Digest version of the last few weeks:
--After many, many hours our laptop is back in business. Hooray!
--We are in the process of working towards closing on the new house. All offers/counteroffers have been accepted and we're waiting on financing paperwork. We're anticipating closing this month but we still don't know when we'll move in. There are a few things (like new plumbing!) that have to happen before we can take occupancy, although we'll have possession at closing.
--We have a Christmas tree! It's got lights on it but no ornaments. The boys love it and think it's quite amazing. I think it's quite amazing that we managed to find one that fit in our house. ;) We went to Eckerts and cut a tree down. The boys even helped with the saw when Mark was cutting it down. Unfortunately, the camera stayed at home.
--We're still gathering paperwork for the adoption. As always with Ukraine, it seems like absolute never-ending paperwork. The nice thing is that it's familiar. I already know where to send off for everything and how to get all of the documents notarized and apostilled, so that's definitely a plus.
--We had our last band concert on Sunday. It was a great concert. The boys were there with Aley (our babysitter) and did really well. They got a little restless by the end, but that's to be expected. Don't worry, we still made them sit through the choir concert afterwards. Nothing like training them to sit for long periods of time. LOL
--Zhenya is going through a rude phase which is hopefully in the process of getting squashed. He has become very demanding and just downright rude. Not a good character trait. I'm not sure if it's happening at school but we're certainly seeing it at home.
--Dima's having a really hard time right now. I'm guessing it's some of that "one-year-home" emotional turmoil that other adoptive parents have seen. He's having a lot of emotional outbursts, which in some ways is really good. When we first got home he would just shut down. It's encouraging now that he is comfortable enough to be able to share his feelings. We just need to work on sharing them appropriately. ;) I've been keeping an eye out to see if any of this is related to Christmas, but it really doesn't seem to be. It seems to be just more of him wrestling with his emotions. We're tightening his reins a bit to give him a little more security and help with consistency for him. Please be in prayer for comfort for him, and strength to deal with the inner turmoil he's got. He's only 6, but he's gone through emotional changes that most people don't deal with until college or later and he just doesn't know how to process all of this.
Monday, December 08, 2008
Thursday, December 04, 2008
SDA appt--one year ago
(Tuesday) Our apartment was located not far from the SDA, but our appointment wasn't until the afternoon. If I remember correctly, this was the day that Kostya walked us all over Kyiv on errands. It was great exercise and a great way to take our minds off of the upcoming appointment. I was so nervous about the appointment that I had basically only eaten one meal a day since leaving the US. Between that and the exercise some of my pants were becoming loose pretty quickly! LOL
Our appointment was in the afternoon. We showed up about 10 minutes early and the outside gate (on the side of the building) was locked. We waited...and waited...and waited--and it was cold! There was another couple and their facilitator waiting as well. Finally a woman came and unlocked the gate and we all filed into the stairwell. A woman came to the top of the stairs and called our names, and all 3 of us headed up the stairs only to have Kostya stopped. After a discussion in Russian, Kostya turned to us and said that the SDA had changed the rules again and he would not be allowed into our appointment with us--that this woman would be our translator. And he said "...make sure she translates everything correctly." ROFL!! When we asked K about it later, he said he meant make sure that she fully answered all of our questions and that we understood everything she was translating, but the way it came out was really funny.
We went up the stairs and went into a door on the right side of the hallway. We passed through a small office with a couch and table in one corner and a desk in the other corner, and went through a door on the right into another office. One end of the very small room was filled with a large desk (maybe it just seemed large because the room was small!) and a filing cabinet, and right in front of the desk was a short round table and two couches and a chair. There was a beautiful, tall, thin woman with long brown hair sitting behind the desk. She had a kind face and smiled when we came in. Our translator sat down in the chair and we were asked to sit down on the couches. I don't remember much about the interview. I think the psychologist asked us to tell her about ourselves which we did briefly. Then she explained that there are very few healthy children available for adoption, etc. Then, without showing us any files, she described sibling sets she had available for adoption. The files were on her desk, and she looked through them, but she didn't hand them to us until we expressed interest in one. All told, we only actually saw two files--one for a set of brothers (4 and 5 yo) with a LOT of medical issues and one for a brother/sister sibling set (2 and 8 yo).
The 4 and 5 yo definitely fit our profile the best, but there were really a LOT of medical issues there, and we were particularly concerned about the oldest. We asked repeatedly to see more files and were told again and again "there are no more." We asked about children with hearing loss, and the psychologist said she had one little girl with no ears (Tami?? Is she yours??) but we were set on siblings. So we looked at the file of the 4 and 5yo again. Stalling for time and trying desperately to figure out what to do, I asked the psychologist where the boys were located.
"Donetsk region."
That sealed it--as Mark and I both started laughing. I hope the SDA workers didn't think they were sending crazy people off to see children. :) Our facilitator was from Donetsk, and we had joked early on about how it would be a great Christmas present for him if we could find some children in Donetsk. When the psychologist said the boys were in Donetsk, we knew we had to go see them, even if they didn't turn out to be the right children for us. After we had accepted the referral, the psychologist smiled at us and told us that the orphanage director for the boys was very mean. She said she just wanted to warn us--that the director was very anti-adoption and put lots of really bad, incorrect medical information into her children's files so that they wouldn't be adopted.
We left the appointment and I was feeling excited but discouraged. The boys really had a LOT of medical issues listed on their files and I just wasn't sure we could handle two with this amount of special needs--and we weren't even sure what needs they really had.
We waited outside while Kostya went in to get all of the contact information he needed for the boys' orphanage to be able to go visit them. When Kostya came out, he had additional information for us. The SDA did not believe the boys' medical information was correct. Apparently, not too long before our appointment, the social worker for the boys' region had called the SDA and asked why no families were visiting the boys as they had been available for international adoption since March(!). The SDA explained to her that due to the extreme nature of the boys' medical information that they did not feel that anyone would want to adopt the boys. The social worker stated the boys were in good health--she had seen them and worked with them and that their medical records were incorrect. So the SDA had decided to start showing their file to adoptive parents.
We were the first family to ever see their profile.
While we had hoped to be able to get our referral papers that day, since our appointment was in the afternoon they wouldn't be ready until the next day. We spent the rest of the day (well, Kostya did!) tracking down train tickets to Slaviansk (Donetsk region) on the overnight train for Wednesday night. We also tried repeatedly to post on the blog, but the internet cafe we were using wouldn't allow me to use blogger so we sent a few emails and called it a day.
Our appointment was in the afternoon. We showed up about 10 minutes early and the outside gate (on the side of the building) was locked. We waited...and waited...and waited--and it was cold! There was another couple and their facilitator waiting as well. Finally a woman came and unlocked the gate and we all filed into the stairwell. A woman came to the top of the stairs and called our names, and all 3 of us headed up the stairs only to have Kostya stopped. After a discussion in Russian, Kostya turned to us and said that the SDA had changed the rules again and he would not be allowed into our appointment with us--that this woman would be our translator. And he said "...make sure she translates everything correctly." ROFL!! When we asked K about it later, he said he meant make sure that she fully answered all of our questions and that we understood everything she was translating, but the way it came out was really funny.
We went up the stairs and went into a door on the right side of the hallway. We passed through a small office with a couch and table in one corner and a desk in the other corner, and went through a door on the right into another office. One end of the very small room was filled with a large desk (maybe it just seemed large because the room was small!) and a filing cabinet, and right in front of the desk was a short round table and two couches and a chair. There was a beautiful, tall, thin woman with long brown hair sitting behind the desk. She had a kind face and smiled when we came in. Our translator sat down in the chair and we were asked to sit down on the couches. I don't remember much about the interview. I think the psychologist asked us to tell her about ourselves which we did briefly. Then she explained that there are very few healthy children available for adoption, etc. Then, without showing us any files, she described sibling sets she had available for adoption. The files were on her desk, and she looked through them, but she didn't hand them to us until we expressed interest in one. All told, we only actually saw two files--one for a set of brothers (4 and 5 yo) with a LOT of medical issues and one for a brother/sister sibling set (2 and 8 yo).
The 4 and 5 yo definitely fit our profile the best, but there were really a LOT of medical issues there, and we were particularly concerned about the oldest. We asked repeatedly to see more files and were told again and again "there are no more." We asked about children with hearing loss, and the psychologist said she had one little girl with no ears (Tami?? Is she yours??) but we were set on siblings. So we looked at the file of the 4 and 5yo again. Stalling for time and trying desperately to figure out what to do, I asked the psychologist where the boys were located.
"Donetsk region."
That sealed it--as Mark and I both started laughing. I hope the SDA workers didn't think they were sending crazy people off to see children. :) Our facilitator was from Donetsk, and we had joked early on about how it would be a great Christmas present for him if we could find some children in Donetsk. When the psychologist said the boys were in Donetsk, we knew we had to go see them, even if they didn't turn out to be the right children for us. After we had accepted the referral, the psychologist smiled at us and told us that the orphanage director for the boys was very mean. She said she just wanted to warn us--that the director was very anti-adoption and put lots of really bad, incorrect medical information into her children's files so that they wouldn't be adopted.
We left the appointment and I was feeling excited but discouraged. The boys really had a LOT of medical issues listed on their files and I just wasn't sure we could handle two with this amount of special needs--and we weren't even sure what needs they really had.
We waited outside while Kostya went in to get all of the contact information he needed for the boys' orphanage to be able to go visit them. When Kostya came out, he had additional information for us. The SDA did not believe the boys' medical information was correct. Apparently, not too long before our appointment, the social worker for the boys' region had called the SDA and asked why no families were visiting the boys as they had been available for international adoption since March(!). The SDA explained to her that due to the extreme nature of the boys' medical information that they did not feel that anyone would want to adopt the boys. The social worker stated the boys were in good health--she had seen them and worked with them and that their medical records were incorrect. So the SDA had decided to start showing their file to adoptive parents.
We were the first family to ever see their profile.
While we had hoped to be able to get our referral papers that day, since our appointment was in the afternoon they wouldn't be ready until the next day. We spent the rest of the day (well, Kostya did!) tracking down train tickets to Slaviansk (Donetsk region) on the overnight train for Wednesday night. We also tried repeatedly to post on the blog, but the internet cafe we were using wouldn't allow me to use blogger so we sent a few emails and called it a day.
Wednesday, December 03, 2008
In Kyiv (one year ago)
We arrived without incident (other than being a couple of hours late) in Kyiv. We waited for a little while for our bags, and there were a few moments when we wondered if everything had made it, but there were many other people from our flight waiting for bags so we stuck it out and sure enough everything appeared. We went through customs without a problem--no one asked to see anything, although the guys at customs asked us twice if we had brought gifts for anyone. We hadn't--only clothes for our future children and then whatever we couldn't use to be left at the orphanage. The customs agent seemed surprised but waved us through.
We went through the hallway and the double-doors that open into the waiting area, which was filled with people. We didn't see Kostya anywhere, so we went to the windows and tried to call him. His line was busy. After about 15 minutes we finally saw him--he'd been looking for us based on our passport pictures which were 8 years old. :) Kostya had arrived in the train from his home region that morning, and he and our driver had been waiting at the airport for 2 hours. Since he'd been on the train the night before he had no way of knowing our flight was delayed. It was raining, so we quickly found Sasha (our driver) and tossed our bags in the back. He had a REALLY nice car and we enjoyed our ride to our apartment. I think on the way we stopped at the SDA to get our appointment time--Mark and I didn't go in, so I can't remember if Kostya stopped then or later.
That evening we met up with Tami and Shad and Chris and Sue for dinner at O'Panas. We were all on the Ukraine Adoption Yahoo group and had set up a dinner together since we all had appointments the same week. Mark and I walked there from our apartment (Kostya was a little concerned about us going alone but we assured him we'd be fine. ;)) It was a blast getting to meet and talk with people I'd been chatting with for months. Plus the food was delicious!
After dinner (and a long wait for the bill!) we all went our separate ways. Mark and I meandered back to our apartment, enjoying being in Kyiv and the beautiful city at night.
We went through the hallway and the double-doors that open into the waiting area, which was filled with people. We didn't see Kostya anywhere, so we went to the windows and tried to call him. His line was busy. After about 15 minutes we finally saw him--he'd been looking for us based on our passport pictures which were 8 years old. :) Kostya had arrived in the train from his home region that morning, and he and our driver had been waiting at the airport for 2 hours. Since he'd been on the train the night before he had no way of knowing our flight was delayed. It was raining, so we quickly found Sasha (our driver) and tossed our bags in the back. He had a REALLY nice car and we enjoyed our ride to our apartment. I think on the way we stopped at the SDA to get our appointment time--Mark and I didn't go in, so I can't remember if Kostya stopped then or later.
That evening we met up with Tami and Shad and Chris and Sue for dinner at O'Panas. We were all on the Ukraine Adoption Yahoo group and had set up a dinner together since we all had appointments the same week. Mark and I walked there from our apartment (Kostya was a little concerned about us going alone but we assured him we'd be fine. ;)) It was a blast getting to meet and talk with people I'd been chatting with for months. Plus the food was delicious!
After dinner (and a long wait for the bill!) we all went our separate ways. Mark and I meandered back to our apartment, enjoying being in Kyiv and the beautiful city at night.
Tuesday, December 02, 2008
One year ago
One year ago today we were heading out to fly to Ukraine. We had a really uneventful travel time--we flew from St Louis to New York and then from New York direct to Ukraine. I remember being really happy I'd been reading so many adoption blogs--Aerosvit wasn't listed on the terminals, but someone else had posted which terminal it was in so we hoped on the tram at JFK and started riding around. Sure enough, we found it!
Unfortunately for us, Aerosvit doesn't have online checkin, so you have to stand in line to check in. As we stood there, our flight was delayed several times. We were originally supposed to leave at 6pm...we finally left close to 9pm. Mark and I had a great time waiting in line and people-watching. Nearly everyone else in line spoke Russian, and the outfits...well, we felt like we were already in Ukraine. ;)
Unfortunately for us, Aerosvit doesn't have online checkin, so you have to stand in line to check in. As we stood there, our flight was delayed several times. We were originally supposed to leave at 6pm...we finally left close to 9pm. Mark and I had a great time waiting in line and people-watching. Nearly everyone else in line spoke Russian, and the outfits...well, we felt like we were already in Ukraine. ;)
Monday, December 01, 2008
Happy (belated) Thanksgiving!
I had the best of intentions of posting on Thursday evening with pics of the boys' Thanksgiving feast at school--complete with pictures! But our laptop has decided to have a mid-life crisis (it's 7 years old) and is not being very cooperative. As in, it currently won't access the internet. We do have another computer but I'm not on it very often as it's down in the basement office and I stay upstairs when the boys are awake.
We did have a very nice Thanksgiving. We went to the Masseys' house for Thanksgiving day and spent several fun hours with their family, including their son Garrett who came home from Ukraine a few months ago. Friday after work we headed to my family and spent the weekend there. The boys ate and ate and ate this weekend. We got home last night and they wanted to eat more--I seriously don't know how anything else could fit in their tummies. They are amazing eaters. Hopefullywe they gained a few pounds this weekend. :)
The Thanksgiving feast at school went really well last week! Both boys participated and there were some spots where Dima participated more than Zhenya, which is nothing short of amazing. Dima was a little stressed in the morning (his teacher said he spent the entire morning saying "Why?" to everything that was said--another of his stress responses ;)) but did a great job not chewing on his clothing (he did have short sleeves on) and did a great job at the performance. He had a really good weekend although we did have a meltdown on Sunday before we headed home. And due to some other continued disobedience as a result of him being VERY exhausted from the weekend, he went to bed early last night and was out instantly. But both boys had a great time getting to see some extended family and playing with some (first cousins once-removed? second cousins?) cousins that are close in age. Their 5 yo girl cousin was very disappointed that there were only boys to play with. ;) Hopefully next year we'll have some girls for you, Q! :) :)
On that topic, we submitted our I600A last Friday! Hooray! For those of you not familiar with the process, we have to get approval from the US government to adopt internationally. The I600A is a request for approval to adopt internationally. Now we wait for our FBI fingerprinting appointment and then our approval to adopt. As we wait, we'll continue collecting some additional documents for our dossier in the hopes that as soon as we have our 171H (I600A approval) we'll be able to submit our dossier to Ukraine.
We did have a very nice Thanksgiving. We went to the Masseys' house for Thanksgiving day and spent several fun hours with their family, including their son Garrett who came home from Ukraine a few months ago. Friday after work we headed to my family and spent the weekend there. The boys ate and ate and ate this weekend. We got home last night and they wanted to eat more--I seriously don't know how anything else could fit in their tummies. They are amazing eaters. Hopefully
The Thanksgiving feast at school went really well last week! Both boys participated and there were some spots where Dima participated more than Zhenya, which is nothing short of amazing. Dima was a little stressed in the morning (his teacher said he spent the entire morning saying "Why?" to everything that was said--another of his stress responses ;)) but did a great job not chewing on his clothing (he did have short sleeves on) and did a great job at the performance. He had a really good weekend although we did have a meltdown on Sunday before we headed home. And due to some other continued disobedience as a result of him being VERY exhausted from the weekend, he went to bed early last night and was out instantly. But both boys had a great time getting to see some extended family and playing with some (first cousins once-removed? second cousins?) cousins that are close in age. Their 5 yo girl cousin was very disappointed that there were only boys to play with. ;) Hopefully next year we'll have some girls for you, Q! :) :)
On that topic, we submitted our I600A last Friday! Hooray! For those of you not familiar with the process, we have to get approval from the US government to adopt internationally. The I600A is a request for approval to adopt internationally. Now we wait for our FBI fingerprinting appointment and then our approval to adopt. As we wait, we'll continue collecting some additional documents for our dossier in the hopes that as soon as we have our 171H (I600A approval) we'll be able to submit our dossier to Ukraine.
Wednesday, November 26, 2008
Trusting
It looks like we will be getting the house that we put an offer on way back when. It's been a long process. I won't go into all of the boring details, but we are basically getting a move-in ready house for less than $39/sq ft. Move-in ready except for the missing plumbing, that is. ;)
This was all part of what we were trying to work out. The house is livable except the roof needs to be redone and part of the plumbing is missing (darn copper thieves!). So we have found a loan that will build the cost of those two repairs into our mortgage while still keeping us under the monthly payment we wanted. At some point maybe I'll share all of the gory details about why we wanted to do this this way, but for right now let's just say that we're looking into the future.
For the overwhelming part...well, a house and an adoption at the same time just tends to be a little overwhelming. I'm excited about both, and the new house has at least 5 bedrooms so we should be set for another few adoptions. ;) My anal side wants so much to be able to see how all of this is going to work out--this is pretty daunting financially. But then I read this post from Audrey. And it pretty much summed it up.
If I have the abilities to do all of this on my own, or I make it appear that way, no one would glorify God for that. But when we are incapable of doing the things He has called us to do and we trust that if this is His will, He will make it work, the outcome will bring glory to Him for the things that only could have come from Him.
Right now I only see the finite--the things we lack to do what we believe He is calling us to do. But if He has called us, He will also equip us and provide for us. We are choosing to move forward in faith and trust, not fear.
"May the God of peace, who through the blood of the eternal covenant brought back from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great Shepherd of the sheep, equip you with everything good for doing his will, and may he work in us what is pleasing to him, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen." --Hebrews 13:20-21 (NIV)
This was all part of what we were trying to work out. The house is livable except the roof needs to be redone and part of the plumbing is missing (darn copper thieves!). So we have found a loan that will build the cost of those two repairs into our mortgage while still keeping us under the monthly payment we wanted. At some point maybe I'll share all of the gory details about why we wanted to do this this way, but for right now let's just say that we're looking into the future.
For the overwhelming part...well, a house and an adoption at the same time just tends to be a little overwhelming. I'm excited about both, and the new house has at least 5 bedrooms so we should be set for another few adoptions. ;) My anal side wants so much to be able to see how all of this is going to work out--this is pretty daunting financially. But then I read this post from Audrey. And it pretty much summed it up.
If I have the abilities to do all of this on my own, or I make it appear that way, no one would glorify God for that. But when we are incapable of doing the things He has called us to do and we trust that if this is His will, He will make it work, the outcome will bring glory to Him for the things that only could have come from Him.
Right now I only see the finite--the things we lack to do what we believe He is calling us to do. But if He has called us, He will also equip us and provide for us. We are choosing to move forward in faith and trust, not fear.
"May the God of peace, who through the blood of the eternal covenant brought back from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great Shepherd of the sheep, equip you with everything good for doing his will, and may he work in us what is pleasing to him, through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen." --Hebrews 13:20-21 (NIV)
Tuesday, November 25, 2008
Memories
This weekend marked the first thing that we have done to complete the cycle of being home a year. Of course, we haven't actually been home a year yet--only 11 months (as of yesterday!).
We got home the afternoon of Christmas Eve last year. Because of circumstances surrounding our travel, we had a quiet homecoming all to ourselves which I really think was best. That night, we went to the Christmas Eve service at our church. We snuck in late and sat in the balcony so as not to see too many people. We continued to keep the first few weeks very low-key, but one thing we did do was go see the Christmas lights at Our Lady of the Snows Shrine in Belleville, IL. The boys loved Christmas lights and the Shrine has it set up where you drive through the story of Christmas, so there weren't crowds or loud music or anything else to contend with. They thought the lights were cool but I don't think they had any idea what they were really looking at. ;)
This past Saturday, we went to the Shrine lights again. This time, they got it. :) They knew what they were looking at and for, and they had a lot of fun pointing out all of the different things they saw--camels, angels, stars. I must confess to getting a little misty-eyed as we drove in. We're coming full circle with their first year home. I'm pretty sure the boys don't remember going to the Shrine last year--they'd been home a week and there'd been an awful lot of changes happening in the month previous. But it doesn't matter. I'm so happy to be establishing positive patterns for them, building a foundation of trust and faith that this is real, and this is permanent.
We got home the afternoon of Christmas Eve last year. Because of circumstances surrounding our travel, we had a quiet homecoming all to ourselves which I really think was best. That night, we went to the Christmas Eve service at our church. We snuck in late and sat in the balcony so as not to see too many people. We continued to keep the first few weeks very low-key, but one thing we did do was go see the Christmas lights at Our Lady of the Snows Shrine in Belleville, IL. The boys loved Christmas lights and the Shrine has it set up where you drive through the story of Christmas, so there weren't crowds or loud music or anything else to contend with. They thought the lights were cool but I don't think they had any idea what they were really looking at. ;)
This past Saturday, we went to the Shrine lights again. This time, they got it. :) They knew what they were looking at and for, and they had a lot of fun pointing out all of the different things they saw--camels, angels, stars. I must confess to getting a little misty-eyed as we drove in. We're coming full circle with their first year home. I'm pretty sure the boys don't remember going to the Shrine last year--they'd been home a week and there'd been an awful lot of changes happening in the month previous. But it doesn't matter. I'm so happy to be establishing positive patterns for them, building a foundation of trust and faith that this is real, and this is permanent.
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