IT'S SPRING! We have been looking forward to this season since we were told several weeks ago that our dossier will go to the embassy in early spring. Here is a photo of my first crocus that has bloomed. We are trying to take one day at a time so that we don't get impatient and anxious about the waiting. Mark and I are both working extra jobs to try to stay on top of the financial obligations of this great adventure of adopting two teen girls. Oh man, what are we thinking??? Two more cars, dresses for dances, makeup, hair "things" and the list goes on. LOL! Please pray with us for the girls that God will prepare their hearts so that they will want to come and join our family. When I think of spring it reminds me of a song that I sang as a teenager in my church.

What a wonderous time is spring, when all the trees are budding.
The birds begin to sing, the flowers start their blooming.
That's how it is with God's love, once you've experienced it.
You want to sing. It's fresh like spring. You want to PASS IT ON!

Please Lord, let our family be the one that can share this love with Tanya and Galina!

Galina's birthday

Wow! what a week. Mark and I headed to Orlando to be with Gabe and Christina on Sunday the 8th. They had to have some tests because Christina had some abnormal blood work and there was concern that baby Rocket had Down's Syndrome. We went to be with them when they received the results of the amniocentesis. On Monday the 9th we got the news that everything was normal. PRAISE GOD!!! Tuesday, March 10th, was Galina's 13th birthday. Mark and I went to the beach with Lacey, Gabe and Christina. As I picked up shells on the beach I thought about what we will be doing next year to celebrate with her. I can't wait to bake her a cake and have family all around her singing with Mark the loudest and off key. We had hoped that we would be further in our adoption process so that we could talk to her on her birthday but we have great hopes that she will be with us for her next birthday. We are still waiting for our dossier to be submitted to the embassy. We had to change some of our documents and are still in line waiting our turn. I was told today that it looks like our dossier will be going in late April or early May.

I171H

Happy Valentine's Day!! I can't believe it. We received our I171H today. It only has been 2 weeks since we went for our fingerprinting. Sometimes Michigan is awesome. Mark and Kristine Wolverton as of 2/2/2009 have permission to bring two orphans that are siblings into the U.S. Praise God!!!

INS Fingerprinting

What is it with us and winter storm warnings??? We received a letter Tuesday, Jan. 27th that we needed to be in Grand Rapids at 8a.m. on Friday, Jan. 30th for our INS fingerprinting. We got up as if we were heading to work on Friday because it's an 1 1/2 hr. drive. We left the house at 6:15a.m. to snow and icy roads. We counted 15 cars off the road on our trip up and back. I sure was thankful for the 4 wheel drive truck and Mark behind the wheel. This is the last appointment that we needed to complete. Now we wait for our turn for our dossier to be processed.

I just went back and read our blog from our previous attempt to adopt Galina and her brother Sasha in 2005. We had many conflicting stories at the time and weren't sure what to think. After 3 years we believe that Almas just didn't have the power to do our adoption. We believe that there was no grandmother and he told us that because it was an "acceptable" excuse.

Adoption Ark Dossier Approval

We received notification from AA yesterday that our dossier has been approved and sent on for translation.

Dossier Complete

Well, as of yesterday (1/16) at 4:30 p.m. our dossier was in the hands of the FedEx man on it's way to Adoption Ark in California. It was a crazy week of trying to complete it. I left work early on Tuesday to check the mail for the one last document that we needed to go get our apostilles. It was in the mail. I called work and told them that I wouldn't be back. I was on my way to Lansing to the Office of the Great Seal. It was a winter storm advisory but waiting one more day just wasn't in my plans. LOL! I got to Lansing by a detour because there was an accident. When Marcy at the Office of the Great Seal went over our documents she couldn't apostille any of our documents that our credit union had notarized because the notary stamp and the state registration for the people that signed didn't match. Soooo, back home to reprint 10 documents and back to the credit union. Another trip to Lansing on Thursday. Guess what? Another person at our credit union's notary isn't correct. A total of 4 notaries at our credit union had incorrect stamps. Back to the credit union with one more set of documents and the name of the one lady at our credit union that had her notary correct. We completed the documents and they gave us movie passes and a gas card for all of our inconvience. I took our packet of documents to our small group on Thursday night and plopped them in the middle of everyone and told them "we need to pray over these". I also shared with our group that I want them to pray for a "miracle day" of March 10th that the girls know we are coming. This was the first time Mark knew that I was requesting this of God and he thought it was awesome! On friday, Lacey returned with our documents and they all passed! I had worked a midnight shift on Wednesday night and had been able to sort, copy and organize the documents that were done. Once Lacey brought me the rest of the documents at work I was able to copy them and get everything completed. I prayed that when I left work I would run in to a FedEx truck otherwise I would drive to Battle Creek and hope to meet the deadline to get it sent on Friday. As I was driving down the main road there was a FedEx truck. I followed him to his next box and he took our precious package. Then I passed 2 more trucks on the way home. LOL! I guess God was letting me know I can trust him in the little details. Now we wait to see if our dossier is approved by AA.

Another step closer

We received our completed home study on 1/8/2009. I mailed our I600 today, 1/9/2009. I have one more document to receive and then I will be able to go to Lansing to get all of our documents apostilled. I am planning to do this on 1/13/2009. I am still praying for a miracle date of 3/10/2009. This is Galina's 13th birthday. I would love for her to know that we are trying to bring her home again on her birthday.