Storm clouds are passing

View from the Hotel Almaty balcony. Opera House in the foreground and the Zailiysky Alatau mountains in the back ground.

We went to bed last night with heavy hearts over not getting to go before the judge and having to wait another week. Maybe we will find the positive that will come from the delay. We just stopped and prayed for Andrew and the process and Lainey. Also we set into motion a few requests for changes that are important in order to stay longer. We awoke this morning and with the previous emotional day behind us, the prospect of being here another week was a little easier to contemplate.


One of the changes needed was new flight schedules. With Lainey at home and starting her first day of first grade on Aug 13 (happy b-day Dad) we really want to be there. It looks like we will make it thanks to Shawna at Golden Rule travel we will fly out Aug 12 and get home Sunday Aug 12. By the way Shawna is the most awesome travel agent we have ever worked with and her company Golden Rule Travel (Goldrule.net) specializes in humanitarian fares which adoption travel qualifies as, so she has been able to help with good fares with little notice.
Second we needed to cut our daily rent. Our in country staff has lined up the same apartment we had on our first trip (which we liked) and we will make that change Sunday. This will save us about 50% of our current hotel room rate a day, and we will have a kitchen, washing machine, and comfortable mattress. It does not have air conditioning but the weather here has been surprisingly cool so we should be okay.


Our employers have been awesome and we appreciate their kind flexibility.

We had a good visit with Andrew today. We no longer see the shyness that he exhibited the first couple of days of this trip.