Anna Photos!

We managed to borrow a couple cameras (Thanks Suzannah and Dejan), so now I can show you a bit of our life lately. Most of these are from the couple days we spent at the orphanage, the drive home, and just after getting here.

Anna is Home!

A couple hours ago, we brought Anna home from the orphanage. Let's just say that the past couple days have been quite an experience: we spent them at the orphanage, sleeping with Anna in a little apartment they have for families.

We feel so blessed by God that this has all worked out. Anna has done so well with all the changes of the past couple days: being around us all the time; being taken away from her usual surroundings (even though we were still at the orphanage, we were in another building in this flat instead of her room with 4 other children); and being examined at by two different doctors, a social worker, and two physical therapists (yes, all in the past 3 days). I won't lie and say she hasn't cried (& had a couple fits), but considering all of this, I think she has been amazing.

I'm sorry I have no pictures yet. Since our laptop died, we haven't been able to update our website or download photos from the digital camera. Oh, the other reason is that our digital camera seems to have also died (on the day we went to the orphanage to stay--we have borrowed one for the next few days, thanks Suzannah).

So, here we are. Parents. Finally. There will be plenty of steps still to come, but the most important one has happened: she is with us! Full-time! Thanks be to God for faithfullness beyond measure!

The visa barrier falls

Today, we got the call that Jenny's visa is ready. This was the one final barrier to bringing Anna home. Jenny will pick up the visa in Dresden tomorrow (Tuesday), then we plan to go live at the orphanage (they have an apartment in the main building) for a couple days and bring her home on Friday! Hopefully all the arrangements will work out so that can happen. In any case, we should have her home this weekend. Praise God!

Of course, I may not blog much for the next week or so (or maybe I'll want to a lot); we'll just have to see. But, Anna's coming...

Anna will be our daughter!!!

In case you didn't see the email from Jenny, I'll start off with the big news: We will be adopting Anna!!!

This past week the adoption committee met and agreed that matching us with Anna makes sense. Their decision is the final permission we need to adopt her. Unfortunately, there is still one thing holding up our bringing her home: Jenny's visa.

We applied for new visas back in May. Mine was ready in an unheard-of-quick 4 weeks. Jenny's, however, is still somewhere in the Foreign Police system. While not having the visa does nothing to our ability to adopt Anna, until we have it in hand we cannot get the papers we need to bring her home. Please pray that the visa will come soon. At this point, we have been visiting every day (one or both of us) and are ready to have her full-time.

One concern that we have is that recently we have seen some of the workers there being harsh in how the discipline the children. Most of the caregivers there are great, but we don't want Anna exposed to that. She is just starting to walk, so we are afraid that she may start getting into more trouble and thus be in danger of discipline methods that we don't plan to use.

Teaching ministry

The past two weeks (and this one) are the opening intensive teaching period at the seminary. The in-class instruction is mostly delivered during three sets of intensive teaching times (Sept, Nov, and Feb). This first one of the academic year is especially full. I have had days of going from Masters' seminars to English teaching to Doctoral seminars all in the same day!

We have started into the English teaching at the seminary. So that Jenny can be home with Anna when she comes, I have agreed to cover more of the class hours. In exchange, Jenny is doing most of the planning. That takes advantage of her experience and skill with planning English lessons, while leaving her schedule freer for the baby.

Computer and Razor Deaths

We have had two losses recently in our family. First, our computer died about a week ago. It would cost about the same to get it fixed here as buying a new laptop, so we have been shopping around. Fortunately, I had just done an extensive backup, so we didn't lose any data. In the meantime, our internet access has been more limited, which also means that we have not been able to update our website and may not be able to for awhile. If any of you feel moved to make a special donation toward a laptop, that would be wonderful, as this is an unplanned expense.

On a somewhat lesser scale, my beloved electric razor died also a couple days ago. I can't complain, since I had it for at least 15 years. However, I was scruffy for a few days, until I was able to get to the store for a few disposables.