Reasons to be Grateful for the Long Wait

Reasons to be Grateful; Or How I Tried Not to be so Bummed About the Long Wait
by Angela Peerman

1. We've had lots of time to get the house ready. (Safety gates, beds, etc.)
   
   
2. He's fairly well cared for there. Not perfect, sure, but better than I had expected before I saw it. (Enough food, some 1:1 care & stimulation, consistent & kindly caregivers.)
   
   
3. He's happy there. He can't possibly understand all that is GOING to happen. It's going to be an adjustment for him, of course. And I'm sure he will be even more happy & fulfilled once he adjusts to life in our family. Meanwhile, it helps a lot to know that he's happy where he is. The wait would be much harder if I knew he were unhappy/not thriving there.
   
   
4. We've had lots of time to enjoy each other as a family of three, even as we all happily anticipate becoming a family of four. (Amusement parks, trips to Grandma's house, even just playing & tickling).
   
   
5. I'm simply grateful for this amazing, gorgeous, healthy little guy. He is worth waiting for!
   
   
6. I'm grateful that everyone who is "close" to the situation wants this adoption to happen. I'm glad that there is a very low chance of disruption.
   
   
7. I'm very grateful to be sharing this journey with Kris and Cerri. Yes, I'm moving into more general territory, not specifically related to The Wait. Well, focusing on the many aspects of this adoption that I have to be thankful about makes The Waiting easier.
   
   
8. I'm grateful to friends & family who are also eager to become part of D's life and who have been very supportive throughout.
   
   
9. I'm grateful to Kris & to my mom for making it possible for me to stay home & take care of our children for as long as they need me to. (Mom is being extremely helpful with the adoption expenses.)
   
   
10. I'm grateful to his birth mother for choosing to give him a chance at life.
    
    
11. I'm grateful to everyone who has been involved with caring for him and ultimately helping him find his Forever Family.
    

Maddening Paperchase.

When we returned from Russia from Trip 1 we figured that completing part 2 of the paperwork would be fairly easy since we got many things done before we left for trip one. Well this turns out that the universe has been conspiring against us. We thought that we only needed 2 documents and a few documents from our agency and to get our FBI clearances apostilled. Well getting those pieces of paperwork has been a nightmare. We knew that we needed a waiver request letter from our doctor, requesting that the 10 days be waived and a letter about our social worker from the state of Virginia stating that she was allowed to complete home studies in Virginia. This is because Virginia does not require social workers to have a license to give home studies. At times we have wanted to pull our hair out and others it just makes you feel like Yosemite Sam and just hopping mad. (Rasafrasen %$*&( %$&*&* blah blah varmints), so remember that sometimes life throws curve balls at you and you just have to overcome and persevere. In the long run we both know that it will be worth it just a huge headache right now. I am sure that others who have adopted have gone through similar issues. So here is the saga that has become our paper chase nightmare.

Well after trying for weeks to get a letter from the doctor who was our IA doctor we finally gave up and got the letter from our local doctor. We thought that since our IA doctor helped us with the referral she would be the best person to give an opinion on the waiver letter. Well we tried and tried and supposedly she sent the letter via regular mail after about 2 weeks but we never received it. Well after my wife having to resort to calling her every day we finally got a letter after almost a month via email. Although the letter that we received was obviously a canned letter and even had the wrong name in one place. We originally chose her since she was highly recommended and was highly knowledgeable of the Russian adoption system. However, it seems that she may have been too busy to actually give attention to all of her cases. Then we thought that we would be able to just have her email or fax the letter to us and we would get it notarized and apostilled certifying that this was an original letter from our adoption doctor. Well as it turns out they would not accept a letter stating this. So we have needed an original signed and notarized by a doctor and then apostilled. So we never would have been able to get her to do that as she seems to be too busy. So we should have just gone to our local doctor in the first place. Well we now have an appointment to get this completed tomorrow. It turns out that even though we had our physicals completed just before trip 1 we glitched and did not get enough copies so we have to see him to have more copies signed and notarized. So hopefully that will all be done tomorrow. Then we can get it apostilled and the entire remaining package sent off for part 2 of the dossier. We have sent in already 50 or more documents for this portion of the dossier.

We also had problems getting the letter about our social worker which we thought would have been a piece of cake. Well the whole thing is maddening but we will get through it and hopefully be able to travel back to Russia get our son soon.

Other glitches that we have had in this phase of the paper chase is we did not realize that Maryland has different laws for apostilles than Virginia. They have to be certified at the county level first then apostilled at the state level. Well one of the county certifiers did not want to certify one of the documents that was for our psychological clearance because the notary had not signed their complete name. So we had to get all these documents redone.

We also have had a few rejected because the notary signature expired on a few documents and also we had an improper notary block on one of the copies of a document as the secretary of state did not like the statement about a true and exact copy not signed by us.

Besides all this we are getting pressure from our agency to get the documents in as soon as possible and believe me nobody wants this to happen more than we do.

Well if everything goes right we will finally have completed all the documents required for the dossier part 2 this Friday.

In all I think that we must have submitted close to 10 pounds worth of documents because when I sent of the documents that we did have 1 original and 2 copies of everything that package weighed over 4 1/2 pounds and we have submitted at least double that amount all told. So it might even be as high as 15 pounds worth of paperwork that must be accomplished to complete the entire process.

We think that it will be approximately 1 to 2 months from the time that Russia gets the whole package that we will receive our court date. The sooner the better.

Returning Home (For Now)

Friday 10 April

We left Orenburg for a day in Moscow. The plane was more crowded than you would expect for 0745 in the morning. Oh well at least this time we got an aisle that was not quite as cramped. The flight was uneventful, and we arrived in Moscow just a few minutes after we left with the time change. Unfortunately, there was a mix-up, and our agency did not have two vehicles even though our facilitator (Alex) had called them the night before to confirm that there would be. Jenn and Jim clearly had priority, since they were crossing to another airport to catch a plane back to the States. We waited at the airport for the other car, that arrived pretty much when the later flight was supposed to arrive. (We were supposed to be on the later flight, but it was booked, so they had to put us on the earlier one. This was the reason for the mix-up in the first place.)

Traffic was bad, but eventually they got us to the Holiday Inn Lesnaya, with our local translator Oxana pointing out some of the city sights along the way. I had no idea that it was so close to the Marriot Tverskaya (where we stayed on the Inbound trip). In fact they are only a few blocks away. After getting checked in we stopped for a bite for lunch, then took the Metro down to Red Square. We then walked around and took a few pictures and did some sightseeing. St. Basil's Cathedral is really interesting, though Ange says that if she just saw a model of it, she would assume it was done up that way as a children's toy because no one would really decorate a cathedral in such a mishmash of colors and patterns. We picked up the one geocache in Red Square, proving that it is possible to do some stealthy geocaching even in the most crowded of places. We have a few extra photos that were taken solely for the purpose of providing "cover" to bring out and replace the geocache from its hiding spot.

This time we did buy souvenirs from the vendor tents, and we even haggled a little bit. (Though we freely admit that we're not good hagglers. How can we begrudge them a couple hundred rubles when it is just a few dollars to us?) I don't know how much time we'll have for souvenir shopping we'll have on the next trip, and there are a lot of people who have been very kind & thoughtful to us that we wanted to show them we were thinking of them. We had to repack our suitcases slightly, moving some laundry to one bag to make room for our knickknacks in the bag where they are least likely to get broken. Back to the hotel we finally had Stroganoff for dinner. Still no borscht on this trip, but I tried it once & didn't like it, so Ange was reluctant. We also were able to get internet access on this last day and were able to connect to Skype and this made Cerri very happy to be able to see us.


Saturday the 11th.

We returned from Moscow back to Dulles. The in flight entertainment system was not working so that made for a VERY long flight. But all is well and we are back here. now just time to get our part 2 dossier done so that we can get our court date.

[Comment from Ange] It seems strange not to have him with us. We've only had about 10 hours with him, all of it in just one room. Yet every moment now we can't help thinking and talking about what it will be like when he is with us. We'll have more days in Moscow processing his paperwork to bring him back to the States. Will he sleep ok in a crib in the hotel? He can eat soft solid foods, but we'll have to proceed carefully and not overdo it. Changing his diapers on the airplane will be an experience, I'm sure. And what about that LONG plane ride, when I'm sure he will not want to sit still. Actually being home with him will be a piece of cake compared to that plane ride. I will have to work on teaching him some baby games like Patty Cake and Itsy Bitsy Spider. He knows Russian games, but I don't know them and not sure how quickly I could learn. But he'll need distractions like that at times.

Anyway, as Kris said, we will need to get moving on our paperwork so that we can get our court date and bring home our little guy.

Officially Accepted

Well today we signed the papers that said that we wanted to accept this referral and continue with the adoption. It was good to be able to play with baby D for a couple more sessions. He was starting to warm up to us just about the time that we need to head out. It was very hard having to leave him after the day. Each time we see him gets harder for us to say good-bye. We will just have to hurry up and get part 2 of the dossier done so that we can return to Orenburg for our court hearing.

[Comments from Ange] We've heard & read a lot of things in our adoption education & simply reading what other families have experienced. But while it is good to be prepared, there is no substitute for the actual experience. I really understood yesterday on a deeper level why Russian families have such a higher priority over foreigners to adopt these children. Previously, I had written it off as largely political. But now I am gaining a much deeper understanding of how much our child is going to have to go through. As overwhelming as I found it when I had moved to England, at least they basically spoke a language that I could understand, and as an adult, I had a lot more control over my own environment. This little child may find us fun to play with, and the care givers may be telling him that we are his mommy & daddy and that we're going to take him to his new home. But he's only 17 months old. He doesn't really understand what is going to happen. I'm quickly trying to learn a few phrases, because I don't have time for HIM to learn things like "come here" and "don't touch that" in English. He is a very busy boy who loves to explore everything. Fortunately our home is fairly well child-proofed, but there in the music room where we were playing, he wanted to bang the back door hard enough to rattle the window. He kept going after electrical cords. And the fire extinguisher that was sitting on the floor. Of course, he wanted to get into everything within his reach, and he wanted to reach everything that was above his reach. It reminded me a LOT of how Cerri was at that age. I like that he has a mind & a will of his own and that he has an adventurous spirit. He will do really well in our family.

But I can't even begin to fathom how he's going to react to suddenly being out in the world with people who speak a language that he doesn't understand in a place that is nothing like the only home he has ever known. He doesn't speak yet, but he clearly understands the things that are said to him. Even when you tell him to come here in Russian, and he looks you right in the eye with a grin as he barrels past you. He understands even though he doesn't actually do it. I really hope that after the court hearing, someone brings him to us instead of having us take him out of the Baby Home. I don't know how much he'll understand or remember later, but I don't want him to associate us with being taken away from his home. I think he will probably attach to us really quickly when we are the most familiar aspect of his new environment. I can understand now why they want to ensure a more gradual transition, and I wish we had time to do it that way. It really makes me sad that he may never get to see most of his caregivers again, even if we do return in a few years to visit. He'll be so different by then, and for awhile he may not want to have much to do with his Russian heritage. Hopefully he will gain some appreciation of it eventually. I am so grateful that he has had such kind & loving caregivers.

I also find that I have developed another facet of love for him. There are many different ways that we come to love our children. There's that kind where you think "oh he's so cute, I just want to kiss & cuddle him." That's the easiest kind. There's another kind where you have gotten to know exactly the way your child likes to be soothed to sleep or when he's gotten too frustrated with using his spoon and really needs you to rescue him so that he can fill his tummy, those kinds of things. That will come with time and getting to know each other better.

But this is that expression of love where you realize that this person's happiness and well-being are more important to you than your own. And you hate to think of your child having to experience any pain, wishing you could make everything smooth and perfectly happy for them. I had a hard time yesterday, realizing the hard time we're going to put him through, taking him out of his home and away from the people that he knows and loves. I tried to explain this a little to Vera & Alex, and they reminded me that he wouldn't be able to stay in this baby home forever anyway. In another year and a half, he would have to move up to the next one, and then another one, and then he'd be out in the world with no support at all. That helped some. It might be easier for him in the short term for him to stay in a place where they speak his language, and he's used to the routines and so on. But in the long run it would mean more home changes, more disruptions in his life. And there's no guarantee that the older children's homes would be as kind and loving as this one. And he would never get to explore the world like he will with us. I think the important thing here is not to try to prevent him the pain of the experience that is coming. Do what I can to make it easier for him, of course. But to be aware, to understand how hard it must be for him. Give him the space to experience his feelings. When he's old enough to talk about it, talk with him and especially listen to him.

By then, he will be so much a part of our lives that to lose him would be like ripping out a part of ourselves. I already know without having to be told that is what will happen, and it won't matter whose womb he was in or whose DNA he has. Through whatever miracle or coincidences of life brought us together, at that point, he will be our son, a member of our family that would not be complete without him. I will need to make sure he knows this, both by telling him so and by showing it in my actions every day.

More Time with Baby D

Well things went well today at the orphanage. We went there twice once about noon for 2 hours then again about 5:30. This allowed us more time when the kids were alert. Yesterday the kids were very tired during our time with them as we were there during what is normally nap time. Well we did a little bit of shopping for souvenirs during lunch break and picked up a few things. The kids were very playful today. So we had a good time playing with them and it was hard to leave them. We decided to start the ball rolling and officially accept the referral and continue with adopting Baby D. We will get to visit tomorrow and have to sign some more papers. Of course, once we return home we will have to complete part 2 of the dossier and get a court date as soon as possible. At least we know that they are in good hands. The caregivers really do care for the well being of these kids that certainly shows in the attention that they are given when we have been at the orphanage. So far we have enjoyed the food and the company.

We do have a funny story. there is a Sesame Street segment where they are in a Russian restaurant but they are out of each of the Russian foods listed on the menu, and they launch into a little song each time the man tries to order something. The first time they do this is for stroganoff, and Ange playfully sings it from time to time with Cerri, especially when she prepares stroganoff for dinner: "Nyet we have no stroganoff, stroganoff, stroganoff. Nyet we have no stroganoff, stroganoff is gone. Hey!" Of course, she has to sing it before preparing dinner and then again after the last of the leftovers are eaten, because in between we DO have stroganoff.

Well today we were going to have stroganoff for lunch, but the restaurant had run out. So Ange got to sing the song for real!

Enough for tonight tomorrow is another day.

Orenburg MoE

Today we will meet with the Orenburg Minister of Education and then get to meet our potential child, along with the other couple that is here. We're pretty excited and a little nervous. I will give an update after we meet with the child. We are not sure if we will also meet up with Izabella and Shaun who also have an appointment with the Minister of Education today.

[Update]
The meeting went well, and so did the meeting with the social worker. I ended up being able to fumble my way through with Russian although my Russian is a bit rusty.
[Comment from Ange:] Kris was awesome. The Minister's eyes went wide, and he got a big smile when Kris started responding in Russian. Vera had to help Kris with a few words here & there, but overall everyone was really impressed. It was a little weird for me to sit there nodding as I got the gist of what the conversation was about. But Kris was definitely a star, and Vera clearly thought Kris had hung the moon after that! :)
[Ok, back to Kris' account...]

We met with the minister of education at about 0830 and then around 3:30 went on to meet with the social worker who will watch how we interact with the child. Everything seemed to go well. [Ange again. I made a mistake. I had read this but forgot. When I first had him on my lap, I was gently bouncing him on my knee, as I know a lot of kids like that. Vera told me to stop, that was considered "shaking" the baby. I felt really awful, because of course I know the difference and would never shake a child! But now I don't know whether the social worker & orphanage doctor are thinking that I'm a horrible mother or what. Meanwhile, Baby D. was kicking his feet & trying hard to get me to keep bouncing, because clearly he liked it...]

Baby D. seems like everything is fine. He took a little while to warm up to us but seemed to be coming around by the end of the visit. He is a very energetic boy and seems to have a very strong will and wants to do things his way. Everything seems to be good for the health side of things. We got a little over 2 hours to interact with him. After that we went to an internet café where we were unable to download any pictures to email to our adoption doctor because I was not aware that we would be heading there straight after the meeting with the child. Well Ange was able to send off an email to Dr. G (our adoption doctor) and describe the situation to her. Ange had been watching carefully and taking notes of various milestone behaviors that Baby D. exhibited. We did end up seeing Izabella and Shaun at the various stops today, and we were able to chat with them for a bit. We shared the play room with Jim and Jenn and their baby M.

Vera and Alex have been very helpful this trip. Vera complimented me on my Russian. I have to admit that the minister looked very surprised when I started to speak Russian to him. I was able to answer most questions with only a little help from Vera on a few of the translations. The baby home is actually located in the center of what looks to be an apartment complex. The inside was nice but so far we have only got to see a few rooms. Baby D ran all over the room and even picked up a hobby horse and carried it around for a while. He is a strong little boy. He liked it when I spoke Russian to him and would sometimes come to me when I asked. Well time to head off as it seems the jetlag is starting to catch up to me.

Travel to Orenburg

Well we got up and, not wanting to venture far from the hotel, decided to eat breakfast there. It was a very nice breakfast, but the price came out to about $30 a person -- that was steep! Oh well, sometimes travelers get gouged.

Our flight from Moscow VNukovo on OrenAir was alright. The plane was fairly new a 737 and the flight was relatively smooth. My only complaint was the seats are very cramped, and the plane was near full. The Vnukovo airport is very small and only has 10 gates. I am pretty sure that they all are domestic only. We were able to check in and wait for our plane, though the waiting area was really crowded & had very few shops or amenities or anything. Even though there was a big sign on the mens bathroom that said "no smoking," there was about 5-6 guys in there smoking, and it really reeked, even for a bathroom. Finally, we boarded a bus to take us to our plane and drove out to the far reaches of the tarmac for our plane. The plane was alright but boarding was chaotic. They even gave us a lunch, not much but at least it was something for the flight over. Flight time from Moscow to Orenburg is just under two hours. Before we left the driver told us that there was another couple in Orenburg that had flown straight through. After landing, we discovered that the Orenburg airport is about as small any I have ever been through. We did not even go into the building -- We left the plane and just exited the tarmac and got our baggage from a building off to the right. Once we got to the hotel, (Hotel #2), we relaxed for a while as Vera our translator had to get our dossier notarized locally, due to the craziness about needing all new documents.

After a few hours they came by our room and took us to dinner downstairs at the hotel. We met Jim and Jennifer who are also adopting with CHSFS. They flew in straight, so they got in about 1am rather than spend the night in Moscow like we chose to do. They are also on their first trip. Jim is adopted also, and they also have a daughter who is 3 ½ and is staying with Jenn's sister. Vera and Alex (our facilitator) both seem very nice. Well we had salad, dumpling soup, and blini for dinner and it was all very nice and the bill only came to 400 Rubles for the two of us a little more than $10. Our hotel is also very reasonably priced at 2500 rubles a night ($75). Strange to us, though, the hotel only accepts cash. Our room is sort of a suite with a separate living/dining area and bedroom. Well so far Orenburg looks very run down. We see a lot of pipes running above-ground. And everything is very muddy. I don't know if the climate is too poor for grass seed to take or foot traffic kills it or if they just don't have the money (or don't want to spend it that way) re-seeding areas that need it. But since there are huge areas with no grass cover, mud gets tracked everywhere, streets, floors, etc. Maybe things will look different on our return trip.

First Day in Russia

Our plane left at 4:50 in the afternoon on Saturday, due to arrive in Moscow at 10:45 am. No complications there. Ange got nervous when it got a little bumpy, but it wasn't really bad. We arrived in Moscow on time, made it through immigration and customs with no trouble. The immigration officer did not ask or speak one single word to us -- We just stood there trying not to look uncomfortable. Of course we were there for legitimate purposes, but it just feels strange to be standing there with someone silently typing away, and then finally she buzzed us through.

In the arrivals hall, we looked around for the CHSFS people and at first did not see them but on the second pass we saw him. We did have about 20 offers from unknown taxi drivers, but they scattered like pigeons, just kept having to say "nyet" & shake our heads at them. Well we got to the Marriott Tverskaya around 2pm. After getting settled we wandered out on the town. In the flurry of activity at the end we had forgotten a few things. Mainly an adapter plug and a phrase book which I meant to purchase on the way out. Well we started a stroll towards the Kremlin and Red Square. There are many beautiful sights in Moscow, but as with any major city there are run down areas as well. It certainly reminded us of other European cities. The main differences are there seems to be more block apartment buildings and also they have huge billboards up everywhere.

As we wandered the streets of Moscow in a drizzling rain and a few snowflakes, we were very hungry so we decided to stop. It seems that being Sunday many shops were closed and we did not see many quick stop restaurants on our side of the street, even though Tverskaya street is still pretty busy even on a Sunday. There are multiple underground crossings that allow you to cross the street but we figured we would explore the side we are on. Most of the underground crossings have little shops inside them, as we did venture down one or two to cross some semi minor streets on the way towards the Kremlin. We stopped for lunch at a Rostik (the Russian KFC) but we didn't want standard KFC food. Luckily, they had have a very nice kebab like thing called a shaslik which we ate so even though we ate a KFC we did not get KFC fare that you could get in the US. So we continued to wander and take in the sights. We did find some nice art statues and some dead dudes on Horses (old joke). We popped into a Metro Station and found our phrasebook. Of course the Metro stations are a little hidden so we actually thought we were headed into a small mall at first.

Rather than take the Metro at this point we decided to continue walking and enjoying the sites of the city. As we neared the Kremlin we decided to go down another underground passageway that had a mini-mall with an electronics store where we found our adapter. After having used British pounds and Euros in the past, it was a little more mental exercise to get used to converting between dollars and rubles. (About 33 rbl=$1) So at first things seemed really expensive that were actually pretty reasonable. But other things were still expensive, even after converting. The adapter that we purchased is good for anywhere in the world and cost about 600 rubles, which at the day's exchange rate was about $18. (That price was including 18% VAT.) This may be a little bit expensive but we will probably not need to buy another one. We had gotten rid of our European adapters when we left England, or at least didn't remember to look for the few that we still have lying around the house somewhere. The phrasebook was about 80 rbl or $2.50.

Well now we had our phrase book and power adapter, and we could just continue to sightsee as much as we liked. We wandered around the front of the Kremlin area and were headed towards St. Basil’s Cathedral and Red square but without a tourist map and only our Garmin GPS to guide us. I had downloaded the street maps of Moscow and a few geocaches but did not have time to download any POI’s. We started following the wall along the Kremlin. We wandered for quite a distance before deciding that we had taken the wrong direction. We would have gotten there eventually, but we had already walked at least 2 1/2 miles down Tverskaia street, and the cold wet weather was starting to get to Ange. So, we decided to abandon the quest for Red Square for the day and headed back towards the McDonald's, figuring we would get a drink and get warm and call home to let them know that we had arrived safely. Well the Kremlin McDonalds has to be about the most crowded one on the planet. There was not a seat anywhere, loads of people milling about, and very noisy. The Sbarro next door was not much better. So we ended up calling home standing on a bridge outside in the cold. Around that time, we found a street vendor selling sodas & ice cream. In spite of the cold weather, we had to get an ice cream, as it had been a long time since we'd had a Magnum. It wasn't as good as the Magnum Double Chocolates, but it was still pretty good. And we're hopeful that when we come back, with warmer weather, they'll have a wider selection of our favorite ice cream bars.

Then we wandered over to the vendor tents selling souvenirs. We really weren't interested in buying anything, since we knew we had another day in Moscow on the way back out of town. But I thought about buying a Russian hat. One guy started at 1000 rubles and came all the way down to 600 as we walked away -- Maybe he'd have even gone lower if we had turned back around. We also witnessed a strange sort of ritual going on right at the city center spot. A person would stand on the mark and throw a coin over their shoulder and then one of the old ladies nearby would grab it. I am going to have to ask about this or research it more. Obviously must be for good luck or something.

Well after that we decided to take the Metro back to the hotel. Since I can speak a little Russian I was able to get us metro tickets and we took the metro back to the hotel. Although we only saw two of the Metro stations and certainly not the nicest of them I can already tell that the rumors are true and that it is the most beautiful metro so far that I have seen. They had marble floors and walls and just fairly ornate. Although the trains themselves are still pretty typical metro train cars, but the stations are very ornate. So we found the station nearest to the Marriot Tverskaya. For those that may have trouble reading the Metro Map that the hotel gives you the station is Belorussaiya it is on the green line. And three stops from Teatlnaya station. I have fairly good vision and not sure if my eyes are starting to fail me or it was just tiredness or the print was too small but I had hard time reading the metro map that the hotel gives out.

So after arriving back at the hotel, we decided to try to catch an early dinner and head to bed. That was our intention anyway, but we fell asleep for about a half-hour, so by the time we got up & out again, it was around 6:30, a fairly normal dinner time. We were going to eat in the hotel but the restaurant was closed at 5pm on Sundays. The concierge directed us to a Japanese place close by. The food was very good but the portions were a bit on the smallish side. We also found a small shop on the way back where we could pick up bottled water and some kind of cookies that were in the same style as Jaffa cakes. Other than the strange experience of eating Japanese food in Russia, our first day had that "back in Europe" feel to it. Very pleasant.

More Preparations

Thursday and Friday 02 and 03 April

Thursday started out pretty reasonable. Ange took the dogs to the kennel and proceeded up to Maryland. This would allow a couple of days for Cerri to get into "staying with grandparents" mode, and Ange could pick up the large quantity of crisp unwrinkled cash that we had requested from the credit union. Everything was going well, and then the nasty surprise hit. Thursday afternoon we were told that some Orenburg administrator was not happy with the Minnesota apostilles after all -- We had to redo the ENTIRE dossier to bring with us, or else the trip is canceled. Holy !

Ange got this information just as she was driving up to her parents' house. I was just leaving work, en route to meet her there. Ange called my cell phone & told me to get over to the agency's local office in Silver Spring. My father-in-law was able to watch Cerri, so Ange could meet me there as well. The local agency office was able to re-print everything, and we got it all signed & re-notarized on site. (They have a Virginia notary at the office.) It was like 5:45 when we left the office, but we managed to rebuild all of Part One dossier requirements. All we needed was the apostilles. That can be done while-you-wait in Richmond, but it was 130 miles from the house in Maryland (about 3 hours' drive). So on Friday, Ange's dad & brother were able to tag-team babysitting Cerri for the day. Ange left the house at the same time as me (around 5:30) in a heroic effort to get the apostilles completed & ready to go for the following day. Her hope was to be headed AWAY from WDC by the time rush hour really kicked in. It worked, and she even made it back in time to get to the credit union that afternoon as planned.

Well The last week at work was very hectic trying to get everything accomplished before I left, and our evenings were very busy as well. One thing we wanted to do was make cerri a DVD with us reading her bedtime stories. Well we had never tried to actually convert video from our camera to our computer previously. It is not a pure digital camera but has small tapes. So we recorded us reading a story to her every night for a week so that if she missed us too much she would have this DVD. We struggled with it a bit on Wednesday and again on Friday evening without success. Finally, on Saturday morning, we were able to use my father-in-law's DVD recorder to transfer the film to DVD. It was still running as we headed to the airport, but we left instructions with them on how to finalize it. They did not end up using it, and they also didn't give her the gifts that we had bought & wrapped for her. But she knew that we had done those things for her, and we did manage to call her at least for a couple of minutes every day. She knew we were thinking of her.

Preparing for Trip 1

The past couple of weeks have been very hectic. We received a referral for a child from Russia. The Main Surprise was this was not the region that we were expecting to receive a referral from. Originally we were registered in Perm Russia. Yet this referral was from Orenburg Russia which is a few hundred Kilometers south west of Perm (our original region). This time we had more information to go on, and it all looked really good. So, we accepted the invitation even though it meant more paperwork for us. We could travel in 2 1/2 weeks if we could get the paperwork submitted in one week. Fortunately, the paperwork for this reason was a lot easier than the other region, and we were able to get it all done in about 3 days. We didn't have to get the apostilles done, as the Orenburg judge had said he preferred to have everything apostilled at our agency headquarters in MN. So we just had to get it all notarized and sent to our agency HQ, and they took it from there. We were all set for our Orenburg MoE appointment for 07 April.

We were also told that it would really speed up the time between trips if we could get Part 2 done. So we spend the following 10 days or so working frantically on those documents, including physicals with our doctor & a signoff from a psychologist. We had a few hurdles to overcome. Our doctor's receptionist insisted that they had done previous Russian adoption medical reports, and none had insisted on the requirements we were giving her. (Filling out the sheet we provided, printing it on clinic letterhead, & having a notary there for the signatures.) Well, I don't know what regions of Russia prior patients used, but these were the requirements given to us, and we can't change them just because it's inconvenient for her. But we were able to make all the arrangements, including having Cerri's exam 2 days later so that we would have the results of Kris' & my lab work. And we had a traveling notary meet us there to notarize the final signatures on all the documents.

Meanwhile, another challenge we encountered was getting a psychologist to do a signoff on people they didn't know in a fairly short time frame. Ironically, us being in pretty good mental health turned out to be a drawback for getting that paperwork done. We tried asking friends of family members who were in the business, but one after another could not do it. (One didn't do those kinds of exams, another felt that it would be a conflict of interest due to having a personal relationship with our extended family, etc.) But we finally found one who met with us (individually), and gave us a favorable report.

By the time we left, there were only a couple more things we needed. One was the 10-day waiver request (one from us, one from the child's doctor). And the FBI clearance was due to arrive while we were away, but we had our next-door neighbor pick it up for us. It's a good thing she did, too, because where it was sitting against the garage, it would have been soaked and/or blown away by the time we returned.

While all of that paperwork was underway, we also had to work through our travel arrangements and get Russian travel visas. And pack everything we needed for ourselves and Cerri's trip. She was given the choice to come with us (with Ange's dad to help care for her) or go with Ange's parents to visit her cousins in Florida. Not a really tough decision for a 4-year-old, of course. Still, we do think it helped her in being away from us that she was the one who had made that choice. She had a lot of fun, but she also missed us, and we missed her. The second Russia trip we will definitely be taking her with us. And she wants us to all go together (all FOUR of us!) to visit her cousins sometime.

Anyway we made the flight arrangements without too much hassle for the first & last legs of the trip. United now has a direct Washington DC (Dulles) to Moscow flight. This is a daily flight and certainly has the potential to become at least one of the new baby flights back from Russia. And it's on a very comfortable 767 jet. Best of all, we were able to get a great rate under $500 round trip DC to Moscow. Then it turns out that my mother-in-law had enough frequent flyer miles to get both of our tickets, so that was very nice of her. We did have to clear our flights with our agency to make sure it worked with the rest of the internal travel. This took a day or two of coordinating, and finally when we had an itinerary we decided to stay an extra night in Moscow on the way in and out, to break up the jet lag a little. We did have a mix up about who was supposed to book our hotel going into and out of Moscow. The agency’s recommended travel agent thought he was supposed to do that, and we were under the understanding that was our job. So we ended up double booked but canceled one of the bookings. He did take care of our our flights on OrenAir, the only airline to fly Moscow to Orenburg. So we completed all that by Wednesday, and we were set to fly out on Saturday. Our schedule was looking pretty good.

1 Year from Signing with Agency

Well March marks the 1 year anniversary of signing with our agency. Also the 5th of September marks the 6 month date from the time that all of our paperwork was submitted to Perm, Russia. I know that others may have waited longer, but it is starting to feel like an eternity. The waiting phase is very hard because we have no control over anything that happens. Right now we are kind of in limbo. We can not make plans for more than 2 weeks out as we are hoping for the call any day. Especially after having a referral then losing it just a few days later. So here is to hoping that all goes well and things get back on track. This waiting period is hard. I know that the next waiting period will be even worse but still just hope that we get the call for the referral and get to travel soon. Originally we thought that both trips would be in the winter -- Now we're guessing that trip 1 will still be in the winter, though who knows when trip 2 will be. Let us hope that it happens before the end of summer. I always try to plan for the worst and hope for the best, so the wait may not be as hard on me as it is on Ange, but it is hard on both of us regardless.

Referral gained then lost

Well these past two weeks have been very exciting. We received a referral from Russia on the 26th of January. Then we submitted some follow up questions to make our decision whether to travel to Russia or not. However, instead of getting any follow-up information, they told us about a week later that the child was adopted out by a Russian family. So at least the child has found a good home. Now we are back in the waiting game, and hopefully we will hear back soon with another referral. Of course that means that we are back to not being able to plan anything more than 2 weeks out. So we are still waiting to travel to Perm. Hopefully soon though.

[This is Ange, adding some thoughts.] I'm not sure I would have described that week as "exciting" so much as incredibly stressful. When I first saw that photo, my gut instinct told me there was something wrong. I wondered why we were being shown a special needs child when we had said that we were not able to care for a child with extreme special needs. It was with some shock to realize that they were claiming that the child was normal/healthy. I feared that I had discovered a deep buried racial prejudice -- The features that I saw as indicating problems might just be the way children of his ethnic background are supposed to look. I tried to find other pictures of people with that heritage. But none of them gave me that gut feeling of "something is wrong" like that child's photo did. Besides, we had gotten absolutely NO medical information on the child. Fortunately, Dr. G was available to provide a worksheet of medical & milestone information to request they fill out for us. That helped somewhat, to know that we would not commit until we had more information to work with.

Still, I was miserable in those following days. While we waited for the worksheets, I tried to get my head around the whole idea. Suppose the information came back that he was perfectly normal? It still felt wrong. My heart was telling me that this child is not the right one for us. I had good wishes for him, but I knew he was not meant to be ours. My intuition also whispered that everything was going to be ok, but it was hard to believe that. Finally, 8 days after we got the initial call, we got another call from our social worker. She was terribly apologetic, fearing that we were going to be devastated, but she had to tell us that he was being adopted by a Russian family. It happens sometimes that an extended member of the birth family steps up to take the child when they hear that they are being considered for adoption by someone else. I'm sorry for the child that it took such an extreme step for the family member to come forward (if that is what happened). But I'm happy for him that he will have his forever family. As for us, even though it was a little sad to have to go back to the waiting game, I was just filled with relief. He wasn't the right child for us, and we weren't the right family for him. I don't know if there was some unseen reason why the whole thing happened. Regardless, it's done & over with now and out of our hands.

In the aftermath, I have had some lingering worries. Will I get that same "bad feeling" when we see the next child? Will it happen to us again, that we'll be offered a referral and then told "oops, not available"? Another possibility occurred to me -- Given that I had such a powerful sense of Wrongness about that referral, will I feel an equally strong a sense of Rightness when we finally see The One?

New Year is upon us.

Well the New Year is upon us and hopefully this will be the year that we add a member to our family. We were told previously (End of November) that nothing would happen til after the Celebrations were complete in Russia for the Orthodox Christmas and New Year Celebration both New and Old New years celbrations. So that time is now that they are done celebrating in Russia at least for now so hopefully we will have something else to celebrate soon. We hope that the referral comes within a reasonable time. We want to be able to celebrate our new family member and show them the wonders of life. I imagine that right now the child is not in the best place that they can be. I am sure that the caregivers at the orphanage give their best to the children but that is nothing like a loving family can give that child. So we hope that they do not have to wait too much longer before they are able to meet with their forever family (US) well we hope that we hear something about the referral soon.