Not Registered Yet

Happy Friday, Everyone! We received a short message from our agency today. The MOE has our documents, but the regional operator did not have time to review them before the weekend. So we're hoping for some news about registration next week. We're also still hoping to make our first trip the first week of May. Thanks for your continued prayers!

Joel & Clarion

A Bit of Good News

We heard from our agency today. Our papers should be submitted for registration next week. We're hoping that they won't need any additional documents. We also have tentative dates for our first trip. We will most likely be in Vlad the first week of May to meet our little guy, although May 2 is a Russian holiday. But that should be ok. We've been given the go-ahead to order the visas, so we're busy working on that tonight. But we'll be waiting on purchasing tickets until we have some definite travel dates. Please keep us in your prayers. Thanks!

Joel & Clarion

Waiting!

Waiting is hard! We've been here before. This adoption is proceeding like lightning compared to our last one. But waiting is still hard, no matter the time frame. It's hard when you look at the picture of that little smiling face which has been your desktop wallpaper on your computer screen for weeks and stuck to the door of the fridge, but you have yet to actually meet him. It's hard when you think about his birthday being less than a month away and you wish he could celebrate it with his family. Yes, waiting is hard.

Inspired by the Holy Spirit, King David wrote (Psalm 27:14): "Wait for the Lord; be strong, and let your heart take courage; wait for the Lord!" That's what gets us through the waiting! We know that the Lord's time is best. How do we know that? We know it in Christ. "But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons" (Galatians 4:4-5). God's work of adoption came to fruition in His time, the best time. And it was in the works even before God laid the foundations of the earth!

So where are we in our adoption journey number two? Waiting! We're waiting to be registered in Vladivostok. We're waiting for travel dates for trip number one. We're waiting for sicknesses that keep plaguing everyone in our family to go away!!! We're waiting...waiting on the Lord. We're taking courage. We're praying for our little guy, for those who are caring for him, and for other adoptive families who also wait. Speaking of other families, please keep our friends the Overstreets in your prayers. Their waiting is even harder than ours. Any day now they should be receiving news of a court date. Any day now we should be getting news of registration and travel dates. It's so close. "Wait for the Lord; be strong, and let your heart take courage; wait for the Lord!"

Joel & Clarion

I-171H Approval. Woo hoo!

Good news! We just received our I-171H in the mail from USCIS. It looks good except for one typo. It says that our fingerprints expire on the date that we were fingerprinted, not a year ahead, but the same year - 2010. Oops! I called and left a message with the officer at USCIS and hope to get a response soon so that we can get a corrected form.

The whole fingerprinting thing still blows me away, namely that fingerprints expire. I've never been fingerprinted as many times as when we did our last adoption. I think it was at least four times. I already know we'll have to be fingerprinted at least one more time for our FBI clearances when we get back from trip #1 and prepare for court. But we should have our little guy home before the I-171H expires.

Please keep Sabrina and Giorgio in your prayers as they are in Vlad getting ready for court and also Justin and Heather as their papers go to the judge tomorrow in Vlad. God bless you all!

Joel

A Nice Surprise!

So we received a nice surprise in our inbox this past Wednesday, as did a couple other families who are adopting through our agency from the same region. We received some unexpected pictures of our little guy. Here he is, at least as much of him as we can post on the blog! Hoping to go meet him soon, probably April. We just can't wait. All of our papers for registration have been turned in and should be on their way to Russia. We'll post when we're registered. Thanks for your prayers! Check out those cute little dimples!

Love,

Clarion and Joel

The Joys of Documents!

Hey, blogger friends! Well, I spoke too soon in my last post. We actually have had some similar document issues as the Overstreets had when they were working to get registered. Trying to get one document from DCFS Illinois with the correct wording about our home study agency proved to be somewhat difficult, but not horribly so. The letter with the correct wording finally arrived in our mailbox today. Our agency verified that it is indeed correct. However, I still need to get up to Springfield to have it apostilled. It's not going to happen today, so I'm hoping I can get there Monday and drop it in the mail to our agency immediately after. We'll see what the weather brings Sunday and Monday. Some snow is forecasted. The bulk of our documents are already on their way to Vlad, so the agency will send this letter along with a couple of other items and we should (fingers crossed!) have everything needed for registration. You all know how much fun documents can be. I must say, however, that we haven't redone as many documents during this adoption as we did during our last one.

Unfortunately, even if we are registered this month or next month, it still appears that we won't travel to meet our little guy until late April. That's when his legal paperwork is supposed to be ready. If you could, please pray that the Lord would allow us to go sooner that that. We've certainly learned how to be patient and wait, but you waiting families know how it goes. Once you've seen your little one's picture, received a medical report, etc. it's hard to wait and wait and wait. Thankfully, the Lord works good things in the midst of waiting, although not always easy to see that until later. God bless you all!

Joel & Clarion

Getting Closer to Registration

Well, folks, we're making progress on the paperwork front. With the documents I had apostilled today and mailed to our agency, I think we'll have everything we need turned in for registration in Vlad. We should find out next week if the agency is good with our paperwork. If so, they're off to Russia. Then we'll see what the MOE says.

It's been an interesting couple of weeks in our household. Two weeks ago we ALL had the flu. We all got over it after two or three days except for Nadya, our exchange student from Russia. Her temperature kept spiking, even one time to 104.7 degrees. Scary! We took her to the emergency room at our local hospital. They sent her home with some meds. Uggh! We had hoped they would do more, but unfortunately didn't. When she was even worse the next day we took her back. They did a chest x-ray and discovered she had pneumonia. During the course of three days here in the hospital it got worse. They transferred her to Cardinal Glennon in St. Louis. Despite the ride down there in the midst of all the snow last Wednesday night, the rest of the experience was very positive. They were able to get her on the road to recovery and by Saturday we were heading home. She's on a seriously strong antibiotic that has to administered through a picc line. That's been fun, especially the one at 3:30am every morning. Oh well, we're glad she's on the mend, and we're very thankful for the prayers of family and friends.

While we were all down with flu, we received our little guy's medical, but it was still in Russian. Nadya took a stab at it and did a pretty good job of translating it, aside from some of the big medical terms. A couple of days later they sent us an English translation. He has the usual developmental delays and some other minor issues, but nothing earth shattering. Thanks be to God. Now we just pray that the next couple of months fly by so we can go meet him. Paperwork hasn't been too bad. It's nice to have another family using the same agency as us as well as the same home study agency. The dilemmas that they solved in the past couple of months with paperwork have helped us get things done the right way the first time (or second time). Anyway, we certainly don't wish paperwork hassles on anyone, but the frustrations and hard work of others often prove fruitful to other families who are trailing them in the paperwork stage. So thanks to Justin and Heather! Their paperwork dramas have helped us avoid dramas, at least we hope. Please keep them in your prayers as they await news of a court date! Blessings to you all.

Joel, Clarion, Slav, Sergei & Nadya