Home Again

Well, we managed to tear ourselves away from St. Pete and the kids and are safely back at home. We miss them already! It has been good to start sharing some of our experiences with friends in person, and we look forward to more of that. Dasha and Dima stayed strong as we said our goodbyes, which made it easier for us to hold it together, too. We will be able to communicate with them via e-mail through Natasha, who has graciously offered to translate our e-mails.

Saying goodbye to Dima went quickly since we were late getting him back to the orphanage after our meeting with family members. So a quick picture and he was off. Dasha spent one more night with us. She was more melancholy on Friday, and Natasha mentioned several times that she did not want to return to the orphanage. The 4 of us had a late breakfast together, then made a quick grocery store stop, where Bob got scolded by an employee for taking a picture (I thought that was funny, so just had to add it in there.) Then we took her back to the orphanage and spent a few minutes with the other children in her group before heading out. We sang a couple songs, then gave Dasha the heart-shaped locket we had bought her. We showed her our pictures inside and reassured her that we love her and are coming back for her. She took it all in stride and gave us sweet hugs as we left.

Then we were off to Paris where we met my friend Amy for a great French dinner and a walk around downtown Paris. We saw Notre Dame, The Louvre, and the Arc de Triumph and Eiffel Tower from a short distance. We then headed back to Amy's place for a few hours of sleep before catching the metro back to the airport the next morning. Paris was beautiful, and Amy was a fantastic hostess! We had a good time talking about what God is doing and realized that just a couple months ago we had talked on the phone about God's timing, not understanding why things didn't seem to be working out for her to be in France or for us to be in Russia - and now look where we were!

Bob and I were serenaded on the Paris metro by an accordian playing opera singer - what a great final impression of Paris! Then we boarded the plane and headed for home. Ten hours and lots and lots of French food later, we were in Houston again where Jacob and Sarah picked us up. We've spent the day resting but did make it to church this morning - there was nothing we wanted to do more than worship with our church family after such an amazing week.

So what's next? A few more pieces of paperwork, which will include another trip or two (or 3 or 4, if history repeats itself) to Austin, then our PW gets registered with the courts in Moscow, then we wait for a court date to be set. We are expecting to be invited back in as soon as 6 weeks, hopefully not more than 3 months.

But we will be patient, because we are learning over and over that God's timing really is perfect.

Thanks for reading - lots of love,
Karen and Bob