This past month has felt like a whirlwind. The sunshine and warm weather has finally arrived and I could not be happier about it. We had thought SP would be out of jail by now but Ukraine is still Ukraine. There has been holiday after holiday and of course everything shuts down for not only the holiday but the day after to help with the hangovers. But we have high hopes we will be getting him in the next week or so. We had a meeting with the department in Sumy about returning into the orphanage. It went better than we expected and we are supposed to be able to pick up the permission on wednesday. This is a HUGE answer to prayer. The next step will be calling the orphanage director to see if she will allow us back in. 2 of our graduates moved back to a family house that borders the orphanage. We went to help and I was able to see a lot of my kids. It was so wonderful to reconnect with them. The last time I had seen them was last august. After many conversations with them, I could tell that the upcoming graduation was weighing heavily on their minds. Most of them have been at the orphanage for most of their lives. Going into to life outside the orphanage is sure to be a scary adjustment and I see it in their eyes. I am in disbelief that they are already graduating. I know it has been six years since I first met them when they were just ending third grade. But the time has flown, and I am in shock that they are now the oldest class.
We also had an amazing experience last night. So often the kids we work with do not show results of progress but we know we have to continue showing them love. We know it is all in God's timing and that we may never get to see the good which is a depressing thought. But last night one of our kids we have worked with very closely came home from a church event. I asked him how it went and he raved about how cool it was and how there was about 60 kids. He said they were told a story about being grateful and they all had to go around and say what they were thankful for. I asked him what he said. He got a little embarrassed and said, "I told them I was thankful for you guys. That I have 3 American girls who have helped me through hard times and always want me to go
down the right path." I about lost it, as I can count on one hand not using all my fingers how many kids have said this to us. Now I know that the glory goes to God, but it was nice to hear that some of this hard work was actually getting through to someone. And this kid absolutely means the world to me. There is always a cycle with these kids so next week he could hate us but right now I am going to soak up the good place he is in. We had 7 kids here this past weekend which felt like a lot but we got to celebrate Vala's(Dusya's daughter) birthday. She turned 4 and it was probably her first birthday where most of the people in attendance were not drunk.Thank you for continued prayers as we always need them. We are looking forward to summer camp. We know for sure we are going to do a graduate retreat again but we have yet to know about a camp at the orphanage so please pray with us that we are granted favor.
