One Year After

I cannot believe that it has already been a year since we became a family. I am writing this to put some closure to our blog. I always hated reading blogs that only talked about the process of adoption and did not go into the actual life of being a family after adoption. Then I became a first time Mom of a 2 year old and realized why it happens. So this is my attempt at letting the world know what the last year was like for us.

Let me start by saying that our daughter is truly amazing. She is the most resilient person I know. It seemed that it was easier for her to adjust than it was for us. It was a truly wonderful thing to give the opportunity to regress and be taken care of for awhile. It was not long until she decided that she was a big girl that could do things on her own. After being home with her 2 months I started working part time and Allie started going to preschool part time. This was another worry that I had. I had so much fear that she would relate this to being in the orphanage. Yet again, my precious little girl proved that she was so much stronger than I could have expected. She fell in love with her teacher but always knew that her Mama and Papa were coming to get her. One orphanage behavior that I can say she kept is that she is quite the charmer. She grabs control of a room the second she walks into it. This quickly made all the teachers and kids at the school fall in Love with Allie Kelley.

In August I went back to work full time and this time I was worried how I would adjust. Strangely I can say that I am a more balanced Mom now that I am working. I have a fantastic job that allows me to be there for Allie and not miss anything. Also I am able to pick her up about 3:30 most days. Allie thrives at the preschool and has made such wonderful friends there. It has been great for her to be around children that she does not have to compete with. Also in August, I started her in dance class. Oh yes, they have dance class for 2 year olds, and it is really really cute! Somehow they are going to have them do 2 dances at the recital, we shall see how that goes.

Allie's language has come along great. She understands and says just about everything. She loves to talk, and because of this, she will still occasionally ramble off some jiberish just for the sake of talking. If you don't know, Chris and I have a tendency to talk a lot as well so this is a good fit for us.

I want to be realistic. Becoming parents has not been the easiest thing in the world. Allie does have a strong personality. Like every toddler she loves to test things and will try it out a couple of times. Chris and I are not perfect, and we have definitely lost our cool a couple of times. She does respond well to time outs and quickly caught on to what this means. We also have had to work much harder at being a couple!

All the time we hear people mention what a great thing we did for her by adopting her. I will always try to explain how much Allie did for us by coming home! She completed our family. We hear laughter daily throughout our house. She is incredibly loving and will tell us and show us how much she loves us constantly. She will sometimes come in and wake me up by softly petting my cheek. I cannot put into words how much this little girl has changed and bettered our family. She took a couple and made them into a family. She taught two kids how to be parents. She taught two very loving people that they still had no clue what love could really be! She did a great thing for us, our darling Baby A!

So anyway I now realize that it is very hard to sum up a year in one blog. To say the least it has been an adventure! To us Allie is perfect and we are so thankful that she gave us a chance. We just finished our Gotcha Day celebration. We swam, ate a bunch and went to an awesome Aquarium. We tried the IMAX but Allie was a little too freaked out by it so we will have try again next year. God knew what he was doing when he made us wait for such a long time to start our forever family. Thank you to all of our friends and family who have all welcomed her so whole heartedly! We are truly blessed.

Week end Review

I am writing this blog as I sit in the car in my driveway. You might be wondering why, well our daughter falls asleep in the car and it has been a struggle to get her naps so we decided to go for a ride. It is kind of nice because now I have nothing else to distract me. I have really been wanting to write this all week but as I am sure most of you know, parenthood keeps you busy. I figured I would review from where I left off last.

Wednesday we were set to have our appointment at the Embassy. If this went smoothly we would get to come home on Thursday, if not it would not be until Saturday. Considering the price of the room and my eagerness to bring our angel home, this was very important. When we got to the Embassy, the consulate informed us that they were having issues with the internet system and that we needed to wait and they would try to get it fixed. Two hours later it was 5 minutes until closing and he was telling us that there was no way that it could get done because it was still not working. Even though it was futile, Chris was begging him to try everything possible. After about 5 minutes of begging, the Consulate decided to check it again. Remember this whole time we are trying to stay calm and entertain a two year old in a very drab governmental waiting room (it was a lot like the DMV). The Consulate came running back waving the papers in the air. He was so excited that it worked and we could bring our baby home. I picked Allie up and twirled her saying "You are going to America!!". The last minute possible has seemed to be the theme for this process!!

So at 1:30am Thursday morning we took our daughter out of bed and brought her to the airport to start our next big adventure. We had no clue what to expect. For instance, the cutest surprise happened as we were boarding the plane. Allie is not one to say goodbye on demand and has only blown a kiss once in the time we've known her. But, as the airport waiting area was just going out of sight, we said "bye-bye Kazakhstan" which was followed by an Allie "bye-bye" and a full-fledged kiss and wave goodbye. I am telling you, the girl is more conscious of what is going on than we will ever know.

The first flight, which was 6 1/2 hours long, amazing actually left on time. Remember that every single flight up to this point had been delayed. I guess these were the ones that truly counted. We were surprised to find that we had been upgraded to Economy Plus and had an entire row to ourselves.

(Okay perfect example of my new life. I am now back 2 hours later because she woke up. We will see how long I make it this time).

Anyways, that flight was amazing she slept half of it and played the rest of the time. Our girl is not immune to tantrums so we were very thankful that this went well. We then had a 5 hour layover in Germany. This was probably more tough on Papa and I than it was on Allie. She ended up falling asleep in the baby carrier. We soon learned that this was the trick to her sleeping. We were worried about the next flight because we knew that we would have less room, it was an 8 hour flight and we would be cutting it close in DC. Yet again our little girl slept for more than half of the flight and Chris slept even more than that. When Allie was awake, she was very playful. She loved the lady who was sitting next to us and considered it her job to be the in-flight entertainment.

In DC we miraculously made it through Customs and immigration in just enough time for me to change the pullup and get her on the next flight. At this point I relaxed and apparently she did too. It seemed surreal that we were about to be home as a family. We both slept for the entire flight.

We were finally home. We unloaded the plane and saw a couple of our friends and my parents waiting. It was amazing!! It took Allie a little while to warm up to the new faces but she soon started to show her amazing personality.

We are now coming to the close of the 3rd day home. We are all learning so much and have a bunch left to learn. We have played a lot, laughed tons, slept a lot, screamed some and even had the first ever Kelley household dance party! How our life has changed! I never knew that I could love my husband more than I already did, but watching him as a father is incredible. Last night he jumped out of bed when she started crying and came back talking jibberish. This morning he did not remember a thing. Clearly he is such a natural that he can parent in his sleep.

Allie is the strongest little girl I know. I know this was terrifying for her but it is hard to remember that when she seems to be doing so well. She is incredible and has been incredibly patient with her new parents. I do plan to post more pictures soon but as you can tell this has been a task in itself. I am thankful to my parents who stayed around and helped a bunch and to our friends who are making sure that we are fed over the next couple of weeks. We have been here a short while and we are already so blessed with such an amazing network of friends.

Sometimes it is hard to believe this has really happened. It is when she is sleeping in my arms that I am able to recognize the magnitude of this miracle in our lives. The adoptions in Kazakhstan are now over for a while and there are many children that will not find there forever home and many families that are now starting over the long process. All of this is happening and here I sit with my perfect, rotten, adorable angel. We are forever blessed and forever thankful.

Allie is a bit sick and unfortunately I think we are going to have to see the doctor a little sooner than I hoped. I will be back to share more about the first couple of weeks home with her. Thank you for following our story up to now and for all of the prayers.

Joys AND Trials, but mostly Joys

To avoid confusion as you read this, note that this is Chris writing today under strict supervision of Cindy.

Yesterday morning was the most wonderful experience, because around 6am a precious little girl opened her eyes, looked at her mama and papa, and smiled. She then reached her little hand out to touch mama's face, as if to make sure that she was real. It was simply amazing, and two rough diaper changes later, it is still amazing! Despite all the changes that Allie is being put through, she is really adapting well. Most of the days she has been wearing a big smile and wanting to play. The only problem is that she would rather keep playing regardless of how exhausted (she and her parents) get. So, for all those wondering how our entry to parenthood has been, we have experienced some fights but we have seen enough joys to know that the fights are worth it.

I am able to write now because Allie passed out for a nap, which is a first for this trip. Yesterday, we tried for the afternoon nap, but that got nasty quick. Eventually, she fell asleep along with us around 3:30. She woke up again at 5:00am this morning!

We are learning quickly about her. Like how she loves to mimic adults, and that is why everything is a phone to her (even her baby doll!). She loved Cheerios, couldn't get enough, until she had goldfish. Now, nothing compares for her. She will eat our other treats that we brought, but apparently baked cheddar is a flavor that cannot be denied. Lotion time is still a big hit, but bath time before lotion is still up in the air. She loves to splash water in her face, but us pouring water on her head to wash out the shampoo is terrifying.

I don't think that our Almaty experience will be remembered quite as fondly as Ust. The hotel still claims to only have the most expensive room, and the staff is less than excited to be hospitipal to us. Allie will remember Almaty as the place of the first time that her parents subjected her to the doctor. The doctor was fantastic with her, but she still hates anything that resembles a doctor's office. Random enough, the doctor was a foreigner as well, he was from South Africa.

The one thing that we do have at this hotel is a truly fantastic breakfast buffet. Still a lot of beef and onions for the morning, but the spread is quite impressive. Allie loves the apples and oranges, but she is not a fan of grapefruit. Potatoes seem to be her favorite food thus far (well, it is probably a toss up with goldfish), so she is definitely Cindy's daughter. If that wasn't enough, Allie has not paid any attention to cartoons that we have for her, but she stopped and watched several minutes of The Princess Bride. For those who do not know, this is Cindy's all time favorite. Inconceivable!

We have not heard otherwise, so it looks as though we are set to have our embassy appointment today at 2:30. That means that we will be flying out in the morning and be home as planned around 5:45pm. Allie did well during the flight from Ust, but that was only an hour and a half. Please pray for the other 15.5 hours of flights, and 10+ hours in layovers. Thankfully, the plane itself does not scare her, so it is really just our responsibility to entertain her. Cindy's biggest fear is changing the "fun" diapers on the plane. We shall see tomorrow!

Gotcha Day, Table for 3 please

Well getting here was not the easiest but somehow we managed. After several really bad delays we somehow managed to get here at the exact same time we had originally planned. Of course our baggage did not. Thankfully we packed Allie's "gotcha day" clothes in our carry on, along with her new music box. Unfortunately we did not have our coats, Brrrr! I am sorry I am just now writing this but of course things have been kinda busy. I am only writing now because it is 3:00 am here and everyone else is asleep. So I am going to try to cover everything from our first full day as a family of 3.
Yesterday morning we both woke up nervous. For so long we have fantasized what this day would be like and it was finally here. It did not feel real. I was excited and scared at the same time. What if she did not recognize us, what if she refused to come to us when we saw her, what if we are absolutely terrible at this whole parenting thing, what if, what if, what if?? It is so strange to go from being a couple to be a couple and parents in minutes. So it was finally time to go pick up our precious girl. We went in her room and there were several children in there but none of them were Allie. The caretaker shared that she was in class and left to go get her. A full hour later (okay it was 2 minutes, but it felt like forever) she brought Allie into the room in a precious pink dress. She was not bald!! In fact her hair is much longer now. She did not scream in glee but she definitely recognized us. We hugged and loved on her, and she was giggling from the first second. We then had to change all of her clothes. Everything that was hers at the orphanage, has to stay at the orphanage. Changing all of her clothes to me is also symbolic of leaving the past behind and starting a new life. She was so patient with us. I was very proud of Chris who learned how to get boots on somehow. Then it was time to say goodbye to the caretakers. This was very emotional for them and me. They were telling her, "You are going to go take a walk". Apparently they do this so that she will not freak out. Her caretaker had tears in her eyes as she gave her blessings, "She told her to live a healthy and happy life". We then had to say good bye. I am so thankful to these women for taking care of my little girl.
We were then expected to go say goodbye to the director and the doctor. We knew this would be rough because Allie does not like the Doctor hall. She screamed and screamed the entire time. We knew this was likely but we started wondering if this was how the rest of the day would be. Thankfully the second we walked outside she was fine. She fell asleep in the car and was not scared of the hotel. We fed her lunch, of course all she would eat was mashed potatoes. Sound like anyone you know? It is so much fun to learn all of these things about her. We were only at the hotel for a couple of hours before we had to go back to the airport to fly to Almaty. She fell asleep in the car yet again. In the airport she was so curious about everything. She likes to point at cars and say "beep beep" and now she is saying "car beep beep". Evertime she says "What is it?" in Russian, she will repeat what we say in English. She is so smart! We hoped that the plane ride would be much like the car ride. Instead she was quite playful the entire time. She did do great though. She ate cheerios the entire time. The only time she got upset was when we had to strap her back in before landing.
When we got to Almaty our luggage was waiting on us and so was our driver! She fell asleep again in the car. When we got to the hotel, they told us that the only room they had left was the suite which costs $300 a night. We just about had a hear attack, but unfortunately do not have much of a choice on the matter. We are hoping that another room will come open tommorrow. Apparently reservations just mean that they are guaranteeing you a room not that they are guaranteeing you a room you actually can afford.
I am so amazed by how easily Allie has adjusted to new environments. She just walks around like she owns the place. She is eating great and even used the potty!! We are still trying to master the sippy cup. She hasn't figured out that she has to suck on it and when we take the plug out she likes to give herself a shower with it. When the plug is in it she sees it as a challenge to try to get the water out by all means necessary (but not in her mouth).
Bedtime was a bit of a struggle. She was not fussy, she just wanted to play. Since Chris and I were both exhausted we just went to bed with her and we were all asleep within a few minutes. Allie is a sqirmer and when I just went in there to check on them, Chris and her were both laying sideways across the bed.
She is so amazingly comfortable with us, it is as if it has always been 3 instead of 2. I feel so incredibly blessed. Please keep the prayers up. We will be going to the doctor for her physical today. This will likely be very scarey for her. Hopefully we will then have the embassy appointment on Wednesday and leave early the next morning. I will try to blog quicker this time, today should be less hectic.

Here we go again, kinda

Day...uh...who cares! The wait is over!

It is finally time to go back to Kazakhstan and pick up our daughter. The wait has gone by fast and slow at the same time. It is hard to describe what it has felt like to be home without her. For me it almost felt like none of it ever happened. It felt like a fairtale story. I am very ready for it all to be real again. We are currently sitting at the Nashville Airport and have been for a couple of hours. Our flight is delayed/grounded with no notification of when we might be allowed to leave. Once we are in Kazakhstan our schedule is pretty tight so if we can't get there by Sunday we will have to be there 2 extra days and it will cost us a bunch of money. This is a rough start but we remember that it is not our plan that counts and we know that God is in charge of every step of this journey.

So, our plan as of now is to get to the region on Sunday. We will then pick her up on Monday and immediately fly back to Almaty. On Tuesday we will have her doctor's appointment and Wednesday her Embassy appointment. Then we are hoping to fly back early Thursday morning.

I did not finish the blog in Nashville so this is a continuation. After a couple of very stressful hours in the airport in DC, we are now in London. This was not our original itenerary but it looks like we will still get there in time. This was fortunate because otherwise we would still be in DC enjoying a 27 hour layover.

During the time we were home, we really enjoyed celebrating Allie with all of our friends and preparing the house for her arrival. I almost cried when we childproofed the fireplace (it used to be so pretty). Still, Allie's room has really become something that I am proud of. We quickly realized that our plans for the baby's room were centered around the notion that we would be decorating for a boy, so our "neutral" plans for the room really didn't help us much. With the aid of wonderful friends and family, I am very proud of how the room ended up. A very special THANK YOU goes out to Cole and Kayla for their hand-painted artwork!

It is Official

Well as you can already tell we clearly did not find out on the 28th that the court decree was final but we found out today that it was final on the 28th and we received a copy of A's new birth certificate and adoption certificate. I was at work today and knew that our caseworker does not get to work until 10:00am so I was completely calm and patient until about 10:05am and them the nerves started setting in. At 10:45am I got the long awaited email that said, "Cindy congratulations it is final, you can celebrate today". I squealed and started crying all at once. Of course I was in a public area of my office filled with staff that I do not know and who have no clue what was going on. Thankfully our office manager did know exactly what was going on and gave me a big hug as she started to tear up as well. Just like with court, I had no doubt that this would go through, but it was such a huge relief all the same. I quickly called Chris, Mom, Dad, and Bryan. I then texted a bunch of people and posted it on facebook. It was so fantastic to hear the relief in everyone's responses. We can breath easy now because although she is not yet in our arms, she is ours!

Meet Allie Anastasiya Kelley

Anastasiya is her birth name and they called her Nastya in the orphanage. We have always said that our daughter's name (which we never thought we would have a daughter) would be Allie. We were just waiting to find our little A!

They should be applying for her passport in the next couple of days. We found out on Thursday that the families that are three weeks ahead of us in the process were notified that there passports were complete. We are hoping that this means in three weeks we will have similar news and can travel back to get her. I will most definitely keep everyone in the know!

Home

Someone once told me that God's plan is like a tapestry that we can only see the back of. There are many colors of thread, but you cannot tell what it is and you cannot comprehend it's beauty. Then when the timing is perfect, God will turn that tapestry over and shows you exactly how beautiful and perfect his plan is. It just takes a little time and patience.

Throughout the last 19 months before we traveled I was constantly struggling with my faith and patience. There would be some days that I was great and others that I could not even fall asleep. There were even more days that I would randomly start crying if someone asked me anything about our adoption (thank you to all that were patient with this). Then out of the blue God slowly started showing us his masterpiece. Let me tell you some of the back story.

On Christmas day in 2008 my brother and sister-in-law announced that they were pregnant. In the next couple of months we started feeling the itch to expand our family as well. This was crazy since we had been married for close to 5 years and resolved that it would be at least 3 more years until we would be anywhere near this. After a lot of prayer and research, we signed on with an adoption agency in April '09. At this point I started praying for our child. I believed that he/she already existed and I prayed that God would take care of him/her and to comfort this child in the fact that her parents will come for her.

We were originally told that the entire process would take 9-12 months. Clearly it took much longer and it felt like it would never happen. I started thinking that I was wrong, my child was not born yet when we started the process and it was possible that the child was still not born. We started wondering if this was just our plan and not God's plan, but I could not imagine why God would put this desire to adopt in both of our hearts if it was not right. Another adoptive mother told me that doubt is normal and to not change anything until it was abundantly clear that this was not the direction that we were supposed to go. On November 29, 2010 there was announcement made that made it clear that our current adoption would soon be over, but it could be over without a child.

A week before this happened I had accepted a new job because I felt that it was time to stop just waiting at home. I was called for an interview within days of applying and hired within a week of the interview. It was so easy and reaffirming that this was what I was supposed to do. So when we got our letter of invitation to travel soon after my first day of work I was very confused. I did not want to abandon a job or people that I had committed to.

As soon as our agency made it clear that no matter what was going on with our paperwork, we would be traveling, it was as if a ton of bricks had been lifted off my chest. This peace has continued throughout the traveling and even now. This is definitely God's doing since I tend to be a worrier. We were even told that traveling is the hardest stage, but, for us, it was by far the easiest.

When we met A on December 20, 2010 it was abundantly clear that this was indeed our long awaited daughter. There was never any doubts on this matter. We soon learned that she was brought to the baby house in June '09 at the age of 6 months. Her birthday was January 4, 2009. As I just said this was around the time that our attitude towards starting our family changed and she was brought to the baby house only two months after we signed on with an agency. The feeling of meeting this child that I had been praying for, for so long, was amazing. I was still a little confused. I did not understand why we had to miss out on that year and a half that she was living in an orphanage. After 6 months in the orphanage children will be available for international adoption. At this point we had just finished our dossier. Our translator later told us that although A was in the orphanage for that long, her mother did not sign away her rights until a year later. At this point I felt like that tapestry had been completely revealed to me.

When our little girl was conceived, God had us in mind as her parents. If we would have traveled any sooner we would not be with our daughter. My wise husband told me over and over that our child was just not ready for us yet, and to my dismay at admitting he was right, I knew in my heart that this was true.

One other part of the tapestry that was unclear was getting a job. This was clarified quickly. They agreed to try to arrange for me to work from home until A is adjusted/attached as long as I needed. This was a huge shock to me, and again not such a big shock to Chris (he was right in predicting this yet again!).

I mention earlier that there was a possibility that our adoption would be over without a child. When we arrived in Kazakhstan our coordinator informed us that we were the last family from our agency to travel. The rest will have to start their process completely over. This breaks my heart for all of these families. I have always been told that it would happen at the perfect time, not too soon or too late, and many times things will come through at the last possible minute. This is clearly the case for us. We could not have gone any sooner or we would not be able to call A our daughter and we could not have been invited even a day later because the program was ending. It is likely that there was a 2 week window for all of this to happen in order for us to meet the Child that God had prepared our hearts for.

Chris and I have both grown so much through this process and the tapestry turned out to be more beautiful and perfect than we ever could have imagined.

Now that we are home I will not be writing every day, but I will update it as we learn more (or when I need an outlet). On January 28th we should receive the decree that our daughter is truly and completely ours (and I will blog to inform all of you and release pictures and name). After this we will be waiting more for the passport to be completed. Although I feel so eager to have her in my arms again, I have learned that my timing is incredibly flawed and God's is perfect.