Me and My Daddy's Stang......

We have been meaning to show a few pictures of Wade's pride and joy....
No.... not pictures of Alyssa yet...... pictures of his Ford Mustang, and also pictures of the fun ride for Alyssa!!!! Daddy has hooked her up with this hot machine from Walmart!!! He is still trying to figure out how to make a mini garage, but for now he parks it beside his in the garage.....
This little girl is going to be soooooooo lucky to have such a great and loving father...... That is why I love him sooooooo much, and that is why I married him. Thanks for stopping by. WE LEAVE IN 4 DAYS!!!!!!!

Julie

Pack Lightly..... Yeh Right!!!!!!

Did someone say that we needed to pack light??? For a month???? What, are you kidding me?? HA HA HA !!!!! This is harder than you think. We are allowed 44 lbs in our checked bag per person. We are still trying to figure out how that is going to happen..... We have almost everything packed except for a few gifts for our Russian friends, and also a few snacks for Alyssa for our visits with her, and for our trip home. We have packed very little clothing for ourselves, and we will probably be handwashing some items and letting them dry in the room. We are so very excited to get this trip underway, and we cannot wait to see Alyssa on Monday November 10th. We will be having our court date on Tues, Nov. 11th. Please keep an eye on our blog because we intend on putting an entry on here everyday or every other day. We will keep you informed the best that we can on this month long journey to bringing our little "Russian princess" home.

Julie

We Have A Court Date!!!!!

Look out Russia, here we come!!!!! We just received the wonderful news that we have gotten our court date!!! We will be leaving for Russia on November 5th. Our court date is Nov. 11th, and we return home on December 4th!!!! We are crying tears of joy tonight while we try to get our visa's rolling along with getting our airline tickets. My head is spinning trying to remember all of the things that we need to get done. We would really like to thank all of you for your prayers and blessings in this long journey to our little girl. We cannot wait to share her photo after we have legally become her parents. Please keep watching our blog. We will be posting as much as possible from Russia. You can leave us comments and we will try to respond by email or phone. We will be using Skype to talk and video back and forth to the U.S. We are so excited that our prayers have been answered. Please continue to pray for us for safe travels, and also for an uneventful court hearing..
We will post again soon...
Julie

Petition To Court!!!!

Praise the Lord, we have just received our petition to court!!!!
When I opened email this morning, there it was......the document that
we have been waiting for ever so anxiously!!!
Receiving this document means that we are very close to bringing
Alyssa home. Once this document gets back to Russia, we will hopefully
receive our court date very soon!!! We are looking so forward to seeing
her again!!! We really loved our first trip, and we look forward to seeing
our facilitators, drivers and everyone else that has helped to make this such
a wonderful experience. The Russian people were so kind and helpful to us.
It will truly be bitter sweet when we do have to come home from the last trip.
Everyone that has been working on our behalf really love these children.
We look forward to spending time in Moscow and our region, and look forward to learning alot more about Russia. The time that we spend in Russia will always be such a great part of our adoption story. Russia will always be part of our lives and a part of the heart of our family. We are going to be so proud to say that we feel in love with a little girl from the wonderful country of Russia. And we will feel so proud to say that she is our little "princess".
Please keep our family in your prayers to get a quick court date, and also pray for the many other families that are waiting also for petitions, court dates, referrals, and regions...
Blessings..
Julie

THE DOG DAYS OF SUMMER

We consider our dogs Wendy and Toby as our "official weather forecasters".
We have had such a hot summer this year that our dogs just kind of lay around and snooze. You don't even have to step outside to know exactly what the weather is. You can tell by watching them through the window. For some reason they do not usually find shade in their doghouses, but instead they stare at us through the window in the door and beg to come in. We know one thing..... A wet Toby is not a happy Toby. Whether it is just sprinkling, or it is pouring, he continuously taps on the door wanting in. When it gets to be cold in the winter, we sometimes let them in to warm up. They usually plop down on the rug, and take a long nap, or maybe watch tv.
We are really looking forward to cooler weather, and we know that our furry friends are also!!! Maybe we should just let them move in to the house with us... NOT!!!

Room For a Princess....

We have had many people ask us lately about Alyssa's room. So we decided to share some pictures of her room now that it is complete!!! We themed it as a "Princess Room". We cannot wait to bring her home, so that she can play with her toys, and sleep in her princess crib. We are hoping that when we bring her home that she will still be small enough to sleep in her crib. We think that she will, but just in case we also added a twin bed. I am sure Wade and I will be taking turns sleeping in her room to ease her transition of sleeping alone. Right now she sleeps in a crib in a room with many other cribs of children. So we know that this will definitely be a change for her. As of today we still have no news from the agency about our Petition to Court document. We are waiting patiently for this document. It is the next big step toward our court date and second trip. We know that the LORD has HIS perfect timing, so we are just waiting and praying that the call will come soon. This Friday will be 10 weeks since we saw our daughter!!!!
Time is starting to speed up and slow down at the same time. It is hard to believe that it has been that long since our first trip, but then again, I find myself looking at the clock periodically throughout my day, and I wonder what she is doing at any given time. We long so much for her to be home with us. We cannot wait to bring our "little princess" home to join our "Forever Family"!!!!

Alyssa's First Swingset!!!!

We thought that we would let you all in on the big project that we started and completed this past weekend. It is Alyssa's first swing set!!!! Wade and I had found this company on the Internet called Kids Creations that sell redwood swing sets, and we fell in love with this one. For one thing it does not take up too much room in our backyard, and there was good reviews by other customer's about their purchase with Kids Creations. It is a company out of Kansas that makes redwood swing sets that are built to last!!! And they are made so solid, that adults can play on them too!!! Their website is: www.kidscreations.com . The swing set was shipped in by a Roadway semi truck to our house last Monday. We had to wait until we got a couple of good dry days to put it together. The set was pretty easy to put together with directions that were fairly easy to follow. What took the most time was to get the swing set level. Our backyard is slightly sloped, so we had to dig and dig to get it level. With the wonderful clay dirt here, it seemed to take forever!!! When we got it completed, one of our neighbors daughters came over to "test it" for us!!! She had a fun time, so I guess all of that digging by Wade paid off!! What a great dad Wade will be... He is loving these projects for his little girl!!!! Who knows what might be next?? Maybe a mini garage for her soon to be purchased battery powered Ford Mustang Convertible!!!!