First day - the trip home

Yesterday was absolutely perfect. I want to try and record everything...this is my baby book! We arrived at the airport about an hour early ( I need to give myself plenty of time to get lost!), but Nick's plane was scheduled to come in 30 minutes early, can you believe it! My brother Joe was going to meet us at the airport to video tape everything and of course he didn't leave himself anytime for traffice et.al. so he arrived moments before they got off the plane! Anyway, we had our balloons and our poster. We walked around for a few minutes looking at the stores and then Nick called to say they had landed. We gathered around the gate and everyone asked who we were waiting for (the sign said WELCOME HOME JOHNLEY) so we told them we were adopting. There was a palpable excitement in the air.

Nick came through the gate carrying Johnley who looked a little freaked out. We started to say hello, but I moved us all to the side, because it seemed like we were in the middle of a crowd. I, of course, started to cry, Nick put Johnley down but kept him close and we all said hello. Johnley seemed fascinated by us and happy, not to scared. Pretty soon Nick had Sammy and Johnley clinging to him! The balloons were a great idea, he was immediatly pleased with them. We gave them to him to hold and Sammy showed him how to bop them, so that became the activity!

We moved down to baggage claim, with Joe taping everything - thank you so much, Joe! We took a few more minutes getting used to each other and when the bags came we headed to the car, Johnley never leaving Nick's arms. Nick said Johnley was very unhappy with the seatbelt from the plane so he didn't know how he would react to the carseat. We had set up both booster seats in the middle seat in the van, so Sammy climbed in his and Johnley was fine with his. I broke out the mini muffins and juice boxes and I'm pretty sure I made a friend for life! He seemed to look at me like "You must be alright if you carry this stuff around with you!"

We said goodbye to Joe, and got on the road. Sammy immediately started showing Johnley the airplanes flying in and out, and Johnley showed Sammy the machines (trucks) and that was that, universal boy language!