Snowstorms, Nerves, and Court Proceedings!

Ty and I woke up to the worse weather we have had in Ukraine in our 34 days since leaving sunny Florida.  Having grown up in New Hampshire we are well aware of blizzard conditions and what that means on the roads.  So when are driver was stuck in traffic on his way to pick us up for court, the nerves we already were experiencing elevated slightly.

My white knuckled grip on the door handle as we headed into Kyiv spoke volumes about my anxious thoughts as I realized we were probably going to arrive late.  I wondered whether any grace was given to people who showed up late for court when all along the roadways cars were slipping and sliding.  Somehow we managed to arrive right at 10am - our scheduled time to appear in court.  But scanning the dark hallway I was not able to see our facilitator/translator, Olga.
This cannot be good, I thought.  However as we sat and waited in the dark hallway no one seemed to be calling out our name.  Perhaps the judge was late too.

Eventually Olga came, she too effected by the horrible driving conditions.  Still no judge.  We were told that she was listening to another case.  Finally after sitting for two hours we were ushered into a small, cold, court room.  The judge asked Ty and I questions about why we wanted to adopt these girls, could we in fact afford to take care of them etc.  Then she asked Katya to stand and asked her many questions about her parents.  Prior to court we had heard that the judge will sometimes deny the application to adopt if biological family is involved at any level with the kids.  This was our major concern coming into this day.  The judge seemed to really press Katya and we waited holding our breath not being able to help her at all.  The judge then asked Mariana some questions.  Finally the lawyer, representing Father's House stood and stated the reasons that they were in favor of this union.

The judge was expressionless and silently stared out the window for what seemed like an eternity.  I searched her face to see if I could guess at her thoughts, but to no avail.
Finally we were dismissed from the courtroom.

As we were on our way out, she said, "I will grant it."

And it was over!  Just like that!!!

 It was hard to believe as it had been told to us about as unceremoniously as possible.  But that did not matter.

Finally in the eyes of Ukraine, we were now the forever family of Katya and Mariana.
PRAISE THE LORD!!!

The dark hallway inside and the horrible weather outside hampered our attempts to get a good celebratory picture, but here we are right after court standing at the front door to the courthouse.
Thank you to the two ladies in the picture who spoke in favor of the adoption.

And of course a huge thank you to all of our family and friends all over the planet that prayed for success in court.  We could not have accomplished this without you.
Thank you to our Lord and Savior, Jesus who has sovereignly orchestrated every moment of this journey.