Visas and Travel Arrangements

On the way home from Birmingham I started taking care of business! Talking to Terri about details, making flight arrangements with a travel agent (great agency in Seattle that works with a lot of adoptive families…the agent was GREAT to work with and very knowledgeable about the process!), looking into the visa process, etc.

For our visas, we used an agency called Go To Russia (GoToRussia.com) and luckily you can fill out an online application (you print out the application after it auto fills in the details for you and then you mail it in). The application is just crazy though…you need to have addresses and phone numbers of past employers, schools, etc. in addition to a ton of other details. It took us several hours to fill out both applications. It was a very stressful process because we are on such a time crunch and I analyzed everything we put on there, double and triple checking every little detail. The representative at Go To Russia was so helpful and easy to work with though - I highly recommend them if you are traveling to Russia!

To complicate matters, Russia has several holidays coming up in the next few weeks…5 holidays in the next 10 business days before we travel to be exact. Because of this, we had to use a very quick processing time which, as you could expect, was a bit more expensive than if we had more time. And by a bit more expensive I mean like twice as expensive. We just had to laugh about it because it was so expensive and crazy what we were having to pay. God is so faithful though and even though money has been going out very very quickly over the past few days, He faithfully provides! And it's not our money in the first place, everything we have is the Lord's!

Everything is in the mail as of Saturday morning though and we are praying that everything moves smoothly and that we get those visas in the mail quickly. Please join us in that prayer! It is really going to be pushing it to the very last second...oh how it makes the planner and organizer in me cringe. "Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God." Philippians 4:5-6

Now I start on my lengthy lengthy to-do list…I mean, my head spins when I look at it! But what a great problem to have. Who needs sleep, right??