Asking for Your Prayers

We are one step closer. Today we went in front of the Judge again this time we had an attorney, something I wish we had since day one. He finalized the agreement that Bob can leave without attending the last hearing. The other person in the court room was the physiatrist, after the Bob leaving early bit was over the Judge asked everyone to leave with exception of Mariada and the psychiatrist. The rest of us waited in the hallway for about 30 minutes. Then Mariada came out, she was all smiles, then she was chatting with the social worker from the orphanage when she started to tear-up. I think the stress of it being over lifted and she became a little overwhelmed. We then learned that Bob and I will have to have two meeting with the psychiatrist, one in about thirty minutes and one tomorrow. She wants to see our apartment. (?) Then we are finished with all that and just have to have our last hearing on the 23rd.

On a very sad note, late last night Bob called the office to do some work and Tammy let us know that we needed to call one of the siblings because Dad was in the hospital. He went in with what they thought was a breathing thing, but it turns out he has pneumonia, he also had a heart attack and now his liver is failing. We are asking for prayers that he stays stable until Bob can get home; the flights to get him out are booked so we don’t think he can leave until Sunday. Please pray for the family as well; although Dad is 87 and we know that we will lose him it’s never easy to say good-bye.

Good News!

Yesterday we went out to the beach, it’s pretty empty this time of year but we wanted to see it and it gave us something to do for the afternoon. It’s a really big beach, most of it is flat but to the south there is a little bit of mountain meets Sea. It was great to get out to the water I miss it so much, one thing has become certain I am much more of a water girl than a mountain girl! And most defiantly a smaller town girl than a city girl!


Today we went in into Tirana to go to the U.S Embassy and file our power of attorney. We also signed a few other papers for when Bob is gone. On that note it sounds like the Judge is going to let Bob fly home on the 20th and let me finish up the last court date alone on the 23rd. This is all working out because of our wonderful friend Fredi making a few phone calls and saving the day for us! It still looks like Mariada and I will be home the 3rd week in January.


We are hoping to take the trip up into the mountains and into Kosovo for Thursday, Friday and Saturday. We hear that the trip is beautiful and we are really looking forward to it.


The very south end of the beach.

I think this is a restaurant in the summer.

At sunset we could just make out Italy, very cool!

Road Trip

Yesterday we went with Fredi down to a town near Tirana. HFTW has bought a property that they intend to use as a place for the orphan teens to go to when they are too old to stay in the government run institutions. Currently when you turn sixteen you go to what are called the dorms, these places are awful and most of the kids drop out of school within a year and end up on the streets. HFTW is going to offer a place that will keep the kids in school and help them go to university or learn a trade, make sure they are feed and continue to help them make good choices for their lives. They have bought the building but it needs work, they hope to have it ready by the end of summer so that the kids moving in can start school in September. On our way back we stopped in a little mountain town called Kruja where Skanderbeg’s castle is, they have a museum to him there that was really very nice, thank goodness Fredi was with us so he could translate for us and basically be our tour guide. We were so high up that we could see the ocean which was a beautiful site!

We also went to a traditional Albanian restaurant the other day that was really good, they cook the food in a big fireplace which also kept the place nice a warm. We had goat cheese that tasted great but sort of smelled of our bathroom! Along with a sheep cheese that was served warm ( mmm good) the wonderful olives, veal, wild boar and tons more. Mariada, didn’t eat the wild boar and she will not eat veal, she really doesn’t like meat but she tried everything with a touch of pressure, at least she tried it.

Today she had English lessons and a two and half hour soccer practice, so now she’s a bit worn out. I think we are in for the evening.

Hope everyone in Michigan weathered the storm and is staying nice a warm!

Mountain town Kruja where Skanderbeg lived.

Skanderbeg museum.

In the distance the Adriatic Sea.

Skanderbeg castle.

HFTW new building.

Future sports area and Chapel.

Boys dorm rooms needs a little TLC.

Yummy! The food here is awesome!

Going it Alone

Well court was good and bad today, good in that we think the judge is going to rule in our favor, bad in that it looks like our final court date will not be until Dec. 23rd!

We entered the court room with the three of us, Agim (our only representation from Bethany), the director from the orphanage a court appointed translator and the lawyer from the Albanian Adoption Committee. About two minutes into the hearing the judge asked that Mariada wait outside, so she and Agim got up and left, I thought they might be gone for a little bit but they never came back in. So Bob and I were on our own, with a translator that translated about 5% of the entire hearing. About 15 minutes in our translator was asking us per the judge for our exhibits, we had no idea what she was asking for. Then we could tell that she was getting annoyed and asking for something, the lawyer from the AAC left the court room and then the Judges assistant left, finally I asked our translator to translate. It seems that the judge had never seen our file and it wasn’t in the court room. So the lawyer and the asst. come back with a folder and we take the next hour going though it together. She asked us a few questions on why we wanted to adopt, could we not have our “own” children and what not. Then after all that she pulls out her daily planner and the lawyer and the translator start chatting, the translator turns to us and says that Mariada will have to see a physiatrist on Thursday the 16th (after court I reilized that the 16th is Wed. we still don't know which day it is) then we will have our final court date on the 23rd of December. Ah what?! Bob and I are asking our translator if we both have to be here? Is there any way we can move that up? Etc. out translator shakes her head no and that’s that! So Bob has to stay which is tough it’s the busiest time of year for him, thank goodness for e-mail and Skype.

Tomorrow we are going to see if there is any way we can get our two dates closer so that Bob can get home, so please say a prayer that the court will understand that a month is a long time to be away from work. Mariada seems OK with everything, she was very nervous going in but on the way out I asked her if she would be ready to talk to the Judge on the 23rd and she said this time it will be no problem.

Settling In

We are staring a bit of a routine here in Shkoder, Mariada goes to school at 8 then we pick her up at 1, have lunch and hang out or take her to practice. Yesterday was a practice day, so Bob and I dropped her off and went searching for a shower curtain, all we have is the cloth part and water is getting everywhere so we thought, how hard could this be. HA I had used Google translator and wrote it down before we left but still in every little shop we thought might have one we had Albanian’s running everywhere trying to find other Albanian’s that spoke some English. Needless to say we still do not have a shower curtain. We got back to practice early enough to watch the scrimmage which was fun and again dropped off two of her teammates.

This morning after dropping her off at school Bob and I went to visit Prenda at the baby orphanage, she wanted us to see the work that HFTW is doing there. It’s a very nice place and the babies where all out playing with exception of the two infants. After our tour, we went out to buy a Christmas tree to surprise Mariada with when she gets home from school. It’s just a little one but it is already helping to get me in the spirit.

Things are going great with Mariada, she is very loving and kind, and she is also a teen so we have our moments. She still isn’t speaking to much in English though we know she can, I think she is just too shy and afraid of saying something wrong, so we have staring pushing her a bit more and cheering when she says a whole sentence, which of course is followed by a very stern “Mom, dad, stop” like I said she’s a teen! Overall, we are feeling like God gave us the perfect fit and are so happy.

This evening is Bible study at church which Mariada enjoys so I think we will be attending that, then going to bed early so that we will be well rested for court tomorrow! I hope it’s all over in one hearing.


Meat market.
Merry Christmas !

Our produce department.

Household Goods .

Largest Catholic Church in the Balkans, right down the block.

Baby orphanage (sorry it's so blurry)

Soccer, Church, and More Soccer

Our weekend was pretty low key, on Saturday we took Mariada to her soccer practice. We meet teammates and her coaches all who love her very much. We got to the field first and when the coach pulled up in his Toyota pick-up he and another coach got out along with 10 other girls! He goes and picks them all up every week. The girls all shook our hands said hello and walked off giggling with Mariada it was very heartwarming. The one coach spoke good English while the other one spoke zero, so he asked to be translated. He wanted us to know how happy he was that Mariada has parents and that she is a very good kid, he thinks it’s wonderful that foreigners adopt Albanian orphans, especially the older children, (then the translator starts to laugh, and tells us that now he is joking) but he wishes that we would have waited two months because they have a cup match next month and Mariada is fifty percent of the team! HA funny guy. The practice was two hours long and I was the only mom present, there were a few dads that showed up and one grandpa. Girls have only been allowed to play organized soccer for two years so it’s great that Mariada is on a team at all. The English speaking coach pays for her fees and even sponsored her to travel to Norway for the World Cup games last summer; he made sure that we were going to keep her playing because he thinks she has a lot of talent. I don’t know too much about soccer but I do know that she LOVES it so yup, I think within a year I’ll know everything there is to know about soccer! On our way home she says, Mom, Dad I love soccer so much. I was so overjoyed to hear a full sentence I wanted to turn around a let her play some more :)

Sunday was church, and then Fredi and Prenda invited us to play a game of soccer with his team, so Mariada and Bob did that while I stayed back with Prenda and helped make diner. She made taco’s which were a bit different than ours but really very good. When we sat down and prayed Prenda was talking with Mariada, then she turned to me to fill me in and Mariada wasn’t sure what she was supposed to do with theses shells and what not, she had never seen taco’s before! She ate three of them!
It was after nine when we left so we came home made a few phone calls and went to bed, Mariada get’s up at 6:30AM for school. UGH

We just heard that the Judge is back at work and we should be able to have our hearing on the tenth, please continue to pray that this happens, we love being here in Albania but would very much like to have the stress of making her “ours” lifted off our shoulders.


Mariada'a Church, it was a full house this past Sunday and every single person came up to us and shook our hands, very nice Church.
Running drills.
Dad, showing her how it's done :)
The view from our penthouse! I keep warning Mariada that we don't have mountains in Michigan, she laughs kinda like I must be kidding, I'm gonna have to get goggle earth up to show her!

The Judge is Sick

Yup, the Judge is sick. We showed up to court this morning all ready to go and the girl working in our Judges office started speaking with Agim (our guy from BCS) and Bob and I knew right away something was up. The director from Mariada’s orphanage was there as well as the lawyer from the AAC. So we now have a new court date of December 10th. We all went out for a coffee to talk about what had happened and the Director and the lawyer do not want us to draw for a new Judge, they both say we have one of the better Judges for an international adoption and that we may end up with one of the ones that make it difficult. Mariada was really upset, even though she didn’t cry, she looked like she wanted to, I think she has learned not to, when I hugged her to let her know that it would be OK she pulled away a little which is so not like her. It’s so frustrating not being able to communicate the way we would like to. But other than this setback things are going well.

After lunch we went up to see Rozafa Castle. It was such a cool castle so fascinating to walk around something that has been here for 2500 years, we tried to explain to Mariada that a house that’s in America is considered really old if it’s 100 years old, she laughed and looked a little puzzled. I think the best part of the Castle trip was that Mariada got a chance to run around in the fresh air for a while, it really released some stress for her.

Tomorrow she has soccer practice and we are all looking forward to that, especially Mariada!

Standing on the edge of the castle.

This guy was watching us and I said what do you think he's thinking, Mariada says "Crazy Americans"!

She's a hugger!

Dad and Mariada working off some stress.

Skanderbeg's Grave we saw yesterday.

Teuta the head of the AAC.

The Birdge in the Middle.


We continue to ask for prayers that the Judge feels better soon so she can approve our adoption!