Most of you reading this are friends and family and may know the history behind our decision to adopt. However, we thought it might be good to start out our blog with a little of the history.
We are the parents of three great kids. We feel so blessed to already have a beautiful daughter and two handsome little boys. However, for some time we have had a desire to increase our family. As we became more involved with the adoption ministry at our church and as God placed many friends in our life who were the parents of adopted children, the desire to adopt was planted in our hearts. Adoption hits very close to home already as Vicki’s sister has traveled to Africa and spent two long years in her pursuit to adopt a precious little boy from Uganda. Also, the statistics are staggering, nearly 150 million orphans worldwide. Many of them live in countries where the people are simply too poor to care for the children who have no one. Finally, God’s commands in his word are very clear that we are to love and care for orphans. In light of all these things, we felt adoption was a wonderful way to add to our family. After many months and much prayer, we decided to pursue the adoption of a little girl from somewhere in the world.
We actually began the process to adopt from a couple of different countries before the doors were shut. Then, one Sunday at church some friends told us they were adopting again from Ukraine and wanted to tell us about the process if we were interested. After meeting with them for coffee in April of 2007 and hearing all about their experience in adopting twin girls five years earlier, we decided to pray about adopting from Ukraine. Shortly thereafter we started the paperwork chase that really turned out to be not as bad as expected. In June of 2007, we mailed our dossier (the packet of official documents that tells the Ukrainian government all about you) to our assigned facilitator in Ukraine to be translated. After several months of our paperwork waiting in line, it was submitted on March 26, 2008. Not quite a month later, we got an email from our adoption facilitator in Ukraine saying that the Ukrainian government had approved our paper work and issued an invitation for us to come to their offices in Kiev on July 15 to review files of children available for adoption!
Time has really flown since then! We’ve been scurrying to prepare for our trip, along with the preparation of getting things settled with grandparents and friends who will be taking care of our children while we’re gone. God has blessed us in so many ways as he has used generous friends and family members to meet so many of our needs.
We hope to be able to keep this blog updated during our time in Ukraine so that you, our friends and family, can stay up to date and participate in our adventure. Please leave us comments! I know we will love hearing from you!
The Dardenne Family
3 comments:
Good luck - I'm really looking forward to hearing about your story. We'll be praying!
Dardennes,
Thank you for sharing your heart for adoption with our community. This process will be a blessing to your adopted child, your biological children, you as a couple, our church and community.
James 1:27: "27Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world."
Jeremiah 29:11-12: "11 For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. 12 Then you will call upon me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you.""
I just found your blog address while catching up on the UkrainianAngels email list. I am looking forward to your updates! We adopted our son Erik who was 2 years old from Kramatorsk in July of 2000. The weather sure can get hot and humid! We adopted our daughter Lauren who was almost 9 years old at the time in November of 2002 from Mikolayiv. Good luck and keep the faith, He will be with you!
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