A picture says a 1000 words...

(Picture taken by Nadia)

This picture was taken during a concert that the Boyarka orphanage was putting on for my mom and the other ladies-- I thought it was a beautiful (and sad) picture.

An update on my moms trip to Ukraine

A GREAT picture of Ella and my mom


My mom has been gone for about a week and a half now. I've had the opportunity to talk to her almost everyday through Skype. It has been great to hear how things are going on a day-to-day basis.

Her trip seems to have been really successful on multiple levels so far. She has met some great people, figured out more details of a future adoption, formed great relationships to help our hosting program Global Family Alliance, and also seems to really enjoy learning more about the Ukrainian culture.

Ella didn't realize my mom was going to Ukraine, so she was quite surprised when she was approached by the other kids in the orphanage saying "your American is here." My mom spent a lot of time at the orphanage- doing crafts, playing games, etc. Eventually my mom asked Ella if she wanted to be adopted, Ella said "I don't know, I'm not sure." From the beginning, my family discussed how we would handle that exact situation. For numerous reasons, we decided that we would never try to persuade her (or have someone else). My family understands her uncertainty and is willing to adopt someone else. There are so many other kids that want a family SO bad and we wouldn't want L to change her mind last minute or regret her decision once she was here. Ella is really just not ready.

My mom said Ella became more standoffish towards the end of the trip. I'm not a bit surprised by this. She is the type of girl that will push away anything that makes her feel anything. It's easier to distance yourself from something then to deal with your emotions. It's understandable, she hasn't had anyone in her life to actually trust. It can be hard on us sometimes though.

My mom has been looking for other kids that want a family- there's a 15 year old girl and 12 year old boy that have especially touched her heart. Our intentions were never to adopt 2, especially since Alona may become adoptable later, which would be 3 kids. We are confident there is a plan for us, and are waiting to see how everything unravels.

Tomorrow my mom is going to Northern Ukraine to visit Alona and a couple orphanages up there. I'm so excited to hear about her experiences. I'm sure Alona will be absolutely thrilled to see my mom! I'll add a picture of her onto this blog once I have one!


Here she is while my mom visited her in Ukraine!

My moms in Ukraine!

My mom left early yesterday morning for Ukraine and arrived at 3am our time in Kiev. We talked briefly on skype and she seemed to be in good spirits even after all of that traveling.

In 2008, before we decided to host Alona, we were going to host another little girl named Alona who immediately stole our hearts. We decided that it wasn't a good idea to host her because we found out that she was going to be adopted within the next few months- it would be too many transitions for her. My mom just learned that the adoption fell through and she's still in the orphanage and constantly tells the social worker how bad she wants a family. I feel awful for her because not only did she lose out on the opportunity to be hosted, but her short-lived hope of a forever family quickly faded. Apparently she doesn't have a single person that visits her in the orphanage. My heart aches for her... and all the other children who want a family and have no outside support.

There are so many stories.

Confusing as Always

We have been anxiously waiting to hear from our facilitator about Ella's thoughts on adoption. She finally got back to us today. As always, nothing is perfectly clear.

"Hello,
I have checked with orphanage director today again about L and she couldn't
say 100% what L's plans are. According to her words she came up to see her
and asked about possible adoption, so she is aparently not against it. I
think we could talk to the director when Diane gets here, just three of us,
we can also talk to L about it as well.
Best wishes, Nastya"

It was very surprising to us that Ella would approach the orphanage director about adoption (if this is true). Like I mentioned before, she is in EXTREME denial that her aunt and uncle gave her up and appeared to be extremely attached to them when she was here.

Sadly, this makes me think that reality might be setting in. November marks 1 year since she's been in the orphanage, she said she absolutely hates it there. Poor girl.

My mom travels to Ukraine with Global Family Alliance (our hosting organization) in two and a half weeks!

Adoption Update

I haven't really written much about my families adoption status. Prior to hosting Alona in 2008, we were anticipating an adoption. Her gaurdians told the areas social worker in Ukraine that they would relinquish their rights. Unfortunately, this didn't happen. Once she returned we were told that "maybe we could adopt her when she was 15." That's the last we have heard but we still plan to host her every summer.
Our family decided to not let this discourage us, there are still plenty of other children in Ukraine waiting for a forever family. We decided to host Ella, who was just recently abandoned in November, hoping she would be looking for a family. We never implicitly asked her if she would like to be adopted, but we do know that she seemed very attached to her life before the orphanage and Ukraine in general. She seemed to be in denial of her current circumstances. Our adoption facilitator is going to talk to the orphanage director and Ella to see what she envisions for her future. My mom is also traveling to Ukraine in November with Global Family Alliance which might also help us get a better feel for things.

Pictures from the Summer

The girls when they first arrived.


Ella after her haircut.


Alona and I.


On our vacation in Arizona.


My sister and the girls having fun.


Some of the kids that were hosted.


Happy girls after a LONG day at Disneyland.


This picture CLEARLY shows how tired I was at this point!

Time Flies

A lot has happened since I blogged last. First of all, I GRADUATED with a degree in Finance.

More importantly, our girls came for 6 and half weeks this summer and returned home a couple weeks ago. Seeing Alona again was great, we missed her so much. In 2008, I wrote a note to her that said, "I'll think about you everyday and hope things are going well for you." After she left I wondered if I would actually live up to that statement. In retrospect, I definitely did. Even if it was just for a couple minutes, she crossed my mind everyday.

Alona has definitely grown up a little. Not so much in her looks, but her attitude. She has gotten a little more sassy. My sister and I are outspoken, opinionated, and slightly stubborn people so we welcome that in our house. But it was a little shocking at first coming from our little angel! Her happy and loving demeonor were still the same and after about 2 minutes it was like she had never left.

I fell in love with Ella just as I had falling in love Alona the summer before. Her personality was definitely different then Alona's though. My dad said it best when he told our facilitator, "Ella is a somewhat complicated girl, but we overcame those challenges and fell in love with her." She was at times extremely moody and stubborn. She is also VERY critical of herself and seems to lack confidence. At the same time though, she is SUCH a deep thinker, extremely smart, 100% aware of her surroundings, thankful, compassionate (once you break down her shell), and hilarious. She yearned so much for love and support. There were so many times when I wished I could communicate better with her...I had so much I wanted to tell her!

I miss them.

We went to Disneyland with the girls. It was SO much fun. One of the best moments in my life. Ella couldn't believe she was staying in a hotel. She was hyperventilating as we went up to our room. We did both parks, Disneyland and California Adventure, in 2 days. One day, we went from 7 am to 11 pm. We also visited my grandparents in Arizona and watched my sister play in a volleyball tournamant down there, it was 110 degrees out... we were basically in the pool or AC the whole time. SO HOT.

We had a tearful goodbye, as always. Alona was extremely emotional at the airport this year, which made it harder on us as well. She's very attached to our family and even started to call my parents "mom" and "dad."

I'll write about some specific memmories of the girls in my next blog.

Hosting plans for 2009!

We’re hosting a second child! Instead of just bringing Alona over this summer, we’re also hosting a second little girl named Eleonora. She is currently 12 but will turn 13 the day before she arrives. We’re so excited to meet her.

My family and I got innovative- with some painting, curtains, pictures, etc. we are slowly turning a corner downstairs into L’s room. A "corner" doesn't do the room any justice, it actually looks pretty good! Alona has a room upstairs that my mom usually uses as her playroom for daycare.

We have been busy shopping for the girls and getting everything ready. My mom and I love shopping, especially the sales racks. So that has been a lot of fun.

On a different note, school is a nightmare this quarter! To say the least, I am extremely busy and will continue to be until the end of the quarter. I’m counting down the days until I graduate… 42 days! Which means there’s only 50 days until our little girls arrive!

I’m also working on a PowerPoint presentation to talk about at the Global Family Alliance (the organization we host through) orientation meeting. I've been gathering a lot of information, both through the internet and other families who've traveled to Ukraine. Whenever I'm working on any projects, I love to get firsthand information. The credibility of the source is so valuable- there's clearly no better source than the good people who are helping the lives of orphans. Thanks to anyone who contributed.

Better get back to my financial statements.

I really really really want to go to America

My mom runs a daycare and is constantly looking for good deals on toys to add to her playroom. We found a good deal on a dollhouse on craigslist, so we decided to meet at the mall to make the trade. We could tell the lady was from Eastern Europe due to her accent, when we asked where, she said UKRAINE!!! It was such a coincidence, she had a lot of valuable information to share about her country and her struggles growing up there, it was very interesting. We ended up chatting forever. We became friends and she even offered to interpret a phone call to Alona with us.

We hadn't called Alona since October so we were so excited! Alona sounded great and hadn't been notified yet that she was for sure invited back to our house. When we told her, she was sooo happy, and said, "I really really really want to go to America."
The other cute thing that happened was this:
My mom: "Alona, I can't wait for a hug when you come to America."
Alona: "I come to America and you hug me."
First of all, great sentence. Secondly, how sweet.

We could also tell she had been trying hard to learn english, she gained a few more words. For example, "Booooring." (She said this when we were talking about our 16 hour car drive to Reno, Nevada last summer)
She also learned "hope"- she said, "I hope to swim when I come to America, I really really really like swimming." That's not a lie, that girl would swim for days if you didn't drag her out of the pool.

Hosting Alona in 2008

I wrote this a couple months after we hosted Alona last summer. It sums up every little detail of our 6 weeks with her.

Our story starts with an e-mail. It was from my aunt saying that Ukrainian kids affected by Chernobyl will be coming over here to get proper nutrition for 6 weeks with an organization called Global Family Alliance. It went on to say that some were orphans and could possibly be adoptable. We looked at all the kids faces, and quickly realized we couldn't say no to this opportunity. We chose to host Alona, a little girl who was living with a gaurdian but would "supposedly" soon be put on the adoption list. We had previously chosen an orphan but were notified last minute that she was going to adopted. So we chose the little blondie that had first caught our eye.

The weeks leading up to Alona's visit were exciting. We looked at her picture everyday with anticipation. I endlessly shopped the sales racks at Macy's scooping up every good deal I could find. We were so excited for this journey- no one knew what to expect.. and that's what made everything so fun!

The week before Alona's arrival seemed to creep by, we were so excited and the anticipation of meeting her was killing us. Up until this point, we had only one picture that we were constantly looking at. Before we knew it, we would be seeing that little face in real life. We were more then prepared for her. She had a brand new wardrobe and everything else that she could possibly dream of, awaiting her arrival.

Then we met her.

All the the host families were sitting down in a waiting area, above us was a balcony that all the kids would have to walk across to go get there things in baggage claim. We waited forever and FINALLY the kids were here. As they stood on the balcony looking down at us, we couldn't tell which one was Alona. Finally my brother said, "There she is, that's her." At the moment we realized it was definitely her. A gfa board member, walked up to her and pointed down at us. She looked and gave us a big smile, she seemed relieved that after all that traveling there was a family waiting for her.

I started crying of course. Despite her circumstances, the fact that a ten year old girl could travel to a foreign place, to stay with a foreign family, and smile like that, was amazing to me.

My dad later said, "I now believe in love at first sight."

When she approached us, she seemed stiff and scared. We tried to rub her back or hug her, but she didn't seem responsive. She looked really tired and confused. The language barrier made it very hard to ease her tensions. In the airport, she had to use the bathroom, she didn't know how to lock the bathroom stall door, so I just held it for her. When trying to wash her hands, she couldn't figure out how to turn the sink on, so I showed her how it was automatic. When we got in the car, she had never worn a seatbelt before, so we had to put it on for her. It was clear from the first 30 minutues, that things in America were quite different here from where she lived in Ukraine. At that moment, I understood how scared she was- nothing was the same! She sat the whole time, wide-eyed in the backseat. When we got home, we gave her a tour of the house. She seemed in awe, she even said something in russian- we just smiled. We stuck her in the bath the first night. We figured it would feel good after all the traveling and help her relax... plus, she desperately needed one.

After the first week, things started to change very quickly as she became more comfortable with her surroundings and her english vocabulary grew. She came into her own and we found that our shy, scared, and meek child at that airport no longer existed. Instead, we were blessed with an ambitous, HAPPY, persistant, sweet, fearless, loves to laugh, SMART, full of energy and life, 10 year old girl. The language barrier got easier and easier as time progressed, it's amazing how much you can communicate with just a "yes" or a "no" and a lot on nonverbal communication. We were lucky though, Alona was super aware of her surroundings so she understood almost everything we were trying to say and picked up on words extremely quick. She also had absolutely no fear when it came to trying to speak english. She was determined and would repeat words without any hesitation. She also picked up on the little words we all tend to overuse, like saying "ouch," "oops," "uh," "oh my gosh," and "ohhh."

Trip to the dentist...

She had her first dental appointment the same week that she arrived. She seemed a little nervous but not overly concerned. Before the dentist, Ommy (my grandma), Jillian (my sister), Marina (the interpreter), and Alona went to Target and Red Robin. Target has a dollar spot in the front of the store, so I told her she could pick out 2 things. Alona looked at everything very meticulously and overwhelmed, trying to figure out what exactly everything was, she kept making this gesture of taking it off the paper and putting it on her hand. I realized she was trying to figure out if they were stickers. Stickers were a very big hit the entire time she was with us. She would stick them all over her body, even all over her face. I led her to the art kit sets where she picked out this kit where you color the stickers yourself. Ommy picked out a Dora memory game for us to play with Alona. Marina described to her how you match pairs. She seemed excited. We will later see that it became her FAVORITE game ever. We would play everyday, multiple times. NOTE: If you're adopting or hosting a child, get memory. Alona learned a lot of vocab words and LOVED the game.

We were finally at the dentist.
Before the dental hygenist was about to look in her mouth, she started saying something in Russian to Marina. Marina seemed to be reassuring her. When I asked what she was so worried about, Marina told me that she asked if they were going to extract any teeth. Marina went on to explain that the dentistry can be horrible in Ukraine, especially if you don't have the money to afford the very best. We assumed that Alona must have had a previous bad experience. The appointment went very well but it was clear that Alona would need a lot of work done on her teeth. Curious of their concerns, I looked in Alona's mouth. Her teeth were in very poor condition, they were yellow and looked like they were rotting. She told the dentist that her mouth hurt too. We made two appointments to get everything in order.

The dentist was very sweet to Alona and cried when we explained some details of Alona's life. At the end, Alona told Marina that the dentists in America didn't hurt and were very nice.

Alona had two more dental visits after the initial one. They all went very well. In the end she had 4 teeth extracted, 2 crowns, and 2 cavities!

In weeks 2-5 we were very busy. The highlights include a road trip to Reno, Nevada and Lake Tahoe, California, trips to the beach and local swimming pool, gymnastics lessons, boating, watching Jillian play a lot of volleyball, memory game, badminton, a trip to the zoo, playdates etc.

Here are my more of my favorite memories:

Alona's improvements in swimming: Alona amazed everyone at the pool with her swimming progress. Everytime we went to the pool, she would learn something new or have some new trick to show us. My brother Joe and sister Jillian both work at the local private pool so they would give her free lessons. At first, she was terrified to jump off the side of the pool, but by the end, she would do tricks off the diving board. On her first attempt, she stood on the board for five minutes, kids piling up behind her anxiously waiting their turn- we told her "Ok, go!" about a million times... but she didn't. Then we told her she had to get off the board because other kids wanted to go- she wouldn't budge. She finally got off the board only to return about five minutes later. This time, she was going to do it. I could tell by the look in her eyes that she was not going to be defeated by the board again.. and then she jumped!
Taking Alona shopping: I took Alona to Old Navy to get a new pair of jeans. She tried on numerous pairs and then found the perfect pair. I told her to go outside the dressing room to look in the big mirror. She walked through the entire aisle swinging her hips, you could tell she felt like a little princess.
The Zoo: Bret and I took Alona to the zoo. She absolutely loved it. She would say "Picture" everytime we saw a new animal, she wanted to capture every moment and every new thing there. We could not pull her away from the bird exhibit, where you feed the parakeets and cockatails, and they land on you. She also loved the reptile night exhibit, we went through it about 3 times.
Memory Game: Alona was so good! She would beat everyone every time! It was insane. We would beat her occasionally, 1 in 5 times maybe, if we were lucky. When she played kids her age, she would win everytime, usually like 32 pairs to 4 pairs.
Boating: She loved being out on the water. It was so cute to see a 10 year old who never had been on a boat, she would peek through the little holes and watch the water pass by from inside the cabin. Every part of it was very exciting for her and so fun for us to watch.

Our last week with Alona was so amazing, but also sad. She started to break out of her shell even more. She actually became pretty crazy- in a good way of course. She would love to SNORT (I don't know where she picked this up), run and jump around the house, and giggle non-stop. She's such a happy girl.

Her increased energy was one thing that was changing, but her affection towards us was evolving even more. The same girl who panicked when anyone would try to pick her up, got stiff when we hugged her, and turned her head away from people in pictures, now was CONSTANTLY jumping on us, hugging us, or trying to snuggle with us. I think she knew her time here was almost over, and she was trying to hang on to us, literally and figuratively. Even though it's been over 4 months, I still have vivid memories of some of the last moments with her.

Meet the Fam

After reading numerous blogs about people's adoptions journey, I was inspired to put my families own journey in writing. Although the future adoption is tentative, and our journey ahead is a long road, I have faith that this experience will be one worth recording. Already thus far in our adventure, there have been many beautiful moments and lessons learned, that I feel need to be shared and remembered by our family.

Let me first describe my family. My mom and dad are proud parents of four children. My oldest brother is 25, his names Jacob. He went to UTI in Arizona then BMW School in Texas. He now works at BMW Seattle as an auto technician. I am the second born, my name is Justine and I am currently a senior at Western Washington University in Bellingham, WA pursuing a finance degree. Joseph is the third born, he is a freshman at Seattle University also pursuing a finance degree. Jillian is the baby of the family; she’s a junior in high school who loves volleyball and hanging with her friends.

My mom and dad have been an amazing duo for 26 years last January. I swear they are even more in love than the day they got married (when they were 19 and 20 years old). My dad works at Boeing and my mom runs an in-home daycare. They share one true passion, and that's for kids. Raising them, being around them, and helping them. They have devoted their entire lives to our happiness and have never been closed-minded to expanding our family even further!