Hailee thanks everyone for the birthday wishes -- she had a nice day. We met with the Nelson's for lunch and than everyone came to our place. We enjoyed cake & ice-cream. The cake was absolutely beautiful and actually tasted pretty good --Hailee did a good job picking it out.



We went to the orphanage at 5 today and spent a couple hours there. The social worker, Natalya and the director searched for a child for us. It's hard to believe but there are none that are available at this time.

One 12 year old at another orphanage is available but the director there will not take into consideration our time here already -- we would have to do the full 15 days of visitation. It would be starting all over again, which means that we would be here at least another 25 days -- we just can't do that -- I don't have enough time left, Jack is already out of time and we can't afford both Jack & I to not have a paycheck coming in.

There is an 8 year old (first grader -- just much too young) & two sibling groups available. One of the sibling groups is 14 & 5, the other 14 & 11. We thought about this but in order to bring them home we would have to pay double the international fee, double the orphanage donation, double the plane fares, etc. We have only been approved for 1 child on our paperwork and the fact that everything doubles puts it far, far out of our reach. Even if the US Embassy would approve this change there is just no way we can afford to pay that kind of additional money.

Hailee seems to accept this and she understands that there just are no children available for us. Natalya asked her about a brother and Hailee told her no, she only wanted a sister. Yulia even explained to her that there were many boys available, but Hailee didn't budge on her wish.

So it is with the heaviest of hearts and deepest sadness we made the decision to come home. Coming home without a child .......... it feels so unbelievable ....... this is not the way this dream was supposed to end. This journey was supposed to be filled with joy, we knew there may be bumps along the way and that it might not be always be what we imagined ........... but this; this was not even a thought.

We know we tried, we know the agency and everyone involved here tried -- we understand that ............ but our hearts do not. There is anger, there is frustration, there is a helpless feeling and as I've said before an extreme feeling of failure. We have the room set, plans in place for school, for summer, for the future and now we're coming home without the dream we came here for.

Now we wonder where do we go from here?