Life lessons

A couple days ago Victoria came home from school somewhat quiet. Apparently several kids at school were talking about the little boy sent back to Russia by his adoptive mother.Several kids at school asked her if little B was going to have stay in the orphanage now?( All the kids and teacher know about little B ). We had spent time talking to each of the kids about the reality of things possibly being delayed to bring little B home because we did not have a court date yet before all the fiasco started.Victoria then said "It is not fair Mom. We did not do anything bad and you would not ever do what that lady did. Little B did not do anything bad either.Besides we already have clothes and cool toys for him to play with and we WANT him to be in our family.Can you tell those people in Russia that?" If only it were that easy.Still waiting for a court date... hopefully.

Trying to keep the faith

I am still in shock and numb over the news of the Russian boy returned to Russia on a one way ticket with a note by his adoptive mother.I can not even grasp the idea that a mother can think about doing that!This little boy is from the same region as our little B. This incident has Russian officials outraged and want to suspend all adoptions to US families.I have literally felt sick and grief to think what this may mean for us.We are soo close to a court date! Please pray for all families effected by this and the children who have loving families waiting to bring them home. I wanted to share some good news but, now we will have to wait and see.This is just so hard!

The Good And Not So Good

So, why is it that good news seems to always come with not so good news in the world of International Adoption.I am so ready to get off this roller coaster ride but, we ARE going to stay on until it is over.The ups and downs are really wearing on me and yet I see the miracles along the way that keep me going on this journey.
The not so good news include...
1. Some judges in Vladivostok is now requiring FBI clearances on top of state clearances for court. We already have them from when we were adopting from Kyrgyzstan but,Russia requires them to be less then 6 months old.Of course this happens right before we get a court date! We did get them done but, they are normally taking 13 weeks to process!! We are working on getting them expedited so we will see what happens.
2.As told a few weeks ago our region is also now requiring the 8 doctor medicals to be done in Russia. Again we just finished up our medicals in the states going through hoops to do them!It was like a full time job getting medicals for 7 people!We were however informed we will probably be able to do them in Vladivostok and not have the extra expense of going through Moscow.
3.The release letter from Moscow for little B had not arrived in Vlad yet! It as been over two months!
Some times my human nature begins to just get so frustrated with all this but, then there is GOOD news that only God could orchestrate. Hopefully in about two weeks I will be able to share what it is. The timing would be perfect so,I am trying hard to remember God has it all under control.

Waiting,Teeth Woes, and Laundry Mania

So, we are waiting sort of patiently for a Court Date ! Honestly, I am not expecting it to come for another few weeks because two documents had be changed slightly. Since hubby and our oldest adult son have the same name they wanted us to designate one to father and one to son so there is no confusion. It was not a big deal to do but, it did entail us to get them authenticated again.I do not even want to know how much we have spent just on authenticating alone for this adoption since each document is 20
dollars here in California.

While waiting I have been spending WAY to much time at the dentist! I THOUGHT I was being smart by getting a crown that was recommended before I went back to Russia for a month. Well... my "experienced" dentist compromised a root in the tooth and now have mega nerve pain in my jaw ! Lets just say losing 5 pounds on my small frame makes my body look and weigh like a twelve year old ! Now we have to wait and see if I will need a root canal. This is not what I need or want before I leave for Russia ! ! UGH UGH UGH !!

My other keeping busy project has been to organize a better laundry system in our home. 7 people plus having kids in sports generates A LOT of laundry !!I am one of those that likes everything organized but, the laundry battle is uphill so I am working on a new and improved system.Now if only I could catch the sock snatcher !

Moving Forward

It has been a busy few weeks getting all the mega paperwork done for the Court Dossier. Trying to explain and convince people to do things a certain way with certain wording has proven to be quite challenging again. I spent HOURS on the phone trying to get a two sentence letter from our mortgage company. They kept telling me they do not write letters with an original signature and a recent mortgage statement and history is all they can do for me. Finally had to go to the main office building THREE times to get this one letter with a real persons signature! Good grief!! I also seriously do not want to have to go back to a CPA anytime soon and explain 1000 times that things have to be done a certain way!! Anyway, after feeling like this has been my FULL TIME job our Court Dossier is complete and on its way to Russia. We may have to redo medicals again because they are only good for three months and our release letter for little B had not arrived yet, so we will see.

Trip Pics

Here are a few pics of Vladivostok, pic of us at a temple in Seoul Korea and a body pic of our little B.

Our Experience

We arrived home yesterday after leaving Vladivostok on Friday and then spending a couple days in Korea.

Where do I begin? So many thoughts,emotions,highs and lows but, most importantly we are so grateful we listened to the promptings to come despite things turning out differently then we had expected.Sometimes we just cannot comprehend how we are divinely lead to situations we would have not thought.

We arrived in Vladovostok on Saturday the 16th and settled in at the hotel. We met several families there who were on trip two and already had there children.On Sunday we went for a walk in the neighborhood down to the completely frozen solid "beach". We kept following the music and found a skating rink there where many were enjoying there afternoon in -29 C weather!! We did not last too long it was just sooo cold!!

Monday morning finally arrived and we went to the orphanage to see sweet baby girl. She was so precious! We held her and played with her for a couple hours the first visit.More then ANYTHING I wanted to feel peace and yet we did not have it. After our visits and many emails to our IA doctors we had to make a very painful decision to decline. I kept wanting to have that peace of going forth and yet we both knew we must listen to the answers we receive. As I held this precious child I prayed fervently that she would find a family who would and could take on what were unable to at this point in our lives. We have felt a peace I can not explain but, it does not make it any less painful with kinds of feeling I can not explain. As I gave the baby to the caregiver the last time I could feel those big, huge tears streaming down my face.I just wanted it to be different but, it was not going to be.I had to let go of my dream of having this precious child in our family. We knew coming that if we declined we would have to come home and wait for another referral.We both felt a strong urge to come and knew someday we would know why.

This is when we begin to see the plan for our family! We were told of a little boy who became available. At the beginning I was very hesitant because we were here for a girl! We knew however that are paperwork actually approves us for two. Something inside just kept telling us to go see this little boy over and over again ! The next day we drove to his orphanage. As we walked in the music room in the orphanage here came the most ADORABLE 2 year old little boy! I can not explain in words the thoughts I had other then I already knew this little boy .We just knew he was meant to be ours.We felt an instant connection with him as he did with us. He is not what we expected but we would have NEVER been lead to him because he did not meet our age requirements. We KNOW we had to be lead to him somehow even if it meant we had to decline another child.

So, this is where it gets even more interesting. We will not only bring home our little boy but, will continue our journey to our little girl from the same region . We do not know when we will receive another baby girl referral from Vladivostok but, we KNOW we are being led and we will follow. When we were doing our home study I am not really sure why we put down two kids other then for a "just in case scenario". Little did we really understand.

There is still so much to absorb from all that has transpired in such a short time. The extreme emotions of sadness to happiness to peace and seeing the plan for us is just a bit overwhelming.The roller coaster of all this is hard and yet I could of never imagined the plan for us.I will post a few pics when I get them down loaded.