Wednesday, November 6, 2013

We are back

So much I could write but still trying to decide what should be said and what will be said. Anna is starting to adjust to living here with us. Actually that part is going fine. She sits on our laps, gives kisses and plays with the other kids already. Not bad for only being home for 2 weeks. She still tries our patience regularly. Tries throwing her tantrums to get what she wants but it never works so we are seeing less and less of those, that being said when she throws one she really throws one. Oh well as already stated they get her nothing. The trip went really well. Catherine was a great travel friend, couldn't ask for anyone better. Will post some pics from the trip. WE were in Bansko Bulgaria in the picture with the fountain. Bansko is a great area to go to. The playground picture Anna had a lot of fun at this park we walked to everyday. She played and we drank our Dunkin Doughnuts coffee....a beautiful set up. On the day we got her visa to come home we went to McDonalds as you can see she is not a fan she is looking in the fry box to see if there is anything else to eat.

Sunday, October 13, 2013

Tomorrow....

So this past Friday was my birthday, and my beautiful family surprised me with a wonderful party. Words fail at how wonderful everything was. they cleaned out the barn and made it the most beautiful party hall. I am so blessed!!! Tomorrow I will be leaving for Bulgaria and be gone till the 23...I am so happy to finally be bringing Anna home...our life will completely change but God is so good to our family. Will try to post from Bulgaria.

Friday, October 4, 2013

Leaving on a jet plane.....

So we made it through court (whew) and have our tickets booked and an apartment to stay in and now on to packing and gathering for the trip. We have had a few paperwork headaches to get through but hopefully we are all set.

Monday, September 23, 2013

The Suspense is Killing Me

Today is our court day in Bulgaria. I am so anxious. We have taken so long to get here, so many set backs and now we are so close. I actually wasn't nervous until last week when I was talking to the agency about booking our tickets and she was like umm maybe you should wait until after the 23 that way if there is a problem you won't have to re-book the tickets. Excuse me a problem what?....yeah her words...."with the luck your family has had you better wait and see if you get through with no more trouble"....not what we wanted to hear. So today I am waiting to get the news that we are legally the parents to Anna Sophia......calm my anxious heart oh God.

Wednesday, September 11, 2013

Quick Update

We have heard from our agency and we have been assigned a court date in Bulgaria. YEAH!!!! So we are moving forward and are very excited. We have Annas' bed assembled and I purchased her bedding it looks so cute actually the whole room does. We were told to plan travel for October 10 or so. I have been looking into flights. So happy!!!

Tuesday, August 13, 2013

A long overdue update

Wow 2 months since last posting. Most people probably don't even check here anymore, but here goes anyhow. We ran into so many set backs that it became very difficult to stay positive. So we wrote nothing because you know the saying "if you can't say something nice don't say anything at all" so that was the decision I made to say nothing I would regret later. All that to say we are finally closing in the end of the adoption. We needed to update our homestudy and INS clearence because Alex turned 18 so we started that in April and got everything in the middle of May took 6 weeks to get it all done and turned back into our case worker at USCIS. She sent everything to the US embassy in Bulgaria we are ecpecting to get the article 5 letter instead we were notified that our embassy wanted our homestudy re-written we were very upset, we had just done all that. So we tried to get our congressman to help us out but no go. We had to re-do our homestudy and get our USCIS approval all over again in June. And in case you are wondering there were no fee breaks every step cost us again. Oh wait while we are doing all this our medical and psychological checks had to be re-done because in all the delays they came close to being a year old and Bulgaria court was not going to accept them. Oh boy were we ever frustrated. But we complied, not with a good attitude but we did everything and we were issued our article 5 letter on June 28. Ohh happy day we were finally moving in the right direction. WHOA there not so fast in July while we are waiting to get the MOJ signature to move into the court phase it turns out that the only person who could sign on our paperworkk resigned from their position. Are you kidding me? NO we aren't. What can you even do? At any given time if we had not had the delays we would not have been affected by his reignation, God knew. So here we are waiting to hear our court date and making plans to bring our girl home still.....her 7th birthday was last week and if you had told us in January when we visited with her that she would not be here for her birthday I wouldn't have believed you. So on her birthday I went on line and ordered her some clothes....a little retail therapy. We are hoping to be in court in September and then travel 2 weeks after that. If we come to mind pease pray that we get to court without any more set backs, we just want to get her home and start our time with her. Even with everything we have been extrememly busy and the summer has flown by. We are switching the upstairs bedrooms around and re-painting and cleaning out so the girls room will be set when she gets home. Our three adult kids will be making moves her in thecoming weeks. This Saturday Matthew is moving back out into his new apartment, Beth goes back to college the next weekend and the

Tuesday, June 11, 2013

We have been very busy and there has been no forward movement on the adoption. Some backwards movement but not forward. It has been extremely discouraging. We recieved our I800 A approval and when it got to the embassy they rejected it and made us do yet again another homestudy update and re apply to USCIC and pay the fees all over again and wait again for the approval that we had all ready been given. We are currently in the empty space between being in Texas and getting sent to Missouri with the paperwork, it can take 2 weeks to go from one place to the other. We did however recieve new pictures of Anna and she looks good, so that was nice. Our son graduates highschool next week and Matt graduated college last month, and we had pre-school graduation last week so whew so many things coming to an end. Anticipating new things begining.

Wednesday, April 10, 2013

pictures

Phoebe and Ava with Phoebes' art work that was on display with our counties art council. My new grandson Jackson Howard. Born March 29,2013 weighing in at 5pounds 10 ounces. He is a tiny little thing.

Tuesday, April 9, 2013

Beauty and the Beast

Alex did a great job as Gaston in the school production. The whole cast did a marvelous job. We enjoyed the play and so many people have told us "we didn't know Alex could sing" SURPRISE ; just because his parents have no musical ability, doesn't mean he doesn't:) Actually all our kids can sing and play instruments, must be it skips a generation.

Sun!!!

So I am happy to say the sun has come back out. YEAH!!! all the snow has melted and this snowman was short lived.

Tuesday, March 26, 2013

Airplane Mode

That's how I feel about where we are at. When we put our cell phones on airplane mode, we want it on but not wasting battery life and always searching for a signal. We have contacted the home study agency our placing agency and the finger print clearance still has not come through. 2 weeks and they are done digitally so it's not like they are mailed anywhere, they are sent directly. So I am trying not to waste energy (time) stressing about when or how it will happen. I have to quit stalking my email looking for something and just enjoy all the other good things that are going on. Alex had his school play and it was wonderful, he made a great Gaston. We went to all 3 performances. On the Sunday afternoon one we had 15 people in for lunch and then went as a group to the school. I will try to post some pictures soon. He was so handsome:). This week on Good Friday our church is having a play, and Alex and Elaina are in that. Yesterday Sara,Jessi and myself went and set up the stage. And I think it looks like an authentic Roman court room. We have a little tweeking to do tomorrow but otherwise we have it set. If you live in the area its' 7pm Friday at our church. It is called The Trial of the Ages. Phoebe also had a piece of her art work go on display at the county Arts Council so on Saturday we went to the art display and awards program for her. I will also try to post a picture of it. She did a great job it is quite beautiful. Dan and I feel better about all the paper ,tape,markers,and glue that the girls use (on a very regular basis) it has not been for nought.:) We continue to be busy and hopeful, why well because we can't be anything else

Friday, March 15, 2013

Quick update

This week we had Alex state finger printed and a home study done. WHEW!!! We are supposed to take him Thursday ,but the school play starts on Thursday, so the problem is miss the production for the whole school and go get it done....because this is really...really...really important.....but so is his other commitement. UGH So I am thinking we go on a different day then the appointment, we have never done this before and I hate to be obnoxious but we really need this done. Decisions decisions. I am posting a picture of my grandson Wesley, I took him away for Monday afternoon with gramma time.

Friday, March 8, 2013

Set backs

We have experienced some set backs with bringing Anna home. Nothing earth shattering just very time consuming and frustrating. Alex has turned 18 so now he has to be finger printed and cleared on the state and federal levels. What it means is more paper work and time and money. We were hoping to travel in May but at this point in time that would take a miracle. Not that God couldn't do that it's really more frustrating than anything. We would love to get her home and start on the next phase of this which is atatchment and bonding. We will persevere.

Wednesday, February 27, 2013

Friday, February 22, 2013

Catching Up

So we made it to Bulgaria and back. WHEW!! We have actually been home for almost a month. We did not post publicly that we were leaving because we didn't want people to know we would be out of town. Everything went so great. My daughter Sara and her family came and stayed at the house with the other kids and we were off on January 19th. Bulgaria was a great place to go to. We never once felt un-safe ,the food was great and the people that we met were so friendly. We flew into Sofia and then drove down to Razlog the town where are daughter is. We visited 5 days with her in the morning and afternoon. She is in a very good family/group home. The ladies that take care of them do a great job. They put a lot of time and energy into the kids in the home. Svetla is more delayed then we thought, but after spending 3 days with her we knew that we needed to focus on what she could do and not on what she couldn't do. We had to do some serious praying and soul searching while we were there. But she is so full of life and her laugh is so contagious, and when we got her to smile at us,well, we knew we would not leave her. She will need lots of support so I have spent some time trying to figure out the best way to help her when we bring her home. I am really not sure what the best way to proceed with her, do we keep her home in the fall and homeschool or get her right in because she needs speech therapy and possibly some OT. I have lots to think about. We have filed the immigration paperwork and are waiting on getting the approval,once that comes the US embassy will be notified and then the in country staff will try to get us a court date and then we travel to bring her home a few weeks after court, in all it can take 15 weeks between visits. UGH!! We would love to bring her home in May, or before. We have just learned that the Bulgarian government has resigned so not sure how that will affect us in getting through the process. We are praying that the process will stay on track or hey maybe even speed up,:) I wanted to post some pictures of the trip but ummmmm, well I can't find the camera so as soon as I locate that I will post some. Like I said Bulgaria was a great trip and we swa some very beautiful places and our girl is too cute.

Wednesday, January 16, 2013

Super Hero Ava

Just wanted everyone to see our super hero. She loves spiderman and all things hero related. She wore this when we did her 6th birthday in December.

Friday, January 4, 2013

It came

We have finally received the official referral. We are able to make travel plans for our first trip. Things have been very crazy here so we will post more later, when I have definate plans but for now we are rejoicing that we are one step closer to meeting her.