So much to blog, so little time....

Last Wednesday the kids and I went to visit Nicole and Zachary, 4 year old twins recently home from Russia. I felt like I was well prepared from all my adoption studies and blog reading to see these two young ones and understand them and what they were going through. But when I met them, there were two things that I struck me unprepared:

First, how small they were. They are four years old, and yet Nicole looks as small as a three year old, and Zach is about the size of a two year old. Oh, they were tiny! But aside from their size they were very well coordinated, and they were incredibly bright and aware. Nicole had the funniest sense of humor! She and her mother, Jennifer, would look through the pictures of the adoption and the orphanage together and Nicole would jokingly point to a photo and deliberately say the wrong name for a person.... and laugh! Zachary was incredibly mischievous! Oh, how he loved his squirt bottle... and until Jennifer took it away, he would sneak into the house and squirt squirt squirt! He was always getting in to stuff. It was so entertaining! (Because I got to watch, instead of be on the mother's end. =) Jennifer said that their smaller size was mainly due to the poor diets that the children had while in the orphanage. They ate rice, potatoes, eggs, and a little bit of meat. Fruit is rare. Nicole's favorite birthday present while in the orphanage was the banana she received for a treat.

Second, how endearing they were. These children were so full of smiles! We brought a couple of toys over for them as a sort of 'welcome home' gift, but these kids were not really interested in toys. They were more interested in being with people... in particular, their mother. It was good to see the bonding that was happening between them and Jennifer. I met Lisa briefly as she came home when we were leaving. Zachary was hanging on her like a trapeze artist he was so happy to see her. These are, very simply, children with a beautiful spirit.

I came away from the visit better friends with Jennifer, and with so much hope and longing for the little one that will one day be ours to love and care for.

The next day I thought I would check in with our agency director to remind him of us again and find out specifically where we were in the process. "Waiting" is such a vague term. The news was dampening. The wait for an infant girl is now approximately 8 months from the time the dossier is submitted. I had mistakenly been under the assumption our wait began when we signed contracts in March. So now our 8 month wait commenced around mid-May, leaving us with January or February of 2007 to look forward to a referral. I can't believe it's going to take that long, though. The director also mentioned that he received all of ONE infant girl referral for the whole month of June, and expects the same for July. He expects referral activity to pick up in September, once everyone has returned from their August holiday. There are currently 7 families at our agency waiting ahead of us for an infant girl. (July, September, October, November, December, January, February...) At the rate of one referral per month that does seem to add up to around 8 months. But I have to believe that they will be getting more than one infant girl referral per month at some time in the near future. Referrals are still coming slow from Russia. The regions are processing international adoptions painstakingly slow because they don't want to attract the attention of the federal government for placing too many children with, to say it plainly, the abusive Americans. I haven't read too much about this in the news in the past couple of months. Hopefully these anti- international adoption sentiments are starting to fade.

Some good news is that our agency has received their accreditation for the next year. They are still waiting to receive their NGO status. They anticipate this happening sometime this summer.

On the homefront, C and K's postponed birthday party is coming up next weekend. I'm not looking forward to the prep work, but I am looking forward to the party! It's a little easier this time, because all the decisions have already been made and the guest list is set. The crabby factor is increasing in the kids though... (or perhaps increasing in me.) It must mean that a party is coming up! (Either that or another round of the pox.)

I wish you all a fun and safe Fourth of July!

(Don't forget to read the following two posts... it was a three-post night.)