First Week

This has been a busy week for us. Oleg is still in summer mode and wants to swim every day. We have been to the Palm Bay Aquatic Center twice. He loves the diving boards! He also loves the beach and wants a boogie board. Twice we had Sergey over. He is the son of good friends of ours. Sergey is Russian and has been a big help translating for us. He has also taken Oleg on a bike ride and spent time with him. 

Oleg starts school on Monday. There is a good ESOL program there. We are hopeful that it will help him learn English quickly. We can tell that he is understanding more every day.

Having a teenager in the house has been stressful. Becoming a first time mom at 57 is not an easy thing. I am learning that teenagers argue and want their own way. It is hard going through that with a language barrier. We are trying to institute an allowance if Oleg cleans his room and bathroom. We will see how that goes. He does like US dollars so that should be motivating.

This afternoon we met a couple who adopted two boys from Russia two years ago. The boys are now 15 years old. It was so helpful to talk to someone that has gone through what we are going through.

We have been to church twice with Oleg. He is used to Ukrainian Orthodox. Our church is not what he is used to! Tonight at church we met a Russian woman that came to talk to Oleg. Also, a friend of ours, Oksana, who is also from Russia, came to talk to him. He was very happy to be able to speak Russian with someone. Next Wednesday Sergey is going to go the the Jr.high youth group with Oleg to translate for him.

I will post next week to tell you how school is going.

The first 48 hours in a new country

We arrived in Orlando at 6 PM Saturday, and went through immigration. A standard part of this is a secondary document review into which we brought a packet prepared by the Embassy adoptions unit to be given to the US Citizenship and Immigration Service.  We waited almost 2 hours but Oleg now has a 1 year Green Card.  The Visa was a one use, one time document. The Green Card will allow travel outside the country if needed.  We will be applying for his Social Security Number and then for a US Passport.
Until age 18 he will hold dual citizenship. At 18 he can decide to either keep both or renounce his Ukrainian citizenship.  Should he keep it he becomes eligible to serve either country's military.  It's something to think about.
We've had him at the beach on Sunday afternoon and at the city's local aquatic center this afternoon.  The center has a tube slide, and a pair of 1 meter springboards.  He liked this a bit better than the beach, but he's not tried surfing yet.
Tonight he had his first moments of missing his homeland.  He's been a trooper through it and it caught up with him this evening.   Our usual night owl turned in before 7 PM.
We noticed a distinct turn in his behavior once we arrived in Frankfurt with German and English being spoken, but very few other than some passengers spoke his language.  Many children in their home countries are more bold and wanting to lead the parents around.  Being dropped into a foreign country where you know little of the language is a humbling experience.

We have been talking with various schools and will try to enroll him in our nearest middle school.  Stone Middle School.  They are best equipped for English and Second Language learners.  Oleg's learnign style is not yet self motivated nor disciplined. The added contact with his peers will also spur him on to learn.  We do have a Rosetta Stone license and will see how he likes that.   Once he gains competency in our language other doors will open.  The school has had good reviews and many reading this in our county will recognize the school.

Oleg and his Visa

Oleg received his travel Visa from the US Embassy yesterday.  It was rather painless.  They tell you to expect up to an hour but we went from security through the whole process in about 25 minutes.  Thursday afternoon was very quiet there.  We had to peel Oleg off the ceiling of the taxi and off the shopping mall ceiling after his Visa, 'Happy Camper' doesn't begin to describe his emotion.  We went to Dreamtown in Kiev yesterday, a pair of shopping malls with the third floors dedicated to amusement parks.   One has arcade style and roller skating, and Two is a water park with sauna, jacuzzi and all manner of pools.  It's a bit like the Mall of America split in half, with the halves 500 meters apart.

Oleg and His Visa:

Ready to Travel!

Crazy Oleg!

We had our first appointment at the American Embassy this morning. It went well. We will go tomorrow afternoon to pick up his visa. That is our last bit of paperwork here. We also went to the hospital for immigrants to have Oleg's TB test read. It was non-reactive.

As our time is winding down I have been thinking about our 11 weeks in Ukraine. All in all it has been a wonderful trip. God has been so faithful to us and has lead us every step of the way. We have met wonderful people and we are so excited about our new son, Oleg. We know there will be many challenges ahead and we know God has great plans for our family.

After lunch at Domino's Pizza with Roger, a man from Kentucky, and her adopted daughter, Alorna, we went back to the amusement park we went to yesterday. Oleg did a kind of obstacle course. It was high up in the air and had a couple of zip lines. He would walk over rope bridges, swaying bridges with slats of wood tied to rope. He had a harness with big clips to attach to the different overhead wires. If this had been in the US there would be a person at every station ensuring the clips were fastened securely. Here each person had attach them. Oleg did great and had a fun time. We will post pictures tomorrow.

Pictures of the Oleg on the zip line obstacle course.

More craziness after the Visa Visit.

Florida Bound Saturday!

Our son Oleg's passport will arrive via overnight train at 7 tomorrow morning.  We have appointments for him at the hospital to examine his Mantoux test and pick up translated records. We make an appointment for obtaining his Visa in person at the Embassy and then go Thursday afternoon to pick that up.  Our travel agent already has us booked on a flight home Saturday, we leave Kiev at 5:45 AM lay over in Frankfurt for 6 hrs and then fly to Orlando arriving at 6:05 PM if everything is on time.
Yesterday I picked up a sinus infection and have been battling that.   God has been good and I've gotten some rest and a prescription is coming.   I'll have a long week work wise too as this is the 2nd Tuesday Microsoft security update week.  That starts for me and my coworkers in just over an hour from now.   Pat took Oleg to a hydro park on the Dniepr River along with the other family adopting a girl. they live in Louisville KY and we'll likely be sharing one leg of the flight home with them.
Thanks for your support and prayers, we've been blessed and graced extremely well here!   We'll also continue posting to this as we get home and make room for Oleg.  Many blogs stop when the family is home, we'll try and keep ours up as there will be many new and interesting things to say in the  days, weeks, and even months to come.
Darwin

Moving Right Along

Today we went to the hospital that does medical exams for immigrants. Oleg had to have a short medical exam and a TB test. We got there at 9 am and found out we needed passport pictures and that the TB test would be done around noon. We had three hours and it took a lot of that time to take a bus and get the pictures done. When we got back to the hospital we waited in line to go into three different offices. We were done by 3 pm and have to go back on Wednesday to have the TB test read.

While we were waiting we met a woman who is in the process of adopting four children, two sets of siblings. She has had nothing but problems the whole time. She was working with an agency and a facilitator but they were not being very helpful. It made me so thankful for the facilitator that the Lord provided for us. She really knows what she is doing and she has helped us the whole way through. We have become good friends.

Oleg was patient for the most part as we were waiting at the hospital. It was very hard for him to get up early to be to the hospital by 9 am. After lunch at a Ukrainian cafeteria we went shopping for a few things for Oleg and then went to a park so he could jump on a trampoline. He needed to burn some energy!

We got news that Oleg's Ukrainian passport should be in the hands of the facilitator in Simferopol tomorrow. She will send it to us in Kiev by train, arriving on Wednesday. Hopefully we can get what we need done at the American Embassy on Thursday and Friday. We could fly home on Saturday or Sunday! We are excited about bringing Oleg home. Please pray that it all fits together.

Fun in Simferopol

Oleg's sleeping schedule is opposite of ours right now. He likes to stay up till 2 am and sleep till 2 pm. We go to bed at 10 or 11 pm and get up in the morning. Our facilitator is a night owl usually so she and Oleg get along quite well. We will have to get his schedule changed when we get home.

Yesterday Oleg wanted to go ice skating again. We picked up four girls that our facilitator knows. Oleg knew two of the girls that used to go to the same school he did in Kerch. He is good friends with one of those girls. They all had a great time. After skating we took them all to McDonald's. A first for Oleg. He thought the cheese burgers were too small so he had a cheese burger and chicken nuggets. He still prefers a full meal, starting with borscht.

We leave tomorrow evening on the train to Kiev. Maybe after a week in Kiev we will be heading home. We are really looking forward to getting our son home!

Please pray for the girls we went skating with, that they will all be adopted. They all want a family. Thanks!