Elliana is almost one year old!

Yesterday we had a little get together party for our princess Elliana! In few days she will turn one. Happy Birthday Our sweet baby girl.

I can't believe it's a year from a day I had her.

Elliana's story begins in August 2009, story of our little miracle.

We had our son Denny in 2008, and when he was almost a year old we started to think more and more about having another baby in our home. When Denny was around 1

0 month old we started to plan another baby. By the time Denny was 1 year old we were sure that we still want to have another baby and also adopt. There is another story why we choose to adopt, and we I can just tell you that God did call us to adopt, to give love and family to someone who is already born, and in need of love.

So when Denny was 1 year old, we did have our first meeting with social worker, and also were planning to have a baby. When we were pregnant with Denny, I did promised my husband a little girl, and we didn't want our kids to have a big age difference so this is why we choose to have another baby so soon. :)

We knew that it will not be easy to have a baby and at the same time go through adoption, but we trusted God and His perfect timing.

In August 2009 we were almost ready to be submitted in Kiev and still not pregnant but very close to go to Ukraine and bring our child home. In early September I found out I was pregnant, we were so happy and we knew that there is no way we will stop our paperwork because we were waiting for our Ukrainian child to be home with us, all the paperwork chase, and just thinking about all the kids in orphanages made me cry, we knew that there was no way we can stop our adoption, or do it few year later. And again we trusted our God, but it was hard.

We had a lot of worries about going to Ukraine with our 20 month old, me 4-5 month pregnant and a new child who we all will need to attach and learn what is to be a family of 5.

We had our appointment in November, and were back to US late December, by the time we got home I was 6 month pregnant. God was with us the whole time we were in Ukraine, and airports and just every second of our life. My husband had to go home after court, so I was alone in Ukraine with our almost 2 year old, 6 month prego and our new 7 year old son. To say it was hard to travel back and be 15 hours in the plane with 2 kids by myself, it like saying it was easy, it was very hard. I was very worried about our baby inside of me because all of the luggage and our 2 year old was always wanted to be held but everything went ok and I made it through my pregnancy with God’s help.

Like I said our daughter was a miracle from the beginning. When I had her, her lungs did open for her to start breathing. Our baby girl was full term baby, but something happened during delivery, and even doctors couldn’t explain what happened, baby lost a lot of blood (no one knows where, how, and when). So our baby did have enough blood to carry oxygen to her lungs. Doctors didn’t give her to me; I couldn’t even hold her after 12 hours of labor.

I will always have a picture in my head, “doctors got a baby, room full of other people(in a seconds after delivery), I am crying and trying to make anyone talk to me and tell me what is going on with my baby, why she is not crying, and when finally I saw my baby, she was across the room from where I was , baby turned her head and was looking at me, the only thing I saw was her blue little, sweet body and dark eyes looking at me, actually she was looking in direction where she heard my voice, I was still asking everyone “what is going on, if everything ok, I want to see my baby””

Doctors took baby to intensive care, and we were allowed to go and see her later. She had IV, and mask to breathe, and doctors made me sigh papers to give her more blood, because she wouldn’t survive without extra blood. We were very scared to sign those papers, all the side effects, and big possibility that our baby’s heart might not accept new blood and other scary things that doctors were talking, scary stuff. After I sign the papers, we prayed and 30 minutes later we got a phone call from baby’s doctor saying that they will not give her any blood, because baby is fine and don’t’ need any extra blood, and also doctors could not explained how did it happen, they were saying that it was a miracle. We know it was, God did answer our prayers.

Two days later we were able to take our baby home and since then we have a happy, healthy baby. Elliana only stayed 1 extra day in the hospital. She is our little miracle, when I look at her I can’t believe we did go through all this trouble. I was concern about breastfeeding, because I couldn’t feed her when she was in intensive care. While I was in the hospital, Sergey would take me down to see baby and try to breastfeed her, but only during a day, at night and every 3 hours when we were not able to go down, nurses would feed her formula. But we are thankful to our God that till today I am still nursing her, and she is healthy.

Praising our Lord for this little miracle and thankful for every moment of our life. Anyone who looks at our baby would never thought that she did go through all this stuff. Elliana started to walk when she wasn’t even 9 month, she is very smart little princess.

Tomorrow she will be 1, and we love her so much, she always makes us smile.

Happy Birthday our baby girl, we love you! Daddy, mommy, Danik, and Denny

*sorry for all the mistakes, I know my English is not perfect