truth of the matter

OK, well, the truth of the matter is I just don't have time right now to mess with things like "redecorating" my blog, so i'm just going to have to get to that later so I can start writing now. :-) have you all had a good summer?

so, in case you haven't heard, we've been invited back to Kazakhstan (yes, they still want us? thank you, God!) and they'd like us to be there by November 28, so if all goes well and all our paperwork is properly updated by then, we will spend yet another cold month in Ust Kamenogorsk. :-)

Updated paperwork includes: new fingerprinting up in Michigan City (hmmm...could our fingerprints really have changed that much in a year's time?), updated dr. and social worker licenses (did you know you can download that stuff now?) updated medical checks, updated homestudy and financial info (which we're still waiting to come back to us) ...when we get that back, we will be able to apply for an extension of our immigration approval, which will expire in December--we can't apply for it till we're within 90 days. 

as i've begun to share all this, some friends have turned and said, "whaa, you mean, you're going back? I had no idea!" and my reaction has been like "you didn't think we were going back? why?"

i realize, though, that for a long time --I just didn't share. for a few months there, I more or less put the adoption and the pain of six months ago aside in order to engage the life that I had here, now. and while we never really questioned that we would go back to Kazakhstan, what we communicated early on might have been something more along the lines of "well, we're just taking some time to regroup and heal, and then we'll see." and people gave us space - I'm grateful for that. we always expected that it would probably be sometime in the fall that we'd be invited back to meet another child, but secretly we hoped it would be earlier than that.

there is so much more to say on this. in my mind, i've written a thousand posts. some i'd like to share, and some are so personal, i've barely even been able to breathe them to Rob. but now, I think I'm ready to reengage this process in the presence of you, my friends/family and readers (are any of you still out there? have you given up on Sandy's blog? some of you whom I have never had the privilege of even meeting...). we have renewed faith - we approach things with a bit more caution and realism than before - but I can honestly say, there has been much healing in the past six, but particularly, past two months. and we have been so much more honest, with ourselves, with God...

we're looking forward to what is ahead. yes, it will be winter in Ust - that would not have been our choice. yes, we will be meeting a little boy that is a little older than what we were initially hoping for - but strangely, in the last two months or so - that has become our choice; we look forward to it now.

and yes, even though most of what I read about toddler adoption scares the pants off me, i feel God is preparing me (and us) in ways we were not prepared for in the least the first time around. i hope that sharing some of those fears and expectations here will prepare not only me, but those around me here in Goshen for the challenges that could lay ahead as we adopt a little person who has had who-knows-what pain and disruptions in his little life. we hope, with love and perseverance, to be able to provide him with the stable, secure environment he has not had. and we hope with love, hard work, patience, determination and a lot of help from God, that he and we will fall in love with each other. even though that may takes months, even years ...

(as you can see, i am preparing myself for things to NOT be easy, or, magical; it's something i need to do this time around.)

and we trust - I think I can finally say that - that this time around, we will experience the confidence and peace from God, which we lacked last time, to be able to say "yes".

if this is all confusing to some of you who are new, stick around. or read back to past posts...it'll probably make more sense.

meantime, i gotta go; rob wants me to come take a look at a video he's working on. for now, life is here and now, and i am grateful that it moves along...

love,

sandy