Our Christmas Miracle!

Yesterday night, after a lovely Christmas Eve dinner, we called Sveta and she gave us the best gift yet. We found out that the registration number for our visas was issued! This means that we are officially out of Kazakhstan in terms of getting back to Ava. All that is left is for the embassy in Washington DC to issue our visas. We're expecting this to happen the first week in January, which means we'll be off the 1st or 2nd week in January. Thank you all for your persistence in praying for our little Ava in this long and complicated journey to bring her home.

Sweet Ava Darina, mommy and daddy are coming back to you so very soon! We love you so much!

We wish you all a very Merry Christmas and we hope it is a special time with your family to reflect on God's greatest gift to us, Jesus.

Almost There...

Well the last and final step is for Astana to transmit our LOI registration number to Washington DC so our visas can be issued. This past week we fought some holidays in KAZ and we're uncertain about the productivity of the KAZ embassy in DC during our upcoming holidays. There's still a chance we get our visas this coming week if Astana does what they need to do on Monday or Tuesday. Please join us in praying for the upcoming week! Thank you all for your support.

Ava Update: Sveta was able to see Ava yesterday and reports that she is doing well. She is the favorite among her new caretakers because she's the best listener. What a good little girl we have!

Finally

We finally got the signature we had been waiting weeks for and it looks like we will be leaving within a day or two before or after Christmas.

Oh how we can't wait to hold you sweet Ava!

Next week should be the week that we get our visas. Pray Please. As always, we'll update as soon as we have news.

Well, we have no visas YET but things are still moving in the right direction for us and we are guessing that we'll be leaving some time the week after next.
In the meantime I am getting ready for Christmas! I am making presents for my family and preparing some things to bring to Kaz for Ava D. Next week I will not be teaching so I am here to make orders if you have any! I made these little dolls for Ava and I just LOVE them! Check out my other blog to see some new things I have posted.
Have a wonderful Thanksgiving day with your loved ones. Even in this time of extreme stress we have so much to be thankful for!

Moving Forward

Things are finally moving ahead with our case! It should just be a matter of days before we can book those plane tickets. God provided us with a little getway this weekend which we are very excited about. We will use the time to enjoy our last childless vacation and to spiritually and mentally prepare for another trip to Kaz. Keep the prayers coming as we don't have visas in hand yet! We will update soon :-)
It will be serious hat and coat weather when we arrive in Kaz.

No we haven't dropped off the face of the earth. We are still here awaiting visa news. We will update just as soon as we hear anything...well, anything positive :-)

Stuck

Getting Back to Kaz Update:
Sorry for the lack of updates lately. It's been a stressful time for us. We seem to be stuck at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Sveta is working hard on getting those visas pushed through. Since our case is so unusual we are encountering problems that aren't typical. Your prayers are important at this time and as soon as we have good news we'll be sure to post it. Ava is well. Can't wait to kiss that little face!

Quick Update.

Now we pretty much hear this every day, but we were told today that our LOI will be all ready tomorrow! Please pray that the LOI can be completed and our visas can be issued! Hopefully we can have good news tomorrow.

Sorry!

We are sorry that we've been so bad about updating. We are still waiting for those visas to arrive. They really should be issued any day now. There is actually a lot going on in our lives right now and we can update you all in time but...we are so excited to see our Ava D. and the Lord is lifting our spirits and preparing us for the trip ahead. Pray that this time next week will be on our way (or at least have our tickets booked :-)

Our visa is just waiting to be shipped to the US and this step seems to be taking way longer than expected. That is the story of our adoption...Longer than expected. But...Luba (Sveta's Mother) is there in Astana and isn't leaving until our visa is shipped. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has told her that they have no problems with our visa and WILL send it to the US for the final step. This is good news b/c you just never know what they are going to have problems with. Big thanks to Luba for waiting this one out for us. Our agency told us to plan on leaving a week from Thursday!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I sure hope so.
Some GREAT news...Once we arrive in Kaz, we don't have to go through any interviews or obtain any signatures!!!!!!!!!!!! We get to go straight to the Orphanage which is wonderful news and saves us at least a week of sitting around and waiting for signatures.
September 17th was Ava's 4th Birthday...Happy Birthday to our little Kaz Princess! Can't wait to see you soon!
Hopefully tomorrow we will report that our visa is on it's way to the US.
Fundraising has been going really well so thank you to everyone who has supported us. I wanted to let everyone know that this is my last week and half to make and ship things so get your orders in if you are interested. We should be getting back with Ava right before Christmas so, if you want to order any Christmas presents, order those now :-)

Another friend or ours was at the concert with Ava and took some darling little pictures. Gaby and her husband are waiting to return home with the 3 boys that they adopted from the baby home! 3 boys! Twin boys and their little brother. Blessings to this family and especially to their 3 year old daughter who has 3 new brothers!

Our Beautiful Little Lady!

So we woke up this morning to a very nice surprise from our friends Katy and Mikuel, pictures of our oh so adorable little Ava. We hope you enjoy them as much as we do! Katy and Mikuel successfully adopted a little baby girl, Olivia Fatima from Pavlodar. A few days ago, they returned home to France as a family of three! Congratulations Katy and Mik!












And here are a few pictures from our walk by the beach in San Clemente last night. It was a very pretty sunset. It would have been even better if Ava was with us. We miss you sweetie!












On another note, we are still waiting for our LOI to be registered in Astana before our entry visas can be issued. Please join us in praying that this happens early next week.

Just wanted to let everyone know that Ava has been moved out to Kashiri orphanage and we have been updated that she is adjusting well and is her same happy self.
We are still waiting for our visa to be officially issued which should be any day now.

A little bit of everything...

Some never before seen videos from Kaz, fundraising, and update on our friends in Pavlodar:

Video: To be honest, it's been a little difficult to watch video or go through pictures since our return to the states. Now that we KNOW we'll be seeing Ava soon, we've gone through some old video and thought we'd share them with you.

Here a video of Ava walking outside. We are so proud of her progress :-)

In this video Ava is eating her messy snack. She really loves snack time.

Ava and her group outside playing



Peggy...don't kill me. Here is a video of us playing games with Jan and Peggy.

Friends In Pavlodar:We are thrilled to let you all know that Peggy, Jan, and Casper are back in Belgium!!!! It will be so hard to be there without them but we are so glad that they've finally made it home with their baby. Our other friends, Linda and Dave, from Canada are also home with their 4 year old boy, Logan!!!! YIPPEE! The other adoptive families that we met, are either home or close to being home which is so wonderful and encouraging for us...I guess adopting from Pavlodar is possible after all :-)

Fundraising: We are so thankful for everyone who has ordered items. Still feel free to email me if you are interested in anything. Through the wonderful world wide web, I have been able to develop a relationship with Amanda. Amanda and her husband are about the same age as James and I and are in the process of adopting from Korea. She lives in Kentucky and is friends with my best friend, Jennifer. Anyways... Amanda has a website where she sells her beautiful jewelry! She has graciously offered to donate 50% of her sales to James and I over the next week or two so if you order from her you will be supporting both of our adoptions! Her website is: http://www.wix.com/amandamay24/jewelry

Also, here is one more project I've been working on this week:

Here are some button hair clips for little girls! Super cute. I wish I had Ava to model them on.

Yay

Got our Letter of Invitation signed today. Should be leaving again in about 10 days!

No LOI Yet

Apparently, school started in Pavlodar today and so the Director of Ed. was not in her office to sign our letter of invitation. At this point, we expect to NOT hear anything so we are pleasantly surprised if we do. It goes without saying that we are ready to be back with Ava and ready for the beginning of the end of this journey. We will update when we get an LOI and estimated departure date. We REALLY REALLY miss our girl.
Here's what we've been up to:

We attended a good friend's wedding which was at an awesome venue! There were Zebra's and White Tigers there (not too close to the ceremony though).

Here are a few new things I've done with some of the orders I've received.

- I did a few Elephants in very "baby" fabrics. There are little jingle bells inside so they are like little rattles.

- I made some PJ Bags out of Red and Black Fabrics so they resemble actual Lady Bugs a little bit more.

- I am making Bed Bugs for my Mom's Second/Third grade students. She is going to use them to encourge her kids to read before they go to bed at night...Read to your Bed Bug! Hawaii is the theme of her classroom so these are the girls Hawaiin themed Bugs.

NO SIGNATURE

No Signature today. The director of education is still looking through our new dossier. We'll hope for tomorrow and let you know.

8/29 Update: Still no signature. There's another meeting Tuesday between the Director and our staff. Pray for a signature AND that the LOI has us going back ASAP.

27th

Well, we are now waiting for our LOI (Letter of Invitation) to be signed. Since we had to do our entire dossier over again, it was a lot of paper work for the Director of education to look through and she is busy preparing for their school year. Our lawyer and Sveta are going to meet with her on Thursday to go through the dossier and we will hopefully get a signature that day as well. So...pray that we will get a signature on the 27th and that, shortly thereafter, we'll be on our way back to Kaz.
James will not return to Kaz until we have a court date. I will be traveling with my mother in law who has graciously offered to join me for the first 3 weeks of the trip.
Emma and her family have had to return to Australia due to some complications with her pregnancy. She told Ava that next time she sees her will be in California when she comes to visit. Since no one will be staying at Emma's apartment, we will be staying there. Such a blessing!
Thanks for keeping up with our journey during this down time. We are hoping to be back with Ava so soon.

Both Of Our Angels

Ava and Emma...

Picture from a friend in Kaz

Today our friend sent us a picture that she took of Ava outside yesterday. It was both wonderful and tough to see the pictures. We miss her so very much and can't believe how much bigger she looks.


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Another Miscommunication

We were able to talk to Sveta today and she informed us that we are starting over. Our director didn't know all the facts and I guess there was a miscommunication. We are now waiting for our new Letter of Invitation (LOI) so we can go back to see our baby. We are praying we can be back by the end of the month, so please pray hard that the LOI is signed in time. When we return in September we'll have about a 6 - 8 week trip where we will do the "bonding" period, apply to court, go to court, serve the 15-day appeal period, spend about a week gathering documents, then finally come home. There is plenty of room for delay in there, so please pray for a quick trip. We were dissapointed to hear this news, but are now happy to atleast have a direction. We'll keep you posted on the LOI.

I Hate Goodbyes!!

Along with missing Ava there is now another family member to miss. My little sister leaves tomorrow night for a 9 month teaching job in Vietnam.
Everyone who knows my family well has to chuckle a little at the world traveling that Erica and I are signing up for. Erica was the four year old who would run down the street after my parents car when they'd leave us with a sitter for only a few hours. And I was the 6th grader who cried for nearly 5 months BEFORE 6th grade camp at the thought of leaving home for a whole 5 days! We've come a long way since then but the thought of not seeing each other for an extended period of time is still very hard.
Erica already loves her little niece and is so sad that she wont be able to be here for her homecoming. In the car ride home James and I were saying how strange it is that the next time we see Erica we'll be standing at the airport with little Ava who will proudly be holding a "Welcome Home Auntie" sign.
In Ava news, we are holding our breathe, waiting for any news from the Regional Court. We are in prayer still that we'd hear great news but are prepared to begin the process again if that is the news we get. Of course we will post as soon as we hear anything.

Here are some pictures from Erica's send off today:

My Dad, our family photographer, and a picture of the 5 of us.

Er saying goodbye to Mom and Dad.

My Cousin lives in Pasadena and he came to send Erica off as well. James and I will miss our sis so very much. Love you!!!!!!

Paper Work Was Submitted

The paper work showing that Ava was offered to local families was presented to the Regional Court on Friday. We haven't heard feedback from the lawyer on how the meeting went but Sveta said she wasn't expecting that they would give an answer today. They will likely take time to look over the paper work and then call our lawyer with their decision. Hopefully we will get an answer by Monday or Tuesday. We're praying hard. Have a great weekend and we'll post some news on Monday or Tuesday.

Local Families are Done!

All three local families have seen Ava and signed off that they don't wish to adopt her. Sveta says they will take the paper work to the Regional Court tomorrow. I am still guessing it wont happen tomorrow but we will be praying hard that it does and that we get some amazing news. If you could pray with us for that miracle we would appreciate it.

Sweet Dress for our Sweet Girl and Quick Update

Talked with Sveta today and here's the update. The third family SHOULD be at the baby house on Thursday this week and the paper work SHOULD be taken to Regional Court on Friday. My guess is that the family will get into the baby house on Thursday but the paper work wont be taken to the court until Monday or Tuesday next week. August is thankfully flying by and it seems we will be back with our sweetie in no time at all. For those of you who have been keeping us and Ava in prayer...thank you! We would appreciate for those prayers to keep coming :-)

Ava's Reversible HAND MADE dress:

This is my favorite side and I think the color will look so cute on her.


I am loving learning how to sew and have been trying to stock up on some things in hopes of holding another craft fair this December.
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While I wish I could be working hard like my awesome husband, I am trying to enjoy the summer and this time to myself before I have a three year old with me full time:

We went to Palm Desert with my parents this past weekend and only took this one picture. Here we are on a golf cart and my Dad is on the phone with my sister Erica who is training in Pasadena for her upcoming trip to teach in Vietnam. We missed you Er.

I went to the pool with my best friend Brandi and her baby, Sawyer. It was nice to get my baby fix in. The three of us were talking about how excited we are for Ava to join us soon.

I printed some of my favorite pictures from our trip and framed them in Ava's room. We can't wait to see her in person in couple of weeks.

A Little Bit of Kaz in California

Today James and I had lunch with our great friends from Kaz! Brian and Simon (Emma's husband)are in LA for a conference and they met us for lunch in San Juan Capistrano. I wish they brought Ava with them but it was just wonderful to see them here and strange thinking we will see them in few weeks on the other side of the world.

2 Down 1 To Go

We talked with Sveta this morning and heard that one more local family has seen Ava and signed that they don't wish to adopt her. The third and final family will see her by the end of the week or beginning of next week. After the third family sees her, they will take our paper work to the Regional Court to see if this can be finalized or if we will need to begin the process again. Keep praying for our miracle! Emma continues to visit Ava and updates us regularly. She no longer cries when Emma leaves her which is very comforting for us and helps Emma as well.

Things are getting a little easier for us here in California. James is back at work and keeping busy. I am going a little crazy at home but am definitely relaxing so I can't complain. Last weekend we went to a wedding in Beverly Hills. James' dear friend Ali was married and we enjoyed a great evening spending time with friends and celebrating.

We hope to have more news by the end of week or the beginning of next week.

Waiting Till the First Week in August

Until the first week in August we wont have news about what exactly our next step will be. This should be the last week of "no news".
Updates from Emma keep coming and it warms our hearts knowing that she has Emma who is watching out for her. We wrote Ava a letter before we left and told her that God is holding her in his hands even when we are not able to. Emma said this in her last email: "When we read the part in your note about her being held in His hands she took her hand and held mine – it was a really beautiful moment."
Here are some pictures of what we have been up to as we wait:



We went to the beach in Laguna with some friends and taught them our new game "Regen Wormen". Our friends and family have given us such great support since we've been home.

Sawyer...I mean Brandi...gave me some sewing lessons and I am having fun using the machine that James bought me two years ago.

I made our Ava Bug a Bed Bug! This is my first project and Zoe is keeping it warm for Ava until she gets home.

Always remember that you are in His hands.

Our Options

We wanted to clear up what the rest of our adoption journey could look like from here on out. Of coarse we are never really sure but these are the possibilities:

Option 1: Regional Court Grants us Custody of Ava
Ava has already been shown to one local family and once she is shown to two more (this should happen by the first week in August) we will take this paper work back to regional court to see if they can overturn their decision and Ava would be ours.
This would obviously be the best case scenario and is what we are praying for. It is not likely but we are hoping for a miracle.

Option 2: Begin Again in the City
After Ava is shown to those local families we will begin the whole process again. 15 days of bonding, apply for court, wait out the 15 days, and return home. If we did this it would not be the 4 month journey that we had last time. It would probably take 6-8 weeks like we expected originally.
Our lawyer and coordinator are not crazy about this idea b/c it means we would have to go through the same court system as last time. Our case has had so much drama that we are afraid it would not be smooth.

Option 3: Continue the Process at Kashiri
Since Ava turns 4 in September, she will be moved out to the older orphanage in Kashiri (a village about an hour away from Pavlodar city). If we wait until September 4th when she is moved we can begin the process again in a new court system, with new judges, and have a fresh start.
This seems better than Option 2 but doesn't allow us to start over until the 4th of September. If this is what we end up doing, I would likely go back in the middle of August so that Ava is not without us for longer than a month.

Deep Breathe...Yes, I know it's very confusing. Join us in praying for Option 1. We know we are on countless prayer lists and we can't say how much we value those prayers.


We heard from Emma today that Ava is doing well. The weather there is rainy so the kids are all going a little stir crazy. We miss her so much but are so thankful that Emma is there for her during this time.


Our adorable friends Peggy and Jan had a possitive decision at court after 7 months in Pavlodar. YAY! We couldn't be happier for the three of them!

We have been getting Ava updates every day or two from our great friends and coordinator in Kaz. She seems to be confused but is still her happy self which is good. We are trying to keep busy here and are counting down the days till we can return. There is still some hope that we wont have to wait till September to begin again so please pray for a miracle. We spent a great weekend down in San Diego with my family. While we were gone in Kaz my parents sold their house, which was the house I grew up in, and moved out to San Marcos. Their new house and community is beautiful and we had a great weekend spending time with them and exploring their new town.


We went on lots of walks and saw some beautiful sights near Mom and Dad's new home.


The puppies were happy to see us and show us around the lake

We were so happy that we got to see my sister who is now off to teach in Vietnam for nearly a year


We are trying to relax, enjoy, and refresh in beautiful Southern California before picking up this adventure once again.

Here are some pictures from our last visit with Ava before we left:

Happy Girl

Dada got some good cuddle time

She cracks us up

We miss you Ava D.

Our pretty pretty princess