Sight Seeing

Here is the picture of the green apple juice from yesterday…… Yuck!!!!!!!

Doug is such a good sport. He drank it all and liked it. The sight of it made my stomach turn……. Oh well, he has been able to eat much more than me this entire time. When we eat, I opt for familiarity like Hard Rock Café or Mc Donald’s and he is always wanting to try something authentic. I think we are trying to meet in the middle. I must say, breakfast was great, pancakes with chocolate sauce, bananas and ice cream. Yum.


Today we walked to red square and saw the Kremlin and St. Basil’s Cathedral. The weather is so nice here, about 80 degrees and we both got some sun. Here are a few pictures of our excursion today.

St. Basil's Cathedral

The Kremlin


A few more tips from Russia-
1. You can buy Ray Ban sunglasses at a steal, (around 20 bucks), as long as you don’t mind the logo washing off when you wash them.
2. Be careful where you sit. Moscow has many pigeons and it could be dangerous. It almost was for us today.
3. The metro can be very confusing. Find a young nice person to help you.
4. You can drive on the sidewalk for a fine of about 2.00 dollars.
5. As a pedestrian, you can cross at the crosswalk (or zebras as our translator called them), and cars are suppose to stop, but they don’t and the fine is also only a mere two dollars.
6. I’ve decided when standing in line, perhaps it is not about where you line up, instead I think it is a lot like driving here. You must be aggressive, or you will get no where.


Tomorrow is our last day in Moscow and then we take an overnight train to Ivanovo. We are excited to see Nadya again and nervous for court. It is starting to feel like the end and then again just the beginning, and we are a little nervous about that. We are mostly nervous for Nadya. We are hoping she is ready for this and does well with the transition.
I’ve been able to email and find out how the boys are doing. Alex and Carter are doing well. Carter misses his mom at night, but apparently Alex is a great comfort reminding him that mommy is in Russia and then tickles his back as I often do. Carter snuggles right up to Alex and falls asleep. Alex can be so sweet.

Medicals......

Well, they are complete... Not much to say about them, except I would say that they were more throughel than we were expecting. No needles or anything like that, but I can say it is a good thing neither of us have a gambling problem. :) We meet a couple who are adopting a little baby boy while we were there and we are meeting them tonight for dinner. They are on the first of three trips and should bring him home in September. It is crazy how different the process can be depending on what region you are adopting from.

I have learned a few things while traveling in Russia that I will share with you.

1. Lane changes are absolutely crazy!!!!!

2. Pedestrians do not have the right of way!!!!! It is dangerous to walk the streets!!!!

3. Do not buy bottled water from your hotel unless you are good with paying five dollars a bottle for a tiny bottle. (maybe 4 swigs!) Our beer was only four dollars and it was a huge glass. Go figure!

4. Tylenol PM and one Russian beer makes for a great nights sleep. (Thanks Theresa for the tip)

5. Snag the barf bags from your airplane because they might come in handy. If your adopted child doesn't need them, you may yourself. Moscow traffic is something else, plus they have no exhaust regulations and the air is horrible!

6. If you plan on being served while standing in line, stand next to the person not behind them or you will not be helped (or in my case, people may just continue to go infront of you).

7. Flea markets are great and the fruit looks amazing. We plan to try it soon!!!!

8. Your websites can come up in Russian!!!!!! (this one does anyway, so I can't run spell checker, sorry!) It's a good thing the buttons are all colored.

Tomorrow will be a busy day of sightseeing, so I am sure I will have more advice soon.

Happy Birthday Jillzy!!!!!!!!! And Diana, Happy Late Birthday! :)

We Have Arrived and We are Tired!!!!!

Well, after a LONG and uneventful plane ride arrived in Moscow. Having only slept 3-4 hours on the plane we were tired. To make matters worse, the traffice is INSANE and it took us about 2 hours to get to our hotel from the airport which is relatively close. We arrived at our hotel and decided we would go walk around and try to stay awake so that we could get on some sort of schedule. We walked around Arbot street and where we shopped a little and then had dinner. At about 7:30 here we thought we had been up enough to sleep, but after about four hours of sleep we found ourselves wide awake. It is 11:00 PM here and about 1:00 PM , so I guess we are definitely still on Utah time. Hopefully our bodies will adjust soon. We are planning to get a drink and try watching a movie, with the hopes of falling asleep because we really need to get on some sort of schedule. It feels good to be here, although I worry by nature so I find that it is already hard to be gone, knowing it will be awhile before we return to the kids. More to come tomorrow after our medicals, which of course, we are hoping are uneventful.

Purchased our Tickets

Well, we leave August 8th and will arrive in Russia August 9th. We will have the 9th to ourselves and then on the 10th we have our medical exams. Over the weekend we will spend it in Moscow and then Sunday Night we will take the over night train to the city of Ivanovo where we will stay to finish up our adoption. If everything goes quickly we should come home August 22, if not, it may be the 24 or 25. I am really hoping we get Nadya's passport quickly so that we can get back to the kids. I have never left them for so long and I am not looking forward to leaving them for that long. It is looking like I will be missing the first few days of school. I wasn't expecting this, but it is looking inevitable.

COURT DATE!!!!!!!

August 14th! We are so excited. The bad news is that I will be missing my entire prep week of school, but I guess that is better than the first week of school. We don't know all the details yet, like when we will be arriving and hopefully returning, but I will keep everyone posted when I do find out.

New Room! It's Pink!!!! (the girls' favorite)

Doug still needs to hang the three white shadow boxes which go on the purple squares and then Hallie will have her own space for special items as well.

A few things on the shelves are Hallie's and will be moved as soon as Hallie's shadow boxes are up on the wall. The idea is that they each will have their own space for their special items. Nadya will be picking out a few things while we are in Russia for her shelves.



This is the "Reading Nook," Hallie helped make the pillows. We found the fabric at walmart for a steal! It is extremely cute. I even find the boys hanging out in there!

So, they will share a room until they are brave enough to move downstairs. Not too bad though, atleast they get their own closet!

Here is a close up of the pillows..................

Frustrated!

Well, we still wait..... We have been told for the past month that we will get a court date any day now! It is frustrating, to say the least. In the meantime, we finished the girls' bedroom. I will post a picture soon. It is bright pink with one pink, purple, blue, and white stripped wall. It is complete with a princess reading nook in the corner. Hallie helped make the pillows for the reading nook, and really enjoys it. Hopefully she will use it for reading. She just loves her room and my favorite quote from her this week is, "I just want to sit in my room all day long!" We also bought Nadya a day bed with a trundle. Hallie already had a day bed and the two day beds are on opposite walls, but face eachother. When they have friends sleep over they can raise the trundle and the three twin beds turn into one gigantic bed. Hallie can't wait for a sleep over. I'll post pics soon. I just got a new lap top and I need to find the cords for my camera.