Merry Christmas Pink!

Merry Christmas Pink!

Mom, Dad & Justin love you & miss you.

Wishing everyone a Merry Christmas & Happy New Year!

Please pray for our daughter..


More news to come!





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Father / son time..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cRdxXPV9GNQ

Last night Justin & I went to the movies..

We saw Avatar in 3D... It was awesome. We both give it thumbs up!

More news to come!

Happy Birthday to our Son!

Justin turned double digits over the weekend!! I remember the Sunday he was born like it was yesterday. Love you bud!

God heard our prayers!!!

What a day!

Mom & Dad got our mail around 11:45am at the house and the state records check was there!! We meet at the commuter lot at 94 & 40 and off I went to get signatures. The next stop was to get the cover sheets notarized by Mary Beth, thanks MB! Then I headed downtown STL for the Secreatry of State's office. What nice ladies!! We looked at pics of Pink and talked about adoption a bit while they appostilled the two records.

I took my two valuable documents and headed for CHI... Meet Anna in the lobby and she took the documents to get sent to Moscow. Thanks Anna!!

Now we can enjoy Christmas!

Hold on Pink! Mom & Dad are getting close.

More news to come.

Please pray for the State report..

We are still waiting for the background check from the state of Missouri. Would love to get it back today so we can run it down to get appostilled.

Would like to say congrats to my little cousin & her husband on the birth of their son Caleb!


Please pray for Pink.


More news to come.

They cashed the check!

Amy logged into our checking account this AM and found that the state of Missouri has cashed our check for the "state" background check. Praise God! Hopefully we will get that back this week and be able to drive it to be appostilled. They know the FBI check takes longer and will schedule court without it.

Last night we had a great evening. We went to the Trans Siberian Orchestra Christmas concert, it rocked! Justin had a blast. They played over 2 1/2 hours.

Please keep our daughter in your prayers.

More news to come!

Medical forms complete and turned in!

Just returned from CHI after dropping off Amy's medical exam. Both of our exams are now turned in and will be appostiled by the state before heading to Russia.

We are waiting for the Highway Patrol / State records check and the FBI records check now. Prayers for a speedy process would be appreciated

More news to come.

What a great weekend!

Friday afternoon, I was able to turn in my physical exam paperwork to CHI. YEAH! Amy should get her's back this week and be able to get it over to CHI. Then all we have left is the MO State recorders check and the FBI recorders check. We are so close! Prayers for speedy processing are appreciated! Also prayers for a Moscow court date to be scheduled would be appreciated. Saturday I was able to install the cieling to floor PINK curtains for our daughter. I still need to steem them a little more, but they are up and look great. We need to get tie backs for them, but her room is getting close.
Sunday night Wentzville had there annual Christmas parade Amy, Justin & grandma attended.

I had an excting afternoon! I flew my first multi-enigne aircraft! 1.3 hours of adrenilin.

Saturday night Justin had his first offical sleep-over, all went well. Amy and I went out to a Christmas dance and caught up with some old friends! Good seeing everyone.

Keep Pink in your prayers please.

More news to come!

Praying for a court date..

Please keep us in your prayers and thoughts for a court date to be assigned! Not to be picky, but we would love to have a date as early in January as possible. The country of Russia celbrates the Russian Orthodox day of Christmas which is on Jan 7, so the have holiday until that following Monday Jan 11.

Happy Thanksgiving!

We celbrated Thanksgiving with family on Thursday. Today we cleaned house!! Amy got up this AM to have a little "mom" time while watching the masses shop for gifts. Justin & I along with two guys from work took advantage of the beautiful weather and did yard work one more time for 2009.

We did switch our little girl's bed from a crib to a day bed in the cleaning process. We miss you! May God look after you until we return!


More news to come!

Third update..

Over the next three days we were allowed to visit our "daughter". She loves bananas! I had brought a bunch of Gerber toddler snacks from the states and got a bunch of bananas from the hotel. One day I think I gave her a little too much to eat, they told us she hardly ate any lunch. OOPs my fault! The third and last day to visit was by far the best! Our little girl was in her own and Amy was too! :-)
They played and played for over 2 hours. Giggles & laughs; followed by hugs & kisses and ending with a goodbye & tears.

She is missed, but we are already pushing ahead on the paper work need for court. Maybe with Gods help we will be called very soon!

Friday morning we got up to return home. Our faithful driver Alex delivered us to the airport. We thanked him and told him we hope to see him soon.

After boarding the plane, we noticed that mechanics were working on the wing. Come to find out that one of the deicing valves had broken and they were trying feverishly to repair it. Well after about an hour they gave up and cenceled our flight. Yeah United! We got loaded up onto a shuttle and shipped to the "lovely" NOT Hotel Air; next to the Russian Airport. I have always been brought up or told to not to say anything if you can't say anything nice. So on that note I will just say we spent the next 18 hours sitting in a small bar, surfing the net & facebooking to friends back home. There I didn't say anything bad about United or the Hotel Air.

The next day United had brought another plane in from London and loaded us up to head back to the good ol USA. We were sad to leave Russia, but we are praying to be back quickly! Thats pretty much covers our first trip to Russia.

We wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving and we hope to update you again real soon!

Second update

Tuesday was the day we had been waiting for. We traveled to the office where we would receive the referral. I'm pretty sure you could hear our hearts pounding all the way back here in the US. :-) After waiting for our turn we were called into the office. Answered a few questions that were subject around international adopting and then we were handed the referral. Due to time restraints we were not going to make it to see our daughter before lunch and nap time. So we had time to kill. We ventured off to do errands with Olga. After the errands and a quick bite to eat, we headed to meet our daughter. She was still in music class, but there was a window that allowed us to try and sneak a peek. Not being shy I edged over and over trying to see who was in the room. All of a sudden this little curious face spotted me, busted! It was her.. The little girl who has already changed our lives forever.

More updates to come..

First update...

Cheese Pizza & Pepsi Light

All I can say is wow! How blessed we are! God has a blessed us with a little girl.

Having never traveled further than any popular vacation destination Amy & I had a lot to learn. We left out of St. Louis last Saturday morning headed to Washington DC. Our flight to DC was delayed, but we had ample time due to a layover. Our flight from DC to Moscow was roughly 11 hours. I quickly found out that we were in the wrong seats, economy is not were you want to be. United has an Economy Select, which is the same seat but with more leg room. So on the trip home we upgraded, what a difference.

Monday we spent the day trying to adjust our jet lag ( I never did adjust) and taking a tour of the city. It is a huge city, we were told there are 19 million people and it is the world’s most expensive city to live in. The city is beautiful with all of its old buildings mixed in with new video billboards every where. We stayed at the Hilton in Moscow, which I would recommend, beautiful place with great service. That evening for dinner we went to the hotel restaurant and had our first cheese pizza with Pepsi lights. It was a simple dinner that gave us a flavor of home and it didn’t break our budget. Moscow didn’t get the title of Most Expensive city for nothing. Couple of sodas and our little pizza was roughly 1500 rubels, roughly $50.

More news to come! (as I get time to update)

Having Pepsi light & cheese pizza in Moscow..

Our celebration dinner was a cheese pizza & Pepsi light in Moscow. :)

God has blessed us..


More news to come!

Amy's luggage...

I'm sure there are those out there who know what Amy is going through. They have told us to pack sensible and light for the trip to Moscow. This being a little bit of a difficult task for her. LOL

Oh well we are packing! Pink we are coming! Love you!

Keep dad in your thoughts and prayers, he is back in the hospital.

More news to come!

House cleaning & packing!!

First I have to thank many of the people who are giving us gifts for Pink.. Thank you so much! She is blessed with family and friends who think so much of her already. I will shoot some pictures of everything soon.

Spent the weekend cleaning house.. Does it ever end?!? LOL

Not much to report.. We had beautiful weather this past weekend. Traveling soon!

Keep Pink in your prayers!

More new to come!

Too funny.... must clarify...

Our daughters name "is not" and "will not" be Pink.. Although I feel a nick name in the making. LOL

She has a name now, that we might or might not change. We started calling her Pink months back for serveral reasons: we don't know her current name, we haven't picked out a new name or if we are going to change it and everything she owns is PINK.... :)

We are getting so close!! Thank God!

More news to come!

Big Day!

Well ok... not THE big day.. but a big one. :)

Amy & I are off to CHI for a walk through with Anna about our upcoming trip to meet Pink. This will be our "what to expect" when we go over talk. Can you believe it? We can't! We are so blessed, we are close to meeting our daughter for the first time!

On another positive note, dad is home from the hospital.

More news to come!

Can you believe the rain?

Wow.. talk about some wet weather! We are supposed to get 2 to 4 inches today alone!

Pink update: scheduling our pretrip walk through with Anna. Its the meeting to go over everything that we will do while in Russia. We are so close!!! Wow.. Prayers & thoughts for Pink, our daughter.

Dad, is still in the hospital. Hope to have him home soon. Thoughts and prayers for him also.

We are cleaning more and more at home to just to get ready.

Saturday in Missouri...

Lets start with the great phone call we had with Anna on Friday. All 3 of the Frids are recovering from having a cold or whatever, so we thought that we would not risk spreading our germs to CHI. Anna told us we are in great shape for our upcoming visit to meet Pink and that our two return trips would be early in 2010. Thank God....

Later Friday,,, dad was admitted to the hospital. As of this afternoon he is recieving medications and resting.

Aunt Judy made Pink a beautiful blanket! Thanks Aunt Judy & Uncle Ron!

Pink's pictures...

We are taking a photo album along with us in November to leave for Pink. That way she will have pictures of everyone in the family that is close. Here are the pics we chose.


I'd like to share my Walgreens Photo Center photos with you. Once you have checked out my photos you can order prints and upload your own photos to share.

Allergies & a cold...

The 3 Frids were pretty much down and out this past weekend. Justin was sick with a cold that got into his lungs (again). Dr visit Saturday morning got us a couple of new meds and a couple ones from before. He went to school today and is feeling better, so we will see.

Not much to report on Moscow. We are going to try and meet up with Anna this week from CHI to go over everything to make sure we are set. Other than that, we are ready to travel!

More news to come!

Getting close to completeing Pink's room..

Grandma Fridley gave Pink this beautiful hand made quilt this evening.. Very pretty... would have made Grandma Hietgerd very proud.... (The blanket is laying on her fuzzy pink rug.)

Rain, rain and more rain. Football practice was canceled this evening. It did allow me to get lots completed around the house. Hoping to have a couple big work days around home this weekend.

No real news to report.. we are on count down to our first trip!

Please keep our daughter in your prayers and thoughts!

More news to come!

What a week!!

First and foremost we would like to thank Leslie for helping us on our "Journey to Moscow" Please stay in touch!

Wednesday and Thursday Justin and I went to Lutheran Science Camp at http://www.heitspoint.com/. I was a chaperone and Justin was a participant in the 4th, 5th & 6th grade over night camp. It was a very interesting two days! Friday we came home and both had a cold. LOL

Saturday we went to the lake and winterized the waverunners hard to believe that Summer is long over.

Amy found a great rug for Pink's room. We are on the hunt for the perfect glider for her room and then it will be finished.

More news to come!

Visas are applied for! Time to pack!

Sat down this evening and filled out applications for Visas to enter Russia. Done! We are paper work junkies.. LOL For those of you reading the blog and considering adoption, the paper work is long and tedious; but well worth it! Just jump in both feet and tackle it. Oh, and I like to think that all the prayers for us and Pink are a big help too!

Did some more work in Pink's room this past weekend. The rocking chair is getting coat and coats of laquer and we added some cute Disney decorations to the walls.

More news to come!

Thanks Grandpa & Grandma Fridley!!

Grandpa & Grandma Fridley were kind enough to supply an antique dresser for Pink's room. Grandma bought the dresser several years ago on one of her antiquing trips. It matches the rest of the room perfectly. Although it didn't start in the Fridley Family hopefully it will be a treasured piece for generations to come!

Pink update: We booked our flight to Russia. CHI is handling all of our hotel reservations and all of the rest of our needs. Leslie from CHI assured me all we need to do is take care of flights, food & souvenirs! They are super folks at CHI!

We would like to take this time to ask for prayers for Pink. We would also like to ask prayers for us to be able to sneak in that second trip yet this year! God has allowed us to get so far ahead of the process and we are thankful, but we can't stop now. As of now we are going to travel in November and then get the second and third trip in late January early February. But, wouldn't it be great to get trip #2 in 2009!

A little side note on me: the foot is not broken! Thank God for that! He did say i had quite a bit of tendon damage and we will play it by ear. At least I don't have to wear the big goofy boot. I have a big brace on my ankle and can slip on some shoes. YEAH!

Fall weather has arrived!

More news to come!

Thank you to the Wilsons and the latest scoop. UPDATED

Want to thank the Wilson family for the perfect gift for our little princess! Thanks guys! Inside the pretty bag is a little Disney princess charm.

UPDATED:

This morning Amy will book all of our "flight" reservations for the first trip. CHI is going to handle everything else except for: flight, food & souveniors. YEAH CHI We fly from St. Louis to the east coast, from there we are direct into Moscow! Anyone know any good books?!? LOL That's really funny if you know me.. :) We arrive in Moscow on a Sunday and basically have a 2 days of leisure. Tuesday we will be taken to the Ministry of Education and then we get to meet Pink for the first time. We will spend the week in Moscow and come home Friday arriving real late Friday night or early Saturday morning.

To toss in a little adversity in our / my life I am dealing with the possibility of broken ankle. Worse case scenario its broke and we do surgery. best case scenario is that a piece of cartilage has broken off and lodged itself in the joint of my ankle and we do injections. MRI this morning, consultation again next Monday.

Moscow here we come!!!

Can you believe it!! We have a date in November to travel!!! Can you believe how blessed we are?!?!

Pink your mom & dad are starting to pack!


More news to come!

Some explanantion of whats to come..

First let me say thank you to everyone who prayed for us and kept us & Pink in your prayers.

Leslie from CHI called with our Awesome news, telling us we were registered.

Basically we hope that in the next 4 to 6 weeks we will get invited to travel to meet our little girl for the first time. They usually give you about a 2 week notice to get to Moscow for your appointment. Which means that hopefully no later than 8 weeks from yesterday Amy & I will be in Moscow for the first time. Which would be around Nov 18 for our first trip. All of the times are based on averages. We are praying to go much sooner!

We are REGISTERED!!!

Praise Him!

Leslie called 5 minutes ago and said we are registered!!

Pink your mom & dad will be there soon!

More news to come!

Example of Patience. Read the Book of Job

Amazing stories in the Bible that tell of Job and his patience..

Should know something for sure in the next 24 to 48 hours!

Please keep our daughter in your thoughts and prayers.


More news to come!

Moscow is 9 hours ahead of us...

Basically it is Tuesday 5am in Moscow City... Hopefully with the Grace of God, some nice educational employee will process the Fridleys into their adoption system this AM... Yeah!

Want to thank Mel for sending us a couple of pictures from over the summer, hard to believe that it is almost offically over. Wow where did the time go.

These are a few of the ILS crew! Go Eagles!

More news to come real soon hopefully!

Please pray for Pink..

Hopefully today we will get accepted by Moscow..

Amy made it home safely. Worked around the house yesterday after church. Lucas came over and did some yard work. Then we got the Mickey rocking chair out and sanded it and then put a coat of prep on it. Hope to stain it this week.

Hopefully some wonderful news to come!!

Finished... A purple toy box for Pink!

Why wouldn't Pottery Barn make it in Candy Purple to begin with?

Dr. Amy is in KC for continuing education. So that meant that the men were going to work around the house tonight.

One of our main jobs was to turn the dreary old white toy box into the Candy Purple toy box, fit for a princess. Job complete! We have to reassemble in the AM, but after 3 coats, its ready for lots of dolls and stuffed animals.

Next week we are still praying to receive that September slot.

More news to come!

We still have a chance...

Well,,, Amy & I are being positive. Talked to Leslie today at CHI and she hasn't heard that the September slot has been filled yet, so we are praying that there is still a chance its ours!! Go Pink!

Bad accident on Hwy 40 at the bridge today. Hope everyone is ok. The Lemen girls hauled Justin home to their house for us. Thanks again!!!!

While picking him up "B" showed us a cool trick she knows... LOL This is one of Pink's future sitters!

More news to come!

Happy Birthday Grandma...

Justin's grandma turned 21 today..... again.. LOL Happy Birthday!!!

Are you ready for some football?

Tonight was picture night for the Wentzville Wildcats. There were football players everywhere and we were only a small percentage of Wildcats.

Today was more Russia paper work for Pink. We will finally be sending a big bundle to the State with a return envelope headed straight to Leslie at CHI, so she can send it to Moscow. No word yet if we squeaked in on the last September spot. Please keep us in your prayers and thoughts, if not for us; for our daughter.

Amy is off to KC for DR meetings. Her and Jen are going up for some training and some R&R. Behave ladies.. LOL

Just saw in the news were Patrick Swayze passed away. Still like that movie Roadhouse!

More news to come!

Thanks to Him!

Amy got an email from the CPA today letting us know that a letter we needed from him was complete. This was the last piece in a puzzle needed for some Moscow Court paper work. She will pick this up tomorrow and have it ready to go to the Secretary of State. We were needing something to happen. We are finding out that neither of us were blessed with much patience. LOL Saturday we are off to CHI for a counseling session.

Thank you for all of your prayers and thoughts. Keep them up, our daughter is close to coming home!

More news to come.

Labor Day Weekend.. Sunday night report..

Football was the word for Sat & Sun.. Justin's team played in the Mid Rivers Invitational Tournament. We got bumped out this afternoon by a loss to one of the Mid Rivers Team. Although the guys played great in a muddy field!

Saturday evening we went over to the Abts for food & fun. The guys decided to help the ladies self esteem so we let them beat us in a game of Battle of the Sexes. Next week we might let them beat us in something else. :)

After the game, Amy & I snuck away for a little shopping & dinner at the Meadows. While there we went into Puddle Ducks and found Pink her bedding. We did a little shopping at the different stores and ended the afternoon at Max & Erma's for dinner. Sat outside on the patio and actually saw what we thought was the sun. LOL Been a very cool, rainy over cast weekend!!

Tomorrow I am off to the airport in the AM for some flying.

This week we pray for some info from CHI.

More news to come!

TGIF and its a Holiday Weekend!!

Pink update: We are painting the final coat on her bedroom tonight! Yeah.. Hope to get the crib put together and set into place. (It is in pieces in the living room :p) Amy has a meeting with our CPA to get the last piece of paper work from him. He has not been as motivated as we are.. LOL but no problem it looks like its finally going to be complete.

Carpets in the house are being cleaned and we have yard workers showing up this weekend to continue to get everything ready. People continue to tell us we are nesting... LOL

Next Saturday we are attending a lecture on different aspects of adoption, hosted by CHI.

We had a family celebration last night. One of our family members rolled 200,000 miles :)

Keep Pink in your thoughts & prayers. She is out there trying to make it to Defiance, Missouri.

More news to come!

Busy weekend!

Friday night Amy had a GNO (girls night out) with Mel, Carrie & Lisa. They went to the Cardinals game and saw Albert #5 hit the game winning home run in the bottom of the nineth. Go Cards! Justin, Lucas, Phil and myself worked around the house. Mulched & removed stumps from the trees that we had cut down earlier in the month. The yard is really starting to take shape.

Saturday was football! The Wentzville Wildcats hosted the annual preseason jamboree. Justin's 4th grade team played 3 scrimage games. The are sooooo improved over last year. The difference a year makes is amazing. After the jamboree I headed down to the airport to finish up some outstanding items I had to allow me to take my Instrument rating test. Flew great, this weekend I do paper work for the big test. Saturday night was quiet, had a very busy day.

Sunday was painting and church dedication. I was able to get 2 full coats of Pixie Dust Pink in her room and trimmed it all in once. I need to put one more coat in the trim and one more coat on the walls and it will be ready ! Our new church was dedicated Sunday afternoon. Great job to everyone who worked hard to get that completed!

Pink update: We are finishing up our documents for the Moscow Court. Our accountant is putting together a couple of letters for us that should be back today or on there way back. Say a small prayer to keep our process moving and for Pink, she is out there waiting to come home to Defiance MO.

Oh yeah.. and today is my 40th Bday.... Pray for me... LOL

More news to come!

See what's in the back of my truck.

We are so blessed. Praise Him.

More news to come.

Sorry for the delay...

What a great weekend!

Would like to thank my beautiful wife for throwing me a great surprise birthday party Saturday night! I would also like to thank: Justin, Mel & Brookie for helping Amy throw a great party. Let me also thank everyone for their well wishes, gifts (which were not neccesary) and coming to celebrate with us.

Update on Pink:

We are back to paper work! Friday afternoon went to CHI to have a meeting with our Moscow specialist Leslie. She is the person who will be getting us throw the last bit of paper work that is specifically for adopting in Moscow. We worked over the weekend when we weren't celebrating my birthday and have all but one piece ready for the notary. Hope to have that last piece dug out and ready to go this evening. If so all paper work should be back from the Secretary of State by Friday ready to be turned into CHI. Praise Him.

We did get a little disheartening news though. There is only one spot left for September acceptance into the Moscow city program. If we don't get that one we have to wait til October. Which really isn't a horrible thing, its just that it pushes us back one month. I keep saying God is driving, we are just along for the ride!

Keep us in your prayers or thoughts!

More news to come.

First day of school...

Yesterday was the first day of 4th grade.. Yeah! It was a half-day, can someone explain that to me? Im not for sure if its the children easing back into school or the teachers?? LOL

Melanie was kind enough to let Justin go with them to Pizza Pro for a little after school party lunch session. Amy & I were both at work. Here is a picture that was taken there and posted on facebook, so I borrowed it and put it here.

One more piece to the puzzle...

Today when we arrived home we found a great surprise in the mailbox. Its the approval letter from the US Department of Immigration. Praise him! We are so excited, this basically says that the US goverment has approved us for international adoption of one little girl, 36 months or younger.

More news to come!

Sept 1

Status... As we know it. Our documents have been sent to Moscow for translation. The Ministry of Education is currently on summer vacation and will return to work September 1. We are praying they will have our paper work on Sept 1, and will accept it and us into the program.

We will start working with our Moscow City specialist this week, really excited to get to know her!

Friday night we went out with the Pitman's to get their information on adoption & Russia. Had a great evening went to Oishi's in Chesterfield for dinner and drinks. Went back to there house for some home movies. Really amazing and over-whelming.

Saturday Justin had football weigh ins in North County. I went to the airport and studied with my back up CFI. Saturday night Amy and I went to Babies R Us, wow things have gotten expensive since Justin was little. We were kinda shocked at how much stuff we realized we will need. Ofcourse we do not know "Pinks" age yet, but still; 3 and under she will need lots of accesories. LOL

Sunday we went to church and worked around the house. Lucas came over and worked in the yard for a few hours. We had a few of our ILS freinds over BBQ later that evening.

This coming Sunday, the paint will be applied!

More news to come.

Speedy recovery...

Thursday,, we had what we hope was our big "oops" in our process. We had sent our paper work into the state to get appostiled. They came back with one of the papers incomplete because we forgot to have the notary stamp it. I hung up with Anna at CHI and 25 minutes later walked in and picked it up from her. I don't know if God liked me speeding or not, but he defiantly made sure there were no officers on the highway while I was heading there & back.. LOL

I got the form picked up from CHI, got the notary completed, got it to the post office, shipped it overnight to the state and made it to pick up Justin and the Lemen girls all in less then an hour. That is a speedy recovery!

Our paper work leaves for Russia today! Praise Him for getting us this far!

More news to come!