Questions....

Many of you, local friends and far away friends, have contacted us in regards to how we are doing and what the next step is. Matt and I are doing fine, there is nothing that we can do about this situation. It is out of our hands and we have to trust that everything will work out in the end for the best.
We are hoping to have a new appointment in Kiev on May 21st. That date can not arrive quickly enough for me! I am ready to see our boys, it has been far too long.
Our Ukraine facilitators have been wonderful to work with and feel terribly about this whole mix up. They have refunded our airfare and lodging for this past trip, which we feel is a nice compensation for the travel. Once we get confirmation that we are traveling again, I will let you all know.
Lisa

Made it Home!

We are officially back in Huntersville, NC. We are hoping to have a new SDA appointment on May 21st in Kiev, but should have the confirmation on that this week. We will keep you all posted on our new travel plans.
Lisa

Headed Home

This will be a brief post. I am simply emotionally wiped out at this point. Basically we had our SDA appointment today and it did not go well at all. Our boys are on the national adoption registry but they are not currently available to foreign adoptions. They are only available to Ukrainian citizens at this point and then foreigners at the end of May! SO, that means we came all this way for nothing. And will have to do it all over again in a month! Really am speechless at this point. And honestly the worst part is that they will not let us even see the boys! We talked with Ivan and Anatoliy a little bit ago and they were both so sad and confused as to why we are Kiev, but can not come and see them. Honestly the most important part of the phone call was for me was not letting them hear me cry. I just wanted to sound positive and upbeat about seeing them in May. Ivan was emotional on the phone which is so rare for him and that just broke my heart. They have been expecting to see us this weekend and now nothing! Flying home first thing in the morning.
Lisa

We have arrived!

After a long and tiring full day of traveling, we have arrived in Kiev and settled in our apartment. While still in Charlotte, we ran into a family that hosted with us this past summer. This family, from Wilmington, was actually in our hosting parent orientation over the summer with us! So we were thrilled to know that not only are they adopting their host child from this summer, but they were flying all the way to Kiev with us AND have their SDA appointment date the same as we do! It was so nice to have this family to talk too while sitting for 5 hours in the Munich airport.
Matt and I were left on our own tonight to navigate the city and find a place to eat. I am happy to report that we found a restaurant, ordered, paid and found our way back home safely:) Kiev is very pretty at night and we look forward to exploring tomorrow after our appointment. I will post pictures of our apartment, etc. in tomorrow's post. Right now my body is slowly fading from only 4 hours sleep.

April 19th SDA appointment

A quick post to say we are going to the Ukraine on 4/17!  We will update the blog before we leave, I'm sure.   We'll be there about 3 weeks on first trip:  We'll leave 4/17, appoinment in Kiev to legally request to adopt them on 19ty, we'll head out to orphanage a couple days later (12 hour train ride) to orphanage, spend ~10 days in an apartment attached to orphanage, appear in court to get approval, head back to Kiev to sign papers, and leave.  Lisa will then go back to get them 10 days later (~early/mid May).

THANKS for all the support!