Showing posts with label Valera. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Valera. Show all posts

Thursday, April 21, 2011

A Package for Valera


Through our adoption agent, I met another family who is finalizing the adoption of their son - who happens to be from the same orphanage as Valera.  She was kind enough to deliver a package to Valera for me on her trip over to pick her son up, and even better, she took pictures of him for me!


I don't remember what I wrote in my letter, but I do remember that Charlie and John each wrote him a quick note and ended it with "Boom chicka boom chicka boom boom boom", something Valera would say a lot while swinging his hips back and forth.  Hopefully his teacher isn't thinking we are crazy Americans!


I really thought he would love the Jelly Bellies and finger flashlights I sent- but my new friend wrote to tell me that what he really loved and shared with his class were the pictures of us.  Lesson learned for the next package, send more pictures, and less "stuff".

Saturday, April 16, 2011

Open Arms Ukraine Slideshow




Through meeting people over the Internet, I found this great organization, Open Arms Ukraine. I love that they are trying to change these children's lives - and the orphanage that they minister to is Valera's! I've messaged back and forth a few times with a sweet member of the team, and she tagged me (on FB) in some of the pictures she has taken of Valera over the past couple of years. It's so fun to see him a few years ago and know that he was being loved on and shown the love of Jesus.

If you watch the above video - towards the end, you'll catch a peek of our boy.  It's the picture of four boys all wearing matching sweaters.

Tuesday, April 5, 2011

I met a lady through the power of the internet that is at Valera's orphanage right now adopting her son. She wrote me an email today -

Hi Amy,


As we were driving off this afternoon, I saw two little guys come running by. Of course, I noticed the little bow legs. I told the driver to stop, and I cranked down my window and yelled. Valera stopped. I said, "you know Amy in America....she said hello". He gave us the biggest, cutest smile! He nodded his head as though he understood. I wish I had thought to grab my camera.


There are some very precious children here! Their smiles are priceless. We will be praying that your process goes well and that Valera will have the courage to say yes. I can give you some advice on that later.

How sweet is that?





Saturday, April 2, 2011

Adopting

You might remember my posts about hosting Valera, an orphan from Ukraine.  When we hosted him, we were adamant that we were not interested in adoption.  We already had six kids and adoptions are expensive!  I'm sure most of you know, though, that we fell in love with Valera while he was here.  The car ride home from the airport after dropping him off was the most quiet I have ever experienced in my life. 

The next day during church all I could think about was Valera and I wished we could afford to go get him.  I thought I knew Derek's heart on the matter, though, and knew he would think I was crazy for wanting to adopt.  That night as I was sitting on the phone talking to my sister, Derek tossed passport applications in my lap and said, "If we won't go get him, who will??"

So I'm pleased to announce, we have made the decision to adopt Valera!  He is not available for adoption until August, so we are just now starting the process.  We are meeting with our agent on April 14th for our first home study visit.  I've met a lady through email who happens to be at Valera's orphanage right now and she's seen him!   

This process is going to cost a lot of money, and we are stepping out on faith and relying on God for the funds.  We have a few ideas for some fundraisers and are anxious to get started.  If you'd like to help out, I have a paypal account that you can donate to.





Monday, January 17, 2011

Departure Day

Yesterday we had to take our boy to the airport for him to head back to Ukraine.  One of the saddest things happened before we even left home.  Derek was filling out the luggage tag and asked Valera to write his name in Ukrainian - he wrote Valera and then used our last name.



Some friends from church hosted a brother and sister from Ukraine.  They came over to our house a couple of times and Molly got so attached to Natasha.  She was happy to get to spend another hour with Natasha at the airport and she pretty much stayed attached to her side like below.


Valera enjoyed spending his last hours with us goofing off with the kids and laying around getting some last hugs from Derek and I. 


He also reconnected with a friend from his orphanage, Vitaly.  Any other time we got around other people from Ukraine, Valera wouldn't talk to them.  He would RARELY use any Ukrainian words in our house, even when we'd ask how to pronounce something.  So it was really fun and neat to see Valera interacting with Vitaly and hear them talking in their own language.


Above, Vitaly is playing with his host Mom's cell phone and Valera playing with Derek's Blackberry.  Who knew Brick Breaker could be so much fun?

We really were not prepared for saying goodbye.  In the training manual and in talking to other folks, I learned that the children usually will not cry.  They are taught not to cry and in their situation, they really just shut down and don't show much emotion.  That is what I was expecting.  When the time came for us to part, Valera had his back to us waiting to be taken to security.  A lady closer to the scene mouthed to us that he was crying.  Derek went to him and said there was a puddle on the floor from Valera's tears falling off his face.  Derek just held him and let his own tears land on Valera's shirt.  Derek let him go and I went to hug him one last time.  He wouldn't look at me or talk to me, so I just held him and his shoulders shook as I did.  The group (the chaperon along with about 15 kids) took off to security and Valera didn't once look back at us. 

I knew that I would be upset.  I wasn't prepared for my own kids to cry.  I wasn't prepared for the 45 minute car ride home in complete silence.  I wasn't prepared to get so attached to a little bow legged Ukrainian boy.

Friday, January 14, 2011

Saying Goodbye

I do believe that tomorrow I'll have to do one of the hardest things I've ever had to do.  We will have to say goodbye to the sweet boy who has lived with us for the past five weeks.


We made a little photo book for him to take back to Ukraine with him.  We all signed the back cover, and Valera tried to get his favorite one of us, Tippy the dog, to sign it.  No joke, he was putting the pen in Tippy's mouth before Charlie grabbed it and signed it for her.


This is his favorite page of the whole book .... all because of the picture below.


Awww - we're going to miss Valera!  It's been a trying five weeks and I've learned a lot about myself.  I think the good memories and blessings will far outweigh the bad.  I wonder how long Derek and I will say, "Voila!" after doing every little task?  I wonder how long before my kids stop dancing and singing, "Boom chicka boom chicka boom boom boom."  Will I ever refer to my nephew by his given name instead of, "Big Boy" with a cute Ukrainian accent?  Will I ever be able to look at a sausage again without saying a prayer for Valera?

People keep asking me if I'll do this again.  Ask me again next month.  It's all too fresh right now.

Monday, January 10, 2011

Snow + Ice Day, Part 2

Valera was one of the kids that was a little afraid to go down the big hill.  It really didn't help that there was a fence at the bottom that they would run into (due to construction).  He finally decided to go down the two-person sled with Derek - but only if he could ride in the back.



Valera didn't quite make it all the way down.


And Derek didn't, either.


These two didn't have any problems, though.  If it would've been up to them, we would have stayed out until dark.

Snow + Ice Day

We had so much fun tonight with the southern snow and ice storm.  This afternoon, there were a couple of inches of snow with about 1/4 of an inch of ice on top - which made for some good sledding.

I know that this first picture is blurry, but I wanted to show the fun the boys had this morning.  One would get to sit on the sled while the others would run them up a bike ramp.  My camera kept messing up and I couldn't get an in focus shot or one that showed them in air.


Later on, we went to our school field that has some great hills.  My Mom let me borrow a really cool antique sled with blades in case the ice got thick enough.  You wouldn't believe how fast it was!  However, only my youngest son was light enough for it to fly and not get stuck.


Valera had a blast on the smaller hills.





I don't think anybody enjoyed it more than my little bit.  She was fearless.  She would find the steepest part and jump on the saucer and go.  She would also climb on her brother's laps and steal rides with them.




We moved to the bigger hills after about an hour, and it took some of the kids a little while to work up their courage.  In the picture above, you can see that the girls decided to slide down on their rears.

Saturday, January 1, 2011

It's been too long, and I have so much to catch everyone up on.  First off, we had a wonderful Christmas!  Since many of my friends and family did not get a card from us this year (due to sending them out December 23 and using address labels from three years ago), here is the picture we used.


My kids are having so much fun with Valeriy and I think he is having just as much fun.  I truly have never seen someone so excited about Christmas and presents.

The kid eats EVERYTHING!  One thing we learned in training is that a lot of the Ukrainian kids are very picky eaters.  They like bland food and the condiment of choice is ketchup.  In fact, their idea of spaghetti is noodles with ketchup on it.  However, Valeriy is nothing like that.  He eats everything we put in front of him and about three times more than my kids eat.  He has gained over five pounds since he got here.  His favorite things are pizza and McDonald's.  Since he loves pizza so much, we thought we'd take him to the place that serves the biggest pizza around, Big Pie in the Sky.  Yup, he and all the other kids loved it.

Monday, December 13, 2010

He's Here!


With the help of family and friends, we were able to raise ALL the money we needed to bring Valeriy here to the states for Christmas.  My younger three kids helped me make a welcome poster for him.  I looked how to spell "Welcome" in Ukrainian on google translate, and I hope that's what I put on the poster!  Who knows (besides Valeriy) what it really says.


Nate and Matt had to stay back in town for a band concert so they couldn't go to the airport with us.  I am telling you, I have never seen someone so curious and excited about every little thing around my house.  He would yell from upstairs, "Mommee! Mommee!" and then come show me what he found.  So far he has found my college ID that I haven't seen in 16 years and a cross pendant that I'm not sure I've ever seen.  I think my favorite thing that he brought me was a binder.  He yelled his "Mommee", then sat and showed me how the rings open and close! 

I do believe this will be a very fun 5 weeks, and oh so very hard on January 15 to say goodbye.

Saturday, November 6, 2010

Will you help us?

We are hosting a sweet little boy in our home this Christmas through an organization called New Horizons for Children.  You can go to their website to read more, but here's an excerpt from an email and this explains a little more why I want to host Valery in our home.
"NHFC is a non-denominational, non-profit, Christian ministry. Our goals are to reach orphans in Eastern European countries and bring them to the USA to visit with American Christian host families for 4-5 weeks over Christmas and in the summer. This shows them a functional family environment, immerses them in English, gives them love of family, and of their Father in Heaven. It undoubtedly builds their otherwise non-existent self-esteem. They realize they DO matter and can succeed in life."

 
Valery - 12 last week! speaks Ukrainian, Russian and a little English. He came to the interview with “Bubba teeth” in his mouth that he got from our team while waiting his turn. He really loves cooking and aspires to be a chief in the future. He has a very warm smile and enjoys playing ball and swimming. He would like family with kids younger than him and dogs. He also would like to live near a city. A past adoptive mom wrote: I (Stephanie) spent some time with Valery while on our adoption trip. He is a little shy, but very friendly and ready to smile! He has very bowed legs, and I think some of the kids tease him for it. Although he is a good little soccer player, he would shy away from playing with the big boys. He is small for his age, maybe a size 10? Super sweet guy!


 

 
 
Some money has already been donated to bring Valery to America!  Derek and I are willing to host him and pour our love on him, but we need help to raise the remaining money.  Will you help us?

I have a paypal account you can donate to, or you can go to my active fundraising page.  By donating through the active page, the money will go straight to New Horizons (for our family and Valery) and will be tax deductible.

Thank you!