Day in court

Well, we didn't find out until 8:30pm Wednesday night that papers had been signed in Kiev to approve our court hearing! The papers were overnighted to us along with another family's and our court hearing was scheduled for 1:30pm on Thursday.

So, today we headed over to the court hearing around 1pm to be ready. A little before 1:30pm, we went into the court room which was smaller than the size of the Maybury jail (for all you old timers who watched the Andy Griffith show!). They even had a jail cell in the court room off to one side (not for us). So we came with Sergei - our translator, Irina - the social worker from the orphanage and also there was the Poltava inspector and the court attorney. Everyone was there......except the judge. So we waited, and waited, and waited some more. Gradually one by one, everyone left to go and finish other work they had (keep in mind they are not in the same building). First the court attorney, then the Poltava inspector, then Grant (bathroom break), and when Irina said she was going to the bank and would be back, the judge finally showed up. Now, remember it's Ukraine......the judge showed up a little after 3pm. So then everyone was called and they came back and we started our court hearing.

Sergei had very well prepared us, and things went along just as he said. Grant was asked to speak first and he was asked a lot of questions. Fortunately, when Suzanne got up to speak, she pretty much just had to say she was in agreement, and answer a couple of other questions. At one point when Irina was making her statement and included that we had visited Svetlana's sister Neelya, and that Neelya had said that 'she has a family and she wants her sister to have one to', so she wrote the paper allowing her to be adopted - the court assistant next to the judge almost started crying.

Everything went well, and at 4:12pm the court declared us as Svetlana's new parents! There is still a 10 day waiting period to allow for any objections (just a formality) and then we get to start more paperwork again. But we should be able to take Svetlana out for the day now, as we went out to celebrate and have pizza tonight. She has never seen ice before - so that was fun, and she had Sprite to drink and was amazed at all the 'fizz' when we poured it out. We think she is still having a hard time comprehending exactly what is going on, or she is just cautious about putting her trust in someone. We had hoped she would be a little more excited than she was, but that's okay. We had enough for all of us. It is hard to understand what she is going through as with any child that is being adopted. After the 10 day waiting period, we will have her permanently, so that would be on the 18th of June.

Please pray for our guidence. She will have a lot of changes she will be experiencing, and too much too fast will spell a really frustrating time for her. Everyone keep telling us 2 things about her - what a sweetheart she is, and what a strong personality she has. We know both of these to be true. Please pray for our discernment in our understanding of her responses to situations and that her trust in us would continue to grow.....when compared to our relationship with the Lord - isn't that what He always does with us? Teach us to trust Him more........