SDA Appointment

Today at 10am was our SDA appointment.  We woke up to it snowing so Svetta wanted us to leave a little eary as the roads were a little slushy. It really wasn't that bad out, it's just they drive a little crazy here.  I was a little nervous going into the appointment as Svettat took us to this side door of a building.  If we didn't have Svetta, I don't know how you'd find this place. It is in downtown Kiev, which is a beautiful part of town.  People were selling Ukrainian souveniers and cool art. It was snowing too hard and windy so we didn't walk around much after the appointment.  Anyway, back to the appointment as most of you are more interested in.  We walked into this hallway and waited for someone to invite us in. We waited only a few minutes before a young lady asked us to come in. I started getting a little nervous and asked God to be with us in this process. As we walked in and saw another couple looking through pictures for a child, we went into what looked like her office. When we sat down I felt relaxed already. It looked like she had our homestudy that was translated into Russian and some paperwork on Dima.  She asked us questions like if we have any biological children, how we met Dima, and why we picked him.  Svetta explained to us that the SDA knows that we chose Dima and he was in the US on a hosting program so we explained that and said we fell in love with him. She didn't have much information about Dima and Sasha explained to us that we should not ask them questions because they don't have much information. We did see a picture of Dima when he was about 6 or 7 maybe, it's hard to tell. He looked sooooo cute!!!! She also said in 2003 he was taken from his mother but their was no mention of his father? We are curious about this as Dima mentioned a father when we asked him through a translator.  He also thought he was about 3 or 4 when he went to the orphanage.  I am sure he doesn't really know or understand time from being in an orphanage for so long. Probably seemed that long to him. After she explained that situation, she explained characteristics of him and she said he was friendly and very active! We all laughed at that, even Svetta since she came with the orphans on the hosting program back in August. After that, we were done!

One thing I forgot to mention was very special that Svetta told us when driving to our SDA appointment.  She said when she was at Dima's orphanage helping another couple adopt a girl his age about a month ago, he saw Svetta.  He ran up to her and asked "When are Mama and Papa coming??" That just made my heart melt.  When he was here during the hosting program, he called us Tina and Dusty. It meant so much to us that he didn't up on us adopting him and that he called us Mama and Papa!!

Svetta explained that we need to go pick up that paperwork from the SDA appointment that will let us into the orphanage tomorrow.  We will then take an overnight train ride to Krivoy Rog. Dima will be told tomorrow that we are coming! I would LOVE to see the look on his face when he is told.  I wonder who will get less sleep thinking about meeting again, him or us!

Thanks Mom for the daily prayer, has been helpful! I am still trying to download pictures, not sure why it's not working? I saw that Lori was able to do it. If I don't write for a couple of days, it is because we don't have internet access. Talk soon!!!!

We have arried in Kiev, Ukraine

After a long flight, we made it to Kiev last night.  The flights were not as bad as I thought.  I think you just need to go into it with an open mind and don't stress about how long they are.  The flight from Detroit to Amsterdam was long and I thought I would just sleep, but my body had other ideas. I figured since I couldn't sleep maybe I would be able to sleep better once we got to the apartment in Kiev. I eventually got sick from being up so long. The flight from Amsterdam to Kiev I slept and felt much better afterwards.

Once we got to Kiev with Lori and Russ, which was really nice to travel with them, we were greated by our drivers. Sasha, our facilitator from Kiev, had two drivers with vans to pick us up in case we had a lot with us.  Good thing they did! We never would haveall  fit in one van. They drove us directly to the market to exchange money and get food for the next few days.  Sasha also helped get us a cell phone and an internet stick.  The cell phone is mostly for them to call us to pick us up for our different appointments.  Then they drove us straight to the apartment and showed us where we were staying.  Lori and Russ are in another apartment within a 10 minute walk.  Once we were shown our apartment we pretty much went to sleep after such a long trip.  The apartment buildings look a lot a like here. The room we are staying in is a lot different than in the US.  We really take for granted space! We are staying in a one bedroom apartment with a small kitchen.  I will try to download pictures, but I can't figure out why my pictures are not downloading onto the blog for some reason? The apartment is very clean.  We can't figure out if someone lives here or not as there is not much in the rooms.

We were able to meet up with Lori and Russ today since our SDA appointment isn't until tomorrow. We walked around the outside market and enjoyed seeing how the culture is here. You can buy pretty much anything at the outdoor market, and I mean anything! The fruits and veggies look great here! The meats I would not buy at the outdoor market.  We saw a meat that Russ said was dog, but I am trying to not believe him as I think about our pups at home:( Could never imagine eating a poor dog. Many dogs are stray here!!! I will not judge as we are in their region and they would probably question some of the things we do.

Lori contacted a lady here that showed another couple that adopted a girl from Dima's orphanage last month. She showed us around the nicer parts of Kiev which we really enjoyed! It is so nice to have a local show us around when we wouldn't have done that ourselves.  Downtown was beautiful. They have some Christmas decorations up which was nice since we will miss the decorations at home.

Tomorrow is our SDA appointment and Tuesday is Lori and Russ's. We heard we may take the overnight train to Krivoy Rog where Dima's orphanage is on Wednesday. Sounds like Dima and the other kids don't know we are here yet.  At this point, I almost wish they weren't told and they would just bring them in the room and surprise them when we get there. We will let you know how the appointment goes tomorrow.

2 More Days!!!!

We are getting so excited for our trip!! We've been trying to get things ready each day so we hopefully will not forget too much. The tricky part of this trip is trying to figure out what to bring that will not take up too much room but that will last for our 3 week stay. Lori Walk did a great job explaining what we should bring. The key to the trip is bringing layers. We will not have access to a washer so we will need to wash our clothes by hand. We were also told to bring some other things like tissues and wet wipes for our trip. I will not go into much detail with that as I am sure you will get the idea! We are also trying to pack some games and gifts for the kids in Dima's group. I have packed some deflated soccer balls and footballs. We will pump them up when we get there. We heard they don't have many balls to play with. Since Dusty and I are adopting a 14 year old, we will most likely just be around other boys his age when we visit the orphanage for a couple hours a day. With my athletic and teaching background, I am hoping we will be able to play some games. I will have to be creative as we won't have much there to play with, but I am up for the challenge! I am sure they boys will just enjoy having some company.

We will have internet access one way or another because Dusty needs it for work, so please keep checking on our blog for updates. We leave Friday and will land in Kiev, Ukraine on Saturday afternoon. If I don't get on here before we leave, everyone have a GREAT THANKSGIVING!!!! Pray for a safe trip!

Flights are purchased!

When we initially found out we were leaving in less than 2 weeks, we were afraid to look at how much the flights would be in such short notice. God was watching over us as they were not much higher than what they have been. Plus, we get to fly out of State College so we won't have the hassle of flying out of a big airport and parking our car for 3 weeks! Lori and Russ Walk are going to be leaving the same day as we are. That is going to be comforting knowing they will be there and have been there before back in May to adopt Ana.

We are busy now trying to make sure we have everything ready for our trip and with our jobs while we are gone. That will be a little stressful, but totally worth it in the end! We are so excited to see Dima again. We can't believe it's happening and so soon. Just thinking that this only started in June!

One goal before we leave is to get Dima's room done! It has been so much fun. Dusty wants to make Dima's headboard. I think that will be a good project for when I am on my second trip to bring him home. We won't know when that second trip will be until we find out our court date.

Please pray for the brother and sister that was here on the hosting program in August. I put their pictures up in one of my earlier blogs. They are absolutely precious! They were going to be adopted by a family here, but they decided not to adopt after the kids went back to Ukraine. Their hopes were crushed but now their are a couple families interested in adopting them!!!

Wow!!!!!

We received our phone call from David, our adoption facilitator, yesterday afternoon that our SDA appointment is NOVEMBER 29th!!!!! Even better, Lori and Russ Walk's appointment is the 30th! The Noel's appointment is December 8th! How cool that these people are the sole reason we are adopting Dima! The Noel's sell vegetables and send out a weekly email of what they have. One day in June they sent an email about the hosting program that the Walk's were organizing. Next thing you know, we are looking at a picture of Dima's smiling face and starting the adoption process.

Since our dates are so close to the Walk's we were going to try and fly out together. We went to the Walk's house to try and get flights together. That was a little more challenging due to the trip being less than 2 weeks!! Dusty and I were able to get flights at a decent rate, but the prices were literally going up every time we clicked on and we left before Lori was able to find some flights. We prayed they could get their flights at a decent rate as they went up over $800 after we booked our flights and the options were not as good as we first looked!!!

We booked our flights on Black Friday to give us a little extra room in case we have any delays. We are to get to Kiev, Ukraine Saturday afternoon. Our appointment is that Monday and it sounds like it's a quick appointment. We then wait for our court date in the city where Dima's orphanage is. We hope that it will be within two weeks as we booked our flights the middle of that week. We trust David's judgement and will continue to trust Sasha when we get to Ukraine. We can't imagine what all Sasha has to do to get these appointments and are so thankful!! In between we will travel to the orphanage and spend only 2 hours a day with Dima at the orphanage. We are so excited to see that smiling face in person! We have so many pictures around the house and have them memorized from looking at them so much.

Yesterday was a really special days in so many ways, I can't even begin to describe. This date used to be a very sad day, but now it means a happy time. It was Dima's birthday and we got the special phone call for our arrival to Ukraine. Those sad days are gone. Dima is my little angel that I dreamed about!

We now have to make sure we've got everything in place for our trip. It is not as much time as we were thinking we'd have, but God had other plans and we are ready!!

Prayer needed

Please pray for a girl that was hit by a car at Dima's orphanage. She is one of the girls that I spoke of before that comes from a family of 5 kids. We have been trying to spread the word about these siblings to hopefully be adopted. This girl is also the one that told Lori Walk that Dima was her boyfriend so I have a soft spot for this girl. She is beautiful from Lori's pictures. She has been hospitalized with a broken arm and badly broken leg that needed surgery to have it repaired. We've heard she is in a lot of pain and pain medicine might not be available. It breaks my heart knowing this poor girl is in a hospital all alone without any family and is in pain. Fortunately, the missionaries there are able to visit her. Please pray to help lessen the pain and that she is not alone.

We've also heard some more information about our possible SDA date. We were hoping to hear very soon, but it sounds like we may be about a week behind. It is still possible that we may make our first trip the beginning of December. My birthday is December 3rd so it would be a nice birthday present!! We are just so excited to be getting closer in seeing Dima again. We miss him so much and talk about him all the time!

Faith

When I first heard that we may be traveling in another month, I started to panic. I started stressing about out how financially we were going to come up with the rest of the money for the adoption, flights, and additional money for when we are in Ukraine since we won't be able to use credit cards. I stressed about dealing with another bank to get a loan as we've had such bad luck with banks while trying to sell our two properties. I stressed about making the second trip to Ukraine by myself. I started stressing over how Dima would do in school and how the other students would treat him. I wondered if the English lessons have been helpful for him. I stressed how we would pay our bills while we are taking all this time off work to travel to Ukraine. I stressed how we will pay our bills once everything calms down when we all get back. I stressed whether I will have to get another job to help pay the bills and the cost of having an addition to our family. I stressed about how our two properties are not selling and how much that extra money would be so helpful. After all this stressing, I thought back to our church service last Sunday and what our preacher said. His sermon really hit me like a ton of bricks, all he said was have faith in God and he will grace us. To me, if felt like he just said "Tina, you just won the lottery". Put all of our trust in him that everything will fall into place like everything has in the past few months. It is so easy to think and worry about the bad things, but we should let God burden those worries for us. If we don't have faith that God will guide us, we will not have grace. As we go through the adoption process, I just have to remember this whenever I feel the stress of everything!