Last Day- Can you believe it

Today is our last day here! In fact we leave in less than 12 hours! Amazing! Today I am off and on emotions wise. Today I realized that it may not be all nerves but I think my trembling might also be excitement! The only other time I wanted to come home so bad was moving home from Virginia. Actually no,I have never wanted to come home more and have never been so excited to see your faces. I am trying to take the attitude of whatever happens, happens. There is only so much in my control. The Lord has to take care of the rest and if that is to let both my kids scream or something, then I will probably cry but have to endure. Please be praying very hard that we can get seats together. Right now we do not. I am a little concerned about that but I know the Lord has us in His capable hands. Please also pray for sleep for the kids. Neither of them sleep unless they are actually in bed so I am hoping that they will regardless. And lastly - just for smooth flights and transitions. We only have an hour and a 1/2 in Frankfurt to switch planes so we are in need of His guidance in that circumstance as well. I of course am nervous being my nature but I think God is working on strengthening me. I have had times of calm today though. It hasn't helped having so much cooped up time to think.

Today we stayed in the hotel until we had to be ready at 1:15. I worked on organzing the suitcases and carry-ons. We only have 2 big and 1 small suitcase to check and two smaller bags, stroller, and a purse to carry-on! Not so bad huh? The big suitcases are not full either! At 1:15pm we met Alex downstairs and he drove us to the Embassy. We and about 12 other adoptive families waited to swear some stuff and get our children's American visas in their Russian Passports. They told us we should be fine in Germany but if not to keep our adoption certificates near by. The kids will be US citizens as soon as the plane touches down in Portland! They will have dual citizenship until they are 18 and then must re-apply for their Russian status if they would like. We need to get them passports in America to give them extra validity and then also apply for American birth certificates. There is still a lot of paperwork, registration, and post placement reports to do after we are home. It was so nice to meet other families in the same boat. Most of them are all flying home tomorrow and some of their kids were acting up for the couple hours we were there so I didn't feel so bad. It feels good to know you are not alone and this is not the first time someone has done this. I think I will take my mom's advice and talk to the stewardess' when we arrive on the plane and make them aware of the situation. There is only one other couple taking our route that was at the embassy today. They are on the same flight to Frankfurt but then they are headed somewhere else. They adopted a much older son. I am thinking maybe 11. He just loved Mollie. He just watched her and patted her head and they made faces back and forth. She was taken with him also. She is a little flirt and he was winking at her! We all got our paperwork and then wished each other good flights and went our separate ways. I wish we could all fly together. Too bad. They need an adoption plane or something! That would be AWESOME! We were given a sealed envelope that we have to give to passport control in Portland for the kids stating their citizenship. We are not allowed to open it. Wow, TOP SECRET. So weird. These are not the first documents we have had to deliver sealed. It is really so we won't tamper with them but still feels odd.

Then we went to Hard Rock Cafe for lunch. It went alright. The kids were as good as they could be. Jones is getting pretty spoiled right now and that makes it hard but it won't last long! He will be blessed at home but will also not get everything he wishes. Mollie just goes with the flow except she was terrified of the restroom there for some reason. She is also terrified of this tub in this hotel. Hopefully she won't mind the one at home. She sure loved that big blue one. She is singing along with Blue's Clues right now and shoving her thumb to the back of her mouth where she is teething and chewing it to death. It is like she is getting all her teeth at once. Another adoptive family has been experiencing the same thing with her daughter. ANyway, we stopped at the grocery store and purchased some airplane snacks and came back to the hotel. I am just waiting for the hour when you guys wake up so i can talk to my family on the phone. This will be my last blog for awhile although I will probably continue to update it through the year and will try to update after just a couple days and letting you know when we are ready for visitors and such. Thank you again for all your support, love, and prayers. It has really been incredible. Keep it up if you think of us, we can still really really use them. Especially tomorrow. I will talk to you all soon.