Getting everything ready...

Is there any doubt these boys are going to be Jayhawks?

Well, we are leaving for Krasnoyarsk on Friday! Just yesterday, we found a KU student to stay at the house while we're gone. Mujibur the cat is very pleased! We are working on the packing issues. There is a weight limit of 44 lbs for our luggage, and I think 30 lbs of it will be adoption documents. :-) We get to see the boys a week from today, and our court date will be a week from tomorrow. We were asked to wait until we successfully complete the court appearance before posting any pictures of the boys, so you'll have to wait till then to be introduced...

We've been telling everyone this week, "we're overjoyed and overwhelmed." It is so exciting to be heading to Kras to bring home our boys, and it is so scary to wonder if we're totally prepared. We know that something along the way will be especially challenging, but what will it be? Will the flight over go smoothly? Will the judge catch us unprepared with tough questions? Will every document be in the right place with the right signatures? Will the boys be in good spirits and good health?

It's impossible to know the answers, but what we do know is that we are bringing these little guys home soon and we're going to be the best parental units we can possibly be for them. Bring it on!

We got The Call!

We were encouraged to hold off on creating the boys' room until the time between our first and second trips to Krasnoyarsk. They explained that the wait can be maddening, and it is good to keep very busy instead of staring at the phone all day. We did as we were told, and finished the room a couple weeks ago. So thank goodness that on July 19, at 10 a.m., the phone rang and we got our schedule for trip #2. We are going to get our boys!

The generosity of friends and family, and even people we barely know, has been overwhelming. We would not have been able to get even this far without you. Knowing you are behind us as we venture off to the other side of the world is most comforting. We will keep you posted on this site as we finalize our plans, and hope to put lots of fun pictures up while we're in Russia.

--Rochelle and Curtis

Playing the waiting game

Hi there. This is the first post on what we hope will be a success story of our trip to Krasnoyarsk, Russia to adopt two beautiful little boys and bring them home. A quick tip of the hat to our friends the Parracks (pictured above with their boys at our house) for suggesting this format. If you check out www.parrackfamily.blogspot.com, you'll see that we decided to follow their example pretty closely.
We started this amazing process in January of 2005, and are eagerly awaiting "The Call", which will provide the itinerary for our second trip. We hope to keep friends and family posted with short exerpts about our adventure while we're gone. Admitedly, the goal will not only be to provide you with info, but to give us some semblance of a connection to you while we're halfway around the world and missing home.

--Rochelle and Curtis