Consent papers completed

Today, Zhenia was back with us. And, today, A & N wrote a letter consenting to our adoption of them. They both had to write this letter. It makes no sense to us that a 7 year old child must give his consent to be adopted. For that matter, that an 11 year old is able to make that decision. But, this is life in Ukraine, and we must follow their rules. All glory to God that they willingly and joyfully wrote these letters!

The children had school today, so we didn't get to see them until after 2:00. When we drove up we sat in the car for a short time. I then see N. She comes running up to the car with a big smile on her face and goes inside the internat. This makes us so happy to see her joy. We go inside and get both A & N. She has changed clothes from just a few minutes ago. She has been wearing the same outfit everyday. I think it is her best clothes. Zhenia leaves us to do paperwork and we walk to the park with the kids.

On the way over, we stop to make dandelion crowns. All of the children get into this, with N teaching Jacob how to do it and Caleb and A gathering flowers. It was a sweet time. Zhenia calles us after about an hour and we meet him at the park and then head over to McD. We had promised N that we would take her today.

At McD, the little ones get happy meals and N gets a large size of what she would like. After she is done with that, she wants more and A wants more fries. We then sit and talk a little through Zhenia. It is good to have him here to communicate things we have all been wanting to say, but are unable to. Afterwards, we all head to the park. N and I take a short walk together and the boys play ball. Then David takes A & N to get some chocolate and I stay behind with the boys. We then walk back to the internat. A is upset tonight and starts to cry as we leave him. We keep telling them soon. They are asking Zhenia when it will be over. It is hard for them and us.

I have been having a hard time with some aspects of getting to know N and helping to make her comfortable. As I was winding down tonight, I asked God to help me understand. He brought to my mind that He woos us to Him. Wow! How true. Jeremiah 31:3 says " ....I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore with loving-kindness have I drawn you and continued My faithfulness to you." As we must come to understand and realize that God loved us first and He draws us to Him, A & N must learn that we love them and we must help them to understand and trust in our love for them.

Tomorrow, Zhenia is off and running doing paperwork. Our prayer is that everyone gets their papers signed and completed in the next couple of days, so that we may request a court date this week. We are hoping to have our court date next week.