Merry Christmas 2009!!!

Merry Christmas from our family to yours!!!

Where in the world are the Kravtsovs?

I do think that our family could be on Amazing Race. I've only seen it once, but with all the traveling we've done, we'd be set. :)

In the past 4 months, we have been to 17 States with the children in tow. Nikita has gotten quite the American history lesson as we've driven through the plains, the mountains, visited the ocean and quite a few monuments in Washington DC.
We have been training for the ministry, finding more Home Team members, and spending time with family and friends. We are so grateful to all who have hosted us and who have spent time with us throughout our travels.
It's November now, and we're in the process of finding the perfect tickets to go back to Ukraine in January as well as finalizing Lindsay's side of Nikita's adoption (November 24th), spending the holidays with family and finding more Home Team members. We are super excited about all that God has done in the past 4 months and what we believe He will do in the next 2 before we leave for our other home.
Praise God for His provision in all ways!

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!!!

USA so far...

We made sure to put Nikita right to work when we got here.

He mowed the lawn.

We have a lot of car seats. Nikita got to sit between two of them. He was kind of scrunched. :)

Keira and Nikita are really getting along. It's a huge blessing!

Nikita got a chance to go putt-putt. He got a flier at church for a kids' day!

Here he is finishing the course.

Andre got to golf too!

Spain

Here's some of what we've been up to lately.

This is the first night that we arrived in Spain.

Here's all of us on the beach: Andre

Lindsay

Nikita

Noah, sleeping :)

Here's Lindsay and Nikita walking in Barcelona to watch the pretty fountains.

Andre and Nikita in front of the fountain!

Nikita jumping on a fun trampoline.

Noah riding one of his favorite rides at the park.

This is moments after he flung himself off. He got right back up. :)

Getting ready to go down the slide.

A new style. Got going too fast and bumped his face.

Noah getting a ride after a rough time at the park.

In order to get to Spain, we had to drive through Poland, Germany and France. We were so grateful to the Lord that our little car did a great job. We had no problems. We were able to stay with friends in both Poland and Germany and when we got to Barcelona as well. It was a really great time to hang out with Andre's mom, to be able to relax and just enjoy the view. :)

We got it!!!

God has designed our family from all around the world. It all started even before Andre and I ever knew each other. The first time I was in Ukraine in 2001. I didn't meet Andre. I was only in Kiev. It was around this time that Aljona, Andre's sister, and a man conceived Nikita. Nine months later Nikita was on the scene, and Andre became an uncle. I was still oblivious that anything was happening half way across the world.
Then in 2003, Andre and I met. We became friends. It was that summer, that I met Nikita for the first time as well. When I met him, there was an overwhelming feeling that I would someday be his mom. I told him that, too, but being 1 and Ukrainian, he didn't understand my English words.
After a year of friendship, Andre and I started to date (2004) and got married in 2005. God started to bring the pieces of our family puzzle together. In May of 2007, Andre finalized the adoption for Nikita, however, I was not on the papers, since it was through the Ukrainian system that he adopted Nikita. Our puzzle was starting to grow, with color and even more life brought to the amazing picture God was creating. Then in November of 2007, Noah's piece was added, and we were all excited to see the picture take more form, exhausted but excited. :)
Now, on June 18th, 2009, I can say that God has added more clarity and strenghted our picture. Nikita was granted his American visa! This moment, I will never forget. Why is it so important? Well, when Andre adopted Nikita, we were granted a new birth certificate with Andre as Nikita's father. However, I was not listed as Nikita's mother. Nikita took Andre's last name, Kravtsov. Now, after 2 years, he will take something of mine. My citizenship! He will be American! It makes me cry even now. I didn't realize how much it would mean to me, because he's been my son for 2+ years anyway, but there's just something about this process that makes the bond stronger.
Yesterday, while we were leaving the consulate, I was tearing up. Nikita asked me, "Mama, are you happy?" "Yes, Nikita, I'm very happy." "Me too."
Praise God for the family that He's creating!

Easter and End of the War Parade

Easter is a really big deal here. It's like Christmas in the States. Instead of calling it "Spring Cleaning," they call it Easter cleaning. Honestly, I don't really know that much about "Spring Cleaning," since our family didn't really do that sort of thing. :) Anyway, here are some pictures from that wonderful day.

This is our happy family on Easter!!! If I remember right,
Noah started cutting some teeth that day. Can you tell?

Mama with the sad, tired baby.

Mama with her boys.

The end of WWII is a really big deal for many here in Ukraine. Ukraine lost the most number of people in the war. Valya, Andre's grandma, was right outside of St. Petersburg when the Nazis came, and she has lots of interesting stories. Each year to commemorate the end of the war, there is a parade. This has become a tradition for our family to go to Valya's and watch the parade. However, before the parade, Valya wanted to take some pictures, so here's the photo shoot.

Noah is very interesting in something over there.

The whole group, and again Noah is distracted. Shocking really.

Here's a good one with the boys and Valya.

The fam. Noah is making a weird face.

I love these guys!!!

Cheese!

Hilarious!

So sweet!

And one of the parade.

Valya's Birthday

Valya, Andre's grandma, turned 80 years old on February 7th! Here are some pics of the time we got to share with her on that day!!!

She really is a tiny little woman. :)

Great-grandma with her boys.

Some of the awesome food that she made!!
My stomach always feels good and full when I leave her house.

Nikita overseeing the cake cutting process.

I'm guarding the chocolates.

Looking good for 80!

Here's the fam. I'm not sure what Noah is doing, but that's not the first time I've said that. :)