts it) but we'll be in Africa on the actual day. We had a blast at ValleyFair in Shakopee, MN.

I know we are taking forever. But Scott ended up painting it because he said it was too blah compared to Annie's bright room so we painted it almost the same colors as Annie's room, blue on bottom, yellow on top and today got a safari border we'll put up. I'm very proud of these wood letters I made, crafty for me ey ? They will go over the kids beds. Hopefully we'll have pictures of the completed room by Thursday, the day we leave. I guess this is typical for the 2 nd and 3rd child, being down to the last minute with everything. It's not like the first child where everything is finished and folded neatly in their drawers four months before their arrival! T

Check this out: some guys in MN started a franchise in 2000 that offers Malaria medication to the people in Kenya. Here is a piece PBS did on it, it's about 25 minutes long. http://www.pbs.org/now/shows/321/index.html

I am working on a preview story for WCCO about all the Liberian immigrants in the Twin Cities on Temporary Relief Protective Status. That means people who have been here for more than ten years will be deported on October 1 st . They will be going back to an unemployment rate of more than 80%. Scott wrote to US Senator Norm Coleman (R-MN) about this and this is the response he got: Dear Mr. Richardson: You may be interested to know that Senator Jack Reed (D-RI) introduced the Liberian Refugee Immigration Fairness Act of 2007 (S. 656) on February 16, 2007 . This bill would provide permanent resident status adjustment for Liberian nationals who have lived in the United States January 1, 2007 and allow a stay of removal for Liberian nationals subject to deportation while their applications for permanent resident status are pending. This bill has been referred to the Senate Judiciary Committee where it awaits further action. Please know that I will take your views into acc...

One Week From Today! We received an e-mail today with the latest heights and weights of our children and have learned their last name is Davis, which we will now keep as both their middle names. EMMANUEL DAVIS 2FT 11IN 32 POUNDS Also check out the spelling of Abigail, good thing I didn't have anything with her name on it, although we are putting an A over her bed and an E over Emmanuel's bed ABEGAL DAVIS 3FT 9IN 46 POUNDS Here is more information on what's going on in Liberia in relation to international adoptions: Applying for and receiving a passport in a country that has little electricity in all offices, that is not computerized, that has graft, that is not nearly as organized as the US means we don't always get what we want, when we want it. Everyone in the AFAA/Liberia staff is working very hard, staff is being increased, staff has been changed to more efficient people - they are doing their best with all that is involved. This is an international adoption in a co...

ABIGAIL & EMMANUEL - everything is ready for their family to arrive. The Embassy has completed their field investigation and a room has been reserved at the Royal Hotel. ELECTRICITY - there is a possibility that the area were our foster home is located may have electricity by the end of the summer. WEATHER - it is reported to be rainy and cold although I don't think it is a cold like the average American has experienced.. Rainy - absolutely -travelers should plan to take extra shoes and possibly short boots.

I am so excited to go to Liberia and add to our family, but I must admit, I know I'm going to miss the pickle terribly. We've been trying to spend special time with Annie before she has to share us! We are sad we will be away on her 3rd birthday but have decided to have an Annie Day the Sunday before we leave which will be her pretend birthday. We plan to go to an amusement park and spend the whole day with our attention just on her. (Plus then Mommy doesn't have to plan a party) Annie knows all about how she will stay with baby Maddie when we are gone. She had a friend over the other day and they both had their babies and she told Jane, my baby is Baby Maddie! A & E's Dad I had thought about trying to meet A & E's Dad who is still alive and lives outside Monrovia. But after asking Cheryl's advice we found that when other families have tried to do this it has caused problems with the family wanting financial support. So we have decided not to at...

A few posts back I wrote about a little 9 month old boy named Emmanuel (the name Emmanuel in Liberia must be like John here) who lives in Liberia but is suffering terribly because he was born without an anus. It looks like everything is coming together for him to come to Minnesota for surgery. Here is the letter I received from the surgeon today. I plan to follow his story and hopefully meet him while we are in Liberia. Georgette, the woman who made this possible is obviously thrilled. I'm pretty excited myself! Ms. Turner. We have contacted Fairview and University of Minnesota Physicians for a cost exemption for this child’s care. I will do the surgery for no cost and I have talked to the group of anesthesiologist that provides services at the University of Minnesota Children’s Hospital and they have agreed to provide anesthesia services at no cost. We just need to work with the Hospital. Although I do not see a problem, these things take time. I estimate that we cou...

Two Weeks from Today What one mom who traveled for her daughter in December wrote me today: "The anticipation of going and meeting your children is so special, and that first day when you meet is indescribable. I couldn't sleep all night, I was so excited! Your children are very, very special." We are still working on the house, the guest room is ready. Everything else is still a process.

From Brussels to Liberia we have a stop in Dakar. Dakar is a city in Senegal about three countries north of Liberia, also very small. AMERICAN AIRLINES 28JUN DEPART MINNEAPOLIS AT 1:35P ARRIVE CHICAGO AT 2:55P FLIGHT AA 1096 AMERICAN AIRLINES 28JUN DEPART CHICAGO AT 4:30P ARRIVE BRUSSELS AT 7:40A FLIGHT AA 88 BRUSSELS AIRLINES 29JUN DEPART BRUSSELS AT 10:40A --STOP IN DAKAR-- ARRIVE MONROVIA AT 5:50P FLIGHT SN 235 BRUSSELS AIRLINES 06JUL DEPART MONROVIA AT 6:55P --STOP IN DAKAR — ARRIVE IN BRUSSELS ON 07JUL AT 5:35A FLIGHT SN 236 AMERICAN AIRLINES 07JUL DEPART BRUSSELS AT 11:05A ARRIVE IN CHICAGO AT 1:05P FLIGHT AA 89 AMERICAN AIRLINES 07JUL DEPART CHICAGO AT 2:40P ARRIVE IN MINNEAPOLIS AT 4:10P FLIGHT AA 439

We received word today, everything is complete on Abigail and Emmanuel's adoption! We will go ahead and purchase the tickets and we are good to go, three weeks from tomorrow. Also we learned today, almost everyone in Liberia excepts American Money. They don't however accept travelers checks or credit card, that's a bummer! I had an exceptional lunch today with a woman named Georgette. She was born and raised in Liberia and has started a nonprofit group here in Minneapolis called Ajenia Enterprises . Georgette is about two years older than me. She had her first child at 15. She is beautiful, with perfect skin, and a face that shows gratefulness not stress. But she has had a full plate for many years. She came to America during the war and got her bachelors degree. She now works full time, is getting her masters degree and is raising an 8 year old with her husband who is also Liberian - but they met here. Her husband has been here for 25 years and runs a small taxi company...

I asked my other Mom friends what to give the kids to eat when they come home from Liberia. Here are some of their ideas: The bottom line is, they like their food hot, so when I cooked I just provided hot peppers for her to add to her food. particularly liked soups and stews, along with rice, to which she added her own pepper. Beef and chicken cooked any way are also favorites. was not used to eating vegetables except for cabbage, and it took a while. She never had mashed potatoes, but loves them! My daughters came home 5+ years ago and we initially stayed away from proccessed foods. This was fairly easy because my kids were toddlers and home the first half year. I guess the bottom line is each child will be different in terms of their food preferences. had great appetites since the minute they got home. We introduced new foods slowly and pretty much had rice as a side dish for every meal of the day. We haven't had any problems with food allergies. Ketchup was a big hit from the be...

We were in Oklahoma over the weekend and the choir from the Methodist sponsored African University in Zimbabwe (southeast Africa) just happened to be singing at Arthur and Charlene's church Sunday. They were FABULOUS. Their accent reminded me so much of the Liberian one. They had great rhythm too! We had fun celebrating with Scott's parents who had their 40 th Wedding Anniversary. Congrats! Charles Taylor's Trial Begins The trial for the Liberian warlord starts today. He is being prosecuted by an attorney from Iowa. Today there was an article in the Des Moines Register saying his family is preparing for him to come back to Liberia. I hope not!