Anastasia

These are some of my favorite pictures taken last summer of Anastasia, whom we usually call Nastia (pronounced "NY-shta"). She is a beautiful 16 year old, who has been living in the Ukrainian orphanage system since she was five. As you can see by her warm smile, she is naturally sweet and extremely bright. She excels in school at the orphanage, and demonstrated her ability in the summer when she scored 100 on her ESL test.



It was incredible to see how much she had developed from her first visit with us during Christmas 2005. She didn't make eye contact with me (Jim) for the first week, and rarely showed any positive response to anything or anyone. But I saw a glimpse of her sweet heart toward the end of that first trip. I'll never forget that on her last night, Christian woke up in the middle of the night screaming. By the time I had gotten to his room, she was already there, comforting him instinctively. She is going to be a great big sister to her little brother!

While she was here, she discovered that she shares our family's love of reading! I say she discovered this because when she first arrived, she told us that she hates to read (ugh!).
But a trip to the eye doctor proved why as her exam revealed profound far sightedness.

Soon she was glued to her Russian translations of Harry Potter for most of the day, and night. Several times I found her reading late into the wee hours of the morning, the true test of a book lover!

Unlike her sister, Nastia is not a big sports enthusiast (except for ice skating lessons with the dashing Dima!). She prefers to do cross-stitch, read, and, we're happy to report, cook! We can't wait to see her again. In her recent letters, she has begun to pour her heart out, describing her hopes, dreams and fears in a beautiful way.

Please pray that God will give Nastia much courage to face her fears about living in a new culture and give her confidence to express the lovely young woman He made her to be.


posted by jim