Say Hello, Goodbye!

And so the time has come to finish our adventure and close the books on our blog now that we are safely back home in Canada. What an adventure it has been for us all, all that anticipation and build-up over the past three years whilst we waited for our day to arrive. It goes without saying that it was worth every minute of the wait, we have a beautiful addition to our family and we could not be happier. Nothing can quite prepare you for going from a family of three to a family of four. They all told us it would be so, and now we fully understand why! This experience has been fantastic for all of us, especially for Charlotte who had the opportunity to visit the country of her birth. It also gave us a chance to dig a little deeper into a fascinating country, and region. We truly hope that one day we can all return when both the children are older.

As with any big adventure, it’s not successful without the help and support of so many people, those who have helped, supported and encouraged us along the way, those whom we have have had the good fortune to meet during this process and on our travels, those who commented on the blog and sent us emails, and all those great people who will now be part of Sebastian’s new family. This is for all of you, thank you, thank you from all of us, it really would not have been a success without you.

     

Once again, thanks especially to SDN (Soleil des Nations) in Quebec, particularly Linda Filosa who always gives more than should be reasonably expected, and to the wonderful people at CRAN, without you none of this would have been possible. Also, a huge thank you to Flor, Reina and Marta at the pension in Bogota for being such wonderful hosts and for working so hard to make the process work smoothly for all the families coming from Quebec.

And so it is time to sign off for the last time. We have had a tremendous amount of fun putting the blog together during our time in Colombia, and taking and posting the photos which marked our journey. We hope to see and hear from all of you very soon and look forward to the opportunity to introduce Sebastian to you in person, we know you will fall in love with him when you meet him. Until the next time we all meet, thanks again for being part of our journey and take care.

                            

On our way!

Just a quick post, we are at the airport in Bogota waiting to board our flight to Toronto. Made it through our customs check with no issues, can get sticky with an adopted child if you don’t have all your paperwork in order, thankfully we do! Just Canadian immigration to deal with in Toronto now!Charlotte is asleep, Sebastian is resolute in his opposition and refuses to give in, taken in by a party of exchange students on our flight who are bound to keep us all awake. We can look forward to six hours of baby wrangling as we look to convince the lad that it is actually good to sleep on the flight. We expect a brief spell of extreme yelling before he gives in. We are all tired and we haven’t even started yet! It’s 10.30pm here, and we should be in Toronto at around 6.00am tomorrow. Looking forward to getting home! We will post a proper blog sign off sometime tomorrow when we are safely home. See you all back in Canada!

Revisiting CRAN

Before we finish our stay here in Colombia it would be very remiss if we didn’t spend a little time looking at the fantastic work CRAN do both here in Colombia, and for many, many families overseas.

                          

CRAN is an orphanage, housing around 80-90 children at any one time. Many children are placed at CRAN by Colombian social services because challenges they face in their home environment. Some children spend time at CRAN before returning to their families, but many become the subject of adoptions, both domestic and international. The children who are resident vary in age from 2 to 9 years.  Babies who come to CRAN through both their mothers programme and social services, are usually placed with foster mothers who may be caring for a maximum of 3 babies at any one time. This is where Sebastian spent his first months, only coming to CRAN when we came to Colombia to collect him. CRAN offer a full range of services to the resident children including accommodation, activities and exercise, education and medical attention. The monies donated to CRAN enable them to provide these, and other programs, to the many children in need of protection throughout Bogota. This also includes support for foster care, a mothers  program and biological family protection. CRAN is located on a hillside west of downtown Bogota, mostly away from the hustle and bustle of the city. In a taxi it takes about 30 minutes from where we are currently staying.

Of course we would not have Sebastian in our lives if it weren’t for the generous assistance of all the fantastic people at CRAN, including Ximena, Gonzalo, Marie-Christina and Sylvie, as well as the foster mother, Gloria, who cared so well for him during his first few months.

                    

For more information about CRAN please go to www.cran.org.co