From Vlad to Moscow

The story all began almost three (it was 2 when I started this post but life was very busy last week) weeks ago - on July 11 - the day after I heard the bad news about the latest child in Russia that we would not be meeting.   After some tears the day before (and some really pretty flowers from my sweet and patient husband), I was pulling it together.  A part of me just knew that the news would not be good - I was kinda getting used to it.  But I was getting ready to go out with my tennis team to celecrate our state win and I was burning some time on Facebook.  For some reason I decided to send a FB message to a woman who lives in my neighborhood who adopted twins from Russia about 4 years ago.  I had only met her a couple of times, but she and her husband had a long struggle adopting and I thought that I would just tell her our latest frustration.  After I sent it, I headed out to dinner with the tennis girls and really didn't think another thing about it.

While I was at dinner my phone started blowing up.  First, it was a response to the FB message I sent right before I went to dinner.  The first was the typical "I'm so sorry, hang in there, and the like." But then, about 30 minutes later, I got a"Please call me ASAP." And then another one like that.  And then she started calling my cell phone (which she had to get my number from a friend we have in common).  I didn't answer since I was with a big group, and it was too late when I got home to call her.  But she had left a message on our home phone telling me that after she got my FB message she contacted her adoption agency and they had a 9 month old healthy girl that MAY be available in August. There was one family deciding whether to take her or a boy.  BUT she is in Moscow and we are in Vlad.  And with a different agency.

In the morning (Thursday 7/12) I talked to Ted and called her back. We decided that I should call the other agency and check it out.  It seemed to good to be true.  You NEVER hear about a healthy 9 month old girl.  It just doesn't happen.  And this agency didn't have a family for her?  We have been waiting for almost a year and have been #1 in line since February.  But maybe God was telling us something.  Maybe, just maybe our child wasn't waiting for us in an orphanage in Vlad, but maye she was in an orphanage in Moscow.  And maybe I needed to trust and follow where He was leading me.

So I called the new agency and it all checked out.  I then made a difficult phone call to the current agency and told them what was going on that we were considering switching agencies.  Of course they wanted us to do what was best for our family, but they too thought it was too good to be true.  And they had heard that Moscow wasn't processing adoptions (not true by the way).  They were being cautious.  We were too and needed to do some more due diligence.   But at this point, another family still had priority over us.  The baby might not even be available for us . . . if we decided to switch.

Late that afternoon, I was scarmbling to get food for the kids, pick up the babysitter, and get downtown to a recruiting event for Ted's law firm.  I was in line at Chick-Fil-A and my phone rang.  I looked down and it was a call from Michigan - the new agency.  The family had decided to wait for a boy, and if we wanted to switch (a BIG process) we would be first in line for the healthy 9 month old girl.  WHAT? This was too much for me to process.  After all our wait and heartbreak.   But we couldn't even talk because of the recruiting event.

So after a grueling night and next day of prayers, tears, doubting, and talking, Ted and I decided to take the risk. And the risk is big. The entire year long wait in Vlad is erased.  Gone.  Like it never happened.  I had to re-do ALL our documents for our dossier in record time.  It took me about 2 months to do it the last time.  This time I finished it all in 3 1/2 days.  On Thursday, July 19 I drove to Montgomery and went to the Secretary of State and got all the documents apostilled myself.  Then I found a hole-in-the-wall FedEx and priority overnighted the documents to our new agency.  She got them to Moscow on Monday, July 23rd and they were translated in ONE week!!!  (It took one month with our old agency!).  And this Monday, tomorrow, the team in Moscow is submitting our dossier for Registration in Moscow.  If all goes as planned, I should have a lot more information at the end of this week.  And we may be headed to Moscow in August.  Unreal.  Praise the Lord!!!