To pass the time...

It is truly amazing the things that you can find to occupy yourself with while you wait for time to pass. We are so anxious to get back to our boys that we can't sit around idly.  We are finding little projects to keep us busy and to take our minds off of the boys.  The fabulous spring weather certainly helps.  We took the opportunity to spruce up our back yard when we had such beautiful weather here last week.  As you can tell, we have more work to do.  Grass doesn't seem to grow well in our back yard.

We still don't know for sure when we will be going back to Russia.  We met with our case worker yesterday and turned in all of our paperwork for court.  Our case worker in Vladivostok has everything she needs to meet with the judge and set a court date.   However, there are several Russian holidays coming up.  Therefore, we should not expect to hear anything until mid-May.  If we receive some good news by then, we should be traveling in early June.  It will be about a three-week trip, so we may even be gone in part July.

We continue to pray for ALL waiting families and the children who really want to come home.  We know that patience is a virtue and will be rewarded when we hold our children in our arms.  

Love,

Joel and Clarion 

Even the dogs can't wait for the boys to come home!

Court Petition Sent!

Good news!  This morning we met with our coordinator at CHI to sign our court petition. What does this mean?  Well, first of all it means...more paperwork.  Today we felt like we were back in December 2006 (that's the month we completed our dossier).  Thankfully, we did a series of paperwork updates this past November, so we're not completely overloaded, but today we kicked it into high gear.  It's time for new physicals, a new letter from our bank that says we are able to buy a house (we need this since we currently rent), an extension for our I-171 (a form from CIS giving us permission to adopt two international orphans), a psychological interview and a couple other updates.  We don't think we're crazy, but we might be after all this paperwork.  Honestly, this is nothing compared to December 2006 and getting together the dossier.  It will take time and patience, but we can get it all done.

Secondly, filing our court petition means that we're getting closer to receiving a court date.  We're trying to get the above documents together as fast as we can.  There's no guarantee that that will make a court date come sooner, but it's always good to get it all done as quickly as possible, but also done correctly.  Some of the documents only have a three-month life, so we're confident that we'll return to Vladivostok, go to court, and bring home our boys before the three months are up.

We ask for your continued prayers, especially that we could get back to our boys in Vlad as soon as possible.  We miss them so much.  Since our court petition was headed off to Vlad today, we went ahead and included two new cards for the boys.  This week's cards included pictures of their finished room (if you haven't seen it check our previous post).  We're so ready to have our boys home!  So are the other 20 or so families who are also waiting to go back to Vlad for their children.  If there's one thing this whole journey has taught us, it's to look beyond ourselves and recognize that so many families are waiting to be reunited.  It's really all about the wonderful, beautiful children God has picked out for us all.  We pray that He would bring each of us together with our children at His appointed time.  We'll keep you posted as we know more.  The Lord be with you all.

Love,

Clarion & Joel

P.S. - Thanks, Mom, for chasing down marriage documents for us!!!  What would we do without you!