Re-entry a little bumpy

We are home at last, and the flight was good but painfully long. Tanya did great and we couldn't have ask for better, so we praise God for our good trip back. We are trying to get into life again, but having a hard time with the jet lag. We hope to feel better soon, and that would help with just about everything right now. Tanya is adjusting to being an American and seems to be settling down a bit. We are still having a hard time with her eating. She doesn't like anything but Cheerios, so we hope that will change soon. Luke is also having a very hard time with having a sister and not being the only child. I didn't think this would be so bad, but like all children who have a new sibling it's hard on them. Our worship leader at church prayed for us last Sunday,and he hit it right on the nose by praying for our transition time as a family. That seems to be the hardest thing right now, but I know there will be other bumps to follow.

A funny story about ice. Most Americans are so use to having ice in our drinks, but little Tanya has never had ice in her drink, and on the airplane I thought she was going to burst when they gave her ice. She was staring at it like it was from another planet. Since we came home, she will request ice just so she can stare at it. She does like to eat it, but it's kinda like watching a love/hate relationship.

Anyway, I can not express how great it is to be back home again. My first two days home, I couldn't utter the word home without crying. It was nice to visit but there's no place like home!

Moving On

We went to the US embassy two days ago to get Hannah her visa so she can enter the USA! It was a day I needed to experience. We went there with another couple from Tennessee who just adopted three children. They were siblings and have been in and out of the orphanage many times. As we arrived, there was a long line of Russians waiting to get inside to get a visa, but we were ushered in front of the line and brought inside right away. We went through security and upstairs to a waiting area. When we got there no one else was in the room and then the room began to fill up with lots of Americans adopting. I looked around and wanted to cry because my heart was about to bust with all of us in the room waiting to take our little ones home. I wanted to kiss the ground because everyone was speaking English and it was like music to my ears. I guess that’s the same way Hannah feels when she is listening to us speak all day. Of course Hannah decided she wanted nothing to do with this event, so when we were called up and ask to raise our right hands, and I was holding her and she went right down and almost did a back flip. She has the timing down!

One thing we have found very helpful with Curious George (I mean Hannah), is if we keep her purse in one hand she can’t reach out and take-grab-touch things. She still has managed to grab a lady’s shiny belt buckle, touch a little girls braided hair, take a teddy bear out of someone’s bag (almost came home with us), and feel a woman’s fur coat. She seems to be getting used to our family because she doesn’t have as many meltdowns as the first few days, so thanks to our pray warriors… we need that so much!

I keep counting the days until we are leaving and pushing the days. I thought one day was Wednesday and much to my dismay it was only Tuesday, but today is Thursday and we leave on Friday!!!!! Now who’s on first??? Thanks to everyone for your kind messages and support. I can not express my joy I had while reading them, and with many of them I would just cry!

Back in Moscow

Well, as most of you know we are back in Moscow and doing the embassy and consulate stuff to finish up our adoption.

Luke and I had a very difficult start at being a new family. I went on a downward spiral like I have never experienced in my entire life, and I think it was a combination of events. The first one being extreme homesickness and I’m not talking, “Oh, I miss home,” I’m talking, “Get me home now or I’m going to split in two.” I’ve only had this happen one other time when we moved to Germany and I recognized the feeling. The other event was lack of sleep, which I wasn’t getting much of before Hannah came to us. Luke always plays off of my emotions and we cried and prayed for several days. We called our adoption agency and talked with Kristen and found out this is very normal and 65% of all adoption moms have this problem. I guess it’s almost post-partum depression which I never had with Luke, but I had something very real that happened here. So, I prayed with Kristen and then our social worker called, and I prayed with her and our great God who loves His children heard my cry and helped me through it. It wasn’t right away, but I knew He was holding my hand with each step I took to feeling better. We are both doing much better now, and thankfully Scott was able to be a source of strength and keep our family together. I’m thankful to have that rock of support that calls us to pray for one another, and I can dial direct to our Creator and know He loves us and wants the best for us. I don’t have an answer to why it happened, but I do know I had some big shoulders to cry on.

Now I can move on to our adventure of being parents of the most curious child I have ever been around. It’s pretty amazing to look at Hannah and see her completely taken by this world of ours. She is amazed by cars, trucks, signs, people, flooring, buildings, in fact, you name it and she will be amazed by it. It let’s us realize how much of the world these little ones do not see. So, we now affectionately have nicknamed her Curious George, but with every nickname there’s a story. We decided to get out of this hotel and take the kids to the zoo, and with her this was an adventure. I don’t think she saw one animal but she saw lots of people and roared at many of them. I was carrying her at one point and realized she had someone’s balloon in her hand, and I think the woman was about to run me over to get it back. We finally bought her a balloon, and it may have been her first balloon ever, and she was so thrilled to have a balloon. She played with it all day, and didn’t care about any lions or tigers or bears. At one point, Scott was carrying her and kept hearing a strange sound, and he realized she was bonking people on the head with her balloon as they passed. When Scott told me this he was laughing so hard it made him cry! Some zoo characters are placed around the Moscow Zoo, and she was walking and decided to grab one of their tails and not let go. The person in the suit knew someone had hold of the tail and pulled with a quick jerk to be freed. We saw it all in slow motion and didn’t know who would win in that battle, but she finally let go and the tail survived.

I’m still very homesick and so is Luke. We miss our church, family, and friends, American food, reading signs, not getting lost. We will probably kiss the ground when we arrive back in the U.S.A!

Gotcha Day!!!

Few words are necessary for what happened today, May 07, 2008 at 10:30am, in Voronezh, Russia! A little girl sat in the back of a car and we went out in the rain to meet her. That little girl ran to me and I put my arms around her, and I told her she will never be alone again, and that little girl is ours. Welcome Home Hannah Tatiana Sheldon!

Children are a gift from God and the heart it doesn’t really matter where they got their start…………

Interesting Day

We had a very interesting day yesterday. It also confirms what I said in the last post that we seldom know what’s really going on here. So, with that small build-up, I will unfold our day.

We did lots of busy work concerning our adoption with getting Hannah’s passport and birth certificates changed for us to take to Moscow for the embassy and consulate meetings. Christina told us we were invited to a concert at her school also because Russia has a big holiday on May 9th celebrating the end of WWII. So, we went to the concert, but first stopped by the headmistress office to meet her and many other teachers and directors, and then we were escorted into the hall for the concert. It was a wonderful show with many of the students performing. They were in military costumes and traditional costumes, and they sang, danced and acted in some skits. There were three WWII veterans there that fought in Voronezh, and they had numerous medals on their jackets. At the end of the celebration, all of a sudden I realized they were going to introduce us to the audience. The headmistress wanted us to come up with her and talk. I really don’t like surprises, and this one really got my full attention. I didn’t want to go up, but people around lead me, Scott, Luke, Galina, and Christina up front. They wanted to know if we like Russia and their celebration. Scott answered in his much worded speech saying “very nice” and “good.” They were clapping and taking pictures of like we were celebrities. After that, a girl got up and sang a song for us in English. And if you think this couldn’t be enough, after taking pictures with the veterans, we were asked to be interviewed with the TV station. So, we went down the hallway into the headmistress’ office where we were interviewed about if we liked Russia and what we liked about it. Scott, Luke, and I answered the questions, and it will be on TV on May 9th during their news. Now mind you, we thought we were just going to a concert to watch a show and then home. We had no idea any of this was going to happen. That is pretty much the way I have felt since arriving to Russia. We really don’t know what is going to happen, when it’s going to happen, or where it’s going to happen. We are just along for the ride!

Today is Gotcha Day! The director of Hannah’s orphanage is driving her up to us. We should be completing our family around 11am, but I am again ready for the unexpected, but I pray that is not going to happen. Can you believe after three years we are finally completing our adoption? I have so many thoughts that lead us up to this day, and hopefully as God has directed us through this journey, it will be as sweet as I always dreamed it would be!

Comfort Zone

We arrived in Voronezh safe and exhausted. I don’t sleep well on trains or planes, and when I don’t it hurts my brain. (I couldn’t help myself, I love to rhyme). Anyway, we received news on our return as to when Tatiana is coming to us. We thought tomorrow, but now it seems on Wednesday the director is bringing her here to us. Some of the paperwork for her passport is not completed, so that is the delay. I’m so pleased to hold on to the concept of expect the unexpected with this process. Yes, I do get frustrated by it all, and I believe it has kept me from getting excited. Some friends have shown their excitement, but I have this big reservoir inside of me keeping all of this at bay. I can’t let myself go there until probably we are back home in Maryland. I know once she is here with us that will recede, but for now I will stay this way and have little moments of celebration as we get closer to leaving.

Now that I am a train expert, which means nothing except I have more unanswered questions than ever before. Like, what is that terrible smell in the bathrooms on the train? Why is the heat on when its 80 degrees outside and no windows to open? Why are there so many stops and no one gets on or off? Why are you not allowed to use the bathrooms with two hours left until your destination? These are some of the few, but I have many more not suitable for this blog.

I have became very good at using bottled water to brush my teeth, wash my face, and take a short shower (short being the optimal word). Besides my water issues on trains, in Voronezh the water is turned off from noon until 5pm, and again at night from 11pm-midnight. Water has become a very important commodity for me, and one that I take advantage of at home. Dare I say, I will think of it differently once I return home or is this just a thought I have now and will let that go? We all have a comfort zone. Where we like to shop, eat, travel, and this excursion has taken me away from all of it. While we were on our own in St. Petersburg, food became another interesting event. We would ask the front desk, but for some strange reason they must think all Americans are rich and want to eat at very nice places. After sightseeing all day, we ended up at a very expensive restaurant arranged by the hotel. We were too tired to find another place, so we ate there and the food was great. Around 9 pm, the restaurant had a fabulous show with singing and dancing, but what is funny about this is we didn’t know it was going to happen. That seems to be the whole thing here; we never really know what’s going on.

Even in my feelings of fear or being unsure of the next disappointment, God is always faithful and near. Last night when reading the Bible, I ended up in Nehemiah (fancy that), and read his prayer and the fear he was facing. Below on that page were these words, “Never be afraid to trust an unknown future to a known God.” That takes the bite out of every trial!

Hermitage Museum

We went to the Hermitage Museum yesterday, and it was very fascinating. Each room was gorgeous! Luke saw originals of Van Gogh, Monet, Picasso, da Vinci, many others. It was funny explaining to Luke that these are the originals that the artist painted, and we showed him the paint strokes and how thick the paint was on the canvas, and then we told him how much some were probably worth. Luke couldn’t believe it! His favorite room was the Egyptian room with many sarcophagi and one mummy completely unwrapped to see the preservation of the body, and to add to all the Egyptian excitement there were ancient Roman, Greek, and Byzantine coins dating back to 500BC. What a wonderful day!

We are in countdown mode for Gotcha Day, and Luke is getting a little nervous thinking about being a big brother and having a little sister. I guess after waiting almost three years it’s hard for me to believe it’s really happening. I am also a little nervous about how she will handle all of this, and the communication is going to be very hard at first. She has never been on a train or plane, and hardly in a car, so big events will happen to her all in one day.

Tonight we board the train and will not have a connection. We hope to reconnect in Voronezh, maybe on Monday. We hope everyone is well, and we thankfully are doing good and staying healthy. Two weeks down, two to go! I’m starting to feel homesick!

It's light outside!

Time zones are a funny thing, at least that’s how we feel here in Russia. I know for sure Luke and I have come up with our own time zone that works for us because we are still wide awake at 11pm at night. Besides that, in St. Petersburg it is still light outside until 11pm, and I am talking light. We are close to the Arctic Circle and not far from the North Pole, so like Alaska being light in the summer it’s the same way here. Well, for you history buff’s we have been to St. Isaacs Cathedral, Peterhof (Peter the Great’s Palace), Peter and Paul Fortress and the Church on the Spilled Blood. Today, we are going to the Hermitage which is like the Louvre in Paris, and in one of our traveler’s guides it said that if you spent one minute in front of every object it would take five years to see everything. So, we will pick what will be most interesting. Luke wants to see some Van Gogh since he has studied him in art class, and he wants to see the ancient coins from Rome and Greece.

We have talked to some of you using Skype and it has been our one way to connect at home. The time zone doesn’t help because most of you are asleep while we are awake, but it is wonderful technology. Before we left, we set up Luke’s classroom computer with Skype and put our camera on their computer. So, Luke has been talking with his teacher and classmates while he is in Russia! He is so excited every time he is able to talk with them, and he can see everyone and they can see him. He tells them what time it is here and something about his day, and sometimes they will ask him questions. We all feel like they are with us every day!

We love your messages and treasure reading them on our blog. It’s like that scene in Horton Hears a Who, with the whole town yelling, “We are here, we are here.” And that is how we feel about your messages that remind us our family and friends are with us.

We will be leaving St. Petersburg tomorrow night on the lovely 24 hour train ride back to Voronezh. We are arriving Sunday night, and then we have two days until Hannah joins our family! The last week we will be in Moscow doing paperwork and getting Hannah’s passport! Our biggest prayer concern now is for Hannah. This will be a huge change for her and we have been praying that it will go good. She probably doesn’t know what major changes are about to happen to her, but we know God can prepare her heart to smooth this hard transition for her.