A great play day...

They say a picture is worth a thousand words, so I thought I'd send you some pictures of our cutie pie for you to enjoy...from her sooo happy parents...


They do not allow stuffed animals in the orphanage because of lice and other bugs that can live on them...so she did not know what to do the first time we showed her this lambie-pie (we call it "key-sa" which means kitty because we don't know the Russian word for Lamb). A week later, we reintroduced her to "keysa" and she loved it! She held on to it the entire time we were there and snuggled with it. So "stinkin' cute" (as Keltner would say!).

After a rocky start, we had a great afternoon at the orphanage with our little girl. She loves fruit! Today she tried apples with peanut butter for the first time. Her face lit up after her first taste and she even chose this over a lollipop when given a choice (that’s my girl!!). She loves dragging the helicopter during our walks. She could not push it in a straight line (cheap toy), so she just decided to drag the thing behind her. Whatever works!!

We had a good 2 hours with her, tickling on the blanket and horsey rides on our knees. Here she is flying with mommy like an airplane (“samalote”). So cute! She has definitely learned the value of saying “please” to get a treat or something she wants. It’s so cute to see her rub her chest (sign language for please) when her mouth is completely full and she can’t get the word out.

We are trying to get her warmed up to the idea of sitting in a car. Initially, she was frightened and pulled back when Hunter tried to get her to sit with him with the car door opened, but after discovering she could play with the buttons on the doors, she was all for it and jumped in his lap. (You can see her spunk in this picture as she was playing a game with daddy and the pringles can.) We are hoping next week, after our court date, we will be able to take her for an hour or two away from the orphanage, get a popsicle and find a swing set. This way, she may associate a car ride with a tasty treat and something fun.

The care givers dress her in very girlie things and always have her hair up in at least one top knot (if not 4 or 5 ponytails). She is the only one in her group that has long hair (a bonus for daddy because he loves long hair!) They usually have a bonnet or hat on her, but a few times they have dressed her in what looks like a diaper on her head. This allows for her pig tails to stick ouf on either side, but we agreed with her when she tore it off her head in favor of daddy's Tucco hat!

We are definitely riding the roller coaster with our little one. Yesterday, we had the worst afternoon ever. Once we took her back to her group, she didn’t want to have anything to do with us. She would not take Hunter’s hand when the group was walking back to the room, so he picked her up which prompted a kicking and crying fit all the way back to the room. Today, however, was a completely different story. Although she cried when we first arrived, she seemed “proud” of us when we took her back to the group at the end of our visit. She kissed us goodbye and waved. Then some of the other kids ran up to get hugs and she shoed one boy away and told him “dit dat” or something like that. She puffed out her chest and walked back up to Hunter and planted another kiss on him, then turned and walked over to me to give me one too. I’m not trying to condone this possessive behavior, but it was the cutest thing we’d ever seen and warmed our hearts!! We'll work on some sensitivity training when we get home.

We insisted that Sergei go home to spend father’s weekend with his family. We also told “Danika” that we could make it with taxis this weekend to give her a break. She is having to use her father’s car now that her brother wrecked the BMW we were in, and we don’t want to inconvenience them more than we have to. So we are on our own to explore and get from the apartment to the orphanage to the internet café. Sergei made us note cards to show the taxi driver with the addresses of these places, so we should be fine.

We are meeting 3 other couples for dinner tonight that are adopting from the same orphanage. One couple is from Italy (the wife does not speak a word of English), the other is from Argentina, but lives in Israel, and the other is from Williamsburg. We’re eating pizza because that’s the safest place to order! You have to be careful here because they like to serve “organs” and sometimes you may get something in your meat you did not expect!!

We are hoping to get our court date Monday or Tuesday next week. We have narrowed her name down to 2 choices and need to choose by Monday, so we have the weekend to keep trying them out on her. We may just let her pull one out of a hat!

We’re off to pizza with our international group! Have a great day!

Blessings, hunter, lauri and our lil’ munchkin