Treading water day 6

Sunday turned into an interesting day.  We got home from church, ate lunch, chilled for a bit, and then went to the Foxes.  Andrew was there, and another guy named Vova (I think).  Inna came over, too.  We stayed there for a few hours and then went to eat at the Ukrainian barbeque place.  Sean Fox did a good job of engaging the guys in profitable discussions.  Vova wanted to talk world politics, and both of them just wanted to speak in English and discuss difficult things.  Sean asked this nice discussion opener: what is the reason for suffering in the world?  We discussed if man was basically good or bad, the origins of the universe, and what does "love" mean.  Sean was very good at using these topics to present the gospel and get them thinking about things they had never pondered before.  It was fun to be a part of this.  We did not see Julia today, because she was going somewhere, but as it turned out, she came by our room in the afternoon and we weren't here.  This morning, I helped the Foxes load all their stuff into a van so they could move to a new apartment.  Libby watched all three kids in our room.  Between those two things, we wiped out the morning.  I had to make a high speed run to the store, since we were out of water.  Julia and a friend, Anya, came by this afternoon for a short visit, we walked them home, then out for bananas, and back to our room.  I know what you are thinking: it just doesn't get much more exciting than that!

Libby's turn

This morning was so fun with Moriah, Josiah and Elijah.  They brought some art supplies with them and made lots of sweet and beautiful artwork for me to bring home and put on my refrigerator .  It was fun talking to them and seeing how smart and creative each one of them are.  We got to visit a little with Cosette, too, and Andy got to hang out with Sean some.  Our time with Julia was so short.  We are trying to plan a pizza outing for her and her friends and half-siblings, but we need our facilitator to make the arrangements with the foster family and the orphanage, so she is feeling antsy that the plans are not in place.  We have not been able to communicate well enough with her that this is something we are planning to do for sure.  But we still have fun with her and laugh a lot.  We enjoyed meeting her friend Anya .  She seems like a fun girl and is very cute.  We heard from Cosette that there is a home for girls that graduate from the orphanage about an hour away in Sumy .  We were so happy to hear of Ukrainians having a heart to care for the orphans.  The sun was out during our walk this afternoon and that made all the world seem more cheery.  We miss our family and friends so much and are so grateful to many of you for sending us emails.  We don't feel so far away then.

Treading water, day 4&5

Not much happening on Saturday.  Just enduring the cold weather.  We got to see Julia for about 1-1/2 hours.  We had both some serious conversation and playful.  We are continuing to try to break down barriers between us.  Language is such a huge barrier, though.  There were times when I really wanted to be able to convey an idea, but couldn't seem to do it.  Sunday morning, we went to a local Baptist church service, that last about 1 hr and 40 minutes.  It had a good format for being long.  We started by singing, then one man spoke, then singing and prayer and another man spoke, then singing and prayer and another man spoke, then singing, a time of prayer requests, prayer, and we were done.  Many people came to greet us and were very friendly.  Some spoke a few words of English, and two or three spoke enough that we could communicate.  We met a very unusual family - they had four biological children and three adopted children.  I told them we also were about to have seven children, so we had a fun connection with them.  Most families in Ukraine are only 1-2 children.

I was happy to see that LSU was beaten by Georgia.  CBS needs to step it up and get highlights posted a little bit faster, though. Mr. Fox is a big Ohio St fan, so I am forbidden to tell him the score until he gets a chance to watch the game tomorrow.  That's it from the chilly NE of Ukraine.

Libby's post

The Fox family have been a great blessing and encouragement to us.  They have been like a Welcome Wagon to us.  They invite us to join them whenever they can and we have enjoyed their hospitality very much.  They are so enthusiastic about meeting people and trying new things and new experiences.  They are lots of fun.  Of course we love being with their adorable children,too.  Their six year old, Moriah, told me she wanted to come to my house when she grows up and stay two days.  While she was there she would cook mushrooms and onions for me that I would love.  Her four year old brother piped up that he wanted to come, too.  Moriah told him he could pull up my weeds!  They keep us entertained and charmed. The family has introduced us to so many people, but our favorite is a young man, Andrew, who just graduated university with a degree in physics.  He is gentle and kind and quietly helpful.  I wish we could bring him home with us!  God has made our paths straight and we see His blessing and care for us all day long, every day, in these kinds of details.  We know we are not alone.  His people are everywhere and His glory IS over the whole earth!  One fun detail about the worship service--the first two songs we were able to sing because they were familiar in America!  First they sang "Count Your Blessings" and then "In His Time".  The rest of the songs were beautiful, but in Ukrainian .  It was good to be in God's house on His day with His people.

Treading water, day 3

One of the benefits of having absolutely nothing to do, is that I am sleeping better.  For a long time, I have not been able to sleep much past 5:00 am, but I did not wake up today until after 7:00 am.  It is wonderful!  We seem to have lost our nail clippers during the trip.  I don't know if you have ever considered this, but having a way to trim your nails properly can sometimes become critical.  Now that I am learning my way around town a little better, I knew exactly which store to go to, and sure enough, there were nail scissors.  Success!  The Foxes and we went on a group hike to the store to restock on groceries.  We had some light rain on the way, but nothing like an Alabama rain.  The kids made a point of stomping in nearly every puddle, of which there are a considerable number, so they stayed entertained during this chore.  

The clothes are finally dry, although Libby hit a few of them with the hair dryer, just to make sure.

We have no way to cook in the room, but Jill set us up with a way to at least heat some water.  We have a small metal container and a heating element that we stick in the water.  This allows Libby to have her coffee in the morning, or to heat water for instant soup.  We are moving up in the world!

This reminds me of a few of the ingenious things David has done in Odessa to make life easier for them.  The first is brilliant, and after trying to dry clothes our way, I really appreciate it.  The ceilings in their flat are very high - maybe 14 feet or so.  David rigged up a clothes drying line that is low, so Jill can reach it, on one side of the kitchen, but as it travels to the other side, it also rises up near the ceiling, so it is both out of the way, and above the stove and water heater, so it reaps the benefit of all that wasted heat. It is a very efficient way to dry the clothes.

The other thing is their hot water.  They do not have very good water pressure in the flat, and it seems that if the pressure is bad, their water heater also does not work well either (it is essentially an instantaneous water heater).  So they have diverted the water into a water barrel, purchased and installed a pump, which pumps through the water heater, and on to the shower or sink.  Brilliant! And they have all the hot water they need.

Don't forget to pray for our missionary friends.  Many things we take for granted, that are easy for us, are a bit more challenging for them.

Treading water, day 2

Just hanging out in Romney, killing time.  Today, the sun came out in the morning, but it is raining again this evening.  After today' sweltering high of 52, the temperature will steadily decline.  By the middle of next week, the high is supposed to be in the low 40s and the low near freezing.  Even though I tease Libby about it, there is a real life chance we will see snow before we leave.  The heater in the room is adequate to moderate the chill, but our clothes have been hanging up for a day and a half and still are not dry.  They better dry soon - I need underwear!

We went walking around the market today with the Foxes.  They met a young (single) man who just graduated from the university with a degree in Physics, who is working on his English, so he has been hanging out with the Foxes.  We got to meet him today - very nice.  His name is Andrew.  I did not bring a hat with me, not thinking it would get quite this cold, so Andrew took me to the market booth with hats.  Now I can keep my ears warm. We also ate at a tiny roadside food kiosk that made something like chicken wraps, with cabbage, cucumbers and tomatoes in it.  Very yummy, especially since I had mine made with no tomatoes.  We wandered into the old Orthodox Church.  It is in pretty bad condition on the inside.  It would be beautiful if someone had a couple of million to invest in it, so it is not likely to be restored soon.  The outside has been mostly repainted and maintained, so the exterior looks nice.

We met with Julia again today.  She is very anxious to get to Alabama.  She and Inna keep asking what the timeline is every time they see us (as does Virginia every time I talk to her).  I took Julia shopping today to get a coat, some shoes, and some jeans.  I don't mind buying her clothes, of course, but this is one more area that it is hard to get a straight answer.  Does Julia have clothes or not? Can she leave the country with them? With some of them? Will someone steal the clothes I just bought?  I really don't know.  I just keep smiling and trying to show love to this poor girl, and trust that even if I waste a few hundred dollars, the investment into her will far outweigh whatever gets lost in the shuffle.

This has gotten long enough.  Here is a picture, just for humor's sake.

First of many days in Romny

We had a quiet day today.  We finally went and met the Fox family.  There is Mom and Dad and three children ages 6, 4, and 2.  It was fun to finally get to meet them after several months of "talking" on Facebook.  They unfortunately have to move out of their current small apartment this weekend, so they went to look at a new place today, and we went with them.  Then the Dad and I went to get a few things for lunch, and we shared lunch together.  It was a lot of fun.  I think they are pretty brave being here with little kids.  They are staying the entire time, without returning home, so they will be here a couple of months or longer.  We went up,to see Julia, but she had plans to go,out with her friends, so they all walked us back to the hotel and continued on their way.  Libby and I went for a walk in the brisk air - it was only about 45 today, but had a cold wind blowing so it felt colder.  Forecast is 40s and 30s for the foreseeable future.  We upgraded our clothes washing technique.  The Foxes loaned us a small wash tub, so we set it in the shower to wash, rinsed in the sink, and hung the clothes on my rope strung across the room.  Now the problem is that it is so cool, nothing is drying very well.  The Internet connection is painfully slow, so we have not been able to communicate very well with family, so we are feeling cut off.  I may roam around the building tomorrow and see if I can find some better spots than our room.

The new washing machine.

Back in Romny

We started the day today at 4:45, caught a taxi at 5:30, and on the bus and headed out of Odessa by 6:00 am.  Our play time with the Martins is over.  We were scheduled to arrive in Kiev at 12:30 pm, but we got there an hour early, so we went next door to the (believe it or not!) McDonalds, and had lunch.  Stas arrived around 12:30, and we started on our way to Romny.  Stas hates traffic, so he is constantly trying short-cuts to go around it.  On today's shortcuts, we went through several deep puddles, that we could feel hitting the bottom of the car, had to loop around and go back once, and essentially found ourselves going the wrong way on a one way street, and so had to turn around in heavy traffic.  But we made it to the outskirts of Kiev, and from then on, it was the pedal to the metal. I've described this before, but the worst time for me today, was during light rain, so the pavement was wet, going (flying) around a blind curve, in the wrong lane.  I peaked over Stas' shoulder and we were doing 160 km/hr, which is right at 100 mph.  I was praying hard for my soon to be orphaned children.  Amazingly, we made it to Romny safely, bought some groceries, walked up and got Julia for a little while, and then had a light supper.  So a little over 9 hours of travel today.

Here are a few leftovers from Odessa.  This is an Orthodox Church that has been rebuilt in the last 15 years.  It was only a hole in the ground when the Martins first arrived in Odessa.

Jill humored me by taking me to the beach so I could stand in the Black Sea.

Back in School

We participated in the Martin's school this morning.  I taught a brief pre-calculus lesson for the high school, and Libby helped with the lower school.  There was a lot going on this morning, in a very dynamic teaching environment.  At one point, Jill was teaching the lower school, David was working one the school's wifi router, one of the missionary fathers, who teaches once a week (he has been a seminary professor) taught Bible to some of the students, the advanced Russian tutor was teaching two of the junior high girls (they were singing a folk song in Russian when I stepped in), and the beginning Russian tutor had a few of the younger kids working with them.  I know these kids probably don't appreciate the opportunity they have been given, but what a great experience they are enjoying!

Libby reading to one of they elementary girls.  This is the "home room" and primary room for the younger children.

Jill working with one of the girls, after having done a math lesson on the board.

Several of the high school kids working in the high school room.

One on one instruction with the advanced Russian tutor.

The primary Russian tutor teaching by playing the matching game.  The kids are required to name the object in Russian, and count the number of pairs they acquire in Russian.

Sunday in Odessa

Since it is Sunday, this post is going to be a little (or a lot!) preachy.  We had the great privilege of worshiping in the Reformed Evangelical Presbyterian Church of Ukraine, the church that David and Jill attend.  Odessa is a city that had been occupied by the Nazis during WWII, then taken over by the Soviet Union until it ceased to exist.  During that time, the church building had fallen into terrible disrepair, and was taken over by various groups, most recently a puppet troupe.  The MTW group that has been working here in the city since the late 1990's to help plant a church, worked with a group of local people to reestablish this facility as a church again.  Right around 2000-2001, the building regained it's original identity and was rededicated.  Now it has been renovated and is beautiful.  The sermon today was taken from several passages, starting in Revelation 1:1 - 2:7, with much emphasis place on verse 4: "But I have this against you, that you have abandoned the love you had at first."  The church in Ephesus, the church in Odessa, and my church in Montgomery all need to hear this message - return to your first love! If we come to Sunday morning and our entire focus is not on praising God and worshiping him, then we are sinning.  If we are out of fellowship with each other, and pretending to be okay with God, we are sinning.  Every other concern, be it legitimate or grumbling in our hearts, are not welcome in what should be a sweet time of fellowship with a Holy God who gave his own Son for our salvation.  The singing was wonderful in this old/new church, with joyful expressions on the faces of the small choir.  It reminded me how precious and cherished an experience it is for them, to again be able to meet and worship God.  They value this - do we?  Then we moved to Romans 5:1-5 

"1Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.

2 Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God.

3 Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance,

4 and endurance produces character, and character produces hope,

5 and hope does not put us to shame, because God's love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us."

Here is where we should return as our first love. We should rejoice that we have been justified by faith, that we have peace with God, that we have hope of the glory of God, and the Holy Spirit has been given to us.  Let's revel in this, and put aside the things that so easily entangle us.

Walking around Odessa

Just walked around town a little bit today.

The side of the Opera House.

The archeological museum, showing early settlements in southern Ukraine

The grand stairway that leads from the harbor, up to the high ground on which Odessa is built.  It is called the Potempkin Stairway.

The Black Sea, as seen from about halfway up the stairway.

The harbor area.

Hangin' with Missionaries

A funny thing happens when you hang out with missionaries - you get to meet interesting people.  There was a work team in the Odessa area working on building a second home for young women who are homeless for whatever reason, either because they aged-out of an orphanage or were living on the street, or trying to exit out of drug and/or prostitution.  They were having their work ending dinner at a street cafe just a few blocks from the Martin's flat.  We were invited to join them, partly I think, because we are in the same "business" - we are just intervening at the front end of the process.  It was fascinating to hear about the goals and vision of the team leader.  And believe it not, the team was from Birmingham, AL.  The team leader is also a pretty accomplished choir conductor, and had been the music minister at a church in years past.  He had taught local choirs here, classic music such as the Messiah, and presented free concerts in Odessa of this and other major Christian works.  He is now working on a project to educate and help those involved with autism.  The diagnosis, treatment, and parental support in Ukraine is far behind what is available in the west, and the stigma associated with autism is extreme.  They are working on producing a documentary to raise awareness and funds to help educate doctors in Ukraine, and provide support and training for parents.  If you would like to see the trailer for the movie and find out more, here is a link.  http://notforgottenthemovie.com/. 

His group also worked with a member of parliament to gain permission to produce and distribute 10,000 pamphlets to all the doctors in Ukraine to provide more information and training for them.  It was very fascinating and encouraging to hear what things others are involved in to help the outcasts of this society.

We have lost our Minds

Just a word of caution to those of you out there who will one day be older than you are now.  You can't do the same things in your 50's that you used to do in your 20's.  Your body just doesn't like it.  Our day yesterday did not end with court.  We did go back and have a short nap, then Julia came by and we visited for a little while, then Stas and Svetlana appeared and we all had supper together.  Since Stas was taking Svetlana back to Kiev anyway, we decided to return as well, and catch the overnight bus to Odessa.  We dropped Julia off at the orphanage, took another wild ride back and arrived at the bus station at about 9:15 pm.  There was a 9:45 bus getting ready to leave, so we hurried to the bus, Svetlana sat us in our seats, told us where we were to get off (in Ukrainian, of course), and she left us.  We didn't even have a chance to go to the restroom before the bus left.  Svetlana told us there was a facility on the bus, but of course, there wasn't.  The bus was supposed to arrive at 5:50 am in Odessa, which seemed to me at the time, to be an awfully long time to get to Odessa.  Off we went.  Neither of us were able to sleep all night, and I'm not really sure why.  The bus was comfortable and it was dark.  About half way there, we took a rest stop, and for a mere 2 hryvnia, you could use the restroom (that's only about $0.25 - no problem!)  Back on the bus.  We arrived in Odessa just before 4:30, wound our way through narrow, back roads, twisting and turning, in an area I really did not want to be.  The bus stopped at the side of what looked like a masonry warehouse, and everyone got off.  We got off, too.  Everyone had a place to go, and off they went, and there we were in the drizzly, cold (mid 40's) dark, breezy street.  It was at this point that it really became clear, that we could not speak to anyone, did not have a street address for the Martins to give to a taxi driver, nothing.  Boy are we dumb.  Fortunately, I had an email on my ipad in which David had sent me Jill's cell phone number.  In a test of true friendship, we called her at about 5:00 am.  She got a taxi and went to the bus station . . . except we were not at the bus station!  She called again, I handed the phone to the kind bus driver and just gestured to him to talk, which he graciously did.  Jill had given her phone to the taxi driver, so between the two of them, they figured out where we were.  As it turns out, if we had walked two blocks in the direction that everyone else had walked, we would have discovered that we were at the big train station.  If we had only known.  We got to the Martin's flat, ate some breakfast, and our bodies immediately went into shutdown mode.  Jill is a wonderful hostess - she gave us her own bed, closed things up tightly so it was very dark, and we slept until noon, so now were are feeling human again.

Court is Successfully Completed

It is a rainy day in Romny.  A sad day outside, but a joyful day on the inside.  We nervously waited for 11:00 to arrive.  We were at the court building on time and went up to the 3rd floor and waited in a narrow hallway.  The prosecutor (I never really did understand what her role was) arrived late so we had to wait for her.  All at once, we were ushered into a very small court room.  It was set up more or less like you would imagine.  On the bench, sat the judge dress in a black robe in the middle, with a "juror" on either side of him, and the court reporter next to one of the jurors.  There was a podium in the middle facing the judge, and two rows of seating facing the bench.  We sat on the right side facing the judge, with Svetlana sitting with us.  On the left side sat Julia, the assistant orphanage director, and the local child protection social worker.  There were one or two other people in the back row.  The judge began, reading a lot of formal documents for the record.  The entire event was very formal.  Svetlana tried to translate on the fly, but mostly he was just reading into the record, all the documents that had been accumulated up to this point.  Now and then, Svetlana would say to me or Libby, "stand up and say 'yes'" and we would do so.  Don't always know what I was saying yes to.  We had to state our name and address, occupation, etc.  There were only a few questions for us.  The main question, was they wanted to make sure we understood that Julia had epilepsy, and that we had the means to take care of her.  As we were answering some of these questions, Libby noticed both the male juror and the prosecutor smiled and seemed friendly toward us in their demeanor.  There were no probing or difficult questions asked of us.  Julia had to get up and say she wanted to be adopted by us, and that she understood she was leaving Ukraine behind and going to the United States.  She was nervous, but she did fine.  Then the judge and jurors and prosecutor left to go deliberate.  They returned fairly quickly with the court resolution saying they approved the adoption, approved Julia's name change, and approved of a new birth certificate being issued with Libby and me listed as her parents.  We are done and Julia is ours!  But wait.  We still have to wait ten days before we actually get her, so even though she is ours, she isn't quite ours yet.  Julia cried tears of joy at the end of the proceedings, and the judge kindly said to Julia that today was like St Nicholas' day for her.  All of this wore out Julia, so she returned to the orphanage to rest, and we went back to the hotel to hang out. (And hopefully take a nap, since we have an all night bus ride tonight).  We finally briefly met the Fox family this morning, but we are still having trouble getting together.  

Safely in Romny

. . . And that is not something to be taken lightly!  Stas made another high-speed run from Kiev to Romny, part of which I slept through.  I woke up, looked out the front window, and promptly closed my eyes again.  I figured if I was going to die, I'd rather not see it coming, and just let it surprise me.  Libby says our faces may look like we have exceeded Mach, or been in astronaut training after this ride.  After arriving, we went over to the orphanage and found Julia.  We really surprised her this time, so it was fun, again, to have her give us big, strong hugs and hear her squeal.  We took her and Svetlana to supper, and went over the details of our court appearance tomorrow.  She spent a lot of time prepping us, both at supper, and later on in the evening with just Libby and me.  Then Svetlana left us, we went to the store, and then walked home, just the three of us, to spend some alone time together.  While we were together, we were able to FaceTime Mary Beth and Virginia, so the sisters got to see each other. We communicated some by google translate, and are encouraged that Julia seems to be able to read English reasonably well.  So there is some level of foundation already laid in her English education.  Tomorrow is the big day - court at 11:00 am.

Good night's sleep

We were determined to "obey the rules" and stay up until normal bedtime, but we both failed.  Libby was asleep by 7:30, and despite having BBC on the television, surfing the net, and messaging Laura, I was falling asleep at the wheel at 8:00, so I gave in, too.  We both woke up just after midnight, and thought we were done sleeping, but after a little tossing and turning, we both slept well the rest of the night.  We were so tired, we didn't realize how bad the mattress was until we tried to get up and walk. But we are up and moving, a nice hot shower, and packing again to head to Romny.

Back in Ukraine

We made it! This time we flew US Airways to Philadelphia (which is a very nice airport, by the way), then Lufthansa to Frankfurt, and Lufthansa to Kiev.  We were worried about the short layover in Phili, but the combination of the pilot flying fast (the flight attendant told us the pilot drove Harley's), and our Lufthansa plane arriving late, made the Phili layover a non-event.  Then we were worried because the check-in guy in Atlanta told us we had to retrieve our bags in Frankfurt and go through Customs there.  That didn't sound right to me, but who knows.  It turns out he was wrong, so that also was a non-event.  The Frankfurt airport was the same old maze, but somehow it seemed quaint or quirky this time instead of annoying.  German security was the same as always, and this time they hauled Libby off to an isolation room to interrogate her.  I stood outside the door peering in like some pitiful lost puppy hoping the didn't handcuff my wife.  She got tagged by US security for the same item.  She had a fancy bar of soap in her carry-on, and all the security guys freaked out over it.  But she made it through both times.  As we were leaving the Kiev airport, going through the last security check, a female customs agent right out of the 1970's James Bond movies (pretty, too much makeup, looked like she could squeeze your guts out with the leg scissors hold - remember the one I am talking about - on the train?) came up to us, stopped us abruptly, asked to see my passport, asked me how much money I was carrying . . . And then lost interest and took off after another victim.  So this too turned out to be no big deal.

The plan is to leave Kiev Wednesday at noon and drive to Romney, get settled and hopefully see Julia, and then court on Thursday morning.  The Fox family is still in Romny, so we are going to finally meet them and hopefully eat supper with them tomorrow night.

This is the view out our kitchen window.  We are right on the square near St Sophia's.  it would be wonderful to stay here, but it is only for one night.

Ready, Set . . . . Stop!

The day started sunny and cool.  A pleasant start to the next phase of our adventure.  A leisurely morning, with the girls getting ready for church.  We packed on Saturday, so all we had to do was get dressed and ready to go by 11:00 am.  Jim was on time, we got out of town in good shape, and headed to Atlanta.  Arrived at the airport, checked in, went through security, got to the gate and camped out.  About a half an hour before boarding time, they made an announcement that they were having trouble getting the fuel in the plane, and boarding would be delayed 10 minutes or so.  My thought was, "take all the time you need! We are about to fly over the Atlantic Ocean.  Put LOTS of fuel on the plane". Ten minutes later, they came back on and said they were still having trouble fueling the plane, and it would be another 20-30 minutes.  Hmmmm.  But right on time, we stated boarding.  Everyone was on the plane, carry-on stuff all stowed, final checks being done . . . And all the power went off.  Normally the power blinks a little when you go from auxiliary power to internal power, but this was a no kidding total power loss.  And it got warm fast!  But in maybe five minutes, power was restored.  The warning flashers started going off in my head, and i started praying for our safety.  Fuel problem and electrical problems?  I didn't want either of these over the ocean.  But then, just a few minutes later, the Captain came on and said there were too many mistakes (maybe just a poor choice of words by a German pilot?) and they were canceling the flight - sorry for the inconvenience - everyone get off the plane - thank you.  Everyone quietly got off, headed back to the check- in counter, calm chaos ensued for hours as people tried to get hotel vouchers ( one line, if you want to call it that), and changed flights in the other line.  I got my hotel voucher, a piece of paper with a 1-888 number for Lufthansa, and headed for the door.  Since we were at the international terminal, we had to pack ourselves into a shuttle to the domestic side, unload, fight our way onto the hotel shuttle, get off, get a room, get some dinner, call Lufthansa and finally make it to bed shortly after midnight.  Not a great start to our trip, but God did honor our request for a SAFE trip.  So we start again on Monday.

Here is a picture of the new international terminal, if you have not seen it yet.

Here we go again!

When I saw everything laid out on two different queen-sized beds, I thought there was no way we would get everything packed.  But amazingly, we have everything packed and we are under weight, so we are ready to go again.  We are on the exact same flights, so we pretty much know what to expect.  All that is left now is to take a 2.5 hour car ride, 2-3 hours of down time, 9 hours flying to Frankfurt, 5 hour layover, and 3 hours to Kiev.  There is a the possibility of us having another family with us in Romny - the Fox family.  We would love to get to know them, since we have been following their progress their entire trip (they are about 2-3 weeks behind us in the process).  They have met many more people than we did, have found a church to attend, and several English-speakers in town.  They have 3 small children with them, so it would be fun to help each other. Libby has been sad today - it suddenly hit her that she has to leave all of her "babies" and grandbabies behind.  But we are both happy that we will be adding another "baby" to our clan.  We look forward to having Julia home with us.

Hurray!

We have our court date!  It is September 19th in Romny, so Libby and I are starting to spool-up to get ready to return to Ukraine.  I already have airline tickets, so that is done.  We have been occupied lately, watching the reports of another family who is also in Romny right now, working on adopting a friend of Julia's. (Svetlana).  They have hit a snag of an unknown Uncle who isn't sure he wants to give his consent to the adoption.  So they are working through that right now.

I checked the climate data, since we will be there into October, more than likely.  Mid-October normal temperatures are high of 55 and low of 38.  Libby was not real happy to hear this, but I think it sounds great.  Maybe it will even snow while we are there!

Left over thought #1

I had my fun making fun of the old Soviet era building the notary worked in, but the fact is that Ukraine is a modern country.  There are remnants of the Soviet influence, with nasty looking old apartment buildings, but there is tons of construction going on, with new good looking apartment buildings going up, roads being improved, no water or power outages (despite all the warnings we had about this :) ).  Kiev is a city of nearly 3 million people, that has existed for over 1000 years!  They had their struggles following the fall of the Soviet empire, but they have their feet under them now and are moving forward.  You have to look out past the foreground in these photos, especially the second picture, but most of what you see out on the horizon is new.