Day 8 - Court Date

We did not sleep that well last night.  Thinking about court and bringing Akvila back here with us and then on the plane to come home.  She has no idea of what flying in an airplane is and is confused about what it means to come home with us to America and to have parents forever.

We got up early to have plenty of time to get ready and dressed for court.  We clean up pretty well :-)
When we met the attorney in front of our apartment today she was happy to see Wayne had shaved off the beard and said he looked very nice.  She was surprised to see me in high heels because it is so cold and slippery outside.  I told her I would be fine. 

We spent a few minutes waiting for the court room to open and met our interpreter, the social worker from the orphanage and the two ladies from Child Protective Serices, one from the City of Vilnius and the other for the Country.  We could not understand most of the conversation of course.  They were discussing Akvila and how she was doing and the attorney was making sure they were supportive of our request to adopt and to have the waiting period waived.  Once we went into the courtroom we both were very nervous.  After being sworn in each of us had to speak about why we are adopting, why we chose Akvila and give our arguments on why the waiting period should be waived.  This included her medical conditions, bonding with us and enrollment in school. 

Then we heard from each of the 3 representives regarding our paperwork, being chosen as the family for Akvila and their support of our adoption.  Our attorney then made her closing arguments regarding our case and emphasized to the judge that we have been in contact with Akvila for several months prior to arriving in Lithuania.

The concerns that the judge had included Akvila bonding with Wayne and that we have only been in country for one week to get to know Akvila.  We did make everyone in the room laugh when we told her that Akvila did not like Wayne's beard so he shaved it off last night. 

At the end of the proceedings the judge advised that she would read her decision on February 11, 2011.  Yes, we have to wait a whole week to find out if she will be coming home with us on this trip.  The attorney feels pretty confident that it will be waived.  She told us after court that the judge is a little leary about waiving the appeal period now because there was recently and Italian couple that changed their mind two days after court and left the country without the children. 

So, we will continue to visit Akvila at the orphanage for now and until the decision is read, because it will be harder if we took her from the orphanage and then had to give her back for 40 days. 

On Tuesday February 8th we will go with her to the doctor so they can examiner her for the Visa paperwork that is needed, they will decide from her medical records if she needs any additional tests or vaccinations.  When we get the court decision and if we are allowed to bring her home we will have to proceed with getting a new birth certificate, passport and visa approval.  We found out today that Wednesday February 16th is Lithuania's independence day, so all offices will be closed.  This might interrupt our planned flights back but we will not know for sure until we get to the Embassy appointment.  The law office did call them and ask them if it can be processed the same day and they could not guarantee it because they have to send information and then receive information back from the U.S. electronically.  Evidently they have slow computers here too.  If we are delayed we will probably return home on February 19th.

Once we got home mom and Peggy made lunch which included a Lithuanian dish called Kugelis (Potato Pudding) and chicken tenderloins.  It was very good and now we are ready for a nap :-)

Tonight we are going back to see Akvila, we get to see her reaction to a clean shaven tėtė (daddy).