After weeks of trying to call Yuliya, we finally got through!! (Word to the wise: Do not use a cheap calling card to make calls.) We spoke to Yuliya this morning at 3:00 AM and it was wonderful. It was an answer to our prayers because we had to align the help of our dear friend Vera in Ukraine (who helped us translate), the social worked (who took Yuliya out of class to talk), and the phone lines (that that miraculously accommodated a 3-way call between all of us). Maybe when I get my phone bill I will be wishing for one more miracle. 
We went to school to pick up the 3 kids so we could go to temply square. Carrie and the translator (Vera) got to talking with the principal, so Yuliya and I took this picture of 2 very bored people. :-)
All of the Ukrainian kids got to go to a ranch in Heber. Ut. One of the families getting ready to go to Ukraine to finalize their adoption hosted the group. The horse's name is Max. (Yuliya's red pants and orange shirt, by sheer contrast, would have been easy to spot had she gotten lost in those mountains.) :-) While there, she found 'Inna', her best friend. We brought a bike for Yuliya to ride and she attempted to teach Inna how to ride it. It was hilarious to see such effort. At the same time, we felt bad that a little girl of who had never been on a bike before. By the way, Inna's host family is also trying to adopt her...we pray that they can adopt her. Here they both are being a little nutty...
(Inna and Yuliya)
(riding Caleb's bike)
This was taken at the city pool. The huge bucket fills with water and tips r over every 10 minutes or so. She had a blast just laying there in anticipation of that water spilling onto her. For the first 3 or 4 bucket fulls after we got there, she squealed with delight. You can hear her in this video. We went swimming here a couple of times, went to another pool with all of the other Ukrainian kids another, and went to the Kearns city pool right before she left. The morning she left, she came to me and said, with a frown on her face, 'In Ukraine, no swim'. Come to find out, she had never been swimming before she came to America. That explains why she swallowed half of the pool everytime we went swimming. In Kearns, I had some quarters in my pockets and the kids had fun diving for them as I threw them in the water. Every time Yuliya would go down, she would come back up sputtering and coughing, nearly needing CPR. But she NEVER gave up...she wanted to play and play. She has the personality of our son, Brandon -- head-strong and determined. That should be an intersting mix. She also has a soft, loving side like Caleb.
Add to shopping list: family pass to the city pool. :-)
I realize that I have not put up a good picture of Yuliya. Here is a picture of her . You can see why her nickname is Angel. This was on Halloween. And trick or treating was interesting. I think we hit every home this side of the Mississippi! Having my 8-yr old son with us, fueling himself with gobs of candy as we went did not help. And of course, this novelty of trick or treat was new and very exciting for Yuliya. 'Trick or treat' is not an easy phrase for Ukrainians. If you want a good chuckle, try to teach one how to say it. Along those same line, she would call Carrie 'mommy', but I was not daddy. By the end, we figured out it was because she could not say it. Another english lesson, and she had it down pretty good. Right before we went up to airport in SLC to get our little girl, I checked the website once again to find out were her flight was. The plane with all of the children landed at JFK and connected with fligh 89 into SLC. We tracked is all across the United States with great anticipation.
O my goodness! The anticipation going to the airport was almost unbearable. We FINALLY got the airport after what seemed like a million miles. And then the wait was on...waiting for the plane to finally land and for all those kids to be with each of their families. After what seemed like an eternity, the plane finally landed and Vern and Nanette went upstairs with some of the other leaders. Nanette said that there were going to be over 200 people there. I did a quick count, and as best that I could tell, there were over 500 people in that crowd at its peak. So you can only imagine the cheers that erupted when we all saw the kids appear at the top of the escalator. Additionally, that is when the Kleenex's started coming out. Tears of joys started to flow. It was a magical moment. The kids were separated into red and blue groups for what seemed like another eternity (if you haven't figured it out by now, time has pretty much dragged on and on since the start of this experience up until the airport.) FINALLY, someone gave the ok and both group of kids started down the escalator. And suddenly, another wave of excited and delightful cheers!! I was not able to capture her picture because I had no idea who she was at this point. But the newscast of channel 4 did during their filming. Here is a screenshot of our little Yuliya coming down the escalator in her little red and white hat, looking like a deer in the headlights!
I guess that the transponder on the plane does not always send signals when it is outside of US airspace, so the information is outdated. As you can see from my last post, this updated information below is not 3 hours old. :-) Yuliya and the rest are 2 hours out of JFK. Woohoo!
The day has finally arrived. The house is spotless, our nerves are frazzled, and we are just as excited today as we were when we found out that Carrie was pregnant. As funny as that sounds, it has been a very emotional time of our lives up until now and today is just the beginning of another chapter. Our lives will be pushed into a whole new world when our little Yuliya arrives at SLC airport tonight at 8:10 PM. I have been tracking the flight all morning from Delta.com and fboweb.com - 2 windows open at the same time. Right now, Yuliya and the other kids are on a Boeing 767 just about to pass the coast line of western Ireland and go over the Atlantic Ocean. Here is a screenshot of what I am looking at from delta.com:
Our family is like a bunch of kids on Christmas morning, all besides ourselves!!
As a follow up to my last blog, we did go to a meeting with The Garretts (Save A Child Foundation founders) and filled out the application. It was quite a heart-warming experience to be there with Carrie. She was SO excited and has been ever since we were offered this opportunity. The pinnacle of at the end when Carrie went to talk to Nannette. We had been waiting patiently during the whole meeting to see an actual picture of Yuliya (by the way, who we now affectionately refer to as our 'little girl'). When Carrie saw Yuliya'a picture, she was overcome with emotion and started to cry. I didn't see this because I was over talking to some of the other kids that had been adopted from Ukraine. Carrie said that when this happened, Nannette looked at her smiling and said 'A mother knows her own'. Wow!! This is truly going down an interesting path where Carrie and I are watching the Lord work something through us. Is this little girl meant to be ours? Is the motherly intuition kicking in where that fine line between Heaven and earth gets a little more transparent? Carrie has NO question in at all that this is where this journey is taking us. I, being a practical guy, am seriously looking forward to when she will be here so I know for sure in my heart. I will post her picture, but because it is an orphanage 'mug shot', I am sure it does not do her justice.
Several months ago, we saw an clip on KSL-TV news about a hosting program that a Utah couple had put together. It involves bringing kids in Ukrainian orphanages here to America for a couple of weeks. Read more about it at http://www.saveachild.cc/Welcome.html. My wife and I have been discussing adoption from Ukraine for quite a while. I am not sure why Ukraine, but somehow as we discuss adoption, our minds always seem to go there. Perhaps it's because the kids are so darn cute! :-)
When we saw this clip on TV, we instantly became intrigued and envisioned this as a way to a means for adoption. We requested additional information and even went as far as to fill out the paperwork. After a little more research, we found that this is simple a hosting program and not an adoption agency in any way. We were almost immediately discouraged and pretty much did nothing more at that point, especially because most of the kids coming over were older(6-16) -- not the age we envisioned for adoption.
On September 20th, Nanette from the foundation called us out-of-the-blue and asked if we were interested. I was at work and could not talk much, so I told her I would call her later. With little intention of calling her back, I kind of forgot about the call. Then on Saturday morning (Sept 22nd), Nanette called back again...this time, I was home with the kids. My wife had left for the scrapbooking store - her favorite hangout. About 5 minutes into the call, my wife returned because it was raining hard and her tires weren't gripping very well. She must have sensed my conversation, because she instantly appeared next to me after walking back into the house. She sat down on the bed and stared at me with a very eager look of anticipation on her face. This was very surprising to me. I told Nanette we would call her back. After hanging up, Carrie instantly made me tell her all about it. I explained that there were 2 teenage boys, 1 6-year old boy, and 1 10-year old girl. When I told her about the girl, there was NO question in her mind that this was who we should have in our home. Again, in my heart was so much excitement, so much happiness, and also a little confusion. In my mind we had already discussed this months earlier. It was clear that this was not the case at all. In fact, she posed the question almost immediately to me, 'How could we ever turn our backs on this child?'. In fact, since then, Carrie has not reneged in the least bit. On the contrary, she has only become more and more excited. We called Nanette back not more than 20 minutes after hanging up and committed ourselves to the program. We found out that our little girl's name is Yulia. We still aren't sure of the exact spelling. It could be Yuliya. Regardless, this we know for sure: Yulia is a special little girl who is coming to America...coming to Utah...coming to our humble little home for a reason. We hope we know the reason why. So to our little Yulia, МИ вас кохаю. :-)
