VIP Visitors – 27 March

Even though Masha was not able to come to the US for the last two weeks of March, we appreciated the opportunity to host the director of her orphanage and one of the orphanage workers on Tuesday, 27 March.

Mark was a tremendous blessing and a help to me in shopping, cleaning, and preparing for their visit to our home, as I was spending almost all of my free time helping tend to my mother. At about 11:30, we picked Ludmila and Kseniya up at the home where they were staying, and brought them to our house for lunch.

Kseniya served as a fabulous translator, and also provided great insight of her own, as she works closely with the children as well. We learned much about Ukraine, the orphanage, and Masha. Best of all, Ludmila and Kseniya provided us with a phone number for the orphanage, and they are allowing us to call Masha once a month until we are able to go to Ukraine!!!!! Our first call will probably be next week.

We showed them the video of the children’s presentation from last summer, and we told them (truthfully) what wonderful children they are caring for. We talked for a long time, shared a lot of food, and then delivered them to the next set of parents.

Later that evening, the whole group of us (four families, plus Ludmila and Kseniya) shared a full Thanksgiving dinner at the Stewart’s home. We have been so blessed to have such a tremendous support system of families that are in pretty much the same boat, working with the same people through the same process as we are, and we take such encouragement from all of them!

The day was a success…we know that Masha is healthy and doing well in school, but she is anxiously waiting for us to come to Ukraine and bring her home. A number of times, Ludmila stressed to us the importance of consistency and setting limits. We also learned more about some of the losses that Masha has been through, and the circumstances that brought her to the orphanage.

We will have our work cut out for us to earn her trust and to help her grieve the losses in her life and heal the old wounds, but we trust God to help us all, and to do a great work in all our lives. People have told us what a great thing we are doing for Masha, but my answer is that she is doing a much greater thing for us…bringing her light and strength and spirit into our home and teaching me about a love I never could have imagined.