Need help from local friends!

Hey guys I know you are all tired of us asking for help with our adoptions but this is our last one and thankfully our girl was blessed with a $10,000 grant toward her adoption so we only needed about $12,000 more. Jared took a side job doing some training and every penny of that is going toward the adoption, when you look on our sponsorship page on Reece's Rainbow that $3183 is from Jared's extra job! He still has a few thousand that will be coming in sooo we think we only need about $6,000 to be funded to bring Berkeley home!!! 

Now comes the help part since I now have 5 kids at home 2 with special needs I can't fundraise like I did last time:( I don't have time to make crafts and things so I need help.......I'm begging for it. I'm going to list a few things we would like help with. 

1. Car wash, this doesn't have to be local only you can do one wherever you are and donate the money to our tax deductible acct. We do want to have one here too possibly more than one after school starts we will need help when we do it! 

2. Save your change!!! We collect all our change and when the jar is full take it to coin star 

3. Things for online auctions. If you have anything you can give me to auction off that's awesome please do the best things are easy to mail. Stuff like jewelry, gift cards, boutique kids clothing, nice purses, small home decor. 

4. Yard sale. I want to have one but will have to find a place to do one of you have stuff to donate for a yard sale I am happy to take it or you can have a yard sale at your house and just donate the proceeds!!!!

5. Friends with kids..... If you have nice clothing your kids have outgrown consider selling it to once upon a child or at a resale shop and donating the proceeds to us!!!! 

There are tons of other ways you can help we appreciate everything. I know many of you don't understand about international adoption and the need for fundraising but I can tell you from first hand experience how badly these kids need families. The orphan crisis has reached epidemic proportions and kids need homes especially the kids that we are adopting that have special needs. Please ask if you have any questions! 

Berkeley is waiting for us!

Timelines.....

Well those are always a little tricky and pretty fluid from the country we are going to, but usually you can make a pretty good guesstimate. We still have one approval left from USCIS so thankfully all we need to do is submit our home study update to them and it won't take as long as starting over. I printed all the papers needed to start our dossier paperwork today and already scheduled my fingerprint appt and medical exam for Monday morning! Hopefully we can get most of the paperwork notarized this weekend and our home study should be finished no later than the end of August. We hope anyway.....

Pictures of the little ones

This was a couple of weeks ago

Savannah is a very messy eater!

Kaeden "helping" brush Pashas teeth!

Kaeden after his 3rd birthday party!

Pasha in the tub

Three monkeys in the tub!

Another specialist checked off the list!

Today I took Pasha to the opthomologist to check on his strabismus and how his eyes dialated. While still in the orphanage I noticed that his pupils rarely dialated correctly and his neurosurgeon noticed also after his shunt revision. Now they react normally so I've decided it was a combination of him never really going outside so he was not used to the sunlight and sedatives. Anyway his eyes are great, even with the strabismus they are working both independently and together and there was no damage to his optic nerve from his hydrocephalus! 

This summer so far I have taken Pasha to a neurosurgeon, adoption clinic, opthomologist, feeding therapist, cardiologist, audiologist, spina bifida clinic and fittings for his wheel chair. 

Callen has been to the adoption clinic, cardiologist and audiologist so far. Both boys still are waiting begin PT/OT and speech therapy and Callen goes to see the endocrinologist next month so as you can tell we have had a busy summer of dr appts so far! 

I'm ready for school to start so we can get into a routine with school and therapy appts. I know it's going to be crazy until I figure it all out but I know that all this will help the boys a lot. They are both doing really good. Learning to play and how to be in a family is lots of work and everyday they are making progress. Both boys understand about 80% of what we say to them in English now which is amazing! The sad thing is they are losing their Russian several times when we have had a Russian speaking friend over or when the interpreter is at the hospital with us Pasha just ignores them and answers in English when they speak to him in Russian! I knew they would probably lose it since they are so young and we are not fluent but I didn't expect it so soon! We still try to use the little Russian we know so they can at least have a few words in their native language. 

Expecting again

Yes it's true we are "pregnant" again!!! Ok so it's a paper pregnancy just like our last ones but hey it still means the same thing. In a few months I will be delivering a beautiful girl who will be 9 or 10 years old depending on which month she arrives in the US via Eastern Europe! 

We are adopting "Berkeley" a gorgeous 9 year old with blonde hair and blue eyes. I have actually posted her photos here on my blog before trying to find her a family! I have been looking at her photos for over  3 years now and praying she would be found. I mentioned her a few times over the years to Jared but at the time either we weren't ready to adopt internationally or like last year we knew she was on the other side of the country from where we were going. 

Some amazing things happened while we were in Eastern Europe adopting the boys that allowed us to be able to start this crazy process again to bring our girl home finally!

Isn't she beautiful!!?!??!!!!!

Family needed!!!

This is "Ally" she wants and needs a family ASAP!!! Did you read that wants and needs!!! She is aging out next month, next month is her last chance to be adopted from her country.....she's listed on Reece's Rainbow so please share her and help her mama find her!

7 weeks home!

Pasha and Callen had their appointments with the cardiologist and audiologist yesterday. Both boys were given the all clear and released, Callen does have to have his hearing retested in 6 months because he freaked out in the booth and they couldn't do the test. The stinker busted my lip he was thrashing so hard in my lap:( 

Tomorrow is Kaeden's 3rd birthday. I'm wondering what happened to the time?! Where did my tiny sweet baby go and where did this spunky wild loud little boy come from?! He seriously has a huge personality and is sooo mischievous! Somedays it feels like these 3 years have flown by and others it feels like its been a million years not 3. In those 3 years we have grown from a family of 3 to a family of 7!!! That's a pretty big growth spurt I think! 

Anyway talked to our home study worker last night and we should have it done by the end of August as well as all the papers needed to send off across the ocean! Now if only we could find that money tree!

Adjustments

The boys are doing very good, yes there are bumps and potholes in our path but we are making progress on the road to a new normalcy for our family! Tomorrow I take Pasha to be fitted for a car seat, wheel chair and bath and toilet equipment. They said it could take 6 months for all the insurance approvals and stuff but I'm really hoping its sooner especially for the car seat and wheelchair. He starts pre K in August and they won't allow him to go unless he had a chair:( 

Callen is still having some behavior issues but they are getting better, we are learning what sets him off and what things he can handle. He LOVES people but gets way too overstimulated and after they leave he's a nightmare to try to calm down so we are still limiting our contact with the outside world as much as we can without being total hermits! 

This Saturday will be Kaeden's 3rd birthday and Sunday we are having the party for him at the house. We invited friends and family so it won't hopefully be too overwhelming for Pasha and Callen. Kaeden wants a jake and the never land pirates cake so I really need to get out and order that today or tomorrow at the latest! 

Other than we are just hanging around the house. No new news yet on the next addition to the family. Still waiting on one piece of paper from our Social worker to be sent to Reece's Rainbow so we can officially announce who it is.

6 weeks home!

Well we have been home 6 weeks now! Wednesday afternoon was the day, and amazingly Pasha has started eating better too that very day! Every meal since then he's eaten pretty well too! He's almost eating as much as my other two American toddlers! Callen is eating too much, he has some food issues and freaks out if others have food and he doesn't. We are trying to give him things that aren't bad for him like dry Cheerios and fruit but he's eating so much he's getting chubbier. He came home weighing 32 lbs and now weighs 36.....uh yeah he's a chunk. He has an appointment next month at a diabetic/endocrinology clinic because some of his labs were concerning. They suspect that he has juvenile diabetes but of course want to do more testing and rule other things out too. 

Next week Pasha has an appointment to be fitted for a manual wheelchair, car seat and bath and toilet equipment. I'm hoping that the wheelchair will be ready by the time school starts, I was told he has to have a chair to start classes. So if his isn't ready we may have to rent one for him. Both boys are doing really really great considering where they were less than 2 months ago, we still are working on things but I did successfully take all 4 little ones to Target last week with my parents and no one had a meltdown! Yay!!! In other news our house is going on the market today..... We didn't know the full extent of Pasha's condition of course until we got to Ukraine and met him. We had hoped he would be able to stand at least someday and possibly walk with a walker. We realized upon seeing him that wasn't going to happen and several doctors have confirmed our concerns. He *might* stand someday but that's a very slim possibility and it wouldn't be alone he'd need lots of medical equipment to do it and more surgeries just for that slight possibility. So long story short we are looking for a house we can handicap equip easier and one that's close to town for all the dr and therapy appointment both boys will need. Also we need another bedroom......more about that later:) 

5 weeks in America

Today is 5 weeks since I arrived in the US with the boys. I've almost been home as long as I was gone, still not quite acclimated back to my life here probably because I have more kids now and we are all still getting used to each other! Anyway since I'm feeling very melancholy about some parts of my trip and missing that country today I'll post a few pics:)

This was on a hill outside the city looking over it.

This was up in the mountains at Yalta

You can see Swallows nest castle in the background

Taken from the boat headed to Swallows Nest

A cruise ship in Yalta

Mmm yummy Shaslik!!!! So good!