Journey to a Daughter

It's a Girl!!!!!!!  March 8, 2013 we finally have a daughter!  Alina Hope is ours as of today.  We have to wait 10 days before she is with us for good and who knows how long before we can get her out of Ukraine but at the court today they officially said she is adopted.  It was quite a process.  We had to wait for a document that was completed as of last Friday at 7 p.m. from Kiev.  They had to fax the document.  That sounds easy to us but not here!  They have no fax machine or internet at the SDA department in Kiev so she had to find one-she went to the post office-they were closed and so she had to go to a hotel and fax it.  We waited at the court for over an hour before we could proceed.  They asked us why we wanted to adopt.  My husband said God had melted his heart when he met Alina and God had called us to adopt.  They asked Alina if she wanted to be adopted and she said yes.  After an hour in court they had no objections to our adopting Alina.  We then went to a grocery store and bought juice and little cakes to celebrate at the orphanage with her group of children that she is a part of-about 10 kids ages 11-13.  It is rainy and cold here today so we are back in the hotel room with Alina.  We will still have to take her back to the orphanage tonight at 7 p.m.  We have waited 4 years and 3 months for Alina to finally be ours.  What a journey God has taken us on.  She has been my daughter in my heart since I met her.  So it is so good to make it official.  To bring her home will take us another journey back to Ukraine to get Alina's passport and go for a medical exam in Kiev that now includes a TB test which is new as of April 1 and will cause us to have to wait for the results.  We get to see Alina again tomorrow and then we fly home and will be back. 

Now faith is being sure of what we HOPE for and certain of what we do not see.  Hebrews 11:1