SDA Appointment

We met Irina outside our appointment at 8:00 this morning. We made the commute drive across the Dnipro River and through Kiev to the SDA office. We entered through the side door of the office and waited about 10 minutes before they called us in.

The SDA representative that we met with was very nice. She seemed about my age, maybe 5-10 years older. She started off saying that she knew we wanted to adopt Nastia and wondered if we knew she had an older sister. Yep, we know, in fact can we adopt her too???? The immediate answer was "No, it is impossible. She is not available for international adoption yet." That was that. She wanted us back on track, talking about Nastia. So she asked us how we knew Nastia and we told her about the hosting program that we had her in our home. She told us from the records that Nastia was happy and untidy. Then she asked if this was true, that she is untidy. We told her "No, she was actually a very good cleaner and loved taking showers. She was cleaner than our boys." She replied with, "Well, that is what a family does for kids." She asked also if we knew she had a speech impediment. We again told her yes we were aware. Then lastly, we did tell her that we plan on coming back and adopting Masha and that we were told the SDA would tell us when her twelve months would be up. She had to call the Dnipro region and found out that she will be available this fall. Fall? We were told it wouldn't be until spring. We are going to verify this when we go to the region and orphanage. Then at the end of the appointment she said she would try and pull the referral together before the end of the day for pick-up. This didn't happen, so we will get the referral tomorrow between the hours of 3 and 5 pm. After this we will take the night train to Dnipro to see Nastia and probably Masha. We can't wait and are sure excited to give them a hug.

After the SDA appointment we toured Kiev and took lots of pictures. We walked and walked and walked! I'm sure glad I changed out of my heels (for the SDA appointment) and into jeans and walking shoes because we are all pooped tonight from all the walking we did today. Kiev is a beautiful city. We really enjoyed visiting the sites and cathedrals.

We ate lunch at an athentic Ukraine restaurant. It was good food and cheap.

After the Lawrence SDA problems were resolved we headed back to the apartment and have enjoyed just relaxing since. We're off tomorrow night! Can't wait!