Please pray for sweet Isabelle!!!! (I met her and her parents in Dec while adopting from the same orphanage.)
She's been having seizures and is currently unresponsive. PLEASE PRAY EVERYONE!!!!!!
http://luckytolovelyla.blogspot.com/
Thursday, June 16, 2011
Good News!
First, Elijah's fever was only 100.2 deg, not 102 deg. Big difference! (Sarah didn't hear Michelle correctly. LOL) Last I heard, his fever had broke, but he was still not feeling all that great. Please continue to pray for him.
Secondly, we heard from Vanya today that the person in the social workers office that was supposed to be out of the office the rest of the week, is in today and tomorrow! YAY!!!! This won't move our court up though, as everything will be submitted to the SDA on Monday, won't be ready until Friday, and then court the earliest on Monday after that. Vanya was going to try to submit the papers to the SDA w/o the social worker piece (no guarantees), but now it will be there - Lord willing. IF the court is open tomorrow, he will hopefully be able to submit everything tomorrow, and start the process of getting a court date a few days earlier than before.
Thanks for praying! This journey has had MANY more attacks than last time. Please continue to pray protection over us here, the process, Jonathan, and the kids and caregivers at home. We know who wins in the end, just getting there is difficult sometimes.
Secondly, we heard from Vanya today that the person in the social workers office that was supposed to be out of the office the rest of the week, is in today and tomorrow! YAY!!!! This won't move our court up though, as everything will be submitted to the SDA on Monday, won't be ready until Friday, and then court the earliest on Monday after that. Vanya was going to try to submit the papers to the SDA w/o the social worker piece (no guarantees), but now it will be there - Lord willing. IF the court is open tomorrow, he will hopefully be able to submit everything tomorrow, and start the process of getting a court date a few days earlier than before.
Thanks for praying! This journey has had MANY more attacks than last time. Please continue to pray protection over us here, the process, Jonathan, and the kids and caregivers at home. We know who wins in the end, just getting there is difficult sometimes.
Wednesday, June 15, 2011
Prayer request for Elijah
Sarah just sent me an instant message that Elijah has a 102 deg fever. :-( I guess he's been mopey and laying on the floor a lot of the morning. Poor thing...please pray for healing for him and for Michelle that might have more than one sick child on her hands very soon. And for my mommy's heart that can't be there for him...
Outside we go!
So, it's a little early yet for a title that says "Same ol' same ol'". :-) We did get a chance to take Jonathan outside for the first time for a little walk this morning. The poor thing is so tired in the morning. He could barely keep his eyes open while we were walking, but he managed to stay awake mostly.
A few shots from our afternoon visit...
Not much else new today. The orphanage was not going to be done with their pack of papers today since a doctor that needed to sign some papers was not in today...go figure. So Vanya will come on Friday and get everything ready to turn into the court on Monday. It really didn't cost us anything though. Evidently this judge likes to have all of the paperwork before we submit for a court date, and we won't have that until Monday at some point (minus the SDA papers). Hopefully, we'll hear about a court date sometime next week. Please keep praying! My mom would really like us home ASAP!
I'm feeling much better. Not quite 100% but getting there. It was nice to be hungry again, but the Milka chocolate didn't settle quite right, so you know I'm not 100% yet. :-) Thanks for praying!
 |
| Cute hat! And yes, the same bibs again. I think they just put him in them for our visits as it usually takes them awhile to get him ready. Makes me feel better. I think the orphanage just got a donation of new strollers too. This one is brand new and there was a brand new double one up in his grouppa w/ the box still there. The nannies at Elijah's orphanage would be green with envy... |
 |
 |
| Up and gettin' ready to move! Well, not quite, but it's a good start. |
I'm feeling much better. Not quite 100% but getting there. It was nice to be hungry again, but the Milka chocolate didn't settle quite right, so you know I'm not 100% yet. :-) Thanks for praying!
Tuesday, June 14, 2011
This 'n That
Ok, I had a little Sprite, animal crackers and yogurt and I'm feeling a renewed strength to blog! Ha! I couldn't let a day go by w/o posting a photo of our little man. The lighting isn't the best, but it works. This is the photo Vanya took today.
A couple of observations from today. He is wearing the same shirt as yesterday and the same bibs for the last 3 days I think. I think that is good as it means he doesn't spit up a lot, right? :-) See, a silver lining in everything! He was very tired today and started dozing off. I kept telling Pat to try to keep him awake since sometimes the nannies don't like a child's schedule messed with. But Vanya told them he was sleepy, and they said he woke up early. Whew...he fell asleep on Pat's shoulder, so that was nice to see too. Sometimes institutionalized children can only fall asleep when laying by themselves, often rocking themselves to sleep. :-( Hopefully we are bringing him home before he develops too much of that. I'll bring the Ergo in later on this week to see how he does with that. He really seems to like being upright, so hopefully he'll love it as much as Elijah did. Funny thing I just thought of...Jonathan is just 3-4 pounds lighter than Elijah when we brought him home and they are almost 3 years apart in age!!! Too much food for a not very active baby perhaps on one side, and very poor nutrition on the other side...oh well, it is what it is and Elijah is still growing a lot!
A HUGE thank you to our "church family" for the care packages for the kids! What a blessing to them and to us!!! You are all so very, very special to us. We thank the Lord for bringing us to you just over a year ago.
Also, a HUGE thank you to my parents and Michelle for helping watch our kids while we are gone. We couldn't have done this without you!!! You guys rock! (Click here to see some familiar faces. :-)) Thanks to Auntie Debbie and my dear friend, Rheann, for giving Michelle a break here and there. Rheann even gave Isaac a new hair do! :-)
Finally, can you please offer up some prayers for a few of my adopting friends in country?
Grace & Mike, Noah's family, are getting to know Noah, but need prayers for a smooth court date. http://www.silvamoose.com/
Ruthann is in the finally stages and had a big day of paperchasing today. I think she is hoping to break him outta there tomorrow or the next day! How exciting! http://livinonlove-lifewithextratolove.blogspot.com/ She stayed alone through the 10+ day wait. Fun thing is that I will get to meet her little love sometime soon I hope. She only lives an hour from me!
Catherine, my new on-line friend, has had a terrible time with many delays, 2 days of horrific food poisoning, and her girls are very frail and malnourished. http://wronginalltherightways-travcat.blogspot.com/
Very soon, my special little buddy, Shea, will have his Gotcha day too! Please pray for Liz as she travels back to bust Shea outta the orphanage forever!!! http://thekulpchronicles.blogspot.com/
Finally, there are many, many other RR families in country right now. All of them need your prayers! If you want to follow any of their journeys, you can find a good list here, including our new friends, Rochelle and Jason, who met their little sweetheart today. :-) http://reecesrainbow.org/category/sponsorafamily/travelingnow
A couple of observations from today. He is wearing the same shirt as yesterday and the same bibs for the last 3 days I think. I think that is good as it means he doesn't spit up a lot, right? :-) See, a silver lining in everything! He was very tired today and started dozing off. I kept telling Pat to try to keep him awake since sometimes the nannies don't like a child's schedule messed with. But Vanya told them he was sleepy, and they said he woke up early. Whew...he fell asleep on Pat's shoulder, so that was nice to see too. Sometimes institutionalized children can only fall asleep when laying by themselves, often rocking themselves to sleep. :-( Hopefully we are bringing him home before he develops too much of that. I'll bring the Ergo in later on this week to see how he does with that. He really seems to like being upright, so hopefully he'll love it as much as Elijah did. Funny thing I just thought of...Jonathan is just 3-4 pounds lighter than Elijah when we brought him home and they are almost 3 years apart in age!!! Too much food for a not very active baby perhaps on one side, and very poor nutrition on the other side...oh well, it is what it is and Elijah is still growing a lot!
A HUGE thank you to our "church family" for the care packages for the kids! What a blessing to them and to us!!! You are all so very, very special to us. We thank the Lord for bringing us to you just over a year ago.
Also, a HUGE thank you to my parents and Michelle for helping watch our kids while we are gone. We couldn't have done this without you!!! You guys rock! (Click here to see some familiar faces. :-)) Thanks to Auntie Debbie and my dear friend, Rheann, for giving Michelle a break here and there. Rheann even gave Isaac a new hair do! :-)
Finally, can you please offer up some prayers for a few of my adopting friends in country?
Grace & Mike, Noah's family, are getting to know Noah, but need prayers for a smooth court date. http://www.silvamoose.com/
Ruthann is in the finally stages and had a big day of paperchasing today. I think she is hoping to break him outta there tomorrow or the next day! How exciting! http://livinonlove-lifewithextratolove.blogspot.com/ She stayed alone through the 10+ day wait. Fun thing is that I will get to meet her little love sometime soon I hope. She only lives an hour from me!
Catherine, my new on-line friend, has had a terrible time with many delays, 2 days of horrific food poisoning, and her girls are very frail and malnourished. http://wronginalltherightways-travcat.blogspot.com/
Very soon, my special little buddy, Shea, will have his Gotcha day too! Please pray for Liz as she travels back to bust Shea outta the orphanage forever!!! http://thekulpchronicles.blogspot.com/
Finally, there are many, many other RR families in country right now. All of them need your prayers! If you want to follow any of their journeys, you can find a good list here, including our new friends, Rochelle and Jason, who met their little sweetheart today. :-) http://reecesrainbow.org/category/sponsorafamily/travelingnow
Paper chasing in progress
Well, our day (my day) started out pretty rough. Let's just say something I ate last night didn't "agree" with me. I was pretty wiped out before Vanya got here at 9am, but thanks to Lord for sustaining me today and giving me enough energy to survive the day (and not having to use any of the public "restrooms").
Our first visit was to the city social worker. She was very, very nice and hardly asked us any questions (no grilling). We showed her photos of Elijah and our family and that was about it. Unfortunately, she will be out of the office the next 3 days. She was very apologetic, but had already made plans before she knew we were coming and couldn't change them. I'm not sure I totally understand how all the paperwork works, even though Vanya explained it to me more than once. But once we get the paperwork from her that was not able to be completed today, and won't be ready until Monday, it then has to be submitted to the SDA in the capital city and then come back to our region for court. There is a 5 day turn around there, so the absolute earliest we can have our court date is Monday, June 27th. Not as early as we would have hoped for, but there is nothing we can do about it. Vanya is doing all he can to get us in for court on that day. To make things a bit more complicated, the train that used to run 3x/day to this city will only be running 3x/week starting tomorrow due to track repairs. The facilitators use the train to send documents back and forth. So, please be in prayer that everything will fall into place with papers getting here and there, and we can have court on the 27th, and get back to the capital city ASAP afterwards to get home to see our kids. We miss them SOO much!
Let's see...what else...we had our 4 applications done at the notary today. They were an application to the court, appl for a new birth certificate for Jonathan, appl for his passport, and one other thing that escapes me at the moment - maybe for the SDA. So, tomorrow, Vanya will get the paperwork from the orphanage (hopefully) and go to the courthouse to start the process of securing our court date. We'll bring in all of the cloth diapers that were donated too! (I need to do another post about the incredible generosity we received in donations.) We got some ointment and drops for Jonathan's eye too, so hopefully that will help him.
Guess that's about it. Vanya was with us for our visit with Jonathan today and took a photo of the 3 of us, but I'm toolazy tired to post it now.
Thanks for all of your prayers! Please pray for my continued recovery and for all of the kids and caregivers back home. Love to you all!
Our first visit was to the city social worker. She was very, very nice and hardly asked us any questions (no grilling). We showed her photos of Elijah and our family and that was about it. Unfortunately, she will be out of the office the next 3 days. She was very apologetic, but had already made plans before she knew we were coming and couldn't change them. I'm not sure I totally understand how all the paperwork works, even though Vanya explained it to me more than once. But once we get the paperwork from her that was not able to be completed today, and won't be ready until Monday, it then has to be submitted to the SDA in the capital city and then come back to our region for court. There is a 5 day turn around there, so the absolute earliest we can have our court date is Monday, June 27th. Not as early as we would have hoped for, but there is nothing we can do about it. Vanya is doing all he can to get us in for court on that day. To make things a bit more complicated, the train that used to run 3x/day to this city will only be running 3x/week starting tomorrow due to track repairs. The facilitators use the train to send documents back and forth. So, please be in prayer that everything will fall into place with papers getting here and there, and we can have court on the 27th, and get back to the capital city ASAP afterwards to get home to see our kids. We miss them SOO much!
Let's see...what else...we had our 4 applications done at the notary today. They were an application to the court, appl for a new birth certificate for Jonathan, appl for his passport, and one other thing that escapes me at the moment - maybe for the SDA. So, tomorrow, Vanya will get the paperwork from the orphanage (hopefully) and go to the courthouse to start the process of securing our court date. We'll bring in all of the cloth diapers that were donated too! (I need to do another post about the incredible generosity we received in donations.) We got some ointment and drops for Jonathan's eye too, so hopefully that will help him.
Guess that's about it. Vanya was with us for our visit with Jonathan today and took a photo of the 3 of us, but I'm too
Thanks for all of your prayers! Please pray for my continued recovery and for all of the kids and caregivers back home. Love to you all!
Monday, June 13, 2011
New tricks
I decided not to title my blog entries by day this time around. Two reasons: 1.) I didn't want to know how long I've been here. :-) 2.) It won't be so obvious if I miss a day or two here or there. But now, I'll just have to come up with creative titles for my posts. Oh well!
I thought I'd better add this up here in case you don't read down past the cute photos and videos. Tomorrow, we start the paperwork process to get everything submitted to the judge to eventually get a court date. Please pray for favor with the social worker and court officials, (we already met the director - seems like a nice guy), and smoothness for the details tomorrow. Of course, please pray for a QUICK court date too. Thanks!
So Jonathan showed us some new tricks today. I laid him on the mat so I could try an outfit on him. (The 12 mo one piece outfit barely fit him over his other clothes! Good to know. I think the 12 mo 2 piece outfits I brought will be fine.) Anyway, he flipped over onto his tummy and was pushing up and bouncing like he was ready to go. :-)
He also "talked" to us for the first time. So fun to hear his little voice!
 |
| Gettin' some lovin' from Mama |
 |
| Total baby toes cuteness! It's fun to see his toes this early in the process. I never saw Elijah's feet until Gotcha day due to him always wearing tights. |
 |
| Notice the guy in the background? Evidently, he takes his breaks in the playroom. So we had company the last half of our visit. |
 |
| Bonding with Daddy! |
Sunday, June 12, 2011
A nice day!
We had a very nice day today. Our visiting hours are from 10:30-11:30 and about 2:30-4pm. Babies obviously sleep more than 3 yr olds, so a bit less time than what we had with Elijah.
Our morning visit w/ Jonathan went well and the nannies were glad to see the diapers we brought in. We left a bit early to get back to the apt before Elijah's birth parents came. Our time with them was such a complete blessing. His mother, Tatiana, brought lots of gifts for all of our kids. So sweet of her. The most precious gifts though are a hand-knit (by her) sweater for Elijah's birthday in September, and a photo album with all of Elijah's aunts, uncles, grandparents and cousins. Priceless... The photo that made me cry was a picture of him right after he was born...it was probably not long after that they realized something was "different" about him and thus their world came crashing down. She also gave me the card that was in his bassinet at the hospital. I can't even begin to tell you what a special treasure these things are to me, and hopefully will be to him too someday. I'm sitting here crying just thinking about it. (For those of you that weren't reading back in Dec, Elijah's parents love him very much and had visited him on a consistent basis while in the orphanage. They just couldn't keep him for financial reasons as she has to work and there is NO place for a child w/ Ds to go in this country. This wasn't just a choice for a better lifestyle for them financially. It is just very different here w/ very low salaries and high prices. We have been in contact with them since we left EE in Dec and met them 2x over there. We are truly blessed to have them in our lives.)
I gave her an album of photos of our family and Elijah, as well as a very special locket that says "mother" on the front and has 2 of Elijah's photos inside. A huge thank you to "Auntie Debbie" for getting that for her back in December. I'm glad Iprocrastinated mailing it to her hung on to it so I could give it to her in person. She was very, very, very touched by it. I know she will treasure it always.
They only stayed for about an hour and a half. It's a long trip for them for such a short time, but it was worth it. I'm glad they made the trip. After lunch, we went to the market, got an umbrella and headed to the orphanage. Yay! After that, we walked and walked and walked to find a great pizza place called Celentano's. It's a chain restaurant and we went there in the capital city and also in Elijah's city. We love it! 2 drinks and a yummy pizza for $5! Can't beat that! Pat brought along his running watch with a GPS in it. He told me we walked a total of 7 miles today! No wonder I could hardly make it up the stairs tonight! Good exercise though and makes up for that Milka chocolate I seem to be eating a lot of...shhh...don't tell my kids, ok?
Here you go! Photos at last. Sorry for the rambling first!
Our morning visit w/ Jonathan went well and the nannies were glad to see the diapers we brought in. We left a bit early to get back to the apt before Elijah's birth parents came. Our time with them was such a complete blessing. His mother, Tatiana, brought lots of gifts for all of our kids. So sweet of her. The most precious gifts though are a hand-knit (by her) sweater for Elijah's birthday in September, and a photo album with all of Elijah's aunts, uncles, grandparents and cousins. Priceless... The photo that made me cry was a picture of him right after he was born...it was probably not long after that they realized something was "different" about him and thus their world came crashing down. She also gave me the card that was in his bassinet at the hospital. I can't even begin to tell you what a special treasure these things are to me, and hopefully will be to him too someday. I'm sitting here crying just thinking about it. (For those of you that weren't reading back in Dec, Elijah's parents love him very much and had visited him on a consistent basis while in the orphanage. They just couldn't keep him for financial reasons as she has to work and there is NO place for a child w/ Ds to go in this country. This wasn't just a choice for a better lifestyle for them financially. It is just very different here w/ very low salaries and high prices. We have been in contact with them since we left EE in Dec and met them 2x over there. We are truly blessed to have them in our lives.)
I gave her an album of photos of our family and Elijah, as well as a very special locket that says "mother" on the front and has 2 of Elijah's photos inside. A huge thank you to "Auntie Debbie" for getting that for her back in December. I'm glad I
They only stayed for about an hour and a half. It's a long trip for them for such a short time, but it was worth it. I'm glad they made the trip. After lunch, we went to the market, got an umbrella and headed to the orphanage. Yay! After that, we walked and walked and walked to find a great pizza place called Celentano's. It's a chain restaurant and we went there in the capital city and also in Elijah's city. We love it! 2 drinks and a yummy pizza for $5! Can't beat that! Pat brought along his running watch with a GPS in it. He told me we walked a total of 7 miles today! No wonder I could hardly make it up the stairs tonight! Good exercise though and makes up for that Milka chocolate I seem to be eating a lot of...shhh...don't tell my kids, ok?
Here you go! Photos at last. Sorry for the rambling first!
 |
| I LOVE how he is seeking out eye contact. He got a little uncomfortable with Daddy after a while though. It's just he's not used to men. Elijah was the same way. |
 |
| Total cuteness!!! :-) |
 |
| Trying on hats for the way home...this one might work. (You can see how red his eye is. I hope we can get some medicine on Tues for him.) |
 |
| Mom, this one might have to wait until next summer. :-) |
 |
| No, he's not napping. He's just saying, "Get out of my face with the camera, Mom!" |
 |
| This was as close to a smile as we got today. I'm just lovin' his hair! The nanny even commented today about how it is similar in color to Daddy's. :-) |
Saturday, June 11, 2011
More about Jonathan and his heart
I figured I'd better get this done tonight before we get busy with tomorrow's activities. I'm excited to see Elijah's birth parents who are coming to see us tomorrow. :-)
Ok, Jonathan's heart. The doctor said today that he has an open oval window, or a PFO I believe, a hole in his heart. This is one of the heart defects he was listed with and none of the doctors here seemed to be too worried about it. From what I gathered it can cause problems if it is large, but most often closes on his own. Ok, good. She said today that they were going to schedule surgery for him in May, but the cardiologist here wanted him to gain more weight first. I thought that was funny since he is so heavy already, but I'm glad they didn't do it. In June, just a couple weeks ago, he was back to the cardiologist and he said he should come back in 6 months for a check-up. YAY!!! It was the end of April that I asked you all to start praying for his heart. I believe those prayers are being answered! Praise the name of Jesus!!!!
In other health issues besides his current eye infection, he's never been sick enough to be sent to the hospital, so that's pretty healthy. I think that's about it for health issues. He has a rash on the back on the back of his neck/back but it just looks like prickly heat to me.
His picture definitely does him justice in the weight department! :-) He is one chunky lil' monkey! We didn't get a current weight on him, but we think he is heavier than our petite 20 mo old Rachel who is just over 20#. I have some 12 mo clothes here that I'll have to bring in next week to try on him. It takes lots of will power to not squeeze his cheeks and thighs! Pat's aunts are going to love him. :-)
Developmentally, of course they told us he is delayed. No surprise there. Physically, he is not sitting up yet on his own, and even sometimes has a floppy head. He is reaching out to grab toys and puts them in his mouth to chew on them, so that was good to see. Lots of teeth to come in yet, as he only has the two bottom ones. I don't think that is totally unusual for kids with Ds though. Someone feel free to correct me if I'm wrong. I'm sure non-ideal nutrition is a part of that too.
I was pleasantly surprised to hear that he was eating baby food from a spoon though, along with a bottle too I'm sure. The doc said he does not really like to eat, but needs "encouragement" to do so. So, we'll see how that all works out. We will definitely ask to see what he is eating/drinking before we leave with him.
I think that's about it. He's had no visitors since he's come to the orphanage. :-( I highly doubt we'll be meeting his birth family, but that's ok. I'm thrilled we are able to give Elijah that gift to be in contact with his bio parents.
Thanks again for your continued prayers. Please pray for everything to go smoothly on Tuesday with the paperchasing. Thanks!!!!
Ok, Jonathan's heart. The doctor said today that he has an open oval window, or a PFO I believe, a hole in his heart. This is one of the heart defects he was listed with and none of the doctors here seemed to be too worried about it. From what I gathered it can cause problems if it is large, but most often closes on his own. Ok, good. She said today that they were going to schedule surgery for him in May, but the cardiologist here wanted him to gain more weight first. I thought that was funny since he is so heavy already, but I'm glad they didn't do it. In June, just a couple weeks ago, he was back to the cardiologist and he said he should come back in 6 months for a check-up. YAY!!! It was the end of April that I asked you all to start praying for his heart. I believe those prayers are being answered! Praise the name of Jesus!!!!
In other health issues besides his current eye infection, he's never been sick enough to be sent to the hospital, so that's pretty healthy. I think that's about it for health issues. He has a rash on the back on the back of his neck/back but it just looks like prickly heat to me.
His picture definitely does him justice in the weight department! :-) He is one chunky lil' monkey! We didn't get a current weight on him, but we think he is heavier than our petite 20 mo old Rachel who is just over 20#. I have some 12 mo clothes here that I'll have to bring in next week to try on him. It takes lots of will power to not squeeze his cheeks and thighs! Pat's aunts are going to love him. :-)
Developmentally, of course they told us he is delayed. No surprise there. Physically, he is not sitting up yet on his own, and even sometimes has a floppy head. He is reaching out to grab toys and puts them in his mouth to chew on them, so that was good to see. Lots of teeth to come in yet, as he only has the two bottom ones. I don't think that is totally unusual for kids with Ds though. Someone feel free to correct me if I'm wrong. I'm sure non-ideal nutrition is a part of that too.
I was pleasantly surprised to hear that he was eating baby food from a spoon though, along with a bottle too I'm sure. The doc said he does not really like to eat, but needs "encouragement" to do so. So, we'll see how that all works out. We will definitely ask to see what he is eating/drinking before we leave with him.
I think that's about it. He's had no visitors since he's come to the orphanage. :-( I highly doubt we'll be meeting his birth family, but that's ok. I'm thrilled we are able to give Elijah that gift to be in contact with his bio parents.
Thanks again for your continued prayers. Please pray for everything to go smoothly on Tuesday with the paperchasing. Thanks!!!!
SURPRISE!!! Guess who we met today?!?
We met Jonathan of course!!! Without first explaining how we got here and met him on a Saturday, I know all you really want to see is photos! Here you go! :-)
Total cuteness or what?!? :-) I LOVE THAT GIGGLE!!! The doctor told us that he is very attentive and smiles easily. We was little unsure about us at first, but as you can see in the video he is warming up to us a bit. He's really good at looking at us in the eye and seeking the eye contact. That's great! He's absolutely beautiful and we love him so much!!!
He has an eye infection too. :-( You can see his right is pretty red, so hopefully they will give us the name of something to get for it at the "apteka" (pharmacy) soon.
Ok, if you want to hear details about our crazy day yesterday, and how he is doing medically, keep reading. Otherwise, I give you full permission to stop now. LOL
So, yesterday morning, Vanya, our most awesome facilitator/translator, went early to try and get us train tickets to region Friday night. See, it's a 3-day weekend (Monday is yet another holiday), so everyone is leaving the capital city and the train was booked weeks ago. Sometimes, a person can pay the conductor to sleep in his/her quarters on the train. They make a little extra money and helps out people, like us, to get where we want to go. He found only one car left that the conductor hadn't "sold" her quarters. It was in 3rd class, but her quarters lock, so it wasn't a big deal. Vanya or Kostya, our facilitator we had worked with to our paperwork, had called the orphanage to see if anyone would be there so we could meet Jonathan on Saturday. It was a go!
We left the apt about 10:30, met Vanya at the SDA, had lunch at Celentano's (yum yum!), did some shopping for gifts, some sightseeing, relaxing at the park overlooking the river, eating some ice cream and back to the SDA to pick up our referral. The referral is the official paperwork we need from the SDA to give us permission to visit Jonathan. The referrals are supposed to be ready between 3-4pm on Fridays. (4-5pm on other days.) We got there about 2:45pm, had a nice LONG chat with Rochelle and Jason, and a couple of other US families adopting various aged children (one was from Roberts, WI - just a few miles from where I grew up!). FINALLY at about 5:15pm, the paperwork was ready! Our train leaves at about 7pm...we booked it back to the apt, grabbed a few groceries, threw our stuff in our bags and headed out to the train station. Because the traffic was terrible on a Friday, we took the metro (subway) instead. We were stuck in traffic last time trying to get to the train station, so I was glad to not go through that again. Navigating the metro with suitcases on a very busy Friday night was interesting as well, but we got there on time! A little sweaty and very tired, but we made it. Our compartment was 1/2 of a 2nd class compartment, but it was fine. We had the window open, and it was very comfortable. Vanya slept in 3rd class and just put his luggage in by us. Neither Pat nor I slept all that well, but maybe by the time I get back to the capital city w/ Jonathan, I'll be able to sleep on the train. :-) It's an acquired skill to say the least.
Whew...still with me? Good. Vanya had called from the train to find available apts and secured one that was available in the morning for us to look at. (We would have stayed in a hotel for a couple of days otherwise until we found one.) When we got off the train at about 7:30am, we took a cab to the apt and checked it out. It is very nice, recently updated w/ a washer and hot water. Internet was installed mid-afternoon. Plus, it's only $20/night. That rocks! Only downside is it's up 5 flights of stairs, but it will do me good. I'll be in great shape by the time we get home! :-)
After we took much needed showers, we walked to the orphanage. It's about a mile walk one-way, so not bad. We did scout out some "marshuka" (bus) numbers to take if it's raining or if my legs just need a rest. The doctor that was in today was very nice and is the doctor that takes care of Jonathan. I think I'll save all of that for the next post so it doesn't get buried here. We learned of his social history as well. The director kindly came in on his day off to meet us, which was very nice. He seems very friendly. Debbie, he really enjoyed the photos of your boys! :-) He was glad that we already have a child with Ds so we know how to care for Jonathan. He's a favorite there and they wanted him to go to a good home.
We visited with him 2x today. Both times for only about 15 minutes. We'll be able to spend more time tomorrow I hope. We will also visit on Monday. On Tuesday, we start the paperwork to get our petition submitted to court. It's a bummer we "lost" 3 days w/ the weekend and holiday towards our court day, but we are so thankful to Vanya for working so hard to get us in to meet Jonathan. It would have been a long weekend here if we were not able to visit him.
Ok, I'll put his medical stuff, his current condition, and more about our visit in the next post. This is plenty long enough for now.
Thank you again for your continued prayers! We can certainly feel them as everything is going so smoothly. Please continue to pray for our kids back home and their caregivers. Everyone seems to be doing fine, so that is a blessing. Love to you all!
Total cuteness or what?!? :-) I LOVE THAT GIGGLE!!! The doctor told us that he is very attentive and smiles easily. We was little unsure about us at first, but as you can see in the video he is warming up to us a bit. He's really good at looking at us in the eye and seeking the eye contact. That's great! He's absolutely beautiful and we love him so much!!!
He has an eye infection too. :-( You can see his right is pretty red, so hopefully they will give us the name of something to get for it at the "apteka" (pharmacy) soon.
Ok, if you want to hear details about our crazy day yesterday, and how he is doing medically, keep reading. Otherwise, I give you full permission to stop now. LOL
So, yesterday morning, Vanya, our most awesome facilitator/translator, went early to try and get us train tickets to region Friday night. See, it's a 3-day weekend (Monday is yet another holiday), so everyone is leaving the capital city and the train was booked weeks ago. Sometimes, a person can pay the conductor to sleep in his/her quarters on the train. They make a little extra money and helps out people, like us, to get where we want to go. He found only one car left that the conductor hadn't "sold" her quarters. It was in 3rd class, but her quarters lock, so it wasn't a big deal. Vanya or Kostya, our facilitator we had worked with to our paperwork, had called the orphanage to see if anyone would be there so we could meet Jonathan on Saturday. It was a go!
We left the apt about 10:30, met Vanya at the SDA, had lunch at Celentano's (yum yum!), did some shopping for gifts, some sightseeing, relaxing at the park overlooking the river, eating some ice cream and back to the SDA to pick up our referral. The referral is the official paperwork we need from the SDA to give us permission to visit Jonathan. The referrals are supposed to be ready between 3-4pm on Fridays. (4-5pm on other days.) We got there about 2:45pm, had a nice LONG chat with Rochelle and Jason, and a couple of other US families adopting various aged children (one was from Roberts, WI - just a few miles from where I grew up!). FINALLY at about 5:15pm, the paperwork was ready! Our train leaves at about 7pm...we booked it back to the apt, grabbed a few groceries, threw our stuff in our bags and headed out to the train station. Because the traffic was terrible on a Friday, we took the metro (subway) instead. We were stuck in traffic last time trying to get to the train station, so I was glad to not go through that again. Navigating the metro with suitcases on a very busy Friday night was interesting as well, but we got there on time! A little sweaty and very tired, but we made it. Our compartment was 1/2 of a 2nd class compartment, but it was fine. We had the window open, and it was very comfortable. Vanya slept in 3rd class and just put his luggage in by us. Neither Pat nor I slept all that well, but maybe by the time I get back to the capital city w/ Jonathan, I'll be able to sleep on the train. :-) It's an acquired skill to say the least.
Whew...still with me? Good. Vanya had called from the train to find available apts and secured one that was available in the morning for us to look at. (We would have stayed in a hotel for a couple of days otherwise until we found one.) When we got off the train at about 7:30am, we took a cab to the apt and checked it out. It is very nice, recently updated w/ a washer and hot water. Internet was installed mid-afternoon. Plus, it's only $20/night. That rocks! Only downside is it's up 5 flights of stairs, but it will do me good. I'll be in great shape by the time we get home! :-)
After we took much needed showers, we walked to the orphanage. It's about a mile walk one-way, so not bad. We did scout out some "marshuka" (bus) numbers to take if it's raining or if my legs just need a rest. The doctor that was in today was very nice and is the doctor that takes care of Jonathan. I think I'll save all of that for the next post so it doesn't get buried here. We learned of his social history as well. The director kindly came in on his day off to meet us, which was very nice. He seems very friendly. Debbie, he really enjoyed the photos of your boys! :-) He was glad that we already have a child with Ds so we know how to care for Jonathan. He's a favorite there and they wanted him to go to a good home.
We visited with him 2x today. Both times for only about 15 minutes. We'll be able to spend more time tomorrow I hope. We will also visit on Monday. On Tuesday, we start the paperwork to get our petition submitted to court. It's a bummer we "lost" 3 days w/ the weekend and holiday towards our court day, but we are so thankful to Vanya for working so hard to get us in to meet Jonathan. It would have been a long weekend here if we were not able to visit him.
Ok, I'll put his medical stuff, his current condition, and more about our visit in the next post. This is plenty long enough for now.
Thank you again for your continued prayers! We can certainly feel them as everything is going so smoothly. Please continue to pray for our kids back home and their caregivers. Everyone seems to be doing fine, so that is a blessing. Love to you all!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)