First and Second Trip to Ukraine

From Face Book:

Well, the trip went very well. Allot of traveling in a short period, felt like a deployment at times. My guides Alex and Sasha were wonderful. Overall, the country was what I expected, but some things were very different. They drive really fast and crazy, but its normal there. Alex drives like I used to, Tiffany would be scared to ride with him, I thought it was awesome. The food is very different, I started to find the food I liked after three or four days, then I was a happy camper. Roman seemed to be enjoying his summer, he was sooooo dark. The clothes are the same for men, the women dress very sexy, I'm not complaining, sorry honey, love you, lol. Can't wait to go back, just dreading the flight and train ride. Maybe Alex can rent a lambo and we could drive to melitopol in half the time. Haha.  -Ken

-Posted on July 7th 2013

 

The first trip did go well; wished I'd gotten to see Roman more.  The trip I leave for today will have 14 days of down time and I'll be staying in his region, so hopefully I'll get to spend that time with him.   The remainder of my time will be spent running around like a mad man from court to SDA to notary's office and to the place where he was born, followed by a final visit to the embassy.  We picked up some school supplies yesterday to give to his friends for the upcoming school year.  I would love to take tons of stuff with me, but it's not fun hauling a ton of stuff around the world.  I will try to pick up some stuff they like while I'm in the region.   

 

 

The most challenging thing we have ahead is what we're going to do when Roman and I return in a month.  As I'm sure you can imagine, have a six month old and a sixteen year old is not very common and we're finding out why very quickly.  We have a wonderful support system here, however, when it comes time to finding childcare for a sixteen year old that speaks Russian and is going to need a lot of love and attention, it gets a little harder.  All of our local family members work full time, so that's out.  Private school with translators would be great if we had an extra $1000 a month to spare.  With Tiffany taking Madeline to Mooresville to the nanny, it kind of limits our ability to take Roman to Charlotte to my Sister's house.  We are exploring all of our options right now; any suggestions would be appreciated.  I love my job and the where I work, but the work schedule is really killing us right now.  Once Madeline is in school it will be much easier, but until then, we're going to have to figure something out.  Roman will be using Rossetta Stone and I will work with him on my days off.  Once he is somewhat fluent in English, we can start a curriculum with him and possibly put him in public school.  My Mother has also offered to take him to my Sister's house so she can home school the days I work.  Like I said, we have some options, just want to make sure we do what's best for him and the whole family.  I know some of you have adopted older children(14+) and will have some great advice for us, Tiffany will be available while I'm gone and facebook is always good for chatting.  I will be gone until at least August 5th, possibly longer and I know I can use Tango from Ukraine, but not Skype, it would not work on wifi, I tried it several times and it always gave me the same message about wifi.  If you have my cell number and want to chat, download Tango and send me a message to call you back.  I also check facebook when I have access to wifi, so that will work too.  Thanks again for all the love, support and donations of your time, things and money.

 

-Ken

Update as of May 15th

Well, we once again had some setbacks.  Tiffany's health took a turn for the worst just before Madeline was born four weeks early in February.  Tiffany's blood pressure was through the roof and she was ultimately diagnosed with preeclampsia.  Because of this, the doctors recommended inducing her early.  With Madeline being premature and then immediately being diagnosed with RSV, I was unable to travel in mid March to Ukraine to begin the final stage of the adoption process.

Life has been a whirlwind of activity and hard work for the last two months, but we are finally ready to submit a letter for new court/travel dates for our SDA appointment.  After speaking to our agent, the earliest I could travel would be around three weeks.  I feel like we have a pretty good handle on Madeline's schedule at this point.  I am not thrilled about leaving my co-workers during the busiest time of the year, but they are all very proficient in their duties.  I'm sure they will miss me as much as I will miss them.  Tiffany, on the other hand, is gong to need a lot of love and support from friends and family.  After having one newborn and splitting the load with my wife, I don't know how on earth single parents do it.  Props to all you single moms and dads. 

We still have some details to work out once Roman gets here; like schooling, counseling, keeping up with his traditions and culture and lots of logistical issues.  We have the best family and friends though and we trust in the Lord and know he will guide us through this journey.  I am sure there are going to be tough times ahead, as I've read many of the other families blogs and face book posts about their adventures in Ukraine and troubles once getting home, but like they said in the Marines "What doesn't kill you makes you stronger."  We should be a strong family after all this is over and if nothing else, our children will have character, which in my opinion is more important than any material possessions.

If you've made it all the way to the end of this post, you're either really bored or you genuinely care about our family and this mission.  One thing we are still in need of is money and frequent flyer miles for the commute.  If you can help or can pass our mission on through face book or other forms of multimedia, it would be greatly appreciated.  And we'd like to once again thank everyone that has donated anything or helped in any way, we love all of you.

-Ken

Donation Link Updated

Sorry for any confusion regarding the donation link.  The issue has been resolved and a new link has been posted. 

http://www.youcaring.com/adoption-fundraiser/Bringing-Roman-Home-/45339

Thanks for your continued prayers and support.

Update

Well, the last several months have been very busy.  As you all know, Tiffany was pregnant with our little girl the last time we posted.  For those of you who don't know, Madeline Grace Frost was born on 02-13-2013, 4lbs 13 oz, 4 weeks early.  We stayed at the hospital for seven days until Tiffany's fever broke and her blood pressure wen back to normal.  We came home for two days and then while at our first check up for Madeline, we were told she had RSV (a viral respiratory inspection) and she had to be put on oxygen and IV's for a week.  After over two weeks at the hospital, we finally got to come home.  So to say the least, we have been busy. 

Since our last post, we completed our dossier and got it authenticated in Raleigh.  There was a slight problem with Tiffany's employment letter, so one day after I returned, Tiffany headed back to Raleigh with the revised document.  The dossier then went over to Ukraine with another family.

Roman was scheduled to come over for hosting around Christmas, but due to some unforeseen trouble in Ukraine, he was not allowed to be hosted; he was crushed. 

We tried to focus our attention on the adoption again and continued the waiting game.  Yesterday, the adoption agent emailed me with our SDA appointment date.  The date is 03-13-2013, the same day my paternity leave ends at work, YIKES!  We are having some troubles with the adoption right now that need to be ironed out before I go buy plane tickets.  We are still gathering information right now, so I can't say much about the issues (don't want to misinform anyone), but as soon as I know, I will update everyone.  Seems like we are not the only family whose adoption is not going smoothly right now, but then, we all knew going into this that the road might get really bumpy and for some, may be a dead end, unfortunately.  I am praying that the Lord will continue to guide our paths and I am confident that everything happens for a reason and although I may not understand why things don't always work out, I know God doesn't make mistakes. 

On another note, we are still at least $15,000 short in funds and with an SDA appointment in one week, I must admit, I am starting to worry.  I have to give our in-country facilitator $9000 upon arrival in Ukraine and I still have to pay for travel expenses and other court costs and such.  I was very confident in the beginning that God would provide and I had no worries, even staring down the barrel of a $30,000 adoption cost that we did not have.  I was sure that since this was a path I was put on by God, that it would be easy and he would provide everything we needed.  Well, God doesn't necessarily work like that.  Like I said earlier, I believe in God and I know there is nothing he cannot do.  As a human, I am still a worrier.  God has never let me down before and has always provided for my family when I was faithful to him and I am hoping that this time will be no different.  After all, what's $15,000 to our God that knows no bounds.

For those of you wondering why I say $15,000 and not more, the range we were given for adoption costs was $25,000-$30,000.  So, we have $1000 in the adoption fund account + a little over $7500 we have received in donations.  I'm figuring $8500 + $15,000, being $23,000, may be enough to get us by.  I can live on next to nothing and I don't mind staying in very poor conditions to save a little money.  I would fly over with the luggage if they'd let me, kidding, no really, I would if I had to.

To all of you that have prayed for us, contributed your time or money or have helped in any way, we want to say from the bottom of hearts, thank you.

Coming Home For Christmas

Immigration -- that is where we are now and in a holding pattern at this point.  BUT we found out that Roman will be here for Christmas!  He has been approved to be here through New Horizons hosting program.  Roman will be here from December 18 - January 15 :).  Since our plan to have him permanently home at Christmas has been pushed back, words can't describe how excited we are to get to see and spend time with him for the little bit of time we will have at Christmas!   


Another great accomplishment! For a couple months now, we have been calling and talking to Roman once a week to keep him updated and just to see how he is doing.    We always tell him that we love and miss him before we get off the phone.  Last week is the first time that he told us he loved us back!!!  That just melted our hearts.

Thank you Thank you Thank you!!

Its been a while...  I wanted to post a THANK YOU to everyone who has donated their time, money and efforts to make it possible to bring our son home.  It is great to know that there are so many people out there praying and supporting us along the way. 

Update

Sorry! It has been a while since we posted. Life has been very busy lately. We had our last home study teleconference with our social worker. We have some paper work to finish and she is going to work on our report. We almost have another item we can mark off of our to do list. Once we have everything to our social worker we can start immigration paperwork.

To prepare for Roman to come home, Kenneth and I have been working very hard to prepare a room. His room is what we used to call the "workout room/storage room" Everything that was previously in that room is now in every other room in the house... Most of it needs to go into a building that we do not have or in our yard sale pile! I guess we will figure that out sooner than later - I hope ;)!

Kenneth went to IKEA and purchased a bed and a night stand. One day after I got off work, we headed to Lowe's to purchase a few things. We ended up finding a rug that goes very nice with the room. I mentioned chalkboard paint to Kenneth and he got pretty excited. Sooo needless to say one wall is painted in chalkboard paint which I have to admit it is pretty awesome. The other walls we just repainted white. We decided we would let Roman decide if he wanted to paint them a different color when he gets home. Thanks to my brother Andrew who helped me paint while Kenneth was helping clean a park in Mooresville.

The next purchase we will have to make is blinds. Man, the blinds currently hanging in the room were there when Kenneth bought this house almost 8 years ago. So they are old and need to be replaced. I am hoping to start with Roman's room and purchase the faux wood blinds.

Kenneth has the photos of the room on his phone, as soon as I get them we will post before and after photos.