Redirect

I haven't posted much through this entire process... 1) I had to be vague about what we were doing which I didn't expect to have to do and 2) My wife started a blog about it and has more time than I to post.  I may post once and a while here still but you should follow my wife's blog...

http://piecesofmyheartukraine.blogspot.com

That said everything has been going absolutely fabulous.  Still waiting for the expected age regression and struggle with authority but it hasn't happened after over 7weeks of being together full-time... even the transition with school has been great and, though she jokingly whines a tiny bit, she clearly loves it.

I guess I should say we always have the age regression... she is like a happy 10yr old nearly all the time ;)  Which is a blast for me but I think Melissa could do without most of it.... hehe.

Oh... and as I expected from summer... she has clearly been "churched".  She has no issue praying, wants to pray when I tuck her in at night, and found out recently that after she prays then she is reciting the Lord's Prayer... the Russian word for "bread" that I caught after a couple of times.

Home

Everyone arrived safely and the family is sleeping soundly... Well except me since I'm used to staying up late. Now starts the actual hard part of adoption :) Thank you for praying through this with us.

The weekend

Since I didn't post any pictures of the court date. Ashley did well though it was nearing all she could stand. Amber was a bit deer in the headlights. It was all really quick... I didn't think it could be quicker than our last one. This judge was no nonsense and I'm pretty sure there wasn't a single unnecessary word spoken in the entire proceeding. I'm told that most judges don't like their pictures taken and she didn't stick around for one.

Today we went shopping for DVDs and a DVD player. I only found two players that support US voltage also and fortunately they were the cheapest at $35. We got about fifteen Russian DVDs... Hopefully Amber will like them. It is kind of hard to pick out movies for a 14 year old who is between liking twilight and barbie. They all look legal but it is really hard to tell over here. I will replace the plug on the player when we get home and we will use it as a way for Amber to just relax after all the school and home work is done on the weekend... Something she can listen to without having to work to understand it. Most can be listened to in English or russian and mix/match with English or Russian subtitles.

We also picked up one of those magic pots... Though it turns out the cheap one we got isn't all that magic. Takes nearly as long as the gas stove to boil water. So they all aren't created equal by the magic pot fairy. When we went to the market we found some English books that help teach the alphabet and reading but explain it in Russian. Most things including Rosetta stone and what she will get in school are primary language agnostic... So we grabbed both lesson books they had and may look for more on amazon.

Tonight we went to the local carnival... The rides looked safer than the ones that show up in our home town. It was fun... Maybe go again tomorrow after the circus.

Today the temperature suddenly dropped and it got windy. In virginia I would be looking for the thunderstorm... Not sure what was up here but it was a relief. The last couple of days have been warm and humid... And me without shorts. In zap you can see the industrial areas spewing out smoke and pollution that hangs over the city... To make matters worse, the air settles in the evening and everyone and their uncle seems to want to create a random bonfire in the nearest field. We even saw people carrying wood and a rock to sit on from their apartment tonight to the embankment next to the main road... Before we left the market they had a good fire going.

Found a close restaurant today with a reasonable variety of food. I liked the pizza but it was close to a meat pie in taste and Melissa did not like the dill they used all over it. Our favorite place to eat is over by the open market but I doubt we will walk the 4.5km to get there at night.

Lastly... I really like the yogurt over hear. Not the stuff they put chocolate on that makes me feel ill, the normal yogurt... Even finding three of the containers having blue mold in them hasn't dissuaded me from eating the others. I also love the fruit juice... Pineapple in particular.

Court done

Yippee

Court tomorrow

Court is at 10a tomorrow... Please pray it goes smoothly.

The deputy director showed us their newly redone computer lab and a speech therapy room. Apparently the staff is doing all the labor themselves to save money and they are doing a really nice job. I will add pictures once I get them off the camera.

Court

Another great few days... I haven't written much simply cause it has been fairly uneventful besides having fun.





We spent more time today with the kids. We brought two basketballs and two soccer balls which were really well received.

There is one really sweet girl there I wish could find a family... She has like five siblings over various ages though and would probably have to be separated to be practical. She was hanging out with us periodically, always has a smile, and has a very meek/mild personality. Unfortunately I don't think she is on the hosting program this time.

We got this Friday the 23rd as a court date.

Praises
- early court date
- all the paperwork made it out last Friday
- Melissa is doing much better but still under the weather

Prayer requests
- the next few days go well, especially with Ashley who was really tired today
- for a great court... The main adoption judge is out so we aren't exactly sure what to expect




I think this picture says it.

Just keeps getting better

Our translator is awesome and all the documents made it on a bus to Kyiv so we can get a scheduled court date.

We got to the school at 8am and went out playing with Amber shortly after. Some of the kids seem took take the opportunity to use our being there as yet another excuse to ditch class. Amber's best friend actually asked and got permission to spend time with us. Once I caught on to what was going on I took the iPad away from the boys getting in trouble and told them to go to class. Apparently some kids have a half day on Friday and some a full day... Had one trustworthy kid who could speak English ok -- the one who actually asked permission -- help me figure out which was which :)

The iPad is a huge hit and since there is no internet there I don't have to worry about the kids getting into trouble with it. I don't put anything on there i wouldn't let my 11 yr old daughter use. The boys tend to play one of the racing games and the girls alternate between barbie fashion studios and cake doodle. I frankly just leave it and let them play with it... Ashley doesn't mind letting them use her toy and the only "problem" I've had is forcing things so the less assertive kids get a chance.

We have been able to spend a lot of time with Amber and gotten to see her with her friends... And not so friends. Had some good conversations with the caregivers too.

Looking forward to tomorrow... Especially not having to get up at 6a to head out. Keep in mind it takes me two weeks to adjust to a timezone... Always been that way... And 6a here is 11p back home.

Location:Zaporizhzhya,Ukraine

A really great day

Today was just a really fantastic day... Probably in the top ten ever. We got to the orphanage around 8a. Anya wrote the letter saying she wanted to be adopted, we got a question on the birth certificate answered definitively the way it needed to be, got nearly all the documents we needed, and of course spent a great day with Anya and all the kids.




Anya insisted on changing her entire name... A little sad because I actually love her name Anya but happy she was comfortable telling us that much. She chose Amber Noelle. It will take some getting used to.

We talked and played a lot. UNO... The iPad was a huge hit. Delivered the NHFC packages... Except one where the girl moved to the trade school. The iPad has been great... Not only the games but we showed some picture and video of host families as well as one girl used it to write a short letter back to her host family... Which I was already able to send.

The kids and staff liked to talk and look at the photos a lot. I have not ever heard of such a supportive orphanage... Not even close. For whatever reason the kids understand that families are good, the realities of their situation, but at the same time have a healthy relationship with their school mates. I can assume it is a culture built by the staff and it is very healthy... And it is a poor orphanage so they do with little.

Our daughter Ashley instantly found several new best friends. She was having such a good time she asked if she could stay... Um no... But I did smile... I didn't want to leave this evening either even knowing I'll be back bright and early tomorrow.

This summer Amber had asked us if we were going to adopt any more kids after her... Wanting a no, and no was our plan. Today she asked if we were going to host or adopt any more after her... And then said she had several suggestions, specifically the adorable little girl standing next to her and wearing a pair of the ear rings we gave her yesterday.

Some of the other girls we know were giving me hugs... At one point Amber said to one of them "my dad"... I noticed she had been a little jealous and cuddling closer most of the day, wasn't minding and she was clearly happy. They were all her good friends. At the end of our time Amber said she was going to be standing there right at the driveway when we come tomorrow.

Current Prayer requests...
0. Melissa gets over her sinus infection
1. That the mayor is in early tomorrow and signs our document
2. That the inspector is in tomorrow and signs the corrected school documents
3. That we can get everything on the train to the SDA tomorrow evening
4. That the discussion at the courthouse goes well tomorrow
5. For a near term court date with a good judge

Location:Zaporizhzhya,Ukraine

Anya

Us right after getting Anya's SDA referral.

The train arrived this morning in Zap. It wasn't bad though I kept worrying about my daughter falling off the top bunk since she moves around so much at night... So got way less sleep than I normally would have.




Got to the inspector office around 2p and got the paperwork done shortly after for the referral and headed over to the school. Unfortunately the deputy director and director weren't there so we didn't get the official answer but it was clear Anya was coming and the inspector and social worker (?) asked her questions. We had rushed to embrace when she entered the room. It was a really good day.

Ashley had been saying, almost demanding, to go see Anya... Made it clear she didn't care about anything else but seeing Anya. We saw her smile more than any time at all on this trip. She really liked giving Anya the rose we got for her and the jewelry she had picked out in America for her.





The topic of Snezhana not going did come up... Which was good, it has been the elephant in the room on our calls for a while since we had not real answer to give her. When we told her she was only slightly bummed and was worried about losing her Ukrainian... Told her we would still go to the Russian speaking baptist church if she wanted and of course let her call Tanya her new friend from Ukraine in America... There is also Dennis though I understand he's not the level of communication she is looking for. We affirmed we want her to keep her language skills too as when she graduates from college, having three language fluent is a big step up... Especially in the DC area. I forgot to mention we are going to let her call h friends in Ukraine too.

We got as much paperwork done tonight as we could. We will be at the school at 8am to do more. We have to figure out with her what name she wants to go by tomorrow. We will also hopefully get the NHFC gifts handed out tomorrow too.

Location:Zaporizhzhya,Ukraine

Snezhana

Finally got a definitive answer from Snezhana... a no as expected. Now we can hopefully focus on a quick and fun trip with Anya... though we still have to break it to her that S isn't coming. I think she knows though and she'll be fine with it... she gets her own room and she knows S was causing some trouble in the house at the end of hosting that she was pretty appalled by.


We are still sad in many ways and wish her the best but it was good to get an answer she is confident in.  At some point we will let her know she needs to reach out to us if she wants to continue contact with us and Dennis.  We will keep sending letters to her grandmother on an ongoing basis and the orphanage director at least until she leaves... so she will always know how to get in touch with us.  I might send return postage to grandma next time in case she wants to write back.


We take the late night train to Zap tonight... hoping to see Anya tomorrow.  We have about 70lbs of gifts with us :)

SDA done

I don't think we remembered to take any pictures. It was all done quick and Ashley and Melissa are a bit under the weather with allergies.

It took a little bit of explaining with the whole Anya, Snezhana, and Dennis thing :). She also wanted to make sure we knew about Snezhana's siblings Violetta and Yaroslav... Yes yes, we know and they don't want to be adopted. It was the same SDA person who jumped in last time and seemed to be making up rules to make our lives more complicated but she was fine this time though everything by the book. I actually could tell her voice when we were outside and she was yelling down at our facilitator... Cringe.

We will get the referral for Anya tomorrow and hopefully get to the train tomorrow night. Found out some stuff we didn't know that got me choked up but the rest of the stuff was typical of SDA write ups.

Thank you for your prayers, keep them coming.

Location:Kyiv, Ukraine

What is Dennis doing?

He is out in the Sierra Nevada mountains camping with grandma and grandpa with Sam. He likes fishing, swimming, boating, and many other things.

Sam finally rode a bike without training wheels and is apparently riding it everywhere now.

Photos

Ashley with some of the players from a Ukraine soccer team at the Munich airport. They are actually deaf and were signing to each other.





The view from our apartment window. This is the golden gate... The gate to the old city at one point.



Melissa had her picture with this statue by the SDA back in December. Ashley and I posed this time.



Not a hard rock I think I will put on my list to visit. The SDA market place is dramatically more active now in the fall then it was when the place was covered in ice in December. We walked quite a bit if the market today but never did find the end.



Mom and dad trying to disgust Ashley.




Some folk parade... Busy square. An hour before there were protestors chanting to free the jailed ex-prime minister... Chanting in English for the cameras with several groups of peace officers watching on. We crossed the street and went on the other side. There was an Amway sponsored bicycling event and an evening concert here too.



A dance show that apparently happens a lot this time of year. We say the kids practicing earlier that day in independence square.



Eating dinner with a fellow adopting family. It was really late and Ashley was having a hard time coping but she did take the picture for us. The others all include her with a not so pleasant expression.

Anya has been texting a lot today and called. It took me a while to realize she is texting in Ukrainian and not Russian. It is very similar but google translate isn't happy if you don't get it right... And there are some letters Russian doesn't use and I needed to get the right keyboard enabled for the iPad. The iPad is fantastic for cross language IM.

Location:Kiev,Ukraine

SDA tomorrow

Posting with themiPad is a bit of a pain... I need to figure out the right number of pictures to not exceed upload limits. This will be a quick text blog. We met up with another couple here and ate dinner at the buffet we like. Today we hung out with part of the NHFC team. Anya has been calling and texting us constantly which has been great. With our dozen common words in our vocabulary. Yesterday she had her deputy director on the phone with her who was "very happy" we are here for her... Stark contrast to some directors who want to keep the kids in the orphanages so they can keep their jobs. Anya was disappointed it will be a few days... Patience is not her virtue her but I can't blame her... We can hardly wait to see her again and get her home. Snezhana... Well, still mostly no communication. Managed to get her on the phone for a minute to tell her we are her but that was it and she didn't want to talk. A translator will be there soon to get her to answer so we can move on... We need an actual no so we can tell Dennis. About to head back out with part of the NHFC team for dinner. Tomorrow we get up for a 9a SDA app't. Keep us in your prayers please.

Plans for Saturday

The only things we have to do today is to call people.

1. A missionary in Zap that is arranging an apartment for us.
2. Anya as promised.  We told her we would arrive on 9/10 just in case there were delays.  Given some of my revelations in past posts, we decided to hold the excitement and call her precisely on the day we said we would.
3. Snezhana as promised.  She has an answer to give.  All her interactions with us since she left hosting have given a no answer... unless we see a change in her we honestly want it to be a no.  But regardless, we promised we would call when we got to Kyiv... and us keeping that promise is important, to Anya too.

We hope to spend the afternoon with our facilitator going to see some things in Kyiv that we have not seen before.  Tomorrow I think we will take Ashley to the underground mall and the places we know... including a dry run walk over to the SDA to check out the timing. We have the first meeting of the morning which hopefully means we won't have to wait an hour.


Praises:

1. Made it here safe and sound without having left anything important

2. The boys seem to be having a blast with grandma and grandpa

3. We are here and desperately praying that the adoption experience we have is the one God wants for us

4. For the 1:1 time with my oldest daughter Ashley

5. For the phones some FB friends sent us left over from their trip


Prayers:

1. That, God willing, the process will go smoothly and quickly.  That the hearts of the people we would meet would be softened and supportive.

2. God to protect and drive our finances both here and at home

3. That we would stay healthy

4. That Anya would stay strong understanding we love her and will support her through this and her entire life.

5. That we will be able to show love to the other children at the orphanage.

6. That I will be able to get reliable internet connectivity by Sunday night so I can work.

7. For all our kids and care givers back home for safety, health, and sanity.  That we can communicate regularly.

We have arrived

It was a very uneventful trip.  We had 1 hour delays for both legs but we had a long layover so it didn't really matter.  Everyone did well though Melissa looks like she has been hypnotized.

We got picked up, drove to the new apartment just down the street from the SDA, changed and went out to a local restaurant.  Melissa and I had borscht which was pretty good but not as good as home.  Melissa and Ashley had Pelmeni but the sour cream was definitely different so they didn't like it much.  This restaurant is more expensive than the buffet by the previous apartment so I may see about walking to the other one from here... and this one has english menus which feels like cheating the experience.

The nearest money changer was open to 8:30p so I, and 20 other american tourists from a tour group, decided to us it.  I'm not sure I could ever do the tour group thing... 20 people walking around like they were part of a high school class with a bunch of preplanned group excursions... just doesn't seem like me.

We got the dossiers from other people and the peanut butter we take into the right hands.

Ashley did really well on the flight... better than Melissa.  After dinner she started getting stubborn but once we managed to get her in the shower, she came out and zonked on the bed completely.

Speaking of beds... I'm weird, to people who know me that comes to no surprise... I tend to look at certain things in upside down ways.  They had a two bedroom apartment available but we chose the one bedroom.  It was more expensive but I already told Melissa I didn't feel comfortable with Ashley sleeping in a room by herself.  But even in this scenario, I took the couch... as soon as I sat on it I knew I wanted it. It is a hard foam couch.  One of my problems traveling and sleeping are the mattresses... I don't even like our 10yr old one at home.  I like very firm beds and they help my back not hurt.

That said... I'm the one who woke up after 5hrs of sleep at 2:30a feeling refereshed.  Just took an Ambien to get back to bed so if this gets loopier than normal that is why.

Let down

We got to talk to Anya yesterday with a translator at the school. I think it was uncomfortable for her a little... She knows the translators we use in the US. It is cool when we call that two girls ran to go get her. It does mean she probably hasn't kept quiet about being adopted but we had no expectation she would... But it likely means these girls are excited for her.

She was a bit bummed in the phone and just wanted to know when we are coming. The hosting interview team was there that day and she ran out to meet their vehicle so we got a nice picture. Unfortunately the bag with the gifts was delayed so they didn't have the gift bag she was expecting. We have watched a pattern with Anya that she can shift in attitude quickly to sadness when a disappointment comes... Even minor depression. I suspect it is just due to having been let down so many times over many years. She doesn't even care why, she just knows she was let down again. Melissa and I are going to watch that with her and make even a bigger effort to focus on making sure we come through every single time... Part of it will being careful with our plans too as even simple things like not being able to go to a park because of it raining will likely bother her. It'll be part of the bonding process.

We are really excited... Melissa is in the air taking the boys to grandma and grandpa who are camping in the Sierra Nevada mountains right now. She comes back today... Yes, four legs and over ten hours in the air today. They slept at a hotel at the airport last night so she didn't add an extra two hours of driving in traffic to it. They seemed to do really well last night. Packing is nearly done and we are awaiting a few more things we are taking with us for people. We are thinking of taking the gifts as carry in given the trouble people are having with bags though we aren't totally sure all the contents are allowed on carry on so we will see.

Right now just finishing off work and hoping the weather forecast is wrong and it will dry up for a few hours so I can mow the lawn one more time before we leave. Thank you all for the prayers.

Calling All kids

Wasn't sure what to write here tonight. I think the feeling is relief as well as sadness over immaturity and the lack of examples of successful and healthy lifes to point the way.

We called S yesterday.. We got a no pickup, then a pick up with Dennis stating hi Oleg. A bit later Melissa tried again and Oleg answered talking with Dennis for 90 seconds. Eventually Oleg started yelling at S to get on the phone to talk with Dennis. She came reluctantly with a bad attitude and decided to be sassy over his use of English to talk. Fortunately there phone died shortly after.

We will still try to call her when we arrive in Kyiv as we have promised when we have a translator with us. We expect a no... Which is the best answer for my family unless she has a significant change of heart.

We caught Anya last night but she was truly tired and it seems they left for the circus today. We will keep trying now that we know a cell we can call.

Ashley has a great idea on a personalized gift for her from Ash.... We will get that weds.

We are just really excited that we should be hugging Anya in ten days.

Calling Anya

We had a translator call with us today. The cell phone we were calling was for a friend but it sounds as if she has moved to a trade school. The school did answer and we got her on the phone.

She is such a sweetheart... She said she was crying today missing us so I'm really glad we called and got through. I think she is feeling really vulnerable and we will try to call every day even if it is without a translator just to tell her we love her.

As usual she had a ton of questions...
- when are you landing in Kyiv
- can my really great teacher who knows English come to lunch with us sometimes
- is daddy coming? Ashley? Amanda?
- do we have to stay at school all the time
- where is my phone that the facilitator promised to get me
- can I have Snezhana's phone number... Which btw we declined as Snezhana seems to be back into the old uncertain, fearful state and we dont want any of that rubbing off on Anya
...

We have arranged to call with a translator the morning before we fly out.

She did say she still hadn't gotten her luggage back from hosting... Which is disappointing and hopefully it will turn up. We had told her to leave anything here she really wanted to keep but she was so fearful we wouldn't come for her at the end that she packed pretty much everything up.

Who?

Going to give this a try... Blogging from the iPad. Since I haven't posted pictures for this blog I figured I would.

This is Dennis' sister Снежана... Most of you know this from our other blog. We will see how mixing Cyrillic into our posts does.

This is Аня... From what I can tell there are multiple ways to spell her name in Cyrillic but this is the one that transliterates correctly to how she likes it pronounced.

Finally the phone answers

We finally got ahold of the girls today.

First A, she and her friend V were ecstatic to hear from us. Even more so when we were able to say when our app't was. V speaks a little English and tried to act as an interpreter. We got I love yous in and A kept reminding us she doesn't speak English... Which we found humorous. We told them we would try to get a translator and call back.

A friend's son... Latvian who speaks Russian and English too... Was volunteered by his mom to come to the rescue. I think she may have enjoyed pulling him out of bed too much. This time A was more distracted by whatever was going on around her. Not so distracted as to keep her from flirting with the 13yr old translator. Man are we going to have to watch out for her. It was all good... Everything really got silly at the end with V and A laughing telling everyone on the phone they loved them. These girls are great fun.

I had to go work at a customer site today so I missed the call with S... So this is all second hand from Melissa. She finally answered but it was only for 4 minutes. They got disconnected a couple of times... I wonder if the cell coverage at the camp is poor. S was noticeably agitated about something and was with boyfriend who kept talking in the background. Who knows what she was agitated at.

S asked Dennis if he wanted her to come... Which of course he said yes. We all want her to come. Actually this is part of my concern... I totally get her telling the relatives and everyone she is going cause her brother desperately wants her to come. Shoot I'd do the same thing cause it is an easy yet powerful way to justify the decision. BUT she needs to actually want to come to be part of our family as a key reason... Ignoring D and not just because of college. Otherwise in 3mo she will be having a tough time, will resent D and us, and it will be much harder in everyone than it needs to be. This will be a discussion we have next month with her.

That was basically the end of the conv. S asked D if he wanted to talk to boyfriend to which he said yes... And the phone disconnected. Calling back just gave a busy response.

We have less than 3wks until we leave... Woohoo.. Please be praying for us.

We have a date

We got our SDA date of Sept 12th today. We are excited and like before we'll leave just a bit earlier than we have to to allow us to adjust and deal with flight delays. Our oldest is coming with us and she is crazy giddy about it. I think her only disappointment is she has to go to 1.5 weeks of school before we leave.

Dennis is really happy to be going to spend time with grandma and grandpa. Sam is far more mellow but prays the girls will come home to us every time he gets the chance... He's also happy about the trip to CA because that is when his DSi restriction ends. He tries to convince me he gets sick to his stomach when he can't play electronic games :)

Melissa talked to the school principals today and I was happy they both seemed to be ok with the kids being out for what could be 4 weeks.

Melissa found a kennel that will take both dogs and they get to run in a fenced yard all day. They may not want to come home. It will still be one of the expensive aspects of the trip but she did give us a discount and she is one of those crazy dog people... So they will be well taken care of.

Now to go see what the weather is supposed to be like in sept and oct in Ukraine.

[im]patiently waiting

Still waiting... Hopefully we'll get dates early this week.

Until then we've sent packages and are working on opening up two way communications. With S we will just wait to know if she will hold to her decision... With gma, boyfriend, and all the familiar surroundings to try to persuade her back. With A we just want to make sure she is reminded to have confidence we are coming as fast as possible.

I think we are going to try to send A a bouquet... Some others did that for another girl at her school and she got it. I had considered doing the same for my wife for gotcha day with Dennis but wasn't sure where to send them... Turns out these guys as persistent so I figure it is worth it.

Pacing

Not like pacing yourself but pacing back and forth. I admit I'm anxious to get our travel dates this week and kick off the crazy series of activities that have to happen. I'm excited that our oldest is going to come with us... We have a blast doing things.

Right now I will just be content waiting... And trying my first blog post from my iPad... Which we got specifically for this trip to give my daughter something to keep her occupied for the long waits. I'm going to ask her to keep a diary on it of her experiences... Maybe we can swing some school credit since she's going to miss a good bit of it.

Hosting over

The girls headed home yesterday... there weren't many dry eyes in the family.  Poor girls ended up on the runway for 4hrs at IAD before starting the 8.5hr flight.  Hopefully they made their connecting flight in Germany... instead of 5hrs to make the change they had less than 1hr.

We expect to hear our SDA date any day now.

Been a while

We haven't disappeared... in fact things are active and great.  We just don't write about hosting during hosting on the blog... many would probably consider that odd since we do blog about the adoption while we are adopting which is what most people don't do who care.  What can I say... we are odd :)

The SDA not closing has made things all that much more interesting.  We wanted to make sure we didn't get travel dates during hosting which we should be good with at this point.  Right now we are just waiting for our dates "real soon now".

Traveling will be interesting... we are pretty sure we are going to take our oldest with us and the two boys will go back to be with the grandparents in California.  Does mean that they will be missing some weeks of school here but such is life.  Middle school is all about learning about the world and what better way to learn than a few weeks in Ukraine for my oldest... that's not something she'll probably get the chance to do again.  Dennis has all the materials the school would be working on him with and since he is still exempt from the actual school work he'll be fine.  Sam is a little harder but I think we'll see if we can audit his nieces' private school for while he's back there.

Anyways, God will work it all out.

Skype broken

Skype to Ukraine doesn't work as reported by many people.  It'll say it is an invalid phone number nearly instantly after dialing.  Someone claimed SMS works so giving that a try.  So far it just says "Sent" but not "Delivered" so either S' phone is off or Skype is broken.

Oh well... off to clean out the garage and work on laundry.  We've had a bit of a crazy week so lots to catch up on.

Father's Day

Pastor (paraphrased):  Please come next Sunday for the encouraging Father's Day message untitled "Are you man enough?"
Wife: <giggle>
Sam (son): Dad, you are more than man enough.
Me: <hug Sam with big smile> Thank you

For those women out there that don't know what all men know.... Mother's Day is about how mothers are wonderful and should be held in high esteem -- both good things --... Father's Day is about how men need to suck it up and do better.  This is of course a generalization but my wife is semi-entertained at how true it holds.  It has held true on both coasts of the United States, in multiple church denominations, and I think has gone on for at least as long as I've been around.

I think we were married two years before I explained the situation to my wife -- we've been married over 14yrs now.  At first she didn't believe me.  This last week she and I were joking about this exact upcoming topic.

This year I listened to the Bringing Up Boys audio book which was pretty good but frankly doesn't tell me as a guy much that I already didn't know.  It goes into this topic but from a bigger cultural perspective.  Took me listening it to realize it is for my wife and I should probably be listening to the related girl's book.  I did read a small book by the founder of Chic-filet, "It's Better to Build Boys than Mend Men".  It is much better positioned to be a book for father's and only takes an evening to read at most -- just my kind of book.

Ok... so seemingly off topic... but this year I have a new son and this summer I am "temporary father" to two girls.

Package to S

We did get to talk to S on Saturday... she 3-way'd in D's Ukraine grandma and then D talked to S' boyfriend.  Tomorrow she leaves for Crimea with the entire rest of the school and then probably gets back just before leaving for us.  I was surprised when she said she was only "so-so" about Crimea... I would have thought it was really nice.  I was also surprised she didn't know what the Crimea was and I had to refer to is as the Black Sea.

She said she would have her phone so we can keep talking to her.  She was VERY excited about coming to America.

So to RANT... S still has not received the package we sent.  The orphanage director still has it.  What kind of person keeps, no steals, from an orphan... a letter with updates about her brother in America and little trinkets for her to enjoy.  I'm pretty pissed... and it's time for me to be writing this months letter to the director... I'll be good but it is awfully hard.

Russian with a side of gardening

Today I mail'd packages to the girls.  The last letters before they get their hosting letters are the airport.  It contains personal letters, pictures, some cheap fashion accessories, and M&Ms for S.  Each also includes a translated calendar of our major plans for July.  The post office had what looked like big red bubble envelopes left over from Valentines... I thought that would be neat for the girls so even though they were a bit over-sized I used them.

S heads to the Crimea on Monday so there is zero expectation she will ever get this package.  It is worse odds (yes than zero) when you realize that her orphanage director still hasn't given her the package we sent with the family over two weeks ago.  When she gets here we will have to have her read all the letters we've sent to see which ones she received.  Wondering if she's allowed to have her cell phone while there or if we'll lose communication.

I don't know if A has received a single one of her packages... at some point we will find out when she gets here.  We have her translated letter for the airport.  Melissa wrote it based on the assumption that she hasn't received anything from us... while trying not to be totally mundane if she has.

This evening I planted trees and bushes.. they are intended to give a little privacy on that side of the house though it'll be a few years before that actually happens.  The chicken coop will go there... it is only 3.5ft tall, doesn't look like a chicken coop, and in my biased opinion it looks nice.  It is movable, an "ark", so you don't foul the ground in one place.

The kids helped a little but mostly played in the yard.  At one point I sprayed Dennis with a little water and he decided that was fun... so all 4 kids were drenched... don't think mom was as pleased.

After dinner I got out our laptop with RosettaStone on it.  Got through the first lesson and the core section of the second lesson.  There are a couple of words I'm going to need to put in google translate or ask a native speaker what they are since I couldn't figure it out specifically from the patterns of pictures.  But I figured out how they setup a keyboard with phonetic mapping which makes it pretty easy for me to type... and was able to read/deduce the meaning of some basic multi-sentence items.  I like that about RosettaStone... I can't book learn with anything... but this actually presents progressively harder challenges and by doing the same things in different combinations you "magically" just start getting it.

Dennis was pretty glues to the laptop with me.  He thought it was funny I was speaking Russian and he understood it.  I checked my pronunciation with him a few times... and he laughed at me as I confused swimming with drinking.  For a second there I got a shock thinking he was actually reading the Russian on the screen... we have no believe he even knows his alphabet or can recognize his own name in Russian.  That belief was short lived as I realized he could hear the computer voice coming from the headset cause it was up too loud.

Lastly, a prayer request... a couple actually...
1. Our renter's for our Vegas home actually paid so they shouldn't be getting evicted.  Pray that their financial situation stabilizes so we don't have that concern hanging over us... and for that matter they don't either.

2. For Melissa's work situation... since she got back from adopting Dennis in Feb and had to use all her vacation time first for that, she's accrued little time off.  Her work has been quite flexible in general over the years and last year even gave her 1 week of unpaid leave during hosting that we were immensely grateful for... but they don't want to give her a few days of unpaid leave this July or allow her to do some work from home if she's taking time off.  That leaves Melissa having to work 10hr days in the office (figured 12hrs total) or not participating in several of the outings.  I have plenty of vacation time accrued so I will be around but it is important Melissa spend a lot of time with the girls too.

To make things harder... due to some odd circumstances, Melissa's working is a nice plus for short term cash flow but in a 9mo outlook we actually have more money in the bank if she doesn't work... so to a large extent she's working for "free" at best.  But she loves her job and the people she is working with so we had decided to ignore the funny money issue... just makes it really hard for July where she feels like she's choosing to stress out and work long days while losing precious time with the girls.

The Letters' Black Hole

So today we actually found out definitively that one of our packages to S is in the hands of someone at the orphanage for nearly 2 weeks and yet to be delivered.  That really ticks me off... just the idea of taking a package with presents and communication away from an orphan.  Even more so when it is a family that loves her and has adopted her brother???  Anyways, make me more certain about the fate of the 4 other packages we sent since December 2010 that never "made it".

Fortunately we know people who are going who on a reasonable consistent basis and can get letters through regardless.  Anyways... irks me unbelievably, so I'm venting.

Just about to send letters to S and A.  I need to write letters to Ukraine gma and the orphanage director about Dennis.

Coming up quick

Melissa tells me this blog entry should have been in this blog instead of Dennis'.  More people follow Dennis blog and part of the summer is Dennis getting to see his sister... but she's right.  This is really more of this blog unfolding.

Today I drafted the last letter we will send to each of the girls before hosting.  The letters are different but I am careful to word in a way that entire paragraphs can be shared (and translated once) as appropriate.  There will be one more letter they will be given on the plane over to here.

Melissa and I have been wrestling for months on how to do these last letters.  How do we introduce them?  How do we minimize fear and conflict?  How do we let each feel comfortable and not in competition? .... A long list of things... most we still don't have answers to and all we lay in God's hands.  We are even concerned what one of the orphanage directors might do if she finds out we are hosting two girls.  This is even more strange cause you normally aren't writing a kid before you host her for the first time.

Anyways, we decided that in the last non-hosting letter to each girl we would simply tell them we are hosting another girl too... more introductions in the hosting letter.  All in a very positive light... which I think it is once you get over any initial discomfort.  This way when it is found out on the plane or in Kyiv it won't be a complete shock.  On the other hand, we don't introduce some of the more complicated questions with no real way to provide answers... only uncertainty and fear.

Like for one of the girls discovering that Snezhana was hosted by us before and we've adopted her brother... frankly, only Snezhana herself can adequately explain that one and one day hopefully she'll tell me :)  Even for S, if she really does just wanted to be hosted twice to consider adoption... she'll probably worry that we've moved on.  Honestly we (with a translator) are the only ones that can answer that... but at least the girls should have time on the plane to get to know each other.

So we are like 5wks to go.  I've been coaching Ashley that she really needs to focus on being A's friend and making sure she never feels like a third wheel.  Snezhana is primarily here to visit Dennis and has a head start with us.  If Ashley is with A that will also allow Snezhana to fill some of the big sister role again with Dennis that Ashley owns now.

As my wife tells me... I over analyze everything :)

Dossiers

I realized I hadn't updated this blog in a while.  Our two dossiers are in Ukraine... all up to God... but isn't it always :)

Shipped

Apostille was picked up, early as the VA authentication center seems to always be early so I checked when we arrived instead of waiting.  The boys and I play hooky from school today to tour the capital and get the dossier sent.  They did great.

It should travel with a family and arrive in Ukraine on Tuesday.  Of course unlike pretty much everyone else submitting right now we DON'T want an appointment yet... not sure we are going to pull that one off but it's a problem I don't mind having right now.

On the way to the Capital

We figured out it would take 2 days for apostille so Melissa decided to drive the documents down today and I'll pick them up & FedEx them to someone traveling tomorrow.  It is a 7-8hr round trip to Richmond... a lot of driving.

Almost to the peak

Got the medical done today... the Doctor was very cooperative -- thank you for your prayers.  The home study update is all done, just had one grammar error to fix... Melissa will pick that up tomorrow (Weds).

So it sounds like we are on schedule for Apostille Thursday.  I'm hopeful they'll do it all that morning so I don't have to come back on Friday due to the large number of documents.  Then decide how we are getting the dossier there.

Also a little question of whether we should specify 10-16yrs old or 8-16yrs old... still working on that one but changing will miss Thursday probably.

Very happy though about how things have worked out so far.

Mountain is building

I scanned in 38 pages of notarized documents today (a little over 50% of what we have already).  We just have the medicals and the updated home study to do.  Then I'll take a trip down to Richmond to get it all apostilled and shipped.

Praying the medicals go well tomorrow... ironically we aren't supposed to need any more tests but the doctor is having a problem signing the forms exactly like she did last time (8mo ago).

On a side note... my mom makes quilts.  There is one in each of our bedrooms... they are pretty nice, especially the one in the master bedroom.  My personal one is a spongebob one but the dog ripped some holes in it so she took it home to repair after she was watching our kids for our adopting Dennis.  It arrived today... wrapped around a Thomas Kinkade painting.  My wife and I really like Kinkade paintings but can never prioritize spending money on those sorts of things... she's now given us three of her's... actually this one was given to my mom who didn't really have room for it any more.  I think she just wanted something to protect the quilt in shipping ;)

Brainstorming what we might do with the kids next adoption trip.  I think the 3 kids were a bit much to handle... I think we are going to take 1, see if a local friend will take another (she always likes to hang out with the kids and has offered to help with all of them, but we won't torture her with that), and then see about the two boys going to stay with family or family coming here.  Something we'll figure out whenever the time comes.  Does mean I need to get passports for all the kids... fortunately the local post office will do them if you call ahead and have pictures brought with you.

Anyways, I showed that quilt and told him his gma (my mom) made it for me and I'm giving it to him.  He's sleeping with it now.

Home visit

All done... I think it was uneventful.  We left the room when she talked to Ashley and Dennis.  No idea what was said.  Will have to see how the 2 vs 4 approval goes... she's going to talk with our agent about it.

Hmmm

Got the apostiled marriage licenses back... woohoo.

On the odd side... our doctor and nurse practitoner signed the medical forms, all seemed good.  Then we were told they must only have the doctor's signature.  Even though the doctor did so last time now she wants to do another checkup before signing on her own.  Appointments on Tuesday... if it gets too messy I'll just submit the copies with both signatures.


Home study visit tomorrow... the house is just going to have to be good enough.  Melissa has been out of commission for over 3wks (mostly lying down)... so the rest of the family has been doing what we can.  No one starved, went naked, ate off floors, lived in filth... but at the same time none of the spring break cleaning and re-organizing after winter happened, or anything that didn't *have* to get done, so the garage & workshop is a mess, the basement could be better, and the yard hasn't been mowed in over a week.


Fortunately Melissa can now hobble around without crutches so she was able to help sort through winter/summer clothes so we could take of that todo the last few days.

CA apostille

This evening my droid app notified me that our CA apostilled marriage licenses were on their way.  Woohoo!

Hoping the home visit for the updated home study goes well.  Having Melissa be an invalid for 2+ wks and spring break has only the minimum stuff around the house getting done (laundry, trash, dishes, food).  Melissa deciding to go through all the clothes to rotate winter/summer clothes added a lot of work too... she's unable to move/carry so you can guess how that happened :)  We have the house cleaners coming on Friday to help out... probably been 6mo since they were here.

Rolling along

Happy Easter!!  He is Risen!

So Friday I got our Virginia State Police background checks.  I was floored and just amazed at God watching over the paperwork.  That was supposed to be a 12-15 day turn around, it was 3.

Today we got our county assessor home ownership verification stuff too.

So on Tuesday we should be pretty much done with everything but the home study update and getting the marriage licenses back from apostille.

I am going to laugh... a big out loud laugh... repeatedly... the kind that people look at you and think you've lost it... if the SDA doesn't actually close and we get an appointment way earlier than expected.  Just as long as it is for after the kids are here for hosting I'm ok :)

Narnia

Trying to think of some new fun stuff we can do this summer.  S and Ashley are avid readers, don't know about A.  I got S & A Russian copies of the Chronicles of Narnia... really nicely done books.  Ashley has the same in English.  Figured it might be a nice get away for all of them and we will likely travel a lot in the van.

I think I will order the movies too and we can watch them in English after the kids have read the chapter in their native languages.  That will let the whole family enjoy that with some popcorn.

Off to the races

Got our 4 marriage certificates today.  Tomorrow I'll send them to be apostiled.  It is supposed to be a week turn around.

My wife's doctor agreed that we don't need any new tests so Melissa is filling out the forms identically to last time and I'll take them down tomorrow to get completed.  That is a big one for us.

That just leaves the VA state background check which takes 12-15 business days (ouch), praying that will be quick, and the home study.  The home study should go well... we were approved for 4, got 1, that is going great, and we are [hopefully] only asking for 2 this time.

Tracking packages

For the dossier we use our FedEx account a lot but I've been less than pleased about how to get updated info from it directly.  Like automatically getting the tracking number and notification whenever someone uses our account.  Unfortunately I don't have a way to solve that... but the Android has a nice free app called "Parcels" that you can put tracking numbers in for just about any shipper and get status updates.  Right now I have:

Virginia State Police: USPS Priority, already in Richmond
Marriage Certificate return label: FedEx -- doesn't show up in system yet
Marriage Certificate request: FedEx, sitting in Memphis

It is kind of nice.  On another note, I will be asking my facilitator about using DHL instead of FedEx for the actual dossier.  I've seen people use it and it appears to take less than 2 days from the US to Kyiv... and costs less.

Take 2

I am starting a new blog for our next adoption that officially kicked off on 2011-04-15.  I didn't want to steal Dennis' blog as even though it morphed over time it is mostly central to him.

On Friday we were told that the SDA will stop accepting dossiers on June 1st.  Being the practical person I am, I did the math and even if it is only closed 3 months it is unlikely a dossier submitted after the closure will result in a completed adoption by the end of the year.  So off to the races... our goal is to send off the dossier on or before May 9th... and actually we discovered we need 2 separate dossiers.

Friday I sent off a note to the county assessor and scheduled our home visit to update our home study.  Saturday we sent off our VA police background check request, our request for our marriage certificates, and finished off nearly all the paperwork for the updated home study.  Monday we'll get a few more documents notarized.

Frankly we don't know if we'll make the deadline but none of this is really in our hands anyways.  Our goal this time is 2 unrelated children.. and we know them both though have no idea if either will really say yes when it comes down to it.  We don't know when this will happen, if it will, or even when/how we'll take care of our kids when it does... heh, so as you can see, all well planned out :)  It's about stepping out, not planning out though... learned that well last time.