A New Year

The past three weeks of 2009 have been interesting with the typical ups and downs of everyday life. The kids are off to a pretty good start on school following the holiday period. Below is an update of the kids:

Jeremy is preparing for college. He took the ACT again to see if he could bump his score up just a wee bit and he did - one point (28). He did very good and his overall score is almost twice what I made in 1980. More than enough to get in any state university. I don't think he gets that from me! He wants to get a degree in computer engineering and seems interested in completing his degree at University of Alabama - Huntsville. I have requested only three things of him; (a)attend Auburn-Montgomery (local) for one or two semesters then transfer, (b) Take only 12 hours per semester the first year and, (c) after completing his degree - work for himself or the Lord (don't go to work for ABCD, Incorporated). He is an intelligent kid and will do well.

Christina is continuing her passion for writing and photography. She spent her money in December and purchased a very expensive camera (enough to make me choke). She has her own website where she makes her prints available. At the 2009 Horse Fair in Montgomery, she had her own booth and offered her services. She had several inquiries and we will wait to see what happens.

My little Sarah is growing up. She is such a delightful young woman and always worried about the feelings of those around her. She and Polina are very close, but at the same time, they both have their own interest. She is all girl and getting into the nail polish and color coordinating her clothes. She has come so far in her education just in the past 12 months. Things she struggled with January 2008, she breezes through now.

Polina is finally putting on weight and getting meat on her bones. She is not quite as picky over her food as she was six months ago. When we arrived in Vladivostok in May, we learned she had gotten her ears pierced. Some less than honest person replaced a gold setting with a cheaper setting. End result - infected ears. We had the earrings removed when we got home (no one in Russia knew how). The holes sealed and healed. For Christmas, she got them pierced again with gold settings. She is working to maintain her Russian by reading her Russian New Testament and using Rosetta Stone.

Dima is our little energy machine. He is as sweet as he can be and full of energy - I mean really full! He will walk over completely unexpected and grab my leg and say, "I love you Pop". He can come up with some dandy stories that were obviously dreams. We make him think about his comments to make him understand that these things did not and could not have really happened. He has improved his ability to control his anger so much, it is just hard to explain. He will still occasionally slip and hit one of his sisters because of something that happened, but it is no where near the frequency that it used to happen. Most significantly, the anger is not there any more. Now when he does lash out, it is just a reaction. They had gone to a party at Christmas for homeschoolers and a little boy snatched something out of his hand. Dawn saw it happen and was wondering of she could grab him before he reacted. He handled himself very well and just moved on to something else.

Nastya is our drama queen. She loves to sing and dance and keeps us in stitches. She will not allow you to hug her neck when saying "goodnight" or "goodbye". If you try, you will get slapped. Now you can hug on her any other time you want without a problem, but she has NEVER liked goodbye.

Well, that's about it. Issues at work have allowed me to help a non-profit group and their efforts to help folks around the world. If things work out well, it may open some doors to allow us to help orphans around the world who are near and dear to us.

Take care and God Bless -

God's Grace - A Christmas Blessing

Christmas has come and gone, and as I sit here thinking over the events of the past couple of weeks I find myself truly at a loss for words. I do not deserve the grace God has shown me. I am a worthless sinner, but God has shown me grace and blessed me with six wonderful children and a loving, God fearing wife. I still have a job after a reorganization than left many long time co-workers without a job. We have a roof over our head and food in our belly. God is good.

We celebrated Christmas with family and we tried to explain to the three younger children what we were celebrating - what Christmas was all about. For the past two weeks, all the children could talk about was Christmas. Once we put up the tree, their eyes got bigger and bigger. Dawn took the four youngest to the dollar store and gave them each about ten dollars to buy presents for each other. To say they were excited was an understatement. Nastya kept wanting to tell me what she bought for me and I kept telling her to wait and let it be a surprise. When they got home to wrap the gifts, then they wanted to wrap everything they could find and offer it as a gift to a family member. So, our Christmas tree was packed with odds and ends from around the house (books mostly).

A few weeks ago, we also went to the local Christmas parade. The three youngest did not know what to think. They stood in amazement as people rode by and thew candy at them. The next morning, Nastya and Dima walked up to me asking if we could go back to that parade. They were a little disappointed when I explained it was gone.

After visiting family, we had our special time together Thursday night. The kids were excited and wasted no time opening their gifts. Their expressions were priceless and I can not do them justice here tonight in trying to describe them.

Like any family, we have had our moments the past day or two with children misbehaving and getting into trouble. But I repeat myself by saying, I am unworthy and truly thankful for the blessings God has provided.

Merry Christmas!

T-Shirt

Christina created the above t-shirt. Below is a link to the site.

http://www.redbubble.com/people/thesilent/t-shirts/2204115-1-slava-bogu

Thank You Lord

A few weeks ago, I was asked to share a testimony at church about our adoption and how God worked in our lives. Since there are parents waiting to adopt reading this, I wanted to share a little with you all.

We started on our adoption journey in 2006 after feeling it was something the Lord was leading us to do. In September 2006, we signed with our agency after months of research and phone calls. We initially started thinking of adopting a boy around three years of age, then as time passed, we felt the Lord wanted us to adopt a sibling group. Now it was time to start working on the paperwork. In particular, the homestudy. Keep in mind, we are a single income family with three kids already. Our household income is less than $100,000. We did not know how we were going to pay for this adoption, but we knew this was God's will and that He would provide.

God was there, holding our hand for the journey. However, we had more company. The devil himself was there to stir things up. When we announced to the family in the summer of 2006 that we were going to adopt, my mother was diagnosed with cancer just a few weeks later. Not just any cancer, but a rare form of cancer that was inoperable, could not be treated with radiation and, did not respond to chemo therapy. She was not expected to live through Christmas.

In October 2006, I was in Sanibel Island, Florida at a meeting and on the last day, my group learned that we were receiving a $2,000 bonus in our next paycheck. Now, I work for an insurance company. Believe me, this was a very unusual move for them. In my 20 years with the company, they had never done this. I called Dawn and told her the good news. God had provided the money for our homestudy.

We knew most people preferred girls over boys and that sometimes, siblings were broken up. In March 2007, we learned of a sibling group of three in Eastern Russia that needed a home. We KNEW these were our children, now we just had to convince the US government and the Russians. Mom had made it through Christmas and asked me every few weeks, when we would be able to get the children home. At that time, we thought if things moved quickly, we could be home Christmas with the kids.

In Alabama, the state DHR has to approve your request to adopt. So, once our homestudy was completed, and our state police clearance was in, our social worker sent the documents to DHR. They can take a week or even up to five weeks to process your documents (our state clearance had already eaten up six weeks). One Friday, while working in Pensacola, FL, I received a call from our social worker - our homestudy had been approved in just five business days. Again God was taking care of things. Now, our homestudy could move to US Immigration (CIS). Atlanta CIS was taking six weeks to process applications. About five weeks in, we received our approval - but there was a problem. When we originally filed with CIS, we were only thinking we would adopt two kids. Even though our homestudy cleared us for three, they went by our application. For the next month, we sent several e-mails and hard mailed documents twice to CIS. We finally got our documents changed to approve us for three children. Once again, God was there..

Mom was doing worse and was now to the point of being bed ridden. She had beat all expectations, but it was becoming clear her end was near. It was October now and she asked me again (as she had done many times before) when the children were coming home. I told her I didn't know, things were moving slower than anyone had expected. The state police clearance and the CIS issue added about two months to our process. I was worried we would be in Russia and she would leave us. However, God was there.

On November 4, two days following her birthday, Mom died. She fought a good fight, and it was time for her to go home. A little over two weeks later, on November 21, we received a call from the agency asking us if we could travel the next week to meet our kids. there was never any question, we said YES! I rushed that day and ordered tickets for us to leave on November 29.

On November 23, while returning home with my oldest daughter after feeding the horses, my wife called, her 1993 Explorer seemed to be smoking. She called, and I told her to pull over and I would come get them. After returning home with them, not 20 minutes after her first call, the phone rings its the police. Dawn's car was on fire. We drive to the scene and the truck is nothing but a hunk of charred metal. We were so thankful she and my daughter had pulled over and parked the car and had not driven it any further. God was there and took care of them.

We traveled to Russia on November 29 and arrived in Vladivostok on December 1. Did I mention we had to make an emergency landing in New York - complete with emergency trucks lining the the end of the runway? God was there and took care of us.

Speed to the end of the story, on April 19, 2008 I received a call from our social worker - we had a court date for May 19! We were elated! Late the following Monday, we received our final "bill" from the agency. I won't get into specifics, I'll just say through no one's fault but my own, the bill was $6,000 more than I had expected. I was in shock because the error was really on me. I had no idea of what I was going to do at that hour. I shared the information with Dawn and told her that I could pay the bill, but had no idea of how we were going to pay for the travel expenses. We said nothing to our friends and prayed. I'm talking hard, down on your knees praying in tears. The following Sunday night, our pastor asked my family to step out while they discussed somethings about us. Keep in mind, we had told no one of our problem. We were called in later and the pastor walked up to me and told me we were the recipients of $6,000 in donations that had come from several people. Once again, God was there and took care of us. Things would be tight, but we were going to make it.

Final note - we arrived in Russia and learned that the motel rate was $40 per night more than planned. Okay, $40 extra for 21 nights. That was going to eat up our travel cushion. Two days later, we received an e-mail from a group we had applied for a grant. They were notifying us we received $1,000 in grant money. We were elated! God was there, taking care of us.

There is more, so much more. But I did this for myself as much as anyone else. To remind me and everyone that God is always there and will care for us if we just seek Him.

Happy Thanksgiving -

Tony

Russian Christmas Gift

As part of National Adoption month, I presented a brief overview Sunday night and requested money for Christmas gifts for children in a foster home run by a friend we met in Vladivostok. Jeff is a fellow believer that we met in Vladivostok while meeting our children for the first time this past December.

Anyway, part of Jeff's work is to oversee a foster home that currently houses 9 children and foster parents. These children are given love and attention that is just not possible to receive in an orphanage. Not that some orphanages don't try, but they just don't have the ability with the caretaker to child ratio.

My church family shocked me by donating over $1,400! Honestly, this was three times more than I expected. We are a small church and that night there were only about 120 people including kids present. I wish I could have shared the joy of telling Jeff with each and every person that contributed.

Soon after sending Jeff an e-mail, I received a phone call from him. He knew I was taking up a love offering, but I think he was as shocked as I was at the response. These funds will allow the foster parents to spend the money they had set aside for Christmas gifts on necessities like food and clothing.

I write all this to encourage those in the adoption community to not forget the children we could not bring home. Find away to help them. It is very hard to open one's heart to adoption if they are not inclined to do so. However, there are other ways to help. There are many reputable organizations out there working with orphans all over the world. Donating straight to an orphanage is risky, but many of these organizations will make sure your money is put to good use.

If you are interested in the group I took a love offering up for, please click on the link below:
http://hopeforlifehome.net

Birthday Wishes

Wednesday was Nastya's 5th birthday. She was so excited as she was able to start celebrating early. My sister came by from out of town and gave her presents to start what turned out to be a 3-day celebration. Of course she loved it and soaked it all in. After our "month of birthday's" the three youngest have learned that birthdays are special and now they get very excited. While we were having cake and icecream on Wednesday, I asked Polina if they fixed birthday cakes at the detsky dom. We had heard that at some orphanages, they fix one cake each month for the kids that have a birthday in that particular month. Polina told us they did not get any birthday cake. It is sad to know that birthdays come and go for all the children over there and there is no one to hug them and tell them "happy birthday" and to let them know they are special. Such a small thing it seems, but to see their faces light up shows that it means something special to them. Just this morning we received an e-mail from Aunt Tatiana wishing her a happy birthday and apologizing for not being able to send a note sooner. She does not have a computer, but she knows someone who does that lives nearby.

After the birthday celebration,the kids all went to Awana at church. They came home wound up and full of energy so it took a while to settle them down for bed. About 10:30PM, I made the rounds to check on everyone and to tell Jeremy and Christina goodnight. Nastya was asleep, but a few minutes later,Dawn heard her crying. She often cries while she sleeps which is oddly common for kids with their background. When Dawn checked on her, she was awake and crying, so she brought her to our bed. Nastya told us she was sad and when we asked why, she told us she missed her groupa. She said she wanted us all get in the car, go to the airport, get on an airplane and go visit her groupa. We explained that it was very, very expensive to go visit her groupa and that we could not do that just now. She cried, and then Dawn started to cry with her. Then my precious little girl said somethings that made me tear up. She told us that at her destky dom, they did not have new shoes, they only had old shoes - and she wanted them to have new shoes. She said she wanted to send them her money so they could buy new shoes. We hugged her and explained that we had collected money from our church to buy them some new shoes (about $800). That seemed to calm her down a little.

If only the rest of my Christian brothers and sisters had a heart the size of my little girl's . . .

Siblings