Boys will be Boys

Well friends it has been a long time since I have blogged to you guys. You think I don't care. But we have been so busy with all of the boys in this house that it is not funny. Between Jacob's birthday and Andrew's only 13 days apart it is hard to sit and find time to blog. I feel that I have missed all of my friends. Well for both of the boys birthday's we went to Great America in Santa Clara for a weekend. Yes I said each of their birthdays that was for two weekends in a row. They had so much fun on the roller coasters. They are both happy we bought season passes for the family. We now are going up to that area for Orion's graduation from Culinary school so we figured we might as well stop by the park and spend a few hours on the roller coasters. Viktor we found out is the dare devil and loves the extreme coasters. Which is good cause Larry now has someone other then me to go on them. I am the one that is reserved and stays on the ground. Someone has to watch all of are stuff. Right! Then this last week Andrew left for 11 days to Mexico on a mission trip and of course we had to go to the mall and get supplies for 10 days. And it all had to go into a medium suitcase. So with some creative packing we got only 7 pairs of shorts, 10 shirts, and two towels. So needless to say he is going to smell like a boy.

Weeks 4-7 and Awsome News

I have now lost count of the weeks that we are in on this process. I think it is week 7. But when you leave things in God’s hands things can change ever so quickly. And for us that has happened. I will explain in week 7. I do not know where to even start. We will start on were we left off on weeks 4 and 5 were almost the same with filling out paper work and talking with agencies making sure all paperwork is being filled out correctly.
Then on the last weekend of May we went on a wonderful mini vacation from Thursday to Sunday. We all pilled in our truck and trailer and went with our friends to Bass Lake. Now talk about fun! We had some of the funniest moments on the lake. Larry and my best friend Krystal jumped in the lake fully clothed to swim when we went on a hike on that Friday afternoon. Then on Saturday morning Larry and Jason went fishing and came back with the whooping fish story of the one that got away. Then later that afternoon we rented a large pontoon boat for 5 hours and tried our hands at wakeboarding and tubing. LOL However, the big kid (meaning Larry) was the first one to jump in the lake and go on the tube. I will have to add photos when I get them from Krystal. She was the only one prepared with a camera to capture the funny moments. And trust me there were many of them. I think if you were to ask the kids they would say it was when Krystal and I fell off the tube without even moving and then had to try to flip it back over and climb back on. And at this point we already were cold and could not stop laughing at how stupid we must of look. Just imagine two women in ice cold water struggling to turn over a 6 foot round raft and then pulling each other back on. Just to fall off not much later. No matter what we had a great time. Except we all came back sore, sun burnt, and sick.
Week 6 was just crazy with the boys finishing school and baseball coming to an end. Then it happened God intervened on June 3 during JZ’s baseball game when another adoptive mom came to us with a situation of a disruption. This is the same friend that has been helping us with all of the paperwork for getting the girls from Russia. And helping us review contracts with different agencies for the last few weeks. So to let you know a disruption means that someone whom has adopted wants to find another home for the child because they are unable to handle the situation. It was a bleak situation they were ready to place him in foster care in the next few weeks. So after several emails with our friend Christine we were given the story of what was happening with the young man. So on Friday June 6 at 3:00 P.M. we picked up Viktor from Visalia. He is originally from Ivanovo, Russia; the same area that we were looking at to get the girls. So now we are a family of 5, 4 boys and 1 girl (me). 2 girls if we can count our dog Lady Dane. Still I am out numbered. Sunday June 8 as a family we made a decision to ask Viktor if he would like to join our family. So now the process has changed. The other family has contacted a Licensed Social Worker to start the paperwork and this Thursday June 13 they will be signing him over to us temporally until it get all paperwork filed in court. So now we start a different process all together. So we will keep you all posted. I am now worrying about how much money we need to have now. Before it was all in installments; a little here and a little there. Now all the money is to be placed up front. And no one can tell us how much and how soon. So we ask for everyone to pray for us and our new family that God will provide what is needed. I will see you in a couple of days. Take care all of our friends and family. We love you all.

Week 2 and 3

Well these last two weeks have been amazing. I feel like we are in a big hurry so it seems everyone else is not. As well as, we had to make some choices of which agency to use for the Adoption and it was down to two. The week was filled trying to get contracts and pricing from the two agencies, plus checking references and licenses. We settled on a local agency to do our home study. We did get all of the birth certificates, marriage license and certificate ordered and they have arrived; so all passports have been ordered. YEA, so one thing is done. NIS paperwork is filled out ready to be taken to NIS office in Fresno. Number 2 thing done and off the list. Plus, the home study info is on the way, YEA again! While all of this is going on our family life is moving forward. We have had so much fun in the past few weeks with our best friends Krystal and Jason. Our kids get along so good. We were over at their house for swimming and a barbeque. Kids got tired of swimming decided to play in the mud and yes even our teenager got in the mix. I guess that is the fun of being a kid… Jacob is playing baseball five days a week and loves every minute of it. So Taxi Mom is my name. How things will to change with girls in our home? Dance lessons, softball, and slumber parties!!! I cannot wait… I pray every day for our boys and who God is going to place in our home.

Trial One- Week One

This week we have been dealing with trying to find the right agency to help us with our adoption. You think it would be easy!! Ha. Boy this has been really hard to choose which one is right fit for our family. They all charge different prices; some will only work certain countries and not others, while some will not work with some home study agencies. I was told that the first thing to do is fill out the INS I600 paperwork cause that can take up to 4 months to get approval. But you can’t fill out all of INS paperwork without having your different agencies picked and on contract. Then to find out that I needed to fill out the INS 1-600a form. So for the most part it has been frustrating to say the least. I was also told that you need current original birth certificates for all of us plus are a current copy of our marriage certificate and let’s not forget passports. And all of this cannot be dated over a year ago. I did not know that birth and marriage certificates even had date of when they were printed on them. So we had to call all of the counties of birth to get info and cost for replacement certificates plus Nevada for our marriage. Then to find out you have to have them all notarized. Nothing can be done on-line. Joy more paper work to be filled out. And it is all repeated over and over, name, address, ssn, birth date, etc. I wish I had a label with all of this information on it. Just peel and stick. I now have to go and get the paperwork for the passports again because I made a booboo.