A very special Christmas

Lily Grace’s first Christmas and our first Christmas as a family has been very special and one we’ll always cherish. We’ve had family members with us throughout most of the time since we arrived from Kazakhstan, and it’s been wonderful to share this special time with all of them. Many dear friends have also stopped by and of course, our reunion with our church family has been wonderful. I think it’s safe to say that Lily Grace now has an unlimited supply of aunts, uncles and grandparents – both related and honorary – to help us nurture her throughout her life!

Today marks one month that we’ve been home and Lily Grace is adjusting remarkably well. She’s a happy baby with a zest for life, and she’s grabbing it for all its worth. Favorite activities include jumping in her jumper, swinging at the playground, pulling up on anything and everything, “power-loving” on Lucy the cat, and starting today, seeing the world from her new stroller.

We are also beginning to find our parenting feet in this “new normal”, and, despite the stress of learning to juggle logistics, to understand and use 100 new baby items and still find some time for each other, we are filled with joy and gratitude. And we can absolutely attest that there’s nothing so sweet as hearing “Ma-ma” and “Da-da”, which are recent additions to her baby sound repertoire.

Many people have pointed out to us how blessed Lily Grace is to now have a family, and we know that’s true. However, we find ourselves focused on how blessed we are to have her as part of our family, and the blessing she is to our extended family, friends and even the strangers she meets. She has touched and will continue to touch many lives, and we are humbled by that and so thankful.

In our next post, we’ll put up a new video clip or two and then before we all know it, it will be January 22 – her first birthday.

We hope you all have had a special holiday time with your families and friends and, despite economic indicators, are looking forward to a 2009 filled with an abundance of joy, love and hope.

Steve and Tonya

There's no place like home

We truly and completely understand now what Dorothy must have been feeling when she said, “There’s no place like home”! There are no words adequate to describe what it felt like to crawl into our own bed for the first time in two months, having gone for the better part of 48 hours with no sleep. It just doesn’t get any better than that.

Well, actually it does get better than that. What’s better than that is the sight of seeing our family waving, crying and cheering as we walked down the airport terminal corridor holding Lily Grace. What a life moment to cherish. Tonya’s dad and brothers were there. Steve’s parents, brother, sister and their families. Balloons, signs, and best of all – the smiles and tears. What a way to come home. Tonya’s mom and sister and her husband, who live in Tulsa, OK will be coming to stay with us later next week for several days. Then will come the reunion with our church family, our friends, our extended families – so many parts of our wonderful family of support.

We're thinking that to better match Dorothy's experience with ours, this would be the famous final scene: Dorothy is sitting up in her bed, with her aunt, uncle and close friends standing all around her, as she tells them all about this wonderful, far away land, and how they were all there with her – really, they were! – when she suddenly stops, smiles, then says, “And I brought back this munchkin – what do you think?!”

For in the end, there is Lily Grace. This beautiful child of God - full of wonder, curiosity and delight - who we are now privileged to call our daughter. This story is her story, but it’s not a story just about her. It’s a story about Lily Grace in the context of family – the family of support she received from the doctors and caregivers at the baby house and our adoption team in Kazakhstan, her new family here, and, ultimately all of you – her larger extended family. We are all now a part of her journey, as she is now a part of ours.

Happy Thanksgiving indeed!

Steve and Tonya

Goodbye Kazakhstan, Hello USA!

We have now begun our long journey home to Tennessee from Kazakhstan, with a very precious carry-on item! If all goes according to schedule, we will arrive in Nashville around 5:30pm Thanksgiving Day.

Our week here in Almaty has gone well, with a smooth process at the U. S. Embassy and even time for some sightseeing in the beautiful Tien Shan mountains. Lily Grace has been a trooper through it all, taking it all in.

We want to take this opportunity to thank each and every one of you for your prayers, your support, your words of encouragement and empathy, and for being so in our corner on this journey to become a family. We have been lifted by you, and have felt the warmth beaming this way from the other side of the world.

We’ll send out another post once we’re home and settled.

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday with those you love.

Steve and Tonya

Goodbye Karaganda, Hello Almaty

We are now in Almaty, the former capital of Kazakhstan and its largest city, having completed all of our Monday tasks on no sleep.

Our wonderful team in Karaganda took us to the airport last night for our 11:00 p.m. flight, shepherding us through an unexpected paperwork glitch with the ticket counter agent for a bit of last-minute excitement. :-) There were tears and warm hugs as we bid farewell to these special new friends.

Lily Grace began the flight upset, a combination of being awake when she would normally have been sleeping with the strange new experience of being on an airplane. As the flight wore on, she gradually settled down. We’re thankful for the angel of a young Kazakh woman seated next to us, who happened to know English, wasn’t bothered at all, and pitched right in to help LG adjust.

Upon arrival, we were greeted at the airport by our assigned driver, Emil, a jovial fellow also well-versed in English, who helped get us and all of our luggage safely to our Almaty-based high-rise apartment on the 9th-floor around 2:00 a.m. Unfortunately, the apartment didn’t have a crib (it was supposed to) and, as sleeping in a crib is all that Lily Grace has ever known, she (and we) had a miserable, sleepless night.

After finally getting her down (we think she simply “gave out”) for about two hours of sleep, it was time to wake her back up, dress and be ready to be picked up at 8:45 a.m. for the days’ required activities. We write this now with Lily Grace sleeping soundly during a late-afternoon nap, as our wonderful travel partner family, the Clermonts, were willing to let us use the crib assigned to their apartment, since their new son, Evan, has adjusted well to sleeping without one.

Tomorrow, we have a day off as LG’s passport and medical papers are prepared for our appointment with the U. S. embassy on Wednesday. (Her medical check-up went smoothly today and all of her measurements and other tests were normal.) We plan on resting here at the apartment in the morning, then meeting the Clermonts for lunch and some sight-seeing during the afternoon.

All in all, it’s shaping up to be a brisk finish to an incredible two-month journey, becoming a new family bit by bit along the way.

Steve and Tonya

Kazakhstani Hospitality

This past Sunday was quite a treat. Our interpreter, Julia, and her parents invited us to a family gathering and dinner at their apartment here in Karaganda. In addition to Julia and her parents, Slava and Sveta, Julia’s Aunt Lara, cousin Helen (Lara’s daughter, who looks just like a grown-up version of our niece Emily) and her grandmother (babushka) and grandfather were in attendance.

Julia’s mother and babushka must have cooked for hours because the table was crammed full of delicious food (we’re getting her homemade pickles recipe!), and a few hours later, so were our stomachs! Lily Grace was scared and cried a bit when we first arrived but soon calmed down and had a great time scooting around in her walker and getting into everything she wasn’t supposed to be getting into. :-)


Much conversation and laughter passed between us, as Julia put Helen to the test, asking her to serve as our interpreter for the afternoon. Helen, who is a second-year English interpretation major (following in her cousin’s footsteps), did a fine job. We all learned a lot about each other – and discovered just how much we all have in common, despite living on opposite sides of the world.

We are thankful for these new friends, and many others we have met, and are humbled by the efforts all have made to make us feel home away from home.

Steve and Tonya

Lily Grace Revealed

We’ve been looking forward to this day for so long – the day we are officially cleared to post pictures and video of Lily Grace Young on the blog! There is a mandatory 15-day waiting period after court before the adoption paperwork is deemed completely final, and that period ended yesterday. Lily Grace is now living with us at the apartment, and we are finally a family.

Lily Grace at the Apartment


Lily Grace Takes a Bath

We are scheduled to be here in Karaganda for another week while her passport is being processed, then we spend a week in Almaty, processing the paperwork required to leave the country. We fly home on Thanksgiving Day, a Thanksgiving like no other!

Thanks to all of you for your prayers, your notes, your love and support – we are overwhelmed and grateful to have such wonderful family and friends.

Steve & Tonya

Karaganda

We are based in Karaganda, Kazakhstan, the city where Lily Grace’s orphanage, or “baby house” is located. Living in Karaganda has been fascinating, as it’s a city that’s literally transforming in front of our eyes.

Karaganda, also spelled Karagandy (Russian: Караганда), is the capital of Karagandy Province in Kazakhstan. It is the fourth most populous city in Kazakhstan, behind Almaty, Astana and Shymkent, with a population of about 500,000.

Karaganda has primarily been an industrial city, built 75 years ago to exploit nearby coal mines using the slave work of prisoners of labor camps. Recently however, with the surge in economic growth of Kazakhstan (due in large part to the discovery of vast oil reserves in the early-to-mid 1990’s), Karaganda is quickly becoming a cosmopolitan city. Observing the co-existence of the old with the brand new, native Kazakhs with Russians, the poor with those with new wealth, has made these two months a very full experience, above and beyond our primary adoption journey.

Steve and Tonya

Here's a collage a pictures we've taken in Karaganda:

A few comments about the pictures:

- water pipe: Karaganda is heated using hot water through radiators in all buildings, including residences. Water is delivered in large pipes from a central boiler. In many parts of the city these pipes run above ground, along the roadside and up and over cross streets.

- apartments: Most citizens of Karaganda live in large apartment buildings. A more analgous term for us would be "condos", as most own their apartments. Single family homes are rare.

- statue of Lenin: Along a main street is a plaza with a statue of Lenin carved in granite. This was clearly the centerpiece of the city during the Soviet era. Now, it appears to be just another piece of history in this city that has voraciously embraced capitalism.

- public workers: Karaganda employs thousands of public works employees. You see them everywhere, laying concrete tiles, restoring the opera house, or sweeping leaves off of sidewalks with handmade brooms.

Officially ours!

We’re writing this on cloud nine, having just returned to the apartment from court, where we were granted custody of Lily Grace! The proceedings went smoothly, other than Tonya breaking down one sentence into her court speech, which she gave right after mine. :-) At which point the judge told her she could just sit down and try to speak later. This must have given her new resolve, as she said “No, I can do this!”, got it together, and finished her speech, which was beautiful.

We are about to grab a bite of lunch, then head to the baby house for our afternoon visit, which we already know is going to be very special.

We now wait 15 days for the decision to become final, then five more days for Lily Grace's passport to be processed, then fly to Almaty for a week of processing out of the embassy. Add it all up and this Thanksgiving will be the most blessed Thanksgiving we've ever had.

Thanks for your prayers and positive thoughts – keep them flowing!

Steve & Tonya

We have a court date - and it's tomorrow!

This morning, we learned from our coordinator that our court date has been set, and - it's tomorrow! Wednesday late morning our time, late Tuesday night back home.

We have each written our court speeches - both are a few minutes long allowing for translation - and are told that the entire proceeding should last about 30 minutes.

If all goes well, and we are certainly hoping and expecting that it will, Lily Grace will become legally ours! The 15-day waiting period, paperwork, etc. follows, and we'll cover more of that in our next post, which we'll send tomorrow night. Bottom line is our planned return around Thanksgiving Day appears to be on track.

We appreciate your prayers and support throughout this process, and particularly at this important milestone.

Steve and Tonya

A Visit to Lily Grace’s Birthplace

This past Sunday, we were able to visit in-person the town and the maternity hospital where Lily Grace was born. When we came to Kazakhstan, we had no idea that we’d have an opportunity like that, or even be able to find out what town she was born in, so when we were given the name of her birth town and realized it was only 45 minutes from Karaganda, the city where we’re based, we asked if we could arrange a trip there. Our coordinator generously offered to take us there herself, along with our travel companion family whose son was also born in this same hospital.

On our drive out, we were able for the first time to see the land around Karaganda – our introduction to Kazakhstan’s vast steppe region. It has its own peculiar beauty, with a vast open sky stretching in all directions, the grasses a golden flax color, all different lengths and choppy, and an equally muted silvery gray sky. (It looks much more interesting in person that in these bad shots taken from our speeding car!) After experiencing this landscape for ourselves, it was clear how this area has been the land of the horse for millennia.

We were struck by the importance that mining is to this region of Kazakhstan, with frequent mining operations popping up out of the horizon every so often along the drive. They mine coal in the Karaganda region, and most of the small villages dotting the outlying areas are supported by the coal mining industry.

The town at which we finally arrived was pretty small, but had it’s own maternity hospital which services many of the villages and towns in that area. We drove up to a 6-7 story Soviet style building and were only able to park and take pictures of the outside, without going into the actual hospital. (We had already been told that would not be possible.) So we walked around the grounds and took pictures at every possible view and I (Tonya) walked down the drive to the entrance gate, imagining the woman who had driven through those gates carrying Lily Grace, and then leaving without her. We can only imagine the mixture of emotions she must have felt.

We drove back, grateful for the ability to in some way, touch this part of Lily Grace’s unknown journey. We hope that by sharing photos of this place with her, one more piece of a puzzle of her life will be able to come together and help her understand part of the story of how she came to be in our family.

Tonya and Steve

Tea Time in Kazakhstan

Those of you who know me pretty well know that I am a huge coffee lover. Some would clarify that as “coffee snob” and I have a hard time refuting this! However, most days here find me firing up the kettle in our kitchen, every hour or so, for some fabulous varieties of the local teas. Black teas, fruit infused teas, green teas … you name it.

We’ve learned that Kazakhstan, being located in central Asia, is a country of tea connoisseurs, or tea snobs if you will. I figured I’d do as the Romans do while we’re here and embark on an exploration of the various teas they have in their “tea aisle” at the grocery stores.

I am not kidding when I say they have an entire aisle dedicated to tea … with a few jars of instant coffee (Tasters Choice) nearby. They also have an entire aisle for chocolate too, which is separate from their aisle of general candies. We can see the priorities of the culture here, and we highly support those priorities!

The black tea here is wonderful and very smooth. The traditional Kazakh way to serve it is with milk and sugar cubes. I also found a Lipton Black tea with Mango and Peach infusion … wonderful stuff which I don’t think we’ll be able to find back home so I may have to bring some back. I also happened to bring a couple of loose tea blends from home, which I’m grateful to have thought to pack now.

So, as you read this, chances are if we’re not sleeping or visiting Lily Grace, it means one thing: it’s tea time and I’m busy firing up that kettle. Cheers!

Tonya

Week Two: Doctor Meeting, Social Workers, etc.

We recently made it through two of the necessary meetings here on behalf of Lily Grace: the meeting with our baby house doctor, and the meeting with the social workers who review our case.

Our meeting with the doctor was very informative, giving us all of the medical information they have compiled on her during her 8 months here. The doctor was amused by the giant list of questions that I whipped out of my notebook and Steve was actually able to use a couple of the Russian words we learned, much to her surprise and (we think based on her smile) approval.

Fortunately, Lily Grace hasn't had any serious illness other than Chicken Pox, as evidenced by the green “dye” they use as an antiseptic on her spots, and which were still on her head and body when we met her. Bottom line though, she appears to be healthy and as they put it: an extremely active and independent little soul. Their exact words were: “She will get whatever she wants in life because she goes after it.” We can only assume they have observed her “grass is greener” behavior with her friends’ toys in the playroom, as she scoots around on her belly stealing her favorites from their stash. Apparently we either have much to learn about toy selection, or about how to help her enjoy what she already has!

Each day we visit Lily Grace, she recognizes us more, is more excited to see us when we wake her from her naps, makes more eye contact and holds it longer. She is being drawn out and is interacting more with us and with others, instead of simply observing life around her. She is sitting up straight now and is scooting around much quicker, and has been lifting up on all fours even, in her attempts to get into crawl position. She’s got very strong little legs and back, which she displays by jumping on our laps or standing and holding onto us. Today she discovered she can bang cups together and make some amazing percussive noise, much to the complete delight and cheers of her parents. It’s been a real joy to watch her change before our eyes and bond with us more and more.

Thanks to all of you who have emailed us and posted on the blog. We appreciate each one of you and your supportive thoughts and prayers.

Tonya and Steve

Tonya’s suitcase arrives!

When we arrived in Kazakhstan on October 1, our bags decided to stay behind. Three days later, four of our five pieces of luggage made it – the lone straggler being Tonya’s suitcase, containing all of her clothes, and also our photo albums of home and family required for the judge when we go to court.

After a week in-country, it was looking pretty bleak for ever seeing that bag again. However, due to the diligence of our adoption coordinator and interpreter here, the bag finally made it from Amsterdam, where it had been apparently misplaced. Needless to say, for Tonya, going through it was like opening a treasure chest, and I think it’s safe to say she’s looking forward to wearing a different pair of jeans today … :-)

Steve

Familiar Faces

We’ve begun to settle into a routine, with our 2-hour visits each morning and afternoon, with lunch and errands in between and then home for dinner in the apartment each night.

Each visit begins with waking Lily Grace from her crib, in a room of 14 cribs, changing her diaper and feeding her, then playing with her – either on a blanket spread on the floor or bundled up and taken outside for a walk around the grounds of the baby house. Lily Grace has begun to realize that we come as a “package deal” – if one of us is holding her, she is now looking around trying to find the other. Eye contact is coming more easily and frequently, and nothing melts our hearts more than looking into her eyes and seeing a smile break out on her face.

In a few days, we will have our official meeting with the baby house doctor, who will go over all of her medicals, give her assessment and then field our questions. We’ve been impressed with the doctors, nurses and care giving staff at the baby house – they do a lot with a little, and clearly care deeply for the children in their care.

After two weeks of visiting, papers will be filed with the court on our behalf, and we will wait and see what court date will be assessed. It will likely be in late October, followed by a mandatory 15-day waiting period, then a week of processing through the embassy. At this point, the estimate of coming home in late November seems to be on track.

We deeply appreciate all of the prayers and well-wishes that have poured in – it buoys us and reminds us that indeed, we are all one big adopted family.

Steve and Tonya

A day we will never forget

Today is a day that we will never forget. It’s the day we met our daughter who we plan to name Lily Grace, and our hearts were totally captured. It’s actually hard to put into words how we feel right now, because it’s such an overwhelming experience. I’ll just give a synopsis of the day below though:

Our interpreter and coordinator took us to the baby house this morning and after being escorted through the home, we saw her across the room in her little walker, jumping around and scooting along the floor next to several other babies. We were smitten and of course, I immediately burst into floods of tears, which was not surprising, but it meant I couldn’t see anything for the next 5 minutes! Total cuteness cannot describe how absolutely adorable this little punkinhead is. Big grin, animated face, little dark brown almond eyes that follow you everywhere and soft dark brown hair sticking up on top of her head. And two new teeth on the bottom, just peeking out of her gums! She seems to have a pretty laid back personality from what we can tell after just one day. We’ll see!

We got to play with her for two hours this morning and then put her down for a nap, break for lunch with our interpreter and our traveling partners, Maggie and Danny who are also adopting at our baby house. Then at 2 p.m. we returned and got her up from her nap, and had the experience of feeding her for the first time. A great mixture of mashed potatoes mixed with turnips and ground meat. She liked it at first but then quickly became disinterested in her potato mixture, preferring instead to watch the little boy next to her get fed. After she was finished, she promptly drained her bottle in about 20 seconds flat. Apparently she’s a fan of juice.

At this point, Steve had to go with our driver and interpreter back to the airport to try and identify our missing luggage, so it was just me and Lily Grace for the afternoon visit. I respectfully bundled her up in a snowsuit and hat (Russians and Kazak culture is very big on making sure little ones don’t get cold!) on this lovely, sunny 60 degree day and we went outside to visit the playground along with Maggie and Danny. She was intrigued by all of the noise of the cars driving by, and she got to practice her favorite activity (jumping) on my lap as we sat on a bench. She has some strong legs. I had to keep a good hold on her so she wouldn’t go shooting off the end of my lap.

We then went back inside for more play time and then, of course the day would not be complete without the first changing of the diaper. Steve made it back from the airport in time for that!!! I know he was really relieved that he didn’t miss that “first!”

After leaving, we went to pick up some supplies and groceries for our apartment and then came back here to unpack the bags that DID make it here. (still missing the ONE bag that had all of my clothes… they think it may still be in Germany… hmmmm) We’re pretty wiped now, but wanted to share the great day we had. Wow. Are we really about to be parents???

To be continued…..

Tonya and Steve

P. S. Our agency has asked us not to post any pictures of her on the blog until she is legally ours – you’ll just have to take our word for it that she’s one of the most adorable babies you’ve ever seen. :-)

Hello from Kazakhstan!

A quick note to let you know we have arrived in Almaty, Kazakhstan. Though not without some adventure - our flight out of Dulles was delayed two hours due to thunderstorms, which resulted in us missing our connection in Frankfurt.

We were routed to Amsterdam, then switched carriers to KLM into Almaty. This required a mad dash through the Amsterdam airport to make this flight, and of course, this means that none of our luggage made it. :-) We're told it should show up in a couple of days. Fortunately, we have with us all of the important documents, etc. we need to move forward.

Will send another update hopefully tomorrow or Saturday after we have a first visit to the baby house!

Steve

We're on our way!

It's hard to believe that the time has finally come to go to Kazakhstan and bring a little one into our family. Going from being a "2" to a "3" still seems amazing and miraculous to us (not to mention exciting and terrifying), and we feel so blessed and fortunate to be on this journey.


We've marked the occasion with our last Mexican meal for quite some time, and after three days solid of packing, think we're ready!

We appreciate all of your well-wishes, notes and gifts - and most importantly, your love and your prayers. We know we're not taking this journey alone, and we look forward to sharing this story with you, page by page.

Our posts will now come more frequently, and we appreciate your comments, as it helps us stay connected to all of you. So, bye for now, and next time you hear from us, we'll be typing with a Russian accent!

Steve & Tonya

We have dates!

Our official travel dates have been issued and the tickets have just been purchased! We will leave on Tuesday, September 30, with a return date of Thursday, November 27. It is possible that the return date will change to an earlier date, but we won't know until we're over there and closer to the end of the process.

This is an exciting step - thanks as always for your love and support.

Steve

Ahhh, yes. Our Grand Attempts to Learn Russian.

Most evenings – usually right before bed – find Steve and me staring at our PC monitor, attempting to learn Russian. Russian is the “co-official language” of Kazakhstan, along with the native Kazakh language, and is the language in which most business is transacted. We’re using the program, Rosetta Stone, and it’s very cool.

You wear a headset, and their immersion/adaptive recall approach requires the student to respond to pictures flashed to the screen, while you point and click at what you hear, or, the program cues you to speak back to it, testing your pronunciation.

If someone recorded what we actually sound like, there would be no end to the embarrassing jokes that would ensue. Let me just say that learning Russian is impossibly hard. We have miles to go before we’ll be able to do anything productive with the language.

Russian uses a completely different alphabet – the Cyrillic alphabet, rather than our familiar Latin (Roman) alphabet. So, as you try to absorb a new vocabulary, master pronunciation and learn how to string words together, you also have to learn a new alphabet. Riiiiight.

Take a look at the Cyrillic alphabet, and you’ll see what I mean. Also challenging are the alternate spellings of basically EVERY WORD WE’VE LEARNED based on gender associations, whether you are speaking to a person about the object in question vs. speaking to multiple people about the object vs. just identifying the object. And verb variations? You don't want to know and I wouldn’t even be able to tell you because I still can’t figure it out. We have a whole new appreciation for folks attempting to learn English with all of our exceptions to our rules.

So, while Rosetta Stone is a good program for building vocabulary – such as, what is Russian for “duck” – I’m thinking we’re going to have to resort to our handy-dandy English-Russian phrasebook for the more practical words and phrases such as asking about restroom locations, directions, and ordering in restaurants. Unless, of course, duck is on the menu. :-)

Tonya

Letter of Invitation

Big news - we have received our official Letter of Invitation from the Ministry of Education in Kazakhstan. The LOI is required before visas can be issued for travel. The LOI has specified a visiting window for us of September 20 through December 20, 2008. What this means in practical terms is that we will not be traveling before September 20. Since it is customary to not receive official travel dates until about two weeks prior to departure, it likely will be September before we know anything more.

Slowly but surely, we're getting there!

Steve

Paperwork!

Some of you may remember that great character, “Roz” from the movie, Monster’s Inc. Her trademark line, “You haven’t completed your paperwork!” runs around inside our heads these days. Because we submitted our adoption dossier back in November 2007, a few of our documents have now expired and have to been done over again prior to traveling to Kazakhstan. “Done over” involves getting each expired document reissued, getting it notarized, getting the notarization authenticated by the appropriate county court clerk’s office, and then getting each authenticated, notarized document “apostilled” by the appropriate state’s Secretary of State. (An apostil, which is as an official seal on a document, deems the document internationally valid.) This was the route we ran for all of the documents in the main dossier, so, while tedious, we're familiar with the process.


Fortunately, it’s not all about paperwork and packing lists and crossing “t’s” and dotting “i’s” during this period leading up to the phone call with our travel dates. Today is a HAPPY DAY, as the baby room is officially done!

This has been a joyful, important process, as it has helped me already begin to bond with our future daughter (we've requested a girl) by making her new home a special place – my first gift to her. In honor of her name, Lilly Grace, I’ve used a garden flower theme and to specifically honor her Asian heritage, I’ve incorporated little Asian-inspired elements like cherry blossoms and a great vintage paint-by-number painting, which you can see here. Steve kids me that after all of this work, we may wind up with a boy!

Thank you all for your loving support to us during this process – we appreciate your emails, calls, cards and donations to the baby house for the welfare of the other children there. We’re glad you’re a part of this journey with us.

Tonya

Where in the World is Kazakhstan?

Before we began our adoption journey, we were not familiar with Kazakhstan, and have found that most Americans aren’t. This is probably due at least in part to the fact that Kazakhstan was a part of the former Soviet Union. Kazakhstan was known from 1936 to 1991 as the Kazakh Soviet Socialist Republic.

We chose to adopt from Kazakhstan because of the quality of its orphan care, which is consistently good throughout the country, and the ability to adopt a younger child. In "Kaz", as the country is commonly referred to by adopting families, orphaned infants become available for international adoption after six months, and in our case, we will likely return home with our child when she is nine months old.





Kazakhstan is bordered by Russia, China, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and the Caspian Sea. A fact that may surprise you: Kazakhstan is the ninth largest country in the world geographically, making it larger than all of Western Europe.

Here is a brief overview of more information we have summarized from Wikipedia.com:

Kazakhstan is very diverse in types of terrain: flatlands, steppes, taigas, rock-canyons, hills, deltas, mountains, snow-capped mountains, and deserts. Its population is relatively small, clustered in cities, and totals 15 million.

Kazakhstan as a distinct entity actually dates back to the 1300’s when it was part of the Mongol empire. The Russian empire expanded to include what is now Kazakhstan in the early 1800’s, and Kazakhstan was ruled by the tsars until, after a brief period of “independence” after the fall of the Russian empire, Kazakhstan was taken over by the Soviet Union in the early 1900’s. After the dismantling of the USSR, Kazakhstan declared its independence in 1991.

Kazakhstan is ethnically and culturally diverse. Kazakhs are the largest group, followed by Russians. Kazakhstan allows freedom of religion, and many different beliefs are represented in the country. Islam is the primary religion, followed by Orthodox Christianity. The official language is Kazakh, though Russian is still commonly used for everyday communication.

Steve

Welcome to our new blog!

Well, we've finally done it. We've created our family blog. The first step in creating a space for our family and friends to visit and stay in touch with our ever-busy, and now dramatically changing lives!

As most of you know, we are in the process of adopting a baby from Kazakhstan, and we encourage you to visit frequently to see the latest in our most excellent adventure. We have requested a little girl. We also plan to use this site to document our lives after we have our new little one home, so you can watch her grow (and watch us try to keep up!)

The most recent progress on this journey is that we've been told we should be traveling in early September some time, and we will be given dates closer to the time we have to leave, so we'll be having to stay very flexible during September and October. For those of you who don't know, the adoption process in Kaz (Kazakhstan) is very lengthy: 6-7 weeks if you choose to make one trip, and if you choose to make two trips, you go for 4 weeks, come home 2-3 weeks and then go back for one week to bring home baby.

We look forward to sharing our story with you all and also to hearing from you.

Tonya