Hotel Lokosphinx

Arriving late in St. Petersburg...thank you Andre our wonderful
driver who was so nice and helpful.



Rest for the weary traveler...the Hotel Lokosphinx was a much better fit for our family of 4. We were sad to only have one night in this amazing replica of Russian history. The hotel makes you feel you have stepped back in time...almost like staying at Catherine's palace which we visited on our stay. Although, internet was still a challenge we were able to check and send email from the second floor large common room...much better than having to sit in a smokey lobby. The smoking issue seems to be better in this hotel as well...poor Emily has been a trooper but her delicate sinus's have suffered much this trip. We are all very worn out physically and emotionally.

The room where we could get internet.

Beautiful stairway to our room

Looking up the stairs from the lobby.

Main room inside our suite



Our bedroom (we didn't think to take pictures
until we were leaving so beds were not
made...Oh, well glad to have the pictures)

I love that I can open the window's to our room and see the beautiful canal...this looks like what I grew up dreaming that Russia would be like. There is a corner market that we frequented that we were able to get water and snacks from. We also felt very comfortable walking out on the street and even saw what we thought was one of the St. Petersburg city orphanages nearby but couldn't be for sure. Lots of military presence on the streets as well. Our short stay was jam packed as we toured Catherine's Palace, and the 900 day siege monument and museum all in one day.

New Shilfet Family Portrait!

Wow! This has been an experience we will never forget. Our Lord is more gracious and more merciful than we ever imagined. We have been drawn closer to Him, and we praise Him for it! Time fails us tonight to describe the last two days, but here we are, ready to introduce our new family. We want to introduce Andrew David and Kathlena Hope Shiflet.

We'll try to post more pictures in the next few days. Right now, we need to eat and sleep. We haven't done much of either in a few days.

Thank you for your prayers. We hope to share soon how much those prayers have meant to us.

Made it to Ark!

Following 11-14 hours of sleep last night (depending on which Shiflet you survey!) and a fascinating tour of beautiful St. Petersburg today, we arrived-courtesy of Russia (state) Airlines-in Arkhangle'sk tonight around 8:30pm local time. We disembarked outdoors to a bus which then took us across snow-packed runways, to an outdoor terminal in deeper snow. We walked about a 150 meters to a small outbuilding where baggage is claimed. We all crammed into a small Russian-made 4WD wagon (with way too many bags) and made our way about 10 kilometers with our driver and guide over the frozen tundra near the White Sea to Hotel Pur-Navolok. What an adventure!It's now 11pm, and we're closing down for today.

It's hard to describe our emotions right now - we meet both the children tomorrow!!! We're excited...and a bit anxious/nervous.

David

Can't Sleep

Well it is 2am here and I am wide awake. I am not sure if I am adjusting better or worse. I was up last night at 4am and never went back to sleep. D and the kids are sound to sleep and have done well adjusting to the time change. It was rough yesterday afternoon because we had a tour of the city but I was so tired I could not keep my eyes open. A beautiful city with so much rich history and our guide, Alex, is very knowledgeable of Saint Petersburg so it was a really good tour. Thankfully, E videoed most of it so maybe I will be able to catch the highlights I missed when I dosed off.

We received quite a bit of snow fall here over night and throughout the day...J has been itching for a snowball fight ever since. It is cold here but not as cold as I would have thought. They keep the buildings and cars so warm that we find ourselves leaving the window open because it gets too hot. Wearing layers is a life saver!

The hotel we are staying in is very clean and nice. The Brothers Karamazo, it is a restored old building made to look like the Russian hotels of the early 1900's. We had breakfast and dinner at the restaurant. Both meals were very good and authentic Russian cuisine. E and I split something that resembled Beef Stroganoff and the boys had steak and potatoes with this gravy sauce that J absolutely loved!

We will be doing more touring today before our flight leaves for Archangelsk. I am already getting "butterflies" in my stomach about meeting the children. I still cannot believe we are actually here in Russia and in less than 48hrs will have laid eyes on our children for the first time in person. I am going to try to get some sleep now, good night!

Leaving the Airport

Here's our ride from the airport in St. Petersburg Saturday night when we arrived. Fortunately, our guide, Alex, speaks good English, and she knows the city very well.

Landing in St. Petersburg

Check out this video E. shot of our approach and landing in St. Pete! It may take a few minutes to load.

I'm finally figuring out this video posting thing. Hopefully more videos of Saint Petersburg-and most importantly-the kids and the orphanage will follow. Connection speed here is very limited, so anything I post will be short or lower quality. When we get to Ark, it may even be worse.

David

We made it to Russia!

Whoa! are we tired. I could not sleep a wink on the flight from the US to Germany but our flight from Germany to Russia....all of us were sawing logs for most of the flight. Emily took some beautiful video footage from the plane of Germany and as we were arriving in Russia. I will try to post that when we get our batteries charged...the camera and us.

We got through the Russian airport mostly uneventful... we had some confusion on filling out "registration" forms here. We thought this was done at the hotel but apparently not...Oh! well we backed out of line in pure Shiflet fashion with all of our luggage and quickly filled out the forms before the last metal doors locked shut...literally. You cannot be a straggler in Russia because you will get left behind.

I wish that I could describe the feeling of coming into this country. It is a mixture of solemn reserve and distrust I suppose...no one smiles, even when you smile at them...just one person at a time hand them this, don't talk just move along. Entering Russia was the most nerve racking part of all of this trip so far.

All of our luggage arrived safe and sound, nothing lost PTL! Even all of our liquids traveled well...Mitzi, you might have noticed our coffee toddy in the pic above. Yes, we will have Starbucks in Russia!

Driving to the hotel though, it looks like most large cities with shopping centers, McDonald's, old run down buildings but with everything in Russian. I am always amazed (with my limited traveling experience) how every city seems so similar/familiar even...I guess that is the mark of our modern times though. I am sure it would be very different without a guide helping us...it is still an unpredictable place but beautiful. It is not quite as cold as we thought...surprisingly. It did begin to snow as we were unloading at the hotel. Big snowflakes! we even later heard what we believe to be thunder although, it sounded quit different than TX storms. Alex said it has been unusually warm this year and last. They really have not had as much snow as in years past but she assured us we would definitely see snow in Archangelsk.

We are going to do some sight seeing tomorrow afternoon with our driver and guide, Alex (she is a very nice young woman who speaks very good English) Alex is very friendly and helpful; we are so thankful for her help.

Our hotel is nice and the staff is friendly here. We have internet service in our room so we will try to post as often as we can and update photos. The above picture is of our room. It was already dark when we arrived so we will try to get more pictures tomorrow.

Please continue to pray for us as we take our last leg of the flight on Mon. to Archangelsk. E and J have done amazingly well for their first major international flying. It still doesn't seem real that we are actually here and just days from meeting our kids. We appreciate all of the prayers, thank you all for continuing to lift us up.

Flight to St. Petersburg

Waiting for our Flight to Russia...security cleared for take off

Guten Tag!

Greetings from Germany:

Well I’ve been up for 22 hours now; the rest of the gang has been up 20. We have two more hours here at the Frankfurt airport, and then 4 hours to St. Petersburg. By the time we arrive at our hotel tonight, it will have been about 30 hours since we have seen a bed.

I’m glad it worked out to have an extra day-how appropriate it’s the Sabbath-to rest before we fly on to Ark and meet with the Russian Ministry of Education who grants us permission to visit the orphanages.

We’ll try to update again Sunday from St. Pete.

David

A Quick Goodbye...until Russia

Our bags are packed, so here is one last goodbye before we head for Russia. We think we have packed all we can and trust that anything we have left we will not need or can find in Russia. Our dear friends the Hood's are taking us to the airport, Thank you!

Thank you all, for the many emails, calls, and prayers over the past week. We are so grateful for the outpouring of love on our family throughout our adoption journey. We love you all!

The Last Minute Rush

Our same FedEx man came back with another package for us today. An international phone! Thank you, Russ, this will be huge for us in Russia I am sure.

Packing is in full swing...J being my point man for stretch wrapping. He has been a real good helper...he would have stretch wrapped the dogs into his suitcase but, Mom has to draw the line some where on what can go. :) We will have to save Chase and Charlie introductions for after coming home.

Emily is feeling much better and none too soon as she is our technical wizard! She has been loading every one's mp3's to the max to listen to on the trip as well as loading important files from the main computer to the laptop. Thank you, Thank you Emily!

Daddy has been diligently tying up loose ends with travel/hotel accommodations while trying to sell boxes. Thank you, Babe you have done an amazing job pulling all of this together this week!

It has not been easy but with the prayers and help of many friends this is really coming together. Okay, got to run because I think I was suppose to be getting something else off the computer instead of posting to the blog...oops! :)

Visa's are here...48hrs to go

Visa's arrived!! We actually had two Fed Ex deliveries today...I think we scared the first guy with our eagerness to greet him, he was very kind though and it was a good practice for the real delivery. The delivery man was very nice and patient while we took pictures...he was excited for us too! One of the amazing things in the past week has been the joy, strangers have shown us about our journey.

E woke up today not feeling well but she is a trooper, still working on translating for our photo books for the kids even though she is not at top speed. She is doing very well with her limited Russian. Thank you E for all of your hard work and diving in on such a huge task...you are awesome!

J. has been taking full advantage of feeling better by running around outside with the dogs while he can...they will miss each other.

One week from today...we meet

Hard to believe we are one week from meeting our children. I am in awe of how all this has come about.

Today has been the calm before the storm. J was not feeling well last night and spent most of today laying around recooperating. He seems much better tonight and no sign of anyone else going down so maybe we have dodged a bullet...bug. Kefir to the rescue!

E has been practicing her Russian for all of us. I just can't seem to sit still long enough to really consentrate on this...perhaps the long plane ride will be better for cramming.

Packing continues. I am realizing that I really can live on a lot less than I think. Thankfully, we have stretch wrap which is the secret weapon of the box salesman's packing technique. You can really pack it in with this stuff but it is easy to go over the weight limit. Putting all of my liquids into tiny bottles has proved time consuming and challenging since I am a bulk buyer but we are getting it done.

We confirmed that visas are to be delivered by 3pm tomorrow...yipeeeeee! Hotel rooms are reserved, plane tickets purchased...we are getting close to the launch sequence...so, until tomorrow, good night.

Okay....so we went a little crazy

Today was met with an early wake up call from New York needing copies of the kids birth certificates for our visas to be processed. Thankfully, a faxed copy was all that was needed and we knew that all had arrived on time. So, we will be looking for those visas to arrive on Wed.

Our itinerary has changed by one day as Russia has a holiday next Mon. (Feb. 25th). We decided to still leave on Fri. and take the extra day in St. Petersburg to recover from the long flight and time change. PTL, He knows we will need that extra time. So, we will be in the orphanages Tues, Wed and Thurs. of next week. We are still firming up our flight schedule but did confirm that our lay over is in Frankfurt, Germany. David will finally get the chance to use that German he took in college! :) HaHa

Our afternoon was filled with the divide and conquer strategy so Dad and J. took off for Academy to gather up some winter closeout deals while E and I headed for the Dollar store and Walgreens to pick up photos, photo albums, toys for the kids and travel sized everything (under 3 oz.s).

Okay, so we went a little crazy with the toy buying. It was so fun though to think about buying for them. I have not allowed myself this pleasure...I have stayed reserved but today what started as a small leak in the dam became a gully washer in a hurry. The picture above testifies to our fun and has added another aspect of realness to this journey. Soon, they will be holding these very items and for 3mos. they will represent this brief time we have with them until we return.

My favorite of these items are the photo books we put together. This was so fun, we laid out all of the pictures we had printed (80, doubles for 2 albums) then all four of us gathered and picked our favorites....it was tough in under 20 pictures to depict to our children who we are and where they are going to be living. Especially, as we are thinking about their tiny hands turning these pages over and over in the coming months until we return. Saying good bye is getting harder each day and we haven't even had the chance to say hello yet. Truly, it is only by the Lord's grace that we are able to press on and walk through this time. It is precious time though, to draw so near to the Lord and receive His peace.

Learning Russian

J.Michael-isms

What is this? J.Michael asked, as he picked up a yellow spongy object.

"Is this one of those stress-producers?

(get it, stress reducer, stress producer
-a more accurate description some might say.)

Heading to Russia...one week to go

All has gone well with our meeting today with Annise. We are set to go in one week. Yes, that is correct ONE WEEK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! So, today has been the mad dash to get our 4 visas together and sent off to New York for processing. I hope we filled everything out correctly.



All in all it was a highly productive day of almost finishing E and JM's current Unit study (one day to go), filling out visa paperwork, finding someone to take care of the animals (Thank you Steph B. and kiddos), cancelling milk orders for the next two weeks, finding a travel agent (thank you, Voddie), cancelling dinner plans with dear friends (so sorry, Malynda-I can't wait to try those enchiladas when we get home) and of course calling the grandparents who are on the edge of their seats now waiting for those new pictures of their grandbabies.


I still have so many friends to call but I am hoping you are checking the blog. If you hear it first from here treat it as if I had called you...because I would have loved to call everyone I know and let them know that this day is finally here. Thank you for your support...keep checking...more to report soon but for now I am totally exhausted...signing off til tomorrow.

Shiflet Valentine Tradition

For the past few Valentine's the kids have made this day very special for their parents. E and J.M. get dressed up, prepare and serve their Mom and Dad a special Valentine's dinner. It is so sweet to see how creative they are and how much they enjoy serving and honoring their parents in this way. Each year they seem to become more detailed in doing special things like vases of freshly picked flowers from the yard, cut out paper hearts to decorate the table as well as specially arranging the candles around the table. Oh and how could I forget the "walkie talkie" system J.M. created for us to let them know when we need refills...so cute! and quite ingenious. Truly a blessing I look forward to.

They are such good cooks now that most of the work is done by them and they shoo me out of the kitchen to get dressed up and wait for Daddy to come home...I am so proud of them and grateful for children who love to give and serve.

Our first Valentine with Emily...I spent all day decorating Emily's bedroom to look like a restraunt, I hung sheets to divide the room, and picked flowers-we lived in the country. Then I got dressed up and prepared a special meal for the two (three, Emily (4 mo. old) was sleeping though!) of us to surprise Daddy when he got home from work. It worked and he loved it.

We were so young and going out was a huge luxury that we just could not always afford-even for Valentines. Over the years though, I have grown to love this Shiflet Valentine Tradition...I would even say I am spoiled by it because I would rather do this than go to any restraunt! Thank you, my precious children for carrying on the tradition.

Blessings of a Blog

Now that we are getting closer to travel time I am so thankful for this blog. I am grateful for the opportunity to tell family, friends, and aquaintances about our journey in real time. Although, I would love to tell each person we know individually, time does not permit but how wonderful to be able to send you to this blog to check in and receive updates as often as you like.

We are so grateful to all of our family and friends who have been so supportive over the years as we have pursued and persevered through this adoption process. We are nearing the home stretch...which really is just the beginning of our life with our new children. I cannot thank you all enough for your kind words, hugs, phone calls, emails and especially prayers (keep them coming). The adoption process is a huge mountain to climb and we have been so blessed to have so many dear people help us carry the load and urge us on during the trying times. Thank you for your love and committment to our family.

We hope to have travel dates soon.....so keep checking back!