Adoption: Living in the heart of God

Today has been a great day! We started the day off with some scrambled eggs and toast in our apartment, which we love! After breakfast we began to walk toward the orphanage, which takes about 25 minutes, Luba stopped a few times to make sure we were on the right track, and we were so we arrived around 11am. When we walked into the orphanage Luba asked the caregiver if M could come around, she went upstairs to where her groupa lives and brought M with her. As soon as M saw me she ran into my arms as I picked her up and held her, these are the moments I hope she never gets to big for, then she jumped to Kate and gave her a big hug. It's hard to see a little girl with so much love to be given up to live in an orphanage, but I am so thankful that the Lord brought us to her and now she has the undying love of her Papa and Mama.

We walked outside and went to her group's garden and talked with her as she enjoyed some chochalate we brought with us. We sat down on the staircase and asked her if she was excited about being apart of our family, and with a huge smile that I will never forget said yes. We have to get her new name settled so we asked her if she like Ayla M.. Williams? She smiled and said yes, I think it is so amazing for a child to feel so at at ease with what most people would think were strangers now giving her a new name, but the Lord has given her a peace and I am sure has assured her that we are her Papa and Mama, and not strangers. We have missed out on so much of M's life that we want to know everything about her: her favorite color is pink and green, her favorite food is spaghetti and pizza, her favorite animals are cats and ponies. We are absolutely in love with this girl and know it is because we overflow with the love that God has given us.

We had to go so M could eat with her groupa, so we assured her we would be back around 2pm and gave her a big hug before we left. We stopped in a little store and bought Kate some shoes, because Toms are not wet street friendly, a coke and a Fanta and we were almost home. After arriving back to our apartment, I called Luba to assure her we made it without any problems, she has been working on getting copies and going over our paperwork all day, trying to stay ahead of the game. Kate took a very short nap while I caught up on some emails, then it was back to see my little girl. When we arrived M came outside and we sat and talked for just a little bit before we decided to go upstairs to draw. She pulled out the ABC's coloring book we bought her and she already had worked on half of it. We went page by page working through the alphabet and the pictures that went along with each letter. She began to show us her skills and without hesitation: Airplane, Boat, Clown, Hippopotamus. She is so smart and is trying so hard to learn her soon to be common language. We wrote her name in the book and she wanted Papa and Mama to write our names. Casey, which in russian looks like "keci," and Kate, which in russian looks like "kat," were written in pink crayon then M grabbed the crayon drew a line from my name and wrote Papa, then wrote Mama next to the line she drew for Kate. I drew a picture on the front cover of the book that was stick figures with our names under each, Papa, Mama, M, and Chandler, she grabbed the crayon then drew a small figure and wrote gato, how could I have forgotten our cat Elliot. After working through each name I wrote, Williams Family, she said, "yes, M Williams."  The funniest part was when she wrote 1 over Papa, then a 1 over Mama, M, and Chandler, thats right friends M knows I am outnumbered already, but she has no clue how much Love this Papa has to give to all three of his girls. The way she prided herself in her new family was amazing, I pray that each one of us can pride ourselves in the family we have been adopted into, God's family, like she is in ours.

We wanted to know how to decorate her room, so after showing her a picture of her new house and her own room, we asked her what color does she want her room to be. She snagged up all 24 crayons, walked us into her bedroom of 12 beds, put the crayons on the bed and preceded to play a russian version of, "eni, meni, miny, mo," eliminating each color. After she ended up with 3 colors she really didn't like she would grab pink and put it back in the mix, hilarious, then ending up with three colors. She grabbed Milly her stuffed cat and proceeded to ask her what she thought. Milly then played the same game ending up with pink, so cute. While we were sitting there her caregiver and M's groupa came into our room and began asking us about ourselves, after playing verbal barrier ping pong, Kate grabbed our photo album and I began to walk her through it. She smiled and was beginning to understand more about who we were. We showed her our house, the school M will be going to and told her it had about 300 students, the church I work at and told her I teach the bible to 70+ teenagers, and then M's new sister Chandler. Her caregiver hopped on M's bed made like a scale and started laughing, I KNOW already I am outnumbered, haha, but I assured her elliot was a boy so I had one cat on my side. We all went outside but not before M could take her crayon and tell her friends that her bed was going to be pink. So Proud!

The girls sang us a song that cheered on Spain in Africa and then we all started throwing the frisbee in a big circle, about 10 of us. After spending 2 hours at the orphanage we had to go, but not before we could hug our sweet daughter. As we left the orphanage, we reminded M we would be back tomorrow, I picked her up and just said, "lublu," which simply means love, and she quickly says it back everytime. We walked away and my heart began to sink, all I could think about was that amazing girl has lived years without a truly loving Mama because alcohol was more important, and has never known the love of a Papa because her mother was single when she had M. Kate and I walked and talked about all the kids there, how sad it was that parents could leave there kids in an orphanage while they lived their own lives, completely free while there child lies in bed at night surrounded by 9 other children, with no chance to be adopted because the parents visit once a year. I told kate that I can not begin to understand how a child so amazing and so kind could never be held and hugged and loved on by her parents for so many years. I plan on taking every moment I can to re-assure M, Chandler, Kate, and however many more children God blesses me with that I desperately love them and would fly to any distance, pay any price, and lay my own life down so they may know how much I truly love them.

Oh God, I am so sorry for taking for granted your Love. You were willing to lay your Son on the cross, pay him the punishment for my sins, just so I may have a life that is forgiven and free. I thank you for showing me what true Love is, and may I show all people the gospel love you have given me.