My mother left this world on Sunday evening, 1 April, after a 2 ½ year battle with lung cancer. She died peacefully at Visiting Nurse and Hospice Home surrounded by our family. While I miss her terribly, I could not have chosen a better way for her to pass. The people at VNHH were the best…kind, caring, and dedicated to keeping Mom comfortable and caring for all of us during her stay. We held a family calling on Tuesday, 3 April, to say goodbye to Mom. Joined on this day with the sadness of this final goodbye was the sweet […]

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We had one of the biggest joys this morning….we talked with Masha on the phone! Flash back to a few weeks ago when the orphanage director was here…she left us all with a phone number for the orphanage, and told us that we could call the kids one time per month until we could come to get them. Life at the orphanage is very structured, and it’s obviously a bit of a disruption to go take the kids away from whatever they are doing, so they do try to limit the phone calls. It’s quite a privilege to be allowed […]

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WE HAVE TICKETS TO UKRAINE!!!!!!!!!!!!! We have booked our flights, and we even found rates for summer travel directly from Fort Wayne that were less than I paid for my last business trip to New Jersey! So…..we leave Fort Wayne on Sunday, 13 May (Mothers’ Day) at 1:23 in the afternoon. We have a 2 hour layover in Detroit, and then board a flight to Amsterdam. An overnight flight schedules us into Amsterdam just before 6:00 AM, and then after a very quick connection, we leave for Kiev at 7:10 AM. If all goes well, we should arrive in Kiev […]

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In the midst of my scurrying and hurrying to get ready to leave this weekend (yes, this weekend!!), my wonderful sisters-in-law organized a “baby” shower for me!!!! It was so great to see so many friends and family members from different areas of my life come together to support Mark and me as we step into this new adventure! In preparation for this, we went to Target about a month ago to register….it’s actually kinda hard to register for a 12-year-old baby!!!! As many of you know, for a traditional baby shower, you can register for diapers and bottles and […]

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We are all packed and ready to go! We just have a couple of last-minute items to wrap up, and we’ll be on our way to the airport…..The last few days have been incredibly hectic, but they’ve also given us many opportunities to gain perspective. Friday morning, we spoke to Masha on the phone. Special thanks to Lena Statsenko, my friend and Russian teacher, for getting up at an ungodly hour to come over and translate for us on the call. It was wonderful to hear Masha’s voice and to be able to communicate with her!! We did encounter a […]

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