Getting Ready!

We have received a submission date of June 29th for our dossier to the SDA. They are still clsoing down on July 11th but if we go ahead and submit, we can be apart of the first families to adopt from the new ministry when they re-open. Our last documents are being sent over tomorrow and we pray that they will be received on Wednesday! This has been a very stressful week getting everything correct and in the right hands but it is all worth it when we can save a child's life! This weekend has been exciting since we decided to go ahead and start painting her room. I know it will be longer until we get her but it doesn't hurt to have fun and start decorating!! The boys were just as excited and wanted to be apart of it all. Here are some pictures of them painting!

Ethan painting his "E"!



Logan painting his "L"!!



No good news...

Well things have changed a bit in the past week. The SDA (State Department for Adoption) in Ukraine announced last week that they will be closing as of July 11th and turning it over to the Ministry for Social Policy. We are not sure what all this means yet but we do know that this will postpone things for us to go over and adopt. Our attorney should be finding out more information this week and hopefully it won't affect us too much. She also received our dossier on Monday and we had one document missing so now we have to resend it to Tallahassee and then off to Ukraine. The worst part of all this is that sending anything to Ukraine costs a lot of money no matter if its one paper or 100. So that stinks that we have to do all of this for one document but its all worth it when we can save an orphan's life!!

We have been approved!!

Finally!! We have received our I171H form (approval letter from the Immigration Services)!! This is the last document we have been waiting for the past 2 months. Now our dossier is complete and was sent to Tallahassee on Tuesday to all be apostilled! The great news is that the director of His Kids Too, who is acting as our courier service to get all our documents hand delivered to Tallahassee, is going herself to Ukraine this Saturday!! This is exciting because one, it saves us money on not having to ship our package and two, it will get in our attorney's hands on Sunday verses one week later if we shipped it!! So next week will be a good week because we will find out our travel date to Ukraine! Now its time to start decorating her room! Fun, fun! Check back soon and hopefully we will have a date to go get our princess!!

Wow, I can't believe it has been a month since I last posted anything. A lot has gone on since then. The first exciting news is that we have finally been approved from the USCIS (Immigration for Visa's) and we are just awaiting our letter to complete our packet. As soon as we receive it, our dossier (packet) will be sent to Tallahassee to be apostled and then it will be sent along to the Ukraine. From there, it will take about 5 days to be translated into Russian language and then submitted to the SDA. Once submitted, they can give us a travel date as soon as one month from that date!! We are so excited, that could mean that we would be traveling as soon as the end of July or beginning of August. Through all of our excitement, I am also nervous because that means less time to fund raise to get all of the money we need to travel. I know that God is bigger than all of this and will help us through it. We are following His plan for us and I trust that everything will work out.
It has been so neat to see the boys getting excited as well. Ethan is always asking about her and will always make sure he lets us know that he is thinking of her. For example, we were visiting some good friends on Tuesday and one of the girls gave Ethan some stickers she had gotten from the doctor. On the table was a sticker of "My Little Pony" and Ethan asked if he could have it....I said to him that its a girl sticker and to let Sami have it but then he says..."Mommy, I want to save it for my big sister, she is a girl!". They can't wait to paint her room too. We have been looking at samples of pink ( I can't wait to have some pink in this house!) and a couple days of the week, Logan will go into her room and say "Mommy, where is pink on wall?" We look forward to painting and decorating as soon as we get our travel date. I don't want to do everything too early as it may confuse the boys. I have bought a couple pair of shoes for her! I know I don't know her size but a store was going out of business and they were really cheap so I couldn't resist. It takes all that I have to not buy her clothes. She better like girly stuff because I am so ready to shop for a girl...pinks, purples, dolls, barbies, hair bows, and anything else girls like!
I hope to be a little better at updating now that things will be going quicker. Praises for prayers.....my back is getting better daily and I had my check-up yesterday and the doctor said I am doing great! I still have a lot of restrictions but its coming along. Also, a close friend of the family works for Delta Airlines and he has offered us two buddy passes where we can fly for a lot cheaper price! The only downfall is that they only go to Amsterdam and then we have to get a connecting flight to Kiev. But if everything works out, then it should save us $1000! Awesome answer to prayer!!