Anna Grace Higgins!

"Papa, Mama & Anya Higgins"

It's official! We are her parents (it will not actually be "effective" until December 5th, but the judge has made her ruling). Thank you to all of you who have been interceding on our behalf! There were many miraculous obstacles overcome and our court experience went surprisingly smooth considering our coordinator here didn't think we would be approved today. She was a nervous wreck this morning when we arrived to court because the orphanage Dr. had not come and they had never had a case presented to the judge without the orphanage Dr. There were other crazy things going on and we were all crammed in a little room outside of the "courtroom". I wish we had been able to walk around & take pictures because you would not believe what the building was like or the condition unless you saw it for yourself. When we entered and were taken to the second floor, I was speechless! The steps were concrete & everything had big chunks missing. It was almost like we were being taken in a back alley for an "underground court" or something illegal! It was very strange. The ceiling where we were waiting was just about to fall apart on our heads. It had hundreds of years of plaster patches and everything was crumbling. Jack said the entire place looked like something out of a WWII movie. Really, I'm not sure we could ever describe it! We learned a lot about Anya in court - not sure if all of it is true since one thing they told us happened 4 years before she was born. After hearing that, what can you believe? The social worker painted her as a monster and everyone was asking, "why is it these people would want to adopt her?" The social worker finally said, "maybe there is just a true goodness in them that would want to help this child" - they obviously do not see anything of worth in Anya. At times, I just wondered "are they talking about the same child we know?". There isn't time or space to relay all the information and some of it will be left for Anya to tell as she desires. We learned more horrors of her childhood than we could have imagined and it's no wonder she doesn't want to love us as "her parents" - they truly weren't good people. It is a miracle she has survived and with such a resilient spirit. She asked us today "do you love me?". I think maybe today is the first time she has believed the answer when I said "YES!". We took her back to the orphanage late & had to say good-bye in the hallway. She had tears in her eyes and I was a mess, but I gave her a calendar I drew on a piece of paper & Katya had translated for her. It has today listed and all the days until we will return for her. Hopefully, it will help her to be able to count down the days. When we got to the orphanage I realized we had not taken a "family" photo today, so we stood in the hall & took our first picture with OUR DAUGHTER! We weren't dressed up anymore, but it doesn't matter - she is now ours forever! Today has been a whirlwind! Actually, this whole year has and I am so relieved, excited and sad at the same time. We will all just be glad to land in Atlanta on December 13th - even Anya said today "it's not fair that you & Papa get to go home today and I have to stay here". I told her it won't be long and then we will be together forever. She swam in our hotel today and then wanted to take a shower. As I was drying her hair and putting it in a ponytail, I asked her "what is your name". She said "Anya Shpilevskaya.... no, Anya HEEEGGINS" (her Russian pronunciation). I can't wait for you all to hear it!

Our next blog will be from home... our flight leaves at 6:00 AM & the driver should be here to pick us up in less than 3 hours - no sleep for us! We still have to pack. Below are a few pictures from today.

Thank you, thank you, thank you all for your prayers! God has answered!

Jack & Stephanie waiting for court (Anya took the picture) Anya was impressed with Jack's suit! Do you see the woman squatting down like she is stressed out? That is our coordinator stressing over the problems with our court cases!
This was the door we entered to go to court.
This was the court building (wish we had pics of the inside!!!)

Anya Higgins at lunch after court.

Anya, the social worker & state inspector (they were our guests at lunch)

Anya Higgins jumping into the pool (from ladder steps)