SDA Referral

The important stuff first: Our appt at the SDA went extremely well. We received several referrals for sibling groups (all of them for 3-5 children), but only one of these really met all of our criteria: a sibling group of 3, 2 boys and 1 girl. Their ages are 7, 8, and 10. They are in an orphanage only about 1 hour’s drive from here, so we will not have to ride the train or plane to get there. Sasha will find us an apartment to live in closer to the orphanage. We will receive our official referral to visit the children late tomorrow afternoon and will be able to meet them for the first time on Thursday. It was exciting to watch Kevin and Katie through this whole process, and they are as excited as us!!

Since yesterday’s blog was so short, I need to write a little about our trip here: All 3 flights were very smooth with no delays, and overall went much better than expected. I can tell that I am 2 years older than I was on our last trip here because I was exhausted!! However, after a night’s rest, we were ready to go. One thing I learned is that if someone at the airline gate says, “Everyone, please remain seated,” it really means, “Everyone, jump up as fast as you can and stampede to the gate- the last one there is a rotten egg.” Speaking of rotten eggs, the smell of many Europeans on the same plane has not changed. Even Kevin remarked that the smell of BO (body odor) just about made him sick. I had to laugh because not even 2 years ago, he told us that he had no use for deodorant.

Once we arrived in Kiev, the sights are the same. It is still one of the most beautiful cities that you can imagine, and I love being here. Our temporary apartment is just next door to where we stayed last time, so we know the area. A McDonald’s is right down the street and we needed a quick breakfast, so McDonald’s it was. I was happy to find out that they now serve breakfast food at this time of day; the last time you could only order hamburgers and fries for b’fast.
The weather was beautiful when we arrived; sunny, low humidity and about 70 degrees. Today, more of what we remember: cloudy, rainy, and a little cooler.

Last night, we ate at the Fat House, typical Ukrainian food that is very good. Kevin announced that he needed to go to the restroom. After a few minutes, he cam out and said that he would wait to go until we got back to the apartment. He said, “it has some kind of special kind of thing in there.” What he meant is the restroom was lacking a toilet. It was the kind of restroom that is still fairly common here: you step up to a tiled area with a hole in the floor. It’s very hard to hover over this hole for very long unless you have really strong legs!!!!

Katie says a big hi to Marie and to Ms. Laura at church and also Ms Laura, please give our blog to Mr. Justin and Ms. Melinda.

Thanks to all of you for your thoughts and prayers. It was so good to see your comments today. This morning our devotion was: 1 Peter 5:7: “Cast all your anxiety on Him because He cares for you.”
How fitting and what a great way to start off an exciting but stressful day! We love you all and will write again tomorrow.

Finally Here

After a full day of traveling we are in our apartment for the night. It ia 9:30 pm and we are exausted. Our appointmnet with the SDA is tomorrow morning at 11:00 am so we should know alot more by the time you guys back home wake up.

Gettin' ready

We are now in that wild phase of...
Do we have it??
Can we get it??
Is it written on the list??
Does it need to be on the list??
Where are we going to pack all this stuff???

I think I will get more sleep on the plane than I have had all week. There's so much to think about and the excitement is growing within all of us. The kids are having a hard time concentrating on school this week, so I am trying to cut down as much as I can.
The last time we went to Ukraine, we took way too much stuff!!!
We are all going to take only a few outfits and necessary items. At least it should not be as cold this trip, so we should not need all of the heavy winter items.
We look forward to writing just before we leave on Sunday!!
Kim

Appointment Date

Well, here we go again. At the first of the year, we felt God calling us to adopt again (another sibling group), so in March we began the process: New homestudy, new fingerprints, new I-171 (or whatever it is now called), new apostilles, etc. We sent our dossier to our facilitator in Ukraine in August. Our dossier was submitted to the SDA in Kiev Sept 1st and we have now received our appt date: Sept 29. I guess it is official since we now have flight arrangements. We understand that Delta will be cancelling its direct flight from JFK to Kiev, so the arrangements were a little more difficult to arrange on the return flight. We will be flying on Northwest Airlines from B'ham to Memphis to Amsterdam to Kiev and will arrive on 9/28.

Please be in prayer for us as we will be taking our 2 youngest children with us (now age 12 and 13). They were adopted 20 months ago from Ukraine and have adjusted remarkably well, but you just never know how this change/travel/new siblings will affect them. My biggest worry is that we will not know which kids are ours when we receive their referral since this will be a blind adoption and we don't have any kids "picked" out at this time. I should not be concerned as I know that God had these kids picked out long ago and is not surprised by anything.

We would love to have you all follow along the way and pray with us through this process. We are so excited about what God has in store for us and this journey as He works in and through our lives.

We ask for specific prayers for the following: travel and safety to Kiev on 7/27 to arrive on 7/28, SDA appt date on 9/29, quick referral for our kids, adjustment for our current kids as well as new ones, focus and concentration for our kids as we continue to homeschool them while we are gone.