My Life is Already Forever Changed

Just reminiscing ... This is the video I made after our second day of bonding with our little boy. It breaks my heart to watch this, I almost had to shut it off. A boy who enjoyed a mama and papa so much should not have to have them taken out of his life for so long for what are extremely long time frames due to government paperwork that must get done in Kazakhstan in order for our adoption to go through. The end result will be that soon this laugh will fill our rooms and hallways in Brooklyn. But it breaks my heart nonetheless that he should have had to be without us for so long. And then again, once we get home after court and he is officially our son, there is still another 5 weeks until he is home. Almaty happens to be a longer process than others.

I think of Batyrhan waiting, and I think of the other children left behind, and the countless orphans all over the world and in Haiti whose life might be bleak, who might never feel the joy of finding a family. Children who have to live their entire childhood in an institution that offers nothing but the basics and sometimes often less than that.

There are more than 100,000 children living in institutions throughout Kazakhstan.
48,000 of them are orphans.
When they turn 16 they will leave the system and 15% of them will commit suicide.
60% of the girls will become prostitutes and 70% of the boys will become criminals.
Only 295 children came home to America last year.

Two Hearts for Hope is a non profit organization that is dedicated to providing hope for those children in Kazakhstan who will never find forever families. Please find it in your hearts to donate even $5 to this organization that is truly doing G-d's work. Started by two adoptive moms with children born in Kazakhstan, Stacy and Kim, dear blog friends, could not turn their backs on those children still waiting. Currently Two Hearts for Hope is holding a raffle where you can win some cool prizes including Grandma Marsha's Beaded and Crocheted socks. Each raffle ticket is $5 and money goes towards the building of a huge playground in one of the orphanages outside of Almaty.



Click here to see a Video about Two Hearts for Hope which is where I found the above statistics.

Bedtime Songs AKA Musical Theater Karp Style

Presidential Blood?

Nursultan Nazarbayev -- the President of the Republic of Kazakhstan since its inception in 1991.


Day 20 since we have seen our boy and I miss him very much.

Family Resemblance

Little Brother happily will share some family traits -- for example, a cute dimple in the chin just like big sister Eden



and beautiful eyes as dark as chocolate kisses like big sister Emma.




Big Sisters Emma and Eden, waiting patiently for their little brother to finally come home ...




Special thanks to my brother, Howie, for his beautiful photography ... soon enough another will fill his viewfinder. Thank you Howie!

More Photos of Emma and Eden's Little Brother

Still no news yet for our court date and time does seem to be passing slowly. The unfairness of the situation for Batyrhan only grows more and more in my heart with each passing day. But I have faith in the process and know that our court dates will eventually come and then shortly after, our final trip to Almaty, in which we bring home forever a little boy to complete our family.

Bolat, our dear translator, saw Batyrhan again today and took two photos. He appears older to me and his hair is getting longer. I was very very pleased and simultaneously heartbroken to hear that Batyrhan ran over to Bolat to hug him and would not let him go. Once again, as it was during our visits that Batyrhan only ever saw Bolat, I am hopeful that there will be memory for us and that perhaps deep within that hug that is hope for us to be there as well. I am also a little bit more sure, from those reactions to Bolat, that likely attachment to us will not be a cause of concern.

We talk about Little Brother every day, we sing good morning songs to him just as I am putting Emma and Eden to bed. He is thought about, imagined in future upcoming family events and loved very much from far away. Decluttering continues, the color blue for his room is ruminated on, a Yankees baseball cap, gotten as a gift already by one of our favorite hat wearing friends, is hanging on his door. Stuffed bears wait for him on his pillow. Mommy and Me class schedules are perused. Images of us playing together and running in the field of Marine Park cloud my mind often. The girls can't wait for his arrival home -- they are proud big sisters already.

What I also am pleased to notice is as much as they bicker over nonsense at times, Emma and Eden appear to be more "in love" with each other than they were before we left for Kazakhstan. We walk back home after picking up Emma from school and Emma will just stop in the street to hug and kiss Eden and tell her "You are so adorable, do you know that?" At night, I notice they are playing more together in imaginative or artistic games that involve both their input. Their friendship and strong sister bond is growing. This is what I always wished for and the fact that they remain best friends as we bring in a little brother is more than I had dreamed.

Time Passes

Photo of a snow capped tree in Almaty on a clear day in December 2009.

It has been almost 2 weeks since we have been home. Time has been spent with family and friends and we have gotten back into the swing of our lives. It took me a very long time to get over the jetlag and I would say it took me about 12 days to feel really back to myself. Is it true that it takes one day for every one hour time difference? That might be right. I am finally staying up later than 8pm and not getting up at 4 am.

The first few days at home had me very busy with my family which left me no extended time to think about Batyrhan during the day. So what happened was I would become awake in the middle of the night in fits and starts with my mind racing a million miles an hour. Wondering about him -- about him there and then at home, wondering about me becoming a more organized and efficient mother and reminding myself that good enough in those areas is just fine. I would get up at 4 am and rush to my bookshelves to pour over my adoption books because I could not sleep and I was concerned about attachment. It's not like I want to worry about these things and it's not like I don't know I overanalyze. This is totally in my nature, nothing is new here. So in order to allay my anxiety, I had to squelch it by reading books at 4 am and then taking naps later in the day. Such was life for the first few days home. I am considerably better now thankfully!

I received a photo on January 6th from our translator Bolat who is still at BH#3 helping with another family. He wrote to me that he was outside the baby house when he saw Batyrhan taking his evening walk with his group. He called out to him in Kazakh "Hi Batyr!" and Batyrhan ran away from his group and towards him! Even the caregivers were surprised. Each day when we were there Bolat would go to get Batyrhan and bring him to us for play time. Perhaps our little boy ran to him hoping for what was next. Bolat asked the caregivers about the 8x10 photos we left which were supposed to be taped near his bed. I was disappointed to find out that these women had no idea where the photos were which likely means that in almost 2 weeks, Batyrhan has not been shown our photos as we had hoped. Bolat said he would try to find out what happened.



I am very excited (and perhaps crazy) but we signed up for Kazapalooza this June, a weekend convention in which we will meet other Kaz families from all over the US and Canada. I have been following along with the goings-on of Kazapalooza for the past two years looking forward to the day we'd be there as well. Though it will be only about 4 months that we are home before we head off to this weekend in Milwaukee, I am hopeful that the event will not be any more overstimulating for Batyrhan than all of us can handle for one brief weekend. I know that Emma and Eden are very excited to go and to show their little brother the little water park that is part of the hotel. It's amazing to think that Emma will celebrate her 8th birthday the weekend of this event, with a new little brother and new little Kaz cutie friends. I feel so blessed to have met wonderful friends and supporters through the blog world and it will be wonderful to get to meet in person all these people who I already consider dear friends over the course of the Kazapaloozas in the coming years.

So life goes on as usual here, with my evenings spent de-cluttering, sorting and stacking in preparation for an active little boy in our lives. Our house seems too small for us now but I think it's just a sign that I need to get rid of lots of stuff. Emma and Eden have been sharing the same room (unofficially) for almost a year now. They enjoy sleeping in the same full size bed and seem to sleep well when they are near each other. They have been wishing for bunk beds too. I would have never suggested to take Eden's room away from her (the tiny pink room with a bed she no longer uses) but it was she who said "Little Brother can sleep in my room and we can paint it blue!" So this is the plan for now and we slowly make arrangements for this to happen. After my pride at finally doing my first hammer and nail project into Eden's wall, it will be time to take it down and make room for a little boy.



I was never one to walk around with a brag book when Emma and Eden were small. Yet these days I find myself taking out of my bag a small stack of photos of our adorable little boy and showing them to anyone who will look. Emma and Eden have also taken their turns taking the stack to school. More than one person has said he actually resembles me in some ways. I tend to agree we both have the same happy cheeks.

HOME SWEET HOME!!!!!!

Time to travel from Almaty to NYC door to door: 22.5 hours
Chocolates purchased in Amsterdam airport: 20 Euros
Length of Delay for extra security check in Amersterstam: 1.5 hours
Amount of Hours I Slept During Entire Trip Home: 1.5 hours
Number of Movies I watched on Plane: 2
Number of times we thought of Batyrhan on the plane: Too many to count
Number of times we thought of Emma and Eden on the plane: Too many to count

Getting Hugged by our Daughters after not seeing them for 18 days: PRICELESS!!