Today we took Grandmother downtown to the immigration office for her sworn statement. Luckily, the background check we had already done for her was sufficient so the sworn statement was the last step in this insane process. Rob and I got a little nervous when we woke up to hear rain coming down in buckets. Our appointment wasn’t until 1:00 so we were praying the rain would subside just long enough to get this done. We were determined to get this done TODAY.
Rob and Grandmother picked me up at work downtown for the drive to the immigration office. Luckily we found the place on the first try. I thought for sure we’d have to circle around the block a few times to find the entrance but that wasn’t the case. We had Grandmother’s wheelchair so we had to find the handicapped entrance. We found the drive that had a ramp entryway to the building, but the parking there was for government employees only. The guard at the gate was extremely nice though and allowed us to pull our car close to that area so we could at least get Grandmother out near the wheelchair ramp. The rain had subsided at this point, by the way. WHEW! Even so, we bundled Grandmother up in a rain jacket with hood and put an afghan blanket across her lap just in case. She always thinks we overdo it with the layering and bundling and she isn't thrilled about riding in the wheelchair. She doesn't want people to think she's an invalid and she's quick to tell everyone that she can walk just fine. LOL! If she had her way she would walk up the stairway to the building and she probably could. It would just take an entire day, time that we did not have at that point. Thank goodness for wheelchairs.
Rob had to park across the street but returned shortly to meet us. We made our way up to the correct office and found ourselves in a huge waiting area surrounded by immigrants from many different countries waiting to take their citizenship tests. This really put things in perspective for us as we arrived at the office pretty irritated by the process we were being put through. In that moment, we were reminded to be thankful that we were born citizens in this great country. We have freedoms that many of these people probably never had in their native countries. We really do have much to be thankful for and should never take it for granted.
After checking in at the reception window, we waited about 10 minutes before the immigration officer called us back to her office. She took one look at Grandmother and we could tell she felt bad about putting us through this, but whatever. She tried chatting with Grandmother and we had to tell her she’d have to raise her voice a few decibels for Grandmother to be able to hear her. Once she did, the blank stare on Grandmother’s face was replaced with a smile. The oath was very official. Grandmother had to raise her frail right hand and solemnly swear that she would answer the following questions truthfully. We all got so tickled at the questions Grandmother had to answer. She was asked if she had ever committed a crime, ever been on parole, ever had to pay a fine or ordered to community service, ever had a traffic ticket, etc. This tiny 4’ 11” woman in a wheelchair was being grilled about her criminal history…absolutely absurd. Obviously, her answers were “no” to everything. It was a surreal moment, just so ridiculous. At one point I got so tickled I almost had to excuse myself. Rob and Grandmother also got tickled but kept it together long enough for us to finish with this nonsense.
The bottom line is that we walked out of that office with our I-797 approval letter. The immigration officer printed it out for us right then since we had been through so much trouble. The I-797 letter is what we will need to take to the U.S. Embassy in Warsaw when we immigrate Kristine & hopefully Olegs too. After all of the court sessions in Latvia are completed and the adoptions are granted, the children will be U.S. citizens once they hit U.S. soil.
It’s great to have all of our paperwork in order. If only we could get our first court dates scheduled in Latvia. Now that the kids are coming here to stay with us for Christmas, we have asked to travel to Latvia immediately after they leave to head back home. Our attorney says that should not be a problem. At this point, we’re not getting our hopes up since we’ve been disappointed in the past. Not much we can do about the timeline of events anyway. We’re just anxiously awaiting the arrival of our kids for Christmas. We’re so excited!! They’ll be here in 2 ½ weeks. We can’t wait!!!!
Thursday, November 30, 2006
Friday, November 24, 2006
11/24 - The Never ending Wait!
Hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving. Rob and I stayed home with Grandmother and had the traditional Thanksgiving meal. Rob smoked the turkey to perfection and I fixed the sides. I actually made homemade dressing and giblet gravy without screwing it up. We cooked up a feast so we’d have tons of leftovers. It was funny to see Grandmother chow down. She normally doesn’t eat much but she had worked up an extra big appetite for this meal. She gnawed on a whole turkey leg and ate pretty much everything on her plate. When it came time for pie, she had two slices!! I told her we were impressed and she just grinned from ear to ear. I’m still amazed at times that we have a 98-year old living with us!!
Okay, back to adoption news…
We heard from our attorney today and she says that now we’re waiting for the Ministry of Children’s Affairs in Latvia to receive the written ruling from the Riga orphan court telling them that Kristine can be adopted internationally. Once that happens, the Ministry will officially match us with Kristine. Next week there is a big NATO summit in Riga so the government offices will be shut down for a few days. That means even more waiting! At this point, we’re almost hoping to travel in January instead of December. Olegs and Kristine will be here with us during the last couple of weeks in December, so things would get a little complicated if we were to get travel dates in December. However, we’re still a little nervous about waiting until January because our attorney is due to have a baby sometime in January. She’ll be out of commission for a few weeks when that happens. It’s possible our court dates could be pushed to February. We can’t think about all of this or we’ll go nuts. Right now we’re just focusing on the fact that we’ll have the kids with us for Christmas and we’re grateful for that.
Rob and I are both tired of being on an emotional roller coaster. We can handle the wait if we at least know why we’re waiting. The information about our case is coming very slowly now and that continues to be frustrating. We have felt strongly that our case isn’t getting the appropriate amount of attention. Even if that’s true, there’s not a whole lot we can do about it. We’re trying to remember that things will happen in God’s timing. Still isn’t easy, though!
We talked to Kristine on Wednesday and got to tell her that she and Olegs will be coming for Christmas. She was ecstatic. We had planned to tell her when we talked to her earlier in the week on Sunday but that conversation got cut short when a friend of hers grabbed the phone and made a vulgar comment using a really bad 4-letter word (use your imagination and you can figure it out). Kristine thought it was a little too funny so we told her we were not happy and we would talk to her later. The friend probably didn’t understand what he said, but just knew it would get a big reaction if he said it. Whatever! We were not amused. We heard Kristine yelling at her friend once she realized we were hanging up, so at least she understands that what he said was wrong. When we talked to her the next time on Wednesday, all was forgotten and we were able to talk about Christmas. Much better. We’ll just be so glad when we can all spend time together. We miss Kristine and Olegs so much.
Okay, back to adoption news…
We heard from our attorney today and she says that now we’re waiting for the Ministry of Children’s Affairs in Latvia to receive the written ruling from the Riga orphan court telling them that Kristine can be adopted internationally. Once that happens, the Ministry will officially match us with Kristine. Next week there is a big NATO summit in Riga so the government offices will be shut down for a few days. That means even more waiting! At this point, we’re almost hoping to travel in January instead of December. Olegs and Kristine will be here with us during the last couple of weeks in December, so things would get a little complicated if we were to get travel dates in December. However, we’re still a little nervous about waiting until January because our attorney is due to have a baby sometime in January. She’ll be out of commission for a few weeks when that happens. It’s possible our court dates could be pushed to February. We can’t think about all of this or we’ll go nuts. Right now we’re just focusing on the fact that we’ll have the kids with us for Christmas and we’re grateful for that.
Rob and I are both tired of being on an emotional roller coaster. We can handle the wait if we at least know why we’re waiting. The information about our case is coming very slowly now and that continues to be frustrating. We have felt strongly that our case isn’t getting the appropriate amount of attention. Even if that’s true, there’s not a whole lot we can do about it. We’re trying to remember that things will happen in God’s timing. Still isn’t easy, though!
We talked to Kristine on Wednesday and got to tell her that she and Olegs will be coming for Christmas. She was ecstatic. We had planned to tell her when we talked to her earlier in the week on Sunday but that conversation got cut short when a friend of hers grabbed the phone and made a vulgar comment using a really bad 4-letter word (use your imagination and you can figure it out). Kristine thought it was a little too funny so we told her we were not happy and we would talk to her later. The friend probably didn’t understand what he said, but just knew it would get a big reaction if he said it. Whatever! We were not amused. We heard Kristine yelling at her friend once she realized we were hanging up, so at least she understands that what he said was wrong. When we talked to her the next time on Wednesday, all was forgotten and we were able to talk about Christmas. Much better. We’ll just be so glad when we can all spend time together. We miss Kristine and Olegs so much.
Tuesday, November 21, 2006
11/21 - Fingerprinting Nightmare Continues
Today was Grandmother’s 2nd appointment for fingerprints. Since her prints didn’t take the first time, we are required to try again before the USCIS will let us do a sworn statement and be done with all this nonsense. Again, we got to the immigration office early, so we sat in the car and waited while we watched all of the others line up at the door. Like last time, it was all I could do to fight the urge to get out and jump in line. We had no choice but to wait until they opened the doors and the line moved inside. I had bundled Grandmother up in my super warm “puffy” coat with a hood over her head but even so I just couldn’t subject her to sitting out in the cold to get a primo spot in line.
Finally, I saw the doors open so I quickly loaded Grandmother up in her wheelchair so we could make our way up the sidewalk. We were greeted by a nice officer at the door and he held the door for us so I could push Grandmother inside. He had to hold the door longer than expected because I couldn’t get the blasted wheelchair over the doorstep until the fourth try. UGGGHH! Grandmother is a good sport and jokes that the bumpy wheelchair rides help keep her awake. LOL! For a second I thought the officer might let us go to the front of the line, but no such luck. He allowed me to wheel Grandmother into the waiting area to sit while I went back and waited in line. I told her to sit tight and I’d come get her when it was our turn. Bless her heart, she didn’t move an inch. She even kept her coat buttoned up with the hood over her head until I came back for her. I called her my little eskimo.
Eventually, our turn came and we filled out the same paperwork again and then got in another line to wait. They assign numbers much like they do at the grocery store deli, so we still had to wait for them to call our number. I was hoping we could get out of there before the need for a bathroom break but before they called our number, Grandmother let me know nature was calling. Of course, by the time we came back, they had already called our number and were now three numbers past ours so we had to get them to work us back in. AARRGGHH!! They finally worked us in, did Grandmother’s prints, and we were on our way.
This afternoon, I called and found out that the second set of prints didn’t take either. The next step will be the background check and sworn statmement. The person who does the sworn statements is out this week so we can’t take care of it until next week. So it seems we will have to bring Grandmother downtown yet again to finish the last steps of this insane process. In case you’re wondering, I did call our local congressman’s office to complain about this. They were very nice but said I’d have to put something in writing for them before they can try to help. I figured by the time I do that and wait for them to contact somebody, we’ll have taken care of it. I will probably send a letter to him after the fact. Who knows. Maybe the law can be changed so others who have elderly people living with them won’t have to go through this.
Finally, I saw the doors open so I quickly loaded Grandmother up in her wheelchair so we could make our way up the sidewalk. We were greeted by a nice officer at the door and he held the door for us so I could push Grandmother inside. He had to hold the door longer than expected because I couldn’t get the blasted wheelchair over the doorstep until the fourth try. UGGGHH! Grandmother is a good sport and jokes that the bumpy wheelchair rides help keep her awake. LOL! For a second I thought the officer might let us go to the front of the line, but no such luck. He allowed me to wheel Grandmother into the waiting area to sit while I went back and waited in line. I told her to sit tight and I’d come get her when it was our turn. Bless her heart, she didn’t move an inch. She even kept her coat buttoned up with the hood over her head until I came back for her. I called her my little eskimo.
Eventually, our turn came and we filled out the same paperwork again and then got in another line to wait. They assign numbers much like they do at the grocery store deli, so we still had to wait for them to call our number. I was hoping we could get out of there before the need for a bathroom break but before they called our number, Grandmother let me know nature was calling. Of course, by the time we came back, they had already called our number and were now three numbers past ours so we had to get them to work us back in. AARRGGHH!! They finally worked us in, did Grandmother’s prints, and we were on our way.
This afternoon, I called and found out that the second set of prints didn’t take either. The next step will be the background check and sworn statmement. The person who does the sworn statements is out this week so we can’t take care of it until next week. So it seems we will have to bring Grandmother downtown yet again to finish the last steps of this insane process. In case you’re wondering, I did call our local congressman’s office to complain about this. They were very nice but said I’d have to put something in writing for them before they can try to help. I figured by the time I do that and wait for them to contact somebody, we’ll have taken care of it. I will probably send a letter to him after the fact. Who knows. Maybe the law can be changed so others who have elderly people living with them won’t have to go through this.
Saturday, November 18, 2006
11/18 - Looking Forward to Hosting Again
Olegs now knows he’s coming to see us for Christmas and he’s so excited. Our friends who were in Latvia this week took him a letter and some small gifts from us. In our letter, we told Olegs that we had gotten permission for him to visit us over Christmas. Our friends told us that he was all smiles when they gave him his bag. We can’t wait to see his precious smile again. What a little cutie pie he is! We told him that Kristine will be coming too. We’re not sure if Kristine knows that she’s coming yet. At the time we wrote her letter, we weren’t sure if we would be hosting her. We’re hoping her children’s home director has told her by now.
When we talked to Kristine earlier this week, she told us that she had also received her letter and gifts. She sounded so happy. She also informed us that she would like us to call her “Kate” now. That is her new American name. Rob and I had decided we would let her choose whether or not she wants to change her name when we adopt her. Before we make the final decision though, we’ll give her a few more options to choose from to make sure we can all live with it.
When Kristine and Olegs were here during the summer, we played a game and asked them what American name they would each like to be called if they had a choice. At that time, Kristine wanted to be called Morgan. Since we have friends with a cat named Morgan and other friends with a daughter named Morgan, we had already decided that she’d have to choose again. Luckily, she picked something else on her own. Olegs had decided his American name would be “Batman” so we’ll have to convince him to choose again. It’s hard to explain to him that having the name “Batman” on his resume will probably limit his future career opportunities. LOL!
We continue to wait to hear when we'll be traveling for our first court dates in Latvia. As time goes by, it's looking less likely that we'll be traveling before Christmas. We're actually okay with that now that we know our kids will be here for Christmas. We can't wait for them to get here. It's gonna be one awesome Christmas.
When we talked to Kristine earlier this week, she told us that she had also received her letter and gifts. She sounded so happy. She also informed us that she would like us to call her “Kate” now. That is her new American name. Rob and I had decided we would let her choose whether or not she wants to change her name when we adopt her. Before we make the final decision though, we’ll give her a few more options to choose from to make sure we can all live with it.
When Kristine and Olegs were here during the summer, we played a game and asked them what American name they would each like to be called if they had a choice. At that time, Kristine wanted to be called Morgan. Since we have friends with a cat named Morgan and other friends with a daughter named Morgan, we had already decided that she’d have to choose again. Luckily, she picked something else on her own. Olegs had decided his American name would be “Batman” so we’ll have to convince him to choose again. It’s hard to explain to him that having the name “Batman” on his resume will probably limit his future career opportunities. LOL!
We continue to wait to hear when we'll be traveling for our first court dates in Latvia. As time goes by, it's looking less likely that we'll be traveling before Christmas. We're actually okay with that now that we know our kids will be here for Christmas. We can't wait for them to get here. It's gonna be one awesome Christmas.
Wednesday, November 15, 2006
11/15 - Fingerprinting Nightmare!
Yesterday was fingerprinting day for Grandmother at the immigration office. Our appointment was at 8am near downtown, so we had to leave pretty early since we would have to fight rush hour traffic. Bless her heart, I thought Grandmother would take forever to get ready so I got her up extra early so she’d have plenty of time. She was ready in a flash so I could’ve let her sleep another 45 mins. Oh well! She was just as happy to spend that extra time napping in her Lay-Z-Boy.
Anyway, we got to the immigration office about 15 mins. early. The place didn’t open until 8am so people were lining up outside the door and I, being the person with no patience, was ready to go jump in line too. I had a 98-year old woman with me and I was NOT going to be last in line! Even though it was very cold, I contemplated wheeling Grandmother up there so we could secure our place in the line. My sensible side won over, however, and I figured that a good space in line wasn’t worth risking her getting a case of pneumonia.
Once they finally opened the doors, the line actually moved very quickly. People were there for different reasons so they were directed to different areas for processing. I wheeled Grandmother up there just as the line was dwindling at the door and the officer let us right in. After filling out our preliminary paperwork and waiting for a few minutes, we were called back to the fingerprinting area. The guy doing the fingerprints was super nice and took his time with Grandmother. She was pretty quiet but when he got to her left ring finger, she boldly told him to be careful with that finger. On that finger, she wears the now thin wedding band that my granddaddy put on her finger 76 years ago. He has since passed, but she has NEVER had that ring off of her finger since their wedding day. The fingerprinting guy was very sweet and told her how special that was that they had been married for 73 years.
Yesterday was actually a piece of cake. The nightmare part started today when I called to follow-up and was informed that Grandmother’s prints are “unclassifiable” which means they must be redone. Apparently, this happens with older people since their skin is thin and their hands are wrinkly. The procedure is that they will attempt to take the prints twice and if they are still unsuccessful the second time, they will allow her to do a sworn statement. Of course, I asked why we can’t just skip to the sworn statement part and the girl I talked to told me this is the law and they can’t change their procedure. I talked to the head of the adoption unit and she wouldn’t budge either. I asked them what they do in cases where someone is bed ridden or homebound. They had the nerve to tell me that in those cases they arrange for a caregiver to get that person to a fingerprinting place. Are you kidding me???!!! Of course, I told them that this makes no sense and is plain STUPID. Well, the person helping me was super nice and felt awful about it. I told her that I know this isn’t her fault but it’s still STUPID. She agreed but said there’s nothing she can do. So the next step is to have the prints taken all over again. At least, I know I can let Grandmother sleep a little later this time. Gotta see the glass half full you know. AAARRRGGGHHHH!!!
Anyway, we got to the immigration office about 15 mins. early. The place didn’t open until 8am so people were lining up outside the door and I, being the person with no patience, was ready to go jump in line too. I had a 98-year old woman with me and I was NOT going to be last in line! Even though it was very cold, I contemplated wheeling Grandmother up there so we could secure our place in the line. My sensible side won over, however, and I figured that a good space in line wasn’t worth risking her getting a case of pneumonia.
Once they finally opened the doors, the line actually moved very quickly. People were there for different reasons so they were directed to different areas for processing. I wheeled Grandmother up there just as the line was dwindling at the door and the officer let us right in. After filling out our preliminary paperwork and waiting for a few minutes, we were called back to the fingerprinting area. The guy doing the fingerprints was super nice and took his time with Grandmother. She was pretty quiet but when he got to her left ring finger, she boldly told him to be careful with that finger. On that finger, she wears the now thin wedding band that my granddaddy put on her finger 76 years ago. He has since passed, but she has NEVER had that ring off of her finger since their wedding day. The fingerprinting guy was very sweet and told her how special that was that they had been married for 73 years.
Yesterday was actually a piece of cake. The nightmare part started today when I called to follow-up and was informed that Grandmother’s prints are “unclassifiable” which means they must be redone. Apparently, this happens with older people since their skin is thin and their hands are wrinkly. The procedure is that they will attempt to take the prints twice and if they are still unsuccessful the second time, they will allow her to do a sworn statement. Of course, I asked why we can’t just skip to the sworn statement part and the girl I talked to told me this is the law and they can’t change their procedure. I talked to the head of the adoption unit and she wouldn’t budge either. I asked them what they do in cases where someone is bed ridden or homebound. They had the nerve to tell me that in those cases they arrange for a caregiver to get that person to a fingerprinting place. Are you kidding me???!!! Of course, I told them that this makes no sense and is plain STUPID. Well, the person helping me was super nice and felt awful about it. I told her that I know this isn’t her fault but it’s still STUPID. She agreed but said there’s nothing she can do. So the next step is to have the prints taken all over again. At least, I know I can let Grandmother sleep a little later this time. Gotta see the glass half full you know. AAARRRGGGHHHH!!!
Wednesday, November 08, 2006
11/8 - Frustration Subsides, Blessings Emerge!
New information about our case has been slow to come and that’s been pretty frustrating. Our attorney has been so busy and stressed that she hasn’t taken the time to keep us updated. When we’ve attempted to ask for status, she has replied to say she’s been very busy and does not have time to explain what is happening. All Rob and I want at this point is the assurance that our case is getting the appropriate amount of attention. We don’t want our paperwork collecting dust on someone’s desk somewhere.
We finally sent our attorney a polite but very firm email to ask why our case is taking so long and to find out exactly what we are waiting on now. Other adoptive families are coming and going for their court dates, while we’re still sitting in limbo. We tried to explain to her that we simply need answers which will help us make certain decisions on our end. Some of her prior responses to our questions almost made it seem like we were bothering her. This was frustrating also because we were purposely making every attempt to limit our questions and emails so we don’t bombard her too much. Rob and I tried to remind ourselves that there is lots of room for misinterpretation in emails anyway and the language barrier doesn’t help. Still, it’s hard not to take certain comments personally at times.
Anyway, our email hit home and our attorney was very kind in her response. She basically apologized and confessed that she was hesitant about giving us any information because of the problems we experienced when we got our court dates assigned prematurely back in October. So instead she opted to tell us nothing, which only fueled our frustration. She said she only wants to give us “concrete” information. This time she told us that there is a court date scheduled next week to officially clear Kristine for international adoption. Well, why didn’t you tell us that before??!!! (whining here). At least now we know why we are waiting. That’s all we want. We appreciated her honesty and expressed to her how grateful we are for everything she’s doing for us. She truly is a good person at heart, just stressed.
Our attorney also suggested that we might want to consider hosting Kristine at Christmas. She can’t tell us whether we’ll be traveling before or after Christmas. As you can imagine, all of the fees associated with the adoption and hosting are adding up and we have to make our money last. There are so many “what if’s.” Rob and I had pretty much ruled out being able to afford hosting Kristine for Christmas. The thought of Olegs being here while she stayed in Latvia was tough to bear, but that’s just how it had to be. That is, until we received an email telling us that some donations had been made to Simple Obedience in our name to help with our hosting expenses. The total amounts donated have been enough to drop the hosting cost significantly. We can now afford to host Kristine too!! Happy tears started flowing when we got this news. God is SO good! Things like this don’t just happen. This was divine intervention at work here. If you are one of the ones who donated, please know that words just can’t express our gratitude for your generosity. We pray the Lord will bless you abundantly for your kindness!
We’re praying that by some miracle we’ll be able to travel to Latvia in early December so we can return before the hosting group comes. When we are in Latvia for our first court sessions, Kristine will need to stay with us so the Latvian social worker can make observation visits. If the timing of our travel & hosting dates doesn't initially work out exactly right, it looks like we’ll have the option of changing the dates of Kristine's plane ticket. Rob and I decided we're not gonna stress about it because there’s nothing we can do to change the timing of things. We are just trusting that everything will work out.
We finally sent our attorney a polite but very firm email to ask why our case is taking so long and to find out exactly what we are waiting on now. Other adoptive families are coming and going for their court dates, while we’re still sitting in limbo. We tried to explain to her that we simply need answers which will help us make certain decisions on our end. Some of her prior responses to our questions almost made it seem like we were bothering her. This was frustrating also because we were purposely making every attempt to limit our questions and emails so we don’t bombard her too much. Rob and I tried to remind ourselves that there is lots of room for misinterpretation in emails anyway and the language barrier doesn’t help. Still, it’s hard not to take certain comments personally at times.
Anyway, our email hit home and our attorney was very kind in her response. She basically apologized and confessed that she was hesitant about giving us any information because of the problems we experienced when we got our court dates assigned prematurely back in October. So instead she opted to tell us nothing, which only fueled our frustration. She said she only wants to give us “concrete” information. This time she told us that there is a court date scheduled next week to officially clear Kristine for international adoption. Well, why didn’t you tell us that before??!!! (whining here). At least now we know why we are waiting. That’s all we want. We appreciated her honesty and expressed to her how grateful we are for everything she’s doing for us. She truly is a good person at heart, just stressed.
Our attorney also suggested that we might want to consider hosting Kristine at Christmas. She can’t tell us whether we’ll be traveling before or after Christmas. As you can imagine, all of the fees associated with the adoption and hosting are adding up and we have to make our money last. There are so many “what if’s.” Rob and I had pretty much ruled out being able to afford hosting Kristine for Christmas. The thought of Olegs being here while she stayed in Latvia was tough to bear, but that’s just how it had to be. That is, until we received an email telling us that some donations had been made to Simple Obedience in our name to help with our hosting expenses. The total amounts donated have been enough to drop the hosting cost significantly. We can now afford to host Kristine too!! Happy tears started flowing when we got this news. God is SO good! Things like this don’t just happen. This was divine intervention at work here. If you are one of the ones who donated, please know that words just can’t express our gratitude for your generosity. We pray the Lord will bless you abundantly for your kindness!
We’re praying that by some miracle we’ll be able to travel to Latvia in early December so we can return before the hosting group comes. When we are in Latvia for our first court sessions, Kristine will need to stay with us so the Latvian social worker can make observation visits. If the timing of our travel & hosting dates doesn't initially work out exactly right, it looks like we’ll have the option of changing the dates of Kristine's plane ticket. Rob and I decided we're not gonna stress about it because there’s nothing we can do to change the timing of things. We are just trusting that everything will work out.
Tuesday, November 07, 2006
11/7 - We FINALLY talked to Olegs!
Today we called Olegs’ children’s home and were ecstatic to get Olegs on the phone. We got a little nervous when the person who answered the phone asked us to repeat what we said a couple of times. We were bracing for the moment they would disconnect us, but they didn’t. Finally they understood that we wanted Olegs so they hollered for him. He came to the phone right away and sounded so happy. Since so much time had passed since our last chat, it was important for us to let him know we haven’t forgotten about him. He had gotten the letter we sent him with some baseball cards, so he was happy. We’re thankful he’s at least getting our letters if we can’t always reach him on the phone. He still doesn’t know that he’s coming for a visit at Christmas. We have to wait for a few more details to be worked out before we can talk about it. He’ll be so excited when he finds out.
One of the other adoptive families is traveling to Latvia this week for their first court. They are taking a couple of small gifts to Olegs & Kristine for us. We also wrote the kids letters that were translated into Latvian by another hosting family’s son (thank you, Josh!!). We wanted to explain to the kids why we haven’t come to Latvia yet. Since the letters are in Latvian, we can be sure they’ll understand. We basically told them that we are still waiting for the Latvian government to give us permission, but that we will be there as soon as we can. It’s important to us that they understand what is happening.
One of the other adoptive families is traveling to Latvia this week for their first court. They are taking a couple of small gifts to Olegs & Kristine for us. We also wrote the kids letters that were translated into Latvian by another hosting family’s son (thank you, Josh!!). We wanted to explain to the kids why we haven’t come to Latvia yet. Since the letters are in Latvian, we can be sure they’ll understand. We basically told them that we are still waiting for the Latvian government to give us permission, but that we will be there as soon as we can. It’s important to us that they understand what is happening.
Wednesday, November 01, 2006
11/1 - More Latvian Phone Games
Today, we tried calling Olegs again and found ourselves playing a slightly different game with the children’s home staff this time. Today’s game was called “set the phone down and walk away.” Again, we called and asked for Olegs. The woman who answered the phone sounded like she was going to go look for him but of course we had no clue what she rattled off to us in Latvian. We were just so thankful that she didn’t hang up on us this time. It soon dawned on us that she simply set the phone down on the desk and went about her business. We could hear people coming and going, kids screaming and laughing, the office staff cutting up, etc. (all of this very entertaining by the way). So Rob and I were together on the line wondering if we should hang up or wait. We kept hearing footsteps coming closer to the phone but then they kept on going. I finally started whispering and then shouting, “Sveiki, Sveiki, Sveiki!” (“hello, hello, hello!”) hoping some kind soul would pick up the phone. After about 25 mins. of wasted calling card minutes we hung up.
Rob and I decided we’d better find out what’s up with Olegs before we try calling the children’s home again. We don't want these "games" to escalate further. We emailed Ilga and asked her to call the children's home to see what the deal was. She was able to find out that Olegs was away longer than we originally thought, so he wasn't there when we called. The children’s home staff was probably trying to tell us that when we called before, but of course we didn’t understand a word. I’m sure it drove them crazy when we kept calling back. Oh well. Ilga found out a good time for us to call Olegs so we will try again and hopefully talk to him next time.
Since we couldn’t reach Olegs, we tried calling Kristine again. We got through to her very easily and she was a totally different girl this time. She was giggly and playful. We told her how much it makes us happy to hear that she’s happy. Her friend, Agnese, was there visiting her today so they were typical giggly girls. Kristine put Agnese on the phone and we got to say “hi” to her. She said “yes” to everything so we don’t know how much she understood of what we said. We could probably have asked if she liked to eat dirt and she would’ve said “yes.” LOL! We later heard from Ilga that Kristine was just in a bad mood the last time we called and that’s why she was so quiet and sad. Another adoptive family will be traveling to Latvia next week to go to court for their future daughter, who is a friend of Kristine’s. Ilga said Kristine is down about that and is wondering why our case is taking so long. We were thankful that Ilga could call Kristine and explain everything to her in Latvian so she’ll understand exactly what is happening.
We hope things will start moving faster with our case. We will contact our attorney again next week. There were two other adoptive families in Latvia for court dates this week, so our attorney was pretty busy. We’re hoping things will calm down for her a little now that those families are heading back home. Maybe she’ll have time to focus on our case again. We just want to bring Kristine home by Christmas. We’ve still got time, so hopefully that will happen.
Rob and I decided we’d better find out what’s up with Olegs before we try calling the children’s home again. We don't want these "games" to escalate further. We emailed Ilga and asked her to call the children's home to see what the deal was. She was able to find out that Olegs was away longer than we originally thought, so he wasn't there when we called. The children’s home staff was probably trying to tell us that when we called before, but of course we didn’t understand a word. I’m sure it drove them crazy when we kept calling back. Oh well. Ilga found out a good time for us to call Olegs so we will try again and hopefully talk to him next time.
Since we couldn’t reach Olegs, we tried calling Kristine again. We got through to her very easily and she was a totally different girl this time. She was giggly and playful. We told her how much it makes us happy to hear that she’s happy. Her friend, Agnese, was there visiting her today so they were typical giggly girls. Kristine put Agnese on the phone and we got to say “hi” to her. She said “yes” to everything so we don’t know how much she understood of what we said. We could probably have asked if she liked to eat dirt and she would’ve said “yes.” LOL! We later heard from Ilga that Kristine was just in a bad mood the last time we called and that’s why she was so quiet and sad. Another adoptive family will be traveling to Latvia next week to go to court for their future daughter, who is a friend of Kristine’s. Ilga said Kristine is down about that and is wondering why our case is taking so long. We were thankful that Ilga could call Kristine and explain everything to her in Latvian so she’ll understand exactly what is happening.
We hope things will start moving faster with our case. We will contact our attorney again next week. There were two other adoptive families in Latvia for court dates this week, so our attorney was pretty busy. We’re hoping things will calm down for her a little now that those families are heading back home. Maybe she’ll have time to focus on our case again. We just want to bring Kristine home by Christmas. We’ve still got time, so hopefully that will happen.
Monday, October 30, 2006
10/30 - Some Good News, FINALLY!
I guess it can be good when things aren’t going your way because that means one of these days things have to turn around. Today was one of those days. This afternoon we got emails from both Ilga (the hosting chaperone) and Agnese (our attorney) to let us know that the first orphan court ruling is in…(drumroll please….). That court has denied Kristine’s relatives’ request for guardianship so they will not be allowed to take Kristine. HALLELUJAH!!! This clears the way for the process to officially match us with Kristine as her adoptive parents. It’s like finally the obstacles in our path are starting to crumble away. Talk about a HUGE weight being lifted. We had no idea how the court would rule, so we didn’t even want to start getting Kristine’s room ready just in case. Now we can go buy the pink paint to start fixing up her princess room.
Even though we've received word of the orphan court's ruling, our attorney later told us that our case is still moving very slowly. We’re not sure if that’s because of the slow court system or because our attorney is now working on so many cases at once and is too busy. We’ve done our best to be patient but now that things seem to be moving forward, we want to keep that momentum going. We really don’t know when to expect to travel. We could get an email any day with new court dates or it could be weeks more. We have no idea and our attorney has been slow with information since she’s so busy.
We are also excited to report that we will be allowed to host Olegs at Christmas. So that means if we travel to Latvia and bring Kristine back before then, we’ll have both kids with us at Christmas!! One possible problem would be if our travel dates are postponed until mid December. We would hate to be in Latvia getting Kristine while Olegs is here for Christmas. We’ll have to cross that bridge when it gets closer. We’re hoping that won’t be an issue. In the meantime, we’re just so excited that we’ll get to see our kids soon. YIPPEE!!
Even though we've received word of the orphan court's ruling, our attorney later told us that our case is still moving very slowly. We’re not sure if that’s because of the slow court system or because our attorney is now working on so many cases at once and is too busy. We’ve done our best to be patient but now that things seem to be moving forward, we want to keep that momentum going. We really don’t know when to expect to travel. We could get an email any day with new court dates or it could be weeks more. We have no idea and our attorney has been slow with information since she’s so busy.
We are also excited to report that we will be allowed to host Olegs at Christmas. So that means if we travel to Latvia and bring Kristine back before then, we’ll have both kids with us at Christmas!! One possible problem would be if our travel dates are postponed until mid December. We would hate to be in Latvia getting Kristine while Olegs is here for Christmas. We’ll have to cross that bridge when it gets closer. We’re hoping that won’t be an issue. In the meantime, we’re just so excited that we’ll get to see our kids soon. YIPPEE!!
10/30 - The Wait is Taking It's Toll
Today was a hard day because we talked to Kristine and she seemed so depressed. She was very quiet and when we asked her if she was okay, she just said “no” and that she was sad. Today she said she has no friends where she’s staying. We feel like she knows that other families from our hosting group are traveling to Latvia for their court dates now. She must be wondering why we haven’t come for her yet. We just have to keep telling her that we’re waiting for the Latvian government to give us permission to travel. We did our best (in our garbled Latvian) to reassure her that everything will be okay. All we can do is pray that it really will be okay.
In the meantime, we tried to call Olegs again because we heard he’d be back at the children’s home today. Lately when we call his children’s home, we’ve found ourselves playing this frustrating game with the staff there. The last couple of times we called and asked for Olegs, the person answering the phone would rattle off something in Latvian and promptly hang up on us. Of course, having no idea what they said and being the persistent person that I am, we kept calling back. It's funny at first but my blood starts to boil after having it happen over and over. LOL! After being hung up on about three times, we finally decided we’d better cool it and just try another day. We don’t want to get on the bad side of the staff, that’s for sure. It’s all these little things that compound the frustration. We just want to talk to our boy!
In the meantime, we tried to call Olegs again because we heard he’d be back at the children’s home today. Lately when we call his children’s home, we’ve found ourselves playing this frustrating game with the staff there. The last couple of times we called and asked for Olegs, the person answering the phone would rattle off something in Latvian and promptly hang up on us. Of course, having no idea what they said and being the persistent person that I am, we kept calling back. It's funny at first but my blood starts to boil after having it happen over and over. LOL! After being hung up on about three times, we finally decided we’d better cool it and just try another day. We don’t want to get on the bad side of the staff, that’s for sure. It’s all these little things that compound the frustration. We just want to talk to our boy!
Tuesday, October 24, 2006
10/24 - Grandmother has to be Fingerprinted!
I forgot to mention this in the last post…I got a call from a security officer at the U.S. Citizenship & Immigration office today informing me that my 98-year old Grandmother (she had a birthday last month) needs to be fingerprinted after all. This officer was working on our I-600A application and said everything is in order except this minor detail. If you’ll recall, my Grandmother lives with us and we were originally told that she did not need to be fingerprinted due to her age. It turns out that we were misinformed. UGGGHHH! The immigration authorities have to run fingerprints to confirm that a criminal is not living among us. Luckily, Rob and I passed with flying colors, but Grandmother is still a suspect. I only hope her prints haven’t worn off her fingers after all these years. LOL! I suppose that’s not possible, but one can wonder. A stiff breeze could blow my tiny Grandmother over but they have to rule out she’s not a criminal. WHATEVER! You can’t argue with the government.
So, as instructed by the officer, I sent off a letter requesting the earliest possible fingerprinting appointment. They are supposed to get back to me right away with a date & time. Grandmother actually thinks it’s funny and is looking forward to her upcoming trip to the immigration office. She reminded me that I have no idea what she does all day while we’re at work. She could be up to all kinds of criminal activity for all we know. She’s a hoot!!
So, as instructed by the officer, I sent off a letter requesting the earliest possible fingerprinting appointment. They are supposed to get back to me right away with a date & time. Grandmother actually thinks it’s funny and is looking forward to her upcoming trip to the immigration office. She reminded me that I have no idea what she does all day while we’re at work. She could be up to all kinds of criminal activity for all we know. She’s a hoot!!
10/24 - Being Patient Is Tough!
We’re still waiting to hear the results of the first court hearing for Kristine’s case and have heard little since we were originally told we’d have to wait. Our attorney is now working on many adoption cases so she’s very busy and it seems at times that her nerves are worn thin as well. She is also expecting a baby in a couple of months, so she may not be feeling well either. Rob and I couldn’t help but get a little annoyed when we emailed her a couple of questions about our case and she replied that she’s not an “information office.” We just have to remind ourselves that there is a language barrier and that just might have been her way of saying she didn’t know the answers to our questions. We’re not going to take anything personally. We know she is doing what she can to help us. It’s just frustrating because it almost feels like our case has gotten pushed aside and maybe it has only because there’s nothing anyone can do right now until the first orphan court in Kristine's relatives' region has ruled on her case.
We're trying to stay positive while we wait and to focus on the good side of things. We’re able to live vicariously through the experiences of the other families who are traveling now. They've been able to share some great information with us about their trips to Latvia. It will only help us to be as prepared as possible when our turn comes. One family who is already home from their first trip got to bring their little girl home to stay with them in the U.S. between court visits. We had planned to ask the court to let us do that with Kristine so that gives us hope that we will be able to bring her home after our first trip as well. Our dream is to have Kristine with us by Christmas. We’ve also requested to have Olegs come for a visit again during the Christmas hosting so there is a chance we’ll have both kids with us for Christmas. We’re trying not to get our hopes up too high just in case it doesn’t happen though.
We talked to Kristine this past weekend and she sounded great and was acting silly. She was giggling and chomping on an apple the whole time. Down the road we’ll have to explain to her that it isn’t polite to talk with your mouth full but that’s for another day. LOL! Right now, we'd give anything to have her here spilling her drinks at the table and talking with her mouth full. LOL! She asked us again when we’re coming to Latvia and we told her we’re still waiting for the government to give us permission. We have been told that she may be going back to her children’s home soon. I hope that happens because she really misses her friends there. We're just thankful we've been able to call her regularly while she's been at this other facility.
We haven’t talked to Olegs yet this week because he’s been away each time we’ve called. After calling a few times, we finally got someone on the phone who spoke English and explained that Olegs is away for the week and will be back next Monday. It turns out that this week is the kids’ autumn break so they are out of school. We will look forward to talking to Olegs when he gets back.
It was at the beginning of this month that our attorney told us we'd have to wait a month to hear how the first court rules on our case. The month is now almost up so we hope to hear something very soon. Rob and I will be able to breathe a sigh of relief once we get official word that the first court has ruled in our favor. In the meantime, about all we can do is wait and pray.
We're trying to stay positive while we wait and to focus on the good side of things. We’re able to live vicariously through the experiences of the other families who are traveling now. They've been able to share some great information with us about their trips to Latvia. It will only help us to be as prepared as possible when our turn comes. One family who is already home from their first trip got to bring their little girl home to stay with them in the U.S. between court visits. We had planned to ask the court to let us do that with Kristine so that gives us hope that we will be able to bring her home after our first trip as well. Our dream is to have Kristine with us by Christmas. We’ve also requested to have Olegs come for a visit again during the Christmas hosting so there is a chance we’ll have both kids with us for Christmas. We’re trying not to get our hopes up too high just in case it doesn’t happen though.
We talked to Kristine this past weekend and she sounded great and was acting silly. She was giggling and chomping on an apple the whole time. Down the road we’ll have to explain to her that it isn’t polite to talk with your mouth full but that’s for another day. LOL! Right now, we'd give anything to have her here spilling her drinks at the table and talking with her mouth full. LOL! She asked us again when we’re coming to Latvia and we told her we’re still waiting for the government to give us permission. We have been told that she may be going back to her children’s home soon. I hope that happens because she really misses her friends there. We're just thankful we've been able to call her regularly while she's been at this other facility.
We haven’t talked to Olegs yet this week because he’s been away each time we’ve called. After calling a few times, we finally got someone on the phone who spoke English and explained that Olegs is away for the week and will be back next Monday. It turns out that this week is the kids’ autumn break so they are out of school. We will look forward to talking to Olegs when he gets back.
It was at the beginning of this month that our attorney told us we'd have to wait a month to hear how the first court rules on our case. The month is now almost up so we hope to hear something very soon. Rob and I will be able to breathe a sigh of relief once we get official word that the first court has ruled in our favor. In the meantime, about all we can do is wait and pray.
Tuesday, October 17, 2006
10/17 - The Wait Continues!
Even though it’s supposed to be a few more weeks before we’ll hear news of the first orphan court’s ruling for Kristine’s case, we are constantly checking email now hoping to hear something sooner. One thing that helps us get through the wait is the fact that we’re able to talk to the kids. We found out that Kristine was moved to a new place last week so she could get some more individualized attention right now. She’s okay but just has a lot of issues to sort out. Of course, upon hearing the news that she was moved, we wanted to call her right away and make sure she was alright. Thankfully, our attorney got the new number for us. We were a little nervous to call this new place (it’s so intimidating not being able to speak their language). We called and asked for Kristine, throwing in a couple of Latvian greetings in the process. Next thing we knew the person on the other end started speaking English to us. WHEW!! This nice lady gave us a direct number to call to get directly to Kristine so we called and got her right away. This was last week and Kristine had just gotten to this new place. She was a little down and asked when we are coming to Latvia. We have to keep telling her that we’re waiting for the government to give us permission, all the while praying that they WILL give us that permission. We reminded her to pray and told her that we love her and miss her so much.
We talked to Kristine again this past Sunday. It was a little more challenging to get through this time. I don’t know if the lady who answered the phone just didn’t like us or if Kristine wasn’t there. It was pretty comical. When we called and asked for Kristine, the woman simply said “NO” and hung up. So being the persistent person I am, I called right back and asked for Kristine again. The woman rattled off something in Latvian and hung up on us again. So we called a 3rd time but this time there was no answer. Obviously, they weren’t picking up on purpose. So the whole time Rob and I were asking ourselves, What was up with that? WHATEVER! We called back a couple of hours later and got a really nice woman who got Kristine to the phone right away. Kristine was much more cheerful on Sunday. She said she was happy and actually liked it at the new place. She had made some new friends. That put our minds at ease to hear that she is okay and that the people are nice there.
We couldn’t get Olegs on Sunday (no answer at his children’s home) so we tried again on Monday. It’s hilarious when we call there because the woman who answers that phone yells at the top of her lungs for Olegs to come. We could tell she was walking down the hall hollering for him because the volume got lower and lower until finally we heard footsteps running to the phone. That was our boy! He was in rare form when we talked to him this time. He had friends with him and they were picking on him and making noises into the phone (typical annoying kid stuff). He kept cracking up and it was the most wonderful sound to hear that laugh we love. At one point, Olegs’ friend yelled something into the phone and then they hung up on us. We called right back and Olegs was yelling at this particular friend (who was a girl by the way) to tell her to leave him alone. Of course, we asked if that was his “girlfriend” and he said “NOOOOOOOOO!!” We had a good visit and he said he was happy and doing good.
Each day we remind ourselves that we’re one day closer to traveling. We know that we’ll look back on this after it’s all over and the long, agonizing wait will seem so insignificant once we have our kids home. Doesn’t make the wait any easier NOW though!
We talked to Kristine again this past Sunday. It was a little more challenging to get through this time. I don’t know if the lady who answered the phone just didn’t like us or if Kristine wasn’t there. It was pretty comical. When we called and asked for Kristine, the woman simply said “NO” and hung up. So being the persistent person I am, I called right back and asked for Kristine again. The woman rattled off something in Latvian and hung up on us again. So we called a 3rd time but this time there was no answer. Obviously, they weren’t picking up on purpose. So the whole time Rob and I were asking ourselves, What was up with that? WHATEVER! We called back a couple of hours later and got a really nice woman who got Kristine to the phone right away. Kristine was much more cheerful on Sunday. She said she was happy and actually liked it at the new place. She had made some new friends. That put our minds at ease to hear that she is okay and that the people are nice there.
We couldn’t get Olegs on Sunday (no answer at his children’s home) so we tried again on Monday. It’s hilarious when we call there because the woman who answers that phone yells at the top of her lungs for Olegs to come. We could tell she was walking down the hall hollering for him because the volume got lower and lower until finally we heard footsteps running to the phone. That was our boy! He was in rare form when we talked to him this time. He had friends with him and they were picking on him and making noises into the phone (typical annoying kid stuff). He kept cracking up and it was the most wonderful sound to hear that laugh we love. At one point, Olegs’ friend yelled something into the phone and then they hung up on us. We called right back and Olegs was yelling at this particular friend (who was a girl by the way) to tell her to leave him alone. Of course, we asked if that was his “girlfriend” and he said “NOOOOOOOOO!!” We had a good visit and he said he was happy and doing good.
Each day we remind ourselves that we’re one day closer to traveling. We know that we’ll look back on this after it’s all over and the long, agonizing wait will seem so insignificant once we have our kids home. Doesn’t make the wait any easier NOW though!
Sunday, October 08, 2006
10/8 - Lighthearted talk with kids
This morning we made our normal weekly call to the children’s home and asked for Olegs first this time. We looked up more Latvian words so we could talk to him better. He says “yes” to everything, whether he understands us or not, so we have to speak more Latvian with him so he can really understand. We asked about the weather and if it was snowing. He said “no” but it was rainy. He said he was happy and having a good day. We had to talk loud at times. In the background, we could hear someone screaming and gunshots going off!! Turns out they were watching some violent movie and had the volume turned up way loud. We talked with Olegs a little more about his school and updated him on what’s going on here before we asked him to get Kristine. We signed off by telling Olegs how much we love him and miss him and then said, “We talk to Kristine now. You get Kristine?” He said “yes” and promptly hung up on us! We definitely need to work on our Latvian! LOL! Rob and I chuckled and then called right back. One of the older boys answered the phone and when we asked for Kristine, we could hear Olegs in the background going “OOOYYYYY” which is what he says when he realizes he misunderstood something.
We had a good chat with Kristine too. She was happy and very chatty. She wanted to know when we are coming to Latvia now and we told her we’re waiting for the Latvian government to give us permission. We just told her to pray that it will be soon and we will pray too. We talked about Halloween coming up soon in America and asked if they celebrate Halloween in Latvia. Kristine got very excited and said “oh yes, my costume is witch.” The kids in Latvia also get lots of candy. Kristine always tells us how much she loves dance, so we normally tell her she should be a ballerina. She can't stand it when we say that. She says, “I no like ballerina, I only like hip-hop dance.” We joked that she could be a hip-hop ballerina and dress up like a hip-hop ballerina for Halloween…she’d be the first and only one. She had a good laugh, but I’m sure she must think we’re crazy at times. HA!
Throughout the conversation, that dang TV seemed to get louder and louder…more ladies screaming and people being shot! We asked Kristine if the children at her children’s home had hearing problems because their TV is so loud. She laughed and said “no.” She’s in for a big reality check when she gets here…mom and dad will be controlling the remote and her TV watching will be censored. We’ll wait to spring that on her when she gets here.
All in all it was great to have a light-hearted conversation with the kids and to have a relaxing weekend this weekend. The events of the last couple of weeks had definitely added some stress but that has since subsided somewhat. We'll continue to await the various court rulings and try to keep busy in the meantime. We have every reason to believe the rulings will be in our favor so we're focusing on that and remaining positive.
We had a good chat with Kristine too. She was happy and very chatty. She wanted to know when we are coming to Latvia now and we told her we’re waiting for the Latvian government to give us permission. We just told her to pray that it will be soon and we will pray too. We talked about Halloween coming up soon in America and asked if they celebrate Halloween in Latvia. Kristine got very excited and said “oh yes, my costume is witch.” The kids in Latvia also get lots of candy. Kristine always tells us how much she loves dance, so we normally tell her she should be a ballerina. She can't stand it when we say that. She says, “I no like ballerina, I only like hip-hop dance.” We joked that she could be a hip-hop ballerina and dress up like a hip-hop ballerina for Halloween…she’d be the first and only one. She had a good laugh, but I’m sure she must think we’re crazy at times. HA!
Throughout the conversation, that dang TV seemed to get louder and louder…more ladies screaming and people being shot! We asked Kristine if the children at her children’s home had hearing problems because their TV is so loud. She laughed and said “no.” She’s in for a big reality check when she gets here…mom and dad will be controlling the remote and her TV watching will be censored. We’ll wait to spring that on her when she gets here.
All in all it was great to have a light-hearted conversation with the kids and to have a relaxing weekend this weekend. The events of the last couple of weeks had definitely added some stress but that has since subsided somewhat. We'll continue to await the various court rulings and try to keep busy in the meantime. We have every reason to believe the rulings will be in our favor so we're focusing on that and remaining positive.
Thursday, October 05, 2006
10/5 - Hurry Up & Wait!
This week we found out that the orphan court in the district where Kristine’s relatives live must now rule on the issue of us adopting Kristine. Once that ruling is in, the orphan court in Riga will be able to rule on the matter. Our attorney says it will take about a month to get the first ruling. We’re not sure how long after that we’ll get the second ruling. So now we have to sit tight and wait. It’s a little frustrating considering we were supposed to be leaving for Latvia tomorrow! :-( However, now that we know we won’t be traveling until next month sometime (hopefully), we can put this all aside for a little while and relax a bit. All the ups and downs were making us nuts!
We’re told that the orphan court rulings will most likely be in our favor but you just never know when there are foreign governments involved. In Latvia, the law states that preference is given to Latvian families in adoption cases. Luckily, the child’s wishes carry a lot of weight so that’s in our favor. Kristine has made it clear to everyone that she thinks of us as her family and wants to be with us. The relatives are strangers to her. This all just reminds us that the whole matter is in God’s hands.
One bit of good news we got was that Kristine didn’t have to be moved to another children’s home (at least not right now). We had first been told that they already moved her but then the next day we found out that they didn’t move her after all. We were able to talk to her on Tuesday morning and she sounded so good. This time she said she was happy, much different from the last time we talked when she said she wasn’t okay.
As you can imagine, we were also concerned about the money we could potentially be losing now that we have to change our flights and hotel. Thankfully, I was able to call the hotel in London (we had an overnight layover on the return trip) and they agreed to cancel our reservation and not charge us. This was big because we had booked a non-cancelable, non-refundable room to get the cheapest rate. We needed a hotel at the airport and those are very expensive so this saved us about $250. WHEW!! We had booked our airfare through an online travel agency so they canceled our reservation for us and will apply a partial credit when we book our next trip. We won’t know until we make our new flight arrangements how much we’ll lose on the flights. Delta charges $200 per ticket change fee for international flights and then we’ll have to pay the difference in fare, plus a small travel agency fee for ticket processing.
When the time comes to book our new flights, I’ll just explain our situation again and hopefully I’ll get a compassionate person on the line who can adjust the fees. Another good thing is that we didn't lose money on the apartment we reserved in Riga. We hadn't paid any money for that yet so they simply canceled our reservation.
So now we wait and pray.
We’re told that the orphan court rulings will most likely be in our favor but you just never know when there are foreign governments involved. In Latvia, the law states that preference is given to Latvian families in adoption cases. Luckily, the child’s wishes carry a lot of weight so that’s in our favor. Kristine has made it clear to everyone that she thinks of us as her family and wants to be with us. The relatives are strangers to her. This all just reminds us that the whole matter is in God’s hands.
One bit of good news we got was that Kristine didn’t have to be moved to another children’s home (at least not right now). We had first been told that they already moved her but then the next day we found out that they didn’t move her after all. We were able to talk to her on Tuesday morning and she sounded so good. This time she said she was happy, much different from the last time we talked when she said she wasn’t okay.
As you can imagine, we were also concerned about the money we could potentially be losing now that we have to change our flights and hotel. Thankfully, I was able to call the hotel in London (we had an overnight layover on the return trip) and they agreed to cancel our reservation and not charge us. This was big because we had booked a non-cancelable, non-refundable room to get the cheapest rate. We needed a hotel at the airport and those are very expensive so this saved us about $250. WHEW!! We had booked our airfare through an online travel agency so they canceled our reservation for us and will apply a partial credit when we book our next trip. We won’t know until we make our new flight arrangements how much we’ll lose on the flights. Delta charges $200 per ticket change fee for international flights and then we’ll have to pay the difference in fare, plus a small travel agency fee for ticket processing.
When the time comes to book our new flights, I’ll just explain our situation again and hopefully I’ll get a compassionate person on the line who can adjust the fees. Another good thing is that we didn't lose money on the apartment we reserved in Riga. We hadn't paid any money for that yet so they simply canceled our reservation.
So now we wait and pray.
Friday, September 29, 2006
9/29 - Change in Plans
Sorry it’s been so long since the last update. We’ve had a lot going on lately. Let’s see…where to begin.
Well, last week we got an email from our attorney telling us that some of Kristine’s relatives (an Aunt and Uncle) have come forward and would like to take her to live with them. For international adoptions, I think a notice is published in the paper or something so that family can be notified of adoption proceedings. Kristine’s relatives don’t want to adopt her but instead want to be her guardians. We are not overly concerned that this will stop the process, but it will definitely delay it a couple of weeks. We already know that Kristine doesn’t want to live with these relatives. They have not seen her since she was 3-years old and have not been a part of her life. Kristine has told the children’s home director and the social worker that she already thinks of us as her family.
We have been told that it is unlikely that the court will side with the relatives but you never know. Today, there was a meeting among Kristine, her relatives, the children’s home director and social worker. Kristine once again told them she doesn’t want to go with the relatives. Now it’s up to the children’s home to pass that information to the Orphan Court so that they can rule on it. We are currently awaiting the ruling of the Orphan Court. If the ruling is in our favor (which hopefully it will be), then the Ministry of Adoption will officially “match” us with Kristine and we can move forward and be assigned court dates.
Our original court dates of Oct. 9th and 23rd were assigned to us prematurely, before the international clearance for adoption had been completed. We expect our new court dates to be around the end of October. However, we are waiting until we know for sure before we make our new travel arrangements. The frustrating part of this is that we’ll lose money on the flights and hotel we already booked. We’re trying not to dwell on it though and are just dealing with things as they come up.
Kristine is going through a rough time right now so please keep her and all of us in your prayers. We found out today that she will be moved to another children’s home next week to stay until we get there. I don’t want to get into the details here but I’ll just say the situation at her children’s home became unsafe for her. Because of this, it may be possible that the court will allow us to bring her home to stay with us between court sessions. Another family we know of was able to do this because their child had special circumstances as well. It may turn out to be a good thing because if this happens, we’d have her home for Thanksgiving and Christmas! We won’t know until we’re there for court whether or not they’ll allow us to bring her back. We’ll just have to see how it plays out.
We talked to Kristine a couple of days ago and and asked her if she was okay. It broke our hearts when she said “no”. We could tell she wanted to say more but she hesitated because there were people around listening to her conversation. All we can do is remind her how much we love her and miss her. She always replies, “me too.” It has to be so hard being the child and having all of these adults meeting to discuss your fate. I don’t know how much they tell her about what’s going on. We just want her to know we’re doing everything we can to bring her home.
We found out that when we’re in Latvia for Kristine’s court that we won’t be able to have Olegs stay with us after all. Now that Kristine is staying in a different place and both kids have to go to school each day, the orphan court and director want us to focus on Kristine right now. We can still spend time with Olegs after school each day but he just can’t stay with us. We still don’t know whether it will be possible for Olegs to be cleared for adoption, so we have to be careful not to make it seem like we’re adopting him right now. He knows we want to adopt him but his situation is more complicated. When we get there, we want to make sure he understands exactly what is going on. When we’re in Latvia, we hope to find out more details about the steps they’ve taken so far in getting him cleared for adoption.
It’s been a little bit of an emotional roller coaster lately. We have no doubt that when everything is said and done we’ll be parents. It’s just hard being so far away and depending on others to do their part to make things happen. It just reminds us to rely on our faith. We have to believe that God wouldn’t bring us this far to let us down now.
Well, last week we got an email from our attorney telling us that some of Kristine’s relatives (an Aunt and Uncle) have come forward and would like to take her to live with them. For international adoptions, I think a notice is published in the paper or something so that family can be notified of adoption proceedings. Kristine’s relatives don’t want to adopt her but instead want to be her guardians. We are not overly concerned that this will stop the process, but it will definitely delay it a couple of weeks. We already know that Kristine doesn’t want to live with these relatives. They have not seen her since she was 3-years old and have not been a part of her life. Kristine has told the children’s home director and the social worker that she already thinks of us as her family.
We have been told that it is unlikely that the court will side with the relatives but you never know. Today, there was a meeting among Kristine, her relatives, the children’s home director and social worker. Kristine once again told them she doesn’t want to go with the relatives. Now it’s up to the children’s home to pass that information to the Orphan Court so that they can rule on it. We are currently awaiting the ruling of the Orphan Court. If the ruling is in our favor (which hopefully it will be), then the Ministry of Adoption will officially “match” us with Kristine and we can move forward and be assigned court dates.
Our original court dates of Oct. 9th and 23rd were assigned to us prematurely, before the international clearance for adoption had been completed. We expect our new court dates to be around the end of October. However, we are waiting until we know for sure before we make our new travel arrangements. The frustrating part of this is that we’ll lose money on the flights and hotel we already booked. We’re trying not to dwell on it though and are just dealing with things as they come up.
Kristine is going through a rough time right now so please keep her and all of us in your prayers. We found out today that she will be moved to another children’s home next week to stay until we get there. I don’t want to get into the details here but I’ll just say the situation at her children’s home became unsafe for her. Because of this, it may be possible that the court will allow us to bring her home to stay with us between court sessions. Another family we know of was able to do this because their child had special circumstances as well. It may turn out to be a good thing because if this happens, we’d have her home for Thanksgiving and Christmas! We won’t know until we’re there for court whether or not they’ll allow us to bring her back. We’ll just have to see how it plays out.
We talked to Kristine a couple of days ago and and asked her if she was okay. It broke our hearts when she said “no”. We could tell she wanted to say more but she hesitated because there were people around listening to her conversation. All we can do is remind her how much we love her and miss her. She always replies, “me too.” It has to be so hard being the child and having all of these adults meeting to discuss your fate. I don’t know how much they tell her about what’s going on. We just want her to know we’re doing everything we can to bring her home.
We found out that when we’re in Latvia for Kristine’s court that we won’t be able to have Olegs stay with us after all. Now that Kristine is staying in a different place and both kids have to go to school each day, the orphan court and director want us to focus on Kristine right now. We can still spend time with Olegs after school each day but he just can’t stay with us. We still don’t know whether it will be possible for Olegs to be cleared for adoption, so we have to be careful not to make it seem like we’re adopting him right now. He knows we want to adopt him but his situation is more complicated. When we get there, we want to make sure he understands exactly what is going on. When we’re in Latvia, we hope to find out more details about the steps they’ve taken so far in getting him cleared for adoption.
It’s been a little bit of an emotional roller coaster lately. We have no doubt that when everything is said and done we’ll be parents. It’s just hard being so far away and depending on others to do their part to make things happen. It just reminds us to rely on our faith. We have to believe that God wouldn’t bring us this far to let us down now.
Monday, September 18, 2006
9/18 - The Kids Know We're Coming!
We called and talked to Kristine yesterday. Once again Olegs wasn’t available (or at least that’s what Kristine said anyway). Whenever we want to talk to Olegs it seems like she always puts her friend Agnese on the phone instead and reminds us how Agnese needs a family too. We always love talking to Agnese and we tell Kristine that we’re praying for Agnese to find a family. We’re really hoping that someone will be able to host Agnese and her younger sister at Christmas. Maybe it might lead to her adoption. Who knows? I know it will be hard for Kristine to leave her friends when she comes to live with us. We’ll just have to do our best to help her keep in touch by writing and calling.
We told Kristine that we would be coming to Riga for our court date on October 9th and she said she already knew, of course. It’s funny how news travels so fast. We got to talk to Olegs today since we didn’t get him yesterday. He had also heard about us coming. This time when we called, we only asked to speak with him. It was funny…when we called, our friend Ilga just happened to answer the phone at the children’s home. She was there meeting with the children’s home director (also named Ilga). The director got busy so Ilga answered her phone for her. Before I knew it was Ilga, I said my usual “Labdien, Olegs Ludzu” and she said “Who is this?” It freaked us out at first because we didn’t expect the person on the other end to speak English. Then she told us it was her and we had a good chat. We haven’t spoken to her since she went back to Latvia, only through emails.
The timing was perfect in talking to Ilga because she had a couple of questions for us about the type of flat we will need for our stay there. She’s helping us locate a place to stay while we’re there. We’ll have both children staying with us and a court social worker will be making visits so it needs to be an acceptable place to the court.
We got a decent deal on plane tickets last week. The airfare was just under $2,000 for both of us which is good believe it or not. Ilga is having the court check out a place she’s picked out for us to stay so that should be confirmed soon too. Things are falling into place. We still have many things to get worked out before we travel though…very important things like how do I make sure my hair dryer and curling iron will work in Latvia? LOL! I’ll probably end up buying new ones in Latvia so they’ll be compatible. That’s just one of the million items on my list! Then there are more important things like figuring out who we should take gifts to. Of course, we feel we should give something to the children’s home director and her staff. Plus, we want to bring some games and candy for the rest of the children there too. We’ve gotten some advice from other adoptive parents based on what they gave as gifts so we’ll be working on our gift list.
Time seems like it’s moving like a freight train these days. It’s starting to hit us that we’re leaving two weeks from Friday. YIKES!!
We told Kristine that we would be coming to Riga for our court date on October 9th and she said she already knew, of course. It’s funny how news travels so fast. We got to talk to Olegs today since we didn’t get him yesterday. He had also heard about us coming. This time when we called, we only asked to speak with him. It was funny…when we called, our friend Ilga just happened to answer the phone at the children’s home. She was there meeting with the children’s home director (also named Ilga). The director got busy so Ilga answered her phone for her. Before I knew it was Ilga, I said my usual “Labdien, Olegs Ludzu” and she said “Who is this?” It freaked us out at first because we didn’t expect the person on the other end to speak English. Then she told us it was her and we had a good chat. We haven’t spoken to her since she went back to Latvia, only through emails.
The timing was perfect in talking to Ilga because she had a couple of questions for us about the type of flat we will need for our stay there. She’s helping us locate a place to stay while we’re there. We’ll have both children staying with us and a court social worker will be making visits so it needs to be an acceptable place to the court.
We got a decent deal on plane tickets last week. The airfare was just under $2,000 for both of us which is good believe it or not. Ilga is having the court check out a place she’s picked out for us to stay so that should be confirmed soon too. Things are falling into place. We still have many things to get worked out before we travel though…very important things like how do I make sure my hair dryer and curling iron will work in Latvia? LOL! I’ll probably end up buying new ones in Latvia so they’ll be compatible. That’s just one of the million items on my list! Then there are more important things like figuring out who we should take gifts to. Of course, we feel we should give something to the children’s home director and her staff. Plus, we want to bring some games and candy for the rest of the children there too. We’ve gotten some advice from other adoptive parents based on what they gave as gifts so we’ll be working on our gift list.
Time seems like it’s moving like a freight train these days. It’s starting to hit us that we’re leaving two weeks from Friday. YIKES!!
Friday, September 15, 2006
9/15 - We Got Our First Court Dates!!!
We got an email from our attorney late yesterday afternoon telling us that we have been assigned court dates in Latvia on 10/9 and 10/23. That means we’re ready to travel to Latvia!!!! YIKES!!! During this first visit to Latvia we will be required to live in an apartment in Riga and have Kristine stay with us there for two weeks. At the first court date on 10/9 we will be granted temporary custody of Kristine. A social worker will then visit us at our apartment approximately three times to observe our “bonding.” Obviously, we’ve already bonded since she stayed with us at our home so this is just a formality. Since we are only adopting Kristine now, she is the only child we are required to have stay with us. However, we requested and got permission for Olegs to stay with us too so we can spend more time with him and he can be a part of the whole process.
On the second court date on 10/23 I think the social worker will give her recommendations to the court and they will hopefully approve us to move forward. Not sure if we’ll find out what our next court date will be at that point or if we’ll have to wait to find out. It’s so hard to believe this is finally happening. We’ve spent all this time waiting that it just doesn’t seem real that we’re gonna be traveling soon.
One thing we’re a little nervous about is that we have to take both children to school every morning and they both go to different schools. The last thing we need is to get lost and get them to school late or something. UUGGGHHH! I think Rob and I have decided the easiest thing to do will be to get the children back to the children’s home each morning so they can go to school with their friends. Then we can pick them up there in the afternoon. Our friend Ilga is looking for a flat (apartment) for us to stay in near the children’s home. We’re trying to avoid renting a car so hopefully things will work out so we can use the public transportation to go back and forth. Hopefully, we can figure out the schedules and routes so we don't get on a bus that takes us in the wrong direction. It’s all so intimidating now but I know things will fall into place when we get there.
So we'll be leaving for Latvia on 10/6 and returning on 10/24. We can’t wait to tell the kids the news when we call them this weekend. They may even already know since word gets around fast. We’re just so excited to be able to tell them that we have a definite date that we’ll be coming to see them. YIPPEE!!
On the second court date on 10/23 I think the social worker will give her recommendations to the court and they will hopefully approve us to move forward. Not sure if we’ll find out what our next court date will be at that point or if we’ll have to wait to find out. It’s so hard to believe this is finally happening. We’ve spent all this time waiting that it just doesn’t seem real that we’re gonna be traveling soon.
One thing we’re a little nervous about is that we have to take both children to school every morning and they both go to different schools. The last thing we need is to get lost and get them to school late or something. UUGGGHHH! I think Rob and I have decided the easiest thing to do will be to get the children back to the children’s home each morning so they can go to school with their friends. Then we can pick them up there in the afternoon. Our friend Ilga is looking for a flat (apartment) for us to stay in near the children’s home. We’re trying to avoid renting a car so hopefully things will work out so we can use the public transportation to go back and forth. Hopefully, we can figure out the schedules and routes so we don't get on a bus that takes us in the wrong direction. It’s all so intimidating now but I know things will fall into place when we get there.
So we'll be leaving for Latvia on 10/6 and returning on 10/24. We can’t wait to tell the kids the news when we call them this weekend. They may even already know since word gets around fast. We’re just so excited to be able to tell them that we have a definite date that we’ll be coming to see them. YIPPEE!!
Monday, September 11, 2006
9/11 - All is Fine with Olegs
Rob and I had decided we would try calling Olegs again today and see if we could get him on the phone. We had to know if he was mad at us. LOL! Plus we just wanted to hear his voice and tell him how much we love him and miss him. We tried calling around 10am which would be 5pm in Latvia. We called and got through to someone in the office who yelled for Olegs to get on the phone. It’s so funny…when they yell for the kids to come to the phone they yell at the top of their lungs in this big powerful BOOMING voice. I’d get my behind to the phone too, and pronto, if they yelled for me like that!! LOL!
Olegs got on the phone and said “yes?”. We told him it was Robert and Kathleen and he said “aaahhh, yes”. He obviously wasn’t mad and I was so relieved. We told him how much we love him and miss him and he said “me too.” Those two little words just melted our hearts. Rob got to tell me “I told you so.” Looks like he was right and that Olegs was just caught up in his game and didn’t want to come to the phone at that moment. We asked Olegs what he was doing and he said “nothing.” Come to think of it, I remember giving that same answer ("nothing") to my mom when she asked me what I did at school. Must be a kid thing. He said he likes school. We told him we’ll be coming to Riga to see him soon and he said he’s happy.
We heard Kristine approaching in the background so we told Olegs we’d call next Sunday and he handed the phone to Kristine. She was wondering why we were calling again and asked what we were doing. We told her that we were both at work (Rob and I were conferenced together so we could call together). We said that we called because we didn’t get Olegs yesterday but now we’re extra happy we got to talk to her too. She said she’s happy too which was sweet. It was a great call and it felt so good to talk to both of them again.
Olegs got on the phone and said “yes?”. We told him it was Robert and Kathleen and he said “aaahhh, yes”. He obviously wasn’t mad and I was so relieved. We told him how much we love him and miss him and he said “me too.” Those two little words just melted our hearts. Rob got to tell me “I told you so.” Looks like he was right and that Olegs was just caught up in his game and didn’t want to come to the phone at that moment. We asked Olegs what he was doing and he said “nothing.” Come to think of it, I remember giving that same answer ("nothing") to my mom when she asked me what I did at school. Must be a kid thing. He said he likes school. We told him we’ll be coming to Riga to see him soon and he said he’s happy.
We heard Kristine approaching in the background so we told Olegs we’d call next Sunday and he handed the phone to Kristine. She was wondering why we were calling again and asked what we were doing. We told her that we were both at work (Rob and I were conferenced together so we could call together). We said that we called because we didn’t get Olegs yesterday but now we’re extra happy we got to talk to her too. She said she’s happy too which was sweet. It was a great call and it felt so good to talk to both of them again.
Sunday, September 10, 2006
9/10 - Weekly Chat with the Kids
Today we called the kids at our usual time of 9am and the phone rang with no answer at the children’s home. It’s a little frustrating because we told the kids we would be calling at that time but for whatever reason no one answered. We have to remember that they are 11-years old and probably don’t understand how big a deal it is for us to call from the U.S. to Latvia. We were happy when we called back about 45 mins. later and got Kristine on the phone. We had the usual conversation about the weather (it wasn’t raining this time). Once again, Kristine said she doesn’t like school. We asked her what she was doing today and she just said “nothing.” So we said, “you just sit and do nothing all day?” She laughed and said, “NOOOOO”. She finally admitted to playing a little bit. There was too much giggling and commotion going on in the background for them to be doing nothing. Her friend Agnese was with her again. I guess the highlight of the call for Kristine was when Maverick (our cat) got on the phone and said "Sveiki" ("hello" in Latvian) to her. Okay, I'll confess that Maverick got a little squeeze from Robert before he let out his meow greeting (no, he didn't squeeze him hard, so don't write us angry letters). LOL! Kristine thought it was hilarious. She laughed and laughed and Rob and I did too!!
We asked Kristine where Olegs was and she said he was playing football. We told her to go get him and could hear her screaming for him as she went down the hallway. The girl has got healthy lungs for sure. LOL! She came back a few seconds later and said Olegs couldn’t come to the phone. We talked to Kristine a little more and she asked us if we wanted to talk to Agnese. So we talked to Agnese for a few minutes and asked her a few things. She answered “yes” to everything so we don’t know if she understood what we were saying or not. We can’t wait to meet her. She sounds like such a good kid too.
Before we signed off, we asked Kristine to go try to get Olegs again. She again went screaming for him down the hallway and came back and said he didn’t want to talk to us. Talk about a blow to the heart. Our boy doesn’t want to talk to us? Obviously, we can’t grill Kristine with questions so we just told her to tell him we love him and miss him and we’ll call him later. She said “okay” and we signed off. It’s hard not to let your mind race with all the possible reasons he might not want to talk to us…Was he mad for some reason? Was he upset that we have to adopt Kristine first and him later? Is he not getting the letters we've sent him but watching Kristine get her letters? My mind was racing because we didn’t get to talk to Olegs last week either because he was away on an outing. Rob reminded me that Olegs was with “the fellas” playing football today and he probably didn’t want to break away if they were having a good game. He probably didn’t want to ruin his cool image. One thing is certain, we’ll be calling again tomorrow and every day after that until we get him on the phone!
We asked Kristine where Olegs was and she said he was playing football. We told her to go get him and could hear her screaming for him as she went down the hallway. The girl has got healthy lungs for sure. LOL! She came back a few seconds later and said Olegs couldn’t come to the phone. We talked to Kristine a little more and she asked us if we wanted to talk to Agnese. So we talked to Agnese for a few minutes and asked her a few things. She answered “yes” to everything so we don’t know if she understood what we were saying or not. We can’t wait to meet her. She sounds like such a good kid too.
Before we signed off, we asked Kristine to go try to get Olegs again. She again went screaming for him down the hallway and came back and said he didn’t want to talk to us. Talk about a blow to the heart. Our boy doesn’t want to talk to us? Obviously, we can’t grill Kristine with questions so we just told her to tell him we love him and miss him and we’ll call him later. She said “okay” and we signed off. It’s hard not to let your mind race with all the possible reasons he might not want to talk to us…Was he mad for some reason? Was he upset that we have to adopt Kristine first and him later? Is he not getting the letters we've sent him but watching Kristine get her letters? My mind was racing because we didn’t get to talk to Olegs last week either because he was away on an outing. Rob reminded me that Olegs was with “the fellas” playing football today and he probably didn’t want to break away if they were having a good game. He probably didn’t want to ruin his cool image. One thing is certain, we’ll be calling again tomorrow and every day after that until we get him on the phone!
Saturday, September 09, 2006
9/9 - Garage Sale Recap
We survived yet another exhausting garage sale today. Once again, it will take me the rest of the weekend to recover since every muscle in my body aches like you would not believe. It’s pathetic, I know. This time we had a lot of competition so we didn’t make as much money as we did in our past sales. There were a couple of big neighborhood sales in our area so we didn’t have as much traffic at ours. That means we had a lot of stuff leftover so we had to drag it back into the garage to store for the next sale. Poor Robert…each time we have a sale he keeps hoping that we’ll sell everything so he can have his garage back. We’ll just wait a few weeks and do it all over again and park the car in the driveway in the meantime. :-)
It turned out to be a gorgeous day and we made about $250.00….not as much as before but we're definitely thankful. Every little bit helps. We’ll probably try to squeeze in one more sale before Christmas since we have so much stuff left. I’m just glad this one is OVER!
It turned out to be a gorgeous day and we made about $250.00….not as much as before but we're definitely thankful. Every little bit helps. We’ll probably try to squeeze in one more sale before Christmas since we have so much stuff left. I’m just glad this one is OVER!
Sunday, September 03, 2006
9/3 - Our Weekly Phone Visit
Rob and I called and talked to Kristine this morning but Olegs wasn’t available today. Many times on the weekends, the kids go on excursions so he was away this weekend. We were a little disappointed that we didn’t get to talk to Olegs but we still had a good visit with Kristine. She now knows we want to adopt her so she’s excited about becoming a part of our family. We asked her how she liked school since Friday was their first day of school. She said she didn’t like it at all…typical kid. She said it was raining today so we joked about it raining the last time we talked to her and Olegs. We asked her if it rained everyday in Latvia and she laughed as she said "noooooo".
Kristine asked what we were doing today and we told her that after church we were going to take Winston over to our friend’s house for a cookout and so Winston could swim in their pool. She thought that was funny that Winston was allowed to go in a pool that people swim in. We reminisced and laughed about the days when she and Olegs were here and they just had to go to the pool every single day....they'd constantly ask, "swim? swim? swim?"
We asked her if she was playing with her friends today and she mentioned that her friend, Agnese, was also away this weekend so she was bored. Kristine talked this time about how she wished Agnese could also find a family. I’m not sure if she’s even available for adoption, but we told Kristine that we would pray that Agnese will find a family too. Agnese is a beautiful girl (We got to see a picture of her last week) a little bit older than Kristine (13, I think) and we also found out that she has a younger sister (9-10 years old) also named Kristine. Rob and I wish we could adopt all of them, but obviously we can’t. We can sure help spread the word about them though. In the next month or so, I believe Jennifer Peters will be looking to sign up host families for the Christmas hosting so please spread the word. Even if a host family isn’t interested in adopting, they can still make a difference in a kid’s life just by showing them love for the few weeks that they are here. If you or someone you know is interested in hosting at Christmas, you can contact Jennifer Peters directly at 404-384-7586 or click here to send her an email.
Kristine asked what we were doing today and we told her that after church we were going to take Winston over to our friend’s house for a cookout and so Winston could swim in their pool. She thought that was funny that Winston was allowed to go in a pool that people swim in. We reminisced and laughed about the days when she and Olegs were here and they just had to go to the pool every single day....they'd constantly ask, "swim? swim? swim?"
We asked her if she was playing with her friends today and she mentioned that her friend, Agnese, was also away this weekend so she was bored. Kristine talked this time about how she wished Agnese could also find a family. I’m not sure if she’s even available for adoption, but we told Kristine that we would pray that Agnese will find a family too. Agnese is a beautiful girl (We got to see a picture of her last week) a little bit older than Kristine (13, I think) and we also found out that she has a younger sister (9-10 years old) also named Kristine. Rob and I wish we could adopt all of them, but obviously we can’t. We can sure help spread the word about them though. In the next month or so, I believe Jennifer Peters will be looking to sign up host families for the Christmas hosting so please spread the word. Even if a host family isn’t interested in adopting, they can still make a difference in a kid’s life just by showing them love for the few weeks that they are here. If you or someone you know is interested in hosting at Christmas, you can contact Jennifer Peters directly at 404-384-7586 or click here to send her an email.
Saturday, September 02, 2006
9/2 - We Got an Email From the Kids!
I just happened to check my work email from home this morning and scanned through my “junk” email box just to see if anything important got sent there accidentally. I got so excited when I saw an email with the subject line, “Hello from Kristine and Olegs.” Rob was at work so I called him to let him know we got an email from the kids!!! Of course, he wanted to know what they had to say so I attempted to “unjunk” the email and read it. My excitement quickly turned into desperation when I kept getting an error message that said “page not available.” Needless to say, I clicked on it again and again, not believing this was happening. I kept getting the same error message over and over!! It was all I could do to keep from banging the computer against the wall. ARRRGGGHHH!! We had an email from our kids in Latvia and I couldn’t open it!!!! Talk about feeling helpless!!!
Well, it dawned on me that it was probably our protective firewall at work that was preventing me from “unjunking” my junk emails from my home computer. The only way we could access that email would be for me to either wait until I go back to work on Tuesday or get in the car immediately and drive downtown to my office so I can check my email from work. There was NO way I was gonna wait 2 more days to find out what their email said. So what if it takes a day trip to get there and back [sarcasm noted here]. In my mind there was no choice. Rob knew I wouldn’t be able to stand it otherwise…plus, he also wanted to know what the kids had to say. This probably sounds so silly, but those of you who are adopting know what I’m talking about. Any communication we get from our kids is more precious than anything.
Since Grandmother loves car rides, I loaded her up and took her with me on the drive to work. It made me feel better about making this silly trip to check an email. It gave us a chance to spend some quality time together so that made it okay. Winston came along for the ride too.
As you can imagine, it was such a relief to get to work and FINALLY open that email. Olegs and Kristine had sent it to us Friday after school so it had been sitting in my junk email box since Friday morning our time. As soon as I opened it, I immediately forwarded it to Rob at the shop so we could read it at the same time. An added bonus was that the kids wrote to us in English. Someone obviously helped them and we were so relieved that we didn’t have to try to decipher an email written in Latvian. They wrote just a few short sentences but the highlights were the parts where they told us they want to come to America and that they miss us and love us very much (talk about melting your heart!). They told us that yesterday was their first day of school and that they liked it because they got to see their friends. They thanked us for calling them and said they enjoy our phone visits. They are also excited that we are coming to Latvia soon.
Talk about making our day!! We’ve reread the email over and over. We just can’t help it. We’ll be calling Olegs and Kristine tomorrow morning for our weekly chat and can’t wait to hear their voices!!
Well, it dawned on me that it was probably our protective firewall at work that was preventing me from “unjunking” my junk emails from my home computer. The only way we could access that email would be for me to either wait until I go back to work on Tuesday or get in the car immediately and drive downtown to my office so I can check my email from work. There was NO way I was gonna wait 2 more days to find out what their email said. So what if it takes a day trip to get there and back [sarcasm noted here]. In my mind there was no choice. Rob knew I wouldn’t be able to stand it otherwise…plus, he also wanted to know what the kids had to say. This probably sounds so silly, but those of you who are adopting know what I’m talking about. Any communication we get from our kids is more precious than anything.
Since Grandmother loves car rides, I loaded her up and took her with me on the drive to work. It made me feel better about making this silly trip to check an email. It gave us a chance to spend some quality time together so that made it okay. Winston came along for the ride too.
As you can imagine, it was such a relief to get to work and FINALLY open that email. Olegs and Kristine had sent it to us Friday after school so it had been sitting in my junk email box since Friday morning our time. As soon as I opened it, I immediately forwarded it to Rob at the shop so we could read it at the same time. An added bonus was that the kids wrote to us in English. Someone obviously helped them and we were so relieved that we didn’t have to try to decipher an email written in Latvian. They wrote just a few short sentences but the highlights were the parts where they told us they want to come to America and that they miss us and love us very much (talk about melting your heart!). They told us that yesterday was their first day of school and that they liked it because they got to see their friends. They thanked us for calling them and said they enjoy our phone visits. They are also excited that we are coming to Latvia soon.
Talk about making our day!! We’ve reread the email over and over. We just can’t help it. We’ll be calling Olegs and Kristine tomorrow morning for our weekly chat and can’t wait to hear their voices!!
Wednesday, August 30, 2006
8/30 - The Kids Now Know We Want to Adopt Them
These days we spend a lot of time waiting for emails from our attorney, the chaperones in Latvia or anyone else who has new information about our adoption case or general information about how our kids are doing. We were excited when we received a letter this week from the Ministry for Children and Public Affairs in Latvia. Right after the children went home, we sent a letter to the Ministry to let them know we would like to adopt Olegs and Kristine. In their reply, they let us know that Kristine had previously been interviewed in March by someone from the Orphan Court about her feelings concerning international adoption. At that time, she had said she didn’t want to be adopted by a family in a foreign country. She was probably scared of the unknown. The letter then went on to say that they received additional information last week from Kristine’s children’s home that she does now wish to be adopted internationally!! She had changed her mind since she and Olegs came to visit us. YIPPEE!! We were so happy to hear that. We always felt she did want to be adopted but it’s good to hear it from an official source.
The Ministry’s letter also addressed Olegs’ situation and confirmed that he is not currently available for adoption. This is nothing we didn’t already know as we are currently going through the steps to get him cleared. The letter went on to say that they would be forwarding our request to the Orphan Court so they can review both cases. Our attorney says our dossier translation will be complete next week so she will then give our paperwork to the Ministry or Orphan Court (not sure which one of them is supposed to get it).
Today we finally got confirmation that we’re allowed to talk openly to the kids about adoption now. We are so happy that we don’t have to avoid the “A” word anymore. Rob and I decided, however, that we won’t talk about it unless the kids bring it up. We don’t want Kristine to be overly excited in front of Olegs. It may be hard for him knowing that we are adopting Kristine first. For now, we’re just telling them both that we’ll be seeing them soon. We’ll talk in more detail about things when we see them in person and have a translator with us.
Another bit of awesome news we got is that the director of our kids children’s home says she noticed a tremendous change in Kristine and Olegs after they got back home…especially Olegs. Olegs was more introverted and sad when he first got here, but after his experience in America and with us, the director says he’s now like a different child. He is much more outgoing and self-confident now. That warmed our hearts tremendously to hear that. He is such a precious kid. Kristine, of course, was our little social butterfly from the very beginning, but she’s now happier too. It’s amazing how just a few short weeks with them made such a difference in their lives and ours too. They understand now that we really do love them and care about them and we haven’t forgotten about them since they left. We feel like our weekly phone calls and letters go a long way to remind them that just because we’re miles apart, we’re always thinking of them.
The Ministry’s letter also addressed Olegs’ situation and confirmed that he is not currently available for adoption. This is nothing we didn’t already know as we are currently going through the steps to get him cleared. The letter went on to say that they would be forwarding our request to the Orphan Court so they can review both cases. Our attorney says our dossier translation will be complete next week so she will then give our paperwork to the Ministry or Orphan Court (not sure which one of them is supposed to get it).
Today we finally got confirmation that we’re allowed to talk openly to the kids about adoption now. We are so happy that we don’t have to avoid the “A” word anymore. Rob and I decided, however, that we won’t talk about it unless the kids bring it up. We don’t want Kristine to be overly excited in front of Olegs. It may be hard for him knowing that we are adopting Kristine first. For now, we’re just telling them both that we’ll be seeing them soon. We’ll talk in more detail about things when we see them in person and have a translator with us.
Another bit of awesome news we got is that the director of our kids children’s home says she noticed a tremendous change in Kristine and Olegs after they got back home…especially Olegs. Olegs was more introverted and sad when he first got here, but after his experience in America and with us, the director says he’s now like a different child. He is much more outgoing and self-confident now. That warmed our hearts tremendously to hear that. He is such a precious kid. Kristine, of course, was our little social butterfly from the very beginning, but she’s now happier too. It’s amazing how just a few short weeks with them made such a difference in their lives and ours too. They understand now that we really do love them and care about them and we haven’t forgotten about them since they left. We feel like our weekly phone calls and letters go a long way to remind them that just because we’re miles apart, we’re always thinking of them.
Sunday, August 27, 2006
8/27 - We Talked to the Kids Again!
We tried calling the kids yesterday morning and were a little bummed when we couldn’t get them on the phone. No one answered the phone at the children’s home this time. Rob and I had already decided that if we didn’t reach them on Saturday we’d try the same time on Sunday. We were so excited when someone answered on Sunday. We politely asked for Olegs and Kristine in Latvian and the woman on the other end shouted for someone to go get them. Then we heard lots of laughing in the background. We always assume they’re laughing at us because our attempts to speak their language must sound pretty funny to them.
A few minutes later Kristine was on the line and immediately started playing some sort of kiddy music into the phone for us. It sounded like that music you hear when the ice cream truck is coming down the street. At least that was before she disconnected us and we had to call back. LOL! Our Kristine is quite the little social butterfly. A couple of her girlfriends came to the phone with her and they were all giggling the entire time. We asked her what they were doing today and she said they were playing with Barbies. She said the weather in Latvia was rainy today. We asked her if she enjoyed her time in America and she exclaimed “Yes, Yes, Yes!” Once again we told her how much we missed her and loved her and she said “me too.” She told us they will be starting school this week and she isn’t looking forward to it. Next she put her friend, Agnese, on the phone and we got to talk to her for a minute. She did more laughing than talking. Each time we asked her something, she’d say “What?” and put Kristine on the phone to translate. We’re so happy that Kristine felt comfortable putting her friends on the phone. We can’t wait to meet all their friends.
We only talked to Olegs for a few minutes this time. We pictured the poor little guy surrounded by Kristine and her giggling friends and imagined he probably wanted to get away from them as fast as he could. LOL! He sounded happy to hear from us. We talked to him long enough to tell him we love him and miss him so much. He also replied, “me too.” We asked him what he was doing today and he just said “nothing.” We asked him if he was having fun and he said “no.” He later admitted that he had played a little bit. He said he was glad to be going back to school. We told him how smart we think he is and he said “thank you.” Then in a flash he was off to something else and Kristine was back on the phone.
It was a great call. We told them both that we hope to see them soon and we want them to show us their favorite places in Riga. We told them that we will call them every week. Rob and I can’t wait to hear when our first court date will be so we’ll know when we’ll be traveling to Latvia. In the meantime, we look forward to these weekly calls. We’ll be thinking about Olegs and Kristine this week as they go back to school.
A few minutes later Kristine was on the line and immediately started playing some sort of kiddy music into the phone for us. It sounded like that music you hear when the ice cream truck is coming down the street. At least that was before she disconnected us and we had to call back. LOL! Our Kristine is quite the little social butterfly. A couple of her girlfriends came to the phone with her and they were all giggling the entire time. We asked her what they were doing today and she said they were playing with Barbies. She said the weather in Latvia was rainy today. We asked her if she enjoyed her time in America and she exclaimed “Yes, Yes, Yes!” Once again we told her how much we missed her and loved her and she said “me too.” She told us they will be starting school this week and she isn’t looking forward to it. Next she put her friend, Agnese, on the phone and we got to talk to her for a minute. She did more laughing than talking. Each time we asked her something, she’d say “What?” and put Kristine on the phone to translate. We’re so happy that Kristine felt comfortable putting her friends on the phone. We can’t wait to meet all their friends.
We only talked to Olegs for a few minutes this time. We pictured the poor little guy surrounded by Kristine and her giggling friends and imagined he probably wanted to get away from them as fast as he could. LOL! He sounded happy to hear from us. We talked to him long enough to tell him we love him and miss him so much. He also replied, “me too.” We asked him what he was doing today and he just said “nothing.” We asked him if he was having fun and he said “no.” He later admitted that he had played a little bit. He said he was glad to be going back to school. We told him how smart we think he is and he said “thank you.” Then in a flash he was off to something else and Kristine was back on the phone.
It was a great call. We told them both that we hope to see them soon and we want them to show us their favorite places in Riga. We told them that we will call them every week. Rob and I can’t wait to hear when our first court date will be so we’ll know when we’ll be traveling to Latvia. In the meantime, we look forward to these weekly calls. We’ll be thinking about Olegs and Kristine this week as they go back to school.
Sunday, August 20, 2006
8/20 - Time for More Fundraising! Next Garage Sale Sept. 9th!
As I’m sure you can imagine, this whole adoption process will cost thousands of dollars. In our case, the costs will double because we’re doing two separate adoptions. While we’re waiting to find out when our first court date will be for Kristine, it’s a good time to work on some more fundraisers. We have tentatively scheduled another garage sale/bake sale fundraiser for Saturday, September 9th. We’ll be collecting donated items to sell again so if any of you have items sitting in your closets or basements that you’d like to get rid of, we’ll be happy to take them off your hands. We also need to borrow some tables if any of you have a table or two you wouldn’t mind loaning us so we can display the sale items. We’ll take all kinds of items…housewares, linens, furniture, kid’s clothes, toys, books, tools, etc. We had all kinds of things donated for our last two sales. You’d be surprised at what people will buy!!
I’ll be selling my scrumptious banana bread again for $15/loaf and my popular monster chip cookies for $10/dozen. If you’d like to place an order, just shoot me an email.
Also, don’t forget that I’m a Mary Kay rep if you’d like to place an order on my website. All profits from my Mary Kay sales are also going towards our adoption fund. There are a lot of great new products to choose from and I offer FREE shipping/delivery. Remember, I can get you a free sample if there’s a product you’d like to try before buying.
So please spread the word about our sale on Sept. 9th. Thank you so much to all of you who have donated items for our sales and those of you who have been praying for us. Please pray for good weather and a successful sale!
I’ll be selling my scrumptious banana bread again for $15/loaf and my popular monster chip cookies for $10/dozen. If you’d like to place an order, just shoot me an email.
Also, don’t forget that I’m a Mary Kay rep if you’d like to place an order on my website. All profits from my Mary Kay sales are also going towards our adoption fund. There are a lot of great new products to choose from and I offer FREE shipping/delivery. Remember, I can get you a free sample if there’s a product you’d like to try before buying.
So please spread the word about our sale on Sept. 9th. Thank you so much to all of you who have donated items for our sales and those of you who have been praying for us. Please pray for good weather and a successful sale!
8/20 - We Talked to Kristine Today!
This morning we called the children’s home again at 9:00 a.m. (4:00 p.m. Latvian time) and were able to get Kristine on the phone. Like yesterday, I was on one phone and Rob was on the other extension. This time when we called, someone answered in Latvian so I said “Labdien, Kristine Ludzu”. The woman then started speaking to us in Latvian. I quickly said “Ne Latviski” which means “No Latvian.” We heard a lot of rustling in the background and we could tell she was calling for someone to get Kristine.
A few seconds later Kristine was on the line. She was a little reserved. We could hear that there were other people in the room so it was probably hard for her to talk. She didn’t speak much English to us, but we were able to tell her in Latvian how much we loved her and missed her. She quietly said, “Me too.” It was SO good to hear her voice. She said she was doing good and that camp was fun. She asked us what we were doing and we told her our plans for the day. She said she was playing with her friends today.
Once again, we didn’t care what we talked about. We were just so thankful to hear her sweet voice over the phone. We plan to call both kids weekly now and will continue to write letters to keep in touch. Hopefully, we’ll be going to see them in Latvia real soon. We can’t wait!!!
A few seconds later Kristine was on the line. She was a little reserved. We could hear that there were other people in the room so it was probably hard for her to talk. She didn’t speak much English to us, but we were able to tell her in Latvian how much we loved her and missed her. She quietly said, “Me too.” It was SO good to hear her voice. She said she was doing good and that camp was fun. She asked us what we were doing and we told her our plans for the day. She said she was playing with her friends today.
Once again, we didn’t care what we talked about. We were just so thankful to hear her sweet voice over the phone. We plan to call both kids weekly now and will continue to write letters to keep in touch. Hopefully, we’ll be going to see them in Latvia real soon. We can’t wait!!!
Saturday, August 19, 2006
8/19 - We Got to Talk to Olegs!
Rob and I got word yesterday that we could call the kids at 9:00 this morning (4:00 p.m. Latvian time). FINALLY!!! We prepared a list of things we wanted to tell them and questions to ask. Then we purchased a prepaid calling card PIN online in order to save some in international long distance charges. A friend of ours told us about this website where you can purchase discounted long distance calling card PINs online and have them emailed to you. This will work fine for now but we're hoping the children's home will eventually get Skype which is an online service that allows you to make international calls for FREE from your computer. You just need to download the software and hook up a microphone (and optional digital videocam) to your computer. It will make things much easier once that gets set up.
Anyway, back to our phone call. We had no idea what to expect since we hadn’t talked to Olegs & Kristine in weeks. We didn’t know if they’d be real quiet and shy again or if they’d be talkative, etc. It was decided that I’d do the talking at first since I’d at least figured out how to ask for them to be put on the phone. Rob and I were so excited we were almost giddy!
When 9:00 came around, Rob and I each got on an extension and I dialed the number. We planned to ask for Kristine first and then talk to Olegs. The phone rang about 3 times and this voice answered in English…"Hello." It was unbelievable that we were talking to someone way across the globe in Latvia!! I said "Labdien, Kristine Ludzu" which means "Good Afternoon, Kristine please." The voice on the phone said "no, Olegs" so I assumed that they were telling us we’d have to talk to Olegs first so I said "okay, we talk to Olegs." Well it turns out that I was speaking to Olegs!!! He had answered the phone!! I thought I was speaking to some young girl in the office. LOL! We had a good laugh about that and then Olegs began talking up a storm!! He sounded so excited and happy to talk to us!! We were impressed that he was even speaking more English to us. He had obviously been practicing. We told him how impressed and proud we were of his English skills and he politely said "thank you."
Olegs told us that Kristine wasn’t able to make the call and that we should try again at a different time. We think he said we are supposed to try again tomorrow morning but we’re not sure. Some things were a little hard to understand. We’ll just go ahead and call again in the morning and hopefully we can get her on the phone. We asked Olegs if he had been playing Uno and he said he played with his friends who he described as “crazy.” LOL! He said camp was okay but we couldn’t quite make out what kinds of activities they did at camp. He said they played cards but I’m not sure what else. It didn’t really matter what we talked about. It was just SO good to have our little man on the other end of the line. He is so precious!!
Rob and I kept telling Olegs how much we missed him and loved him. It melted our hearts when he replied in English..."me too." We told him that Winston and the kitties missed him too and he laughed. We had some great laughs about some of the funny things that happened while they were here. We asked him if he’d had any lemons and he chuckled (remembering our outing at Red Top Mountain when he ate the lemons, rind and all, and made himself sick in the process).
Now that the kids are back from camp, we want to set up a time to call each week so we can talk to them. If we can just hear their voices periodically, it will go a long way towards helping us get through this long wait that’s ahead of us! Rob and I keep replaying this morning’s call in our minds. We’ll be on cloud nine for the next couple of days for sure!!
Anyway, back to our phone call. We had no idea what to expect since we hadn’t talked to Olegs & Kristine in weeks. We didn’t know if they’d be real quiet and shy again or if they’d be talkative, etc. It was decided that I’d do the talking at first since I’d at least figured out how to ask for them to be put on the phone. Rob and I were so excited we were almost giddy!
When 9:00 came around, Rob and I each got on an extension and I dialed the number. We planned to ask for Kristine first and then talk to Olegs. The phone rang about 3 times and this voice answered in English…"Hello." It was unbelievable that we were talking to someone way across the globe in Latvia!! I said "Labdien, Kristine Ludzu" which means "Good Afternoon, Kristine please." The voice on the phone said "no, Olegs" so I assumed that they were telling us we’d have to talk to Olegs first so I said "okay, we talk to Olegs." Well it turns out that I was speaking to Olegs!!! He had answered the phone!! I thought I was speaking to some young girl in the office. LOL! We had a good laugh about that and then Olegs began talking up a storm!! He sounded so excited and happy to talk to us!! We were impressed that he was even speaking more English to us. He had obviously been practicing. We told him how impressed and proud we were of his English skills and he politely said "thank you."
Olegs told us that Kristine wasn’t able to make the call and that we should try again at a different time. We think he said we are supposed to try again tomorrow morning but we’re not sure. Some things were a little hard to understand. We’ll just go ahead and call again in the morning and hopefully we can get her on the phone. We asked Olegs if he had been playing Uno and he said he played with his friends who he described as “crazy.” LOL! He said camp was okay but we couldn’t quite make out what kinds of activities they did at camp. He said they played cards but I’m not sure what else. It didn’t really matter what we talked about. It was just SO good to have our little man on the other end of the line. He is so precious!!
Rob and I kept telling Olegs how much we missed him and loved him. It melted our hearts when he replied in English..."me too." We told him that Winston and the kitties missed him too and he laughed. We had some great laughs about some of the funny things that happened while they were here. We asked him if he’d had any lemons and he chuckled (remembering our outing at Red Top Mountain when he ate the lemons, rind and all, and made himself sick in the process).
Now that the kids are back from camp, we want to set up a time to call each week so we can talk to them. If we can just hear their voices periodically, it will go a long way towards helping us get through this long wait that’s ahead of us! Rob and I keep replaying this morning’s call in our minds. We’ll be on cloud nine for the next couple of days for sure!!
Friday, August 18, 2006
8/18 - Our Documents Are In Latvia!
We confirmed that our attorney, Agnese, received our dossier paperwork this week. Today she emailed us to say she gave it all to the translation company to have it translated into Latvian for the court. Once it’s translated, she’ll submit it to the orphan court. After that, they’ll assign us a court date and then we’ll book our first flight. YIKES!! We feel like we’ll probably be traveling on our first trip to Latvia sometime in October but for all we know it could be earlier. Not much we can do but wait right now.
The kids are expected back at the children’s home this weekend so we’re hoping to talk to them soon. We also heard that the children’s home director and possibly Helen and Ilga (the chaperones who accompanied the children to the US) will be interviewing the children (or at least Kristine) about their wishes concerning adoption. Since our kids are older, their wishes are taken into consideration by the court. Of course, we expect them both to say “yes.”
The kids are expected back at the children’s home this weekend so we’re hoping to talk to them soon. We also heard that the children’s home director and possibly Helen and Ilga (the chaperones who accompanied the children to the US) will be interviewing the children (or at least Kristine) about their wishes concerning adoption. Since our kids are older, their wishes are taken into consideration by the court. Of course, we expect them both to say “yes.”
Friday, August 11, 2006
8/11 - Sending our Dossier to Latvia!
The highlight of today was getting our paperwork to our new friends who are traveling to Latvia on Sunday for their 2nd court date. We are so thankful to them for taking our dossier to our attorney. Things seem to be happening really fast. I don’t know if it’s this situation in particular or life in general. I just remember as a kid how time would never move fast enough. I remember crossing the days off of the calendar waiting for school to be out for the summer. Now it seems like life passes at lightning speed. Anyway, now that the paperwork is on its way to Latvia we need to get ready to GO to Latvia. WOW!! Sometimes we can’t believe we’re actually doing this. It’s so exciting!!
Once the attorney receives our paperwork, the first step will be for her to have it all translated before giving it to the court. That should take about 1-2 weeks. After that, we just sit tight and wait to be notified of our court date. The kids are due back from camp in another week and we hope to call them when they’re back at their children’s home. It’s so hard not being able to talk to them.
Once the attorney receives our paperwork, the first step will be for her to have it all translated before giving it to the court. That should take about 1-2 weeks. After that, we just sit tight and wait to be notified of our court date. The kids are due back from camp in another week and we hope to call them when they’re back at their children’s home. It’s so hard not being able to talk to them.
Thursday, August 10, 2006
8/10 - A Little Bump in the Road!
Rob and I got to the sheriff’s office this morning at 8:00 am and luckily we were waited on by the really nice woman who had helped us when we originally came to get our background check letters. She’s not the one who actually types up the letters but just handles the requests and forwards them to someone else for processing. We explained to her our situation and gave her one of our incorrect letters and showed her that they weren’t notarized correctly. We had to tell her that we needed new letters no later than tomorrow because we’re sending our paperwork to Latvia this weekend. As soon as she realized the urgency of the situation, her friendly smile turned into a look of almost desperation…like she was scared of something. At this point, we expected her to tell us that there was nothing they could do for us and that we’d have to come back in a couple of days.
It turns out that she was actually a little afraid of asking the lady who handles the letters to redo our letters. Apparently, that just isn’t done. She told us that there’s some lady downstairs that types up the letters and everything would depend on “whether or not she’s in a good mood.” Rob and I pictured some old crabby lady in a dark dingy smoke-filled room with only a small desk and a typewriter. The friendly lady told us to sit tight and she would do her best to talk to the cranky woman. We waited and waited and soon afterwards she came back with new letters so I guess that woman was having a good day. She had done one new letter for Rob and one for me. That was great except we needed TWO letters each!! So then we had to explain that we needed one more letter for each of us. The poor woman looked overwrought and told us you just don’t understand…”going down there to talk to that woman is like cutting ice with a butter knife.” Those were her exact words…no joke!! Nevertheless, she went down there again for us and eventually came back with our additional letters. WHEW!!! We thanked her over and over and would’ve given her a big bear hug if it weren’t for the big glass window between us. She just smiled and said she was just happy that we were adopting and wished us well. What a nice lady!!
Now that we had our new letters, I took them right away to be apostilled. Since everything was in order this time, they apostilled them with no problem. With that, our dossier is now complete!!! YIPPEE!! Now, to get our paperwork to Latvia!
It turns out that she was actually a little afraid of asking the lady who handles the letters to redo our letters. Apparently, that just isn’t done. She told us that there’s some lady downstairs that types up the letters and everything would depend on “whether or not she’s in a good mood.” Rob and I pictured some old crabby lady in a dark dingy smoke-filled room with only a small desk and a typewriter. The friendly lady told us to sit tight and she would do her best to talk to the cranky woman. We waited and waited and soon afterwards she came back with new letters so I guess that woman was having a good day. She had done one new letter for Rob and one for me. That was great except we needed TWO letters each!! So then we had to explain that we needed one more letter for each of us. The poor woman looked overwrought and told us you just don’t understand…”going down there to talk to that woman is like cutting ice with a butter knife.” Those were her exact words…no joke!! Nevertheless, she went down there again for us and eventually came back with our additional letters. WHEW!!! We thanked her over and over and would’ve given her a big bear hug if it weren’t for the big glass window between us. She just smiled and said she was just happy that we were adopting and wished us well. What a nice lady!!
Now that we had our new letters, I took them right away to be apostilled. Since everything was in order this time, they apostilled them with no problem. With that, our dossier is now complete!!! YIPPEE!! Now, to get our paperwork to Latvia!
Tuesday, August 08, 2006
8/8 - Apostilling Documents
Since we’ve finally gathered all of our documents for our dossier and had them all notarized, the next step was to get the documents apostilled. Since Kristine hadn’t been cleared for international adoption, Rob and I had decided we would wait until she did get cleared before sending the documents to Latvia and wiring money to our attorney. That was until we got an email this evening that said Kristine IS now cleared for international adoption so now we’re back to rushing around!!!!
One of the other families who is adopting a child from the Christmas hosting is leaving for Latvia on Sunday for their second court date, so they will be hand delivering our documents to our attorney for us. It costs about $130-$150 to FedEx paperwork to Latvia so this will save a little bit (every little bit counts at this point). We had originally heard they were leaving around August 21st so we had planned to wait until then. But then we later found out that they’re actually leaving THIS weekend so we’ve been running around like crazy gathering last minute items, getting things notarized, etc.!!!
Today I took our documents to be apostilled and ran into a little snag. It seems the notary who notarized our background check letters didn’t notarize them correctly. There has to be a notary statement on the letters and there wasn’t one!!! ARRRGGGHHHH!!! So the lady at the apostille place said we would have to redo them. Let me add that the people at the Georgia Superior Court Clerks’ Cooperative Authority office (the ones who do the apostilles) were some of the friendliest people in the world. Sometimes government workers get a bad rap but these people were awesome. I was able to walk right in and hand them my paperwork. They did everything while I waited, except for the ones they were unable to process.
So Rob and I had to decide the best way to get new background check letters. How would we tell the lady at the sheriff’s office that she screwed up? They don’t take that kind of news too well. We ultimately decided we’ll get up early and be at the sheriff’s office first thing tomorrow morning. If I have to start crying to get something done, then that’s just what I’ll have to do. :-)We’ve got to have those letters by Sunday!!!!
One of the other families who is adopting a child from the Christmas hosting is leaving for Latvia on Sunday for their second court date, so they will be hand delivering our documents to our attorney for us. It costs about $130-$150 to FedEx paperwork to Latvia so this will save a little bit (every little bit counts at this point). We had originally heard they were leaving around August 21st so we had planned to wait until then. But then we later found out that they’re actually leaving THIS weekend so we’ve been running around like crazy gathering last minute items, getting things notarized, etc.!!!
Today I took our documents to be apostilled and ran into a little snag. It seems the notary who notarized our background check letters didn’t notarize them correctly. There has to be a notary statement on the letters and there wasn’t one!!! ARRRGGGHHHH!!! So the lady at the apostille place said we would have to redo them. Let me add that the people at the Georgia Superior Court Clerks’ Cooperative Authority office (the ones who do the apostilles) were some of the friendliest people in the world. Sometimes government workers get a bad rap but these people were awesome. I was able to walk right in and hand them my paperwork. They did everything while I waited, except for the ones they were unable to process.
So Rob and I had to decide the best way to get new background check letters. How would we tell the lady at the sheriff’s office that she screwed up? They don’t take that kind of news too well. We ultimately decided we’ll get up early and be at the sheriff’s office first thing tomorrow morning. If I have to start crying to get something done, then that’s just what I’ll have to do. :-)We’ve got to have those letters by Sunday!!!!
Tuesday, August 01, 2006
8/1 - Making Progress Towards Adoption
Today it felt good to make some progress. We got confirmation that the attorney we were hoping for has agreed to help us. We’ve been communicating with her via email and she’s been so great at responding to our questions. Another big bonus is that she speaks English. The first thing on the list was to confirm what items we need for our dossier. She told us not to send anything more than what was asked for on the Procedures of Adoption section of the Latvian Ministry’s webpage. There were some extra items that we had gathered so it was good to know this ahead of time so we didn’t waste money apostilling extra documents.
For those of you who may be interested, below are the items we’re sending as part of our dossier. We think we’ve narrowed the list down enough to match what the Latvian government requires. Let me add that this is only what we believe to be correct. We are by no means adoption experts, so don’t rely on this list to be exact but use it as a guideline. Next thing on the agenda is to get these items apostilled so we can send them to Latvia.
- Initial Application to Adopt a Child
- Home Study, including Agency License
- Verification of Residence
- Autobiography - Wife
- Autobiography - Husband
- Financial Statement
- Police Clearance - Wife
- Police Clearance - Husband
- Color Passport Copy - Wife
- Color Passport Copy - Husband
Through an email exchange with our attorney, we discussed each child’s situation. We confirmed that we will have to focus on adopting Kristine right now because Olegs is not yet cleared for adoption. So that means we'll have Kristine home before Olegs. Kristine is free for adoption and only needs to be cleared for international adoption. Her case should move rather quickly. Olegs, however, is not yet free for adoption so his case will take much longer. We knew this before we hosted him and we chose to host him anyway in the hopes that he would eventually be cleared. We believe that he will also be cleared but it will take time and patience. There is a lot of red tape involved but we are prepared to wait as long as it takes. In the meantime, we will write to both children and try to set up times to call them when they return from camp. They should be back at their childrens’ home next weekend. And of course we will continue to do lots of praying!!
Saturday, July 29, 2006
7/29 - Getting Down to Business
We’ve almost had to go through a grieving process since the kids left. We reached a pretty low point and have had to pull ourselves out of it. Each day is better though and now we’re ready to get back to the business of compiling our dossier so we can officially request to adopt them. We almost have everything we need. Yesterday we received our final homestudy documents in the mail. YIPPEE!!! We only have a few minor things to gather and then we’re ready to get our documents apostilled and send everything to Latvia. Now, if only we knew who to send it to. There is a wonderful attorney over there who has been helping some of the host families from the Christmas hosting with their adoptions. We’re praying that she’ll be able to help us as well. We had heard that she’s expecting a baby so we’re not sure how that will affect things.
Tonight we had our debriefing meeting with the other host familes. It was so great to see everyone again. We hadn’t seen each other since the airport and we were all pretty upset and emotional that day. All of the host families have such a special bond and I know we’ve formed life-long friendships through this experience. It will be so neat for us to all get together when our children come home and celebrate Latvian holidays together. One thing that was a little hard for Rob and me was to hear how many of the other famliles had been in touch with their children already. We found out yesterday through Ilga that our children are at a summer camp until August 21st!! It’s apparently way out in the country somewhere so that means we can’t contact them until they get back. It seems like an eternity. I only hope they don’t forget us. Of course we’re happy for the other families because we’re just as excited for them, but we can’t help but be a little jealous.
One bit of good news we found out was that Olegs did get his suitcase after all. We found out that he did receive it when the airlines said he would and everything was intact. Helen (one of the chaperones) was so kind to take it to him at camp so he’d have his things. We were so grateful to her. At least we can rest assured that he has his stuff. We only hope the other children haven’t taken any of his or Kristine’s things. Olegs had asked us for a small padlock for his suitcase because he said there were thieves (he pointed to the word “thief” in our phrase book) at the childrens’ home. Of course we gave him a lock, and Kristine too, because we just couldn’t face the thought of someone taking their things. That may or may not have been a good idea but it at least made all of us feel better.
At the debriefing meeting we exchanged emails with some of the other host families so we can keep in touch throughout the adoption process. Everyone seems to be at different stages of the paperwork gathering…some are just starting their paperwork and others are in the middle of their home studies. It’s just so good to be going through this at the same time so we can encourage each other and compare notes. Each day we’re trying to remember that we’re one day closer to bringing our kids home!
Tonight we had our debriefing meeting with the other host familes. It was so great to see everyone again. We hadn’t seen each other since the airport and we were all pretty upset and emotional that day. All of the host families have such a special bond and I know we’ve formed life-long friendships through this experience. It will be so neat for us to all get together when our children come home and celebrate Latvian holidays together. One thing that was a little hard for Rob and me was to hear how many of the other famliles had been in touch with their children already. We found out yesterday through Ilga that our children are at a summer camp until August 21st!! It’s apparently way out in the country somewhere so that means we can’t contact them until they get back. It seems like an eternity. I only hope they don’t forget us. Of course we’re happy for the other families because we’re just as excited for them, but we can’t help but be a little jealous.
One bit of good news we found out was that Olegs did get his suitcase after all. We found out that he did receive it when the airlines said he would and everything was intact. Helen (one of the chaperones) was so kind to take it to him at camp so he’d have his things. We were so grateful to her. At least we can rest assured that he has his stuff. We only hope the other children haven’t taken any of his or Kristine’s things. Olegs had asked us for a small padlock for his suitcase because he said there were thieves (he pointed to the word “thief” in our phrase book) at the childrens’ home. Of course we gave him a lock, and Kristine too, because we just couldn’t face the thought of someone taking their things. That may or may not have been a good idea but it at least made all of us feel better.
At the debriefing meeting we exchanged emails with some of the other host families so we can keep in touch throughout the adoption process. Everyone seems to be at different stages of the paperwork gathering…some are just starting their paperwork and others are in the middle of their home studies. It’s just so good to be going through this at the same time so we can encourage each other and compare notes. Each day we’re trying to remember that we’re one day closer to bringing our kids home!
Wednesday, July 26, 2006
7/26 - Back to Reality
Today Rob and I both returned to work and it was a good thing because we kept busy and didn’t have too much time to sulk. I had done so much crying the evening before that I thought I was all cried out. I was okay until my friends at work asked me about the kids and then the tears would start. Luckily, I didn’t fall apart though and was able to control myself. It really felt good to be around friends who were so supportive.
Then the email came later this morning. The kids made it safely back to Latvia….but Olegs’ suitcase didn’t make it. Here came the tears again at the thought of my little boy in a big airport without all of his things. I thought of all of the clothes he had in there, his favorite superman doll, his trucks, etc. The airline said it would arrive the next day but you know how airlines are. We didn’t believe that and were trying to figure out how we could send poor Olegs a package to replace the things in his suitcase.
It was hard coming home from work to our quiet house and not being able to contact the kids just yet. We miss tucking them in at night, playing Uno, the daily pool visits, etc. Believe it or not I even miss the pouting and the neverending drink spills! LOL! We knew going into this that it would be a long process so it will require every ounce of patience we have to get through the long wait before we can bring them home. Rob and I will both feel better once we can talk to them so at least then they won't seem as far away.
Then the email came later this morning. The kids made it safely back to Latvia….but Olegs’ suitcase didn’t make it. Here came the tears again at the thought of my little boy in a big airport without all of his things. I thought of all of the clothes he had in there, his favorite superman doll, his trucks, etc. The airline said it would arrive the next day but you know how airlines are. We didn’t believe that and were trying to figure out how we could send poor Olegs a package to replace the things in his suitcase.
It was hard coming home from work to our quiet house and not being able to contact the kids just yet. We miss tucking them in at night, playing Uno, the daily pool visits, etc. Believe it or not I even miss the pouting and the neverending drink spills! LOL! We knew going into this that it would be a long process so it will require every ounce of patience we have to get through the long wait before we can bring them home. Rob and I will both feel better once we can talk to them so at least then they won't seem as far away.
Tuesday, July 25, 2006
7/25 - Saying Goodbye...At Least For Now :-(
When we first woke up this morning, for a brief instant I pondered what fun things we had planned for the day. It quickly hit me that this is the day we’ve been dreading. Today the kids must return to Latvia. Luckily, we had packed their things the night before so we were able to take the time to go out for a nice leisurely breakfast. While sitting there we cut up with each other as usual, but there was a sadness in the air. I had to try to focus on other things because I felt like I would cry at any second if I thought too much about them leaving. For the most part I held it together until we got to the airport.
On the way to the airport, we found a place to stop so we could say our official goodbyes. We had to tell them, “we say goodbye now, because we cry at airport.” Of course they laughed at us but we just hugged them and told them over and over how much we loved them. Then the tears started so we quickly composed ourselves and continued our drive to the airport. The whole way to the airport, the events of the past four weeks replayed in my mind like a movie. It was so tempting to just pass up the airport and keep on driving, but of course that wasn’t an option. We ultimately decided that the Latvian government would probably frown upon that and hold it against us in our adoption hearings. LOL!
At the airport it was so good to see the other families. We were all in this together and there to support each other. The inevitable moment of separation was quickly approaching and I only wished somehow we could stop time from passing so we could have just a few more moments with them. Soon they were all summoned to the security line to make their way to their gate. We both grabbed them and just hugged them so tight and kept telling them how much we loved them until we had to let them go. We weren’t allowed to accompany them to their gate but had to watch them walk away from a glass hallway that ran the length of the security line. We lined up along the glass with the other families and the tears just flowed and flowed. Olegs remained composed but kept looking back and waving at us until he was out of sight. Kristine, with tears flowing, held onto her girlfriend, Gertrude for comfort as she followed. The heartache seemed unbearable as we watched them walk away. For four weeks we bonded as a family and now it was like the rug was pulled out from underneath us. One thing that meant a lot to us was that our pastor took the time to come to the airport and support all of us. He led all of the families in a nice prayer that was really comforting.
The ride home was difficult as we dreaded going home to our quiet house. We couldn’t bear to hear the Kelly Clarkson CD that was in the CD player as that was Kristine’s favorite. That used to be my favorite CD but now it makes me cry. In time I know that will change. We got home and the house seemed so empty. Even Winston was looking for the children and seemed depressed too. Our hearts are broken right now, but we told ourselves we wouldn’t sink into a depression. We have to focus on the next steps in our journey and get our paperwork together so we can officially request to adopt them. We’ve got to get these kids back!!
Monday, July 24, 2006
7/24 - Kristine's Name Day & Our Last Day Together
Today is Kristine’s Name Day. It’s celebrated like a birthday. We had no clue there was such a thing until Ilga told us that it’s a big deal in Latvia and that we would need to get Kristine a gift. In Latvia, each day of the year has certain names associated with it and people with those names celebrate their day by receiving gifts. All their friends are supposed to call or visit them on that day. I’m not exactly clear on this but I read somewhere that the names are related to traditional feast days for saints or something. Kristine wasn’t about to let us forget either. She kept telling us over and over that the 24th was her name day.
Rob had to work today so we decided to wait until he got home to officially celebrate Kristine’s name day. The kids and I met him for lunch at a country buffet restaurant which had good home cooked food. Of course as soon as we sat down with our plates….WHHHOOOSSSHHHHHH!!! It happened again! This time Olegs spilled his drink!! AAAARRRRGGGHHHH!! Luckily there was a napkin dispenser on the table so we grabbed a pile of napkins and sopped up the spill. Kristine came close to spilling hers too but thankfully didn’t this time.
After lunch Rob brought the kids home and I went to the store to get a couple of special goodbye gifts for them. Aside from it being Kristine’s name day, we wanted to get them each a special going away gift. We decided that a couple of cross necklaces would be special. I found a really cute glass one with small green and red flowers for Kristine and then a masculine one on a leather necklace perfect for Olegs.
When I got home we presented Kristine with the princess cupcakes we got her and sang “Happy Name Day to you, Happy Name Day to you, Happy Name Day Kristine, Happy Name Day to you!!” to the tune of our happy birthday song. We had no clue what to do so we just decided to treat it like a birthday. We had gotten her a little scrapbook photo album, some earrings, lip gloss and a little pink ceramic dish with a cover that has ballet slippers on it and says “follow your dreams.” It’s hard to describe but it just looked like her to me. She loved all the attention and told us that she never had anything like this at the children’s home. We could see Olegs was looking a little dejected since he didn’t have anything. We had gotten him a new photo album as a little something so we gave that to him. Then we presented them with their necklaces and told them to keep them close to their hearts. We told them that we all needed to keep praying for each other when they go back to Latvia. They both tried their necklaces on right away and hugged us tight to thank us. We could tell that they understood those gifts were from the heart and very special.
This evening some of our friends came over and brought some small gifts for Olegs and Kristine. So many of our friends have gotten to know them and are just as sad to see them go. We spent the rest of the evening washing their clothes and packing their suitcases. They had to pick and choose which toys to take because everything wouldn’t fit into their suitcases. We just told them we’d get those things to them later.
Because this was our last night together, we stayed up late and played Uno until we couldn’t stay awake any longer. We got an extra Uno game so that they each could take one back to play with their friends in Latvia. It’s still hard to believe our time together is coming to an end.
Rob had to work today so we decided to wait until he got home to officially celebrate Kristine’s name day. The kids and I met him for lunch at a country buffet restaurant which had good home cooked food. Of course as soon as we sat down with our plates….WHHHOOOSSSHHHHHH!!! It happened again! This time Olegs spilled his drink!! AAAARRRRGGGHHHH!! Luckily there was a napkin dispenser on the table so we grabbed a pile of napkins and sopped up the spill. Kristine came close to spilling hers too but thankfully didn’t this time.
After lunch Rob brought the kids home and I went to the store to get a couple of special goodbye gifts for them. Aside from it being Kristine’s name day, we wanted to get them each a special going away gift. We decided that a couple of cross necklaces would be special. I found a really cute glass one with small green and red flowers for Kristine and then a masculine one on a leather necklace perfect for Olegs.
When I got home we presented Kristine with the princess cupcakes we got her and sang “Happy Name Day to you, Happy Name Day to you, Happy Name Day Kristine, Happy Name Day to you!!” to the tune of our happy birthday song. We had no clue what to do so we just decided to treat it like a birthday. We had gotten her a little scrapbook photo album, some earrings, lip gloss and a little pink ceramic dish with a cover that has ballet slippers on it and says “follow your dreams.” It’s hard to describe but it just looked like her to me. She loved all the attention and told us that she never had anything like this at the children’s home. We could see Olegs was looking a little dejected since he didn’t have anything. We had gotten him a new photo album as a little something so we gave that to him. Then we presented them with their necklaces and told them to keep them close to their hearts. We told them that we all needed to keep praying for each other when they go back to Latvia. They both tried their necklaces on right away and hugged us tight to thank us. We could tell that they understood those gifts were from the heart and very special.
This evening some of our friends came over and brought some small gifts for Olegs and Kristine. So many of our friends have gotten to know them and are just as sad to see them go. We spent the rest of the evening washing their clothes and packing their suitcases. They had to pick and choose which toys to take because everything wouldn’t fit into their suitcases. We just told them we’d get those things to them later.
Because this was our last night together, we stayed up late and played Uno until we couldn’t stay awake any longer. We got an extra Uno game so that they each could take one back to play with their friends in Latvia. It’s still hard to believe our time together is coming to an end.
Sunday, July 23, 2006
7/23 - Goodbye Pool Party
Today we went to the goodbye pool party for all of the host families and children at one of the host family’s houses. Everyone brought food to share so there was lots to eat and it was a fun day. It’s always great to see the other families and see how much fun they’re having with their kids too. We are so excited that most of them have also decided to adopt.
A couple of families at the party are already in the middle of their adoption process. They had hosted kids at Christmas and had already been to their first court dates in Latvia. It was great to hear about their experiences and learn more about how the process works. We are so thankful to know of others currently going through the adoption process because they’re able to help us learn what to expect. While the children were swimming, Rob and I got to really talk to the other parents and the chaperones and get many of our questions answered about the next steps we’ll need to take. We are almost finished compiling our dossier documents so we’ll be ready to send everything to Latvia soon. It was just good to make sure we were doing things correctly.
The kids had a blast and stayed in the pool almost the entire time. They got out once or twice to get a bite to eat but quickly jumped back in. It was hard to get them to leave. This was kind of a sad day because we all knew the next time we’d see each other would be at the airport when we say goodbye. We tried not to think about too much.
A couple of families at the party are already in the middle of their adoption process. They had hosted kids at Christmas and had already been to their first court dates in Latvia. It was great to hear about their experiences and learn more about how the process works. We are so thankful to know of others currently going through the adoption process because they’re able to help us learn what to expect. While the children were swimming, Rob and I got to really talk to the other parents and the chaperones and get many of our questions answered about the next steps we’ll need to take. We are almost finished compiling our dossier documents so we’ll be ready to send everything to Latvia soon. It was just good to make sure we were doing things correctly.
The kids had a blast and stayed in the pool almost the entire time. They got out once or twice to get a bite to eat but quickly jumped back in. It was hard to get them to leave. This was kind of a sad day because we all knew the next time we’d see each other would be at the airport when we say goodbye. We tried not to think about too much.
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