It’s Ok to Ask - Really

I have noticed lately that as I run into various people that they are naturally curious about the adoption process and how we chose to go down this path. The ‘brave’ ones that ask the questions that are on their minds usually preface it with something along these lines… “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want.” Or “This may be too personal, but…” I just want to let anyone know that reads this that Justin and I are both very happy to answer any questions that you may have. We are not offended by them - as long as you are polite of course :o) and enjoy telling our family’s story. There are some details we have not posted on this blog. I try to be an open book to help others and to document our journey, but I have deliberately left off a couple of key things. Why international adoption? Why Russia? Why not have another child ‘naturally’? These are all questions we are very comfortable answering, but they are not questions I am comfortable blogging about. We never want it to appear that we feel that our decisions would be right for everyone. We have made our decisions based on what we feel is best for our family. This is not to say our way is better AT ALL. It is just better for us. So in order to do our best not to offend, confuse, or hurt anyone we have opted to not write about those things online. If you see either of us and you have questions feel free to fire away. You may regret that you did so though because we may talk your ear off and tell you wayyyy more than you wanted to know! If you aren’t in the area and you would like to chat, just send me an email and we can communicate that way or we can exchange phone numbers, Skype accounts or IM accounts (gotta love technology!).

Heather's email address: jnhoverstreet@yahoo.com
Justin’s email address: justinoverstreet75@yahoo.com

Christmas Marathon

We have 4 Christmas gatherings down and 2 more to go. We have had a great time with our families so far and Brady and Madison love staying up late. One highlight for me was being at my mom and dad’s house. They have a wall of pictures with the grandchildren on it. They had printed the picture we emailed out of Blake, framed it, and added it to the wall. It is great to see. In a way it is kind of ‘weird’. Our feelings and love for Blake are so real and yet the situation doesn’t seem real at all. No one but Justin and I have even laid on this lil guy. Hopefully, sooner than later, that will all change and everyone else can see what a sweet boy he is!

Here are a few Christmas photos to share.

Brady and Madison on Christmas Eve.


Our little poser!


Brady with his Harry Potter nesting dolls from Blake.


Madison with her 101 Dalmation nesting dolls from Blake.


Juatin with his 1985 Chicago Bear Superbowl Champions nesting dolls from Blake. (He was such a good sport playing along with my picture taking!)

Merry Christmas!

We want to wish each and every one of you a very Merry Christmas. No matter what trials and tribulations we are facing there is always reason to celebrate Jesus’ birthday. We thought we would share with you our new family tradition for Christmas morning. We got the idea from our dear friends Chris and Rachel Smith. On Christmas morning Brady and Madison will open their stocking gifts while Justin and I are attempting to get our eyes open. After that we will sit together and read the Christmas Story. We then will share with Brady and Madison the meaning of communion. We will drink grape juice and eat crackers to remind us of the Lord’s Supper. We will share the things we are thankful for, what we are looking forward to in the upcoming year - a time for reflection. This really helps keep the day in prospective.

We are saying a special prayer today for our friends – The Pitman Family and the Martin’s (the Cajuns). Both families are due to arrive home today – Christmas Eve. We sure hope that they have no travel delays are able to spend their first Christmas as a family in their own homes.
Safe travels to all.
Love,
Justin, Heather, Brady, Madison & Blake

Attitude Adjustment Needed

Justin and I have come to the realization that if we are going to survive this wait we are going to have to have an attitude adjustment. We have found ourselves over the past week becoming bitter toward the adoption process. We remind ourselves constantly that our journey has been so much shorter than many of the other waiting families, and we thank God for that daily. But now there is a face to this process. There is a little guy who has stolen our hearts. Before meeting him, we looked at the paperwork as a test of our endurance. We felt we were being challenged to see if we were up to the trials and tribulations that we would soon face. Now we don’t want to play the game. We don’t want our endurance tested. We want our family to be together. When dealing with state, federal, and international governments families deal with a tremendous amount of red tape. At this point, it is red tape that has no bearing on your ability to parent a child. All of those issues should have been hammered out in the homestudy and prior to getting a referral. Now the paperwork seems pointless and meaningless other than the fact that that is what it takes to get Blake home.

So when Justin and I began our conversation about what we needed to do to change our attitude, we realized we can not be negative and cynical for the next couple, few, several, whatever months while we are waiting. It is not fair to Brady and Madison or to those around us. So where are these strong feelings coming from? Well, we both agreed that something has happened that neither one of us fully expected. We read in several books and heard from many people that you will not necessarily fall in love with your child right away. It can often times take awhile for love to enter your heart. Justin and I fully expected that to be the case. We expected to care for the lil guy. We expected to feel protective of him. We even expected to feel an attachment to some degree. But we are both in total awe of the love that has filled our hearts. We love Blake so much. It is truly like he is the missing member of our family. As if God was just waiting for Justin and I to realize that we had work to do and He helped Blake wait for us to prepare our hearts. We are so grateful to feel such a connection. We know that we are very fortunate and that not everyone can understand. To be honest, we don’t fully understand. But we do know that the pain and heartache we feel now will be short-lived in comparison to the years of joy we are going to have with Blake as part of our family.

So we will get through the next several months and we will pass the numerous tests that are put before us. It is our prayer that we do so by letting God’s love for us shine brightly even through the dark times. We hope that this entry finds everyone staying warm. It is about -3 degrees here with a wind chill factor of about -30. Time for some hot cocoa.

Getting Our Bearings

So the common question is what now? Now we wait. We have a slew of paperwork that we must complete. I actually don’t know why we have to complete some of this now. It seems that these are things that should have been done prior to meeting any children, but we’ll play the paperwork game if that is what it takes. We have to have an FBI background check as well as one from the state. Those take about 3-4 weeks to get back to us. We have to have ANOTHER medical evaluation and blood tests. Those are only valid for 3 months so if you do them too early you have to get them updated, but you want to have them done so that they are not waiting on your paperwork. Quite an interesting procedure really. In addition we have to have a psychological evaluation done. Funny that people don’t have to do any of this to bear children huh? We are fortunate that there is a man in town that will get us in in January. We found that many of the doctors are scheduling into March and April for new patients. We don’t have that long to wait so we were relieved to find another person in Macomb that is qualified to do the paperwork. Anyway, many of the documents are a repeat of the things we did for our homestudy. The biggest hurdle is that we are waiting on a couple of documents to arrive from the Vlad region for us to sign, notarize and return. Our agency is closed for business from December 22-January 3. And then the Russian New Year holiday is celebrated January 1-5 and then the Russian Orthodox Christmas is on January 7th. So they will return to work on about January 12th. Now that we have met the little guy and have connected with him, waiting is so much harder. Justin is anxious to travel and return before planting season. Brady and Madison are beside themselves with anticipation. They are so sweet and love to look at the pictures we brought back. We explained to them that when we go for trip number two that we will be gone about 3 times as long as we were on this last trip. The families we met were averaging about 25 days away from home. Brady says, “Ohhh that’s ok Mom. It will all be worth it. You will get to bring Blake home.” Kids are so understanding. Also they both want to make sure that everyone knows they are getting a little brother. We wrapped a couple of Christmas presents (I am soooo far behind), and I told Brady to write on the tag that the gift was from he and Madison. He said that he was going to put from Blake, Brady, and Madison and that Blake’s name would be first so that everyone could see it. So Justin and I have been trying to prepare them. Not squash their enthusiasm, but prepare them that a little brother will get in their things; and will need a lot of help; and will take quite a bit of attention; etc… They just say yeah yeah mom we know – we know.

In order to survive the holiday craziness, keep our sanity, and be cheery for the Christmas season, Justin and I are trying to remove ‘extra’ items from the plate so that we can avoid feeling so overwhelmed. That means no Christmas treat baking this year. Also I am not going to attend WIU graduation this Saturday so that we can finish our shopping and getting our house back in order. I have also decided not to do Christmas cards this year. I am thinking maybe we’ll do like an Easter or Fourth of July cards instead :o) We try to catch ourselves when we start to complain. We have so much to be grateful for and the things we complain about are just small details in life. We just hope that things continue to go as smoothly as possible and that we can bring Blake home sooner than later.

Still adjusting

We did make it home safe and sound on Saturday. We are having a very difficult time adjusting back to our time zone. I will try to update everyone as soon as possible on how things are going. We do not have any idea when we will return to get the lil guy. It can take anywhere from 2 to 6 months. We have another round of paperwork to complete and also documents that have to be completed by various parties in Russia. I hope to write more soon.

Brady and Madison made us a sign with a little help from NaNa to welcome us home. It was great to see them!

Mixed emotions

It has been an exhausting day. I am sitting on the floor of the Seoul airport completely worn out. I am so excited to return home and be with Brady and Madison. We long to be surrounded by our own culture – people who speak the same as we do, the holiday cheer, etc… But still our heart aches for the little guy today. It was yet another amazing visit. I believe I mentioned yesterday that we were all sick of the visiting room. God must have known we were at our wits end. When we got to the baby home today we found out that the room was having a window repaired and we would have to go to the ‘gymnasium’ to play. Yahooooo. We were super excited to see the other parts of the baby home and have a different backdrop for all of our snapshots. While we were up stairs, another group of children came up to play. It was good for us to see the other children and how our lil guy interacted with them. First he gently backed them all away from us. He was not interested in sharing us with them. He then stacked all of the items we were playing with right between Justin and I. Once he was sure the things were safe from the other kids he went over and played with them. He was very gentle and gave one boy a hug.

Lana, our interpreter, came back in a bit earlier as we had requested. She helped us explain that we would be coming back for him soon. She took time to go through the photo album with him again and spoke to him about Brady and Madison. Lana explained that we were going home to get his room ready for him and to prepare Brady and Madison for his arrival and that we would be back soon. We were able to leave the album, a little blanket and pillow that my mom had made for him, and a disposable camera for the caregivers to take pictures for us. There is no guarantee that we will get these items back but we hope so. He gave us big hugs as we left. I turned my back so that he did not see the tears running down my face. I already miss him so much.

Back at the hotel we said our goodbyes to the Pittman family. They will always have a special place in our heart. They were our go-to guys for many of our questions. Their children are so great and are lucky to have Becky and Eric as parents. Justin and I adore Max. We think we were so drawn to him because we loved to listen to him speak Russian and because he is only 5 we could actually understand a few words :o) We had lots of good laughs. First time parents are a good source of entertainment! We also said goodbye to the Cajuns – Carol and Carl and their son. We look forward to staying in touch with them and watching their son grow over the next several years. It was a special experience to have spent time with parents of a child from our guy’s same group.

So the wait begins again. We will be back to the frustrating paper race and having our patience tested. We will pray for our little guy night and day and think about him constantly. Hug your family members today and remember how special the people God has placed in your life really are!

Vlad Day 6 – Visit number 4

Yesterday was another great visit. I think we are all getting tired of the visiting room though. It is causing us to get very creative in coming up with new games to play. One of the caregivers walked through just after the lil guy had done something really neat and Justin and I were saying high piat (piat is 5 in Russian). He loves to give us high piats and low piats. The caregiver must have thought this was cute or we were completely nuts because she got a huge smile as she left the room. So today was his day for manipulating me a bit :o) He loves to drink water from a water bottle we have kept in our bag. From what we gather from other families, the children in the baby homes and orphanages do not get a lot to drink. They pretty much drink with their meals and that is it. This of course is to keep bathroom trips and wetting to a minimum. So we try not to let him have very much of the water. Well he picks up the bottle and looks at me for more. I say Nyet (no) and shake my head. He says Spaseeba MaMa (thank you MaMa) and tilts his head and gives me a grin with a twinkle in his eye. How can I resist that!?! He knows how to play us.

After leaving, Lana asked us if we had made our final decision to adopt him. We of course said absolutely and that we would just go ahead and bring him home now. She giggled and said that that is what everyone says. I have no doubt! We then had to go back downtown to the city of Vlad to go to the notary. This was to make it official that we will adopt him and to sign a very important paper that will take him off the registry so that he will not be adopted by another family. Lana took us to a few shopping places downtown and then we treated her and the driver to Baskin Robbins. She said, “The we-there not so good for ice cream.” Justin explained that the weather is ALWAYS good for ice cream. She couldn’t argue with that.

I guess we will not be able to share his Russian or English names on the blog until everything is final in court after trip two. Sorry about that!

Today is our last day here. We will leave in a bit to visit the little guy. We will work with Lana to try to explain what is happening the best we can to a three year old. I am praying to God this morning that he give me the strength to keep my emotions in tack until after we leave the baby home, and also that he gives the lil guy peace in knowing that we will return soon. He knows no life other than the baby home. He has never spent one minute outside of institutional living. For the next couple/few months, we pray that he falls back into his routine and he is content. Of course selfishly we would like to think that he will miss us, but for his sake we hope that he does not.

We leave Vlad today to fly to Seoul then to LA then to Chicago. We will get on the morning train in Chicago and arrive home in Macomb at 10:30ish a.m. on Saturday – assuming we have no traveling drama. It will be a hard day for us, but we know that we are coming back to two amazing children, tremendous family and friends and that helps a great deal.

Another good day

Yesterday was another great visit with our lil guy. He was excited to see us and was quick to begin playing with us. I think he knows all of the right things to do to find a place in Justin’s heart. Today he took the little tape measure we brought to measure him with and went around the room measuring everything. Justin thinks he holds the tape measurer as well as Grandpa Critter does – lol. He then found two toys to be his hammer and screwdriver and he went around ‘fixing’ things. You could tell Justin was quite proud of his skills. Lana and Irena (our interpreter and coordinator) tell us that Justin has golden hands. When you can build and fix things and do many different types of tasks you have golden hands.

During the visit we were more rambunctious in our style of play. We played a hide-n-seek type game and he got to ride on Justin’s shoulders. He began to laughing so hard – a true belly laugh. I hope that I got some of it on video. We haven’t had time to check it out yet. Today we go for our fourth visit and will have to tell them whether or not we accept the referral. We have found tremendous peace in our decision that this little guy is exactly who God had intended to be a part of our family. We think that Brady and Madison will adore him and that he will love them even more in return. So just as we have begun to get attached and allowing our hearts to soften it is almost time to go. I knew this was going to be the hard part. I have been told that it would be, but until you experience it yourself you have no idea how hard it is. I will say though that his baby home is very clean and the ladies that work there truly care for the children. I have no doubt in my mind that he will be cared for while he waits for our return.

Visit Number 2

It was an exciting day around the hotel yesterday. Becky and Eric were able to have the two youngest children come and join them for the remaining of their visit. So they went from a family with no children to a family with three children in a short period of time. They sure have their hands full, but you can tell they are going to make great parents. The kids look so healthy and excited to be back together. It was also a very exciting day for Carol and Carl. Their little boy Garret got to come stay with them as well. Garret is in the same baby home and the SAME group as our lil guy. They got amazing pictures for us that we will be forever grateful for. We have a great group shot of the kids and of their sleeping area etc… Not everyone gets to see these areas and take pictures so to have them is priceless in our opinion. They were also able to report back what they observed our lil guy doing in his group setting. Which fortunately is how he behaves with Justin and I. He is very smiley and loves the camera! It is also great to see size comparison. Garret is four years old and Carl and Carol bought him an adorable little preppy outfit to bring him home (the hotel) in. It is a size 2T and it is a little big on him!!! We all agree that if you give us a couple of months in the States we will fatten them up real quick :o)

Today we got to go to his group’s room to pick him up to go to the visiting room. His face lit up when he saw me (Justin was in the bathroom!) and took my hand so that he could lead me to the visiting room. He started by giving me a hug and then he went to Justin and threw his arms around him. Now that was a site. This lil guy is seriously little, and he was determined to give Justin a hug he could feel! He picked up right where he left off yesterday. Got all of the toys out and dug in the bag for the Fruit Loops. He then went to my purse. I said Nyet (No) and he gave me a look of persistence and of course his heart melting smile. So I went over to supervise the purse rummaging. Interestingly he was very careful and didn’t pull anything out at first. Then he found what he was looking for. He pulled out the photo album we had brought with our pictures. He immediately took it out and went through it page by page again. He loves to look at pictures of Brady and Madison!

We had some animal puzzles and such that we wanted to work with him on so that we could get a better feel for his cognitive ability. It is hard though when you cannot explain to him what you want him to do. Our interpreter Lana stepped right in and helped us play with him for a bit so we could do these activities. He was able to match the animals in the puzzle, put the pieces back together, match colors on a gear toy we brought, etc… We have no doubt that he will be able to pick up on things quickly. Lana then left to ask a few questions for us. At this point we were feeling good about things other than the fact that he could not tend to a task for more than a minute it seemed – other than the photo album. We wondered if it was the overstimulation of the room, us being new, etc… But the educator in me just had to know. Can this lil guy sit still long enough to really tend to a learning task? So out comes the book. I put him on my lap and we began to look at the pictures of the animals. I made animals sounds. I assume cows still say Moo in Russian and cats say Meow! I was expecting him to want to get down immediately. Well guess what – he sat through the entire book. Lifted every flap and was so attentive. Yeah!!!!

Ok – sorry these entries get to be so long. I just want to remember all of this stuff. One more cute story. On the wall there are posters of their holiday routine and their daily routine. And they have used pictures of the children in the baby home for the poster. I didn’t think he was in any of the photographs so we used the Russian word for friends and he pointed to children in the photos. We asked Lana to ask him where he was in the pictures. Where was his photo? He got a big smile on his face. Pranced over and grabbed our digital camera off the couch and said that that was where his picture was. Tooo cute.

So I think it is becoming apparent that he has stolen our hearts. I cried in the hotel room when we returned. I am so thankful that God has held our hands through this journey. Believe me, you second guess every decision you make. For us, every doubt that we have and begin to worry about – God allows for something/someone to intervene and remove that doubt. We are emotionally exhausted. We miss home a lot. We are desperate to hug Brady and Madison. We are so thankful that this lil guy is so open to us. I am heartbroken that we will have to say goodbye on Friday and not be able to bring him home. It really is a humbling, exhausting, emotional, and amazing experience.

Love to all!
Justin and Heather

Tuesday’s Entry (part 2) – Monday in Vlad

What an emotional day! First Justin and I began our day in prayer and in our prayers we often ask God to please open doors for us that should be open and close those that should be closed. Please make it apparent to us, Lord, what you have in store for us. I feel that by asking for that guidance, certain things just fall into place without Justin and I having a chance to mess it up.

Lana - our interpreter, Irena – our agency rep, and Alec – our driver were supposed to pick us up at 10:30 a.m. to go to our MOE (minister of education) appointment. This is where we would officially be approved to see a child and be invited to visit an orphanage. Now, I didn’t post this earlier because I didn’t want our parents to freak out, but when we were picked up from the airport Lana told us that our documents had not arrived from Moscow yet. “Don’t worry He-There – Now is not the time to worry,” she said. Sure, sure I won’t worry a bit! Yeah right!!! So Justin and I were both sick to our stomachs that on Monday we would not be able to go see the lil guy. At 10:00 a.m. the phone in our room rings. Lana says to us the papers had night arrived yet, but they are supposed to be at the courier’s office by 11:30 so they are going to pick us up at 11 instead of 10:30. Again… “Don’t worry He-There – Now is not the time to worry,” she said. Ummmm I am thinking now is a great time to start to worry.

So at about 11:15 they arrived to pick us up. The city driving here is like no other. Different than Chicago for sure! It is best to just not pay attention. We stopped by the courier’s office and Irena came out with a huge smile on her face and said congratulations! Our papers arrived! We went to the MOE and answered some questions. We were told Tatiana was in a good mood today and we were lucky for that. When she saw the pictures in our homestudy of Brady and Madison she smiled and said beautiful children! Awww sucks – we sure think so :o) She showed us the picture of our lil guy and invited us to go visit him. So we were back in the van and off. Ohhhh – one more thing for future first time travelers to Vlad… ladies be sure to take Kleenex with you at all times. In the public restrooms, there are to toilet seats and no toilet paper. I get the no toilet seat thing. They say that you should not sit on public toilet seats anyway so why have them. The no toilet paper thing… I don’t get. Someone suggested that perhaps it just gets stolen. Not for sure – but always be prepared.

Because our day started so late with waiting for the papers to arrive, we could not go to the baby home right away because it was nap time. So we went back (we did exchange our money – that is a story for another entry!) to the hotel and ate lunch with Lana, Irena, Alec, and the Pittman family. I was surprised I could even eat. I was still nervous about our first visit. The drive to the baby home is about 45 minutes from the hotel. When we arrived, we had to put little blue things, like surgical hats, over our shoes so that we didn’t dirty the floor. We got the impression from the beginning that cleanliness is very valued there. We were taken upstairs to a room with a couch, two chairs, and some toys and waited for him to come in. When he came into the room he was so incredibly cute. He smiled from ear to ear and came right over to Justin and I and began to check us out. He was intrigued by all of the toys in the room and was anxious to start playing. I will say though, first timers reading this… be prepared for your child to look awkward in the clothing. The home put him in a visiting outfit which was blue cotton tights with shorts over the top, a long sleeved shirt tucked in, and brown shoes that are too small and look like something we would put on a little girl. It catches you off guard at first. But I have to say, his smile and eagerness to play with us helped get over the awkward look.

He is a little guy. Average for the baby home, but much smaller than a ‘typical’ three year old in the States. He has shown growth over the measurements we were given and that is a relief. He was able to sort objects, jump, blow bubbles, play with the cars, put objects together, etc… All of the ‘tests’ we had planned to put him through he just showed us on his own by playing with the toys. We brought Fruit Loops in a little package. They were a huge hit! Here was particular moment that stole my heart… We had put together an album of pictures of Brady, Madison, Justin, and I to share with him. We did not plan on getting it out the first day. He found it in the bag and pulled it out. He immediately took it over to a clear spot on the floor and started to look at it. He face lit up. His back was to Justin and when he got to a picture of Justin and I he got very excited, pointed to the picture and then turned to point to Justin and said PaPa. Wowza! I think it caught Justin off guard a bit.

Well our entries are too long now so I will stop for the day. We will go back and visit each day. We will need to have made our decision of whether or not to accept the referral by Thursday. We cannot share any pictures on here until after we return for our court date. We will share his name though in our entry after Thursday’s decision. We hope all is well back at home. We appreciate comments on the blog and emails. It is great to know that we are still in touch somewhat with things back in the States. We miss Brady and Madison a lot! We love you guys.

Dasvidanyia (Goodbye!)

Tuesday’s Entry (part 1) – Sunday in Vlad

We have met another great couple – Carl and Carol. They are from Louisiana and they will be getting their son to stay here in the hotel with them today. Ironically their son is in the same baby home as ours so it great to compare and gather information. They had planned on going down to the city on Sunday and invited us to come with them. We knew it was our only chance to go so we were excited to accept the invitation. Unfortunately we had not exchanged any of our money to rubles yet and it is illegal for anyone here to accept U.S. dollars for payment. Carl and Carol graciously offered to lend us some rubles so that we could make the trip with them.

First thing I have noticed is that the Russian women that are out and about and working in public places are all very beautiful. They have a natural beauty to them and they dress very stylish, wear fur coats often times, and amazing boots. The ice and snow here is thick and the women still wear stiletto heeled boots. Our translator, Lana, gave us her theory as to why they always dress like that. She said that because of the many wars that the Russians have fought there are far fewer men than women. Women are in competition for men’s attention here. (Justin thinks that is pretty cool –lol)

Here are a few pictures from our excursion.

Justin and I outside a casino we passed. Of course we didn’t go in but we thought some folks back home might get a kick out of it!


This is where we got on and off the train in the city of Vladivostok.


Part of the city of Vlad


So if you know Justin well, you know that he is a huge fan of ice cream. He was quite pleased to see a Baskin Robbins nestled in with all of the Russian shops!

We have arrived safe and sound

It is about 3:30 in the morning here on Sunday and 11:30 back home on Saturday. My internal clock is obviously messed up, but I am anticipating having plenty of time to nap. We are in a safe area and feel very comfortable (don’t worry mom and dad and all our wanna-be moms and dads); however for the simple fact that we are foreigners in another country we will not be able to go out at night and our agency rep and interpreter would prefer us not to go too far away from the hotel during the day. We are so fortunate that there are several adoptive families here right now - all of which are on trip number two. Some have their children with them as they are waiting out the required 10 day period for all decisions to be final. They are so incredibly helpful and informative. There is a room upstairs at the hotel called the White Rabbit room. This is where many of the families go around 5 or 6 to hang out with other English speaking families and debrief about the day’s visit to the baby home or to take a break from the four walls of the hotel room. This is a gold mine for us. There is better advice to be given than from those that have just completed the process that you are about to begin. Even though we have read book, blogs, internet sites, etc… nothing is better than a heart-to-heart with the experts.

Speaking of experts, another family from our agency is here right now as well. They are the Pittman family (their blog is linked on the left). They have adopted 3 siblings. Becky and Eric have taken us under their wing. In fact I think we are going to have to ask CHI to transfer part of our travel fee over to them! :o)

Today or tomorrow (however you look at it - Sunday) we are hoping to get train tickets to go downtown to look around. We have been told by the other families that this is completely safe to do. The hotel clerks will write us a note in Russian with our information so that if we get lost or anything we can show it and they will help us return to the hotel. Today will be our only chance to do this since our visits start on Monday and we will return too late to get downtown and back before dark. Hopefully it all works out and I will have some pictures to show you of Vlad.

Tomorrow, Monday, we will be picked up around 10:30 a.m. to go to the Department of Education to get our official invitation to meet ‘a’ child. We will then go to Artem (Artyem) to gather as much information as possible, and then finally meet this lil guy. We are beside ourselves with anticipation, anxiety, and excitement.

I promised Brady and Maddie that I would try to put pictures up everyday so they can see different things that have happened. I haven’t had much of a chance to take many pictures, but here are a few.

This is the four of us at the train station in Macomb on Thursday morning.


This is the Vlad Inn




And for a little humor… I am the gadget queen (no comments Tim or Corey!) and so here is a look at the mess I created when my darn blow dryer blew a fuse in the converter thingy we were using! For those future travelers – just get a European style hairdryer and forget the converter all together! Luckily we can us the adapters without the power converter for our other electronic devices so I did not have an anxiety attack!

Seoul, Korea

We have arrived in Korea safe and sound. It is almost 9:00 am on the 6th here and it is about 6:00 pm on the 5th back home. Thanks for all the emails and blog comments. We appreciate the support and being able to stay in touch with what is happening back home. We will start boarding our flight for Vlad in about 30 minutes. We are excited to get there, but getting really nervous as well. I think Justin and I have asked every parent between Chicago and Seoul how old their little one was that was traveling with them. We forget what 'three' looks like and find ourselves letting our minds wonder wildly about how our first visit to the baby home will go. We hope to have easy internet access at the Vlad Inn so we can chat with Brady and Maddie and update everyone. I have tried to upload a picture but the free internet access here won't let me :o) Until next time...

Justin and Heather

We are packed - I think

Exhausted but unable to sleep I thought I would get another post in before heading out tomorrow morning. It was crazy how a nesting feeling just overwhelmed me today. While completely procrastinating on getting the luggage packed, I got the house back in order, laundry all caught up, and baked cookies for Brady and Madison. We eventually did get into packing mode. I'll spare you the details, but it is difficult to pack when you have to watch the weight of your luggage. I am used to completely over packing just in case I am not in the mood for a particular outfit. That won't fly this time. I am also used to having a very handsome strong gentleman by the name of Justin carry my heavy luggage as well. Also not going to fly this time. So I had to make some tough choices tonight :o)!

I tried really hard to keep it together when putting the kids to bed. I want them to stay excited about the extra time they will have with the grandparents. I did pretty well. I was able to let the tears roll down my cheeks in silence as I gave them hugs and was able to slip out without making too much of a scene.

Our photobook we ordered from Walgreens did not arrive today. They are just positive it will arrive tomorrow. That does us no good. I guess if that is the worst that has happened so far then we should count our blessings. Now I have a new project for the hours of travel. I have gathered several of our photos and will put together my own album with both Russian and English words to leave our lil one.

Tomorrow morning my mom and Justin's mom are going to come and pick us up so that we can be in Macomb by 6:45 a.m. for the train. Brady and Madison will get to see us off and then be treated to an ever so healthy breakfast at McDonalds before school. We will fly out of O'Hare airport tomorrow evening (God willing) and arrive in LA. From LA we will fly to Seoul and then to Vlad.

Continued prayers and encouragment are greatly appreciated. We feel with every ounce of our being that what we are doing is right for our family, but we do know that there are going to be bumps along the way. We just hope they are little bumps and not huge potholes on path. Off we go!!! YEAH (or yee-haw as Justin would say!)

They Arrived!

I am very happy to announce that our visas and passports arrived this morning safe and sound. What a huge relief! Justin and I bought a few toys to take with us this afternoon while Madison was at dance and Brady was at his piano lesson. We are taking things that will help us evaluate fine and gross motor skills as well as cognitive development. We have been given advice by other adoptive parents. So specifically we have gotten items that will show his ability to stack, sort, put together, and then of course playdough, cars, bubbles, etc... for fun. My mom sewed a super cute fleece blanket with matching pillow that fits into a little matching fleece bag. She is so talented (a skill I have never learned!) We are hoping that the photobook we put together will arrive tomorrow (thanks Mary for all the great pictures to chose from). We will be able to leave the album behind and the caregivers will go through it with the lil guy until our return on trip number two. There is still lots to do, but we are getting close to having everything gathered.

"I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me." Philippians 4:13

This photo was taken this morning of Brady and Maddie standing in the first snow of the session which fell over the weekend. I thought my family in the southern states (Texas, Arkansas, Georgia and Florida) might like to see what they are missing out on! HaHa

Plugging along

Happy Birthday Justin! It is a memorable one. We both got a lot squared away at work today and several errands ran. We are both starting to feel like we are catching something (wouldn't have anything to do with stress and lack of sleep!) so we are going to try to head off the bug the best we can. They will not want us visiting the orphange with colds. Here is a picture of Brady and Madison from Thanksgiving with the costume that Maddie made at school. I am sick to my stomach about leaving them, but I know they are in great hands!

Random thoughts and answers to questions

Please forgive me for the randomness of this post. I am typing it in the car trying to utilize every spare moment possible. I first want to start by saying that if any of these posts come across as complaining, please know that we are just overwhelmed or tired. We do not want to complain in the least as we are so thankful for God’s timing and blessings in our life. We just have to learn to adjust to His timeline, and even more difficult – I have to realize that I cannot control all of the events in the upcoming weeks.

We are not sharing the referral picture now. It is not recommended that we do that. But I will tell you that the lil guy does not have blonde hair and blue eyes as many think of Russian children. He actually has dark hair and dark brown eyes. Quite an adorable picture! It is our prayer that all is well with the referral and none of the million and one things that could go wrong actually do.

We should be able to update our blog while we are gone. The hotel and surrounding areas are supposed to have internet access. We do not know exactly how busy we will be and how we will adjust to the 16 hour time difference so we’ll do our best to keep everyone in the loop. Justin says I didn’t handle the 5 hour time change to Hawaii for our honeymoon very well so he isn’t holding out much hope for me! He says if the entries are crazy it is because he is trying to post for us while I am passed out.

Tomorrow is Justin’s birthday. We are going to have my parents and his parents over for dinner and go through Brady and Madison’s schedule. We are so fortunate to have family and friends so close to us. They will do their best to keep up the routine will we are gone. Justin has tried to remind me that it is ok if Madison’s outfits don’t match or if Brady’s hair is standing on its end for school. Moms just worry about these things I guess. They are both very excited. They seem to understand what is going on. We have told Madison several times we will not get to bring her brother home with us this trip. She says she knows that, but then she tells people that we are going to Russia to get her baby brother. They are such big hearted children! We have done our best to prepare them that something may not work out all while trying hard not to squash their excitement and anticipation.

Right now Justin and I are working frantically to make packing lists, shopping lists, to-do lists, etc… We belong to a yahoo email group for adoptive parents through Children’s Hope. We have been able to posts travel questions on there and get quick responses from people who have gone before us. It really is a great online support group. We have had two couples contact us that they will be in Vlad the same time we are and in the same hotel. This is their second trip so they will be able to give us good advice.

Right now we are most freaking out about our visas. We of course cannot travel without them and Thanksgiving slowed down processing because everything was closed. Supposedly our passports will arrive to the agency on Monday. They will do same day processing and overnight passports and visas back to us. They seem to think we will have them in our possession on Tuesday. I sure hope so. That is making me nauseous! Lots of last minute details to take care of for work too. So needless to say we are running like crazy right now. But we know it will all work out.

Tonight we are going to try to purchase our Christmas tree and get that decorated so it will be up for Brady and Madison to enjoy. Thank you all for your continued support. It really means a lot to us!

Dates

Only have a quick second, but we got a call this morning with our travel dates! We will more than likely be leaving on December 4th. We will either meet the little guy the afternoon of the 8th or on the 9th. We should probably arrive back in Macomb on December 13th. Sooooo much to do so little time. Happy Thanksgiving everyone. We have a lot to be thankful for!

Few details

So as you can imagine we are completely overwhelmed right now. However, I want to be careful not to complain. We are so grateful that God feels we are ready to move forward with our journey. We may know tomorrow when our travel dates are. I am trying not get my hopes up too high. Justin and I both have to admit that we already feel a connection with this little guy just from the photo and small bit of information that we have. So earlier we were complaining that things have begun to move too quickly and now we are complaining that they can’t move fast enough. Geeze we really are hard to please! I am finding it very difficult to sleep. My mind is racing all of the time. I want to be with Brady and Madison so they do not feel left out in any way. I want to be organized with work so that things will go smoothly while I am gone. We want to learn about Vlad. I want to know how to speak Russian. I want to know what on earth to pack to travel so far away. The list goes on and on.

Justin and I had an hour and ten minute conversation with Pam from Children’s Hope today. She answered many questions about traveling. We had intended to know a bit more Russian before heading over there. It is a tremendously difficult language to learn, but what language isn’t once you get older! We have ordered a talking Russian-English dictionary so hopefully that will arrive at the beginning of next week. It is also a relief to know that for all of our appointments, orphanage visits, etc we will have a driver, CHI representative (speaks limited English), and a translator. They stick with us for the most part and are very well trained. Many families have gone before us and assure us that we are in good hands.

Tonight my parents came over. We got them signed up for instant messaging and Skype. I want them to practice using it before we leave. I am hoping that the internet will be reliable enough that we can call back home with Skype. What an amazing invention. It was fun to watch them learn to IM. They’ll catch on! Now if we can just get Betty Jo and Lisle on board we should have a good chance at staying in touch with Brady and Maddie at least on a limited basis.

There are so many details I would like to share. I know that we have people reading this blog that are considering adoption, and we have family members that want assurance that things will go well. Time is so limited now. I will try to update more when I catch my bearings.

Thank you so much for your support. It is amazing how people just step up and are willing to help others no matter what inconveniences is causes them. A special thanks to Pam for being Brady’s special guest today at the Thanksgiving presentation. He thought that was great!

I will try to do a brief update tomorrow and let you know if we got travel dates or not. Keep the prayers coming! :o)

Unreal!

I wish I could have a recording of the past 48 hours to put on this blog. It would be much easier than trying to explain the turn of events. I will do my best. Please forgive me if I am rambling or have run-on sentences!

Before leaving Springfield on Friday to drive home after the conference, I called Pam from CHI and informed her of our decision not to travel to see the two boys. She was not at all surprised and commented that not changing the birth order for Brady and Madison is a very good reason to turn down a referral. That is not an adjustment that is easy for many children. She also reassured me that they will find a good home for the boys - that is what they do she said! Don’t worry. So I felt even better that we had come to the right decision. So the rest of the way home from Springfield I was on my cell phone. I spoke with my mom and Justin for quite some time just replaying what had happened. I was really looking forward to getting home, unwinding and having the conversation with Justin face-to-face. We both thought this was a huge reality check for us. We need to be more prepared. If a call can come that quickly we need to get several things in order. We need to be in contact an International Adoption (IA) doctor so that we can have he/she review the medical information when we get a referral. We need to start reading everything we can about the details of traveling. And the list goes on and on.

I then called my dear friend Kate Schaub to catch up on all that has been happening in Pennsylvania. In the midst of that conversation, the other line rings and it is Children’s Hope????? I apologized to Kate and told her I had to take the call. Of course in trying to switch over, I lost the call! Ugh. So I immediately call back and get her voicemail. It was driving me nuts. What could she want? Then my phone rang again and my heart was racing a million beats per minute. Here was the conversation as best as I can remember….

Heather, you are going to think I am nuts, but I wanted to get a hold of you before the weekend. I know this sounds crazy, but we have a three year old boy that just came available in Vladivostock (Vlad). His birthday is September 15th 2005 [date is off slightly]. He is of normal health, mentally healthy, but sometimes has bronchitis. The doctors did not diagnose asthma yet. His tests for HIV, hep, syphilis were all negative. (She then shared just a couple of details of his birthparents). Again, I have a picture if you would like to see him. (Here we go again. I am in a complete state of shock. My stomach was twisting, head was aching, and heart was pounding. I then caught my bearings and began to ask my own questions – ones I had wished I had asked just a couple of hours before).

Why are we getting these referrals? Everything we have read is that this process can take so long to get a referral. Is there something we should know? Should we be suspicious or skeptics of how this is happening? Here is the explanation. .. Right now we are considered unassigned. We have not had our documents registered with a specific region yet (regions in Russia are like our states). And of the people that are unassigned, we are the only ones open to taking a boy up to the age of three. The people that are registered in the Vlad region are either waiting for a girl or are only open to a child 18 months or younger. Once you are assigned a region, that is where you stay. So if a child comes available in another region that meets your ‘criteria’ you are not considered for that child unless a lot of things are done to make that happen. Essentially many of the people waiting to adopt are not open to children over the age of 2 – especially boys.

My next question was why is he just now available? This is harder to answer. We don’t know the exact date of him being placed in the baby home. He could have possibly been there since birth. There are many unknowns here. But in Russia children have to be placed on their national registry for a period of time. In fact only about 7% of children in orphanages are up for adoption because of laws requiring certain things to be in place. Orphanages are often understaffed and there is no one to do the paperwork or to pay fees that are required to have the children registered for adoption. It is quite sad.

I told Pam that I would have to discuss this with Justin and let her know if we wanted her to send the picture. By this time it was already about 4:00 and she leaves the office at 4:30. I called Justin and shared the information. We agreed that based on the information we had so far that we would go ahead and have her send the picture to us. I called Pam back and asked her to send the picture. She reminded me that if we agreed to meet the little guy we could travel in two weeks. We need to call her back the early part of the week and let her know if we agree to travel to meet him!

I could not get home fast enough to see that picture! I used the time in the car to pray. Is this God testing us to see if we can do things according to His will? He knows I am a fanatic about planning and schedules. Is He trying to make me realize that not everything is according to my plan? When I got home Justin gave me a huge hug and I lost it. All of the emotion of the past day and a half was exhausting.

Ok this posting is getting very long. I’ll just get to the point. We have decided that we will call Children’s Hope on Monday and let them know that we would like to travel to meet this little boy. We are so nervous and scared, but we are excited all at the same time. We will update everyone with more specifics as they come available. We would greatly appreciate any prayers you have to offer! We are also open to any advice you have for packing to travel halfway across the world! :o)

Out of left field!

Justin and I have found out are completely unprepared for the decisions that lay ahead of us. We just sent our papers to Moscow a week ago today. We are fully prepared for it to take up to a year before receiving a referral AFTER we have been assigned a region. And again it could take up to four weeks to even be assigned a region. Essentially we should not be hearing anything about the adoption for a couple of weeks at least.

So I have been at a conference in Springfield since Wednesday. Yesterday, I go to my hotel room and check my voicemail. There is a message from Pam with Children’s Hope asking me to call her back as soon as I could. By the tone of her voice I braced myself for some frustrating news about our paperwork – something not signed in the right spot – something missing – some expired date. So I call her and she said… Heather, I called Justin and left him a message as well. I am glad you called back. This may come as a shock to you since you haven’t even been assigned a region yet, BUT we have two boys that we are looking to place. They are brothers. They are a bit older than you had said you are open to, but we wanted to see if you would consider. We don’t have a lot of couples open to sibling groups…. (I began to shake and my stomach started turning! Were our papers even in Moscow yet??? This is unheard of. No one prepared us that this could happen now.) The boys are from the Vladivostock region and their birthdays are July 2001 (7 yrs old) and September 2005 (3 yrs old). Their medicals are being sent but we don’t have them yet. We have a picture of each boy. Would you like me to send them to you? (Pictures?? Ummmmm I don’t know about that?!?!). Some people don’t like to see pictures until they have made a decision one way or another (Whew – great idea. Please don’t send the pictures yet). We understand if this is too much for you to consider right now and the boys are older than you had requested, but we’ll give you some time to digest the information. And one more thing before I let you go, if you and Justin decide to meet the boys you will travel to Russia in two weeks!

So after hanging up, I was in a state of shock. This isn’t how things were supposed to go. God, is this the path you want us to go down? Are these boys hard to place and they are trying to take advantage of Justin and my newness to the system? Is this a defining moment that we are going to miss? If we say no, we are telling two little boys that we don’t want to provide a home for them. This is gut wrenching!

Justin and I spoke on the phone for some time and after getting over the initial shock, we both decided to take some time to pray, think about the events, and see what each of us come up with. Unfortunately time is of the essence because if we say yes to meeting the boys we have to get everything in order. If we say no we need to do so quickly so they can approach another family. Again, I can’t explain how incredibly difficult and unexpected this whole situation is.

So what did we decide? After many text messages, phone calls, praying sessions etc… we have decided that we are going to have to say no. The driving force behind our reasoning is that the 7 year old boy is older than Madison. We are not comfortable with the impact this may have on Brady and Madison. They are prepared for one or two younger brother(s) or sister(s). They are not prepared to have another sibling older than them or in between them. Justin and I feel that we have to respect our current family structure while preparing ourselves for our new additions. We are upset about having to say no to these two little boys, but we do feel a peace with our decision. We would ask each person that reads this blog to lift up these two little boys from Vladivostock, Russia in their prayers. We pray that they find a permanent home soon in a nurturing environment.

Another Video for National Adoption Awareness Month

This tender ballad about adoption will have you reaching for a kleenex, and hopefully will make you think about adoption in a whole new way. Inspired by an interview heard on the radio with Christian recording artist Mark Schultz, this heart-wrenching song was written by Debbie L. Rice. Debbie's father was adopted, and Debbie is also the mother of a little girl adopted from China (from GodTube).

Weekend Recap

Our weekend was exhausting, but everyone had a good time. We headed out for Des Moines, IA around 4:00p.m. on Friday. Before checking into the hotel we went to Justin's cousin's house for dinner. I think we finally got checked in and in bed around 11:00 p.m. Saturday was the big day. Madison and I were on the go basically from 8:00 a.m. to 11:30 p.m. She had dance workshops in the morning and then competition at night. The girls had to stay for the awards ceremony that was held at the end of the night. Her two groups did very well. And her hip hop group won an additional prize for the most entertaining routine in their age bracket. They were VERY excited. Justin and Brady hung out all day going swimming, to a science museum, coffee shop etc... They were quite relaxed compared to Madison and me! So sparing you all the details, Madison had a great time. She was not too impressed with the stage make-up and putting on the obnoxious eye liner. We figured out the trick though... let another mother do it. As long as I wasn't the one trying to apply the eyeliner then it seemed to go on just fine!

Madison's tap routine costume. She just hates getting her picture taken. Can't you tell?!?!?

Madison and her friend Emily after their hip hop routine.

On Sunday we went to church and then the Cheesecake Factory with Justin's cousins and their families. It was great to see them and catch up on everything. We usually only see them once a year. Needless to say, I am still worn out from all of the excitement!

Off they go!

So we got this email today!

Dear Justin and Heather,
I have reviewed your Registration documents and everything is OK. Thank you so much. I am sending your documents to Moscow today, Friday, November 14. They will arrive in a couple of days. Once you are assigned a region by the Moscow office, I will contact you to let you know where that is. Then you will need to start working on Region specific documents. I will guide you through that process when the time comes. Congratulations on completing the next step in the process and let me know if you have any questions or concerns.
Sincerely,
Pam Bischoff

My heart raced just reading it. I mean, I knew they were supposed to go out today, but to get the confirmation made me all nervous and excited!

Couple of other random thoughts. Justin and I went with two other couples to see Fireproof last night. It is a totally low budget movie and a bit cheesey, but the message is a good one. I highly recommend it to any married or to-be married couples. Here are a couple of websites that tell you a bit more. Fireproofyourmarriage.com and The Love Dare

Madison has her first dance competition this weekend in Des Moines. Hopefully I will get some pictures to post on here. Have a great weekend everyone!

Shhhh – Can you keep a secret?

I am glad Brady and Madison don’t check this blog! I just have to share something Justin and I are getting them for Christmas. A few months ago I got an email that had a link to this website called Adopted From Russia (http://www.adoptedfromrussia.com/index.html). It has cute things that you can purchase. Justin, Brady, Madison, and I want to learn some basic Russian which is very difficult to do. My thought is, what a better way to learn than through toys? We are getting Madison the talking doll, Kukla. "Kukla" means "doll" in the Russian language. Kukla says five phrases in Russian language - starting with "Privet" (Hello) and continuing with "Ulybnis' " (Give me a Smile). Push her tummy, and you will hear her say "Ya Tebya Lyublyu" (I Love You), followed by "Davai Druzhit'" (Let's Be Friends) and, finally, "Poeegrai So Mnoi" (Play with Me). We are also getting her a copy of Goldilocks and the Three Bears that has both the English and Russian text on the same page.

For Brady, we chose a talking toy Cheburashka which is Russia's most famous and loved cartoon character. Cheburashka, speaks about 20 Russian phrases in a cute childish voice. We are also getting a DVD of the Cheburashka series that we can watch in English or in Russian with English subtitles. We think this will be a great thing to bring along with us whenever we finally get to make the trip back from Russia with our little one!

I wanted to get more books. I have a weakness for children’s books and this is a genre I have never even thought of before. But Justin and I have agreed that we will not go overboard with Christmas this year so I opted not to spend any more money…. Plus I still have to get nesting dolls for them right?!?! :o)

Awareness Video

November is National Adoption Awareness Month. I thought in honor of this month I would try to find things to share that would help me explain the answer to the question that people often ask. Why do you want to adopt? It seems like such a simple question, but the answer is very complex on many levels - and definitly not easy to put into words.

An Adoption Story - The Richt Family

Song to Share

I am not for sure what it is about this song that keeps it stuck in my head but I thought I would just share it for the day's entry. Chris Sligh was a finalist on American Idol's 6th season. He has written this song which is currently doing very well on the Christian music charts. I think if we all emptied ourself of even a portion of our selfishness and pride that we would be amazed at the results. Have a great weekend everyone!

Chris Sligh - Empty Me
From the album Running Back To You

I’ve had just enough
Of the spotlight when it burns bright
To see how it gets in the blood
I’ve tasted my share
Of the sweet life and the wild ride
And found a little is not quite enough
I know how I can stray
And how fast my heart could change

Chorus:
Empty me of the selfishness inside
Every vain ambition and the poison of my pride
And any foolish thing my heart holds onto
Lord, empty me of me so I can be filled with You

I’ve seen just enough
Of the quick buys of the best lies
To know how prodigals can be drawn away
I know how I can stray
And how fast my heart could change

Chorus:

‘Cause everything is a lesser thing
Compared to You, compared to You
‘Cause everything is a lesser thing
Compared to You, so I surrender all

Chorus:

Next…

So our packet arrived safe and sound. Wouldn’t you know we were missing a couple of things? Luckily they do not have to be notarized or certified so I will be able to put them in mail tomorrow. And of course our next payment is due with those documents and we didn’t send the check. Here is the information CHI sent as to what we should expect… “We send packages to Russia 2 times a week, Wednesday and Friday. Yours will go whichever day they are ready. It typically takes about 2 days to get there. They will get translated. Depending on how many families’ registration packets are there, it could take anywhere between 1-4 weeks. They are not just translating; they are reviewing your request to send your paperwork to the best region for you. Once you are assigned a Region, I will let you know and you will start working on the region specific documents. For now, I will review your documents and add mine. Mine do need to be Apostiled in the state of MO, so I will be sending them to our Secretary of States office on Tuesday (Nov 11 - Ummm this is Veteran's Day I better email them!). We send to SOS once a week. I will get them back on Thursday (Nov 13). If everything is in order and OK, I will send your documents out on next Friday (Nov 14)."

At this point they say the first trimester of the paperwork pregnancy is complete.

Off they go - another small step

This afternoon Justin and I drove our registration documents to Springfield. I cannot tell you the number of times I checked our folder to make sure I had everything on the checklist I was given. I was driving myself crazy! It was great that Justin was able to drive down with me. They still have one field of corn left to harvest, and he had to leave my dad and Lisle to handle the work while he was gone. Nothing usually gets in the way of harvest progress so you can tell how important this is to the both of us. He wants to be involved the entire step of the way. We found the building (Secretary of State Index Department) easily and did not have to wait in line. The lady saw our stack of papers and said, ummm this is going to take awhile. We weren’t for sure what that meant. Awhile like 5 minutes or awhile like 2 hours? She was off with our papers before we could even ask. My anxiety increased having our documents out of my sight. She returned in about 30 minutes with a fancy sheet with a gold seal attached to each of our documents. It costs $2 per document to have them Apostilled. This time we had 30 documents. There will be more in the future I am sure. So once again I had to verify that she had given us back every single piece of paper. The post office was about 2 blocks down the road so we decided to go ahead and express mail the packet to Children’s Hope so it will arrive before noon tomorrow. I had to check the folder two more times before sealing the envelope. I was becoming compulsive. What if we forgot one??? Sealing that envelope and leaving it behind was rough. There was a lot of hard word put into those silly papers. These papers are going to be representing Justin, Brady, Madison, and I in Russia. This will be the first impression the Russian folks have of the Overstreet family. YIKES!!! No pressure right?!?!? I will anxiously await an email from Pam Bischoff, our program coordinator with CHI, verifying that she has the documents and that everything is there that she needs. I will update this blog with what comes next after this. I THINK I know, but I am going to ask one more time just to make sure the procedures haven’t changed in the last 24 hours. Which believe me is quite possible.

Matthew 19:26 Jesus looked at them and said, "With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible."

New vocabulary word

We finally have all of our registration documents gathered and notorized. This past week I worked frantically to get all of them together. I found out that the newest checklist required one additional marriage certificate so I had to get another copy of ours. I was worried that I would have to drive to Rock Island to get them. Now, because of good old credit cards you can request them over the phone and make payment that way. I was quite relieved. Now Justin and I need to make a trip to Springfield to have the documents apostilled.

Apostille is a French word which means a certification. It is commonly used in English to refer to the legalization of a document for international use under the terms of the 1961 Hague Convention (I'll let you research that one on your own). The Apostille is done by the Secretary of State in the state where the document originated. It basically means that the Secretary of State acknowledges/verifies that the person notarizing your paper is a true notary and that they are currently commissioned with the state.

I am very antsy to get this done. Perhaps Wednesday afternoon we will be making the trip.

Halloween Recap

Madison was excited that Ariel, the ladybug, got to go trick-or-treating with she and Brady on Friday night.


On Saturday, the kids got to put their costumes on again and go to their cousins' birthday party. Brady was an apple bobbing pro.

Month or so later

We waited and waited for the state endorsement letter to arrive so we could move a tiny step forward. I began to pray each night that the person whose desk was flooded with paperwork and letting our documents just sit there – that they would realize it was more than just paper. In essence, people’s lives or a portion of their life journey was sitting on their desk. On September 26th Carole called me at work to tell me that she got the letter. She was able to complete the homestudy. With that, she mailed the approved homestudy off to CIS so they could then process the I700A form that would say we were fit to parent an orphan. Do you notice a theme here? Hurry up and get paperwork done so you can wait to get approval so you can hurry up and get more paperwork done and wait some more! And then (as I posted that day) on October 24th we got our letter from CIS. So the ball is back in our court. More paper gathering. We are hoping to have all the documents ready to drive down to Springfield the first part of next week.

So finally I think I have gotten this blog up to speed with the beginning process of our adoption and a whole lot more. It will be MUCH easier to journal these events as they happen. It is on my to-do-list to put a timeline on the side of this blog to document the important dates.

Happy Halloween!

And then

So the rest of July and into the first part of August we got all of our paperwork and education hours done. We were just waiting for the DCFS approval so that we could send the homestudy down to the state for their approval. Finally in the second week of August the letter arrives and Carole is ready to ship off the packet. But – wait!!! Of course it can’t be that simple. Just one week prior to Lifelink finds out that the state of Illinois has raised its hours of face-to-face consultation by 1.5 hours. So before we can send out the packet we have to document the additional time. Any kind of parenting class or anything would work. We didn’t want to drive over to Peoria – plus Carole was leaving for vacation. We called all of the agencies in McDonough and Warren County. None of them were offering sessions until over the start of the school year. Ugh! Luckily there was a very nice lady that works with Catholic Social Services in Macomb that agreed to put together a few things and meet with Justin and I one-on-one for the hour and a half- for free! We did that on August 13th . I faxed the letter she wrote to Carole that night and the homestudy was sent off to the state for their seal of approval on August 14th.

Quick one

Only have a couple of minutes and thought I would upload a few pictures. I have been trying to catch up from being at a conference the past two days. Brady (Brian Urlacher – Chicago Bears) and Madison (WIU cheerleader) had their Halloween parties today. Justin and I have parent-teacher conferences tonight. Brady tells me that conferences make him nervous because teachers talk about kids and that it isn’t fair the kids don’t know what is being said. Sounds like he might have something to be nervous about :o) I am also working frantically to get our registration documents together. I’ll write about that soon. Getting our letter on Friday from CIS started a little whirlwind of activity.

After Naperville

So picking up where I left off, we returned with our rug late Tuesday night. Two days later on Thursday, June 26th we took our medical forms to our doctor to have filled out. We needed them as the last piece of the paperwork for the first stage of our home study. Then on Friday morning, Justin and I were back on the train and headed for downtown Chicago for an amazing weekend. Our friends, Bridget and Jordan, were married that weekend. We took a cruise out on Lake Michigan and through the City; jogged on Lake Shore Drive; attended church at one of Willow Creek’s satellite churches; walked through the Taste of Chicago; attended a beautiful wedding and fabulous reception at the Contemporary Art Museum. We took the train home Sunday night and had to have our house ready for the home visit the very next morning – June 30th.

The home visit was obviously at our home (duh!). Carole came and met with Brady and Madison and spoke with them about their openness to the adoption. She walked through the house checking for things such as fire extinguishers, smoke detectors, medicine and sharp objects out of reach of lil’ ones etc… We are pleased to say that we passed with flying colors. At the end of the visit we went through all of the outstanding documents that we needed in order to send the home study to the state for their approval. We still needed the medical forms, the fingerprint/background check results from DCFS, and our documentation of our adoption education hours.

Yippeeee

I am sooooo excited! We got our letter from CIS today!!!! What comes next? I don’t know. I have to read, reread, and make calls. I am just beside myself though with this little break through. Nothing could move forward without this little letter so we are off and running again. The paper reads “Notice of favorable determination concerning application for advance processing of orphan petition. It has been determined that you are able to furnish proper care to an orphan or orphans as defined by (insert lots of legal language)” Yahooooo!

I also want to update this blog by saying God is good! Not only did we receive good news this week, a friend of mine shared news that she is ten weeks pregnant with a healthy little boy or at this point a lil’ gummy bear :o); another friend and her husband confirmed their pregnancy this week after infertility issues; another friend has a ring waiting in a save spot to pop the question soon! There is still lots of heartache in some relationships that I continue to pray for, but there is so much good that is taking place as well.

Naperville – here we come

So my mom and I drive to Arkansas with Brady, Madison, my niece Alexis, and nephew Trevor for my cousin’s high school graduation and for the Underwood family reunion. We left the night of June 20th and returned the afternoon of June 23. Justin and I had train tickets to Naperville and left Macomb around 6:00 p.m. on the 23rd. The rest of this entry was supposed to be super easy to write because Justin actually wrote a journal entry about the entire event. Unfortunately, someone decided to spill coffee on her laptop a week and a half ago and fried the hard drive of the computer. You would think that since this person is a technology director that she would have all of her files backed up. But no, of course not!!!

So we get to Naperville in the evening; grab a cab; stay at a less than stellar hotel; arrange for a cab to pick us up by 7:00 a.m. for our 8:00 a.m. appointment. The next morning we got up, check out of the hotel bright and early and were off with our backpack to spend the day in Naperville. So the first moment of panic was that our cabbie was clueless how to get to the CIS office. We had the street address so you would think that that should have done the trick. He was calling back to his home base to get help and no one seemed to know what he was talking about. My heart was pounding. We could NOT miss that appointment! Finally after we told him to keep driving and get us to the block where the building was 'supposed' to be, we found the CIS office nestled in a strip mall. We were in line right at 8:00 a.m. So the entire fingerprinting process took a whopping 30 minutes. Seriously we were back outside the building at 8:30. We had the remainder of the day to backpack through Naperville. Luckily there was a mall right across the street from the CIS office. As we headed that direction, I noticed a large tent set up in the far corner of the lot with rugs. I jokingly said to Justin, we should get a rug to take home. Ha Ha. We spent the entire day in the mall. We needed to be back at the train station by 6:00 and wanted to grab a sandwich for the ride home. So we headed out of the mall with our backpack and few bags in tow. Off through the parking lot we went - straight toward the rug tent. Ohh, we have some time before we have to get the cab, let’s just take a peek right??? Wouldn’t you know it. I found a rug that would be just perfect for the house. The salesman tried his best to get us to take it, and we explained that there was just no way that we could carry the rug on the train and get it home. We told him why we were in Naperville and walking around with a backpack, and he was moved by our story. He made us a deal that we just could not refuse. So after laughing hysterically at ourselves, Justin packs this rug on his shoulder and off we went down the streets of Naperville. We took it into Panera to order our sandwiches, and we called a cab. When the cab arrived we discovered that the rug would not fit in the trunk!! This was getting more and more ridiculous. Luckily we got it to fit in the back seat with the window rolled down. And we were off. We were able to get it on the train with no problem at all.

I am pleased to report that the rug fits nicely in our office. It will always bring back the memories of our Naperville fingerprinting excursion.

Whirlwind of Activity

Ok so I left off with our first visit with our caseworker. The month of June was a flurry of activity. Before I lay out the timeline of how things went let me first explain a little about the fingerprints I mentioned several entries ago. We sent our I-600A form to Citizens and Immigration Services (CIS). They then send you a letter assigning you a location and time for you to get your biometric fingerprints taken. People in our area are either assigned to go to Naperville or to St. Louis. We couldn’t believe our ears. Keep in mind that we just had had our FREE biometric fingerprints taken at WIU 5 minutes away from our home just prior to this. Unreal! On Friday, June 13th we get our letter from CIS stating that we are assigned to get our prints taken on June 24th in Naperville at 8:00 a.m. Why is it that the people the furthest away are assigned an 8:00 a.m. time? This is beyond me. So Justin and I decide that we would have to go up on the train the night before, stay at a cheap hotel, and get the prints done. Not so bad right? Well here is how things went – Letter received on June 13th; Next meeting with caseworker in Peoria on June 19th; the kids and I to Arkansas June 21st – 23rd; drive like crazy on the 23rd to get me back to Macomb for the 6:15 p.m. train on the 23rd; Naperville on the 24th; I was supposed to be in charge of VBS registration that entire week; June 26th get physical form to the doctor; back to Chicago June 27th – 29th for a fabulous wedding; June 30th our home visit/inspection; July 2nd leave for Disney. Not to mention I am supposed to be getting a lot done at work including deploying an entirely new phone system. Things were seriously insane!!!

So the meeting with the Carole, the caseworker, on June 19th was a full day ordeal. She interviewed Justin and me together for about 3 hours. We went through all of the paperwork we had turned in; discussed parenting styles; our relationship; feelings we have about people who give their children up for adoption; awareness to cultural differences etc… We had a short lunch break and then she interviewed each of us separately for about 1.5 hours. This was to get a feel for our upbringing; more conversation about our marriage; our parenting styles; etc… I think she was trying to find out if we are nuts or not. Luckily that day we appeared to be somewhat normal :o)

Random thoughts

I haven’t had even a second to get back to this blog! I thought I’d squeeze in a few updates between duties. First of all, for all that requested the Cat Litter Casserole recipe – just click on this link and it will take you to the recipe. We used ground sausage in ours. Secondly, I did take the bedroom pictures. So they are ready whenever we get ready to send our packet to CHI. Third, we had a very fun weekend. My friend Bridget and her husband Jordan come down from Chicago for the weekend. (Now if I could just get a friend to come visit from North Carolina and one from Pennsylvania to come visit I’ll be happy!) It was great to hang out with them and to get to know Jordan better. I am pleased to report, the more we got to know about him the more we liked him! Lol. It was also WIU’s homecoming and Madison walked in her first WIU homecoming parade with her Dazzler dance team. We took the city slickers out to the farm to ride in the combine and tractors so they could see what harvest is all about. Unfortunately the tour was cut short when the combine decided to breakdown and throw sparks on the ground lighting a little section of the field on fire. It didn’t do much damage to the field. Thankfully there were plenty of feet to stomp it out. I told Justin and Lisle that they didn’t have to put on a show for our guests!

On a more serious note. I have been praying for many relationships lately. If you pray, I would ask that you partner with me in asking God to lift up families that are struggling right now. It seems that there are a lot of strained relationships. There are couples that are considering divorce, there are couples that are trying desperately to get pregnant, there are couples that are pregnant and they are on pins and needles because of some risk factors, etc… I know that these are regular life issues, but for some reason I feel like they are more prevalent right now among the people I know. It really is weighing heavy on me that I can't figure out a way to make things better for each of them.

Ohh and at 6:28 we found Squirmy dead in his tank :o( Madison was sad until I told her she could pick out a new fish since I obviously picked out one that was sick!

Bedroom pictures

This entry is way out of order, but I wanted to ‘vent’ just a little. I have really got to get this blog up to date so this makes more sense. Anyway… yesterday we sent pictures to our social worker to include in our dossier (again – I’ll get to that later). Children’s Hope said to include 2 pictures of Justin and I, 2 pictures of us with Brady and Madison, a picture of the front of the house, one of the back of the house, and then a picture of each of the rooms in our home not including bathrooms. So I took pictures of all of the rooms, but I chose not to take one of our master bedroom. I don’t know why, but I just didn’t want to share that with the bazillion of people that will be looking at the documents. Honestly, there is nothing special, weird, or anything else about our master bedroom. It is simply a bedroom. So anyway, I get an email from our social worker yesterday afternoon. She said that she noticed that we did not include a picture of our master bedroom. She was wondering if I forgot that picture?!?!? No, I didn’t forget! I shared with her briefly that I had intentionally left it out. She is so sweet and of course said that it was my decision whether or not to include the picture. Ugh! I told her that I would include it. If she noticed right away that is was missing, that means that as the paperwork works its way ‘up’ for approval it is bound to come up again. I would rather just include it now then run into a road block later. I know this sounds so petty and silly. And to be honest, I don’t really know what the big deal is. It just bothers me. Guess I’ll have to suck it up, make our bed, and take the picture!