"Once our eyes are opened, we can't pretend we don't know what to do. God, who weighs our hearts and keeps our souls, knows that we know, and holds us responsible to act."

"Do not be afraid, for I am with you; I will bring your children from the east and gather you from the west. I will say to the north, "Give them up!" and to the south, "Do not hold them back." Bring my sons from afar and my daughters from the ends of the earth" Isaiah 43:5-6

"Remember those…who are mistreated as if you yourselves were suffering." (Hebrews 13:3)

"Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves…defend the rights of the needy." (Proverbs 31:8,9)


"The King will reply, 'I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.'" Matthew 25:40
This is our journal to rescue an orphan with Down syndrome who lives in an orphanage in Eastern Europe. Anna was left at the hospital by her parents, who refused to take her home because she was born with Down syndrome. In Anna's country people with disabilities are looked down upon and are typically hidden away in orphanages from birth and their outlook for life is not very good. Once the orphan turns 4-6 depending on the region they live in, they are then transferred from the orphanage to mental institutions or insane asylums. Our family desperately wants to make Anna our daughter before she is transferred as she is already 5 years old. We will love her and give her the family that she deserves and give her a future full of hope, despite her disability. When our family stepped out in faith and committed to adopt Anna we didn't have the money that it would take to get her here. God has worked miracles in so many aspects of our adoption. The biggest miracle is that I have had faith all alone that God would send the money we needed to adopt Anna. Through many answered prayers, God made sure we had every penny we needed to make her our daughter!

Please watch this video and see what God says about orphans and the starving children!

Wednesday, February 23, 2011

Love this girl!

Yesterday was hard :(  We started out in the orphanage director's office and she was very concerned about Anna being adopted.  She genuinely acted like she deeply cares for Anna.  She said to me "I'm sure you can relate yourself being a mother and how I feel about her leaving us".  She also stated that she is concerned about what happened to the boy who was adopted by a woman in the US who put him on an airplane by himself and sent him back to Russia.  I assured her (I hope that she was) that Anna would be very much loved by her family and that there are so many people excited about our addition to the family.  I told her that she will be able to go to school and interact with typical children rather than just children with disabilities like where she is now.  Anna will have friends and go to swimming lessons and birthday parties and be loved by a family that she so deserves!

This next part was very surprising to us!  We walked out of the office to go and have our visit with Anna and she was actually sitting outside the office with some of the orphanage workers.  She turned around and saw us and she let out a squeal of happiness, ran to Mike and held out her arms for him to pick her up!!  Ahhhhh we were in heaven and she looked like she was too...she hugged his neck and wouldn't let go :)  The orphanage workers also told us that when they were getting her all dressed up for her visit with us today, they told her "your mama and papa are coming to see you today" and she got soooooo excited!!! I am so in love with this girl!!  As we were leaving and Anna was walking away, Mike leaned over to me and said did you hear that we can't come tomorrow because it is a holiday? Nooooo I did not hear that and the tears started falling because I knew that this 2nd visit we had with her today would be our last visit with her on this trip.  We won't be able to visit her again until we come back to her country for court :(  I am so sad and feel so cheated right now.  I feel like Anna was cheated too.  How dare we come for two days and have to leave her so soon and not come back until who knows when?  I am so determined right now to raise the rest of the money, get our papers ready and get our booties back over here and get her.  I wanna cry as I sit and write this all down.  By the time we get home we will have been gone 7 days.  That's 7 days without our children at home and 5 of those days without spending time with Anna.  I hate to sound like a baby but I am so emotional and hormonal right now :(  Yaaay me! :(

So back to Anna.  She is the sweeeeeetest thing!  She is going to fit in our family so nicely and everyone is going to love her to pieces, I promise!!!  She is just a bubbly little ray of sunshine and I cannot wait to have her home with us.  Please pray that we can get the rest of our funds and paperwork quickly so that we can head back over and bring our princess home!  Thanks to all of you and God bless!!

                                                    My favorite picture of all!


Stealing some love..



                                                       He makes me laugh!



Hey, what else do you have in that bag for me?





Playing pat a cake




                                                          She loves to get dressed up!



She also loves to run her hands across daddies beard and hair!!  We were worried she might be
afraid of him because we thought she wasn't around very many men....but NOPE she loves him!!






7 comments:

Sandy Winey said...

I just love these pictures! What a little cutie Ana is - and she looks like a bundle of love. I can't wait until you all can bring her home!!!

kecia said...

she is such a doll!!! It makes me so excited to meet Kareen! How old is Anna?

Traci said...

Thanks! Kecia, Anna is 5 almost 6 :)

Katie said...

Oh, man!!! I would be so disappointed too...but sooo glad you were able to see her and have her KNOW and be excited about the fact that you are her mommy and daddy! It might have taken other children longer to understand that and bond to you, so it is just such a cool thing that it was SO immediate with her! The next time you see her will be the beginning of bringing her home!

Katie said...

Oh, and did they tell you about the scabs on her face?

Heather said...

Priceless photos. Perfect girl.

Traci said...

Katie,
they said the scab on her face was possibly an allergic reaction to something....but who knows? It looked like a boil or something and she had other rashy, bumpy things on her face. We figure it is possibly from her face not being washed properly. According to their description, they don't give them real baths, just sponge baths, ick.