Very quiet day today. I need to help Mike with a book report, and there's laundry, but otherwise very little to report.
My book, Adopting Alesia: My Crusade for My Russian Daughter, explores the turbulent time it took for me to journey to Russia, decide to adopt Alesia, and then get her home, 2003/04. There were so many obstacles, and it was such a trying time for me, that writing obsessively in my journal became cathartic. Winnowing down the hundreds of pages into something readable would occupy what little free time I had for the next several years, culminating in the publication of my book last year. I don't expect it to ever be a bestseller, but it's an honest account of an adoption, and most adoptive parents who have read it understand my feelings, whether they adopted from Russia or not.
So I thought today I'd share some photos of the adoption.
This was my choir in January 2003, outside the hotel in Khabarovsk. I am right behind Steve, who is squatting, and I am wearing a hooded coat and sunglasses. The glare was fierce.
Above, the choir singing at the orphanage. I don't know what the white thing is showing on my shirt?! Below, the first photo of me and Alesia, just before the choir sang. Mother said later as soon as she saw that photo, she knew I was going to adopt Alesia. Took me some time to figure it out, because the thought was so scary. I did feel strongly that God was telling me to bring her HOME, though.
More photos of her in the orphanage... Below, Alesia and her friend Nadiya with Olga, who tutored Alesia in English at my request.
Christmas...
Sometimes charitable groups would give presents to the kids and then the caretakers would take them away as soon as the good samaritans had left the orphanage. Sometimes the older girls would beat Alesia. It was a really rough place.
This is Alesia and her best friend, Snezhana, outside the orphanage. This was made in spring 2004. It would take me about 6 more months to get her home. Snezhana also got adopted, by a single mom in who has since become a dear friend of mine. I just wished they lived closer. // Below, outside the courthouse just after the adoption hearing, November 14, 2004.
Below - Alesia at the Japanese restaurant where we ate the second night I had her. She ordered shrimp, not really knowing what it was, and when she first saw it she asked Pasha, in Russian, "Is this the foot of something?"
Below, this was made at her very first meal in a restaurant as Alesia Thompson, not long after she left the orphanage for the last time. She told me later she had never in her life known the feeling of "full" until she became my daughter.
Below, Alesia between her English tutor Olga, and Svetlana, the missionary who was instrumental in helping with letters, talking to the orphanage director, etc. Those two ladies, and my friend Kate's aunt Tamara, looked after Alesia when I wasn't there and I will forever be grateful for their kind and loving hearts.
Below,Alesia and I just before our tour of the Kremlin. I was SO cold!
Above, Alesia in our room at the Ukraina, a marvelous old hotel in Moscow. It was built during the Stalinist era, and had 5 restaurants, and we paid to go up on the roof and see out over the whole city. Quite a magical place.
Above, Alesia's first Christmas in America.
Below, Alesia about two months after she got home.
This was her first professional portrait, in about April of 2005:
Below, from summer 2010 - an amazing transformation, huh?!



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