Getting Stickier

Is stickier a word?

I talked to Alina yesterday. I was giving her until Friday to call me with an update on Mak's before I called and followed up again. I made it to Wednesday. :) Wish I would have waited. So apparently the blacklist is only updated every few months. It will not affect our first Trip to Russia. HOWEVER if we come home from Trip 1 and they are still on the blacklist we may have to 1. wait until they are off of the list (who knows how long that will be) or 2. get a new home study done. Keep in mind home studies take about 3-4 months and cost about $4000.

And to top that off, she said it could now be the middle of September until we hear about our first travel date. This has to be one of the most excrutiating waits of my life.

Adoption Ark on the Russian Blacklist

We just found out that our agency was placed on the Russian Home Study Blacklist. This basically means that their home studies will not be accepted in Russia. Very scary thing for us. Our caseworker let us know today that they were just notified of this on Wednesday. How it works is that all agencies have to submit post-placement reports for all of the children that are adopted through their agency at 6 months, 1 year, 2 years, etc. If those reports are not submitted the agency will be "blacklisted". Alina said that there was an issue with one report that was missing because the Department of Education in the Kemerovo region was on vacation when the Russian government requested all of the documents. Apparently that should be cleared up quickly and everything will move forward smoothly (Adoption Ark will come off of the blacklist). Keep your fingers crossed and pray for us that this is the case. Makes us pretty nervous. We don't want to experience any additional delays. If this doesn't get fixed, it could prevent us from bringing Maks home period.

That simply cannot be the case. God wouldn't be that cruel. I will keep you all up to date when we get more information.

No News...

I talked to our caseworker Alina today and we have no new news. She's not sure if we will find out about our travel date at the end of August or the beginning of September. She said that two families will probably travel together each week and that it will probably go in the order of "wait time." Bad news for Jason and I as we were on the bottom of the list. So its looking like Trip #1 won't be until October. We're still hopeful though!

Grandma Peterson's church drive for Mak's orphanage went REALLY well. They were able to collect 187 pairs of socks, 19 pairs of shoes, 7 vitamin bottles, 3 sleepers, 7 onesies, 9 blankets, 3 toys and some random clothes. AWESOME! Thank you Fox River Lutheran Church! Aunt Andrea has now been inspired and is going to start a collection at her school. We're hoping to get a bunch of things and ship them all at once.

Thank you Grandma (and Grandpa) Peterson and Grandma (and Grandpa) Johnson!

Mak's orphanage has a real need for shoes, socks, underwear and vitamins. Any time you need to organize a shopping need, call my Mom or my Mother in Law! They are really good at it. Mom has recently gone on a shopping spree buying little shoes and clothes for the orphanage, not to mention some things for Maks along the way! Thanks Mom!! And Dad for working hard too so Mom can buy these things! :)

Shirlene (aka Grandma Peterson) organized a collection basket at her church and is collecting shoes, socks, underwear and vitamins for the orphanage. She made the announcement last week and they have already collected a bunch of things! We are going to put all of our collectables together and do one big shipment to Russia with love. I'm sure UPS is not cheap 1/2 way across the world, but little boys simply should not be forced to wear pink shoes and purple socks! Thank you Mom P!