The Next Step

Trust

2011-09-24T12:45:00.003-04:00

We're back in the US. Its been a while since I posted because we've been so busy with settling in, finding our new house, Connor starting school, unpacking, and find a job for me.

Its been a stress-filled epic adventure that started months ago when we left Boston.

We almost stayed in China for the year. Almost. Then it became obvious that was not the right decision for our family. Very obvious. I pushed to stay, but we just couldn't make it happen. We packed up our 5 suitcases, got on a plane, and headed to Los Angeles. It took us nearly three weeks to find a house to rent. The day we moved into the house, Connor started school. Then we got our kitty back, then our stuff arrived.

The whole time I was looking for a job.

I looked and looked. I must have applied to over 100 jobs. I went into my "the economy sucks, there's nothing out there, I'm never going to find anything" phase. My restrictions are strict as far as commuting distance. 10 miles or 20 minutes. Family friendly. With Jon traveling, I needed to find a company that was going to allow me to be primary on the kiddo and not give me a hard time.

Then, the phone started to ring. And ring. And ring.

Within a two week span of time, I got two offers and two second interviews. After thinking on all of the opportunities, I decided to take the job that combined all my skills and was going to be a challenge. It also made me a manager.

I just completed my first week of work. My stress level has greatly decreased from what it was.

So this brings me to the title of my post. Trust.

I was wanting to direct this adventure of ours. I didn't want to trust that the right thing would happen. I wanted to make the decisions.

I trusted when I quit my job in Boston that things would be OK.

And they are. It just took me a while to realize that they would be.

Things started turning around when I gave everything up to God. "Let go, and let God." It only took me a moment to do it, but it took me days to believe it. The moment I believed it, the phone rang with a job interview.

The Pied Piper of Shopping

2011-07-30T09:09:00.002-04:00

I went shopping this evening to see what I could see.

I mostly looked at shoes and realized I was being watched. This is not an odd occurrence, however, what happened next was.

As I went from store to store from shoe rack to shoes rack I realized I was not just being watched, I was being followed by a group of women. Women of all ages. One would join, another would peel away from the group. I had a steady group of about 10 people, no one staying more than 15 minutes.

Each shoe I touched was touched by someone in this pack. Several shoes were bought because I touched them.

Me, I just went on about my merry business of shoe shopping and ended up scoring some killer boots on a massive sale.

None of the women ever talked to me.

Welcome to China, where being a westerner is really odd.

Normalcy

2011-07-27T21:01:00.002-04:00

Its not the most glamourous topic, but to me, after the past several weeks, it is. We have hit the sweet spot in our adventure here and its name is Normalcy.

Normalcy for us is defined by an established routine, a sense of peace, and our little man being in his happy place.

A normal day for us is hanging out in the morning, having a lunch in or out and then getting together with friends for a play date. The past week has seen us return to Normalcy, and how sweet it is.

The bad behavior, back-talking little guy has fallen away and we're experiencing the Connor of old, the typical five year old who loves to play with kids and is gentle with those younger with him. The kid who says "please" and "thank you" with little reminder and loves to burn off energy any way he can.

I'm grateful my happy kid is back. We've missed him.

The Art of Shopping

2011-07-20T07:32:00.004-04:00

Now, most of you who know me in real life know that I am a Shopper. With the capital S. I can find the best of deals and burn through my credit cards so that they're still smoking days later and they still don't know whats hit them -- or the account. ;)

In China, you throw two more things into the matrix to take into consideration.

1. Everything is negotiable.

2. What is the exchange rate from Dollars to RMB (China's currency); so that you know how much you're really paying and if its worth it or not.

Bethee is Shopping. Shopping is Bethee.

Bethee is dazed and confused in China. I haven't mastered the negotiation aspect of it, but I have mastered the art of figuring out if what I'm seeing is worth buying (i.e. what does it cost in $$ in the blink of an eye.)

Example: Today I was shopping with a friend and we were looking at the shoes in mall next to where we live. I'm not going to say this was shoe nirvana (thats a different store), but its a huge department. We wandered around for over an hour and then we saw shoes that we had to try on. So we tried them on. LOVED the shoes. I was grateful for having my friend with me who is bilingual and started to negotiate for me. I saw the rhythm and art of the negotiation and made a mental note to hone my language skills in regard to numbers and negotiation words. I realized after doing quick math that the shoes would cost more here than what I would pay for them in the States. Said bye-bye to the shoes and walked away.

So overall, a very positive shopping experience. I learned alot. However, I didn't walk away with any shoes. I did learn China-value vs. China-cost, though, which will serve me well. I need to learn the negotiation aspect of it, but that will come once my language skills are better.

I'll write a post later about how different the shopping experience here is compared to the States.

Crossing the Street

2011-07-19T08:55:00.003-04:00

This topic deserves its own blog post because the topic is so dangerous to your well being.

Crossing the street here in China is a feat unto itself. You need to cross aggressively, but not too aggressively. If you cross too aggressively, you're likely to get mowed down by the cab that would have let you cross if you'd shown a little humility.

Never look a driver in the face to see if they see you. They do. If they don't, simply back up and try again once they pass by. Its not uncommon to have to try a few times or wait a while until the street empties of cars and other hazards. Because you have to keep an eye on the electric bikes (these are unregistered and uninsured, and have a reputation for taking off after any conflict or accident) or regular bikes, cab-bikes or other vehicle (tri-car) before you actually make your full attempt to cross the road.

Make sure you step off the curb and get as far out into the street while its semi-empty. Carefully pick your way between cars (because cars blow red, yellow and all sorts of other lights) watching the on-coming traffic.

Cars will slow down if you cross with purpose but they will try to hit you if you're too timid.

Kid in hand? They don't care. No special treatment for you.

You'll get honked at by at least a dozen cars on your way to the other side. You definitely feel like the chicken who crossed the road. But there's only a "good" chance you'll get to the other side the first time. You might have to try a time or two, maybe three to actually get there.

Oh, and don't forget that cars and other vehicles use one way streets in both directions, so you need to be aware of those coming from the other direction.

As if you didn't have enough to look for.

Fireworks!

2011-07-17T20:48:00.002-04:00

Our 4th of July was non-existant this year, for obvious reasons.

However, at least 4 times each week, we are privy to a monster display of pyrotechnics courtesy of whomever is getting married or celebrating a significant event in our vicinity. It doesn't appear that you need a permit to set off fireworks, it seems as if anyone can do it. They explode them close to the ground ... they never seem to get up to the 23rd floor (where we are). So we get to look down on them from our room.

Last night, we had just finished tucking the little man in bed when a gigantic display of fireworks started. Red, green and a few purple ones. Giant, small and LOUD! This must have gone on for at least 15 minutes. Little man? Slept through it all. They were bright, shiny, and awesome! Who needs fireworks once a year? I say lets go to an all year round celebration!

Its 11 hours later, actually, and he's still sleeping. He's had a busy weekend, and I'm glad that he's taking advantage of being able to get some additional sleep.

Inspired

2011-07-10T09:49:00.002-04:00

The city slows but does not sleep.

The lights shine as far as the eye can see.

From up above, the people scurry to and fro.

Up high?

The weather's fine.

Room with a View

2011-07-03T07:39:00.007-04:00

So here are some of the photos I've promised!

We're on the 23rd floor of a hotel in the middle of the city. Today was the clearest day we've experienced. This is a very polluted and smoggy city. Normally, we can see about 10 blocks (barely) in any direction. Today and tonight? We're looking a mile or so out. I took the opportunity to snap some pictures from our bedroom windows.

We have two windows in our bedroom looking out over the city. I'll take pictures and post those separately.

That is a huge intersection. We're 23 floors up in the air. Crossing this street is a feat of bravery that is unparalleled.

The building under construction has been abandoned for a year or so. It was recently bought by a company that has promised to finish it. So far you only see security guards standing at the door of the finished, but empty, lobby.

The parking lot is interesting. Its a very good predictor of the weather. It turns into a giant puddle when it rains!

This view is out of the other side of our suite. Take a look at the shopping center on the right of the picture. Yea. Fendi. Prada. And on, and on, and on. Right now, I'm grateful for the insane tax on luxury goods because it makes it more expensive to buy these luxury items here than back in the States.

This is a great view. You can see for miles. Even looking from this height you think the city goes on for miles and miles and miles. It does. Its huge.

Overall impressions and feelings. I like it here. I'm glad we're here.

Movies

2011-07-02T21:56:00.002-04:00

Last night we went to see Kung * Fu * Panda * 2. We were lucky enough to have some of Jon's co-workers that knew Chinese and knew we had a kid, find a theater that was playing the English version. It was equal to about $15US, which is alot more than we usually pay to see a movie.

The movie was worth seeing, but what played out more was the warning about not going into public bathrooms unless absolutely necessary. Connor decided he really had to go potty, and out of 15 stalls in the ladies room, there were three working, all without doors and each of those had lines that were 10 people deep. The bathroom wasn't clean by any means. When I sent him to the bathroom with one of the guys so that hopefully he could go potty before he had an accident, they quickly came back letting me know that all the stalls in the mens room were locked. So back we went into the ladies room, where we dealt with the grossness that was in there and quickly went.

That was certainly the grossest I'd ever seen a public rest room.

We went to the movie and had a great time. The movie was worth seeing, and we saw it in 3D! What was even more awesome was that Connor decided to keep his glasses on the whole time instead of chucking them across the theater like he did last time.

Come to China and eat American food.

2011-06-29T21:05:00.003-04:00

In the past three days, we've had chinese food exactly zero times. Thats right.

I have picky eaters in my household, so every now and again I humor them into thinking they have control over what we're eating. This time they got the jump on me.

We've had Pizza Hut twice. It doesn't help my cause that they are literally right downstairs from our apartment.
We've had McDonald's once for lunch. This city has McD's everywhere. I'll admit it was a reward for good behavior, but still! :P
Today for lunch we're heading to a cute little hole in the wall place that reminds me ALOT of any boutique restaurant in Austin, only without the live music. Its called the "American Cafe". Seriously.

I've really enjoyed having my own kitchen, even though its miniature sized (I'll post pictures soon, I promise!). Its been great to be able to eat in most evenings and not have to wait for food or worry about what we just ordered. But instead of letting me try out new foods/dishes, I'm making familiar things. I'm hoping to change this in a few weeks as we get more adjusted and more familiar with things here. Two nights ago, I made steak, asparagus, and rice for dinner. It was a huge hit, and the local farmers market didn't let me down the some of the best asparagus we've ever had. I figured out the rice maker (don't laugh) in our kitchen, and the steak was easy to cook.

Tonight, we're going out, and I'm making sure Cat comes with us so we can go where we want and try new things without fear for what we just ordered. LOL We're going native tonight for dinner, I'll let you know how it goes.

Back

2011-06-27T20:33:00.003-04:00

We've had a challenging week. Behavior has had us modifying our plans many times. I think (I probably just jinxed us), that we're over the worst of it. We're still not out of the woods, but at least we're not having horrible behavior for 5 hours straight. Just 2. Right now, I'll take what I can get. On top of this transition, we're looking at a monster growth spurt where he's outgrown all but one pair of the four pairs of shoes we brought along. He's grown at least 1 1/2 inches, and I'm sure we're in for more. He may go home with a whole new wardrobe! LOL

Anyway, back to this adventure we are on.

Sunday Connor and I went with Cat to adventure in the old part of this city we're in. I promise to start taking my camera with me, but even with two people handling a five year old in the middle of all that this one is in the middle of, I'm lucky to come out with my sanity. :)

The old part of the city (I'm taking a few hundred years) has what they call "Commerce Street". Its not just a street, its a web of streets that all network together around a temple dedicated to the fishermen and sailors that leave out of the ports. (Tianjin is a port city.)

Commerce Street is shop after shop after shop selling everything from Calligraphy brushes of all sizes to gorgeous Chinese paintings to traditional Chinese dresses. There are also jewelry vendors that sell beautiful Jade and gold and wooden creations both eastern and western in style. I even saw a few toy vendors. I want to go back and explore the beautiful teas that I saw and maybe pick up a tea pot or two for my collection.

The calligraphy brushes are stunning. Its amazing how intrigued by them I am, but right now, there you are. Some are made with bamboo handles and some are made with plain wood. Some of the handles are stained or painted and some are not. Some are so large that you can use them standing up and paint on the ground. Those handles are at least three feet long. The brushes on the end of the large ones are enormous. The bristles themselves start out fat and then taper to the finest point you can imagine. I saw one that was smaller than a pencil.

The Jade is beautiful. I'm so glad that we have someone like Cat that can help us navigate through picking the right things and helping us learn to bargain for things. I've seen bracelets, necklaces, earrings, and more. I've seen deep green jade all the way to almost white. I know there's more colors and things out there that I haven't seen yet, and WOW, I can't wait to see a whole range of colors and types of jewelry in front of me.

Cat is working with us on learning some key Mandarin words, but its so overwhelming right now, I'm lucky to just get a key word or phrase here or there. And I'm good with that. The language is very difficult. Evidently if you mis-prounouce the word Vanilla in Mandarin, you're saying a very bad word. Needless to say, I have that one written down and just show it to the person I'm trying to order ice cream from. ;)

Transitions

2011-06-22T21:01:00.002-04:00

For today, I'm hitting the Pause button on the adventure blog. I'm hitting the Play button on the Mommy blog. So if you're here for the adventure, you might want to come back tomorrow. :)

Connor has a problem with transitions. When he was very little, he had issues with all transitions, small and large. Meaning, if we changed his routine or did something out of the ordinary, his behavior would suffer. Our happy go lucky little man would get overly confused and his behavior would go south very quickly and very dynamically.

As time went on, he developed the skills to handle these short and medium transitions (small changes to routine, changing a teacher at school, new visitors or new experiences). These are now taken in stride or will small explainations before and during the event happening. His behavior might be what would be considered "Squirelly" at most, but we always come through with no residual issues and a better adjusted boy.

Large transitions, i.e. moving, where everything in his world changes, are bad. The first two or three weeks are fine, but then his brain realizes we're not returning to the routine and familiar and the behavior goes south. Very south. The past few nights have found him realizing that we're not returning to the familiar and that this new adventure is his new reality. All the fear that he's hidden over the past few weeks comes bubbling like hot lava to the surface to burn us all. The days have been fine and normal its just night time that all this comes to the surface.

We've spent the past two nights dealing with a boy that is neck deep with this transition. This is one of the most significant transitions of his life. People around him look different, sound different and act different. He is in a new apartment, he does not have his house and the majority of his things are in storage.

Today, I'm going to keep his world very small. We're going to watch a movie, go shopping for an alarm clock (we all overslept this morning), and have some school time this afternoon. Tonight I'm going to try to have something familiar for dinner and then keep his routine very basic until bed time. I'm hoping this helps his transition to this strange and foreign land.

Exploring!

2011-06-20T04:17:00.002-04:00

Today was the first day with our new tour guide/assistant/nanny.

I'm going to name her Cat on here. She's a college student at a local university. She studies English and wants to be an interpreter. She likes kids and understands what I mean when I describe Connor as "all boy". Or at least she pretends to understand. :)

Cat took us out looking for places that we can take Connor to go play. We hit Gym*boree first, which in the US, is a monthly fee usually. Affordable. Here? China? Insanely expensive. We're talking crazy-expensive territory. I saw the price and almost fainted territory. I could go on, but won't.

BUT it was nice to let Connor run off some steam. The place was closed for its weekly sanitizing, so he got to experience and play in one of the classrooms. Talk about a treat! He had so much fun and had taken the edge off his energy by the time we left.

We went to another place that only taught English. No play time. Oops, not for us! Then another, but it was a public-government run kindergarten, so right idea, wrong setting. Then another, only training classes, music, language, karate, etc. Each class is a la carte, and is just too far.

By the time we were done with all of that, we must have walked five miles in 90 degree heat. We hopped in a cab and went to Pizza * Hut. But then we were hot, sweaty, and almost ready for nap time. We enjoyed introducing Cat to pizza as she had never had it before. I'm not sure she liked it, but she was a good sport and tried it. Tomorrow she is taking us to a traditional Chinese restaurant. Jon has expressed interest in joining us, so he can try it traditional food before he has to do it with co-workers. Smart idea, husband of mine!

We made it back to our room and crashed for nap time. Connor, who usually fights a nap, curled up and passed out.

I've got a load of laundry in and the little man is watching Wallace & ** Grommit on the computer. Its so cool to hear him laughing at the shows!

Tomorrow the plan is to visit another play place for Connor. Then shopping and our traditional Chinese lunch. Should be fun!

First Relaxing Day

2011-06-19T05:03:00.003-04:00

Today was what we can pin point as our first normal day. We didn't have any plans, no work, no errands, no must-dos.

We slept in until almost 8AM after a fantastic dinner (Connor behaved wonderfully!) and visit with Jon's boss.

We made a quick trip to the grocery store after a simple lunch of pasta. We picked up some fresh bread, juice and snacks for the day. We headed back to the apartment and hung out all afternoon. Its 5PM now and we're just now getting around to letting housekeeping in the room. My brain is pushing against this down time with everything in its being. My body is grateful for the down day.

I just made some tea for myself and I'm enjoying some shortbread cookies from the bakery.

I'm about to start a load of laundry and I'll start dinner once housekeeping is done. We're having steak, rice and bread. Again, simple for now. We'll get a little more exotic as time goes on, I'm sure.

Elbows and Knees

2011-06-18T01:36:00.003-04:00

I love my son.

He's one constant growth spurt that once or twice a year goes into a major growth spurt. The first thing I'll notice is a change in attitude followed by a lack of coordination. Or, "elbows and knees". He's all sharp angles and doesn't know how to handle it. Last time, he grew an inch in two weeks.

We're at that now.

We're also a week and a half into our Chinese adventure, which is traditionally when his brain realizes that we're not going to where he used to think of "home" and is starting to adjust to a new "home".

Needless to say we're experiencing transition issues and growth spurt issues at the same time. Exhaustion, crankiness, sass mouth, aches, pains, and mourning what he just left.

So naps are twice as long as normal (yay!) and attitude is at "super cranky" (boo!).

I found some Lavender Jonson's Baby Bath, which always helps soothe him. He just went down for a nap, and I'm hoping this is a nice, long one.

I'm pulling out all the stops in my bag of tricks today.

We're having dinner with hubby's boss tonight. This could be good ... or bad.

I'm hoping for smooth sailing and not elbows and knees.

Farmers Market

2011-06-15T23:47:00.004-04:00

Today we walked Jon to work. He's got an easy commute. Its a 5 block walk.

We continued walking on after dropping Daddy off and giving him a giant hug goodbye. We passed a park, stores, more office buildings. We hung a right on a side street and went past a local kindergarten. Its a bright blue building with a good size court yard for the kids to play in. On we went to the Bakery, where we picked up some cookies, cakes and banana bread. I don't speak more than two or three Mandarin words, but I can point and get my point across as I need to. :)

After the yummy Bakery, we headed to the Farmer's Market. Table after table of all kinds of fruits and vegetables and candy and meats. The sights and sounds were overwhelming for the kiddo. He didn't let go of my hand the entire time. We saw cabbages, bananas, beans of all shapes and lengths. Tomatoes, cucumbers, watermelon. We saw fresh shrimp, caught just this morning, chicken that was freshly butchered (thankfully we didn't see any of that happen in front of us.) We saw a vendor making fresh egg noodles and other vendors selling packaged candy. We walked around for about 10 minutes before choosing our bananas. By the time we found our bananas, Connor was no longer in sensory overload and we had a great discussion about what fruits, vegetables and animals we were seeing.

We put those in our shopping bag with our already purchased bakery goods and headed back to the apartment.

It took a little bit to get back to the place and we were both glad to be able to put our purchases away and watch a documentary on deep sea fish via Net*flix.

We throughly enjoyed the cookies while watching the show.

Our Place: Connor's Room

2011-06-14T18:40:00.006-04:00

Our apartment here in Tianjin is incredible by local standards. We have two bedrooms, one and a half baths, a full (albeit tiny) kitchen, and a living room.

Connor's room has a desk and chair, a TV, an armoire, a couple of night stands and his very own king size bed. He has a twin size bed in storage. That twin size bed had every inch traveled over it every single night ... at least two or three times. He's a kid that moves all over his bed all night long. Now he gets to travel all over his king size bed. He only does one lap around the bed, though.

We've found a spot for his Le*go's. His shoes, clothes, and even toys.

You'll notice that we brought along some creature comforts from home. We brought two blankets and his towel. He hasn't had any trouble going to bed ... even the first night. He saw those blankets and he knew he was going to be fine. And as soon as the towel came out, he wanted to take a bath.

Small things are making a huge difference for us.

Mommy might have forgotten her deoderant but we did not forget the little things that are making this transition smooth.

You'll notice the doorways. The one on the right goes to the kitchen. The one on the left goes to the living room. We're very grateful that he's such a heavy sleeper otherwise we wouldn't be able to raid the kitchen once he goes down for the night. :)

He chose four of his favorite stuffed animals to bring on the adventure with him, and those stay in or around the bed.

During the day he has the option of taking a nap or playing quietly. The king size bed allows him to have his quiet play and fall asleep with no problems. Yesterday, he had Le*gos taking up 3/4 of the bed.

Nanny 1: Interview

2011-06-14T18:30:00.003-04:00

English? Meh. She kind of understood what I was saying, but I expected better comprehension from someone who claimed 20 years of studying it. I cut her a little slack because English was her third language, but when someone asks you about the weather, don't reply with a confused all-over-the-place answer.

Bottom line is that she didn't have enough child care experience.

I have three more potentials to talk to today. Hopefully one of these will work out.

Just found out that Jon will be traveling to the Taiwan office later this month for 3 days or so. Will need an extra hand to save my sanity. :)

Settling in.

2011-06-13T16:40:00.002-04:00

While Saturday was an exercise in settling into our apartment and getting unpacked, Sunday was an exercise in settling into the city we are now calling "home."

One of Jon's co-workers took the kiddo and I on a walking tour of our part of the city. She took us to a farmer's market, a bakery, a park, a stationery store that had a few kids toys, a western-style grocery store, and a Japanese restaurant. All in the span of a few hours. We had a great time and I can only hope that I'll be able to find all those places again!

We live in the middle of one of the downtown areas of the city. Its a huge city of over 15 million people. Now that we've got the kitchen set up, I'm trying to shop for groceries European-style, meaning, every day and only for what I need. So far, so good.

We live in one of the tallest buildings in the city. No matter what direction you look out of the windows you cannot see the edge of the city. You just keep seeing buildings going on and on and on. Tall buildings, short buildings, houses, apartment buildings, malls that take up two city blocks. Its all here, and its very cosmopolitan. Of course it might have to do with the fact that we're in the middle of the city and not on the fringes.

Today I got to spend the whole day with the kiddo by myself. This is something that rarely happens. We're usually always on the go or have something planned. Today, we didn't have anything planned, but managed to have a great day. I'm still trying to keep his world pretty small, as he was up at 2:30 ... and up for the day. We managed to keep him playing quietly (coloring, Legos, etc.) while Jon and I tried to get a few more hours of sleep. Once we finally gave up and got up with him we got ready to tackle the day! Jon got ready for work and we got dressed and ready for whatever unfolded in our day.

Knowing that he'd already been up for six hours, I decided to keep our day as quiet but focused as I could. Turns out it was the right way to go. We had some breakfast and watched a movie while ramping ourselves up for the day. Once Jon left for work, and we finished watching the movie, we took a nap. He slept from 9-11 and was surprised as how quickly the 11 came! We walked to the grocery store, came back, had lunch, watched a documentary or two about dinosaurs and then worked on a hand writing lesson. We played catch with his ball, watched a dinosaur cartoon and then played with his ball some more. We ended the day with Legos and a fun (for him) Iron *** Man cartoon.

Jon came home and we walked to the grocery store where we found the makings for BLT's. Dinner and a quick game time with Daddy and off to bed he went. He was asleep in seconds. He's still asleep now. Its 5AM, and I'm not going to jinx it, other than to say, I'm grateful he's still sleeping.

Me, on the other hand. I sleep seven hours and I'm up. So after falling asleep at 9, I was up at 4. I need to try to push that 9 a little later otherwise I'm going to have problems. Yuck. But thats ok, I'm finding being up this early gives me the opportunity to catch up on the blog, and think about what we have to do for the day.

I'm interviewing a candidate for our Nanny today. I'm told she speaks English, but I don't know more than that. Never had to interview one before, so i'm not really sure what to ask, but I'm sure I'll figure it out when she gets here. Jon's company is sending someone over from the office to act as translator in case we get stuck. I'm hoping I'll be able to see her resume before she gets here, otherwise I'll be at a slight disadvantage. :) We've always just hired teachers from his pre-school if we've needed a night out here and there.

Initial impressions? People have been more than kind, more than generous, and more than I expected. Jon's company has gone above and beyond what they needed to do in order for us to feel good about our decision to move here. We definitely feel valued and a part of the team already, and Jon's only had one full day of work in the office here. We now hope we live up to expectations.

Once the kiddo starts having a better sleep schedule, I'll start venturing out into the city to see what is out there to explore. I just don't want to take an exhausted kiddo into places that I know will trigger meltdowns if he's that exhausted. I'm even hoping to take him to Beijing to experience some of the sights there. The bullet train is only a 29 minute ride into Beijing from where we are, so thats an easy day trip!

Kiddos first request? He wants to see the Great Wall of China. Sounds like a good first request to me! I think we need to save that one for the weekend, where Jon can join us. I think he wants to see that one, too.

Once we told his teacher back in Boston what was going on, she had a little mini-lesson on China for the class. They talked about the Terra Cotta soldiers, the Great Wall of China, and a few other things that have stuck in his five year old brain. He was so prepared when we landed, I'm going to need to send his teachers a thank you of some sort. What could have been a scary ride into the unknown was a gentle landing into a new land. He's really been excited about this adventure. Even going so far as to say he wants us to live here for a long time.

Well, kiddo, who knows. Stranger things have happened!

Jet Lag

2011-06-11T20:15:00.002-04:00

I'm good with jet lag. I know it, embrace it, and sleep through it. Within about 48 hours, I'm good to go.

My husband, it hits him a few days later.

My son is a typical kid who will go until his body stops and shuts down.

Last night we experienced this first hand, and it was pretty amazing to witness.

He fell asleep for a nap around 4:30 after getting up earlier than the sun and when it was time go to out to dinner with friends, he could not be woken up to save his life. He sleep walked through getting in the cab and then promptly fell back asleep.

We made it to this really nice, authentic German restaurant where he proceeded to sleep on my husband throughout dinner. Slept through loud conversations and the band getting ready to play. Anyone who knows my son, knows that he would be trying to crawl under our collective skin to get away from such a loud sound. He slept through it all. Hubby's pants were soaked with poor little man's drool. LOL We finished dinner and moved outside where he continued to sleep. It was breezy and cool and every now and again, he'd wake up just enough to look around, take a sip of apple juice or a bite of the Bavarian pretzel we got him, and back to sleep he went.

About half way through our outdoor time, he woke up and just wanted to hang out. So he drank his juice and ate more pretzels.

We got home around 10PM local time, he stayed up for another 30 minutes winding down, and he went right to bed. And slept until the glorious hour of 7:15. This is amazing. Usually he's up with the sun. Which, right now? The sun is up at 4:30 here in our part of the world. So yes, we're very grateful, and now confident that he, too, has kicked the nasty Jet Lag to the curb.

Stares ...

2011-06-11T20:11:00.003-04:00

Its funny, we were prepared for the stares of being so obviously foreign here in China.

Our son, however, was not.

He is mighty uncomfortable at the incredibly bold and rude stares he has been getting. Now, granted, he's a gorgeous kid, and thats not me being biased. Its just part of being a stranger in a strange land. But yesterday he got so uncomfortable with the stares that he told some people in McDonald's to stop staring at him.

That just made them look harder, so we left.

I feel bad that he doesn't understand all this quite yet. But what I am grateful for is that he now gets it when we tell him to stop staring at people.

So I guess we're making progress.

Ah, sleep.

2011-06-10T03:40:00.007-04:00

What a difference a great nights sleep and a couple of showers makes. Seriously, we got here, and almost raced each other to get in the shower and get clean. I had forgotten what, exactly, traveling in the middle of summer meant. Hot, sticky, sweaty, gross.

Jon, Connor and I spent the morning being taken from the hotel to the apartment where we'll be living to the grocery store and then back to the apartment. Connor is content this afternoon to just play with his Legos and listen to the Discovery Channel. He's adapted much more quickly than I thought he would. Yesterday we were crazy with the exhaustion and heat. He was shy and squirrely. Today he's actually impressed some of Jon's co-workers with his behavior and manners at breakfast.

Its so good to finally be in the apartment. I cannot tell you how good it feels. We'll keep tweaking our routine here and there until we find our rhythm. Right now I'm trying to keep Connor's world fairly small, and it seems to be working. Today, he has interacted with everyone thats come across his path. That is a huge step forward from where he was even six months ago. I'll try to expand things a little at a time, and that should work out fine. My task for this weekend is to try to find a park where he can run off some of this energy.

There is so much construction here. As we were driving into the city from Beijing, we saw apartment buildings being built. Not just one, two, ten. At least 50, and probably more than that. Each building had a huge crane coming out of the top of it. All were within approximately the same amount of completion.

I know I mentioned yesterday about the traffic and the pedestrians. Wow. The way they thread themselves (both cars, people AND bikes) is just incredible. Its watching this dance of all of these things as they try to get from point A to point B while trying to avoid getting hit. People here are absolutely fearless.

The people we have met have been beyond kind and amazingly generous. We're looking forward to exploring our new part of the world once we get settled in and adjusted.

We're here!

2011-06-09T16:26:00.000-04:00

It was quite the adventure, and I must say, Connor was a real trooper. He got a little delirious when we were flying from Boston to Los Angeles and ended up cold cocking me in the nose, but other than that, wow, did he rise to the occasion!

This has been quite the adventure!

We move to our apartment today, but yesterday they didn't want us to go to our apartment without having the opportunity to stock it up first. Sounds like Connor and I will do that while Jon is meeting the rest of the staff at the office this morning and then we'll go out and have an official "meet and greet" with the executive team at lunch.

Jon's boss came right out and said that we can stay as long as we want, so this could really get interesting!

The Beijing airport was absolutely huge. I mean huge. Never seen anything like it. We landed around 2:30PM and got through customs and baggage claim around 4ish. We got to the office and met a few of the team and then came straight to the hotel and took showers. Let me tell you how much better we felt after that!

Dinner was simple pasta from room service and we were lights out by 9.

Everything that you've ever heard about Chinese driving is true, by the way. No rules, only suggestions. I can tell you that I won't be driving here anytime soon. Pedestrians are some of the bravest people, hands down. This is going to be really interesting!

Tianjin is a very modern city. Much more so than I thought it would be. We'll walk around and explore a little more over the next few days, but so far, I'm impressed for a city of 15 million people.

The office manager at Jon's office is so sweet. She's been tasked with finding us a nanny/assistant/translator so things aren't so difficult. She'd determined that Connor be able to speak some Mandarin by the end of the summer -- bring it on! I think it would be great for him!

Baby Steps

2011-06-05T09:40:00.003-04:00

The guys came and packed the house in almost record time yesterday. They showed up at 10 and were done by 3:30. The last time we had people pack us, it took them three days. Makes me wonder what, exactly they did for those three days.

The day was gorgeous, and I was able to spread a blanket out on the grass in the front yard and enjoy the sun and just hang out. Until they disconnect the internet. LOL I knew it was an accident but it was funny to be surfing along one minute and the next everything went blank! Thank goodness we got it turned back on.

My sister came to help and we ended up keeping my sanity in check. Usually at this time during the move, my only job is crisis management. This time, everything is just falling into place. Very different, but wonderful experience, I must say. :)

We're here at my Dad's house because all our stuff is packed. We're living out of one suitcase ... but we're doing fine.

We have a day off today, so I'm really hoping to not do much of anything. I really need a down day. The next week is going to be unlike anything any of us has experienced. I really don't want to borrow stress from the future. I just want to enjoy today for what it is. Beautiful and restful.

Tomorrow the loaders come back and load up the storage units. The trash guys are coming tomorrow, too. We're getting rid of our old mattresses and a broken couch in addition to some other stuff.

I'm not thinking beyond Monday at the moment. China will come soon enough.

We're moving.

2011-06-03T10:06:00.002-04:00

Again.

We've done alot of moving in the past few years. All of them awesome, amazing adventures. We're about to embark on one of hte scariest, exciting, pivitol of all.

We're moving to China.

I'll let that sink in. I'm still working on letting it sink into my brain, and we leave in 5 days.

We'll spend the next 4-5ish months over in China (maybe longer) and then head to Los Angeles when we return to the states.

Today is my lsat day at work at a job I've really enjoyed. Today is the kiddo's last day of school. The storage units show up at the house today.

The packers come tomorrow. We move in with my Dad tomorrow.

The loaders come Monday.

We leave Tuesday.

We have an adventure in front of us, thats for sure. The pets have been distributed to their new homes. All our ducks are in a row.

Follow along on the adventure!

Don't forget to comment!

Testing ... Testing ...

2011-05-14T16:04:00.001-04:00

Lots of changes a foot in the bethee household.

I'm dusting off the old blog because things are starting to happen again.

Let the excitement commence!

All is well.

2010-12-20T21:39:00.002-05:00

Things started heating up right after I posted last.

On the day of our anniversary, both my husband and I were laid off; but not without my husband having a full time job to jump to.

As a result of this new job, we relocated back to the Boston area. We're experiencing such joy as we see family and friends and know that they are just around the corner.

Its been one heck of a year.

Its almost done.

I'll be back blogging after the first of the year with regular posts. I've got a few waiting in the wings ready to go.

I hope there are still a few readers out there from the before time. :) Comment, I'd love to hear what you've been up to.

And so it begins ...

2010-08-22T22:45:00.003-04:00

Once Mom died, my huge accomplishment of losing a ton of weight on Wei*ght Watch*ers went out the window. I had gone from a size 12 to almost a size 8.

I turned to food; gained it all back and then some. I officially have no pants that fit and only one pair of jeans that fits. Those are so thin that they are about to shred at any moment.

Saturday, I went back to WW. I'm going to lose this weight. I WILL get back down to where I was.

I'm not using food for comfort anymore.

So God.

2010-08-13T21:59:00.002-04:00

So, God.

I've been in a very challenging professional situation. My manager is months away from retirement, but has already checked out. Seriously, two hour lunches, an hour break in the morning and afternoon if she can sneak it in. She's had some challenges and stressful situations, which she's managed to take out on me. Yelling and lots of "counseling" have happened although I've done nothing but complete my tasks and be professional.

So, God!

A few weeks ago I hit critical mass. I just couldn't deal with it anymore, and I had run out of ideas. There were no jobs I could apply for that I could get a call back for; I was a victim of the economy.

So God.

I gave it over. I was driving along my commute to pick up the kiddo when I just said, "Alright, God. This is yours. I've done everything I know to do. This project is yours." Twenty seconds later, I got an email.

"Whats your status? Are you in the market?"

A job found me.

So, God, thank you.

Perspective

2010-07-12T23:48:00.003-04:00

I haven't written in a while, but that doesn't mean nothing has happened in my world.

1. I lost my mother. She died peacefully while taking a nap one afternoon. No, it was not recently.
2. The six weeks before that happened saw me in the ER for people in my family thee times.
3. The two weeks after saw me in the ER.
4. The relationship between my son's former school and our family deteriorated to the point where we decided to pull him. We had a meeting with the school Director his final day to let them know he would no longer be returning.

1. We moved him to a school that saw a complete 180 degree turn within the first two days.
2. We celebrated having our son in our life for over 3 1/2 years.
3. We are touched and humbled that even though his last school situation was a disaster, the new one is encouraging promotion to kindergarten -- a year early!
4. We learned to move on without Mom. We are sad for our loss, but not devastated. She was sick for so long that it wasn't a surprise, just a shock when it finally did happen. We miss her, certainly, but we realize that she was suffering much more than she wasn't.

I have several things I need to write about:
1. Finding my birth mother; and then losing her.
2. Realizing why Mom did things the way she did. (Hint: No, its not too late. We still talk.)
3. Enjoying "normalcy" and appreciating "boring".
4. Gratitude.

I didn't set out to make lists of things; but thats what happened. I'll expand on most of those things at a later date. Right now, i'm sitting in the dark, appreciating all I have and grateful for the people in my world.

Final Post Placement!

2009-08-17T23:13:00.002-04:00

I cannot honestly believe we're hitting the three year anniversary of Connor joining our happy family. Its been quite the adventure!

I'll have a full post closer to the actual dates of things happening, but it still amazes me how little and frankly how delayed and what I call "behind the eight ball" he really was.

We have our final post placement report meeting the weekend of Labor Day.

Three years.

Wow.

Continuing the Saga

2009-08-15T08:53:00.002-04:00

So I got my original birth certificate in the mail. I now know what my original name is. Thank you parents for changing it. Seriously. My time of birth is on there, too.

So is my birth mothers name.

I contacted an intermediary who got in contact with my birth mother. I wanted to respect her space and her life as much as possible.

It took a couple of weeks to finally connect with her. But the bottom line is: she wants no contact. I'm not upset. Resigned, but not upset. It also doesn't mean that I can't contact my half brother and sister in a decade or so. I now know who they are and where they are.

Emotions? Honestly, since I've known that I've always been adopted, I had very few emotions about it. I've accepted long ago who I am and who my real parents are. This woman may have given birth to me but honestly, I was only interested in finding out weird things like: who to blame for my insanely thick and curly hair.

I have my family here. My fabulous husband and cute and sassy son. I have parents that are wonderful and a sister who is crazy (in a good way). I have an extended family that is amazing. There's SOO many of them.

She didn't answer the questions I had, but maybe someday I'll get the answers.

Saturday Surprise

2009-06-22T00:54:00.002-04:00

The check I sent along with the form to get my birth certificate hasn't been cashed yet. However, on Saturday, I checked the mail and was STUNNED to find a copy of my original birth certificate.

My birth name, my birth mothers name, the empty slot where a birth father would be listed and best piece of information yet, the location of my birth mothers birth.

This information is currently being digested. I'm not sure how to respond or how to react. All I know is that it will be a deliberate and considerate response.

Bunny Hop

2009-06-17T22:27:00.002-04:00

Small-ish bunny hop in the process to getting my original birth certificate. The state agency that handles this process called me to let me know that I didn't have enough identity verification included in the envelope. Evidently the copy of my drivers license and passport wasn't enough. ;)

So down to the local court house I went to get a copy of my marriage certificate.

Now, I wait. I'm looking forward, excited, and terrified all at the same time.

I'll know a little before hand that they've succeeded because they'll cash the check for the fee. $28.

Then I'll just have the wait for it to get to me.

Day of days.

2009-06-01T22:16:00.003-04:00

Today was a day. Not just a capital D Day, but a DAY. All caps.

Today I mailed a form to the state I was born in. I requested a copy of my birth certificate. My original birth certificate. Pre adoption.

Six to eight weeks to get it back. I'll know the names of my birth parents.

I'm excited, scared, elated, terrified. Most of all, though, I'm proud. Damn proud that I did it. I've been wanting to do itfor a very long time.

Today, I did.

Little Man

2008-02-11T00:05:00.000-05:00

You're becoming such a little man. I am surprised by you each and every day.

Today I was at work all day, and when you and Daddy came to have lunch with me at the store, you pointed to my apron and said, "Mamma, off." So off the apron went, and off we went to the food court. You had fun swiping bacon from my baked potato, meat from Daddy's cheesesteak, and you LOVED your seasoned fries. Not the best lunch, but for you, a great afternoon snack. :)

Tonite, as I was putting you to bed (you wore your poor Daddy out and he was in bed before you!) I said, "Mamma wants a kiss." You leaned over and laid one on me. My heart just about exploded. You've been so affectionate lately, and its been wonderful to see.

For the first time yesterday I asked you to smile when I took a picture of you. And to my surprise, you DID! Your constantly smile, so I never have to ask, I guess I just never realize all I had to do was ask, but wow, what a great treat!

We are praying and hoping that the hitting phase (Mommy and Daddy only, thankfully) is passing us ...

2007-12-17T08:01:00.000-05:00

Wow. I didn't realize it had been almost a month since I last updated.

So here's whats been going on in my world:

Right now I have a "one shift a week" job at the mall just to keep me busy. DH has been taking care of the little man while I'm at work, and I'm seeing great things come of it in their relationship. He's turning into a "father" instead of just "daddy". I love seeing the two of them together.

We're heading out of town for the holidays. Visting friends ... which we're very excited about. The boy has his own seat, and between the three of us, we have the entire row, which will make the experience of travelling much better than it has been.

I may or may not be able to check in between now and the new year. But if I don't, please have a happy and healthy holiday season.

Question for the techies ...

2007-11-24T02:12:00.001-05:00

Ok, the time is finally getting to me (and that fourth cup of caffienated tea!).

How do I find out how people find my blog? I see where people post on their blogs, "one person found me by Googling 'St. Lucia' when they mentioned it in passing once a year ago.

TIA. I'm totally lost. Even after my own Google search for the answer! :)

Another one ...

2007-11-24T01:57:00.000-05:00

... bites the dust.

Or in this case, our holiday. :)

The In-Laws came down for the holiday and a fun time was had by all. Little Man performed on cue. DH behaved. Said In-Laws behaved as well. *AHHHH* Sheer bliss.

We had family portraits taken today. Wow, how our little man has grown. Last Turkey Day, he could fit in the crook of our arm. This one? HA! He was the child that did not want to be contained. It was a riot to see.

I've started working at the local gourmet tea store one day a week. I've only been at it a few weeks, and I still get the once-a-shift call of "Get home NOW, or you will find me bald." from my DH.

Rather amusing. He's been loving spending the time with him, but is starting to appreciate that I'm not kidding when I say that he was really active that day. LOL

I miss the days when more than one person commented. Is anyone out there?

Quick: What infamous band had a song named "Is there anyone out there?"

Grow!

2007-11-09T11:57:00.000-05:00

When we first brought you home, you were so tiny. At 12 months, you weighed 16 pounds and were 29 inches long. You were so skinny and small that you were wearing clothes fo a six month old, and they were big.

You certianly have made up for all that! Over the past 13 months that you have been home, you have gained weight and grown. MY HAVE YOU GROWN! You are now wearing a size 3T-4T depending on the clothes, and are over 37 inches tall! You're still skinny, but we no longer see your ribs, and we no longer worry if you're OK. Turns out, you are meant to be slender and tall.

Life could be worse. :)

You're entering another growth spurt, which puts you in a VERY tall category. You're going to tower over your Daddy and I.

Now if we can only get you to say "Dada" instead of calling him "Mama", we'd be in good shape.

The price of Teeth

2007-11-01T01:36:00.000-04:00

The cost of going to a sucky dentist in the former town that wasn't about being proactive?

Me: $1400
DH: $3500

Connor smiled and waived on command but wouldn't show teeth. Back in another six months to see if we can pry some xrays out of him. I think we may have to sedate him. LOL

Our wallet is devistated for the moment. *sigh*

Proud

2007-10-21T05:08:00.000-04:00

I've been meaning to post this for a couple of weeks now, but things have been a little crazy around here lately. :)

We made the decision to send our son to a small Monstessori school nearby last spring. He'd been home for close to six months by that point and was showing very good signs of positive attachment. So we started him for just two mornings a week. Just enough to get a little socialization with kids his own age, and learn proper respect for people that weren't his parents.

Evidently it worked.

We had our first Parent/Teacher Conference at school a couple of weeks ago. His teacher was very pleased with his progress, said he was "Doing great!" But the best compliment that she could have given us was this: "He's friends with everyone. He enjoys playing with every child in the class, and also is content to just play by himself when he needs to." She went on to mention that its pretty rare to run across a child that will be friends with everyone at this age. He's in the toddler class with other one and two year olds.

What a joy to hear.

Normal

2007-10-19T20:11:00.001-04:00

Connor is feeling better.

So much better, in fact, that when I asked him if he felt better, he responded with his "all better" sign.

Its not a typical sign, however.

My husband puts Connor to bed every night. One of his favorite books is the Hungry Caterpillar. When he gets towards the end of the book, there is a passage that says, "And he felt much better." (Paraphrased for now, as the book is in the room with the sleeping child.

When they get to that part, my husband rubs his tummy up and down and says, "All better," until Connor repeats it back to him. Its gotten to be a very cute game for them both.

So today, when I asked how he felt, he replied with his sign for, "All better."

He even giggled as he did it. My baby is back to normal.

Sleep Deprived

2007-10-17T21:40:00.000-04:00

I started my week with a toddler with a temperature of 103.5. Thought it was just a nasty cold. Then the fever wouldn't go away, and the toddler stopped eating.

One trip to urgent care and one trip to the ER discovered Hand, Foot & Mouth Disease.

I've had seven hours of sleep in 2 1/2 days.

On top of a sick and cranky toddler I've had a sick and cranky husband.

Our goddess of a sitter is coming over tomorrow (local college student) to hang with him while I try to get some sleep. I'm exhausted.

Two

2007-10-16T19:33:00.001-04:00

I can't belive our little one is two. His party was a month ago, but as most mom's will attest, all I can do right now is just shake my head and say, "Where did the time GO?!"

We had such a wonderful time. Connor has a new friend, we'll name him B. B and Connor are wonderful friends. They spend alot of time together since B's momma and I are good friends. You see, B is from Russia, too. So lots of commonality all around.

Anyway, back to the birthday. We held the party at our local kid-friendly-also-has-a-retail-clothing-chain-name place. He was the king for a day, and loved every minute of it. They did all his favorite activities and sang all his favorite songs. We had a cookie cake ... which I would highly suggest by the way. Virtually no mess and very easy clean up. NO FROSTING FIGHTS!!!

He's changed so much in the year we've had custody of him. He's gone from not being anywhere near any growth chart anywhere to being a tall kid with really good muscle tone. He's a bit on the skinny side, but in a healthy way, not severely underweight and under nourished like he was when he came home.

The first few months he was home he consistantly ate 4-5 jars of baby food at a sitting -- 4 to 5 times a day! Now he's eating chicken nuggests, green beans, peanuts, bacon and peas like a champ!

He's got around 30 words that he uses consistantly, about 8 sign language signs, and is running around like crazy. Fantastic progress for a little one who could barely crawl when he came home.

Post Placement: Year 1

2007-09-09T01:03:00.000-04:00

Right before my surgery, we found a new social worker. The last one we had for his six month PPR (Post Placement Report) met with us over lunch in a restaurant. We only spent 45 minutes with her, and the report showed it.

The recommendation for this one came from a friend of mine whose son is also from Russia. This woman is WONDERFUL.

She came over to the apartment, spent several hours with us observing us, our interaction with Connor, and what he's up to.

The bottom line is we're doing great things with him, he's made wonderful strides, and to keep doing what we're doing as he's heading in the right direction. *AHHHH*

Can I just say that we slept very well that evening.

I can't believe he's been home just shy of a year. In some ways it seems so much shorter ... and in others, like he's been with us forever.

Yesterday I took him for his two year check up.

He's 34 1/2 inches tall and 24 1/2 pounds.

When he came home he was 16 pounds and 29 inches. A year ago, he wasn't even waving to the size charts. Not even in the same room with them. (Ok, his height was at the 1 percentile, but you know what I mean.) This year? Smack dab where he should be.

I slept well last night, too.

Surgery and all that stuff

2007-09-09T00:46:00.000-04:00

This past May, my little man was sitting in his high chair. Little man was done as he could be with his lunch so I took him out of his high chair and let him down on the ground. I didn't see that he had grabbed my fork off the table on his way down to the floor.

So as he starts to sprint by me, I plant my feet, turn my body, reach for my lovely son. *POP* *SNAP* and all of a sudden my knee is in excrutiating pain.

Of course, Connor at this point, sees that something is wrong, turns around, gives me the fork, and turns around and jets off to play with something else.

Meanwhile I'm on the floor trying hard to push my knee back into position so I could stand up.

Fast forward to that weekend. My knee is four times the size of the other knee, and the doctor at the urgent care clinic we went to was happy that I hadn't broken my kneecap.

It took six weeks for the swelling to go down to only three times the size of the other one.

By that time I'd seen my Primary Care doc, and gotten a referral for a good orthopedic surgeon.

Because of all the happenings and travelling I did, I had a nice prescription for pain and a great knee brace for the rest of the summer.

By the time I got the MRI and had everything confirmed by the surgeon, the only option was surgery. I had torn the meniscus in my right knee. Not a significant surgery by any means. Out patient, and I was to recover in a few days/weeks.

My parents graciously offered to come down to take care of Connor while I was recovering. So while they hung out with the little man, I went through my procedure (took the doc 20 minutes to fix it!) and laid in bed for a week (ok, as much as possible LOL) my folks took him to Gymboree, swimming, and tried to stay cool through a nasty heat wave. They even took us to the beach for a week once I'd felt almost normal!

So I spent the first week in bed. Second week trying not to take the good drugs, and trying to work the knee out. I was really limited in activity until the stitches (all two of them) came out. They were just in the wrong place to bed my knee more than a slow walk would allow. Third week at the beach, and week four, I can honestly say, I'm back to normal.

Every now and again, I do get a twinge of pain/discomfort, but its usually because I'm moving my knee/leg in a way that I haven't in a very long time. I'm now working on building the muscles of that leg back up, because there is a visable (at least to me) difference in size between the two legs.

Hi!

2007-09-09T00:44:00.000-04:00

Hi there. My name is bethee.

I figured that since I abandoned my little corner of the net for so long that I should reintroduce myself to y'all.

So hi there. :)

I'm going to make individual posts for each event/topic since otherwise, well, we'd be having a HUGE novel in one post. I won't torture you that way. Promise.

So, Topic 1 ...

Surgery, and how it all went down.

Normalcy

2007-09-04T14:33:00.000-04:00

Connor had his first day of school today (for the school year) and spent the morning settling into the classroom again. He has grown by leaps and bounds, and is SUCH a happy boy.

We completed his one year post placement report and sent that off this morning. Two down, two to go.

HUGE update coming, I promise. So much happened during this crazy summer.

The knee surgery was successful, though. For which I am extremely grateful.

Pouring Rain

2007-06-24T21:45:00.000-04:00

The old saying is true: When it rains, it pours.

1. We had planned our first vacation as a family and three weeks before DH comes home and informs me that he cannot go. So I sucked it up, changed his flight to the fall (he's got a convention in that city), and Connor and I went by ourselves. We had a wonderful time, introduced the little man to most of our friends, and hung out with one of my best girlfriends for a few days.

2. A week before our big vacation, I blew my knee out. Yea, me, who hasn't seen a tennis court or a ski slope in at least 15 years. I was chasing after C when I twisted when I should have stepped. Felt a snap*POP, and my knee is instantly 2.5x the size of the other one. Haven't been able to get on the floor and play with him for weeks! :( I had an MRI last week, and will get the results this week. All I know is that if I do need surgery, we're getting a nanny. I'm just not going to be able to chase after him ... that would be really bad.

3. The week we left to go on vacation, I got a call from home (not unusual, just the content of the call is). My uncle (Dad's brother) was diagnosed with inoperable stomach cancer. It had already invaded his liver. They sent him home from chemo due to an infection, and to make a long story short, he passed within 3 weeks of diagnosis.

4. So I got home from vacation (a week long)and had to turn around within 5 days and head north to my parents house for two weeks. My sister and I spoke at his funeral, his son played "Amazing Grace" at his graveside on his trumpet. They held an Irish wake (lots of celebrating of his life). The wake had over 400 people, and the funeral was lovely. My trip up there also straddled Father's Day, so we all met (My parents, myself, C, and my uncle's family, and grandkids) at his grave and released red baloons. It was touching, and I know that DH hated that he had to work and stay at home. We stayed with my parents, and C's job was to distract his grandpa and infect him with his innate happiness. It worked, C did his job so well, that grandpa's stress over the loss of his brother wasn't lessened by any means, but it was softened. My dad and uncle used to play golf weekly, and the two couples would do dinner every other month. I'm glad that we we able to play a small part in the discovery of a "new normal".

5. We enrolled C in a local Montessori school towards the end of the year. It was hands down one of the smartest decisions we've made. He was there the last 2 1/2 months of the semester, but at the rate it took him to transition to the class full time (3 hours, 2x a week), the year was almost over. He had seperation anxiety to the point where I had to sit outside the classroom for a month. Those tears were music to my ears. It proved that we are doing something right. It proved that his attachment is solid. When he begins in the fall, he'll be fine. No transition problems at all.

6. He's handled all the transitions over the past few months (vacation, home, trip to my parents, meeting all these new people, back home, and into a familiar routine and surroundings) like a trooper.

He's developed into a happy, loving, baby who loves to give hugs. He's always got a smile and a wave for anyone. He only hugs those who are very special.

We're so blessed.

Happy Boy

2007-02-05T20:55:00.000-05:00

We've been in such chaos over the past few months, that we've been grateful for any sort of schedule or normalcy. Back in Boston we had a pseudo schedule. We did the same things every day, with some variation depending on what was on our To Do list.

No schedule is possible when you're in transition like we've been. We've been through two hotel rooms and a chaotic apartment. I finished his room yesterday (I'll post pictures eventually.), which meant that another change to his room happened. So we had a very difficult night last night. C was up until 3AM, and then up by 8:30. Not to mention that the cat finally came home. (He's been staying with my sister for the past few weeks while we get settled.)

So back to the point of my post.

Tonight was the first night since we left the old apartment that he went down without crying, without anger, without stress. Just a sippy cup, and a smile. We're hearing chatter and laughter through the monitor as I type this. How cool.

We're doing good. :)

Cute Story

2007-01-29T10:10:00.000-05:00

As you all know, we have been in the middle of our move for the past month. Our lives have been in chaos, to say the least. We have been in the apartment just about a week, and only found towels last night! (We've been sharing two towels for the past week, washing every day.)

The baby has been a trooper throughout this whole chaotic time. He made the transition to the first hotel room, to the second hotel room to the apartment with predictable, but minimal fuss. The day he got his crib back, he was a happy boy.

Well, yesterday, we found the music toy that attaches to the side of the crib. I had to go out and run errands and DH attacked another box. What could be inside this magic box, but the babys wonderful music maker! This is the same one that he discovered and learned to turn on by himself very quickly upon our return home (baby, not DH, LOL). DH put said music maker on the floor and the baby raced over to it turned it on, and curled up on the floor next to it for five minutes!!

DH said that the baby kept touching it and playing with it like he couldn't believe it was back! How amazing!

The baby will turn it on in the middle of the night if he wakes up and just wants a little comfort. He's had a tough few weeks without it. This morning, after teething and being up most of the night, he turned it on, and by the time the music was over, he was sound asleep again. I heard a little sigh when the music started.

Such a simple idea, but what a difference it has made for him.

In

2007-01-24T10:20:00.000-05:00

We're in the apartment, and its great. We're about 3/4 unpacked, and we have a couch and TV console being delivered tomorrow. We should have plenty off room for them!

Only complaint about the apartment is that the dumpster is really far away, so you have to drive your trash there. *grr* We're trying to figure out how we are going to get rid of all of our packing boxes! :)

Atlanta!

2007-01-14T10:09:00.000-05:00

We've arrived!

We're in corporate housing for the next week until our apartment is ready and our stuff arrives.

Post more when baby is napping. :)

Blackout

2007-01-09T23:26:00.000-05:00

I know I've had a blackout on this blog for the past couple of months, but there is a reason. A good one.

Life is great. I love my son. I love my husband.

Enter stage left, a moving van.

Yes, folks, you guessed it. We're moving. Again.

This time we're on the road to the deep south. CNN territory. World's largest aquarium and all that.

I spent two days last week in that city finding an apartment. Holy cow, is that city big.

Hubby got a new job which equals promotion in this case. He's so excited, I have a feeling he wants to leave today. Only his last day of work is Thursday. HA!

Cars go on the truck tomorrow morning. Packers and movers arrive on Thursday and depart with our stuff that same day.

Friday, we depart for that very Hot city.

Good thing: my sister has been living there since '93.

Bad thing: my sister has been living there since '93.

This is the closest I will be living to her since we lived in my parents house together. This will be an interesting experiment, 'cause it looks like we'll be there for at least three years. Love her, yes. Drives me crazy, yes. Now this gives my parents an even more open invitation to invite themselves down. *sigh* We had just signed a visitation agreement about the baby and they can only babysit one day a week. I'm now afraid they're going to move down for months at a time. With us.

(The above is written in a half jesting/half serious manner. Please take it as such.)

So like it says above, we leave Friday. Don't know when we'll have our next internet fix, but when I do, I'll be sure to check in. I'll let you know how it is to move with a 15 month old. ;)

Bonus points if you can guess where we're moving to by the references in the post. LOL

PHOTO!

2006-11-27T20:41:00.000-05:00

I finally have 5 minutes to upload a picture for y'all! Here's our little man!

I'll keep this up here for a couple of days and then for privacy concerns, I'll take it down. If you're interested in the photo and missed it, please leave your email or blog link in the comments! :)

Registered

2006-11-20T16:03:00.000-05:00

When I was old enough to vote, I registered as most young people do. The first time I voted, I was attending a boarding school almost 2000 miles from home. I voted via absentee ballot, and was proud to walk my ballot down to the mail room to send it on its way to be counted. I ran into a classmate of mine who was two years younger, 16, and hadn't begun to vote yet. We chatted about it a little, and at the end she said, "I envy you the ability to vote." She was someone I had a huge friend crush on, and it made my proud event even that much more so.

Today, we received from our FedEx woman our son's Russian Passport that verifies that he's been registered at the Russian Consulate.

He was down for a nap, but I started to cry as I opened the envelope. I cannot describe the emotions that ran through me, I still cannot. One of the great fears I had throughout this process was that we would never finish. Never have a baby.

We have one that we love and are so excited to have be a part of our world.

Another proud moment.

Purse Tag

2006-11-19T11:13:00.000-05:00

The contents of my purse have been moved to my diaper bag for the duration of the diaper era. :)

So, other than the traditional diaper stuff (diapers, wipes, baggies, medicine, etc.), my purse has been relegated to a pocket in the bag. So here goes!

Wallet with all necessary (and frivolous) ID's, credit cards, and business and appointment cards.

My magenta Razr phone.

Two silver coins from our local grocery store. They qualify me for special reduced pricing on one item per coin.

Receipts from Bloomingdale's. I snuck out last night after the baby went to bed to return a bottle of perfume that I never opened. (I have a 7 day rule. If I don't wear it or use it within 7 days, it goes back to the store.)

Receipt from Teavana. I enjoyed a Ceylon Cranberry iced tea last night when I went to return the perfume. The store is tea equivilent of Starbucks minus the pasteries.

Receipt from the ATM machine.

Keys are absent as they are kept in a dish by the door.

Tired?

2006-11-11T11:06:00.000-05:00

You were so tired yesterday afternoon. I kept trying to put you down for the night starting around 5. Usually you fuss for about 2 minutes and are out cold until 7:30 or 8 the next morning. Today you were havnig none of that. Everything I tried didn't work. I was beside myself because you were hysterical.

Finally figured it out after 45 minutes of hysterical crying.

You were trying to tell your bonehead of a mother that you had a loaded diaper.

Natch.

Once I figured that out, life got pretty easy. Or at least bedtime did. :)

Food!

2006-11-11T11:03:00.000-05:00

Today you not only discovered that things that were on your tray can be eaten, but are actually the same things that I've been spoon feeding you for the past few weeks.

You were fussy and I put you in your highchair in the kitchen while I cleaned up our mess from the day. I also put a couple of Vanilla Wafers and a handful of Cheerios on the tray with you. You immediately picked up the Vanilla Wafer and started knawing on it! Your fussiness just melted away and you started to smile. You were SO pround of yourself!!

You stayed happy and content in the highchair alternating between a fistful of Cheerios (picking them out of one hand, one at a time and feeding yourself) and the cookies.

YAY, Baby!

Discovery

2006-11-10T09:15:00.000-05:00

A couple of mornnings ago, we were woken up by music coming through the baby monitor. We have one of those toys that attach to the side of the crib that plays music and has some cute buttons and twisty things to keep you busy.

Well, this music starts when one of the buttons is pressed, and after introducing you to it in the first couple of days that you were home, its mostly been silent except for the few times I've started the music for you just to show you it was there.

So back to our story.

Fast forward to today. Naptime. You're laying in your crib peacefully. I can see you on the nightvision monitor that we have. You're just having a great time hanging out and babbling. All of a sudden you scooch up to where the unit is attached to your crib and turn on the music! You stated playing with the buttons and things, and then you started "dancing" in your crib! Ok, so rocking to the music, but you get the idea.

You've exhausted yourself now and are just laying in the crib. You're still babbling and chatting up a storm, but I hope you'll give up this particular ghost and sleep.

You had a reall bad night sleep-wise last night, so I'm hoping that you take a good long nap.

Sippy Cup!

2006-11-10T03:42:00.000-05:00

We've had an issue since we picked up the baby from the baby home. Even before, actually.

My baby would not drink from a bottle, a sippy cup, a cup with a straw, or a regular cup. He's been drinking. Oh yea.

I've been using the plastic measuring syringe that comes with baby Mot*rin. 1.25mil at a time. 3 oz. would take me 45 minutes.

Today, like I do every other day, I gave him a sippy cup with juice in it (watered down, of course). Today he actually drank!!!

YAYAYAYAYAYAY

I was so excited, I called DH at work and told him.

WAHOO

Tough Week

2006-10-29T16:55:00.000-05:00

To say its been a tough week is being kind.

We got back home on the 21st, and the first night he slept through the night was Thursday.

I finally had to call in reinforcements (my parents) on Thursday because he was crying uncontrollably and we ended up taking him to the doctor. Turns out he needed some Benedryl and some special cream for the rash he's developed.

It looks SO much better, but it took all four of us to keep him up on Friday and Saturday so that he slept all night long.

I hope we're on the other side of it!!

I do have a post in the works about the trip, but right now the boy is the priority. :)

Doctor, Doctor

2006-10-23T08:45:00.000-04:00

This morning we're on our way to our first visit to the pediatrician. She's supposed to be wonderful, and she's come highly recommended.

Connor slept from 8AM to 4PM was up for a while, then slept from 6PM to 9:30PM. We were lucky enough to tire him out and he was back down at 11. Bad news is he was up at 2 ... for the night. So while DH half slept, I walked the floors with the boy. Not too bad, but he was SO hungry. He had FOUR containers of food! You'd think we'd never fed him before. LOL

His bath at 6AM was wonderful and quiet. He was sound asleep -- fully dressed -- at 6:30. I'll wake him up around 9:15, feed him, and off we go!

My parents are coming in to help me with him. Thank god! If they can keep him awake and active until about 4PM, I have a good chance of having him sleep 12 straight hours, which means we are on track. I've gotten nothing more than 3 hour cat naps since Friday. I'm running on empty.

And loving every minute.

Home

2006-10-22T08:21:00.000-04:00

We're home. Flight good, baby was a trooper.

Exhausted (understatement), but elated and happy.

I'll post more once I get my brain turned in the right direction. :)

Two Days

2006-10-18T04:37:00.000-04:00

The courier leaves tomorrow for the US Embassy in Moscow. She's fantastic, so I know she'll get everything done.

Friday: Wait. And, oh, yea. Pack.

Saturday: Leave.

Can't get home soon enough.

Saving

2006-10-16T06:50:00.000-04:00

There's actually an adoptive (single) mom here that is insisting that she is "saving" her baby.

Several people have tried to speak to her about this, but she is not listening to it.

Sad, actually. For her daughter.

The rest of the families have just tuned her out.

The Room with no View

2006-10-11T09:53:00.000-04:00

Setting: Our tiny one room hotel room.

Time of Day: Early Evening.

Scene: Bed time for the baby.

Mr. Cranky Pants (MCP for short) delayed his bedtime for over an hour trying to trick his Mommy and Daddy with Crocodile Tears that flooded the Sahara and wailing that could be heard in the hotel dining room. Mommy and Daddy grew a collective "Parent Brain" and outsmarted the baby. How you may ask? We shut off all the lights in our tiny room so the baby thought we were going to bed (at 9 PM).

BUT!

Our heroes remembered to grab their digital camera with X-Ray, uh, I mean night vision (!) built in!

Only they forgot one thing. They can only see if the baby is sleeping if the baby is facing in their direction. *sigh*

So Daddy Hero walked across the mine field that is our room with camera in hand and all lights off (didn't stub a single hero-toe) to gaze through the hazy green goodness of night vision to see ..

... that the baby was staring up at him.

LOL

So he crept silently back into bed, forgetting to use night vision on his way back and stubbing his pinky toe (OUCH!) on the way.

We stayed in bed, in the dark for another five minutes, and next time we looked through the camera lens? Baby was facing us (YAY) and he was sleeping!!!!

Tomorrow we transfer to a new room ... a suite.

I'm sure I'll have all sorts of delicious (toe stubbing) bedtime stories! :)

Ahhh

2006-10-10T14:04:00.000-04:00

No wonder my baby boy was insanely fussy (understatement). Its not just that all three teeth were trying to break through one at a time. No, that would be too easy. Poor little guy had ALL THREE break through on the SAME day.

Today was a much better day.

Monday he went down for 2 two hour naps and one three hour nap.

Today, he had one two hour nap.

He was wired all day, but we'd rather have this baby (pain free) than the other baby (inconsolable).

The drug mixture worked, and he was relatively comfortable.

Thank you for everyones support and advice. Don't think I could have survived the day without it! :)

I've got some interesting posts and commentary that I'll be posting once we return home. Some of the adventures we've had are hilarious/crazy!

10 days and counting until we land.

Teething

2006-10-09T02:03:00.000-04:00

Yes, we're teething.

We're also mourning the loss of everything we know and is familiar.

We have three (yes, three) teeth coming in at the same time, and he has been completely inconsolable for the past two days. Poor baby!!!

We're alternating Baby Tylenol and Baby Motrin every few hours along with Baby Oragel as much as he wants.

Poor doll!!

Announcing ...

2006-10-06T03:43:00.000-04:00

... the arrival of Connor Ivan!

He officially joined our family at 11:AM, Friday, October 6, Vladivostok, Russia time.

Court was a breeze, and they asked DH all the hard questions, me all the softballs. :)

We then spent the next 5 hours retreiving him from the Baby Home where we welcomed him into our arms at 3:PM Vladivostok time.

We returned back to the hotel, with a tired, cranky baby. And two very hungry parents.

DH climbed in the tub with him for his first bath. His bath took all of 3 minutes, but just enough time to have him get clean ... and burst into tears! :)

Right now, DH is on the bed playing with him right now before we put him down for bed.

We couldn't be more thrilled.

T minus

2006-10-05T06:37:00.000-04:00

13 hours. 10:30 AM local Vladivostok time is our court date.

Oh. My. Good. God.

I'll post tomorrow night once we have him in our hot little hands. If we're allowed custody, that is.

Age

2006-10-04T19:37:00.000-04:00

Connor is 12 1/2 months.
His birthday was 2 weeks ago! :)

What is so special for us is that our anniversary is during our 10 day wait. We'll have our son!!! :D

YAY

2006-10-04T16:10:00.000-04:00

We're one day away from court, and our son!!

Ok, now that that happy news is out of the way, heres whats been going on in the past few days.

We left Monday for our 3 hour trek to the village that our baby home is in. We got there in the early afternoon and they immediately brought him to us. We hung out with him for a while until the director of the baby hospital/home came and visited with us. We gave her our final gifts, 4 knitted handmade baby blankets done by my mother and godmother and about 75 pairs of socks. The socks were from the baby shower. We asked everyone attending to bring a package as a gift for the baby home. Everyone loved being able to participate!

Back to our story ...

We hung out with the baby and went for a walk (and a late lunch) late in the afternoon. We discovered that he doesn't like having the sun in his eyes ... it made him cry. I made a mental note to myself that I need to buy him sunglasses.

He's grown taller but it doesn't look like he's gained much weight. I think he's going to be tall and skinny later on.

The baby home has just started him on solid foods. We had the opportunity to feed him while we were there, sometimes with some success, and other times, with no success. It should be interesting to see what happens once we get our paws on him. Hopefully he'll eat everything in sight, and gain back that cute little Budda belly that he had last time we were here.

He surprised us when he showed us that he can pull himself up on the side of the crib (oh crap, now we have to re-adjust the mattress height in his crib at home) and he actually walked along the length of the crib as long as he continued holding on. His preferred method of transportation is crawling. For a baby that was just starting to crawl when we saw him 12 weeks ago, he's learning things by leaps and bounds.

Right now his favorite toys are a cute rattle, some stacking cups and a little teddy bear. We brought some others, but those seem to hold his attention the longest. We brought a stuffed Cookie Moster, but he's really too big and heavy for him to hold for too long a time. He did use him as a pillow, though! It was so cute! The little teddy bear I found at Babystyle ( http://www.babystyle.com/common/search/search_results.asp?adv=1&sort=P&searchtext=teddy+bear+mini+barry&grp=0&prc=0&sze=0 ). I would highly recommend this bear for any baby, as it is small enough and light enough to fit in their tiny grips.

So all told, we spent 3 days with him. We were told that we will need to add up all the hours that we've spent with him from both trips and be prepared to tell that number to the court. We're pretty sure its over 50!

We got back to the hotel in Vladivostok last night and after taking showers, we went right to dinner. We ended up hanging out with several other families that were in various stages of their 10 day wait. It was good to hear their experiences about their adventures. We finally left after 4 hours of that because we were simply exhausted. All this travelling and emotional upheval is very wearing on a body, and we just about collapsed when we got back to the room. I got a full 8 hours of sleep and feel like a new person.

Today we'll have a meeting with our coordinator who will prep us for court. Once that is done, the rest of the day is ours. Since it takes the better part of an afternoon to wash and fix my hair, I might do that. (My hair is rather crazy that way.)

Day 1

2006-10-01T15:07:00.000-04:00

Our first full day was spent recovering from our trip.

We slept a wonderful 14 hours, had a great breakfast of pancakes and hashbrowns, and didn''t leave the room except for lunch and dinner. What a treat!

I passed out early, and its now 6AM. We've been up for half an hour, but the jet lag is so much better this trip vs. last.

We're leaving this morning to spend a couple of days with the baby, so we won't have internet access. We're lucky enough to be able to stay in the baby home, which will be intersting. I'm bringing my computer and toilet paper, so we should be fine. HA HA

Day 1/2

2006-09-30T20:06:00.000-04:00

Flying into Vladivostok yesterday was so different than last time. This time, the flight steward helped us fill out the immigration form, which had us through immigration and baggage claim in record time! We were first in line for passport control and immigration, and our luggage was first off the plane. We beat our coordinator to the lobby by about 10 minutes. It was crazy! We met another family leaving (our coordinator was dropping them off while picking us up) and they were headed back to the States with their son.

We got to the Vlad Inn and got settled. We were in bed by 6, and up at 8 today. The service here is fantastic. The staff here knows their stuff and understands and speaks English very well. We had an issue with one of our converters for our computers, and after speaking with the front desk for a moment, they brought us one that put ours to shame. I'm looking forward to eating in the dining room, as I've heard alot about the wonderful food.

Sunday will be a day of rest, since Monday we head out to see the baby for a few days.

Vladivostok

2006-09-30T02:28:00.000-04:00

We got here about an hour ago and have already met some fantastic families!

We're on our way to bed, though. We're beat. :)

Delayed

2006-09-29T18:50:00.000-04:00

Turns out there was supposedly a bomb discovered in one of the parking garages. They shut down three terminals while they investigated it. We got to the airport at 7:45, and they shut everything down at 8:30. They wouldn't even let people arrive at the terminals to be dropped off.

We got off the ground 90 minutes late, and made up all but 15 minutes in the air. Good flying! :)

We're in Seoul waiting for our flight to Vlad. Can't wait!

Stuck

2006-09-29T00:40:00.000-04:00

We're in the JFK airport waiting for our flight.

They've shut down half the terminals and they're not telling us why. :(

They've moved us to the Business lounge, which is making us very comfortable and happy.

DH has his electronic toys, and I'm playing on the computers they have available for their weary travellers. :)

We hope to be cleared to go soon!

And we're off !!

2006-09-28T12:05:00.000-04:00

Tickets - check
Passports & Visas - check
Luggage - check
Clean house - kind of. ;)
Packed car - next on the list

We're driving to my parents house in about an hour. We'll bring Mr. Kitty with us for them to enjoy while we're gone. They're driving us to the bus, which will then take us to JFK.

I'll post when we get there and get settled. :)

Priorities

2006-09-25T20:52:00.000-04:00

Connor is packed.

His parents live in chaos and have no idea what they are bringing, but Connor is packed.

The priorities are appropriate, I think. ;)

3 days.

Itinerary

2006-09-23T22:23:00.000-04:00

We leave late Thursday night, early Friday morning.

Court is October 6.
We return to the States on October 21.

The cat will be staying with my parents starting Thursday until at least a week after we get home. Then we take it a day at a time.

Answers

2006-09-23T01:39:00.000-04:00

1. The 10 day wait in Vlad is almost never waived. We will not know if we have custody during those 10 days until court is over. We hope so, as it will be a LONG 10 days without him!

2. The trip. Ah, the trip. So as soon as I got home from my adventure to IKEA, I got on the phone with the travel agent. Turned out the rest of the world wants to go to Vladivostok over the next two weeks. A great majority of the flights were sold out! We had the most insane time trying to find seats just to get into the city. We actually almost had to arrive two weeks before court, which would have meant that we left on Monday. Yes, this coming Monday. I made one last ditch call to Korean Airlines and after talking to them for 20 minutes realized that there were two seats open in Business Class for next Thursday! I had them put a 24 hour hold on those seats, called the travel agent back and then booked them and the rest of the itinerary through her.

The problem was only with the leg of the trip that had us travelling from Seoul to Vlad.

All told it took us ALL afternoon to get the tickets organized.

The Visas are being done with a one day turn around, and I just got a call late today from our travel agent stating that she'd talked to the consulate and that everything is "Perfect." We'll get them on Tuesday, I'll pick up the tickets on Monday, and we're good to go!

We had a minor issue this morning with a mis-understanding. Our travel agent thought we'd requested a lap ticket for the baby, when we really wanted the baby to have his own seat! OOPS! Problem caught and solved! YAY

Ahhh. Music to my ears. Just what my over-stressed mind needs!!! YAY!

Great way to start the weekend!

3. Picked up my sister from the airport this afternoon. She's in town for the shower, and because work is about to hit warp speed for the next three months. So the lucky girl gets to treat this as a mini-vacation. Picked her up and ran errands for the trip. Thank God she doesn't mind hanging out and running mundane errands like that. *phew!*

4. In the middle of all the errand running and traffic sitting, we almost ran out of gas. I had 5 miles worth of gas left when I rolled into the gas station. Nothing worse than sitting in traffic trying to get off the highway and theres no exit for a couple of miles! And you're on fumes already!

5. Got a call in the middle of the afternoon that a 2d cousin was killed. He died on his way to a fishing trip to Alaska. He was in a group of 6 men and the pilot. The plane crashed, and he was the only fatality. My sister and I were stunned. We called him "Uncle" and we are the same age as his kids. He was greatly loved, and will be missed.

New Season

2006-09-21T21:22:00.000-04:00

Tonite, I begin feeding my addiction, thats right, my addiction.

Hello, my name is bethee, and I am addicted to Grey's Anatomy.

LOVE the show.

Studio 60 looks like it might be good, too. And don't even get me started on my addiction to Law & Order and Law & Order: SVU.

But.

This is the only episode I will get to see until late October when we return with the boy. My kingdom for a Tivo right now.

I'm counting down the days until we leave. 7.

The Next Step

2006-09-20T15:56:00.000-04:00

At 1:05 PM this afternoon, my cell phone rang.

I was in the car, at a stop light, on my way to the local IKEA for my latest organization project. (Nesting, don't 'cha know?)

It was our parent coordinator, P. "Do you have a pen and paper?" she says.

I scramble for it. I'm expecting her to have a recommendation for us for a new homestudy agency.

"Got it", I say.
"Good, because I have a court date for you!"

Pretty sure I screamed. I know I was in a fog as I drove to IKEA and walked around.

It soon became abundantly clear that my head was not in the game of shopping, and that I needed to just go home and call the travel agent and get the ball rolling.

Because don't you know, we leave NEXT WEEK!

Our court date is the first week of October.

Now I just have to breathe.

Hopefully the travel agent can come through for us!

Murphy's Back.

2006-09-19T17:05:00.000-04:00

My entire life should be dedicated to Mr. Murphy and his hideous law. Every time something is moving along smoothly, I get a monkey wrench the size of Alaska thrown in just because things were WAY too normal.

He's struck again.

Our homestudy agency. The agency that has been in existance for over 100 years. Has processed literally generations of adoptions, is closing. Now normally, this would be be disappointing and sad. Now?

Its horriffic and scary. Here's why. The agency is closing their doors at the start off December. Our homestudy is expiring mid-December.

We're waiting for a court date, and if that court date doesn't happen until December? Well, we have to re-do our homestudy for a THIRD time. Thats right. Three. With this agency, it would have been a simple office visit, and they would have taken care of updating the paper. Now?

Well, you're starting to get it.

So our agency is trying to figure out whats going on in Russia. What steps we might have to take, and figure out what contingencies we need to put into place if we need to pull the trigger on something quickly.

Can I just be sedated until we leave for trip two?

Please?

Rain, Rain, go away ...

2006-09-16T20:17:00.000-04:00

... but only come back if its a baby shower!

Baby shower is next Saturday. My sister is coming up from Atlanta for the event. The In Laws are coming from Pennsylvania, and my Sister In Law is coming up from Connecticut for it!

SOOOO COOOOOL!

Can't wait to see everyone! People who I haven't seen since our wedding in 2002 will be there. That is more important to me than anything else.

Now for that danged call ... ;)

The wait.

2006-09-14T18:18:00.000-04:00

We thought the wait for a referral was bad. This wait has that one look easy.

This one is just about to kill us. Or me. DH is working 14 hours a day on his latest project. He's distracted. I'm not. *sigh*

So what we're waiting for:
1. The release letter.
2. A court date.

Whats the saying, "That which does not kill you, makes you stronger." ??? I think thats it.

Back!

2006-09-12T18:58:00.000-04:00

We're back!

We had such a wonderful time. Breakfasts, lunches, happy hours and dinners with friends with the side benefit of it being expensible for DH. He had a great time at his conference, too. :)

I spent some time tracking down one last infamous piece of paper from our Accountant. His license expired at the end of July and it was my task to track it down. Well, I've been trying to get my hot little hands on it since we returned in July, and finally got him to fax it to me at the hotel. I had made phone calls, sent emails, my agency had, and so had some of my friends. The thing that frustrated the heck out of us was that we NEVER got a response from him. Ever.

Justifiable frustration, eh? :)

So I emailed him and told him if I didn't have it by X time that I was driving up to his office and waiting for it until it was done and then taking it to the Secretary of States office myself.

Took him another 24 hours, but I finally got him to fax it to us! YAY Got it notarized, to the SOS' office and off to Russia it went!

We also had the amazing opportunity to send a package with a family who was heading to our region for their court date. They'll be there this week and deliver our birthday package to our son!

So not only did we have a great last hurrah before the baby comes home, we hung out with our friends AND finished our final paperwork!

Life is good right now.

Hows yours?

Vacation

2006-09-01T19:06:00.000-04:00

I'm singing the Go-Go's song as I type this.

DH has been invited to speak at a geek, uh, gaming conference in Austin this coming week, so I'm tagging along. Since we lived there for over 6 years, we've got alot of friends there. Our schedule is absolutely packed, and we wouldn't have it any other way! :)

Any regular blog readers who live in Austin and want to hook up for a Margarita, let me know. We'll figure something out! :)

Meanwhile, no news on the court date. I'm waiting for the phone to ring every day. So far no ringing. :(

Well, I'm off! I'll post anything from Austin if I hear. Otherwise I'll post a vacation breakdown when we get home. :)

Chair Update

2006-08-19T10:38:00.000-04:00

The company will fix the chair to the way we ordered it, plus give us a refund of 10% of the total purchase price.

It makes the ottoman almost free. I'll post about it again once everything is resolved.

I'm working on pictures. Right now the room is piled with stuff! I finally found the right crib set, so as soon as I put that on the bed, and put some of the clothes away, I'll be able to take some photos of the room.

Right now you can't even see the chair to take a picutre of it! LOL

Rocking Chair

2006-08-14T15:49:00.000-04:00

The first item that I bought for the baby happened right after we received confirmation that our paperwork was registered in Russia.

Our rocking chair and ottoman. Ok, so its a glider, but at that point, its semantics. :)

I called at the beginning of May. Changed my mind on the ottoman the next day, called back and changed it to a gliding ottoman instead of a stationary one. No problem, they said.

So I began my hunt for fabric. It took me two weeks to find some. I went to every fabric store in a 50 mile radius of the apartment, a different one every night after work. I finally found something and its awesome! Its white, with colored embroidery. I know, I know, not good for a new baby, but perfect nonetheless. I'm going to head back to the store tonite to see if I can snag some fabric to make a throw for the chair to protect it from the worst of things. I'll post a picture soon!

I sent in the fabric and forgot about the chair for a while. With 8-12 weeks production and delivery time, I didn't expect a call until July. Well, we got the call right on time, and we scheduled a delivery. The night before the delivery was due, we got a call from the company I ordered it through and they said that the address tags for our items were put on another persons order and vice versa. Long story short. Our order was in Wisconsin. They recalled the chair and shipped it our way.

Fast forward to today. Five weeks later, we finally get our order. The chair is perfect. Fabric is great, size for the room is just what I thought it would be. The ottoman? Stationary.

Now I'm going back and forth with the company to see what they'll do to make it right. They assure me that they will do what it takes to fix it and make it worth my while to shop with them again.

Crib Time

2006-08-13T08:26:00.000-04:00

To take advantage of Massachusetts Tax Free Holiday, we went back to the baby store this weekend and bought the crib, dresser, mattress, and toddler rails. DH and I spent some time yesterday afternoon putting it together. Usually those things are a one person (me) job, but this time, no-go. You needed to be an octopus if you were one person to put the dang thing together.

Once we put it together, I put all the baby stuff in the crib so that our job today is straight forward. Anything that isn't in the crib goes into the storage unit.

So the plan for today is to finish emptying the baby's room into the storage unit that will be delivered today. We still have boxes upon boxes upon random furniture that we're not using from the move from Texas. I'm hoping they come early enough to drop of the storage unit so that we can load it and lock it up, and I can take advantage of the rest of the "holiday". Although its strange, we already don't have to pay taxes on food and clothing. This expands the no tax status to single items up to $2500. Where most states that have this break in taxation restrict it to school supplies, this one is expanded to most items. So our baby furniture yesterday was tax free. The furniture and luxury item stores are packed with people taking advantage of it.

When we were in Babies **** Us yesterday, the sales guy said that last year there was an increase in revenue by 3x for a typical Saturday and over 4x for Sunday! Incredible!

The Rest of the Trip

2006-08-09T21:44:00.000-04:00

Day 5

We arranged to meet A and her Dad a little earlier than normal so we could get the proverbial show on the road. We went to breakfast and had our usual Corn Flakes, Pancakes (they were really Crepes) with Honey, and Tea.

So we had one more visit with the baby at the Baby Home.

So where a lot of visiting parents might take the baby for a walk or something exciting, our goal was to push his comfort level a little more each day so that he never got freaked out over anything.

The first day he was so quiet. Very serious baby came to us. By the second day, he was babbling and laughing and smiling. Atta boy!

Our goal each day was different. Fist day was just get to know him. Second was a laugh. Third was a hug, but we got spontaneous crawling instead. Fourth, was to say good bye.

When we finally had to leave, we took him back to his room that he shared with two other babies. They were both napping, and it looked like our baby soon would be, too.

We left the Baby Home and started for the long drive back to Vlad. Three hours flew! Although we came across the same herd of cows walking down the middle of the road, this time I got a picture!

We signed the intent to adopt document, then went to the notary to get more documents notarized.

Then we were done!

A and her Dad dropped us off at the Hotel where we immediately bought an internet card so we could get online and see what was going on in the rest of the world.

We came upstairs to our room, got settled in and logged on. Only we blew a fuse in the power converter that we brought. Thank god there was a back up fuse in there, otherwise we would have been skreweeeed. So we plugged it into a different socket and worked perfectly. No more fuses blown.

Ordered room service because we just didn’t have the energy … ok, so we were jonesing for our internet fix, and couldn’t be bothered to leave the room.

Day 6 and 7

Day 6 we managed to walk around a little bit, but DH was really feeing like he needed to stay close to the room, so we just walked down the street and looked in the windows of some of the shops before turning around and heading back to the hotel. There is a small gift/jewelry counter on the first floor, so we spent some time and some money there.

Mom, MIL, and Leslie are all getting amber pendants. I’ll pick up something in the Seoul airport for the Dad’s.

Day 7, DH was still feeling under the weather, so we did breakfast downstairs as usual and then went for a walk down to the water. We had a lovely time walking along the waterfront and discovered a cute little amusement park for the kids. We’ll have to remember it for the second trip and bring the baby back.

They even had some ponies, which were so cute!

We went back to the hotel and took naps, went downstairs for lunch, and once I got DH settled back in the room I went back out and looked around the shops. There wasn’t really anything in the shops that I wanted, or that I couldn’t get back home, so I just meandered around and worked my way back to the hotel.

We hit the Korean Restaurant in the hotel for dinner, which I thought was very interesting and good! DH is just starting to feel a little better and didn’t want to push it, so he just had rice. I had this really yummy vegetable soup.

Once we came back to the room, we started flipping channels. We saw a soccer game, so started watching. Then we realized that it was playing in the stadium that we had walked by this morning … and that we can see it out our window! So we spent some time with the telephoto lens on the digital camera watching the game from the window in our room and listening to it on the TV.

Last night, we actually ran across the Simpsons in Russian. Hilarious!

Today’s Observations

• Use bills smaller than 1000 rubles. The shop keepers don’t like breaking something that large, and you’ll probably take all their change.
• Cross the street with everyone else. If they’re J-walking, do it when they do. Don’t try to attempt it alone.

Returning ...

2006-08-03T13:21:00.000-04:00

We have one or two pieces of paper that we're waiting for ... and one of which is completely out of our control.

The second one, well, lets just say, I'm gearing up to persue this one. From the sound of it, its gonna be a doozy. I should be ready to try to make this one happen tomorrow.

Although I geared myself up for a fight at the local police station, and the nice officer on duty totally disarmed us by doing the letters for us on the spot. Huh. Fantastic stuff, I tell you! :)

Once all that is done and apostilled, we'll send it off and get a court date.

Right now we're thinking October/November timeframe. But honestly, until we get a court date, everything is unknown.

Day 4

2006-08-02T21:27:00.000-04:00

Interesting day!

We met A and her Dad in the restaurant as usual, and took off for our day. First stop was at another Baby Home. This one looked like it took care of kids of all ages, as there were all sorts of ages of them hanging around.

We took a woman from there to the passport office and back. Not really sure what the purpose of the visit was, but it didn't take too long and off we went to see the baby!

Today was just like the other two days. We hung out with the baby until he was exhausted, handed him back to the nurses and went to lunch. We went to the same place we went to the first day. Only this time, the food wasn't as good. Hmmm. Ordered the same thing, too.

Like I was saying before, first on the agenda when we get home is to learn a little bit of the language.

Accomplishment of the day was in getting him to spontaneously crawl from Point A to Point B. YAY! Go, baby!

More laughing, more smiles. We're so happy with him!

We haven't started calling him Connor yet, and I'm not sure why. I think it has a lot to do with the fact that he's not ours yet. Just "Buddy" or "Baby".

A keeps suggesting that we should take him for a walk, but we just never seem to get around to it. Or the baby's tired. Or we're tired.

I did have the opportunity for our first snuggle. Towards the end of the afternoon, he was really starting to drag, so I just picked him up and cradled him in my arms. I just started coo'ing to him and he just looked at me with these big brown eyes. Yup, my heart is toast. :)

Its been really interesting to me how exhausted we are by the end of the day. Both of us are ready to collapse into bed by 8PM and sleep straight through until the morning. Hope this isn't a sign of things to come! LOL

The weather has been absolutely beautiful since we've been here. Sunny and warm every day.

Today's Observations :

Napkins are small cocktail napkins folded in half into a triangle and are arranged in a holder on the table.
Most music videos in Russia are remakes of American videos from the 80's and 90's. Very few are original concepts.
We have passed a lot of abandoned buildings. Beautiful brickwork that was obviously done in the Soviet era, just crumbing to the ground.
Paved roads are hit or miss. You can be driving along a main road and turn off into a dirt road or one paved with pot holes so big, you'll lose your car. Main roads seem to be well maintained, but any secondary road is iffy, and a tertiary road is the luck of the draw.
We've seen a lot of stray dogs and cats. But interestingly enough, the dogs that we have seen with owners are usually off a leash but trained well enough to stay by their masters.
Rotary's or Round Abouts are most often just lines drawn on the pavement. You need a spine of steel in order to get through one of these unscathed. The ones that have a true filled in center seem to be better for the average persons heart rate, but not by much. ;)

Jet Lag Gone

2006-07-31T21:27:00.000-04:00

We've spent the past few days sleeping and fighting going to bed in the middle of the afternoon. First time we did that? We ended up sleeping 8AM to 5PM. OOPS!

This weekend went a long way to fixing all of that.

Last night I was in bed by 9 and up at 5. Much better!

Day 3

2006-07-31T21:09:00.000-04:00

What a day! Today, our goal was to make him laugh. And boy, did we!! We even managed to get it on video. You can see the progress that has been made … even in the two days.

We’re thrilled!

We started the day off in the hotel restaurant. We meet A and her dad, or driver, V for breakfast and it was really good. I think tomorrow I’m going to have the pancakes that everyone else ordered. I had bacon and fried eggs, and it just wasn’t the same as what you get in the States. Their version of a fried egg is one side fried, the other side left alone ... in other words, the equivilent of our sunny side up.

We exchanged some money, and got a really good exchange rate. We got 13,250 rubles for $500. The line at the bank was long, but it was worth the wait to actually get some cash in our hands.

Next, we went to the plumbing supply shop. We bought a toilet, two faucets, and the necessities to hook it all up. Cost? Under 3,000 rubles. This was another gift for the baby home. Once we were done, we picked up the social worker and brought her with us to the baby home. She was a wealth of information.

I did let them know that if any of his brothers or sisters become available for adoption, we would like to be contacted because we strongly believe in keeping a family together is possible.

We hung out with him for a few hours, took him for a walk around the baby home, and then went to lunch with A, V, and the director of the Baby Home, O.

Today, we also brought the pictures of DH's family with us. As both A & O were looking at them, they made the same observation even though they’d made it a few hours apart. K (DH’s mom) looks like a “Movie Star” and got the universal thumbs up symbol. It was funny! We’ll have to pass that along to his mom. She’ll get a kick out of it!! They also noted that everyone in the family has “big eyes”. They seemed to enjoy the pictures that we brought. I was really upset with myself that I didn’t have the pictures of my family to bring, too. I realized half way over the Pacific i'd left them on the dining room table. Next trip.

We went to lunch at the local Chinese restaurant. The food was great. We had Shrimp (with the heads, legs, and tails, so DH wouldn’t eat them), Sweet & Sour Pork, and Fried Chicken along with steamed rice and our usual Coca Cola. It was the first big meal Jon had eaten since we got here, and his demeanor improved exponentially after that.

We really enjoyed lunch. The conversation was much better than it has been, especially since A was talking with us more and translating for the rest of the table.

After lunch, we went back to the Baby Home and waited for the baby to wake up from his nap. DH napped on the little bed in the room, and I cracked out my book and read for a little while. A stayed with us. She did some work on our paperwork and on her laptop and then napped on the other little bed.

When they brought him in to us, he was dressed in a little girls outfit. Poor thing. We vowed not to take any pictures in the afternoon. Boy, were we wrong about that! He was really quiet for the first little while that we were there and then all of a sudden, DH made him laugh! He wouldn’t stop once he got going, and it was a full-on belly laugh! It was music to our ears!! We whipped out the camera and took pictures and video of the whole thing. So much for our vow!

He was SUCH a happy baby!!

He’s so obviously well taken care of there. He still has issues that we’ll work on once we get him home. Right now he’s using them as coping mechanisms, and that’s OK. He’s loving the one on one attention he’s getting from the two of us. Yesterday he was pretty reserved, but today, he really opened up with the smiles and laughs. We really did get some amazing pictures.

I really worked on eye contact today. We made some good contact, and he reacted back. He looked right into my eyes and smiled at a couple of points. Very cool.

When we were done for the day … we really over stimulated him. He kept grabbing his head and his ears and we couldn’t calm him. So I brought him back to his room that he shares with two other babies and put him in his crib. I didn’t want to do it, but he was pretty wiped and ready to end the day.

We were back at the hotel by 5:30, had dinner in the hotel at 6. Note to self: do not order the meat rolls. They are wrapped in fish. I had to send it back as it made me nauseous. So DH and I ended up splitting his dinner, and topped it off with some ice cream and a coke to bring back to our room. Much better ending!

We went back to the room and I took a bath and washed my hair. Felt good, but I hated to loose the flat-ironed look I’d arrived with. The rest of the trip I’ll just be curly.

DH got his jeans back from the laundry and they look great. It was $2 to wash them, and totally worth it. They were really stinky from the trip.

We’ll put the room and all the hotel charges on the credit card when we go. I’m so glad we’re using the card that has no foreign fee.

A did say that we’ll go sight seeing and shopping one day this weekend, so I’m hoping I’ll be able to pick up some really cool things to bring home.

Lights out at 9, and I was up by 7. Much better sleep than I’d been having. Took a sleeping pill though, to help sleep through the night. I’m still a little lethargic, but that should be taken care of at breakfast.

DH is sleeping quietly beside me as I type. He’s got another 10 minutes before our alarm clock goes off.

Today’s Observations

• Meat rolls are wrapped in fish. Note to self: do not order!
• Unless you keep an eye on your place in line, people will cut in front of you (like at the bank!).
• The Chinese food we had tasted just like the Chinese food at home.
• Same with the ice cream. Only it was better here!
• The country side is so pretty! There are mountains that remind me of Colorado, but the green lushness of it all reminds me of Vermont.
• Cows have the right of way when crossing the street.
• Deodorant is optional.
• Bring your own alarm clock. It was a last minute addition to the carry on luggage, and we’re so glad we brought it! The hotel we’re in right now has no clocks in our room. We’d be completely lost without it.
• Leave your watches at home. You really don’t want to be a clock watcher over here. Your coordinator will take you where you need to be at any given time.

PSA

2006-07-27T07:12:00.000-04:00

Your friendly neighborhood Public Service Annoucement.

We're home, incredibly jet-laggeed, and exhausted.

I'll post more this evening, but right now I need to get ready for work and our final doctors appointment. Thats right, we'll do our final tests and stuff, and thats pretty much the final piece of the puzzle.

Well, that and the big elephant in the room. Going back to the local police department to get another letter from them.

Lord help us all, on that one. ;)

Day 2 ... AKA Baby Day!

2006-07-26T05:12:00.000-04:00

Day 2

Got up after heading back to sleep for a few more hours. Not quite the sleep I’d hoped for, but good enough. We packed up and headed downstairs for our Continental Breakfast that was included with the room. We were both pretty happy with the fact that most of the things were pretty recognizable … and good. Potatoes were a disappointment, though. Cold and only partially cooked. I was expecting good ‘ole hash brown potatoes. Wow. That first bite was a surprise!

We went back up to the room to wait for A’s call. Once she got there, we checked out and off we went!

Her Dad is our driver for the week. Nice guy. Or at least seems to be. Doesn’t speak a word of English, and I just learned my first official Russian word. Thank you. HA!

It has helped, though.

It took about three hours to get to the Children’s Home. We went in and they brought him right to us. What a cutie. Seriously. He immediately had this thing for my glasses. DH did take some great pictures. I managed to pry the little guy out of my arms – didn’t want to let him go – and pass him off to DH every now and again. We both got some really good pictures and video to share with everyone back home. Should be fun!

My parents have been asking for a very long time what they can do to help. Well, this past winter, they went south like they always do. Every winter, they travel down to Florida like the thousands of other retirees. So I asked them to pick up a beach ball. You know the ones. The inflatable ones. They could only find larger ones, but its working out well! What a great thing to bring, because it packs flat.

I don’t think the baby had ever seen a ball that big before or really understood the concept. When he first saw it, it was pretty obvious that he was very frightened of it. Over the next few hours, he gradually started to interact with the ball … to the point of understanding that the ball rolls away when he pushes it and he even likes to head-butt it. I think we may have a soccer player on our hands!

We also brought a board book and he didn’t do much more than try to chew on it. That’s ok. He’s got plenty of time. ;)

We met with the Doctor/Director of the Baby Home, and got more information on him. She seems like such a nice woman. We took her out for lunch, too.

We also gave her our donation of clothes. She seemed very impressed with the amount, and some of the things, in particular. There was one little baby sweater that was hand-crocheted by my Godmother, and that was one of the items that she picked up and looked at in detail. I think I’ll try to bring the same amount next time along with the hand knitted blankets for the kids. The blankets are being knitted by my mother and godmother.

Later that afternoon, I asked A if there was anything else we could do. We agreed to purchase a few more things for the Baby Home.

One of the nurses also brought in a bottle of formula for him, and he didn’t want anything to do with it. He only wanted to hang out. I tried to feed it to him a few times, and finally gave up.

Our impressions of the people are wonderful. The buildings are this: they do the best they can with what they have.

A left us alone with the baby for a couple of hours. I finally realized that the day was getting long, and we were getting tired. So was the baby. So I tracked down A who was right outside, and we gave the baby back to the nice women who took care of him.

Once we left, it took about an hour to get to our new hotel. It’s called “Rent” Hotel and its very nice. We’re in a suite, and it’s on par with any Suite you would get in the states. I don’t even know what town we’re in.

We settled in pretty quickly. DH sent his jeans to be laundered and then we managed to get access to the internet room for a couple of minutes to email everyone to let them know that we made it ok and met the baby. The Internet Room was actually three computers hooked up to a router. The computer we used had a very old version of IE 5.0, I think, and had Windows 2000 installed. It was so old that it didn’t have a USB port anywhere.

Once we did that, our family obligation was done. Off to dinner in the hotel restaurant. Not one server spoke English, and their “English Menu” sucked. It was a straight, literal translation of the Russian side of the menu. It was so confusing! Since our waitress didn’t speak a word of English, we used the universal ordering language. We pointed to different things, and she brought them to us. We managed to find some food that was actually pretty good. I had a salad and some chicken. DH just had a salad. I think tomorrow he’ll end up ordering what I did tonight. He’s pretty hungry, as such a picky eater he’s losing a lot of choices in the translation.

We got a peek at the breakfast menu, and it seemed pretty passable. I think DH will load up on breakfast. I know we saw Egg and Bacon sandwich on there. So I think he’ll be OK.

Again, we’re in bed by 7. I’m about to turn off the computer. I seem to be getting around seven straight hours sleep before I wake up for a couple hours and go back to bed. That’s pretty normal, but I sure hope that it doesn’t mess me up too badly once we get home. DH seems to need a lot more sleep here than he does at home. He got a full 12 hours the first night, and he’s on track to repeat that for tonight.

We met our baby, and he’s a sweetie. Now we just need to get him home.

All that’s left to do once we leave the Baby Home is to go back to the Ministry of Education in Vladivostok and sign the Intent to Adopt paperwork. Should take another 10 minutes. Then we’re done. We don’t leave until Monday. So honestly, I’m not really sure what we would do if we left here to go back to Vladivostok.

Today’s observations

• Buildings crumbling around the people that live in them.
• So many buildings without glass in the windows.
• Babushka’s hanging out on the side of the road selling berries and flowers.
• Wells for water next to houses with no running water. The wells have the ropes attached to buckets that bring the water up.
• We’ve noticed a lot of road construction. Main roads are well maintained, but side streets are completely ignored. The road that the baby home is on is filled with pot holes.
• Today, we saw an Army water truck watering a flower bed that was in the middle of a Rotary. Pretty interesting to see these big, burly men in military uniform out with a hose watering flowers.
• In every larger sized town that we drove through, there seems to be either an old Soviet-era plane or tank somewhere in the middle of town.
• Gas for your car is interesting as well. Gas stations had one pump for each grade of gas, and you just drove to the right pump. Its also full service here, so people pump the gas for you.
• The further outside a major city you go, the less that is recognizable. In other words, fewer advertisements for Coke, etc.
• Here, they understand the universal language of Coca-Cola. Just don’t ask for Coke. They have no idea what you are saying.
• Elevators here are really small. Most of them fit 4 people max. The elevators at the hotel at the place we stayed in the first night in Vladivostok was normal sized.