Now for the important one...

One thing about the process in the Ukraine is that it is very slow. Many parents here that are doing what we are doing find themselves as captives in their hotel rooms and the regions they are staying in. There is a lot of down time and unfortunately, not a lot to do. We get two hours a day with our Stasik and the rest of the time is spent walking around town, and after finally freezing, we wind up staying in the hotel room. We read, watch TV, and follow up on correspondence; but mostly we talk about this experience, both good and bad. We laugh, cry, and sometimes this cramped hotel room is just too small to hold in all of the emotion involved in this. Everyone has different outlets. My outlet has always been humor; so hopefully no one takes offense to my use of it sometimes. Twelve days ago I was so sad that it would have been impossible for me to even laugh, but today is a day to rejoice! We are less than 48 hours away from our court appearance and everyday with Stasik is just a great day. If I let everything else going on at home and here get me down than I would truly miss the miracle happening in the little orphanage we spend two hours a day in.

I guess the workers actually went and spent some time in our playroom and realized that it is freezing. Today we went to a new room. It was very bright, warm, and very pink. I think we arrived in part of the girl's wing of the orphanage. It seemed to be an area where they were doing some remodeling and one of the rooms seemed to be more new and modern. There were tons of beds and cribs and I just kept thinking, "I hope they are not getting these ready for more little babies coming in." The fact is, Debbie and I wish we could save all of them, but we can't. We can only do what we can do as adoptive parents and spend the rest of the time advocating for these kids and raising awareness. Hopefully, someone reading this blog might help save a life by either adopting themselves or by letting others know the seriousness of the situation here in Eastern Europe. Unfortunately, there will never be a shortage of kids, only a shortage of loving parents.

Stasik was all over the place today. I am not sure if it was the sunlight or maybe the warmth of the room, but he could not sit still. He laughed a lot, grabbed Mama's hair several times, and kept trying to crawl up on top of us while we laid on the ground next to him. For the third day, he kept down his milk and there were officially no signs of reflux at all. We did not even have to pull out a wipey today to clean up anything. We keep looking back at pictures from day one and remembering how we felt. We remember being told about all of his problems and things he could and could not do. Now we just marvel in it everyday and think about how just small acts of love and encouragement can change the world for these kids.. We know that we are far from being out of the woods, but we are going to be glad for every good day that we have with him. We are so thankful to God for what we are seeing!

Thanks for your continued support and prayers, we can definitely feel them lifting us up!