So we leave in just a few more days for Russia. This will be our third (and last) trip to Nizhny Novgorod and we will be bringing our boys home this time. Hallelujah! Because it has taken so long to finally get to this point - it will be 15 months total from the time we started the home study to bringing the boys home - I have been repressing the feelings of excitement of having the boys home. No more. I am full of joy knowing that 3 weeks from now I will have 2 new sons in my family, under my roof, in my loving care. I have been nesting like crazy. Once I got clothes and shoes organized for Calvin & Silas, I have moved on to organizing other parts of the house, too. We are moving back to OH in August, and so I figure that anything I can do now to be better organized will prove helpful towards that move.
I must say that this adoption has been quite expensive. I know that many of you readers have adopted or are in the process of adoption. Talking about expenses in adoption seems to be not found on most blogs - or, at least, I have never read how much it costs on the many adoption blogs that I follow - but I don't have a problem with sharing total costs here. I think it's important to know how much the process costs to bring a child from Ukraine or Russia into your home. With our Keith & Iryna, we paid $33,000 to bring them home and we are still paying on that adoption. With Calvin and Silas, it will be about $55,000 to bring them home. We were anticipating it to be around $50,000, so needless to say, money is quite tight right now. I am trying to focus on the joy of this adoption, but lately the financial aspect is getting me down. I am praying for God to open the heavens and to bless us with financial miracles or opportunities to bring in more income, such as my Choffy business.
I do want to share a sweet story from my day yesterday. I went to the commissary to buy some groceries and when I went through the checkout, I was pleased to see Santina as my checker. I have spoken with her a few times before about our adoption and she was happy to hear that we leave next week for Russia. And then she said that if we could use some groceries after we come home that she would be happy to help us. I was blown away by her kindness. I have only spoken with her a few times. I became emotional and had to reign myself in so I wouldn't cry.
Another quick story, I was at Iryna's school talking with the nurse, Loretta. Loretta's boss was there going through inventory. Loretta mentioned that I was adopting two special needs children from Russia. Her boss became emotional and began to cry, saying how special of a person I was for doing this. I, of course, became emotional, too. People tell me that what we're doing is wonderful and that we are special people, but I don't regard myself as being any better than anyone else. God has called me to adopt special needs and I have answered his call, and we have been so blessed in doing so.
4 comments:
So excited for you! Adoption is NOT cheap. And I find that frustrating...very frustrating. This is especially true in my case as we're now approaching the point where we've spent almost as much on therapy and medical bills as we did to adopt them.
Between our domestic attempts, the fraud situation we were caught in, and our actual adoption, we were over $47,000 for our kids. Every dime of our tax credit went to medical bills, too. Thankfully we had that coming in for the first several years we were home or we really would have been sunk.
Just make sure Santina's idea of "helping with groceries" isn't "forgetting" to scan them. ;)
Hugs to you friend--that is so awesome :D I love the quote you have on your blog from Elder Holland--those blessings will most definitely come! It's just hard to wait sometimes for sure :D Will be praying for you!!
I am glad you have a lot of help and support. You are a special person. I know you love all 5 of your children. It has been a long road to have your family together, but you are almost done. Yay!
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