10 months later and 5 from Ukraine

We took 10 months to continue our adoption journey and this time it would be in a new country Ukraine. We first heard of our Luke thru a friend at our agency. She said some people had met a child with many medical needs and they were raising money for his heart surgery. We saw his picture and we asked can we adopt him? At first they did not think the director of his orphanage would agree because we were such a large family. However, the Lord again had other plans... He said we could and we got together our dossier again in 1 month for our adoption of our Luke. Luke had a vsd ( hole in his ventricle in his heart and he needed his aortic valve replaced or repaired). This was urgent but the NAC ( director of adoptions for Ukraine) was very difficult to work with. We were paper ready in April 2004 but she did not allow us to travel until Sept.... Luke also was born with his right leg fully attached to his back. He has a spinal hernia and his l leg was webbed and had a severe clubfoot. He also had a severe cleft lip and basicallly no palate. He has had some cleft lip revisions and repairs to close his clefts. He had his heart surgery within weeks of being home and is doing well. In June 2006 we began his leg repairs. With an 18 hr surgery to straighten and loosen skin, ligaments and place an external fixator on his r leg. He wore that for 6 months and then it was removed and his l leg and foot was also done and placed in another fixator for 4 months. After lots of pt, and hard work on his part he walks... in full leg braces and is beginning to walk without them too. He has done this way earlier than expected just like Mya :) We also adopted Nataly. She was 11 yrs old and had a difficult beginning with her very abusive mother, who is now dead at the yg. age of 29 of alcohol poisoning. While at the orphanage she was in we met a boy who had a cleft lip/palate who was 15 yrs old. We had pretty much said we would not return to Ukraine because the NAC director was very difficult to deal with. So we were shocked in 7 months to hear that the director had contacted our coordinator because a surgeon who was going to repair Vadim's cleft lip had spoken to her and he heard that a family was interested in adopting him and he thought it better if that happened and the surgery was done here. This was so unusual that we knew the Lord was moving us towards this child and another trip to Ukraine.... funny how you say "never" and the Lord turns it into when. We again were paper ready quickly because Vadim had turned 15 and we would not be able to adopt him if he was 16. We traveled in Nov. 2005 and spent 5 long weeks there but we were blessed with Joseph- 15, Cate-13 and Leah-12. Joseph- Vadim had the cleft palate/ lip issues and terrrible speech. Cate had been in the orphanage all of her life. She was born to a 14 yr old mom. Leah's past was much like Naty's. We have had 2 surgeries for Joseph and he needs some more in the future to correct his cleft issues. He has speech and is transitioning to adulthood as a fine yg. man who gave his life to Jesus just this summer and feels a call to missions.... maybe back in his home country. Cate and Naty have also given their lives to Jesus. They have all transitioned well into our family and we feel so blessed to have them. They are working hard in school and are catching up to their grade levels.