Archive Post: Hello!

Where have we been? I hope y'all are paying enough attention to notice that we have been missing in action for a while! I'll just blame our absence on some faulty internet equipment and that should about cover it. I am sure many of you have had to deal with computer woes and will sympathize with me!

Things are happening, sort of. What do I mean by that? Well, our dossier (paperwork) is in Ukraine and has been for some weeks now. We are still waiting for it to be submitted. This only can happen on Mondays and "Our Monday" has not come yet. The only indication of when that may happen is from our translator, Valentina (who has the dossier and will be the submitter on our behalf). Steve asked her if she thought we should re-do our medical physicals since they will expire in early August or if she expects to be submitted by then. I was encouraged that she told us that she hoped to be submitted by then but since many things do not depend on her, that we should go ahead and get them redone. It encourages me because our time is at least on the horizen!

Should we be submitted by August, the pattern has been that three months from the date of submittal comes the appointment. This could very possibly put us there in November which is Steve's biggest month of business. Although we will be so excited to be able to go, we are concerned about the loss of imcome. (naturally) We are thankful for Abel, Steve's new employee, who will be here and should be able to hold down the fort while we are away so that those weeks of absence will not be a total loss financially. Please be in prayer for us. Finances continue to be our major source of concern in this phase of the process.

I personally am hoping for an early July submittal with an earlier-than-usual appointment (a possibility on account of the fact that we are adopting three and they may want to hurry us in before we come to our senses!). We will trust God that whatever happens, He will supply all our needs and work these things into the greatest good possible as only he can do. Praise be!

If you are able to assist us financially, please consider doing so. I am asking outright because it is so important to us and for these children. We are hoping to go without racking up debts. If we have to, we will, but we are sure there are people out there who understand our reluctance to add the stress of a large amount of debt to the already unpredictable and emotional situation of attempting to adjust and blend our new family. I would normally cringe at the thought of asking for money but adopting these chidren is something I believe in so strongly and so passionately as being truly good that I have no quams whatsoever; instead, I am almost eager! So please, consider how you can help. Maybe you don't have the money but you know someone who does. In any case, and no matter what, pray. We need you!

This is all so thrilling and so terrifying at once and I am so excited in my anticipation of meeting my children that I can hardly stand it! I am constantly breathing prayers, trying to cover every angle I can think of. Not because I am afraid God will not provide but because I am always wondering "what if?" and "who?" and "what emotional baggage?" My most common prayer is that God will prepare their hearts to love and to be loved despite the sure fact that life has been harder for them than we can imagine--and them being only small children. Pray for them with me, if you will.

That is what is on my heart today. Thank you for your interest, prayers and support that so many of you give to us in so many ways. We appreciate you more than you will ever know.

I've gone and gotten wordy again. Hope you've made it this far!

Melissa

Archive Post: Entry for May 24, 2007

I call this picture, "Has Anyone Seen Annette?" She is there in the middle of my garage before I tackled it today. We've been stockpiling stuff for a fundraiser garage sale but the stuff has been reproducing and sale-stuff and non-sale-stuff were getting mixed together in one giant jumbled mountain of --well--stuff!

Who enjoys cleaning out the garage? Still, it didn't take me as long as I expected it to and now I keep opening the door and looking in to admire the fruits of my labor. I've been systematically trying to get the whole house organized and de-cluttered. I am hoping to bring the children home to a welcoming environment and I don't want to spend those last precious days with Hannah, Annette and Ivy cleaning out closets and frantically trying to plan for our month-plus absence. I want to be ready--or at least have a list that I can plan on using as my guide. I can picture myself lying awake at night thinking about who is going to water the plants or mow the lawn or make sure the bills get paid! If I just plan now I can save a lot of stress later on! So, I am nesting. Preparing for my young--but not to be born--to come home.

Steve is being cautious about the work he schedules for late fall. That is when we suspect we may get our appointment. It could be earlier; it could be later. I may have to clean out the garage again before then! Yeesh! I hope not!

We're still waiting for our paperwork to be submitted. Please keep this in your prayers.

Melissa

Archive Post: Entry for February 5, 2007

Welcome to our new blog

Archive Post: Entry for May 14, 2007

Our paperwork is in the hands of the translators now and our translator, Valentina, will submit it when she is able. First she must translate it all and then she will submit it to the SDA when our turn comes up. A lot of waiting!

It is pretty exciting to think that for my next Mother's Day I will probably have double the number of children in the family to be thankful for! Praise the Lord (in advance)!

I was just thinking this morning that I should start making a list of things that need to be done before we leave for Ukraine. When they do call for us, we will likely only have a week or two to prepare for the trip. I will be so excited I am afraid I will forget things like who to call and little things like that! We have to plan to be gone at least thirty days! Eeek!

Archive Post: Homepage Makeover

Well, Maybe you have noticed that our home page has had a makeover; if not, check it out! Actually, It has had two makeovers but this one is more asthetically pleasing.

We have also added a "thermometer" as a visual to show you all where we are in our available funds. Anyone can donate using the "Donate Now" button under the meter!

Archive Post: Value: $0

I suppose if we had written, "priceless", it would have gotten held up in customs...

Hannah, our seven-year-old, videotaped for us

The package is in the mail to Ukraine!

Monday we chased around getting the final certifications from the counties our documents originated in. Then we all headed west to Nashville, our state capital, where the documents would have to be apostilled. We were able to stay with my lovely sister and her handsome husband in their home. On Tuesday, Steve went and got the apostilling done and came back to get the girls and me so that we could all go together to FedEx to mail the package. Steve filled out five forms before he got one perfect and handed it over to the man behind the counter. Hannah videotaped the whole thing for us.

Phew! All that work and now we hand it over to somebody behind a counter to be tossed together with a bunch of other envelopes probably very few if any of which hold the future of little orphaned children inside of them. It seems like our package should have been the biggest box, tied with a huge red bow and followed by a marching band instead of tossed in a pile and marked with a "$0" under 'value'.

Now our role changes from gathering documents to being patient. Waiting. We do have $10,000+ to raise so we won't be sitting idle while we wait! Every day brings us closer to the day that our children will be with us. I wish we knew when that would be!

We'll keep you updated. Thank you to all of you who have donated to us through the card sales or just with monetary donations. We hope to put a counter of some kind on the front page to keep you all more informed about where we stand in our fundraising.

Thanks for your prayers! Don't stop now!

Melissa and Steve

Archive Post: Entry for April 17, 2007

God is good, all the time. It's just that sometimes that phrase rolls off the tongue a little easier than others! LOL! We all know that!

I am so pleased to tell you al that Ukraine did open up to new adoptions yesterday! (audible sigh of relief here!) They have been in such political turmoil over there that their foreign adoption program had been shut down. At first they said it would be through the end of April and then through April 16th. Even that date was questionable. We wondered about changing countries but Steve said that for some reason he had a feeling we should stick with Ukraine. (If you know Steve, he doesn't normally put much stock in 'feelings'. He normally would do what seemed most logical.) Even I keep thinking that it seems that God is paving the way to Ukraine. Our immigration form coming back so quickly was a real encouragement to us and especially to me.

I believe that we are always called to do the work of the Lord, helping orphans, widows, the poor, overseas missions as well as here in our own neighborhoods. At the risk of stepping on someone's toes here, I do not believe that we are to ask what to do and then wait for a "feeling of leading". (Not that God doesn't communicate this way, just that He'll seek us.) We are to act on his revealed Word. This is what Steve and I have sought to do in pursuing this adoption. Jesus said that whatever we do to the least person, we might as well be doing it to him--He takes it that personally.

All that said, I do believe that God has been leading as well as cheering us on while we run this race. What an encouragement it is to see him blessing our efforts. How amazing that He does hold the whole world in His hands! Even little orphans in Ukraine.

Oh those little orphans! I can't wait to hold them in my arms. My prayer is always that God will prepare them to be loved and to love and me to love without expecting love in return. This will be a challenge.

Well, today we praise God for allowing Ukraine to open again and tomorrow we may question His plan if something doesn't go the way we want it to. Either way, God is good, All the time.

Archive Post: YAHOOOOO!

Hooray! After only three weeks, the form that we have been expecting to take three months arrived in the mail! Hannah and Steve had been out this morning and brought it up from the mailbox; Hannah with cheers (she announced that the i-pod 7oo 70 H was here--It is called the I171-H) and Steve with tears in his eyes.

We are so thrilled and excited. This means that we are free to finish compiling paperwork that we thought would have to wait a couple of months and then get our forms approved by our consultant and finally off to Ukraine to be translated.

One small hitch is that they spelled my maiden name wrong and so we will have to send it back to be fixed or however that is handled. That hopefully should not take long. We'll see.

This is the form that we specifically prayed over. In fact, Steve took it to church and had everyone in sight pray over it with him!

Needless to say, we are very encouraged. This makes the reality a little more apparent and draws into even clearer focus the fact that we may have our little ones in our arms sooner than expected. We aren't holding our breath, though! Uncertaintly is the nature of foreign adoption.

Please continue to keep us in your prayers. Particularly as we assemble the rest of the paperwork and especially because the situation politically in Ukraine is very unstable at the moment. They have closed to foreign adoptions through mid-April and it is unsure as to whether or not they will open again by May.

Pray, Pray, Pray!

Melissa

Archive Post: Greeting Cards Fundraiser

Well, now that we have entered into a "waiting" phase and can slow down on chasing paperwork, we have started making more plans for fundraising. We have quite a bit of money to raise before we are called to Ukraine and the clock is ticking! We can't wait till the money is in before we send our dossier to Ukraine because our paperwork will expire.

Our first fundraising effort is one that any of you can participate in. I have hand-painted several different designs onto greeting cards and we have them for sale here on this website's fundraising page.

Check them out! I hope you'll like them and keep me busy painting!

Melissa

Archive Post: Ukraine

Well in the last 10 days Ukraine has looked as if it is closing to international adoption to not closing to Americans to definitely closing to singles and strict age restrictions for older couples. In addition the director of the SDA and several deputies have resigned and the director of international adoption has quit. Other than that all is stable and well in Ukraine. Surprisingly I am at peace with what is going on. There is nothing we can do so we will just keep moving forward and hope and pray for the best.

Steve

Archive Post: Entry for March 22, 2007

Well, it's done! We have been fingerprinted and the information is on its way to Memphis to be processed! This is the part that we expect will involve a long wait. Please pray for a speedy processing time. We can't send any paperwork out until the social worker's licence is renewed in June since it is so close to expiring. But we will feel much better having the forms in hand!

My sister lives in Nashville so we were able to spend the day with her and she kept the girls while we went to the immigration office. We were there around an hour waiting after we got the forms and handed them in to wait for fingerprinting. In that time we sat across from an older couple who was there because the wife, who was from Russia, had her name spelled wrong on her green card and also needed to change to her married name. We enjoyed talking to her and showing off our few Russian words! Steve was wearing his shirt from Moldova that says, "God's Design" in Russian. She confirmed that and also translated the word on the back for us: 'kurasho', good.

We are going to have to go back again later for fingerprinting again because for some reason the two different forms can not use the same biometric fingerprints. Go figure. I have no idea why, but that's okay, we'll get to visit Bethany and John again.

Melissa

Archive Post: Phew!

Sorry not to have posted sooner. I was having Blog issues. Here is the latest news and it turns out to be better than we had hoped for!

Throughout the course of the day on Tuesday it was hard to sort out rumor from fact and now that the dust has settled, so to speak, we have found out that in fact, the quotas, which caused so much concern will likely not affect Americans. I don't know what happens with the Canadians and the Germans but this quota system is being challenged in Ukraine because it is actually illegal by Ukrainian law!

The even better news requires a bit of explanation. This is confusing and hard to explain clearly but here goes:

Up until now one of our biggest challenges with the paper work is that while every piece of paperwork expires (most at the one year mark), Ukraine refused any dossier (all the paperwork) that had ANYthing expiring within six months. So it would seem that as long as all the forms were assembled within six months we would have plenty of time, right? Wrong. Not only did each form need the 6-month buffer but so did the license of every Doctor, Social worker, Notary and Apostille. Even the Adoption agency's license must not be due to expire within 6 months! I cannot tell you how difficult this is to accomplish and these licenses could not be renewed early (we checked!). In waiting for one, another would time out and on and on.

Someone petitioned the US Embassy in Ukraine and they are now waiving this rule for Americans! Apparently, the problem comes because of the system by which we do our license renewals. It just was not "translating" into being do-able. Now, the rule is just that the licenses must be current at the time the paperwork was assembled. This is a huge relief!

With all this, we are still likely staying with Ukraine. We will decide for sure this week. The reason we still have hesitation is that we worry about the stability there.

We continue to ask for your prayers. I find myself thinking of the children often and am so looking forward to just getting them here.

Melissa

Archive Post: Breaking news... Pray.

We just found out that Ukraine has now decided to limit the number of foreign adoptions it allows. The number is based on the average number of yearly adoptions per counry MINUS the number of non-compliant (people who do not continue to send in yearly progress reports as they must agree to do) adopters. This number ends up being only 75 for Germany and 24 for Canada. Both of these countries have already maxed out for the year. The U.S. is alotted 320 but this large number only represents a higher number of adopters in this country and the percentage will likely mean that it is maxedout by late spring. We are waiting now to hear from our consultant as to her reccommendation but we were just about to get our fingerprints done and then send our imigration form to USCIS. Now we have been advised to hold off on doing this as we may have to switch countries.

I am sure I do not need to tell you how discouraging this is since to change will be very costly and would involve finding an agency (we are now independant) not to mention delay the process. Please take a moment and pray for this situation. If we had to be stopped mid-stream, we were days away from it being even more of a burdeon. I am thinking also of families who were further along than us .

This is very punitive on the part of the Ukrainian Government but it is meant to act out against families that did not do what they had promised and it turns out to punish everyone involved EXCEPT them! They already have their children.

Pray.

Melissa

Update: Our consultant just told us that she's being told that this is a quarterly quota that should not affect the U.S. I hope that is true! We will keep you posted. She is just finding out the details herself.

Archive Post: Fingerprint card

Yea! Our fingerprint card came in the mail today! Our homestudy report has to be complete in order to go and get the prints but it hopefully should be done this next week. It feels good to be able to do something. (looks like we will be coming for a visit before long, Beth!)

M.

Archive Post: Fundraising

Keep a look-out on our fundraising page for our first fundraising effort. I am hand-painting greeting cards to be sold in packages of 12. So far I have two packages-worth done so I will need to step it up! I'm hoping orders start piling in.

I was listening to my Russian last night wihile I painted and Steve, from the living room, said what I was thinking, "I just want to GET there!" Spring is starting here and having a touch of the spring fever just magnifies our desire to get going!

M.

Archive Post: Waiting... February 27, 2007

We are still waiting for our petition to sponser an imigrant child form(I600A) to be prcessed. This is the part that is expected to take several months. Steve took it with him to church the Sunday before we mailed it and had everybody we saw pray over it. The first part of it is expected to go quickly. They get the form and then send a card to us so that we can go to Nashville and get our fingerprinting done. Then we send it back and settle in for the long wait. They have cashed the check so we know it is there!

Some have asked about the insurance situation. We have gotten that worked out so that we could get a group plan for the business and put us on it. This requires that adoptive children be treated the same as any child born to us naturally. No pre-existing conditions. We still are intending to fight the battle with TRH but not yet.

Business is picking up again. When spring comes and the sun shines everyone starts calling at once. Steve has almost no work for the month of January but now he has every day this week booked, starting today! This is a mixed blessing since we need the money more now than ever but it is hard for Steve because he has a hip problem that seems related to his work that keeps flaring up. Please keep him in your prayers.

We are working on learning our Russian. I am planning to order a set of books and tapes to listen to in our our car but we also have a CD set that is more designed for tourists. We started out wondering if we would ever say a single word but our tongues are starting to give in to the extra ordinary demands of the Russian language!

Thank you to all who are praying. We appreciate this more than you know.

Du'svidan'i!

Melissa

Archive Post: I600 A

We are submitting our I600A petition to sponsor an immigrant child/ orphan with the USCIS which is the old INS. We are forced to do this at the Memphis office. Please pray that this form will not be delayed and will be processed in a timely manner.

Thanks

Steve

Archive Post: Valentine's Day 2007

We have been busy this week. We have finished up patching a big hole in the

ceiling in the basement from a leaky pipe. We painted and installed all the
finishing touches. We ordered the carpet for the basement. We have nearly
finished all the necessary indirect expenses for the adoption other than
clothing the kids.

We have our in home visit tomorrow and our sending the I600A in after that.

Pray that the form will be processed expeditiously.

Thanks,
Steve

Archive post: February 22, 2007

We spent the day in the Atlanta area attending a conference on parenting hurt children. Actually, it was designed more for social workers but it was great for us, too. The speaker, Dr. Gregory Keck, was very entertaining while still being extremely relevant and imformative. I was a bit prepared for the topic having read his book but Steve hadn't read it yet and either way we both got a lot out of it. He talked quite a bit about extreme cases but pretty much all these children will have some kind of attatchment issues. It may be quite an adventure!

People have asked me how I expect to deal with the fact that Hannah, Annette and Ivy may have jealousy problems when these new children require so much attention. Not to pretend that won't be an issue, but I suspect that the bigger problems for them will come when the new child breaks a beloved toy or acts out in an agressive way. I cannot preserve their "bubble" once the kids are here and can only do so much to prepare them. I know they are so excited about the new brothers or sisters but am afraid of their hearts being broken by not being loved back. I think I can handle that situation for me but it's such a big thing to ask of these innocent,
wide-eyed little girls we already have. We will need your prayer.

My mom kept the girls while we were at the conference. I am so thankful that my parents are here in Tennessee now. The girls love to go there and when I called them this afternoon, they were having a ball painting pictures. I don't think they even remembered to miss me! I am sure that having family nearby will prove to be an invaluable asset to us in these coming years.

The hotel where we stayed last night turned out to hold a few surprises. Steve noticed the Eastern European name of the girl behind the desk and found out that she was from Russia. We amused her by "practicing" our "Russian" (if you can call it that!) on her. We had the hardest time just saying "Hello"! She said that I said it right but she just laughed at Steve. Thing is, I can only retain the correct pronunciation for about 6 seconds! I hope that becoming more familiar with the sound of the language will help us remember pronunciations better!

This morning when we were checking out, the girl behind the desk had an obvious accent. Steve asked her if she was from Russia and she replied that she was from Romania. Steve told her that he had just been in Moldova and was a stone's throw from the Romanian border. Her eyes lit up and she said "Actually, I am from Moldova but I just say Romania because no one knows Moldova." Turns out she was from Cahul, the city where Steve had been based while he was on his shoe mission! She had started out a bit short with us but by the time we left she was all smiles and as we left, Steve turned back to her and said "Thank you" in Romanian. What a small world sometimes!

Melissa

Many people have asked what is it that you mean by the "refer a dentist?"

We have undertaken this adoption process on faith. When we initially started the first year direct and indirect costs were budgeted at nearly $80,000. This is much more than we make in a year! Through God's provision and careful choices we have been able to trim this direct and indirect costs to about $55,000. Through aggressive saving and generous gifts we are now within $10,000 of what is needed to complete the adoption of these children. We have a limited amount of dental insurance that depending on circumstances involving our children's dental needs could be exhausted very quickly.

Between the adoption expenses, costs associated with adding three children to our family, and the likely loss of two months income this is a major endeavor. Anyways, children who come out of the orphanage system have terrible mouths. Both foul language and foul teeth!

Melissa and I will work on the foul language part. Although I have a drill and wrenches we unfortunately cannot work on the foul teeth part.We often hear of dentists taking mission trips overseas to care for the teeth of disadvantaged children. We are seeking a dentist who wants to take a mission trip for Ukrainian orphans without leaving his office.

If you are a dentist or know a dentist who would want to partner with us to repair these children's teeth if needed. Please call us at 865-986-3482.