Basile's Family Adoption

Hi Everyone,

 

Well, our wait is almost over. Just 2 more days until we can take Luca home from the orphanage. And like I said before, it gets harder to leave him there. Today, he wasn't the happiest kid when we dropped him off. He cried and asked for tati and was holding up his arms for me to pick him up not to leave. It was very hard and I just had to turn away so the care givers could take him to his room. It is comforting to know this doesn't have to happen much longer. Gabriela and I had our appointment in court and it was a very pleasant experience. The judge was very nice and looked at me like he truly cared and wanted to hear why we want Luca. The system is very protective of their children and their best interests come first and fore most. He was very receptive to what I said and was proud that we would be Luca's parents. It has been difficult the last couple of days since Gabriela returned to Canada. Nicolas has really missed her and words cannot express how much I miss her. You know it is amazing to think that you really don't know what you have until it's not their anymore. I know it's only a short time until we are together again but it is like a piece of me is missing and I can't wait to get it back. Luca asks for mami and I have showed him pictures of mami and his reaction is so cute. We can't wait until we get to the airport in Toronto to be reunited. On that note, we will be finally there on July 23rd. That day can't come fast enough.

 

We can't wait to see all of you. This will be the last entry on this blog as we are heading back to Kiev on Tuesday. I am assuming my schedule in the last week will be hectic. So at this time I would like to say thank you to all those that followed our journey here in the Ukraine. It has been one of the most memorable experiences of my life. This experience was even more special because of all of you. Your kind words of love and support made this time in the Ukraine so special. Good luck to all the families who will do the same in the near future.

 

Gabriela, your boys are coming home! Can't wait to see you baby.

With love to all,

 

The Basile Boys.

 

Nicolas, Luca & Frank.

Hello Everyone,

 

Yet another couple of days have passed in our time here in the Ukraine, and each day, it gets harder to visit Luca at the orphanage and leave without him. Nicolas has a hard time understanding why we keep leaving without him, and it gets harder to make him realize that this won't happen for much longer. It is almost as if he doesn't believe us anymore. It is not the easiest thing to make a child understand. Besides that, Luca is great. We have grown to love this child so much and we feel that same love coming back to us. Especially when he calls us Mami & Tati. We can't wait to bring him home to meet his family. Nicolas is missing his cousins. He asks about Luciano & Kyle everyday and wants to go home and play with them. He misses his friends from school and asks about Shemar all the time. Nonno, Nonna & Bunicu, your grandchildren are misssing you. Nicolas also said that Nonno has to make him a pizza, and he is not bringing his own food from home. "Joke from Nicolas". There was a group of kids that we met that live in the building we are staying at. When they realized that we didn't speak Ukranian and were from Canada, they were so friendly and nice which is comforting. The tried their best to speak english to us. Besides that, the same routine is taking place daily.

 

We would like to take this chance to thank some people for there love and support. Mom and Dad, Mama & Tata, Ruxandra & Tony, Vince & Rosa, Nick & Nadia, Kyle & Isabella, Luciano & Mikeala. You're love and support you have expressed to us during this experience will always be remembered. We would also like to send a special thank you to Rodica and the staff at Carc Adoption. Without you, this would not have been possible. Also, our facilitators here in the Ukraine. Lesya, Irina & Natasha. Words cannot express what you have done for us and how you have made our stay here very comforting. We are forever grateful to all of you.

 

We miss you all, until next time!

 

The Basile's

Hi Everybody,

 

I finally got the pictures to you. Those are my boys.

Talk to you soon.

 

The Basile's

Hi Everybody,

 

Things are moving along quite nicely here and Misha is growing more comfortable as each day passes. He calls us Mami & Tati although he hasn't quite mastered Nicolas just yet. Although he has said cola which is close enough. He is incredibly agile for his age and when he wants to run, good luck catching him. His appetite hasn't slowed one bit as this child eats anything you put in front of him. Today he also said hello and good boy. "somewhat" We can't wait to come home for everyone to meeet him. Nicolas and Luca as we started calling him get along great and Nicolas shares everything with him. We are three weeks into this trip and the time feels that it is passing so slowly, but we are almost there. Of course Nicolas taught Luca how to say no and it is quite funny because when he does it Nicolas starts laughing and luca is right behind him laughing his head off. The weather has been beautiful for the most part as the temperature is around 32-35 C daily. Night time is comforatbale too as it cools down to 15 C. And very little humidity. The apartment complex where we are living just turned off the hot water for the next month for pipe restorations. So boiling water to take a bath has been fun. We manage. It is tough going to the orphanage though when you see so many beautiful children that don't have a family. It is heartbreaking to think as Canadians we tend to take for granted what we have and when you see this, it puts everything into perspective. Children are so precious and it is a shame that so many are in this situation. I would strongly say that this adoption has been such a positive experience and believe me, the love you feel for a child whether ii is yours biologically or not, makes no difference.

 

I will try to write again in a few days.

 

Missing all of you!

 

The Basile's

 

Well, we just mentioned how big apetite Misha has and we didn't realize that we shouldn't really encourage that. He doesn't know when to stop, and we learned that we didn't know either. We fed him too much and he got sick. The teachers gave us shit and told us no more cookies, no more juice, no more nothing. We felt really bad. The second day they let us give him only fruits and water; still an improvement!?

Misha started to be comfortable enough to throw tantrums. It is cute how he does it. But also comforting for us is the way how we can manage to calm him down.

Misha is very fast on his feet and hard to catch. Laughing the whole way! He climbs everything and has a good balance. Nicolas gets courageous and tries the same but, like we all know, he is a bit clumsy, today he fell flat on his face and hurt his leg trying to climb a chair. It was a dramatic situation... he felt very embarrased and he cried saying he really needs a bandaid. Another reason to be carried on Frank's shoulders smiling on the way home!

Another sweet thing about Nicolas... he was watching outside from the balcony, and came inside with the question: "Mama, how come everybody here is peach?" We asked him what he meant, and he said "peach colour". We told him that Canada is a diverse country of many different people, but in Ukraine lives only Ukrainians. He was cute!

We are walking at least 4 km a day and I am impressed with Nicolas and how he keeps up. He always mentions that he will be faster than Shemar when he is going to come back in Canada.

On another note, we don't know how people live here. Cost of living is very high, everything is very expensive: food, clothes, housing,etc. We are by ourselves right now, our facilitator left for Kiev for some more paper work. Yesterday we went shopping and we stayed 10 minutes in front of a shelf not being sure of what we were buying. Everybody is looking at you in the stores; but I can say that here in Kremenchuk people are more pleasant than in Kiev, more helpful. Much more quiet.

I read blogs before about same experiences, and different people mentioned that you should bring different things (i.e. toilet paper). We don't think you need anything; everything can be found here.

We tried to add some photos but we have to install some software at the Internet Cafe, and without Natasha is very difficult to make this guy understand. So maybe next week when Natasha comes back we send some pics.

We change the permissions for our blog to be visited by anyone on the Internet, so whoever mentions that they want to read our blog, just give them the address.

Thanks everyone for your good wishes and thoughts; they mean a lot to us.

Love from Ukraine,

The Basile's