The beautiful faces...

The beautiful faces of Ukrainian children.  The orphanage we adopted Grace from was very large, the largest in the region.  It was very clean but in a run down kind of way.  There was an old, rusty playground and it was behind huge iron gates.  But within the joy of meeting our baby girl, there were the faces of the other children.  As we would walk and play with Grace, the older children, maybe 3 or 4 years old would stand at the edge of the play area and watch us.  They seemed transfixed by us.  Did they know or even understand that one of their own was getting a family?  It made me so sad.  I wanted to take them all.  They were the most beautiful children.  Many will spend their lives in an institution because their parents can't care for them due to prison, drugs, alcohol, poverty and some, like Grace, were just abandoned.  And at age 18, they are simply let out into the street.  Many turn to drugs and/or prostitution.  The suicide rate among these young adults is alarmingly high.  They never had the opportunity to know real love and so have never developed the ability to love.  Yes, they are cared for in the strictest sense of the word, but no more than that.  This is just one of the many, many reasons we want to go back.  We loved our experience in Ukraine.  The people were wonderful.  These children deserve a chance to know real love and to thrive.

These children are Ukrainian, aren't they gorgeous?