And were back! Part 1

So much has been going on lately that we have plum forgot about the blog. Well, to catch up we left on October 8th for Moscow. It was an 11 hour flight and the worst night of my life! We got to Moscow along with two other family's and we (and our luggage) packed into two cars. The traffic was so bad that it took us three hours to go from the airport to the apartment were we stayed. Once we got to the apartment and got settled mom and dad had to go and get a medical check by the Moscow doctors. They had to do this because our doctors don't know nothing about medical. While mom and dad were out I stayed in the room and slept for three hours!

We have finally received our court date!!! We will leave on or about the 8th of October to return to Russia, and will go to court on the 13th of October. We will be returning to the States sometime around the 20th through the 29th of October if all goes well. Thanks to everyone for your many prayers and encouraging support. Sometimes it just seemed that these final days would never come. God has been so very faithful during this long process. He has grown us over the past 3 years. If He calls us to do something He will provide every means. I heard on WAGP this last week one of the pastors say that we must do our part and God will do His part. God's part is always bigger. Even though this process has been sometimes discouraging and trying we would not change any of it (except perhaps our attitude).

We are back from our 1st trip to Russia. It was wonderful to see the children and to get to know them. Egor (Matthew) was very friendly and happy. Maria (Anne Marie) was a little shy and harder to approach. She warmed up to us as the days went by. Anne Marie was in the hospital and was brought back to the orphanage to see us then taken back to the hospital. She has asthma and got very worn out during our visits. They are very close to each other and did not like to be separated. We flew to Moscow and from there flew 4 hours on to Novosibirsk Siberia. The orphanage was located 2 hours outside of Novosibirsk in a small village called Tuguchin. The village was very small and most people lived in small log style houses with no running water-they used a community well to draw water-and no indoor plumbing. The road was just barely passable and very uncomfortable. We actually had an accident while on the way to the orphanage. The rear tire blew out on the car we were in and by the grace of God hit a guard rail which stopped us from going down an embankment when our driver lost control of the vehicle and spun out of control.The car was out of commission so we had no idea how we were to continue on to Tuguchin. This was to be our last visit with the children and we did not want to miss it. Our coordinator sent someone to take us on to the orphanage and it was so worth it.
We are expecting to return in about 6 or 8 weeks for our court date.Sarah is very excited that she will be going with us on the next trip.
We are so thankful for all of your prayers. We hope you enjoy the pictures.

Our news is WE ARE GOING TO RUSSIA at last. We have our invitation from the embassy in Moscow and will be leaving around the 13th of July. We have not made our airline reservations yet but are waiting on our Visas. We are expected in Moscow on the 14th and will then fly on to Siberia. Please pray that all will go smoothly and that God would prepare us and the children for our first meeting. We really have no idea what to expect from that first meeting and I never expected to be this anxious. Your prayers are coveted.

We have officially accepted the referral for the twins (Maria and Egor). We will be traveling as soon as Russia sends us an invitation. That should come in any day along with an invitation to enter the country. We will apply for our visas and hopefully be leaving in a few weeks for our first visit to meet the children. This will be an exciting time for us. Please pray that all will go well and that the orphanage will supply all of the information that we will need to submit to the doctors at the International Adoption Clinic at MUSC in Charleston. Thank you all for your support and prayers.

We finally have some news to report. We have heard from Russia that twins available for adoption. A boy and girl 4 yrs old. We are trying to get as much information as possible to MUSC so that they can determine their medical condition. It is very hard to get information like this from Russia because they don't like to give it until the family actually comes to see the children. We do have pictures so we will post them. They are so precious and we are very fortunate
to be offered twins. Please pray that all goes well with the medical reports. If so we will be traveling for our first trip sometime in June.

We received word from Russia yesterday that a new director of orphanages has been appointed in our region. This is her first time in this position. She is making some changes from the way things were done in the past. Actually she is making changes and requirements that no other region throughout Russia is requiring. Our facilitator in Russia told us that since we were adopting two children and since we have a biological child living in the home, the director will only let us adopt siblings. Since it could take a very long time to find siblings to match the age range we have requested we are having to change the ages we are willing to accept to 0-6yrs for both children. This requires a change in some of the paper work. We see this as an opportunity to show God that we really do trust Him and will submit to His will. We know that God has chosen our children and will deliver them in His timing. Please pray for these children who are waiting to find forever homes. Please pray that they are being loved and fully cared for by a gentle and caring provider. I keep remembering what Bob Glover once told me.
He said that we should pray for these children to have a visible peace . This is what I would ask that you pray. That God would give them a peace so that who ever comes in their presence would feel that peace and not only be blessed by it but would want to meet their needs.
In Christ Alone
Bob, Jo and Sarah

update March 17th, 2008

We have heard some news recently that is very exciting. Our case worker at CWA tells us that our dossier together with other dossier will be registered at the Department of Education tomorrow.
Once this is done our name will be submitted for referrals. The word is that this is taking anywhere from 2 to 6 weeks. So (according to our case worker) we can expect to travel to Russia sometime in early summer. We have waited so long just to get to this step that any news is exciting and an answer to prayer. Thank you all from praying and supporting us as we patiently wait for God to move at His time. We know that He has His divine timing and we would not want to jump ahead of Him. In this as in all things He has our best interest in the palm of His hands.

"Commit your way to the Lord; trust in Him and He will do this: He will make your righteousness shine like the dawn, the justice of your cause like the noonday sun." Psalm 37:5-6

The Brunsons

Novosibirsk, Russia

Hello Everyone,

This is such an exciting and very busy time for our family. We are finally at the stage where all of our paper work for the adoption has been submitted to The Christian World Adoption Agency (CWA) again.
It has been sent on to our agent in Novosibirsk and will be presented to the Minister of Education. This has probably actually already happened. Some of you already know some of our story ,that we have been waiting for 2 years for this adoption to happen. Russia was closed to all adoptions for all of last year due to reconstructing of some government agencies. We, unfortunately, were caught up in this freeze and had to redo all of our documents. When Russia finally opened the region that we were assigned to, Rostov on Don, they had still not completed all of their compliance documents so we were asked if we would be willing to change regions so as to make things go faster with our adoption. We changed from Rostov on Don on the Black Sea to Siberia. Burrrrrrrrrr!. We are just happy to be moving forward.
Just to share how God works in spite of our plans, we were planning to adopt only one child but, after having all these months to sit and wait we felt God calling us to adopt two children. We are so thrilled that God would entrust these precious little ones to us. Please pray that we will be faithful to lead these children in the way that God would have us. Pray that they would accept Christ as their savior at an early age and that they would grow in the grace and knowledge of the Saviour.
We will keep you posted as we hear news.
Thanks for your prayers
Bob, Jo and Sarah Brunson