To Miss

According to Dictionary.com

miss- to regret the absence or loss of

I miss my brother. It doesn't hit me hard everyday, but it does still hit me. It's been over a year since he passed away, and I wish he were here. I miss his quick wit and one liners. I miss his calm way with his daughter. I miss him making fun of me (however much it used to annoy me, I miss it now). I miss his presence.

regret- to think of with a sense of loss

I definitely regret the absence of my brother. I do feel a sense of loss. I am sad. I know that many may think that goes without saying. But sometimes, just to say these things makes it easier in some way.

He will.

August 15th, 2009 was the date of the Eric Sickels Memorial Golf Tournament. This was an event to commemorate the life of my big brother and to enjoy the other people that also loved him very very much. Our family from Florida even flew to Iowa to be there. It was a wonderful surprise. We truly have the best family in the world.
During that time in August, I began to think about something seemingly unrelated. Are we going to have family pictures? You see, before Nikita came to live with Andre and me, my side of the family got some family pictures taken. Nikita was not there. My mom told me that we were not going to get another family picture taken until we were "all together." So, now what? Nikita is here. But we are not "all together."
After the unexpected death of a person so close, you begin to have to make a new "normal" for your life. You have to adapt. I must say, some days I don't want to adapt. But as we move forward, I realize that we will get our family picture taken at some point. God is still God and He's with us always, and Eric is too in some way.
On October 16th, 2008, my big brother passed out of this world and into the next. In August, we celebrated a life that encompassed so many wonderful adjectives like devoted, caring, loving, hard-working, smart, passionate, and many more.
As we turn the calender to October 2009, I can safely say that I'm not sure how I feel. There have been days when I don't really think about him much. And there are days that I ache with the pain that I will never see him on earth again. There is much that he will miss and many times that I will feel there's just something missing.
However, in the midst of all of this, I think about the movie Rudy. I think about how no matter what, that little guy kept going. When he almost quit, others came along beside him and pushed him forward. In the end, he was the only Notre Dame football player to ever be carried off the field. He persevered. And by golly, so will we! We will continue to love, we will continue to live, we will continue to believe that God is good and that He loves us more than we can imagine. What has happened is so awful, but it will not overtake us. Oh, may God make some thing really good out of all of this. He will. He will.

I'm Proud to Be an American!!!

Andre and I met a year after our oldest child was born. He may not have come from our bodies, but he (Nikita) shares our heart. Many of you know the story in detail, some of you lived parts of it with us, however, I wanted to tell the story of how God wove the first 3 members of our family together.

It started on May 4th, 2002 when Nikita was born in Dubno, Ukraine, just 30 minutes from Rivne. He was born from Andre's sister Aljona, but even from the beginning Andre was involved. Andre was the one to name him, Nikita (Mykyta in Ukrainian). He liked the name because it could be shortened to Nike (like the shoes :). Nikita began to live with Andre and Valya (Andre's grandma) when he was only one month old. Very quickly he began to occupy a space in their hearts. Aljona was in and out of the house, living with them off and on. Then in May of 2003, Aljona passed away. Nikita was now an official orphan, according to the world.

In July, 2003, I met Nikita. Here's a picture of all the girls from our team and me. Nikita was 1 year old at the time.

People might think, wow if she only knew that she would one day be his mom. Well, it may seem kind of weird, but I sort of did know. I'm not a big kid person, but I was with Nikita. We had a bond, fueled later by my bond with Andre, but beginning with just us. What a blessing from our Father!

In 2004, Andre and I started dating. I remember talking on the phone with Andre (he in Ukraine and me in the States) and Nikita got on the line and said, "Mama. " Andre quickly came on and said that was only word he knew, which helped me regain my breath. :)

This is a picture of Nikita and me around the time that Andre and I started dating.

Andre and I were married on September 30, 2005 (almost 4 years ago).

Here are the 3 of us at the courthouse the day we got married.

Here we are at the party after the legalized marriage ceremony!

Nikita soon after moved to Spain to live with Andre's mom. Why did he move there, you might ask? Well, it was a decision that had been made before Andre and I were even really dating, but soon after we were married, we realized that it shouldn't be a permanent situation. In January, a month after our weddings, we approached Andre's mom with the desire to adopt Nikita. She was stunned at first but soon agreed that it was the best thing for him.

In early March, 2007, Nikita moved to Ukraine to be with us! The triangle that started so long ago was completed! Nine months later, in November, the triangle became a square when Noah was born.

This is the first night at home with Nikita. He was pretty comfortable with Andre right away.

He wasn't quite as sure what to think about me, but we bonded quickly.

Here's the first time Nikita got to see Noah! He was already a proud big brother!

Although we have been a family at heart for more than 2 and a half years, today we received a monumental piece of mail. Nikita has received his US passport!!!!! For many of you, you've been praying for this moment with us for a long time! Thank you! As he opened the mail, addressed to him, I couldn't help but shed tears of joy that my little boy was now my little American boy. He can travel wherever we go. We don't have to stand in line for visas for him anymore. We are the same. We get the same insurance, the same line at customs, we are a family in the eyes of all governments all over the world. That's a sweet moment right there. :)

Thank you all for praying for both our boys! We are so very blessed to have them both!

Praise God for family!

Cousins!!!

I grew up with what I would consider a big extended family. We always got together and enjoyed being with cousins and aunts and uncles. Well, now I'm one of the aunts and one of the moms of this hilarious group of cuties. This is a picture taken last month when we were together. I'm so thankful that God has given us a family that loves to be together. There was chaos, oh my, there was chaos, but the smiles and memories are so worth it all. So, the order goes like this (L to R) Nikita 7, Merek 4.5, Keira 3, Ani (Annika) 3, Noah 21 months, Norah 14 months, and Leah 9 months. I hope that as these kids grow, that they will appreciate and love the time they have together as much as I did when I was a kid. Praise God for cousins!!!

What's it like for you now?

We had been waiting for this moment for 2 years and 4 months. We were finally going to touch American soil with our whole family, all 4 of us! We got our luggage and proceeded through the doors to see Nana and Grandpa waiting for us! It was a great moment. Nikita wasn't shy, like I thought he might be. He jumped right into sharing all of his thoughts with Grandpa and pointing out every airplane in and around the O'hare airport. :)
Just moments after the hellos and hugs ended, we learned that Leah, Jamie's daughter had the chicken pox. Well, I guess life wouldn't be our life without a few struggles. :) We didn't really care, though. We were here.
Many people have asked how we feel, what are we doing, what are our plans?
Well, we feel good, bad and in between. We are excited that Nikita has already learned how to ride his new bike, that we get to spend so much great time with Nana, Grandpa, Jamie and her girls. We are so grateful for a wonderful room to put our stuff and the chance to eat Doritos with Mt. Dew whenever we want! :)
We are also so excited to be able to get more involved in our church here and meet some new people. We have been gone for a while, so a lot has changed. We've already attended a Kids' Day Out event, which was super fun.
We feel sad as well. I mean, it's hard to come back here and not see Eric. He has left these wonderful little girls that give us a lot of joy. It's hard that he's not here to enjoy them as well, though. It's hard that our sons won't get a chance to meet him. Life is moving, though, and God is still God, so we are moving forward too.
The in between feelings come from the unknowns. Moving from Ukraine back to the States for a while, changing organizations and cultures makes life interesting and confusing at times. God is showing us the answers to our questions little by little. We are doing our best to trust Him until the next answer is revealed.
What's the general plan? We are hoping to be in the States until January. We have to wait for some documents for Nikita, so that might change the plan, but the current plan is to return to Ukraine in January. We are going to be doing some fundraising, training and traveling for the next few months, visiting family, friends and ministry partners. After that, we will probably be more based in Iowa City as we figure things out with documents and work from here.
We are so grateful for all the ways God is blessing us everyday!!! He is truly the best reason to wake up each morning!!!