When a needy person stands at your door, God stands at His side

Becky's sister, Dana again. The quote above is a Hebrew proverb and the truth of it is magnified through the Ukrainian orphans who are in the US visiting and looking for their families. The group of orphans that were here last year are just now coming back to the US with their forever families. I am amazed at how each child has ended up with the family that was right for them, and each family has ended up with the child that was right for them.

So many of these adoptive families (including Becky and Kevin) said they were only hosting, there was no way they could adopt. There wasn't enough room, money, time etc. But they knew their kids when they saw them in this group of orphans. I hope that everyone reading this will take the time to come to one activity with this new group of kids and just open their hearts to the possibility that their child might be there.

On to my favorite quotes from R and S, the two orphans who are staying at my home and are looking for families:

I took the boys to the grocery store to buy food for their lunches and told them they could buy whatever they wanted. Every time we put something in the cart R (who speaks English) would say, "Dana, this is so much. This is so much to eat for lunch." I kept telling him we could use the food for multiple lunches but I think he was afraid I expected them to down it all in one night.

I asked the boys if they wanted to buy anything for someone back in Ukraine, R said he wanted to get something for his girlfriend and S got a huge smile on his face and yelled out, "Babushka!" He wanted to buy something for his grandma! Who can resist a 14 year old who wants to buy a present for his grandma?!?

My 14 year old was super impressed with the way S downed Tabasco sauce so he sent me out to buy "Insanity Sauce", which is made with super hot ghost peppers. My son Carter and a couple of his friends tried a drop on their finger and their eyes almost popped out of their heads. R tried a drop and had the same reaction. S tried a drop and then spread it over his chicken! His eyes were watering and he downed three glasses of water but he was bound and determined to eat that sauce.

R was eating a candy and he said to me, "In Ukraine they say the woman loves chocolate. In America does the woman loves chocolate?" My 9 year old yelled out, "Yea, that's why in all the movies the lady gets a big heart filled with chocolate. If you don't give her that she won't love you."

Yesterday (the 24th) R said to me, "Today is the day the man with the long beard walked far. He had a golden (makes a motion of hammering something into the ground) - that happened in Utah." Well, he may have had Brigham Young hammering in the Golden Spike but I still think he had Utah history down better than most Americans!

I asked both boys if they had ever had Pop Rock candy. R said no and S (with his very limited English) pointed to his mouth and said, "Yes, fireworks." Great description!

These are GREAT boys and would be a great addition to the right family. There are 12 other children in this group looking for their families - boys and girls of all ages. Thanks for all the love and support (and donations) for Becky and Kevin, now that Sergei and Max are here I can barely remember our family without them! We hope we can bring the same joy to another family.

Just Call Him Dimples

As you can read in the post below we are currently hosting two boys from different orphanages in the Ukraine. R and S. We actually had the chance to have S stay with us for a few days when he was here last year. He spent most of his time with a family who wanted to adopt him but was ultimately unable to complete the adoption process, leaving him as the only kid from last year's group who did not get adopted.

We adore S and have been writing him throughout the year so we were thrilled when we found out we got to have him in our home again. S is 14 and will turn 15 in April. He is a sweet, funny boy and is willing to go along with anything we plan. He is darling and has deep dimples. He loves the outdoors and anything in the mountains.

He gets along great with our teenage sons and all their friends and is also really good with our two younger kids. He would fit easily into almost any family configuration I can think of. He wants to please and is always helpful  . . . we will miss him TONS when he finds his family.

If you want to meet S or any of the kids who are here you can attend any of the activities that are planned for them or host them in your home. Contact Rob Jolley at 801-259-7034.

Meet our Future Attorney - R

Becky's sister, Dana here! My family is currently hosting two boys, R and S, from the Ukraine. The boys came over with the same group that brought over Becky's boys last summer, and like Becky's boys these boys are looking for their family.

Let me introduce you to R. R and S are from different orphanages and didn't know each other when they got here. R speaks English - well. He taught himself after visiting the US several years ago. Because R has the advantage of speaking English he is able to translate for S. R takes this responsibility seriously and has gone out of his way to make sure that S understands everything that is going on.

R is 15 and is big for his age (though not as big as my 15 year old). He is great shape and seems to be a natural athlete. He is motivated, as evidenced by his ability to teach himself English. He has big plans for the future - he wants to go to college and law school and he is willing to do the hard work to get there.

In addition to being a great translator for S, R has been amazing with our younger kids. I expected he would get along well with our 17 and 15 year old and he does, but he is also darling with our 11 year old daughter and 9 year old son. He is especially cute with our son. He plays with him, encourages him and even prods him to make better decisions and listen to his parents.

R would be an amazing addition to any family, though I would love to see him in a family with some little kids. I am certain he is a success story just waiting to happen.

If you are interested in meeting R you can attend any of the events the kids will be at over the next three weeks to meet him. You can also host him in your home. The family that adopts this boy will be a very lucky family! Contact Rob Jolley at 801-259-7034 for more information on any of the kids.

Pass it on after reading

Please take a moment and pass on the link to this post - today!  You can help to unite a child with their mother and father with a simple Facebook link, Twitter tweet, or email forward.  Something small like that was what lead us to our boys.  We know the kids in the pictures below - ask us about them!  The letter and details follow below...

Friends, Colleagues and Clients,

Last year I sent you an email about a group of Ukrainian orphans that were coming to Utah in hopes of finding their “forever” families. They arrived last summer on July 18^thand by the time they returned to their orphanage 21 days later 10 of the 11 kids who came had met families who were interested in adopting them, including three siblings who did not travel here!

Opportunity for More Miracles! – Kids Arriving in Late July!
We are bringing 15 more children from Ukraine to Utah this summer to find adoptive families on July 19. I am looking for volunteers to help with their visit. I am looking for potential adoptive families, host families, Russian translators and volunteers to help with their visit here in Utah.

If you know of a family who might be interested in adopting one of these kids, hosting one of these kids in their home, translating for these kids or volunteering during the visit, please forward this email to them TODAY and have them contact me via email (robjolley@msn.com) or call me at (801) 259-7034.

Better yet, please forward this email to your email contact list and Facebook friends. The more people who see this email the more likely that potential adoptive families will be contacted. Even if you don’t think one of your contacts would be interested, please send this email to them anyway. They may know someone who might be interested. You may be a link in the chain of a child finding a family!

More Details
We expect them to be arriving in Utah on July 19th and staying until the morning of August 12th.

Adoptive families do not need to live in Utah. Two of the families from last year were from other states.

The list of kids who will be traveling here includes children from the same Ukrainian orphanage as our daughter. Five boys and five girls, a brother and a sister, and two siblings groups whose youngest sibling is not old enough to travel: two sisters (older one is visiting), and two sisters with a little brother who is too young to travel. The ages of the kids traveling here range from 6 to 16. The majority are over twelve. Two files are attached which contains a list of the kids coming and their photos. The list also contains sibling groups who aren’t traveling but are also looking for families.

The Incentives for Action: Both Positive and Negative!
The benefit of this kind of hosting program is that the kids who are coming here have been hand-picked by our adoption facilitator in Ukraine and the orphanage directors as the children most likely to adapt and bond to an adoptive family. A prospective adoptive family gets to spend time with the child here in the US. in the comfort and convenience of their own home. All members of the family can participate in sharing their lives for a few days with their guest. Hosting a child is a unique way for a family to make an adoption decision!

While there is a wonderful cause for celebrating when a child finds their forever family, life continues to be a grim existence for most orphans. The statistics can remind us what can happen “when good people do nothing”. As I told you last year:

· Ukrainian orphans "graduate" from the orphanage system at the age of 16.

· Many of them, after they graduate, will become homeless and alone and lack the education necessary to provide for themselves.

· 10% commit suicide by their 18th birthday.

· 60% of the girls will end up in prostitution.

· 70% of the boys will enter a life of crime.

· Only 20% will find work.

· These are the kids that human traffickers target and exploit.

· Typically, after the age of 5, a Ukraine orphan only has a 20% chance of being adopted.

However, over 80% of the children who come to the U.S. on hosting programs like the one we did last summer meet families who adopt them!

As you can see from these statistics, the future of orphans is very bleak if they are not adopted. Please consider taking a few minutes to broadcast this opportunity to your network of friends! Just imagine the satisfaction you would feel to help a child meet their forever family!

But equally important, the families that adopt these children will have a life-changing impact upon their own lives as well. This has been the case for my wife, my family and me. We are so grateful that we found three of our children through similar hosting programs!

Thanks!

Rob Jolley

And Then There Were 16 . . .

Guest blogger Dana here. (Becky's sister). Becky has big guilt from not blogging but she also has 5 kids so I thought I would help her out. We just got back from our family trip to Bear Lake and Max and Sergei brought the grand kid count to 16! Becky and Kevin are great, patient, funny parents and the girls are FABULOUS. Here are some cute things about the boys:

-Max calls Sergei "Sir-la-gear". I am going with the phonetic spelling because I have no idea how to spell it correctly. It is one of those longer-than-the-real-name nicknames and it is cute coming out of Max's mouth. (Becky and Kevin do not think it is cute coming out of Max's mouth in the middle of the night when he is looking for his brother but I do :)

-Max does crack. Max is tall but SUPER skinny. He cannot keep a swimsuit pulled up to save his life.

-Sergei has a little obsession with BMWs. Whenever we see one he points and says, "Sergei's car." Whenever he sees a junky old car he points and says, "Dana's car." He thinks it is hilarious.

-Even more hilarious to Sergei than pairing you with an ugly car is pointing at your shirt and saying "ketchup" and then getting you in the chin when you look down. This was also the most hilarious thing to his mom Becky until she was like 30 years old - the apple does not fall from the tree.

-Max LOVES pop-its. If you want to win him over bring him a box of pop-its. Best 39 cents I ever spent.

-Somewhere in the Ukraine there is a tall, skinny teenage boy that took good care of Max. Sergei is always Max's favorite but a close second is any tall teenage cousin. We have a lot of teenage boys in the family but he is especially drawn to my oldest son, Harrison, who is 6'4". When he couldn't have Harrison he was very happy to have my girlfriend's son Chris, who is about 6'3". If neither of them were around he would settle for Caden or Carter, who measure less than 6' but he was happiest when he could find his "bolshoi cousin" (big cousin). This is a lot of pressure for a family where the average height is 5'2".

-We had a pull up contest at the cabin. Sergei won. He killed it. He can also do flips off of a picnic bench. It makes me want to throw up.

-Every time we left to go somewhere Sergei would say, "My mom is slow." Already annoyed by his mom - :)

-I was telling Suzy and Pearl a story in their bunk bed one night when Max climbed onto the bed. He stared Suzy down and said, "Hi Suzy". This was not a friendly hi. It was a brotherly challenge. Suzy just stared back. Max upped the ante. Teeth clenched, "Hi Suzy." I turned to Suzy and whispered , "Just say hi." She stared him down again and finally said, "Hi Max." It was hilarious! Sibling rivalry knows no language barrier!

-Our friends, the Baughs, let Sergei drive their jet ski (with me on it). Sergei LOVED it. He told Kevin he didn't like "Salt Lake", he liked "Bear Lake".

-Sergei and I were on a bike ride and I thought it was a great time to work on his English. Every time we passed an animal I would ask him the animal's name in Russian. He would tell me and I would then tell him the English word. We were working with a limited number of animals but since repetition is the mother of all learning I would do this every time we passed a horse, cow, dead frog etc. I would also do the animal sounds. After the third time of me pointing and saying "cow", Sergei looked at me and said, "I know!" That is the universal teenage language for "shut up" (which Sergei is not allowed to say :)

-I am training Sergei to say I am his number one aunt. At the lake he said my uncle Mike was his "number one aunt." My uncle gave him a dollar for that little betrayal and did not punish him for making him into an aunt. I will probably end up buying him a BMW just to win this position - my aunt greed knows no bounds - watch out Mike!

We love our new nephews, cousins, grandsons and we are grateful to everyone who helped get them here.