It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas

It has been almost 4 months since Miss Abigail became a part of our family.  And we are in full Christmas swing -- decorating the house, putting up lights, baking cookies, and so forth.  Christmas music rings through the house.

Okay, maybe not Currier and Ives postcard perfect, but still...  We won't mention the batch of gingerbread cookies that didn't quite turn out, or the almost catastrophes from one too many cords strung across the floor (but mom! you should watch where you are going!).  Sigh ... good times.

Tony and Abigail had a blast putting up the outside Christmas decorations.  Abigail was disappointed that she couldn't actually go inside the Snoopy Sno-Machine to play.

We recently had an ice storm hit (I say the word "storm" very lightly as growing up in Colorado, it really wasn't much in the way of a true storm).  But nevertheless, we were pretty much confined to the house for four days because of the sheets of ice on everything outside.  Because Abigail had plenty of snow in Bulgaria, white stuff on the ground was not a novelty, but she still enjoyed throwing snow (I mean "ice") balls at Tony.  She hasn't quite got the knack of a true snow ball fight yet because she kept trying to get Tony to stand in a certain place with his back turned for perfect throwing distance.  I tried to explain that you just gotta grab the snow and throw it, but then the ice started flying my way (I was hiding out by the door of the house to run inside real quick if necessary), and I decided to stop trying to help Abigail with the art of snowball throwing.

I hadn't realized how much of an inside the house person I had become because recently Abigail has asked several times to go outside to play, and my first instinct is "it's cold" or "it will be messy".  I guess I'm going to have to get out of my comfort zone a little there because I do want Abigail to keep her desire to be active and healthy.  Something I can learn from her to be sure.

Abigail is progressing amazingly well with the English language and only seems to struggle a bit when she is tired from a long day.  We have learned to not try to communicate much of importance after 8 p.m. at night, or before 7 a.m. in the morning for that matter!  We definitely have a night owl on our hands which makes bedtime and mornings quite interesting when school is in session.  We had quite a peaceful time of it when we were stuck at home and could wake up any time we wanted.

I hope everyone is staying warm, and Merry Christmas from our family to yours!

Do we take the toilets?

Okay, this was too funny not to share.  Today has been a good day with our precious girl.  I have not felt well, and Abbey has been a real trooper in understanding when mom needs to rest to get better.  She really does have a compassionate heart.

We are hoping within the next year to be able to sell our house and move closer to my work.  Right now I have a half hour drive to work, which is wearying at times.  Also, we want to get Abbey in a better school district.  So because I was feeling not motivated to do much else, and Tony needed to run to the hardware store, I sat down with Abbey and said, let's look at houses.  So we started looking online at potential houses we might want to buy (if we were able to sell ours).

This was a true novelty to Abbey and she has probably spent about 4 or 5 hours today alternating between Tony and I helping, looking at houses.  Of course she likes to see the big fancy ones too.  Tony told her when she became a star someday she could buy it and we would all live there.  So she understands we can't buy the super big houses.  (This morning I started out with ones more reasonable, but apparently, she figured out how to move the buttons to the more bedrooms and more bathrooms options).

What Abbey was having a hard time comprehending was that we would be taking our own stuff to the house, and if there was furniture in the pictures, that belonged to someone else who would take it with them when they moved.  She wanted the big flat screen TV in one (who wouldn't), and she liked the kids bedroom set in another.  So anyway, Tony finally was using the Google translate site to try to explain to Abbey that we take our stuff to the next house.

Then out of the blue Abbey asked Tony "Do we take the toilets!??"  Oh my, we couldn't help but laugh.  So now Tony is trying to explain which parts of the house stay, and which parts we take with us if we move.  Too funny.

Rollercoaster of Parenthood

It has been almost a month since we finally got to Abigail and added her to our forever family.  Many of you have been eagerly awaiting a blog post, and I apologize that it has taken so long to write.  I guess the muse finally hit me.  It is late, and it has been a hard day.  Hard on our little one who is trying to figure out how to make it in a whole new culture.  Please pray for Abigail, that she will process through her emotions in a healthy manner.

We got home from Bulgaria on August 30th.  I had to return to work on September 4th, with some days off for Abigail's doctor appointments.  Tony returns to work next Monday.  My dad (grandpa Ken) was in town for the first week in September and Abigail enjoyed getting to know him too.  Abigail also got to meet Grandma Patty (Tony's mom) over the past few weeks and hang out at Grandma's condo.  Tony said Abigail poked her head into every nook and cranny at Grandma's.  A curious child indeed!

Abigail started school yesterday.  We had hoped to enroll her in a private school near our house, but that did not turn out.  So Abigail is attending a special public school for kids learning English.  There are kids there from many nationalities.  Abigail is having a hard time dealing with this multi-cultural setting.  Yesterday, she said she wanted to go to school with the American kids instead.  We have been trying to educate her on the fact that all these kids, including herself, ARE American kids.  We are also teaching about respecting all cultures and peoples.  Today she told us she wanted to go back to Bulgaria to go to school with just Bulgarian kids.

She says she is not sleeping well, and that is why she wakes up grumpy.  We are trying to resolve this with various approaches, but it makes for rough mornings, sluggish afternoons, and exhausting evenings.  Please pray for all our strength.  Our 13 year old sweet princess is going through a roller-coaster of emotions, multiple changes, and is sleep-deprived apparently (from what she told us tonight).  And to be honest, we are exhausted too.  We love her so much, but we can't do anything to make the transition any smoother. She must go to school, she must learn to obey parents, and learn to go to sleep at bedtime so she will be alert and awake in the morning, and we aren't going to stop loving her and send her back no matter how much she wants to go back to the way things were.  She is getting time for 8 hours of sleep (same as we know the schedule was in Bulgaria for the school year), but she said she got to sleep more during summer vacation.  So part of this we know is any kid's struggle to get back into the school routine.

One hard part about adoption (whether domestic or international), is finding the right balance to respecting a child's past, while at the same time helping them move forward to a brighter future.

But all is not a struggle, there are joyous parenting moments too.  Like how funny it is that Abigail goes to check the mail every day when she gets home from school (even though Tony has picked up the mail earlier).  Tony has started leaving the junk mail in the box for her to bring in.  If anyone of our friends would like to send her mail (fun cards and the like), just e-mail me for the address if you don't have it.  I think it would be fun for her to get mail addressed to her.

Please pray for me at work that I will catch up swiftly on my workload.  I have a lot on my plate right now, but Abigail needs a mom to be home fixing dinner for her (not coming home late after Tony and Abigail have eaten).  We are trying to sort out the schedules so we have as much family time as possible (as all families struggle with I know).

Please pray for Tony's endurance as he drives the half-hour trip to take Abigail to school and pick her up every day.  He needs a supernatural measure of rest this evening.  He is an amazing husband and father.  His love for his family is so evident to me, and humbles me truly, and makes me want to be a better spouse and parent.

Well, I didn't mean to make this post too serious, but it is late, and I am completely worn out.  I guess the funnier stuff may come when I am more awake.  Thanks for all your prayers and interest in how things are going.

Thank You!

Thank you everyone for your prayers and support through our adoption process.  We will be traveling soon to pick up Abigail and we appreciate everyone who has helped us get this close to the finish line of the adoption, though parenthood has just begun!

Final Adoption Fundraising Post

Alright, folks.  We are on the homestretch for raising funds to go pick up Abigail from Bulgaria.  We don't know our exact travel dates yet, but it is likely we will be traveling as early as August 14th.  Because of some circumstances beyond our control, we may end up needing to stay in country for two weeks instead of the standard one.  Nothing is definite yet, but we need to plan for the contingency and expenses of two weeks in country.  What exactly are these expenses? you might ask.  Well, here is an estimated breakdown:

Airfare - $5,000
In-country adoption agency fees, translators/drivers, and accommodations - $2,100
In-country personal expenses (food, items needed for Abigail, unexpected emergencies fund) - $1,000
Abigail's VISA - $404
Final payment to English Tutor for Abigail - $300

Total: $8,804

We have about $4,800 of this amount already saved up, so we are asking for people to help us fundraise the final $4,000 needed.

$4,000 in 2 and a half weeks - that is essentially the airfare cost left.  Wow! sounds overwhelming and at times it is.  But I know that wherever God leads, he will get us there.  If you can help out in any way, that would be awesome.

Short of sending us a check for the airfare (for which we would be totally grateful!), there are many fundraising venues we have running for you to donate funds to our adoption that will also give you something in return (besides a warm fuzzy feeling in your heart).

Looking for a tax deduction for your donation - Check out our Adopt Together page here: https://www.adopttogether.org/thegrubaughs

Looking to buy some highly recommended coffee - Our page at Just Love Coffee is the place to go: https://justlovecoffee.com/about/beneficiary/childofprayer/

Perhaps you want some discounted prices for restaurants - We have a link with CoupAide as well: http://coupaide.com/deal/grubaugh-adoption-fundraiser/

Closet looking a little empty, need a new t-shirt, or want to show your support for adoption - Check out our Adoption Bug T-shirt Fundraiser Site here: http://www.adoptionbug.com/grubaughadoption/

We are also selling some collectibles and vintage toys on Etsy here: http://www.etsy.com/shop/TreasuresbyEllie?ref=em

and at Ebay here: http://myworld.ebay.com/trghpu/

You can also link to all of the above using the images to the right on this blog.

Some friends of ours are also helping us do another garage sale next weekend, Thursday, Friday and Saturday, August 1 - 3, the address is: 740 Fox Run Trail, Saginaw, TX.  Come on by!

Thank you SO much for your time in reading this post and considering how you could help us with these final airfare expenses to bring our girl home!

We are parents!

We passed court today!  Woohoo!  We are officially the parents of Abigail Grubaugh. Adopted into her forever family on July 22, 2013.

Thanks everyone for all your prayers so far.  Now comes the wait for travel dates.  It might take two weeks to get the travel dates assigned, and another two to three weeks until actual travel (sometime end of August beginning of September).  Then we get to go pick her up and bring her home to her family!

Praise the Lord from whom all blessing flow.

Court Date!

UPDATE (7/18/13) - We have been notified that the Court Date was moved forward to July 22nd! Woohoo!  And our apostilled final home study agency confirmation letter is on its way now to North Carolina to our adoption agency, and they will send it on to Bulgaria today.  Thank you Lord, for moving that smoothly along.

Text of original post:

Our adoption court date has been scheduled for July 25th!  We have to get one more document from our home study agency that we should have in hand by tomorrow to send for apostille.  It is looking like we will be able to get that document back to Bulgaria in time.  Yay!

Typically, the travel week to pick up the adopted child is four to five weeks after court.  There are a lot of factors involved, so we won't know the exact date for a while yet, but if all goes smoothly, by mid-September, our daughter will be home.

Praising God for his watch-care over us, even when my faith felt small, compared to the mountains of paperwork and process it took to get to this point.

Received Signature - now waiting for Court Date!

Hello everyone! I am excited to report that we have received the final Minister of Justice signature for our adoption file, and our file has now moved to the Courts for the adoption proceeding to officially make our girl part of our family.  Yay!

We are now waiting to hear when our court date will be scheduled.  The agency is pretty sure it will be scheduled for this month, which means it is likely our girl will be home in America sometime in August.  It is getting so close now!

Doing a happy dance.

Conversation with Abigail

We were able to message with Abigail through Skype today.  It was so good to talk with her.  It is all through text messaging as they don't have voice or video capability for Skype at the orphanage where she lives.

Abigail is beginning to be able to write short English sentences. We asked her some of the books she was reading with her teacher's help.  Here is the list (I fleshed out the info, we just got titles during the text session):

Through the Bible in Felt – Betty Lukens

In a People House – Dr. Seuss (Ages 2-5)

Let's Visit the Zoo – Harcourt Early Reader (Grade 1)

A Rainbow of Friends – P.K. Hallinan (Ages 3-5)

Never Ride Your Elephant to School (Preschool – Grade 2)

The Day Papa Came Home – Barbara Justus and Caroline Starbird

Baseball Blackout – Scooby Doo Picture Clue Book #6 – Level 1 (Ages 4-8)

Meet Big Foot – Scooby Doo Picture Clue Book #12 – Level 1 (Ages 4-8)

Treasure Hunt – Scooby Doo Picture Clue Book #13 – Level 1 (Ages 4-8)

As you can see, she is working with Kindergarten through 2nd grade books on English reading right now.  She just finished sixth grade in her own country.  We don't know how quickly she will catch up with English reading.   Will it be faster than learning reading in her original language?  Possibly she will, because she already knows the words, just in a different language, rather than learning the concept of sentences, paragraphs, etc. for the first time.  We are hoping she will be at a strong 3rd grade reading level by the end of the summer.  Her tutor that we hired is doing a great job, and we are glad that they have the resources (English language books) from which to teach her.  I am sure that helps a lot more than simple word lists.

We do not yet know what grade we will place her in for school here.  There are a lot of reasons to place her in seventh grade when she gets here, one of which is so that she stays on age with her peers.  But we will decide that in conjunction with the advice of the school, once she is here and we meet with the administrators.

We don't have any new information regarding the adoption process itself.  We are still waiting on a government signature, then a court date, then 2nd trip to pick up Abigail and bring her home.  We are hoping now that the second trip will be early to mid-August, but it could hit as late as October depending upon the timing of the government processes.  Praying that we will have patience to last another four months of waiting if need be!  It has already been three months since we last saw Abigail, and the wait is very rough for all of us.

Thanks for your prayers.

"I will not leave you orphans ..."

From the Mayo Clinic website:

"Cystic fibrosis is a life-threatening disorder that causes severe damage to the lungs and digestive system.

An inherited condition, cystic fibrosis affects the cells that produce mucus, sweat and digestive juices. These secreted fluids are normally thin and slippery. But in cystic fibrosis, a defective gene causes the secretions to become thick and sticky. Instead of acting as a lubricant, the secretions plug up tubes, ducts and passageways, especially in the lungs and pancreas.

... Although cystic fibrosis requires daily care, most people with the condition are able to attend school and work, and have a better quality of life than in previous decades. Recent improvements in screening and treatments mean most people with cystic fibrosis now live into their 20s and 30s, and some are living into their 40s and 50s."

In the last sentence of the above quote, the "recent improvements in screening and treatments" does not mean this is available everywhere in the world.

Here is a quote from the Cystic Fibrosis Worldwide Website:

"The average life expectancy for a CF person in Bulgaria is about 15 years."

We are adopting a 12 year old girl from Bulgaria who has been diagnosed with Cystic Fibrosis.  Within the next few months, she will turn 13.  

We are excited to have her become part of our family.  We are excited at the prospect of being parents.  But as important is the ability to provide this child access to medical treatment that can literally add years to her life.

If you take much time reading on the web, you will see people who are supportive of adoption, those who support only domestic adoption and think people should not adopt internationally, and you will even read those who despise adoption fundraising.  Perhaps, you, my dear reader, are one of those people.  Perhaps you even now are thinking some of the things I have read ... why are they adopting if they can't afford to do so?  They should save up the funds before they start the process? Isn't this just buying a child?  No one helped pay for my child when he/she was born.  And so the list of questions and comments could go on.

I thought I might address a few of these topics.  First of all, if everyone was required to have $32,000 in the bank before giving birth to a child, I think there would be much less children on the planet.  Just because adoptive parents are fundraising for adoption expenses (agency fees, lawyer fees, government fees, travel expenses), does not mean that they are buying a child (none of this money goes towards getting better service or convincing parents to "give up" their children, if correctly done through Hague accredited government processes). It also does not mean the adoptive parents cannot afford to raise a child, just as it did not mean that you could not afford to raise a child if you did not have $32,000 in the bank free and available the day your child was born.  I cannot speak to the last comment regarding "no one helped pay for my child when he/she was born" because I think that is more a comment about how society has failed to live as a village supporting one another in time of need, than really related to adoption at all.

So I do not apologize to those out there who might come across my blog and despise adoptive parents who are sharing their needs and fundraising.  I had considered stopping doing so on my blog, so as not to "bother" people.  However, I have found that my heart cannot stop writing because of the sense of urgency that is tied into special needs adoption.  

This child does not have time to wait until the money is saved up and every circumstance of life is perfect.  God asks us to step out in faith and we have done so.

"Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world." James 1:27

So if you have read this far, and I hope you have, you have heard my heart.  I do not ask for help because I decided I needed a child and that all my friends should help "pay for it."  It is frustrating to hear when people couch adoption in those terms.  I ask for help because there is a child without a family on the other side of the world, hoping she beats the odds for the life expectancy of CF and finds a family.  

We need to raise an additional $6,000 for plane tickets and related travel expenses.  We hope to travel sometime mid to late July.  There are many links here on this blog which you can use to help donate toward this cause.  The next time you are ill and schedule an appointment to go to the doctor, or stop at the clinic to get medical care, please think of our girl, who is waiting to get to America, and find treatment she desperately needs.  I beg you, I implore you, do not harden your heart to adoption fundraising, whether it is for our girl or others who may cross your paths.  Adoption is the heart of God.

"I will not leave you orphans, I will come to you."  John 14:18

Need ... coffee ... now

Okay, so you don't need a trinket for your house from E-bay or Etsy, you've got enough t-shirts to keep you fully clothed, and you don't need a discount to eat out at restaurants (what? are you sure?!)

But here is one thing you know you need (wait you don't need it ... you can survive without your morning caffeine fix ... yes, we all believe you). :)

You need Coffee!

Well, we've got a place where you can purchase coffee, and here's the bonus, for no additional cost, you can be supporting our adoption too!

Check out this link: Just Love Coffee

Oh, and if you really don't drink coffee, did I mention that you can support our adoption and get the word out about kids all over the world that need to be adopted by buying a t-shirt through our Adoption Bug link to the right? :)

Thanks all, we appreciate your support.

Adopting an Older Child and Adoption Update

Often when we mention we are adopting a child, people do a doubletake when they realize we are adopting a 12 year old. When people hear the word "adoption" I guess a small toddler is what comes up in people's minds, because after we get into the conversation and I mention Abigail is 12 years old, people have clearly surprised looks on their faces.

So in this post I wanted to advocate for the older children out there that still need a family. It is not just babies and toddlers that are left in need of parents in this world. Often older children are not selected because people feel it is easier to "grow up" with a child before having to deal with teen issues. And perhaps it is. I expect it might be easier. But it is not fault of the child that he/she has been left without parents at age 10 through 16.

So please, if you are considering adoption, think about these older children. If you have friends that are considering adoption, help them change their mindset perhaps on what type of children are adoptable, or send them my way and I can talk to them too.

Here is the latest update we got from Vesta today on our file:

This week the legalization of Art. 5 letter will be done and we will submit it to the Ministry of Justice (MOJ).

MOJ needs a month to prepare the dossier for the final consent of the minister of justice. After the consent is given, the dossier is sent to the court in 3 days.

Due to the change of ministers due to the new government we expect some delays. We will keep you posted.

So anyway folks, that makes earliest possible court date somewhere around June 27th if we are lucky. We are still praying hard for a July pick-up trip, in order to have our girl home before her birthday and before school starts. It seems a bit impossible right now, but I have to believe that with God all things are possible!

Thank you so much for your prayers and support of our adoption. We just have $5,500 left to raise for final airfare and travel expenses.

Waiting Some More

I have no new information to give you on the adoption process, but realized I hadn't done a post in a while, so thought I would write a bit.  We are still waiting to receive the Ministry of Justice approval signature.

We got to communicate via Skype chat messaging with Abigail today.  We hadn't gotten to talk to her for about a month, so that was a real encouragement.  It seems that she is doing well, and is looking forward to summer vacation from school.

Please continue to pray that our paperwork will move smoothly through the system and that we will be able to go for the pick-up trip to get Abigail sometime in July (or sooner if possible).

Thank you for your prayers.

New Fundraiser - CoupAide

Hello All.  We have added a new fundraiser to our blog - see the link at the right.  It is called CoupAide.  You donate $20 and get a $50 gift card to use at Restaurant.com.  We get $10 of each purchase toward our adoption fundraising.

We need to raise about $9,000 more for final adoption expenses and the pick-up trip to Bulgaria.  Any help you can give is very appreciated!

Praying for Godspeed

It has been five weeks since we returned from Bulgaria.  Waiting to go back and get Abigail is very, very difficult.  We miss her so much.  Fortunately we have a good online community of others adopting from Bulgaria to keep us in the know for expected timing of each step of the way.

On April 12th, our I-800 application was provisionally approved.  On April 20th, the Bureau of Consular Affairs sent a notification letter to us that they sent the I-800 approval to the U.S. Embassy in Sofia, Bulgaria.  So now we wait for the approval from Bulgaria.  From what we have been able to ascertain, this is  how the process should go from here:

The U.S. Embassy notifies our adoption agency (Vesta) representatives in Bulgaria that they have received the I-800 approval notification.

Vesta takes to the Embassy (by scheduled appointment) the DS-230 Application for Immigrant Visa completed form (http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/81807.pdf) and payment.  Once the Embassy approves the DS-230 form, we get something called an Article 5 Letter.  If you would like to know what that looks like, here is an example: http://www.state.gov/documents/organization/105116.pdf

After the Article 5 Issuance, our paperwork goes to the Bulgaria Minister of Justice for signature.  Then our agency is notified of that, and Vesta then gets a court date scheduled for our file.

We do not attend the court date.  If all goes smoothly, on the court date we will be the official parents of Abigail.  Then, there could be up to another wait (after being officially her parents!) for notification of second trip to go pick her up. This is because of paperwork necessary to get her back into the United States as a citizen (Visa, passport, adoption paperwork, etc) from what I understand.

Please be praying that all this goes very swiftly in spite of lots of holidays for Bulgarians in May and May 12th election of new government officials.  May God speed our paperwork through.  We miss Abigail so much!

Learning English

Well, it has been about two weeks now (this Saturday) since we returned from Bulgaria.  The wait gets harder with each passing day.  Will we make it the four to six months? I suppose we shall have to do so.  But it is hard.  We miss Abigail so much.  However, we are able to communicate by e-mail through the lady we hired to tutor Abigail in English.  As any proud mom might do, I give you the word lists that Abigail has been learning over the past two weeks (as reported by her tutor):

First week:

She learned English words: life, live, visit, wish, wait, go, favourite, food, hungry, always, sometime, house, young, old, time, parents, family, new, big, small, swim, week, usually, often, never, sun, sunny, weather, happy, sleep, know. We learned pronouns.

Second week:

She learned English words: grandmother, grandfather, plate, pan, kitchen, bed, chest, living room, adore, mountain, Good morning, Good afternoon, Good evening, Good night, doll, toys, street, pick up, cinema, Of course, Be careful, Let me show you, dress, telephone, book, birthday. Wе learn from The Past Simple Tense.

Note to self: call a movie theater "cinema" if we want to take her to the movies. :)

Some would tell us that it is a waste of time to be paying someone to teach her now when she will pick it up quick once she is here and in school.  Nevertheless, it would be helpful to communicate with her when we pick her up and while we are here before she starts school.  So we think it is worth it (beside the fact the tutor is our only direct contact with her during the wait period).

We are told that Abigail painted a picture of our house for us.  Instead of drawing they call it painting there, but we never saw paint, so I presume the tutor means with crayons or colored pencils.  We gave her a photo book of places and people here, so she would have an example from which to draw the house.  I am curious to see her rendition.   We asked Abigail what she liked to draw beside houses and trees.  She said buildings and flowers.  We may just have an architect, landscape designer or civil engineer on our hands.  

Well, that is all the news for now.  We are also in the middle of some paperwork processes to get documents to the government, but I thought the above information was probably more interesting than going into paper chase details.  

Until next time...

First Trip to Bulgaria

For those who weren't on our e-mail list for last week (I'm sorry if I missed some of you ... I tried to get all those who requested to be on it, but know I missed a few) - we just came back from our first trip to Bulgaria to meet the girl we are adopting.  Her new American name will be Abigail.

Abigail is bright and smart and very organized like Dori.  She also is very into computers like Tony.  We can't post any photos here on a public space, but trust us when we tell you she is super adorable (not that we are biased or anything).  Below I am including some of the journaling I did throughout the week while we were there:

Monday - She had been waiting in the next room over for at least half an hour while we were talking with the director and psychologist.  I gave up on my questions and said, "can we meet her now?"  So nervous.  In she came, smiling just as nicely and sweetly as she was in the photos and videos we had received.  We all were a little bit formal, as we are when we meet new people with so much on the line.  I can only describe it in terms of how one might feel on a first date when you really hope the other person likes you and aren't sure how it will turn out, but on a deeper level of parent to child.  Gladly, our translator, the director, and the psychologist all helped get the conversation started and eventually we settled back into awkwardness of translated conversation, where either one or the other side is waiting to find out what the other one just said.  Abigail has had some progress in her English language learning.  In English, she can count to twenty, knows her colors, can do basic welcome greetings (hello, goodbye, thank you), and she may understand more.  She did know "table" and "beautiful".  We found out that she has not learned the English words for days of the week yet.

I don't think seatbelts are popular with Abigail because each time we got in or out of the car, I said "seatbelt" and showed her to put it on.  Overall, Abigail was very respectful, sweet, kind and thoughtful (holding doors open for adults, etc.) however, the psychologist said she does have an independent spirit, which we may not see much of yet in this introductory phase.  I could tell this though from the slight reluctance to comply with seatbelt rules.  But only one small issue for the whole day.

We had a fun afternoon doing beading, and making the foam sticker crosses.  We gave Abigail a gift photobook of ourselves, our home and Texas photos, and reviewed that with her too.  We didn't talk so much in the afternoon as just spend time together.  Finally it was time to go, and the director said after we left Abigail could give the butterscotch candies and gum that we had brought for the kids to them.  Abigail walked us all the way to the car, hugged us and seemed excited for us to come tomorrow, 

Tuesday - We got to see the room where Abigail sleeps, the living room area where she spends time with her "family" group, and the kitchen area where they eat and learn to cook.  She lives in a two story building that used to be a standard orphanage with dormitory (rows of twin beds) setting.  They remodeled into the family type format where a group of 10 kids live in a more family type area with smaller number of kids in a room, and the living room, and kitchen to spend time in what feels more like a family type environment.  It is a good beginning, but not a foster home type environment like we expected.  Rather imagine a college dorm hallway where some rooms are bedrooms, one is set up as a living room, and one set up as a kitchen. That was more the feel.  

We went to tour the Tarjishki Monastery.  Abigail was very interested in learning about history.  She is so inquisitive and bright.  Our translator said that she and the psychologist were talking about how well-balanced she is in that she is not over-excited easily or spoiled.  I am not sure why but our translator said often the orphans are spoiled and expect gifts in their behavior.  Perhaps from a lot of donations? Not sure.  But anyway, our translator said Abigail's focus on tasks was VERY unusual for the orphans she has seen over the years in her job working as an adoption translator.

We pulled out the computer and let Abigail type some stuff.  It was interesting to see her try to type words on an English language keyboard.  She said computers is her favorite class in school.  At her age they are not allowed on the internet so the things she is learning is matters such as creating documents in a word processing system and the like.

Wednesday - There is one way in which Abigail is similar to Tony rather than me.  Abigail is not a picky eater.  We asked her if there were any foods she didn't like to eat, and she couldn't think of any.  Admittedly orphanage life may have given her a limited food experience, but we do not think she has been underfed.  She and the other kids we have seen at a glance in the orphanage seem healthy and well fed (though not overfed).  Abigail regulates her eating well.  She has ordered Coca-Cola every day for lunch, but only drinks maybe 6 to 8 ounces of it.  Only today did she drink all 12 ounces.  She had a huge plate of spaghetti today and she stopped when she was full, and didn't order dessert.  Even though she had been eager for dessert the other two days.  I was incredibly impressed with her stopping eating when she was full.  Our translator said that Bulgaria has a much stronger culture than what she has seen in some parts of America for eating fruits and vegetables (we found two fruit and vegetable markets while we were out this evening, but couldn't find a place to buy milk).  Kids don't know to be picky.  Abigail said that she was willing to try any foods.  Admittedly she may develop food preferences over time, but I was so glad to discover right now she doesn't seem to have food issues that can sometimes be seen by kids coming out of orphanage life.  I do believe she has been a favorite at the orphanage and gotten very good treatment.

I do believe our little girl has some exposure to the Disney channel.  :)  Her favorite star is Demi Lovato.  She is a super, super fan of Demi Lovato.  So of course I shall now have to research her music and figure out what is worth listening to and what Abigail will need to be taught are not appropriate subjects or themes.  I am hoping Demi Lovato is still young enough to have decent themes and songs.

Thursday - We had a great visit with Abigail today.  She loves showing her english skills on our laptop.  She can type phonetically many words.  We were sad to leave for the last time today.  She said she will be waiting for us and believes that we will be back, so she was not sad.  We have hired an English tutor.  The lady works at the orphanage for a miniscule wage and the small amount we paid will greatly help her.  She did not want the money, but we gave it to the director to give to her.  We will email Abigail and call her as often as it will work with our schedules.  She is so excited about her new name.  She plans on using it tomorrow when she returns to school.  We also gave her a Bible, she was very excited, her English teacher will help her as she learns to read in English.  She appears to pick up English quite quickly.

Friday - We found the Bulgarian Archaeological Museum.  It was 10 leva apiece, and well worth the money for the antiquities that one gets to see there.  It had the added advantage of being warm.  There were a bunch of guards there because a lot of the antiquities are out in the open (grave stone markers, columns, statutes, etc.) and not behind glass.  There were signs saying stay back 70 cm or an alarm would sound.  Next time I come I really need to know my cm to inches conversions better because it is really hard to know how far to stand back without that conversion.  But we just figured to not get too close would be okay.  In one room on the second floor, Tony accidentally got his camera bag a little too close when he leaned in to look at a description of a piece and the alarm sounded.  Made me jump, but fortunately, the guards just walked into the room to make sure we weren't trying for a museum heist, and when they realized that all was well, went back to their post.  Crisis averted.  They wanted to make sure we saw the whole museum too, there were three floors, and I am worn out with walking this week, so I told Tony we could skip the third floor if he agreed.  We started to head back down to the first floor when one of the docents motioned something to the effect of "no, no" and pointed up.  Apparently there was a specific pattern expected to be followed.  So ... we saw the WHOLE museum.  Of course if we spoke in Bulgarian we probably could have said we wanted to go back down, not up, but I didn't want to cause a stir with that many guards around, so we saw the third floor items too.  Which were very nice, several gold and silver pieces.

After the Museum, we went down to an area we were told about underneath one of the main roads by the Presidential Palace, where there were different shops for tourist items.  We bought three items in the shops there and then determined if we were going to have the foot energy to get back to the apartment, we had better start heading back.

We eventually decided to go back to the apartment because a different driver from our agency (the same one that picked us up from the airport) was coming at 2:15 to take us to the Notary office to sign papers. So at the notary we signed the official papers that will go to the Bulgarian Ministry of Justice and the U.S. government accepting our adoption of Abigail.

Thanks for following our journey, and I hope by sometime in July we will be doing this again for the second trip to pick-up Abigail.

Getting Ready for Travel

As we prepare for our trip overseas to meet our girl, I can't help but realize how each day I become to think more and more like a mom.  At first we were just thinking, what will we need to take with us? What is the process for international travel? Etc., etc.  But then there was the thought of gifts to take to the orphanage directors, adoption agency workers, and so forth.  All of this running through my administrative mind.

Then it comes to thinking about spending those five days with a 12 year old girl we are just meeting.  What will she think? Will she be happy? Apprehensive? Aloof?

Who knows?  But then a friend of mine reminded me of all the times we worked with kids in Mission Arlington Bible Studies or even with the refugee kids who didn't speak English, and that we just cared about them, taught them about Jesus, and had fun.  I don't recollect a single one of those kids disliking me.  Oh sure, they were kids and had attitude sometimes or didn't always want to follow instructions or join in on the activity of the moment.  But it had nothing to do with whether or not they liked me.  So why if I can take on a group of 20 bible study kids am I so nervous about this one visit? Probably because in this case, the eventual plan is to bring this one child home.  And yet, I am reassured that as a general rule kids like me, so it is likely that we will get along over those five days.

It is so hard to wait though.  Wondering what she is like. What does she like to do?  What is she interested in?  We are packing a suitcase full of fun stuff to do ... crayola, markers, sketch paper, jump ropes, craft kits, and so forth.  In hopes there will be enough variety that something will hit her interest area.

I know this is more about getting to know each other rather than what we do in particular, but still I want her to be happy.  And today, I went shopping for a little more ... just in case.  Some Easter basket type stuff.  I realize most of these things will need to be shared with everyone, so am buying things to take that can be shared.  Because I want my daughter to know that sharing and giving is an important value.  "My daughter" ... sigh, someday soon.  So excited!

Received Official Referral and First Trip Travel Dates

Yay! We received our official referral paperwork and have been assigned our travel dates for our first trip to meet our daughter.  I'm not going to say exactly when it is here for purposes of privacy.

I would like to try to do some blogs while on the trip, so am debating on setting up the blog as password protected from here on out so that people who are interested can follow, but the entire world won't know our personal matters and location.

So please add a comment below if you would be interested in following this blog password protected from here on out.  If I don't hear from anyone, I will presume that just general information here is fine for everyone and will leave it open, but without daily updates, photos, etc.

So if you would be interested in following a detailed journey, password protected version of this blog, please let me know.

Thanks!

Please pray

There is some overturn in the Bulgarian government today.  Please pray that this will be a positive in Bulgaria for their economy.  Please also pray that this will not hinder the process of international adoption moving forward.  We are waiting to obtain the official referral of our girl and the invite to travel for the first trip to meet her.  This was tentatively scheduled for mid-March and we are praying that we will stay on schedule.

A quote from Star Trek: "The needs of the many, outweigh the needs of the few, or the one."  However, this is hard to say, when I am the one waiting.

This is the official word from our adoption agency:

Dear Families,

We wanted to make you all aware that the adoption processes in the Bulgarian program will not be affected by the resignation of the Bulgarian government.

Our in country partners, Vesta, have checked with the MOJ  and have been informed that this situation does not concern the international adoptions.

The IAC will continue to be held and will not be canceled during the election of the new government as the chair of the IAC will  not be changed.

We will let you know should any of this change.

Let us pray that this stays true, and nothing related to international adoptions is affected, except for the better.  It is all in God's hands (as always).

Waiting

We are waiting to hear when it is time for our first trip to travel to Bulgaria.  Waiting is difficult.  I try to convince myself I am a patient person, but in truth I am not always.  I don't like to wait.  If I have to leave a voice-mail message for someone on the phone, I want them to call me back right away.  (This is in a work context where I am needing information for a file ... as to personal calls I am much more patient and realize people have busy lives).

In an effort at cost-cutting we got rid of all but the most very basic cable television.  And there is not much to watch on "regular television" so I find myself seeking something else to distract me when I don't want to be doing my chores or post-graduate studies.  The other day I thought how there used to be more music in my life, but now it all seemed to be books, reading, working, etc.  Where had the music gone?  So over the past few days I put on my headphones and just listened to my music.  Today I found that the music had come back as I was singing while getting ready for my day this morning (much to my husband's chagrin at such an early hour of the morning).  I may have to move my "concerts" to a more tolerable hour of the day.  Nonetheless it took me back to my childhood when I would sing, sing, and sing ... for hours on end.  Just because I wanted to, not just to fill the time while I was waiting ...

We miss too much of the now looking ahead to the future.  At least I know I do.  Another thing I have done to fill the gap of time is to begin to read Les Miserables.  Because I just don't get all the hype about the movie (haven't seen it yet), so I figured I needed to read the original story so that I could get the full picture.  I often find that when we have read the book, and then watch the movie, our minds fill in the gaps in the story that the movie leaves out thus adding poignancy to the theatrical production.

I know I sound like I am a person with nothing to do but wonder what to do while waiting.  Not true, I am a grand procrastinator.  I have plenty of things to do to fill the hours of the day without music or leisure reading.  I need to read my Bible more.  I need to clean house more.  I need to work on my studies more.  But I am a daydreamer at times ... I need music and I need to read fiction that inspires. Somehow, I feel the urgency to incorporate as much of it as possible in this waiting period.  Because when we finally bring home a little Bulgarian girl, I am sure I will find it doesn't really matter anymore what I need ... but what she needs instead, to grow in wisdom and godliness.

It is an anticipatory waiting.  I rush to fill the days with all the quiet moments I cherish, in anticipation for the day when it will be the crazy, busy moments of life I cherish above all others.

Well, so much for rambling philosophy ... would love to have some comments on this as I am quite in stream-of-consciousness mode this week and would love to discuss any of the above random topics --- at your leisure.

Blessed

We are feeling incredibly blessed today.  This adoption process has been a journey of faith trusting God to provide every step of the way.  Due to some recent generous donations, we are 2/3 of the way to our financial goal.  This means that we have raised enough for the next amount due for adoption expenses and for the first trip (hopefully end of February / beginning of March)! So excited to see God's provision come when we least expected it.  We have another 4 or 5 months now to continue to raise the rest of the funds which will cover the final payments due for adoption expenses and take the second trip, hopefully sometime this summer.

I am not just speaking in cliches when I say this has been a journey of faith.  More times than I would like to admit I have suggested to Tony that perhaps we should apply our tithe money to this.  Surely this was as noble a spiritual application of funds as giving the money to the church, just to send it for missions overseas.  This was like our very own mission project.  I was always raised to tithe, and give it cheerfully, but also was raised in enough of a variety of church and para-church organizational structures to also have my own internal conflicts on what exactly counted as "God's storehouse" into which the money should go.  Did it have to be the church centralized, or could it just be giving 10% to ministry "stuff"?

But God has blessed me with a wonderful husband, who is a strong spiritual leader, and he stood firm that the tithe was to go to the church.  It isn't just about "doing good" with the funds.  It is about supporting the ministers and the ministry of the local church as the base for ministry of the body.  Now, I admit some days I am still conflicted about the meaning of tithe...not doubting or complaining about the 10% allocation, but more just wanting control of its application I suppose.   So this was the journey of faith ... we continued to tithe throughout this process.  With me worrying about the amount that could be going toward the adoption fund instead and wondering if we would have saved up enough money to go get our girl in the end.

But God himself knows the tithe can be a testing ground for people.  Did God not say, "Test me in this, and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that you will not have room enough for it." Malachi 3:10

So we have continued to tithe, and as Malachi states ... God has blessed.  Something I always knew to be true on paper, but through this journey, I now know to be true by heart.  

Blog Name Change

Hello everyone. We changed the name of our blog to Child of Prayer, it also has a new web address: www.childofprayer.com.   You can use the old blog address link and it will redirect, so whichever way works.

Dossier on its way

We finalized our dossier for the adoption in Bulgaria and sent it out to our adoption agency in North Carolina on Wednesday.  The dossier should be arriving at the adoption agency today.  Yay!

Next our adoption agency forwards the dossier to Bulgaria for translation, presentation to the appropriate governmental officials there, and then we will receive the official referral to go meet our girl.  Can't wait!

We hope that everything will run smoothly and that sometime in February or March we will be making that first visit.  I will keep you updated.