It's Official!

Today we officially became Angelina's parents! Court lasted about an hour. The whole experience was very positive, and emotional (notice my puffy face!). First I spoke before the court, for about 15 minutes, then Eric addressed the court. Then the baby home representative, social worker, and prosecutor addressed the court and gave their recommendations that we be declared Angelina's parents.

After a very, VERY, short deliberation, the judge returned and declared that we are now Angelina's legal parents. It was an overwhelming, awesome moment! Tomorrow we get to visit OUR DAUGHTER, ANGELINA. We sign her out of the baby home on March 15th, and begin the final leg of this journey together, as a family of three. We feel incredibly blessed and are very thankful that Russia allowed us to adopt this precious child!

Great Day!

Today was a great day for two reasons: the first was of course reuniting with our daughter, Baby A. She was a little congested today, and as a result was a bit more snuggly and less active than prior visits. By the end of our visit, we had warmed to each other all over again, just in time to say goodbye for the day (boo!). Tomorrow we have court at 11:00 a.m. and hopefully another visit afterwards. Tonight we are meeting with our facilitator to prepare for court. We can hardly wait until Baby A is officially in our arms . . .

The other great part of the day was (you've probably already guessed) Eric's suitcase was located and is on its way to the hotel! Hurray! No emergency shopping necessary! We are going out to our favorite restaurant here for dinner tonight and hope to be able to get some much needed sleep so we are rested and ready to go tomorrow.

That's all!
Eric & Kathryn

We Made It . . . .

but Eric's luggage didn't! They are tracking the bag and we are fairly certain it will turn up while we are here (bummer!).

Otherwise, everything is good. We are relaxing at the lounge in our hotel - we are exhausted from our trip & the stress of losing our luggage. Tomorrow morning we will be reunited with our girl! It has been over two months since we have seen her and we are looking forward to seeing how she's grown in that short time. We have court on Thursday at 11:00 a.m. We may try to shop tomorrow afternoon, after our visit with Baby A, to pick Eric up a nice shirt or sweater to wear for court, assuming the luggage is not delivered in time. Right now, he only has the clothes on his back, which consists of a short sleeved shirt (we traveled from sunny, warm Florida), jeans and loafers. It will all work out, one way or another.

That's all for now; we'll keep in touch.

We Have Our Court Date!

We awoke this morning to find out that we have officially received our court date . . . March 3rd! We will arrive in St. Petersburg on the 1st and reunite with our precious daughter on March 2nd! We are over-the-moon excited and are now in "crunch mode" to get ready for our departure. We are thrilled!

Our Dearest Baby "A": Mommy and Daddy are on our way; we will be together again soon!

Holding Steady

We were hoping for an early February court date, but instead have a tentative court date for the end of February, provided nothing unexpected pops up. We realize it is not really that long to have to wait for a court date, all things considered. In all, our process has moved along quite well and we have no complaints.

We go back and forth about whether we will remain in country for the wait period, or come home and make a third trip to Russia. As of now, we are planning to stay in country (yes, yes, I know . . . that's not what I said in an earlier post . . . ). Since we thought we would have an earlier court date, I had already started packing, filling out most everything on our visa applications, and creating my travel checklists (ref. Doug & Shelly's blog). I also packed for our daughter, which I found to be a lot of fun, yet surprisingly, nerve wracking. What exactly DO you pack for a child so young? Since it now appears that we will not be leaving for at least 2 weeks, however, I feel I can relax just a little bit and give the matter more thought. In any event, it will be fun reading about my fellow bloggers' adventures as they recount their (rapidly approaching) day(s) in court on their own blogs.

The following may sound mushy, but I just have to say it . . . sometimes I just step back and marvel at the incredible journey my husband and I are on - the people we have met, where we have traveled and the amazing child that will be our daughter. I also read about the similar journeys other couples are on as they create or add to their own families through Russian adoption. It all fills me with a profound sense of awe and deep gratitude for the blessing of Russian adoption; how lucky and blessed we all are to be on this journey to our children. Wouldn't you agree?

That's all.

Kathryn

Wow!

This week our family and friends threw us two baby showers! It was so much fun to celebrate our daughter's upcoming arrival with such special people! Both showers were AWESOME! We felt like we were in a dream!

We now sit in our daughter's room and can't believe all of the clothes, toys, necessities and other goodies she has waiting for her. We are overwhelmed and so grateful.

A special "thank you" to Judy, (Grandma) Mom, (Aunt) Mary, (Aunt) Lori, and (cousin) Emily for all of the effort and love they poured into organizing our showers and making each one so magical and memorable! How blessed we are to have such friends and family waiting to love our daughter along with us! Thank you!

Brief Update

Today we assembled our daughter's crib! Her room is nearly finished . . . all that's needed is her!

If you are wondering where we are in this process, we are now simply waiting to be notified of our court date, which we anticipate to be within the next 4-6 weeks (hopefully). Once we receive a court date, we will have approx. 1 week to make our travel arrangements to go back to Russia. We will stay in St. Petersburg for a few days (to attend court and of course, visit with our little girl), and then return home for about one week (there is a full 2 week wait-period after court before the adoption is considered "final"). We then go back to Russia, pick up our daughter (hurray!)and the 3 of us will go to Moscow, where we will remain for about one week (doing adoption related business). After that, we can finally come HOME and begin our lives as a family of three!

Fingers crossed that our court date comes SOON!

Happy New Year,
Kathryn