So a little bit more

First, I'm not sure why pictures aren't posting so I'll have to try to figure that out this weekend! I'm not the most technical person.

As we were leaving the apartment this morning to walk to Alex's car, all of a sudden my sure-footed husband when DOWN! Just slipped right on the ice and was down in the ice/snow/sand mixture. Oh boy, I figured he injured something! But no, just covered with sand all over his good pants and coat. But it all brushed off. Talk about a start to the day! Then walking up the courthouse steps I tripped! The steps aren't even height and I guess I just wasn't paying attention. But at least I didn't go down, just looked a little less than graceful.

We went out for dinner to the Snowflake – had to do SOMETHING! Very nice dinner – Veggie salads to start, Brian had grilled pork with potatoes and I had grilled chicken breast with potatoes. Then he had ice cream for dessert – and proceeded to do his allergic sneezing for the very first time this trip! I had tiramisu for dessert – we both were stuffed then! Stopped at the liquor store on the way home and I got a bottle of wine – figure I can drink a little now! Then we checked and we again had a phone line so we knew we were back in contact!

First call was to JJ – my dad got him on the line and I said "Hi JJ, guess what?" And he said "we got him?" I said "we got him" – and he didn't say much more but then said "goodbye" and hung up! So I figured they'd call back. When my mom got to him minutes later she said "did you hang up?" and he said "yeah, she didn't have anything else to say!" LOL

So we're sitting here reading emails, posting and reading comments. We figure if you never commented before you better now! LOL

We don't have Nathan yet and might not until the 10-day appeal period is up but we'll ask next week. Regardless, for now we are just praising and thanking our amazing God who got us to this point!

And I just added time onto our calling card so you can keep calling us! (but mom, it did say $8.95 left b4 I added time)

Pinch us, we think we’re dreaming!

At approximately 4:30pm local Irkutsk time on Friday, January 30, 2009, we were named to be the parents of Nathan Eugeny Ninmann!!

We are still in a bit of a daze on the whole thing but we're going to type about it while it's fresh in our memory.

Last night Alex came by and practiced with us – that had us so much better prepared than the last time. We capably and confidently were able to answer any question tossed at us. Some were ridiculous in our opinion but most had a reason for being asked. There really was nothing we couldn't answer. And we both feel that we did get off somewhat easy as there were other questions we would have asked if we were the court! But the Judge listened to all our answers, had us comment if needed, and would go on.

At one point in the morning I felt more confident that things were going to be ok – the prosecutor was really quizzing me about the Bethany/Nightlight relationship and what would happen if Bethany lost their license and all sort of questions about that and I answered that the State of Wisconsin had addressed that and if it would happen they would get another agency to handle us and they would inform Nightlight about the change. The Judge concurred that there was a document like that in our files – one small victory!

The hearing started up with her wondering how we could prove where we were born as our passports didn't state it – Brian had that question and he thought our marriage certificate listed it. So she pulled out the certificate and it apparently doesn't list our cities of birth. But she sort of just dropped it then for Brian. So when I had to do my introduction I just said I was born in Wisconsin. She said "what city were you born in?" So I replied "Columbus, WI" – she again was saying she couldn't find the documentation on this and how could she approve our adoption petition since we couldn't prove what city we were born in (our cities of birth are part of the petition). Well, I knew that the Holmes had gone through this EXACT THING last week so I knew what answer they gave – and I replied "if it pleases the court, maybe you can just list our state of birth on the birth certificate and leave off the cities" (Alex in the background is going "yes!") – and she accepted that answer!

Next it was time for Brian to give his "speech" – to add to our petition. This is the prompt we completely missed last week and resulted in us getting lots of questions! Brian did EXCELLENT! The prayers were heard – he gave an excellent speech, clear and concise, looked everyone in the eyes and confidently talked about our adoption journey. He even had a little smile on his face! There were some questions directed to him but he answered them all wonderfully!

Then I added to our petition. At the beginning I got a little teary eyed but was able to get myself under control quickly. Then I was grilled by the prosecutor about the BCS/NLC arrangement, etc mentioned above. That went on for forever it seemed! But Alex said I handled it all correctly and good.

Then the guardianship committee and the representative from the baby home and the adoption center all gave presentations. We didn't get a lot of this translated to us but that was fine – it was very tense in the room! Later Olga, our translator, told Brian it's like that every time but we were a little worried for a bit. I honestly thought there would be a delay of a few days for some documentation on Nathan's medical conditions or another situation that came out (nothing big but you never know what will be taken as a big point!) This went on for quite some time.

Then there was a break for lunch. We went to Studio Coffee with Alex and Olga. They both said everything was going according to normal proceedings but of course we never know what will happen. We know, we were prepared for anything. Alex did say if the petition was denied he was going to immediately file an appeal as he thought our case was strong. I sort of was thinking then how he said the same thing right before our documents were accepted by the court and thought that might be a good sign.

So we went back into court after lunch. The Judge read through our ENTIRE DOSSIER – Volumes 1, 2 and 3 and addendums! There were some questions about some statements made in documents but nothing we couldn't handled. She was more concerned what kind of church we went to and Brian's school board involvement (from his employer letter) than making a comment that the person who signed his employer letter is his father-in-law ?!? God is Good! :) Then the prosecutor wanted to know more about me being president of the local ladies group. Told you I didn't want that job – LOL! So I made it to be a social organization which does good for the community – food drives and such. Not entirely untrue! And then they asked me what the population of Hustisford is ?!?

Then we all gave closing comment – the prosecutor gave her approval of the adoption petition, the guardianship committee lady spoke, Olga from the Adoption Center talked and we each gave a short speech. I started crying about the 3^rd word – and I stole part of Brian's speech! I managed to get my 4 sentences out tho without too many waterworks. Brian then gave a great closing statement also. Alex spoke and then the Judge took a recess.

She was back in 5-minutes with a one page typed document. She relayed the official details about the case (case # etc) and Olga was translating. When she got to the part that the "petition is granted" I could hardly hear Olga and tried very hard to keep my chin from wobbling! His name is now Nathan Eugeny Ninmann and the official document will be available February 2^nd or 3^rd (we don't remember exactly now) – we still weren't really "hearing" what was being said.

So the Judge then left the room and there were hugs and congratulations all around. Everyone seems very happy that Nathan Genya has a family. We are very happy that we can now go on to the next steps in our lives. Now we're still here for awhile but Alex says it's just "bureaucracy" and is "downhill from here". I'm not exactly sure on timeframe yet but we figured we weren't going to ask those questions today!!

One now-funny moment in court – when it was time for the break Olga says to us – "We now take a break for one year" – One YEAR! I said? She said, "no, sorry, one HOUR!" – whew!! I wasn't sure what was happening that they needed a year break!

And now for some serious moments from court – before we left this morning I played the Babbie Mason DVD that Brandi had sent me years ago and the song "I'm praying for you" kept rolling through my mind as we were sitting there… I KNOW so many of you were praying for us and it would help me get my heart and breathing under control. Brian had one thought throughout court – he kept imagining Carleen praying for him. Carleen, he FELT your prayers and they brought him so much peace you cannot imagine. We are thankful for ALL OF YOU!

So now it's somewhat anticlimatical. Our phone bill was apparently paid this afternoon so we should have phone line this evening sometime Alex said. (And that means you'll be getting to read this post!) Otherwise we were just left to our own devices so we're going out to dinner. But more on that later….

Court is 10am our time Friday 1/30

That is 8PM Thursday night Central Time... It will be several hours long

No Phone!

Apparently Alex didn't pay the bill this month so we have no phone service in the apartment right now. It's 9:30pm and we're at the Angara Hotel's business center. We found it earlier today when we had to print the documents for the court out of my email because apparently Alex can't open PDF files - and I'm not sure where the faxed copies went ?!

Anyway, we woke up this morning and we were going to connect online and it said "no dial tone"- hmm, we pick up the phone and a lady is speaking Russian so we had no idea what was up. I went to the shop around the corner to borrow his phone to call Andrew to find out when he was coming by us. He was coming at noon and then found out our problem. He also said ÿou don't have lights here - we explained why not! So everything is falling apart in the apartment - lol. So we head to get some pictures developed to present at the hearing and then we were going to the internet cafe to print out those documents for Alex. We go to the cafe, get online, get the documents and hit print -- says install printer. Andrew asks what happened she said printer isn't working.... Cripes! and they still took our 11 rubles! So then we came to the Angara Hotel and had a no commotion visit getting it printed out. Then we went back to get our pictures and then went to a buffet lunch Andrew knew of -- 200r for Brian and I to eat -- 1/3 the price from last night and equally good!

We then went to the apartment and started practicing our speeches for tomorrow. Alex came later and told us to "charm them" so we might revise them a bit yet but he was very happy with Brian's presentation. He said it's ok to smile and show our personality (which is NOT in the documents he gave us before). We are MUCH more prepared now as we have it explained what will be happening, what is expected of us, we went over the document contents thoroughly, he asked practice questions and explained why the answers are important. This is 10,000x better than last week.

Keep those prayers coming. We will post as soon as we are able and we so hope to post that the adoption was approved but there is a chance she might ask for more paperwork on the Russian side.... PRAY!

PS - If I didn't post it before, Nathan's eye is just fine - you wouldn't know anything happened to it.

webcam

we got it to work tonight -- so hard -- "click to start webcam" and our IM people can see us! Talked to Neal, Dan and my dad... oh we feel much closer now! Samantha, we KNOW you'll want to try this out -- but we'll have to get on in the morning or we'll try on the weekend.... technology is so great!

Sitting

Last night Alex stopped by and was a little excited – I think his day in the court had pumped him up. We had to get revisions to one document from the state – adding the words "domestic & international adoptions" behind two statements. The court is accepting a FAXED copy of this document! Huge!! Again, it seems like such a little thing but this is what the H family had to do and in the "big picture" does make sense…even tho it's such a little thing. So I immediately emailed our Waukesha office and they jumped right on it. Sue and Heather are so wonderful! They even called last night to clarify what needed to be done. We love calls from home and remember if you use our Russian calling card it's cheap! I saw this morning now also that Alex had sent them emails while we were sleeping and he had written the same things I had told them to do so that was good – LOL! They had the letters written from the State by 11am their time, were faxing him the copy so he can start translating and the apostilling will be happening today WI time. Then the Sec of State office will fax a copy of the apostilles to the BCS office so they can fax them here to Alex. This is such great cooperation with the State of WI! Under two days turnaround time.

And our light switch? I don't think he realized what really had happened but said he has a "friend who knows electrical things" and he'd send him over. And he agreed we need more than a new light switch!

Alex also said we'll be practicing for court tomorrow (Thursday) – thank goodness! We needed that last week but maybe he too didn't think it was going to go past the medicals submission? Regardless, now we all think we have some ideas of questions that will be asked – and we also know some of what the H's were asked – so we are going to be better prepared. Alex explained in detail our adoption timeline in Russia since 2004 and some of the answers I gave last Monday, even tho they were trying to make me appear I didn't know what I was talking about, WERE the right answers. But now I can answer with more confidence!

Here are some pictures of us from the past days with the frog from Justin getting around the city! I'll have to get some with Brian holding it next!

Here's from the celebration dinner for the Holmes adoption! Mike, Skip, Harry and Judy on right. Volga, Keesha and Irena with me on the left. Notice the vodka? ;) The M&Ms were personalized in honor of Harry and the veggies on the plate were one of the "salads" – there are two others in front of Judy if you can spot them. They were all delicious!

So we are now back at the apartment to end the day. I entitled today's blog "sitting" because that's about all we did today. We sat around the apartment this morning (self-imposed, just lazy to get ready), sat in the car all the day to Cheremkhovo and back and then sat for dinner just now. I miss our daily walks -- back at them tomorrow!

Our trip to Cheremkhovo was nice because we had one of Andrew's friends, Igor, in the car with us. He is a paramedic in IRK and works 24-hours on and then is off 72-hours. He lives in Cherem so hitched a ride with us. He apparently has also been carrying some of our paperwork to the Guardianship committee so he had been working for us. He spoke quite good English and asked many questions – later we found out that he had taught himself English (had taken German in school). He also told us that he had "never spoken to foreigners before"! It was good to have him in the car also as he explained about some of the villages along the trip – one is called "half" because it's halfway between Moscow and (the easternmost city the Trans Siberian Railroad goes to) V something. Also we went through a "military town".

Because of Igor riding with us Brian got the front seat of the vehicle. So he sat in what would be our driver's seat – his comments about this is that he was able to see what would happen before the driver would and Brian says I wouldn't be able to handle that! They had Brian put his seat belt on but when he asked Andrey why he didn't put it on he said he'd be able to spot the police and put it on in time! (Kathy F, Andrey says "hi" back to you)

Once in Cherem we visited Galena at the guardianship committee office – she was very cordial and wishes us luck. Alex had sent copies of the paperwork we received this week so she can be assured this Bethany/Nightlight alliance is all legal and valid. We then went on to the orphanage where we waited a bit to see Genya but once he came in the room he was again happy to see us. We played with blocks and cars, read a few books (Sarah C, he loves the Dr Seuss one and repeats the sounds so well!) and flew paper airplanes. Brian and he had made some that flew long distances – mine? Flew about 6-inches! He laughed at that! And later, when he was leaving, he collected his and Brian's airplanes to take along but he crumpled mine up and tossed it away! Oh, also, when he came in the room he showed us how he had colored the Snow White coloring book we had left him at the hospital and he pointed out how he made the witch's nose red – he just laughed and laughed, like father like son?! (Brian and his red nose sayings I'm referencing). We had a much calmer visit this time – we wouldn't let him get crazy and I didn't pull out the balloon. We did get some really good pictures also that we'll be developing tomorrow to present in court. The funniest was when he and Brian had barrettes in their hair! (Kirstin, I thought of Vince when we were doing this!). So anyway it was a nice visit and when he was leaving the speech teacher had him say, in English, "I love you" and I said it back in Russian. They said he'll wait for us! And also his eye is just fine – you wouldn't even know it was injured last week!

The trip back to IRK was in the dark so not a lot to see until we hit the traffic of the city. JJ, we were in a traffic jam! It was crazy! There was an accident and between that and the cars and the trolleys and then someone with a flat tire in the middle of the road – let's just say if we would have video taped you would KNOW why we don't even think of driving in Russia. We got back to the apt after 8pm so we missed the Rotary meeting – we'll have to go to that café and explain what happened! We were very hungry as we hadn't eaten since before lunch so we went across the street again to the place we had pizza the other night. Tonight we had a little bigger meal – we both had Greek salad to start (excellent – cucumbers, peppers, cheese, tomatoes and olives and put your own vinegar & oil dressing on); then Brian had 'spaghetti with meat' which was spaghetti with bacon which he said was good. I had Friscesse (?) with Chicken which was chicken breast pieces with onions, carrots and maybe something else in a light sauce – excellent! We also both had deep fried potatoes – comparable to In n Out's or 5-Guys! This was our $25 dinner but was very good and we hadn't spent money today! We do have to get grocery shopping again, the cupboards are bare!

Yesterday when we were down by the river we saw on the railing all sorts of engraved padlocks on it

Today we asked Andrew what that was about – he said it's a new custom, he thinks it came from Moscow, that when couples get married they put the lock on to symbolize the lasting marriage. We didn't think to ask him if they threw the key in the river then?!?

Tomorrow we're developing our pictures and then practicing for Friday's court. The stress level will be starting to build! Keep those prayers coming – when I start to get a nervous knot in my stomach & my heart starts racing I just think of all of you and it goes away!

Just hanging around Irkutsk

Tuesday morning we got a phone call from a friend at home – yeah! He was "Google mapping" and was able to pretty close pinpoint our apartment. I told him to show that to JJ when he's by them later this week. So all morning then we spent "on-line" but just downloading. We loaded on IM so we can maybe webcam with JJ one day. We have the software now I think so just have to figure how to activate the camera and set a time for the call. I'll work on that here.

Got some of our dossier documents emailed to us, mainly the ones I had never seen, so that will help us prepare a little better for court. Still hope to get some of the WI ones I don't entirely remember (I had started working on this in Feb 2008!) I go between utterly nervous for Friday (and worried I'll get a cold sore) and at total peace knowing God has this in his hands. Yes, I know he does but my human nature kicks in way too often. We really can feel the prayers when they are sent heavenward for us and for Nathan Genya also. I just can't believe that a little boy who gets an injury to the eye because he is proud he has parents wouldn't be able to become a part of our family! I just keep praying, talking to God and reading the Bible for reassurances!

So after the uneventful morning we decided to head out for lunch. Yesterday we had seen a fast-food type place so headed there. I had hoped we could just point but we couldn't – had to order with words and we got a gal who said "oh no" when I asked if she spoke English. So we made it through with my handy translation book. JJ, I ate ketchup!! (it came on the burgers) We ordered hamburgers and fries – the burgers I think were made in the morning and sat there until we foolishly got them. They sat in our stomach all afternoon – but the fries were passable. When we were at the counter there were some young boys, maybe about 10-11 years old, who wouldn't talk English to us but we know they knew what we were saying… Their table was near us and they ordered something really good looking (which I had tried to get by pointing but that didn't work for some reason). So I went over to them and in my very broken Russian asked them what they were eating is called – they said "shis-shiek" which is like shish-ka-bob. That is what we're ordering next time! It wasn't a cheap meal either – our afternoon tea/cake breaks are less expensive so that's what we'll do more I think. But it was nice to try another place and just explore.

After eating we headed to a different part of the city – past the courthouse and continued on down to the river. Pigeons everywhere – Brandi, I think of your pigeon stories with Evan when I seem them! On the way a whole cadet of either military or police type recruits marched by us – they were practicing formation at a memorial, I think to WWII. They were all very young looking and the girls all had bows in their hair. Down at the river there were all sorts of engraved locks attached to the metal wall. I said we have to ask Alex or Andrew what that's for. Then we walked by the area with all the ice sculptures and watched young kids and teenagers slide down the ice slides. They all were having fun! Then we just came back to the apartment as we don't know exactly anyone would be coming by.

The weather is much nicer today – it says -14c on the TV but there was no wind. You could tell it's warmer as the women were now in shorter jackets and mainly nylon, not the long furs anymore. That must be what they do?? And the sidewalks were much messier today – the snow and ice was melting. There were more sidewalk sweepers out today also.

So we got a phone call from Alex about 4:30 – he had been at the court all day with our documents and they were accepted! Including the medicals. There is one document requested yet from the State of WI but that can be faxed to the court along with a promise to send the original within two weeks. It is really just a clarification of a document she has already – but adding the words "international adoption" to a statement (that is implied by a previous statement is how I read it). He also said that we were going to go to Cheremo. today but he couldn't reach us ?? Brian said that is NOT what he said last night, he said specifically we "wouldn't go tomorrow" – but we are going to go Wednesday (tomorrow) – But Andrew, who really wants to go with us, isn't feeling well and Alex is unable to go with us so we might go with Andrew or we might just go with Andrey our driver. The language would be a bit of a barrier but we can handle it. I still have a list of questions to ask them at the BH but will have to wait for Andrew to help with that. So at least we have a plan for tomorrow! And we continue to review documents and get everything prepared for Friday morning – we have a few questions to ask Alex about proceedings and how to respond to questions but we're preparing for our "offense" (instead of the "defense" we've been doing for months!)

As we knew Alex wasn't coming by for a few hours we went out for one more walk – it was snowing slightly and windy again but overall not too bad. We walked for about 45-minutes. Now we're watching TV, this time of night there is this program on the MTV station where people get 1 or 2 minutes to do their own thing. Just saw a very bad violin player, now a belly dancer (not real attractive either!) and generally there are some American Idol wannabes who make it painful to listen to their songs!

Tonight we're just going to have some leftovers for dinner and might try the frozen blini's we bought at the supermarket the other day…then probably watch another episode or two of Moonlighting (we had forgotten how fun that show was! Good lines!). And maybe we'll get lights in the bedroom?!?