Friday, January 28, 2005

44 + X = ??

There have now been two changes that will probably lengthen our stay in Kazakhstan. Not that we don't love Kazakhstan, but geesh!

The first change was made by the US Embassy in Almaty. All foreign passports are being checked to see if the holders are threats to homeland security. Yes, a 9 month old baby or a 10 year old girl might be a terrorist. But, anyway, the Sisters were submitting the passports early, so that this check would not hold anything up. Well, the US Embassy will not allow this anymore. We might have our stay lenghtened by 1, 2 ?? days waiting for Homeland Security to decide that KJ doesn't pose a security threat.

And now, Kazakhstan will not provide one day turnarounds on the issuance of passports. No one knows how much longer it will take. But it means, we'll have to stay in Petropavlovsk until the passport is in our hot little hands. With Cameron, our facilitator took the overnight train to Astana, got the passport and was on the next overnight train back to Petropavlovsk.

Our 44 day trip seems to be getting longer by the minute! I'm bringing 250 Huggies for Cameron, and at this rate, that won't be enough!!

Thursday, January 27, 2005

It's Getting Closer!

I spoke to our agency director yesterday. We could be getting our travel dates in 1-2 two weeks, AND we might get as little as 10 days notice! Oh my!

So, now we're doing as much as possible to be ready, so that there won't be as much to do when we get that call.

We haven't learned anything our KJ from the Mom who is over there right now. We're hoping that we will soon.

I bought all the diapers Cameron is going to need for the trip, as the supply available in Petropavlovsk tends to fluctuate. Let's just say, that we aren't going to have any room in our suitcases for anything but Huggies! Guess we'll be going with just the clothes on our backs!

Thursday, January 20, 2005

Russian Child Talk

For those of you trying to learn a little Russian, as we are, I've added a new link that appears in right column under "Links." It's called Russian Child Talk

Monday, January 17, 2005

YeeHaw

Our dossier is out of the Embassy! Got an email late last night from our agency, telling us that our dossier was sent to Kazakhstan last week. I'm on Cloud 9!

This means, in about 4 weeks or less, we'll be getting our travel dates.

We're shopping this weekend for KJ's bedroom. We're looking at furniture and a bed. I know that when we have her bed set up with her clothes hanging in the closet, I'll truly feel that she's coming home.

Friday, January 14, 2005

Father Apple

For those of you wondering what it is like in Kazakhstan, I found some beautiful photos of the area surrounding Almaty. We will be in Almaty for a total of about one week.



Almaty

Thursday, January 06, 2005

Happy News!

Well, I learned that I have been fretting for nothing. Our dossier was sent to the Kazakhstan Embassy on December 17. So, there must have been some confusion on where it was when I last checked. Now we have to wait for the dossier to be processed out of the Embassy and sent back to Kazakhstan.

Our photo album is set to fly to Kazakhstan in just a few days. We're hoping and praying that KJ will see it soon. It's filled with photos of Cameron.

We are now looking at doing the adoption in one trip. We got confirmation from Jim that it would be a 44 day trip. I think we could do that. We would save money, have only one flight back to the US, and best of all, we wouldn't have to leave KJ behind after the first trip. We don't have to let our agency know until we have our travel dates.

Stay tuned!