One day forward, four days back..

I’d forgotten what a mattress felt like, but last night it all came back to me. With the three of us here, I gave the boys the pullout and I took the single bed in the bedroom. Apparently my body was appreciative and as a result I got 8 solid hours of sleep. I thought the boys would sleep late since they didn’t get to bed til 10, but Harry was up first – at 7:30 and Skip followed 15 minutes later. At that point I was figuring the day would either be one with naps, or, crabby kids come dinner time, but EARLY bed.

Harry liked the strawberry oatmeal slightly more than the pancakes, but ate every bite of his fresh sliced pear. (Russia has the best juicy, sweet pears. We’re eating them constantly!) Skip loved both and ate rather quickly – something he doesn’t normally. Do. I let them play on their own while I did the laundry – and managed to get my two loads done before Harry could do any real damage around here. The thing about the antique washing machine here is you can only do small loads – very small – so yes, three people produce two loads on most days. I did have a leftover sheet from yesterday so I think that made a difference too. In between laundry I managed to shower – QUICKLY and with the door open so I could hear – and to have my own oatmeal. All our morning rituals were done by 10:00 (about an hour later than I’d like, but we’re making progress toward that goal).

From there we headed into school work. Harry again printed his name. First with help, then alone. He can hold a pencil just fine, and has better fine motor control than I’d figured as well, but his problem is he doesn’t like “help” so showing him how to form each letter poses a bit of a challenge, but after 4 years pursing this adoption, it’s an easy hurdle to overcome.

After his printing we reviewed his numbers via a wooden puzzle brought from home. He recites 1 throuh 5 without help, then stumbles through 6 – 10 but is eager to learn it. THAT is a good sign. Wanting to work with Skip, I let him paint again. He chose a Thomas the Tank book, and got right to work. At some point he flooded the paint palette, so the colors all merged sorta kinda. As a result everything he painted was a beautiful dishwasher grey!

Skip did some printing practice then Geography. He’s intrigued by the fact that in some parts of the world, namely Antartica which we are studying, the sun doesn’t set in summer, nor rise in winter. I That brought us to snack time. Popcorn & juice for all, then back to work. Harry switched from paints to markers, and Skip started in on Math. After coloring with markers both Skip & I worked on teaching Harry “circle” & “square’, and the color “red”. Red was a big hit. I showed Harry a red circle, then asked what else was “red”. Both he and Skip proceeded to point out about 50 things throughout the house that were red. I then asked Skip to spell red, which he did. I’ll have to do that again, and eventually with other colors.

For lunch we had Hot Dogs without bread) and homemade chicken soup I took from the freezer. In the soup the boys put some cracker I picked up at the store. They look like oyster cracker, but unsalted, and have either a happy or sad face on them. They enjoyed poking around to see how many of each they had. Harry devoured every bite of the dog, but wanked a little about the soup. I took some of the broth out, and he seemed happier with that.
before the juice incident

And afer...Ooops!

But when I left the kitchen for a split second, he poured d about ¼ cup of his pineapple juice into his bowl. This is an ongoing problem with him – putting his juice onto his food, so I made him eat it anyway and removed his cup from the table – much to his dismay.. Somehow, he didn’t seem to mind.the pineapple chicken soup. While I tried to clean up I set the boys over-the-door race track up, this time just supporting it behind the couch, making it easier for them to put the cars on. They played long enough for me to make myself a well-deserved grilled cheese for MY lunch. They continued to play cars while I ate in the living room – something I’ve learned necessary at this point.

I was on the fence about whether to do naps (I sure wanted one!) or go for cranky kids from 5 – 7p.m. and put them to bed then, and when they continued to play nicely – first the cars, then warriors with makeshift cardboard shields & foam block “swords” – for more than an hour, I decided to just take it as it came. By 2:00 the warriors were beginning to get a bit too rough so I decided to have them just “rest”. No naps required, just rest. I sorted through their DVD’s to find a mellow one. Skipped past all the Tom & Jerry, Donald Ducks, and Jay Jay Jet Planes until I found Charlotte’s Web. Figured that might do the trick. Apparently Harry is catching on and understanding more English. When Skip told him “Spot” meaning “Sleep”, Harry retorted “Nyet Spot, DVD!” Generally when we implement rest or nap time, we spend ½ hour or more telling them to “stay on your side”, “stop talking please, it’s nap time”, etc. etc. etc. before they settle down. Today it took just a few minutes and they calmed down to watch the DVD. I started to write my post for today, and about 20 minutes into the movie, Harry was out! Skip remained on the couch for quite awhile, but then since he was being very good I let him up to play on the computer. I took his spot on the couch and managed to read about a chapter & a half in my book before my eyes got heavy…I closed my eyes for about 10 minutes, then woke with a start, fearful Harry was awake and trying to make himself dinner or something J He did wake up a few minutes later but I could have stayed there forever! Instead I had them dress up in the winter gear so we could walk for Ice Cream. We went to a little grocery store in the opposite direction as the usual place, about ½ or so from the apartment. The cold but fresh air felt good, and certainly woke us up. A potential crisis was averted when we got in the store and both Harry & Skip wanted to push the cart. Had they been the small ones I would have let them, but they weren’t so I told Skip it was his turn. Harry didn’t like that. He refused to move so I picked him up and carried him past the security guard (all stores have guards at the door) and by the time we were ½ way up the first aisle he was over it. We got our few things again, including the boys’ ice cream, some chicken nuggets and more applesauce. The walk home was again refreshing, and we ducked into a small store which houses about 6 tinier stores – one being a toy store. Harry picked out a little airplane (the type you pull it back and then it propels itself forward) and a talking flip-style cell phone. A total of 46 rubles which is about a $1.50 Skip got a plastic bowling set. 6 pins and 2 balls for $5.00. Our big purchases for the day. We then headed back here to the apartment and while they played with their new treasures, I got dinner ready. Pizza, cheese sticks & oven-baked fries. They’re now back to their toys, except this time Harry has rediscoverd a flashlight Levi brought him last fall. It has 4 settings – one for regular, one produces a red light, another blue, another green and another shines all the colors. He ran around shutting all the lights off to get it dark, so he can fiddle with the colored lights, until something else caught his interest, and the flashlight to a backseat. Once they were in pj’s I read to them before we made a phone call to Grammy.

waiting his turn to talk on the phone

NOW it's Skip's turn!

Harry loves to talk on the phone, and insists on sitting on desk chair in order to talk. After our call to Grammy, we got calls from Levi, Mike (who arrived home this morning (well, last night your time) and then Irina called..Our attorney picked up the adoption determination this morning and as I had suspected but didn’t want to mention until I knew it for sure – the 10 days didn’t start ‘til yesterday, the day the judge resigned herself to the fact it was over and she had to sign it. I guess she figured signing the document last Friday would have been making it too easy for us, and we all know, she won’t have that! So, instead of the 2nd being the day he’s officially free, it’s the 6th. Four extra days here, but in the big scheme, minor. On the 7th we’ll go get his new birth certificate and if they are open (it’ll be a Saturday) we’ll apply for his Visa, and pray that they issue it without our having an adoption visa. Last fall they said it wouldn’t be a problem, but things here change overnite. In the event it’s required Mike will have to somehow fly back here with the adoption visa, spring us, and return home while we go on to Moscow to get our clearances there. I’m not stressing over any of that right now, I’m just taking it one step at a time. I’m too busy chasing these two rugrats around to have time for any stress over logistics… We’ll be home soon, just a few days later than we hoped for.