Wrapping up in America

Please excuse typos. I am writing on my phone.

Our seemingly endless to-do lists are slowly wrapping up, we have both managed to squeeze in a rather impressive amount of family and friend time, and we are almost ready to head out.

Mark, along with the help of his parents, frantically completed the task of prepping our home for renters. Together they cleaned and emptied the house and garage, patched and painted holes in the walls from pictures and curtains, put up a retaining wall in our backyard and (Mother-in-law of the Year award goes to...) Cindy even cleaned out our fridge and freezer. Mark has also finished up the final
steps in prepping our cats for the big move. As much as I really really want a labradoodle, we couldn't possibly handle or afford toting another animal around the world with us. We have yet to make it through a single day without a ten minute conversation about transporting the cats. Right now they are living with one of Mark's sweet coworkers since our tenants have already moved in to our home.

I've spent the past few weeks smothering my family with love that I pray will sustain them during my absence. Early Christmas, Halloween, and the everyday fun of making swords out of wrapping paper tubes and ghosts on a string from packing peanuts has made the experience both enjoyable and memorable. It's tough to leave my family, but I'm grateful that this new life will allow me more cumulative time with them than staying in D.C. would offer.

Tomorrow Mark is driving to Georgia with our old SUV so that when I return to deliver Ryan I have my own means of transportation. Oh! That reminds me! Last week we learned that our little baby is a BOY! We are very excited and it's been great fun to talk about someone with a name rather than an obscure unamed baby. We are naming him Ryan Markle Harlan. Ryan is my mother's maiden name. She always wanted to name her son Ryan but she only had girls. I know what you're thinking and yes, Ryan is a cute name for a girl. My dad's name is Kimberly and as a result, he was a little particular about the gender-specificity of his daughter's names. I am excited to finally bring my mom's longtime wish to reality. Ryan will have my last name for his middle name and take Harlan as his family name. After seeing pics of Mark as a baby, I'm pretty excited to have a baby boy that will be so adorable.

Enough rambling today... More details on Ryan and Addis shortly!