My husband will leave in a month - I will follow in 9 months

The plane ticket has been bought, and the bags are just about packed. Right now Lale is just doing last minute stuff and finishing up the month working before he leaves. I still have nine months until we leave. By we, I mean, me and our gaggle of children. By gaggle I mean 7 kids.

• Andre - my almost 12 yr old son.
• Jordan - my almost 10 yr old daughter.
• Micaella (Mickey) - my 4.5 yr old daughter.
• Victoria (Isa) - my almost 4 yr old daughter. (yes I will have two 4 yr olds at the same time - Mickey and Isa are 10 months apart)
• Johan - my 2.5 yr old son.
• Jolani - my just turned 1 yr old daughter
• Lalito - my yet to be born (due in 8 weeks) son.

With the exception of last night, I have yet to cry over the fact that my husband is leaving. I don't know if it is just out of pure exhaustion from not being able to sleep, or being very good at putting it out of my mind. I know as the day gets closer, the tears will begin to fall. I don't want to have this baby and him not be there. I don't want the baby to be 7 - 8 months old the first time that Lale gets to meet him in person. But that is the way it has to be, and I understand it totally. My father in law, whom I love so much, is in Honduras taking care of all of our stuff, and buy stuff I mean, our land, and our animals, and overseeing our house being built - or being finished I should say, and fighting with the helpers that are supposed to be working on the land - but instead they spend all of their time complaining. And my father in law is just to old to be dealing with that. He isnt in that great of health, and its just time that Lale goes back. It is time for us to take care of him, and let him rest. So I am not complaining that he has to come back, it is just upsetting that we can't all go as a family. Thats all.

Meanwhile I have about 9 months to do what I need to do so that I will be ready to go, and it seems like it is so far away, but really, it will be here before you know it. I am a little nervouse about going. More so about leaving my mom I guess. I talk to my mom 4 or 5 times a day usually, but once we are there, it will be much less frequently. And I think I will be going through mom withdrawel, LOL.

My husband is worried that I am not going to go, that I will change my mind at the last minute. I had to laugh because he said to me I had to let him bring two of the kids as collateral, so that I HAVE to go, LOL. He is so silly. I so don't want to be away from him again. (He went to Honduras back in '03 for 10 months and it was hard for me.) I am going to miss him everyday. I am trying to show him how to use the internet so that I can send him emails, and post pictures of the kids online so that he can see them grow, without me spending so much money on mailing stuff down there. Or to tide him over in-between the picture shipments.

Things that I have to do before I leave -

• Call the consulado/embajada and get copies of all papers that I need.
• get enough money for everything that I need (which is LOTS of money, LOL).
• get Honduras passports for all the kids - this needs to be done before my husband leaves.
• get USA passports for all the kids - get the papers that need to be signed and notarized done before my husband leaves.
• get everyones paperwork and have it all notarized and certified and what not.
• find a reliable company to ship my stuff down there.
• pay off the van and ship it down.
• but the plane tickets.
• start weeding out things I don't need to take.
• there is a bunch more, but my brain is going blank right now.

Try to talk my mom into going down with me to help me get settled, and to help with everyone on the plane. (Can you imagine - me alone, with 5 kids ages 5 and under, plus the older two, on a plane for approx 6 hours, and a layover - which means I have to shepard them all to another plane. Sounds like fun to me! Not.)