Coming home soon!!!

The wait is almost over

Well Tuesday our court decree should be ready so can start the paper chase to bring the boys home! Wednesday is a half day of work here and Thursday is a holiday soooo its going to be tough to get both boys paperwork done on Tuesday and Wednesday. We have to go to their birth cities to get their birth certificates. When i say we i mean me and my regional facilitator since Jared is at home in the states.


I'm ready to start our new lives with 5 children but dreading the journey home with two little boys who will be scared and probably freaking out over all the changes they will be going through. I am also sad that I'm leaving this city without Masha, i never really believed that i would. I am however ecstatic about seeing Ashlyn, Kaeden and Savannah!!! I have missed my kiddos so very much! Ive missed ny dogs too lol!

Callen loves dogs the orphanage has a few but hes kinda rough and i don't think he'll realize our dogs are dogs since they re so big! Grayson likes the dogs as long as they aren't too close to him so thats going to be a challenge with two huge overly friendly great danes wanting to meet him!

I'm getting ready now to ho catch a bus to the orphanage to go see the boys, they too are getting tired of the monotony of the visits, especially Grayson since he was allowed to leave twice to go to the airport to see planes to help prepare him for the trip. He loves cars and now everyday asks about driving again!

The plans you have........

Well things have not gone according to our plans but then again they rarely do. The process of International adoption is a journey of faith and believe me this journey has tested mine many many times. Ultimately i know God is in control and orchestrating every move we make we just have to trust him that his plans are way better than ours. When we started this process it was for Masha, Grayson was our added bonus....that doesn't mean we wanted him any less but just that since hosting Masha we felt she was our daughter and we would go through this crazy journey to bring her home.

After getting Masha's referral and getting to see her again we found out we would not be able to adopt her. There are many factors to this none of which were known to all parties involved until recently. We were not aware she has several family members she still sees regularly so even though she wanted to be adopted by us she still struggled with leaving everything behind. Although we were and are devastated and heartbroken we pray she will be loved here and maybe someday when she is older she can come to the US. The pain is still great over the loss of her being our daughter so please don't ask details because i am tired of talking about it.

We did after a lot of discussion and prayer decide to still bring home two children, so Grayson is coming home and another little boy we met at the same orphanage who we named Callen. One week ago we had our court date and both boys are now legally ours! I am still in country for the waiting period after any court decision and then I'll be started the paper chasing part to bring the boys home, hoping i can be home in two weeks or so.

We are in country!!

Ok sorry I'm a terrible blogger anyway but it's has been very hectic since we arrived in country Sunday afternoon. We were delayed one day from getting our official referral to come meet Grayson because of a crazy snow storm that hit the capital city here shutting everything down. We of course did not have coats. I don't own a warm one since we live in south TX I don't really need it, Jared just thought he'd be ok for a few days without one since our region is way south of the capital and typically warmer this time of year! WRONG lol we actually were ok in just two layers and a fleece hoodie or sweater but all our facilitators were freaking out saying we must be cold blah blah blah and we were sticking out really bad as foreigners without coats so on Monday we walked to the GAP to find coats they were on clearance and we paid about $165 American dollars for them, more than we would in the states but clothing here is expensive. We didn't get to get out and sight see though since we were rushing trying to get our referral so we could head down to our region to meet Grayson, we do have to take the almost 15 hour train ride back up to the capital in a few days though to get Masha's referral. We did get to meet Grayson on Thursday morning and have visited him a few times since. He's absolutely adorable and very smart. Spoiled by the staff at the orphanage too, everywhere you look his picture is up on the wall. He is already calling us mama and papa.

Getting closer!!!!

In less than a week we will be boarding a plane to fly overseas to start the last part of our journey. Our bags are almost packed and ready to go, we have things taken care as far as childcare for our three kids here at home. Only thing we are really lacking is our tax return which we need to have. We have enough money to get there and last about two weeks or three depending on costs of food and accommodations in country but if the refund doesn't get here soon we are in trouble.....talk about stress. As if getting ready to leave the country for two months isn't stressful enough. Lol in good news my best friend Jenny took me out to dinner last night. It was great having adult conversation, no kids, no husbands, just two friends having a nice dinner and a couple of margaritas! I'm going to miss my kids, my friends, my family, my pets basically everything while I'm overseas BUT I'm also excitedly nervous  about getting to see the kids. I can't wait to see Grayson and hold him, I'm excited to see Masha again and hear her cute accent when she says my name!

Twelve Days!!!

Well we got travel dates this past Thursday so the craziness has commenced!  We fly out of Houston on Saturday the 23rd and have our first referral appointment on the 25th!!! Two days later i should be holding my new son for the first time and about a week later we get to see Masha again!

I am beyond excited to go and dreading it all at the same time, I'm going to miss my kids SOOO bad and I do not do well on long car rides I get pretty restless. So I am literally going to look like i have ants in my pants, i get pretty squirmy after a few hours.

Its crazy here right now trying get everything ready to be gone so long and be so far away from everythibg familiar. I'm an over packer by nature, I'm the person who has everythibg you could think of possibly needing either in my diaper bag or cars console. Seriously, extra diapers and wipes in console, yup! Straws, yup! Plastic spoon, yup! Chick fil a barbecue sauce, yup! You get the idea! Everyone keeps telling me to pack very lightly but I'm really not seeing that happen!

Sorry I'm a bad blogger!

Well I'm a bad blogger plus I have had a pretty bad cold for about two weeks that I'm pretty sure has turned into a mild case of bronchitis. I announced the winners of the cutest kids photo contest on my facebook craft page and contacted all the winners. All three winners very generously turned down their $40 gift cards! One I just kept the money and the other two asked that their cards were instead a donation to a waiting child on Reeces Rainbow or that we jeep the money ourselves. I donated $40 to Berkeley and $40 to Maggie. Both girls are in the country we are adopting from and need families.

In our adoption news, our dossier has been submitted to the kids country so now we are just awaiting travel dates. We are hoping to travel the first week of April but it could be sooner, it could be later. We are really close to being fully funded so hopefully we will be able to have another carwash soon and I'm having another auction on facebook. The auction is also benefiting two other adopting families!

We are getting excited and nervous about traveling. I'm so ready to see Masha again and to  finally see Leonid! I am not looking forward to leaving the other kids here at home for that long. I know they'll be fine but still....plus I have never flown for that long before. I'm borderline claustrophobic and I get restless very easily. I cannot even sit still through a movie!