Goodbyes and Thank Yous

Today is a hard day because Daddy is heading back to the capital tonight on the overnight train so he can catch an early flight home on Saturday.  We will sure miss him :(.  This morning was the perfect time to open up my email and see a message that our AdoptTogether fund had received another donation from our Ravenna First Church of God family!!!  Over $500!!!! Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!

We also have some other good news to share - We have court for Big Sister D on May 7 - woo hoo!! We should find out today if we will be allowed to combine court for both girls, or if we will have to have a separate court.  A separate court (3 1/2 hours away) will mean several more long trips to Little D's village, more money, more paperwork, and it could add a couple weeks to our trip :(. Please pray that the judge will allow us to have one court date. 

After the court date, there is a ten day waiting period before I am allowed to pick up the girls.  After that, we will travel back to the capital (overnight train) to start Embassy paperwork and medicals. If all goes well, we may be home at the end of May :)

Here are some pics from the last few days. Thank you again for all of your support and encouragement!

Our wonderful facilitator - she is amazing and is such an awesome advocate for the kids here:

Getting a manicure from my daughter and her friend:

Daddy's first bracelet!

Some photos from our daily life, and yes, I had to buy some cat food :)

A restaurant at a nearby hotel:

Busy Week, Big Decisions

We had a very busy week!!

The Easter Bunny came to our apartment on Sunday (Easter was celebrated here on April 12)! Then we went to a small street carnival.

We traveled by overnight train (first class on the way there, complete with a velvet headrest!) to the capitol city for our second referral appointment, and spent one day enjoying the city while we waited.  Our apartment was rather fancy - the one with the special doll.

Then we traveled back to our region by overnight train (second class this time; first class was all booked up. I sure did miss that velvet headrest 😟).

As soon as we got off the train, we ventured by car for 3 1/2 hours to meet with the officials for our Little One.  Then we got a chance to meet each other for a short time.  Grant and I traveled back to our apartment and took a day to really think about becoming parents of three - a huge decision for us.

On Wednesday we were able to visit with D - we had really missed her!!

On Thursday, we decided to take the Big Leap and then traveled back to start the paperwork process for Little D!! Wow, what a difference we saw in her when we returned for a second visit! This time she had been told that we were her Mama and Papa.  When we saw her in the hallway with her caregiver, she started skipping down the hall and kept looking back over her shoulder (she had to go change her clothes first) saying "Mama! Mama!" I think that long list of diagnoses that we had been carrying on our hearts flew out the door in that second :)

We didn't get a chance to take many photos for two reasons.  For most of the visit, we had the camera taking video of Little D chattering away and doing a puppet show for us.  Then we had to cut our visit short and run back to the notary office to try and get our last paper of the day signed - but no luck :(. Thankfully, one of the notary office workers will be traveling close to us on Tuesday and will bring our signed paper.  Until then, we cannot apply for a court date. Thankfully, we can continue to visit big sister D while we wait.

Thank Goodness for Moms

While Grant and I are 1/2 way across this country for an appointment, these are the texts I received from my Mom, who is taking care of Gerry: 

Monday: made pudding. Watched minions. Chased flies. Played Hulk. Played transformers. Chased flies. Nose rinse.spray. Slept 11 hrs. Dry. Oh, chased flies! Going to playground soon. Feeding pigeons, chasing pigeons, playing on both playgrounds.

Thank you, Mom! What would we do without you?!!!!!!!!

The Weekend

We were able to visit D on Saturday, but Sunday was Easter here and the orphanage had an outing planned for the kids.  D did not want to go at first since she was afraid she would miss out on a visit with us but it was not her choice. We heard that she did have fun with her friends and I'm so glad that she was able to spend time with them. How hard it must be for her knowing that soon she will leave them behind. There is one close friend who is very sweet who always comes to the visits with her (and she has a little brother) - our home study only approves us to adopt two children, not three. :(

Gerry always has an entourage of kids surrounding him - makes no difference that he doesn't speak their language.  Whether we are at the orphanage or the playground by our apartment, he is making friends :)

We had interesting visitors in the region this week.  Since the weather has turned much warmer recently, lots of insects have been waking up.  We have had the biggest stinking flies I've ever seen hanging out in our bathroom. Seriously, it is like the movie "The Birds" when we shower or go to the bathroom - complete with arm waving, ducking and screaming! And those suckers make big shadows!  

I think we are finally starting to respect each other's space, or maybe we've just given up on trying to kill the new ones each day. It could be a long couple of months!

Time for a rest after our overnight journey on the train back to the Capitol. It was like a sauna at first, so we stripped down to our skivvies but then woke up freezing! No photos for this leg of our journey, thank you ;). 

Here we are at breakfast after our train ride.

Here are also a couple of random photos of our favorite drinks here and Grant doing laundry.  Please think of us the next time you turn on the faucet and use the water to drink, cook, brush your teeth, bathe your child without earplugs . . . . Or turn on your coffee pot :) But really, we have everything here that we need and are so grateful for the support we have here and back home!

Day 3 - Playground and Our Apartment

Little Brother an Grandma - 2nd Day with Our Girl

Gerry and Grandma got to meet D.  Gerry was soooo excited when we were waiting :)

She Said Yes!!

Was so beat last night I just couldn't post - had to sleep!!!! We have been averaging about 2 hours of sleep per night (last night was the first night that Gerry didn't wake up at 2 am raring to go). Then after about an hour of sleep Tuesday night, we took the 7 hour death race to our girls' region (think wooden roller coaster ride with giant potholes and dodging semis).  There were only a couple minor mishaps on the way, both involving Gerry and a squatter potty - pee on my shoe and a Rescue Bot that almost fell in the hole!

We arrived around noon and dropped Mom and Gerry at our new apartment , went to the social worker's office, signed papers, and went over to the orphanage (it's referred to as a boarding school here).  It was lunch time, so we waited and waited for the director to come to the room (Grant and I thought we were waiting for the director). About 45 minutes later, "D" came rushing in!!! Hugs all around!! She is sooooo excited to have a family and is just the sweetest girl :). She was excited to look at the photo book we brought that has photos of our family, the cats (a big hit), our home (with her new room), and activities around us.  D had big smiles and kept showing the social worker and our facilitator the photo of Gerry with his "I love my big sister" shirt. She also seems very happy to have grandparents and kept going back to those photos. She does not seem shy at all, and really likes affection, wanting to sit close and hold hands. She is just absolutely awesome!!!

After a little while she asked if it was ok if we met her brother.  He is 18 and still attending school (we are not quite sure why he is allowed to stay there since 16 is the age at which kids "graduate" at this orphanage). She showed him the photo book, and it was so hard for us to watch as he got tears in his eyes and told the social worker that he wanted to be adopted, too. The US will not allow children to be adopted after they turn 16 :(  

It is difficult to communicate because of the language barrier, but we played games of tic tac toe and took turns taking photos. We will have to think of some activities to take some with us today - we can visit for about 2 hours in the afternoon.

The director came in for about 30 seconds at the end of the visit, and we did not get a chance to ask any questions or get information, but he signed the paper we needed - thank goodness!

We cannot get our next referral appointment for our little one until next week because of the holidays, but that will give us a chance to visit more with D this week. Plus, it will have be nice to have a break from traveling since Little One's orphanage is 3-4 hours from here, in a village in the middle of a field. This will be quite the adventure!

Our new apartment is nice and has good internet - woo hoo!  The microwave smokes but our facilitator is awesome and will take care of this I'm sure.  She and her husband drove us around yesterday to our appointments, and took care of everything we needed to get done. She even took us to the grocery store and helped us find what we needed. Beware to those of you traveling, make sure to tell your spouse how many bags you paid for if he is bagging at the other end of the conveyer belt - poor Grant got stopped by security because we only paid for 3 and he had used 4 bags!

Ok, time to go try to figure out the washing machine before we head out - mom and I have found that you just start pushing buttons and hope for the best. And if it doesn't seem to be working, push lots more buttons! This new washer has a metal locking basket - wish us luck - I have heard stories of clothes getting trapped!