Birthday Parties and Christmas

This week we Western Union(ed) some money to Ukraine to make sure that Vitaliy would have a birthday party this year.  This was his VERY first birthday party! As a matter of fact until recently he didn’t even know when his actual birthday was and how old he was.  He thought he was already 10 years old but I found out and told him that he was actually going to be turning 10 on the 15^th of December.  With the money we sent our missionary friend she was able to buy not only cake and juice but also fruits and chocolate candies for his entire class!  The missionary reported that he was very excited and that his class was shocked.  She gave him a huge piece of cake with 3 candles.  She asked him about his biggest dream and he replied "I want to be adopted by American family!”  We pray that we can make this happen.  We are thrilled that we were able to do something special for Vitaliy and share that fun with the other orphans waiting for their forever families.

Our home study (to my knowledge) finally went off to Florida after a few snags.  As long as everything goes as planned it should just be a few weeks before it is approved. We were hoping to be able to tell him that we were adopting him by Christmas but now we are just looking forward to when we will be able to let him know, whenever that is.  We know that it will be a wonderful announcement for him no matter the date. 

We just sent off two very large boxes to the orphanage for Christmas.  Several people donated toys and gifts to send along.  I know that the kids will be thrilled to have new things to play with.  Thank you to everyone who participated in this.  I imagine that we will get some pictures of the kids with their new things soon. 

We haven’t received any new donations to our fund recently and we know that the Christmas season is difficult.  Please remember to pray for us through this.  We are praying that we will have half of the entire cost to adopt by the new year.  That total is about $8,000 more.  We are thrilled to have raised 30% already.  Thank you Lord for your many blessings.