Faith allows things to happen. It is the power that comes from a fearless heart. And when a fearless heart believes, miracles happen.

    I start with a Faith quote, because that is what brought us here today.  Two weeks before our first trip to Ukraine Liz and I were broken and ready to call it all off.  We finally got the strength to sit our girls down and discuss that we were going to give up our attempts to get Masha.  There were tears and disbelief that we would give up.  (We preach daily to never give up regardless of the reason) Carley at the end of the conversation said she would pray and we would be going to see Masha for Christmas.  I assured her it was over and final even after her comment.  She looked at me as serious as Carley can be, and she told me she was still going to pray and we would be seeing Masha for Christmas.  Her faith even then rattled me as it was so confident, and I was afraid that she would be crushed when we did not proceed.  The next week she spent every night praying at bedtime that we would get Masha on Christmas.  Then somehow everything that was in disarray just seemed to right itself, so Liz and I took off on our first trip to Ukraine that you have already read about.  After returning all we had to do is bid our time for the court date to go back.  A week and a half later we get our court date of December 26th, but we picked Masha up on Christmas Day and have had her since.  I have no doubt the events unfolded like they did because of one 8 year old's childlike powerful faith.
     Today was court day.  The start of the day was filled with mixed emotions; nervousness, doubt, happiness, fear of sadness, and under all that shear excitement for what could be.  Court consisted of two jurors, judge, prosecuting attorney, ophanage representative, our translator, Masha, and our family.  Normal questions were asked of us that one would expect when adopting.  I could elaborate so much more, but this would become a novel.  Then it was Masha's turn, and our turn to fight back tears with her answer.  She described our family as something out of her dreams that she did not even know could actually exist.  Masha's words for Liz and my girls did bring me to the brink of tears, and I think I would have lost it if  they continued with the current line of questioning.  Finally they got to the real question, "Do you Masha, want to be Masha Nicole Atchley forever?"  Her answer was an immediate yes without hesitation, however just like us I can see the fear of the unknown in her eyes.  We have discussed each one of those fears, but she has never known the unconditional love of a family that will not abandon her.  She is about to embark on a great adventure into the unknown with people that say they love her, but in essence know very little of her.  I like to again think of it as an incredible leap of Faith though I know there are many factors in her decision.   The sense I get from her today is she is happy for what lies ahead of her, but scared to leave everything she has ever known behind.


PS. I will add the adventurers of 3 days of traveling with two little ones on a future blog.  Let's put it this way if travel could be worse I don't know how.  The girls never once moaned groaned no matter how bad it got.

Day 3 & 4 Reunited

     Day 3 in Ukraine we thought would be a complete waste because we had to wait on permission to travel to Masha's region until late in the evening.  We could not have been more wrong.  Nastya our facilitator sent us a guide to give us a tour of Kiev.  This young lady, Masha, gave us an incredible tour of the city with an in depth account of the 1500 year history of  Kiev, Ukraine.  Usually I am not a big history buff, but she held both of our attentions throughout the day.  The highlight of the tour was the Catacombs at the Kiev Monastary. Walking through the caves with the caskets and the religious symbols was very Indiana Jonesish.   The tour was soon over and we were on to what we heard was the dreaded train ride to Masha.   I thought every one was crazy at first, because the cabin was not bad, I didn't mind the loud rocking of the train, and I've been in worse bathrooms at football games.  Then two hours into the ride I was awaken by sauna like temperatures in our cabin.   There was absolutely no way to turn it down or off, so the temp just kept rising.  We resorted to opening the cabin door just to be met by more heat. I'm pretty sure it was almost hot enough to crack an egg and cook it on the floor.  Liz and I rode in complete misery for the next 7 hours.  I will now agree with everyone the train is just flat awful.
     Day 4 was the day we finally got to see Masha.  The reunion could not have gone better.  We got big smiles and huge hugs.  The director got right to business asking Masha if she was ready to sign her letter of intent.  There was no hesitation in her answer of да.  We then spent the rest of the morning at the orphanage while the facilitator started all the paperwork, and the afternoon running around the small town getting more signatures, copies, and notaries.  Masha got to spend the entire day with us while we did the paperwork, but it really ate into the quality time we got to spend with her.  Unfortunately our time was short with her and we had to board a different more comfortable train back to Kiev to make our flight home.  We are currently sitting in the Kiev airport getting ready to start our journey home.   We are praying that we have the shortest waiting period for our court date, so that we can bring the girls with us.   Things are looking good right now as our facilitator was able to get every signature he needed in one day, which usually takes 3-4.  He will submit our paperwork the first of next week then it will just be waiting for the court date to come.  Following that court appearance Masha officially becomes our daughter.

Day 2 Ministry of Magic Appointment.

     Day 2, appointment day, or first of 3 D days.  Today is the first day we actually accomplished something for real.  We met with the State Department of Adoption/SDA/Ministry of Magic.  This is where you set down with Ukraine officials select Masha, tell a little about yourself, and hear Masha's psychosocial and physical status.  I will have to say Liz quite impressed me with her Russian as she answered questions directly to the lady helping us without the translator.  I think it also put the official at ease because at first she appeared uptight and tense.  That seemed to change with a little effort from Liz to speak the language.  We also had to present a photo album, which they looked through every page and asked many questions.  After the interrogation we were told to come back the next day for approval to go down to see Masha.  Not sure why it takes a whole day, but it looks like we will finally see Masha on Friday after being here the entire week.  Tomorrow we will go on a 10-12 hour train ride to see our girl.
     Riding our high from a successful appointment Liz and I set out on foot around Kiev.  We probably covered a solid 10 miles of walking.  This place is truly a shopping girls paradise.  I thank God we only have so much room in our suit cases, because I think Liz has seen a million pairs of boots she would buy.  We ended up again eating something not very adventurous and settled on Pizza.  We did however eat dessert at a coffe shop and had some nice coffee and cheesecake.   I was feeling pretty good following the coffee and really tried to get Liz to head to a club and go dancing, but was completely unsuccessful.  She was worried how it would be perceived.   I was thinking it would be a good way to experience more of the culture myself.  Instead we came back to the apartment, she put on her flannel pajamas, watched it pour down snow, and now we are going to sleep.

Ukraine Day 1

     Day 1 pretty uneventful .   The only thing we did was stop by the grocery store, which was not much different than at home other than you have to lock up backpacks before you shop and the swap meet like shops you walk through to get to the groceries.  The people and driving remind me a lot like  New York, lots of pushing in baggage claim, no use of excuse me, and tons of honking in traffic with crossing more lanes than a person should at once.  Liz even stated she needed to put her New York hat back on, and the airport instantly reminded me of her friend Shannon throwing people out her way to get my bags when she picked me up 15 years ago.  After the grocery store we headed back to the apartment  which is very nice inside, the exterior reminds me of something right out of the movies or Rocky V.      I am very boring when it comes to trying new food so we went to TGIFs for some very American cuisine.  When dinner was finished we went for a short walk around the streets of Kiev.  I noticed Liz blended in very well and I stick out pretty noticeably as I got lots of stares at dinner and walking down the street.   Guess I'll attempt to wear a stocking cap and Johnny Cash type attire the rest of the trip.  Back at the apartment we pretty much crashed after a rather brutal day of travel.  We slept for a couple of hours, woke up to talk to the girls via Skype, and then back to bed.
      Wednesday is a pretty big day as we have our meeting with the ministry of magic to get our ok to go see Masha.  After the meeting we plan to get our adventurer hats on and explore the city some since we can not leave to Masha's region until the following day.  More to come as the 2 year quest to bring Masha home continues.