Project Model UN

Travel Approval!!!!!!!!

2011-07-29T22:46:00.002-04:00

TA! TA! TA!

We received TA today! We don't know when we will travel yet because we are waiting for Consulate Appointment, but the earliest dates our agency suggested have us leaving around the 8th, which is really soon!!

Today is our 16th wedding anniversary. This is the best anniversary present ever. And we beat the August 1st deadline. If TA had been issued on the 1st or later we would have been subject to new rules that require post placement reports for the next 5 years and various other requirements.

No idea how buying tickets will go with only a week's notice, and I am a little unsure about spending the month of August in southern China. Good thing I like the heat ok.

Progress

2011-06-30T20:11:00.002-04:00

We are moving (rather quickly) towards travel. Since we are a Hague family we have many steps between referral and travel. Here is our progress so far:

Referral 6/1/2011
I800 sent 6/6/2011
I800 approved 6/20/2011
Cabled 6/28/2011
Cable letter 6/30/2011
Article 5 - about 2 weeks
TA - about 2-4 weeks after Article 5
Travel! - about 1-3 weeks after TA

So if we follow the shortest estimate for timing, we could be in China in 5 weeks (around August 8). Most likely it will be 8/22 or so.

We got updated information about little Anya, and she seems to be doing well!

Hope someone is holding our baby

2011-06-20T23:36:00.002-04:00

It is so hard to just wait to travel and not know anything about how Anya is doing. We don’t really even know if she is in an orphanage or foster care. Her paperwork says she is in the social welfare institute (SWI), but that would be really unusual for this SWI as most kids under 3 are in foster care.

Her SWI is notorious for providing no information before or after adoption. They do not generally allow adoptive parents to visit. Many people with referrals from throughout China use various services to send care packages and get updated info and photos of their kids while they wait to travel. Several people in the June group have recently gotten wonderful updated photos. Anya’s SWI does not provide these updates to these types of services. So we have decided to send a more personalized care package on our own with no hope of an update (but we have not gotten it together yet). I’m planning to use my rusty Mandarin and hand-write a note to accompany the package. I hope they are not offended.

Our agency may get an update right before we travel, but that is months from now and all the information we have is already 3 months old. I panic when I read about any trouble in China (currently - floods, riots, lead poisoning, bombings!).

The Fuzhou yahoo group is reassuring at least. They state that the kids – whether in foster care or the SWI - are generally well cared for and healthy. Few to no cases of scabies have been reported. Several kids came home with giardia, though, so we will take precautions until we can get her tested (i.e., not let Nik and Anya take baths together and wash our hands a lot). Not all kids have it, though – especially if they are in foster care. There is a Half the Sky program at the SWI, but we don’t know if Anya is in it – probably not because I get the feeling that most kids in the HTS programs are SN.

I learned about a person who can get updates and photos - primarily from the Fuzhou SWI. People who have used his service have gotten as many as 75 photos of their kids with the foster parents, the town, the SWI, the baby’s bed, etc! BUT, I have also heard that this person pays the SWI director and possibly the foster parents to obtain all the info. While that is an innocent payment, it makes me nervous and is probably technically a violation of Hague and possibly US immigration laws. We cannot give money to our future daughter’s current guardians until the adoption is final. But… 75 photos of our little baby and her life before joining our family! And others have used the service with no issues. Sigh… we will (probably) wait until after the adoption and then use his services to get photos of people and places that were important to her early life.

And, in the meantime, please pray that our little girl is happy, healthy, and loved.

More Information

2011-06-05T16:46:00.009-04:00

We got a FedEx with two more pictures and a little more information. Everything is from March, so when she was about 4 months old. There is not a lot we can tell about her development based on a report at 4 months old. She was not rolling over or grasping at toys yet, but these are skills that develop around 3-4 months. And considering how bundled she probably was from the time she was born in November until the report in March, it is not surprising at all. She laughs out loud, recognizes familiar people, likes to be surrounded by activity, likes quiet, likes music, and sucks her fingers. "She makes noises at people and animals" - I wonder what animals she encounters? Her personality is described as, "introverted, cheerful, lively and active. She has an exuberant energy, but sometimes she is relatively irritable." I love the expression on her face in one of the new pictures - like "what the heck is going on." Nikolai made a similar expression when we took him outside for the first time. I find it interesting that they appear to have photoshopped out someone's arm from behind her in one picture. It's not like we would expect a 4-month old to be able to sit up on their own.

These are the characters of her middle name
Jing 4 (modest, chaste) Xiu 4 (beautiful, elegant)
婧秀

Usually Chinese names have a meaning that goes beyond the exact translation of the two parts. I don't know if that is true for Anya's name, but we hope to have a Chinese speaker give us their interpretation of her name.

These are the characters we would use for her first name (although a Chinese name would never have 4 characters plus a surname!)
An 1 (peaceful) Ya 3 (elegant, graceful, refined)
安雅

Ge ge (big brother)

2011-06-02T22:30:00.002-04:00

Nikolai seems genuinely excited about his new sister. When I picked him up from daycare yesterday I gave him a picture and he first showed it to his best friend Kayleigh, then Mr. Jarrell, the teacher in his new class. Then he ran down the hall and into the 2s room and plowed through the group of kids standing around the craft project demonstration in order to show it to Ms. Nahid, his teacher for the last year or so. On the way to the bank to meet Chris to get a document notarized, Nikolai spouted off all the things he is going to teach “his baby”. He is going to teach her to talk, and to walk, and to climb, and to climb in his chair. And he’s going to do the monkey dance to make her laugh. When we got home, he saw the other copies of the one photo we had yesterday and said, “my baby sister! There’s more! They all match.” Yes, when you only have one photo – they all will match. I hope he really adjusts to being a big brother as well as he appears to be.

It's a Girl!

2011-06-01T13:49:00.006-04:00

We finally got the call! She's beautiful! I can't stop staring in her dark eyes.

Anya JingXiu

DOB: November 17, 2010 (about 6 months)
Fuzhou SWI, Jiangxi Province
Favorite toy: rattle
Favorite activity: being held
Healthy appetite, supposedly eating milk and rice formula, rice cereal, egg, and meat soup?
In March she was 25" long and weighed 13 lbs

We will travel in about 11-15 weeks!

I just plotted her measurements and if what they told us is accurate, she is about 50 percentile! Amazing.

Waiting is making me crazy

2011-06-01T10:23:00.002-04:00

Why on earth do we get so much advanced notice? Is it just to ensure we are absolutely crazy by the time the call comes? Last night we got an email from our agency...

"We look forward to calling you about your match tomorrow! Have a nice evening."

Have a nice evening? Not even a hint? Our agency will begin making calls at 9 am their time - so 11 am our time. It has been a long morning.

It was so much easier for Nikolai. I was at work and saw our coordinator was calling but assumed it was because they needed more paperwork or something. I answered the phone calmly, she spit out the brief info about our potential son and that was that. No stress!

We're In!!

2011-05-30T11:28:00.005-04:00

The cut-off is confirmed of June 30th!!!! Not only are we in, but the rest of June 2006 is being referred!! I am so happy for those included and for the morale boost for those behind us. Referral calls are happening in Europe today. The US should receive theirs tomorrow and hopefully our agency will call on Wednesday. It all seems so sudden (which I realize is ridiculous because we have been waiting more than 5 years).

From RQ:

http://chinaadopttalk.com/

Wednesday?

2011-05-27T20:24:00.006-04:00

According to our agency, referrals have been mailed! Of course Monday is a holiday, so packages won't arrive until Tuesday. Our agency won't make calls that day, but waits to translate everything and makes calls the next day. SO we may know who our second child is on Wednesday! We still don't know what the cut-off is, so there is no guarantee we are in, but probably. The only cut-off rumor is for June 30th, which would be the largest batch in a couple years (4 times the size of last month)! So it is a little hard to believe, but it is being reported by multiple sources, so maybe. It would be nice for the rest of the Junies to be included together, and this would be a HUGE boost to everyone behind us. I hope we keep busy over the weekend.

Next??

2011-04-29T23:19:00.000-04:00

Referrals came out today. Congratulations to all the new families! Unfortunately this was the smallest batch in history, with a cut-off June 20th. If they had gotten through the 21st we would definitely be in next month. Now, I think we will be in, but it is not a guarantee. I was disappointed and sad about the cut-off and then saw the email from our agency letting us know we were not in this month. They have never contacted us before, and the fact that they felt they needed to let us know we were not in this month – as if there was a chance we could have been – made me panic. How can I be disappointed about a small cut-off and panicked about potentially being in in the near future at the same time? Brains are confusing.

Next, Next

2011-04-02T10:30:00.012-04:00

Yes – we are still adopting from China. After almost 5 years, I think we can safely say we “next next” and should finally see our second child’s face in late May or early June, and then travel probably at the end of August. At least we don’t have to worry about bringing any bulky winter clothes. When we went to Kazakhstan, it was in the 80s when we arrived and the low 40s when we left – that was hard to pack for.

Referrals came out yesterday and the cut-off was a tiny bit better than expected - June 15, 2006. Our LID is June 23, 2006. I think there is almost no chance that we could be in the next batch at the end of April (I predict a cut-off of June 21, although the 22 may sneak in there). There is also almost no chance that we WON’T be in the batch at the end of May! It feels very weird after the years of uncertainty and every month having to extend our estimate for referral another month (or another year) to actually know when we will get referral. In the back of my mind I keep worrying that something will happen – that maybe we were told the wrong LID or our dossier somehow fell behind a book case at some point over the past 5 years. Unfortunately things like that have happened, but they are always resolved.

Our new agency (after our first agency went out of business) will not provide any info the day referrals come out, but waits until they check and translate everything and makes calls the next day. This month, referrals arrived on a Friday, so people with our agency have to wait over the weekend to get any information – torture! It will be strange to actually know the day that we will get the call. I may have to take the day off work; how could I concentrate? I think I prefer how we got the call for Nikolai – we knew we were in the time range to receive information, but we had been in the range for months. Then out of the blue I got a call at work from our coordinator, who announced that they “had a little guy for us”!

I am trying not to hope for any particular “type” of referral, but it is hard because I do want a child as young as possible to limit the time they had to spend in an orphanage. I also would like a girl. But then again the referral photos of the toddlers are SO cute, and boys are great too. We’ll see what happens. We may have a heart attack if referred twins. I can’t comprehend even simple tasks with three young kids – like getting from the car into daycare. Twins are VERY unlikely, though.

Our house is totally not prepared for another child yet. The little one’s room is a mess and full of the clothes Nikolai has outgrown – in case we get another boy. We need to re-baby proof and figure out some system for toys that allows two development stages worth of toys to be out in our little living/play/TV/dining room (or perhaps we should use other parts of the house). I have no idea how to keep Nikolai’s toys with tiny pieces off of the floor. I guess we should try to teach him to pick up when he is done with things, but then that requires actually having space to put things away. My parents and Nikolai are coming to China with us! It will be essential to have my parents to help with Nikolai so that we can focus on the new child when needed and attend official paperwork things alone. We are not willing to go 3 weeks without bringing Nikolai. The only drawback is that my parents will also be jet-lagged when we get back. When we came home from Kazakhstan, my parents had filled our refrigerator with perishables and made a bunch of baby food. The first couple weeks home was crazy hard with Nikolai – I was SO tired, jet lagged, and sick. And I could not do anything without Nikolai clinging to my leg or wanting to be picked up, so I often went without lunch (except for the days our Kazakh neighbor brought me lunch!). Thinking back I find it hard to believe I couldn’t figure out a way to feed the baby and eat myself. I don’t know if it will be easier this time having experience as a parent. I should be a little less tired because we will have been in China for longer and had custody of our child longer. Then again this child may have a significantly harder time adjusting than Nikolai – who adjusted and attached easily. There have been discussions on Rumor Queen comparing the stress and fatigue associated with having a newborn to bringing home a newly adopted child. The consensus from those who have experienced both was that both are equally hard, but for very different reasons.

We need to prepare a little bit more in advance than we did for Kazakhstan (admittedly we were given only one week’s notice to arrive in Kaz). We will NOT pack the day we leave again (even if we ALWAYS end up packing the day we leave – including doing so twice for our trips to Kaz). We plan to cook some things and freeze them (soup, casseroles, etc.) as well as preparing baby food (if appropriate).

It has been so fun watching all of the other June bugs get their referrals over the past three months! While I don’t know any of them in person, having been in the online group together for 4-5 years makes them important to me. As someone else described it on Rumor Queen – every referral announcement is like seeing a niece or nephew for the first time. Every one of the babies/toddlers referred so far has been absolutely wonderful. The first group is getting ready to travel!

Unfortunately China has just issued new rules regarding post placement reports – well, unfortunate for our family but probably good for kids overall. It used to be that you submitted a post placement report at 6 and 12 months and that was it (plus one more the first year to satisfy VA requirements). Now China wants reports at 1, 6, 12, 24, 36, and 60 months. It is not that big of a deal, but the 1 month one will be hard. In the past our social worker has required a month to write the report so she would have to come to our house the first week home. At least we really like our social worker. But who is to say she will be available still 5 years from now? Who knows if our agency will even still be around?

We will be fingerprinted for the final time next week. Assuming we don’t get any requests for evidence from USCIS, we will soon after get approval to bring our next child to the US as a citizen. That is the most important outstanding adoption-related thing we need to do – at least for now.

Nikolai

2011-04-01T22:03:00.004-04:00

I have been a bad blogger – thanks to Facebook. I just wanted to share some cute stories from the past 6 months or so.

Nikolai is a talker, and talks almost constantly. If he goes 10 minutes without saying something, invariably it means he has something in his mouth he wants to spit out (a vegetable he has tried, apple skin, etc.). If he is mad he will also get quiet.

He pronounces almost everything perfectly, so when he doesn’t I think it is so cute. Instead of saying “don’t forget” he says “don’t have got”. He calls ninjas “injas”.

Nik: That car is in front of us (referring to the one behind us)

Me: No, that car is behind us.

Nik: No! That car is in front of my back!

Last fall, while trying to catch leaves as they fell from the trees last fall, Nikolai looked at me and seriously said, “we don’t have to catch leaves, we can just pick them up!” Yes, but…

After watching a Dora episode where they were trying to find wishing stars, Nikolai said he wanted a wish. I asked him what he would wish for, and he replied, “the moon.” So cute!

Nik and I met Chris for dinner at church and stayed for the beginning of the youth drama rehearsal. While Chris was talking to the kids at the front of the room, Nikolai ran up and wanted to be picked up. Without Chris realizing, Nikolai started making funny faces to make the kids laugh. He LOVES to be the center of attention.

The fact that he likes to be the center of attention makes pediatrician appointments easy. He loves everyone talking to and looking at him. At his 3-yr appointment, when the nurse was done checking his temperature, height, and weight, she started to walk out of the room. Nikolai called after her, saying “don’t have got my heart!” She responded that the doctor would do that, and Nikolai said, “but you’re a doctor.” After she clarified that she was a nurse, Nikolai told me “that doctor is a nurse!” When the actual doctor walked in the room, Nikolai immediately asked her to tell him a story. When she looked in his ears, she told him she saw a red bunny in one and a blue bunny in the other – just being silly. But at bed time Nikolai very seriously and with wide eyes told me, “the bunnies are still in there.”

A few days after the Christmas play at church, Nikolai declared, “my friend Patrick likes juice. He’s going to take all his friends’ juice.” Patrick played King Herod, and kept declaring loudly that he was the King of the Jews in the play.

I asked Nikolai if he wanted a sibling, and he emphatically said “Yes!” I then asked if he knew what a sibling was, and he answered, “yes, a candy!” It is just like him to assume the best - that something he doesn’t know is the most wonderful thing he can think of.

Another example of this thinking – One evening Chris declared that dinner was ready. Nikolai jumped up, declaring “Yay! Yay! Hot dogs!” (We were not having hot dogs)

The other day he got up from the chair in the living room and headed towards the kitchen. Just before entering, he turned back to us, held up his hand and said very seriously "don't come." Nothing suspicious about that statement! He was after a marshmallow.

Chris got Nikolai a carnation for Valentine's day and he acted like it is his pet. We put it in a little vase, which he had to carry up to his room when he went to bed. He placed the vase on his book case, saying "awe, good night little fella." He carried the vase downstairs with him the next morning.

Early one morning while it was still dark out, I was lying in bed and heard Nikolai walk past. I said, “Nikolai what are you doing?” and he answered, “I’m just getting the stool.” He picked up the stool and brought it back to his room, put it against the dresser, climbed up, grabbed a paci from the bin, got down and climbed back in bed! I am beginning to feel obsolete.

Fourth and FINAL LIDiversary

2010-06-23T20:50:00.003-04:00

Today is our fourth LIDiversary. It is hard to believe we began the process to adopt from China 4 years ago. Time sure flies. I love all the excitement in the June group on RQ, as we are now less than a year away from bringing our kids home. People have started getting their nurseries ready, although we now realize that it is likely that at least some of us will get boys so final decorations will have to wait. Some of the early Junies may see a picture of their baby 6 months from now!

I alternate between excitement and panic. We know so much more about adopting now than we did 4 years ago (ask us anything – about any program J). With that knowledge comes the realization that not everything always works out well or is easy. Nikolai transitioned and attached easily; he very quickly caught up developmentally, really largely before we even finished the bonding period in Kazakhstan. Overall he is fairly healthy, and he has always been a good eater. His attitude of “everything is fun until proven otherwise” certainly helps him. There were aspects of his baby house that were great, and are pretty uncommon in orphanages. He had a consistent group of caregivers who really enjoyed and interacted with the kids, and his playroom was bright with lots of toys.

I remember everything about Nikolai’s adoption as easy, but looking back I can see that it was a process to get to the point we are at now. It is daunting to think about going through that process again – especially with a child who may have a significantly harder time attaching or have significant sensory issues. RQ did a good series of posts on sensory issues that can be read here http://chinaadopttalk.com/2010/01/12/different-kinds-of-sensory-issues/. You can read her posts on attachment here http://chinaadopttalk.com/category/attachment/.

During our visitation period in Kazakhstan, the first week Nikolai sort of played next to us, the second week he laughed and was excited to see us, but it was not until the fourth week that he reached back for us when we returned him to his caregivers. In China, our child will be handed to us after what may have been a long bus ride with people they didn’t know without any further transition – rip-the-band aid-off style.

After we came home, Nikolai was happy and engaging, and would cry for food or attention. But he did not seek us out for hugs and snuggling for some time. At the same time I realize I did not bond to him instantly either – not in the way we are bonded today where I think my heart would literally stop if I lost him. I found him adorable, but I was jet-lagged and sick and often just wanted a break. This is totally normal, and something we learned in adoptive parenting classes. It is especially important for people to keep in mind when bringing home a toddler or older child. When you suddenly have a stranger in your house who is grief-stricken and constantly raging or completely shut down, it is understandable that a strong bond is not felt immediately. Plus it is hard to shake a feeling of guilt when all your child wants is to go back to what is familiar to them. Fake it until it is real is the guidance always given.

Health wise, it is easy to forget that Nikolai had what we and other Kazakh adoptive parents called “orphanage cough” for almost six months. The doctor thought it might have been RSV or something like that. He had many appointments to get blood drawn and other evaluations just to get a baseline for where he was health wise. It turned out that all of his vaccines had to be repeated and that he had been exposed to TB and needed antibiotics for 9 months. He was in the 10% for height and weight, and quickly shot up to 50% in less than six months. So, life in the baby house was not exactly perfect.

I especially worry about how the China adoption will affect Nikolai. Before we had him, I would have said that we would be prepared to bring home a child and deal with anything, but now I am not so sure. I read posts of people who upon arriving in China find that their child has significant undisclosed needs and they are faced with a daunting choice of bringing them home when they feel utterly unprepared or coming home without a child. It would be SO much better if the orphanage/CCAA were honest in the paperwork. I always am relieved when I read that parents decided to continue, and heartbroken when they leave the child behind. But who knows how we would react in that situation? People often mention that there is no guarantee when giving birth that your child will not have significant issues and you can’t choose not to keep them. But adopting is not giving birth – and all adopted children have special needs that must be dealt with whether it be issues with speech, physical development, sensory, attachment, medical, or other issues; we are prepared to deal with these things. You can choose not to drink while you are pregnant, shouldn’t we be able to choose not to adopt a child with fetal alcohol syndrome if we don’t feel we can handle it?

I think that there are few issues that would cause me to leave the child behind, and most of those issues (mental illness, RAD, FAS) are impossible to diagnose in the one day you are given to make a decision. A child suffering from grief and exhibiting post-institutional behaviors (e.g., head banging, rocking) may appear to be severely disabled or autistic. How do you know in such a short period of time? The truth is you don’t. You just jump in and hope for the best. Many people describe the feeling of being handed their child for the first time as panic, as they put it “what the hell did we just do.” While there are no guarantees that the child is not disabled, I am lucky to have read many parents’ honest accounts about those first few days. In one example, the family was handed a 22-month old who did not appear to be able to even sit up unassisted, made absolutely no sound, could not suck on a bottle (the openings of bottles in the orphanages are large enough that the liquid just pours out), and certainly could not eat solid food. To the parents’ complete surprise, on the fourth day the child stood up and walked around! Chris and I are going to try to come to an agreement about some of the more common medical issues that appear in the NSN program. Some, like spina bifida and deafness, scare us more than others, so we need to do some research.

Of course the fact that I do remember everything as easy with Nikolai’s adoption should be reassuring. In rereading this post it sounds so discouraging. Now for the excitement part – yes, many things can go wrong, but in most cases everything ends up great. I know the first year or so may be hard, but you just take it one day (or one hour) at a time. Kids and parents make great strides in six months to a year. I have read only a few times out of the thousands of people adopting a second child that they had regretted it – and those times were only people whose children had severe RAD. I love having a sister, and want Nikolai to have a sibling. We are so excited about potentially having a baby in the house again (or at least young toddler). Nikolai keeps saying he wants a baby, and he doesn’t know that we are adopting yet (a year is too long for a 2-yr old to look forward to something). He will be a great big brother.

_______________
*READOPTING: Several people have left comments on our blog requesting info on readopting in VA. I am SO sorry I haven’t checked the blog lately. If you still want templates leave a comment and be sure to include your email address – or you can get on the adoption in VA yahoo group, where several templates are stored.

And now, what everyone wants to see – new pictures of our cutie!

Late Night Musings

2010-05-06T00:42:00.002-04:00

Yes, I went out with the young archaeologists tonight. They aren’t even that young – late 20s and early 30s. We went out to eat at a seafood restaurant on the water and then to a karaoke bar just a bit down the street from the motel. We work hard and it was good to relax a little.

I hate ticks.

One of the crew members is a great singer and sang in choruses throughout school. She wanted to sing three karaoke songs. Of course the DJ gave preference to his friends, so her third song didn’t happen until after 11:30. It was cute – after I told her that I was fine and had half a beer and half a napkin left to doodle on, she told her friend, “it’s ok, she’s not mad or anything.” Of course it makes me feel old to be the one who may be “mad” about staying up late, but they are sweet and good archaeologists so I forgive them.

Tomorrow I just have to monitor a backhoe and dig a 50-cm square hole 1.5 meters deep (or two). But I am sending the young ones to dig as many shovel tests as they can in an open field.

Ticks are bad.

How can anyone not want to be an anthropologist? There is nothing more interesting than watching people at a bar in a town you are not from on karaoke night.

Cute Things

2010-02-24T23:00:00.003-05:00

When we pull into my parking space in the evening, Nikolai now happily proclaims “we’re home!”

Daycare has graham crackers for the kids on the way out the door. Nikolai eats his on the way home, biting them into various shapes such as cars, buses, lions, and kitty cats (or so he claims).

I took him with me to the grocery store this evening just to pick up a few things. As soon we parked he started crying, saying “no shopping, no shopping cart.” I assured him we would not get a cart and he could either walk or be carried. I handed the first item to him to carry and then put in the basket. Then he wanted to carry the basket, so we got a separate one for him. He was SO cute carrying it through the store and putting things he wanted in it. I let him keep most things (a toy chick, a pear, blue berries) but the cookies, candy and lettuce had to go back and the bananas were too heavy so they ended up in my basket. This was definitely not a quick shopping stop, but still a fun outing.

Driving home this evening I actually was able to figure out what song he was singing. He said “no! no more! No more!.. Doctor…jumping, jumping.” Can you figure it out? It’s the “no more monkeys jumping on the bed” song. Although he kept correcting me when I was singing; he said “no monkeys…doggies.” Maybe school sings it with doggies jumping on the bed? I doubt it, but who knows.

He has started memorizing parts of the books we read at night, and now “reads” them to us.

When we eat together, if I finish something, Nikolai will kindly ask “do you want more?”
Daycare has been working on opposites (up/down, big/small, left/right). All of a sudden he suddenly ‘gets’ big and small. He correctly identified the baby bears as small bears and the mama as a big bear. He got it right with his rock collection tonight too! It is amazing to watch him learn new things every day.

He plays air guitar, violin, mandolin, and piano.

Nikolai is 2!!!!

2010-02-05T23:01:00.005-05:00

Nikolai's birthday was Thursday. Due to the forcast for two feet of snow today and tomorrow (oh my), Chris's mom and my parents came down on short notice for a party. Nikolai had fun, and enjoyed the sports theme, with lots of footballs, soccor balls, etc. We had to relight the candles and sing to him twice. I did not finish his cake in time for the party, so we had little cakes from the store - which Nik assumed were his alone. When we did not produce a fork fast enough, he just leaned over and took a bite! We got his cake done, and sang to him again today.

Yummy!

What? Nothing to see here.

797

2010-01-26T22:26:00.003-05:00

I lifted this from Mary on Rumor Queen. I thought it was really funny:

"Surprise Paper Pregnancy"

Wife: Honey, sit down. I have some news for you.
Husband: What is it?
W: Well, I don’t know how to say this, so I’ll just come out with it. I went to the mailbox today and, well, we got a 797.
H: A what?!? A 797? As in, we’re going to have another baby?!?
W: It looks that way.
H: But how? We’ve been so careful! I put away all the blank I-800A forms. Didn’t you hide our homestudy update?
W: Of course I did, but don’t forget, there was that one night?
H: What night? (pauses) Ohhh, that night, But it was only once. We were just messing around. I didn’t print clearly. I didn’t even use ink! (pauses again) But it was kind of fun. (giggles). It was, wasn’t it?
W: I’ll never forget how cute you looked getting your fingerprints taken.
H: So now we’ve got our 797, eh? But that doesn’t always mean you’ll adopt, does it? I mean, shouldn’t you see the agency or something, make sure everything’s okay?
W: I already did.
H: And?
W: I’m five documents along.
H: Five documents! And they’re all notarized, certified and authenticated okay?
W: Just great. There was one small scare when the agency couldn’t see the Notary’s middle initial but it showed up just fine under the magnifying glass. Thank God. And you, honey? Are you feeling okay?
H: I’m feeling fine. As long as I know you’re happy about this.
W: Happy? I’m thrilled! It’s always a shock at first when something like this happens, but of course I’m happy.

And yes, we got our 797 for China. We are officially approved for one or two kids, either gender, up to 36 months, non special needs or mild to moderate special needs. That should cover all potential variations of our referral. Of course when I had hoped USCIS would actually drag its feet, they decided to be ultra efficient and we got our approval in 35 days – which is among the shortest time recorded in the past year for people who have submitted their stats on RQ. Our approval expires in April 2011. I think we will get referral some time between January and April 2011, so we will probably have to file for an extension since the 797 must be valid for 3 months after referral.

Nikolai is going to be a good big brother. This weekend we ended up watching a 13-month old during the choir concert at church since both parents are in the choir. Nikolai was so cute with him. When the concert started, Nikolai kept pointing to the choir and asking the baby if he saw the singing. When the baby flicked a few cheerios on the floor, Nikolai picked them up. I thought he was going to eat them, but instead he put them back on the baby's tray and wagged his finger saying "no throw." Nikolai also gently scolded the baby for "throwing" his sippy cup - of course Nik did not seem to see the correlation as he threw his toys on the floor. Nikolai shared his toys with the baby, sweetly saying "here you go." So CCAA - you see we are ready NOW.

Christmas +

2010-01-23T21:21:00.002-05:00

Christmas was a lot of fun. We had Christmas morning at home with both sets of grandparents. Then a few days later my sister and her family came into town. Nikolai was really good – he loved opening presents, but understood that many of them were not for him. He really likes all of his new toys; we are trying to figure out how to manage all of the pieces, though. It is fun to see how imaginative he is when he plays now. He is so cute with his stuffed animals – and new Mr. Potato head. He acts like they are real. He will lay them down and say “night night”, ask “do you need help?” when putting on their sunglasses or having them turn the light off or on, and put them in a chair, walk a few steps away, and turn back and strenuously says “sit!”.

Nik has started talking in complete sentences! He has moved into the 2-year old/discovery preschool class almost full-time and seems to really enjoy it. I don’t think he can officially move until he is actually two, though. One of the morning teachers teaches him Spanish, and actually pulled him into the room after the Spanish classes’ performance at the “Winter Gala” to show him off. I kind of think they are angling to get us to sign him up for the Spanish enrichment class. I have no problem with him picking up as much of any language as possible, but I am not ready to pay for Spanish class for a 2-year old!

He just learned almost all of his colors. It happened in one day – we sent him to daycare knowing yellow, black, and pink – and he came home knowing all the rest. I am not sure if he just learned them or just decided to identify them correctly. He thinks it is hilarious to answer incorrectly.

Nikolai is generally still a really happy and easy going kid. But clearly there is a switch somewhere in that little brain that has alerted him that he is about to be 2. He will yell and throw things across the room for the most minor thing – like if I give him the wrong spoon, or if I try to help, or if I don’t help quick enough, etc.

Catching Up

2009-12-24T11:29:00.004-05:00

The week after Thanksgiving my Grandmother passed away, so Nikolai and I got on a plane and headed back to Michigan. It is always hard to lose someone, but it was nice to see all of my mom’s family and to visit my sister again. Nikolai now really knows his aunt, uncle and cousins; he will still occasionally name them all (including Cocoa and Sebring) and then sadly say “bye bye”. The day after the funeral we went to Grandma’s house and the whole family went through her house and chose things we would like. It brought back a lot of great memories about Grandma and Don. Some of my favorite memories include playing spoons, raiding the pantry for home-made pickles, fishing, looking at the polished rocks Don was working with (we always got to keep one!), and just laughing a lot. The smell of bacon in the morning still reminds me of vacation. Chris still talks about the first time he met Grandma and Don and one of the first time he met my family in general. He came up to watch a skating competition my sister was in and we all met at a restaurant, where Grandma and Don proceeded to start a mini food fight!
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Nikolai amazes us every day. He is so cute and silly! The other evening he pulled a yogurt out of the fridge and carried it around while I got the rest of his dinner ready. A few minutes later I asked him where the yogurt was, and he said “where go?” I asked again, “where did the yogurt go?” Nikolai suggested “fridge?” (not likely – he cannot open the door). I found the yogurt inside the seat of his ride-on truck. When I pulled it out, Nikolai declared “oh yogurt” in the tone as if he was saying “silly yogurt”.

He calls Santa Clause “binga ball” (jingle bells) and his Frosty the Snowman musical card “happy face card” since the song says Frosty was a “jolly happy soul”. He loves to dance and sing.

Current cute phrases: careful!; where are you?; let’s go!; (I) did it!; come ere (here) let’s play; this way; whoa big truck

He asked to poop on the potty, and actually did! He often asks to pee on the potty, but has never actually gone. I think perhaps he asks when it is already too late. At least he seems to be starting to become aware, not that we have any intentions of potty training in the near future.
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SNOW! We got about 2 feet of snow. Shoveling off the sidewalk and around the cars reminded me how many muscles I have lost since I have transitioned from mostly fieldwork to mostly office work. Nikolai has no interest in playing in the snow, but admittedly it is nearly above his head. He loves to eat it though. Although lately he has been asking to go “outside snow” a lot, so I think the snow is starting to grow on him – or perhaps he just likes to wear his hat and gloves.

Now on to Christmas!

We are Very Thankful

2009-12-02T23:39:00.005-05:00

Happy Thanksgiving

Sharing Nana's Lap

Drumming at Jungle Java

Mom and Jen trying to flip the turkey AFTER it was put in a bag to marinate

Sweedish pancake breakfast

We drove to Michigan to spend Thanksgiving weekend with my sister and her family. My parents, Ron’s mom, and Ron’s brother and his family all came too. Ron’s brother has a daughter just three days younger than Nikolai. They were really cute together, especially leaning in at dinner to smile at each other down the length of the table. Nikolai sounded a bit like a broken record, though, constantly saying “mine”. He gathered his and a few of Ryan’s footballs and guarded them. While Bella does not say a lot, it was clear she got the “mine” idea as at one time she got a hold of one of the footballs and paraded around waving it above her head. Kids are SO funny. Nikolai was especially disturbed to discover he has to share his Nana and Pop with his cousins. We heard a lot of “My Nana!” “My Pop!” “My football!” “My Dada” “My ice”… you get the picture. By the end of the weekend he was ok if my niece or nephew sat on my parent’s laps, and even shared my lap with Alexis at one point.

Friday we went to Jungle Java – a coffee house with a huge indoor play area for kids. Nikolai had so much fun, especially once he abandoned the under 3 playground and headed to the big kids’ climbing area. Of course I had to go with, which was fun and great exercise. He (and I) was exhausted by the end.

I think everyone had lot of fun. I was so impressed with all of the kids – no one had any real meltdowns and everyone had fun playing together. Nikolai even learned to take turns. And the adults got to play a lot of cards and watch movies.

Adoption News:
We received Nikolai’s Certificate of Citizenship!!! It only took 12 months, three in-person meetings with USCIS officers, and the involvement of our Senator. It made me laugh, though, when we finally got the certificate it had Nik’s original visa photo despite our having to provide new passport photos and a full N-600 application (luckily without fee!). So USCIS had the info just sitting there for 12 months and no one thought to hit print??

No good news from China. While referrals came out today and finally all of March 2006 LIDs have been matched (with adorable babies!), no referrals were sent in September or November. In September there was a big holiday and in November a new director of CCAA was appointed (first time in about 7 years) so there were reasons for the delays and hopefully it will NOT become a pattern to send referrals every other month. Still, since we had been thinking we would get referral at the end of 2010, skipping two months pushes us into 2011.

The atmosphere in the China adoption world is all doom and gloom, with rumors that the NSN program will close and no one beyond April 2006 will even get referral, or that May 2006 will wait an additional 2 years. I am worried about the increased time between referrals, but otherwise do not buy into the horrendous predictions. I really think all of April, May and early June 2006 LIDs will get referral next year. I really feel for those with 2007 LIDs, though, who have already waited 2+ years and probably have 4+ years to go.

Happy Halloween

2009-10-31T23:42:00.004-04:00

Halloween has always been one of my favorite holidays, except that Chris’s dad died on Halloween. We miss him a lot. I am sure he would have been a great grandpa, and is watching Nikolai grow up from heaven.

Earlier in the week we carved our jack-o-lantern. I did not want to wait till Halloween to roast the seeds – yummy. Nikolai helped take the guts out the pumpkin. Luckily we planned ahead and he just wore a diaper. By the end he had a thin layer of pumpkin over most of him – to the point that he was too slippery to stand up, and I had to pick him up to get rinsed off. It is amazing how willing he was to dive right into the pumpkin, especially since I have read about so many adopted kids with sensory issues.

Nikolai was a lizard for Halloween. His costume was supposed to be a dragon, but he said he was a “zhizhard”. He wore his costume at daycare for part of the day yesterday for a parade. When I picked him up he was still wearing his lizard shoes. He likes to wear them around the house in general.

We took Nikolai trick-or-treating after dinner. We went to the neighbors we know – as well as anyone right around them who had their lights on and main door open. Nikolai caught on real quick. He walked right up to the doors, grabbed a piece of candy (or two) and put them in his pumpkin. He was so used to the process that each time we came home he grabbed a few from our candy bowl and put them in his pumpkin as well. He was a little freaked out once we started encountering more kids dressed up – especially the ones with scary costumes. He got tired pretty quickly and we did not make it even to all the houses where we know people – which is probably for the best candy wise. I think he had fun, though.

We came home and dumped out his pumpkin to see what he got. We then shared some kitkats in honor of the giant kitkats we had last Halloween on our last day in Kazakhstan. Nikolai had his first (to my knowledge) lollipop, which turned his whole mouth and chin blue. He was really tired and it was bed time, so I put his candy up on the table to get him ready for bed. You would have thought we took his most prized possession – he looked SO sad and cried hard, saying “my chocolate”. Luckily he calmed down quick once he went upstairs and fell sound asleep.

Mama! Look!

The requisite tasting of the pumpkin top

What's in there?

Trying on his costume

Here we go!

Adding the candy from our house to his pumpkin

Chocolate!

Forever Family Day

2009-10-27T22:02:00.003-04:00

Yay Football!

More Borscht Please

One year ago today we arrived in Astana after an 18+ hour trip, drove to the baby house, and were finally handed our son to be part of our family forever. Nikolai’s favorite care giver dressed him for the last time, reviewed the outer clothes we planned to put on him to keep him warm for the last time, and kissed him good bye. We then headed back to the airport and to Almaty.

This past year has been more amazing than we could have dreamed. We have been blessed with the cutest, silliest little boy in the world. He is currently obsessed with football. This morning at 6:30 am, he greeted me with: “morning mama; watch football?” Apparently he had his morning milk sitting on Chris’s lap watching Sports Center. He likes to play football too, but unfortunately seems to be emulating Jason Campbell. He wildly throws the ball, and then spins and falls down. Anything exciting gets a “Yay football!” sort of the same way that any music he likes is described as “drum!” I played the Happy Adoption Day song by John McCuteon in the car on the way home from daycare, but Nikolai barely tolerated it before requesting his current favorite song – a Laurie Berkner song called Song in My Tummy that he calls “La La”. We usually listen to that song at least three times on the way home.

We went out to dinner Saturday night to celebrate because Chris knew he had drama rehearsal with the youth tonight. We finally ate at the new Kazakh restaurant in Arlington – Café Assorti. It was SO good, had a great atmosphere, and was totally kid friendly at the same time. The food leaned more towards the Russian rather than Kazakh side of the cuisine. I could smell the dill when we walked in, and had four different Pirozhki – cabbage was the best (as usual). Chris had pelmeni, and Nikolai had chicken blinchiki. Chris and I also ordered borscht, and Nikolai ate a lot of it. I think it was more vegetables than he has eaten in months. It was really fun to see Kazakh people too. I do not think the people we met who worked there were necessarily Kazakh, but there were several tables of people who were. They clearly were a little amused to see a little Kazakh with us, too.

VACATION

2009-10-14T23:16:00.008-04:00

We just got back from 11 days of vacation in the southwest. We flew to Phoenix and then starting driving, eventually making our way to Denver to fly home. This was definitely a test of Nikolai’s resilience. While he was tired by the end, he did great! We had been so worried Nikolai would get sick before the trip, but he was fine – and Chris and I were sick. Oh well… we still enjoyed ourselves. Chris had never been to that part of the country before, so we spent a lot of time just observing the scenery. It is hard to be back at work, but nice to sleep in our own beds and be back in a more humid climate. I feel like we were gone so long, I was a bit surprised to see that they have not finished repaving the beltway and the same 10 or so songs are still being played on the radio.

Prescott, AZ

The drive from Phoenix to Prescott was amazing. Unlike in the east where if you go way up, you then go way down, we went up a big incline and then leveled off! We traveled from an area of saguaro cactus up to a rocky landscape of scrub brush and mesas.

We went to Prescott for a friend’s wedding. Kirsten and I worked together nearly 10 years ago and she is still an architectural historian with my company – in the Phoenix office. Prescott was cute, but definitely outfitted for tourists. Much of the town, including our hotel (which is on the National Register of Historic Places), dates to the late 19th to early 20th century. The wedding was outside and it was a little difficult to hear, especially after a low, small airplane flew overhead and Nikolai repeatedly exclaimed “airplane! airplane! one more?” The reception was beautiful. I wish I had not been sick.

Traveling with a 20-month old was an interesting experience. Nikolai had a different focus than us, which was a bit frustrating at times, but mostly amusing and forced us to look at things in a new way. This was particularly noticeable on the brief hike we took at a lake outside of Prescott. Much of the path was paved with rocks and boulders. Nikolai would stand on a rock, count 1, 2, 3 and jump off. He would take a few steps and then excitedly climb onto the next rock and start again. Meanwhile Chris and I are looking at the ½-mile of rocks ahead of us wondering if we will ever reach the top. We intended to do the entire mile or so hike, but a 50-mile an hour cold wind led us to cut our walk short.

Since I was not feeling well at all at that point in the trip, I went to bed at the same time as Nikolai and Chris went out exploring. He came upon a folk music festival – which is funny since Chris is currently obsessed with perfecting his banjo and mandolin playing in order to participate in our local bluegrass jam sessions. Who would have thought we would find folk music – including some bluegrass – in Arizona!

Ready for the wedding

The entrance to our hotel in Prescott

1, 2, 3 Jump!

Grand Canyon, AZ

Prescott is only 80 miles from the Grand Canyon, so we could not pass up the opportunity to visit briefly. We managed to get a reservation at one of the hotels in the national park, and had a great room just a short walk to the rim. Having always visited national parks as a kid via tent camping, it was interesting to stay in a hotel instead. When the temperature dropped to 20 degrees overnight, we were especially glad not to be in a tent – I sure hope my parents are staying warm. They are on a 6-week camping trip in UT, CO, AZ, and NM. The weather was really nice once the sun was fully up.

The Grand Canyon is perhaps the easiest park to visit with a baby. The rim trail running the length of the park is paved, so we took a 3.5-mile walk pushing Nikolai in a stroller. We took the free shuttle back to our hotel – not exactly roughing it. I think the canyon itself was lost on Nik, but he really enjoyed carrying rocks, occasionally throwing rocks, and watching the people and dogs walking by. Despite this rather settled/populated experience of the national park, we managed to see some wildlife, including several mule deer, elk, little lizards, and a squirrel (well, the squirrel hopped up on the wall and begged for food, so not exactly “wild” but still cute).

There was a full moon that night to guide us back along the rim trail from dinner at a different hotel. The views of the canyon lit by the moon were breathtaking. We did not encounter anyone else on the trail that night, so it was just the two of us pushing a stroller through the woods along the rim of the canyon by moonlight. I think Nikolai may be starting to realize what a crazy family he is a part of.

A common activity on the trip - collecting a rock

Los Lunas/ Albuquerque, NM

Next we drove 6 hours to my aunt and uncle’s house in NM. The drive was beautiful – especially the part just south of the canyon through a ponderosa pine forest and the first part of NM through Navajo lands. It was strange to be on so many roads where we did not see another car.

It was so much fun staying with my aunt and uncle. They are fun, generous, loving people. Tom and Dorene have two sheep, a cow, two dogs, a cat, two goats, three rats, a bearded dragon, chickens, a duck and probably other critters. Nikolai loved being able to wake up in the morning and visit the sheep. One of the new words he learned on the trip was lizard, which he says so cute – like zhizhard. He especially had fun driving the golf cart with Dorene’s dad.

We originally planned to get up early and drive to Albuquerque for a 7 am hot air balloon launch, but the balloons did not fly due to rain and a thunderstorm. So we went out to breakfast and then walked around the old town part of Albuquerque perusing the various stores. There are some amazing American Indian artists in the region who make beautiful (and expensive) jewelry and ceramics. Many of the stores had large drums for sale or holding up tables, etc. Nikolai was in heaven getting to beat on so many drums. We bought him a little toy drum supposedly made at the Cochiti Pueblo, which includes several well-known drum makers to the point that the seal of the Cochiti Pueblo is a drum.

Being silly at the balloon museum

Golf Cart!

Albuquerque

Canon City, CO

Finally we drove about 5 hours to Canon City to visit our good friends who just moved from MD to CO. We arrived after dinner time, but Nikolai was so excited to see his friend Tyler he ended up staying up late. He kept giggling uncontrollably at everything Tyler did. We realized that most of the vacation Nik had been happy, but it takes other kids’ craziness to really make him laugh. We stayed four nights and by the end Tyler and Nikolai were actually starting to get on each other’s nerves, especially in the back of the car when one had something the other wanted. It was so funny to listen to them – sort of a preview of what to expect once we bring home our child from China.

Unfortunately Canon City experienced a cold spell with record lows while we were there; we visited the local Goodwill to buy a snow suit for Nikolai. Cacti coated with ice are pretty. The first day’s weather was not bad once the sun came out in the afternoon, so we visited the Royal Gorge. The gorge has the tallest suspension bridge in the world, which we walked and drove over. There is also an incline railroad that we took to the base of the gorge. On the coldest day we went to the local history and dinosaur museums, and then had dinner at Jen’s parents’ house. Jen’s dad is a geologist who now runs the dinosaur museum; he had a great rock collection I enjoyed looking at. The final day we stayed inside most of the day, but went for a brief walk in the afternoon once the clouds broke up some.

Welcome to Colorado

Icy Cactus

Royal Gorge

Uncovering dinosaurs at the museum

All bundled

Ooh. Pretty

Citizenship

2009-09-20T23:31:00.007-04:00

When we landed at Dulles back in November 2008 we took a picture to commemorate Nikolai becoming a citizen. Since then we have been struggling with USCIS to get them to acknowledge that Nik is a citizen rather than a permanent resident and to get a Certificate of Citizenship. Several USCIS officers told us various things and promised the mistake would be fixed – with no action other than to confiscate the Permanent Resident Card so that we have almost nothing to prove that Nik is even here legally.

So we enlisted the help of our senator – who got an answer from USCIS the next day after contacting them! Our file and related documents have essentially been archived and there is no hope of fixing the mistake in the ways the USCIS officers assured us would work. Rather we need to submit the N-600 and supporting documents. This is not a big deal and it would have been a lot simpler if USCIS had just told us this back in January. Because of all the hassle, our senator’s representative will be hand delivering our application to the congressional liaison to USCIS, who will be hand delivering the application to USCIS headquarters and requesting they waive the fee. Whether we have to pay or not, I am finally feeling confident that this will be resolved. The senator’s office also told us she could arrange for us to go in person and apply for a passport without having to turn in Nik’s Kaz passport (which contains the IR-3 visa and the only proof of his immigration status we have).

We heard from the senator’s representative today and need to get the N-600 packet to her tomorrow. Since we first thought we might have to submit this application back in January, the passport-type photos that we had of Nikolai were way too old to use. So I attempted to take a quick digital picture that would work. I found the series of resultant photos funny:

CROWLSTOCK XI

2009-09-08T21:53:00.005-04:00

This weekend we went up to Chris’s mom’s farm to camp with a bunch of friends from college. We first got together in 1997 and have only missed a few years (including last year since we were in Kazakhstan!). What started out as a bunch of recent graduates drinking beer and playing board/card games has turned into a big family weekend. Adults still barely outnumbered the kids – by one. All of the requisite Crowlstock activities took place: horseshoes, camping, a huge fire followed by smores, games, and a trip to the corn maze. Nikolai loved the weekend since he was entertained by the other kids and the grandparents, he had unlimited access to whole peaches, and he got to be “out si” almost the whole weekend. We had him sleep in his new peapod bed in the tent since it is all we are bringing on our upcoming trip to the southwest. He woke up several times the first night, but slept better the second night.

It was great to see everyone!

Helping prepare the fire pit

In the "girls' tent" - after being invited since he "is just a baby"

Bubbles

A crowded sand box

The grandparents and I escaped to do a little tasting at a local winery

Reassuring Progress

2009-08-09T11:34:00.006-04:00

Nikolai is very outgoing and wants to greet everyone – even perfect strangers. He will actually head towards anyone in the town house complex who happens to be outside, waving and saying “hi” the whole time. In speaking with my friend at work, she says her son is the same way, so we realize this is not necessarily a sign of attachment issues, but as an adoptive parent you always are overly attentive to any potential issues. July 29 was our 14th wedding anniversary. We went out to dinner with my parents and Nikolai. We chose a Japanese steak house because we figured the entertainment factor would occupy Nik and allow us to enjoy our meal longer. He loves new things and is rarely frightened by things (e.g., he actually clapped and cheered the first time I used the blender). But apparently fire is SCARY. The first time the chef started one of the big fires, Nikolai literally leapt into my arms. He spent most of the rest of the meal with his head buried in my shoulder. While it was not the relaxing meal we envisioned and we hate to scare him it was nice to see that he sought us for comfort.

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He has moved up from the "wobbler" room to the toddler room at daycare. And has learned some new words, including:
Mine!
No!

I think he is becoming a toddler.

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He found a new favorite instrument he can play by himself!

Funny Moments and Cute Pictures

2009-07-25T11:10:00.007-04:00

The other night we were having a snack in the living room and I put Nikolai’s cup on the coffee table. He promptly picked it up and placed it on a coaster!

This past weekend we met some old friends at the American Indian museum. As I’m sure I have mentioned, Nikolai is obsessed with drums. One of the exhibits had a large drum encased in a column of glass. Nikolai went around and around (and around and around) the exhibit looking for the entrance. He would stop occasionally and try to drum, and then start going around again. Eventually we had to just pick him up and go to a different area.

When I was baking lasagna, I stopped Nikolai from touching the oven and told him it was “hot”. He squatted down in front of the oven and gently blew on it like he does when his food is hot. So cute!

I gave Nikolai ham for dinner. He took a few bites and then insistently asked for cheese. Somehow he has already figured out that ham and cheese go together. His Dada (who is obsessed with ham and cheese sandwiches) was very proud.

Nikolai will not ride his bike until he puts his toy keys in the hole in the handle bar. We did not show him this – he just decided that is how it works.

Singing and Playing Piano

Nikolai's Favorite Activity

Chilling after a day in the pool

Language

2009-07-10T20:47:00.003-04:00

Ok, so I am going to brag a little – Nikolai seems so smart! His language skills are really taking off. Of course, he is only one-and-a-half (almost), so we are not talking full sentences or anything, but he is adding words seemingly daily and can repeat anything we say. He regularly uses about 30 words (including animal sounds and expressions). He will also sign more and please. He does not really put words together, except to say “hi doggie” “here doggie” “bye bye mama” “more banana”, etc. Last night I was trying to get him to point to pictures in the picture book when I said the word, which is something he would not do at all last time I tried a few weeks ago. This time he actually pointed to the dog, sheep, fish, ball and guinea pig (we have a guinea pig). After doing this for a while with various things, out of nowhere I turned to a page and in quick succession he pointed and said “fish, banana, ball, doggie, airplane, blue” and then closed the book as if to say “there, all done”. Not all of his labels were completely correct, but pretty close; the “ball” was actually a pumpkin and the “banana” was actually a lemon. We had seen an airplane earlier and had just been talking about that picture, so that was not as surprising as it sounds. The “blue” was a blue triangle. Daycare has been saying that Nik knows yellow and blue, but I was not sure if he really knew the colors or just the words – apparently he knows the colors!

Nikolai's Words:
Mama
Dada
Nana
PopPop
Heh oh (hello - when playing with the phone)
Hi
Bye bye
Ear (while pulling on his ear – hopefully he is not trying to tell me it hurts!?)
Eye
Apple
Ish (fish)
Banana
Tea (eat)
Ah done (all done)
Yay!
Wow
Uh oh
Wawa (water) daycare says he says “agua” but we have not heard this yet
Book (he really stresses the “k” now – maybe they have been working on it at school?)
Ba (bath)
P (up)
Ball
Bubbles!
Blue
Yellow
Car
Tuck (truck)
Doggie
Calk (chalk)
Dirdie (birdie)
Dinie (guinea pig)
Boon (balloon)
Ow si (outside)

Ooh ooh (dog)
Ee ee (monkey)
Ga ga gak (chicken)
Meeaa (cat)
Baa (sheep)

Happy 4th of July!

2009-07-05T21:41:00.003-04:00

The weather was amazing this weekend – well below the 99 degrees that is typical here in July. Friday we went to Nana and Pop’s (my parents’) to swim and to Frying Pan Park. The park is great; it has farm animals, a restored historic farmhouse, a playground, wooded hiking trails, and a hay ride.

On the fourth we took the shuttle from our church to the parade in town. When we arrived at church Nana and Pop were already there and picked up Nikolai. He kept pointing at the church, nodding and signing “more”. Good baby, asking for more church! He could not understand why we parked at church and walked away from it towards the bus. He looked a little worried on the bus, but enjoyed a few rounds of “wheels on the bus”. I think he had fun at the parade, especially watching the dancers and marching bands, as well as the people walking by with dogs. Nik chased down two dogs – followed the people all the way to their blankets in order to pet the dogs. One of his favorite parts of the parade was the Bolivian dancers – the boys wore bells on their legs and danced and stomped to the music. Nikolai has been stomping his feet and “dancing” ever since.

After the parade we ate at a restaurant on the parade route, which understandably was busy and slow. There was a guy there singing and playing a guitar, which was (almost) enough to keep Nik happy even though he was tired and hungry. The guy let Nikolai play the guitar as he kept singing, and gave Nik a guitar pick to use when he gets older. It was really sweet, albeit a bit embarrassing since there were several other kids watching the guitarist too.

Saturday afternoon we went to our friends’ house for a welcome home party for a friend who has been in New Zealand for a year. There were lots of kids there, including one girl who is Nikolai’s age. Nik did not really care what the 1-year-old did too much, but tried to imitate the older kids and generally acted silly. It was great to catch up with everyone.

Nikolai woke up Sunday morning in a REALLY good mood, singing and talking. He is so funny – everything is either a telephone or a microphone, and many things switch back and forth. He will walk up to anything at his level that vaguely resembles a microphone and start singing. He always sings the same song – a slow one with long drawn out “oh” sounds. He makes the cutest expressions to go with the song. After church we went to dinner at IHop with my parents. Nikolai nearly ate his entire huge pancake with strawberries, bananas, yogurt, and whipped cream – all of which formed a face on the pancake. We left the restaurant after Nik’s bedtime, but he did not fall asleep on the drive home! He was very giggly and probably on a sugar high. Mondays are always a little rough at daycare for him (he often gets a “content” report rather than “cheerful”); I guess we have too much fun on weekends.

3rd "LID"iversary

2009-06-23T23:00:00.004-04:00

Today is our 3 year "LID"iversary. Hopefully we only have one more LIDiversary to get through before we can bring home our China baby.

It is somewhat fitting given our experience with China adoptions that today we learned that our China agency is bankrupt and closing their doors tomorrow. After panicking due to very poor communication that made us think we had to have our new notarized application and additional payment to the new agency by tomorrow, we are much calmer now after reading all of the bits of info other Harrahs clients have gleaned. Apparently we have until mid July to submit the payment and paperwork to our new agency - CCAI. It looks like a good agency, but the unknown is always a bit worrisome. Harrahs was so flexible and laid back, and it looks like CCAI will be a bit more "hands on"; for example, apparently we will have to pass a quiz verifying that we took 10 hours of training before we will be allowed to make travel arrangements. Hopefully they will be as flexible about us adopting from Kazakhstan during the wait as Harrahs was.

First Archaeology Site Visit

2009-06-10T09:27:00.004-04:00

This past weekend I took Nikolai to his first archaeology site. One of the sites we are working on had a public day on Saturday where anyone could come and tour the site. It is not an excavation I am personally involved with, but it is for a client I work for a lot. The excavation was in the yard area of a stone building that had been built ca. 1760 and called the Market Master’s house. You can read more about the excavation here http://www.bladenarch.blogspot.com/

Nikolai was a little unsure about where I had brought him at first, probably in part because several excited coworkers and our client came up to us right away to meet him. Our client also had her 1-year old son there, so that was fun. She offered to let Nik sit in a test unit for a photo, but I opted for outside of the unit. I tried to get Nik interested in helping screen at the public screening station (i.e., play in the dirt) but he was a little unsure why I was encouraging this. He really liked the metal conglomerate that Tara showed him, though.

One of my coworkers (who Nik had actually met before) showing Nikolai a test unit

Posing with artifacts (including the whole and very breakable artifact our client handed Nik for the photo!)

Rumors

2009-06-08T09:38:00.001-04:00

There is nothing like a good rumor to get us really focused on finishing our home study update so we can get a valid 171H. RQ is reporting a rumor that CCAA will match all of March 2006 in the next batch of referrals. I KNOW it will not happen (and RQ says the same), but what if…? Most people think it will take until at least October to finish March, if not the rest of the year. No good rumors have ever come true, but eventually over a 4-year period, one is bound to happen, right? Even though the rumor is very unlikely to pan out, it is fun to dream for a little – just don’t tell my employer.

Camping

2009-06-02T22:41:00.003-04:00

We went camping this weekend with two other families. Nikolai LOVED it, which makes me happy since most of my fondest memories from when I was a kid are family camping trips. I am not surprised that he had fun since his approach to life is that everything is fun until proven otherwise.

I took Friday off to pack. I was running a little late, but left our house at 3 to pick up Nikolai and then drive to Annapolis to pick up Chris, who had a business “meeting” at a crab house. We left Annapolis at 5 and arrived in VA beach around 10:20 pm! I hate traffic. As we approached the camp ground, the temperature dropped about 5 degrees, the wind picked up, and we started seeing a lot of lightening. We pulled into the camp site, which Jenn, Eric, and Tyler had luckily already chosen, and could tell that the storm was imminent. Tyler was already asleep in their tent, so Jenn and Eric went back in their tent and we sat in our car as the skies opened up and lightening flashed everywhere. After the storm passed, we finally got the tent up around 11:30 pm. Luckily Nikolai just slept through everything and we moved him into the pack-n-play in our tent.

Nikolai was funny Saturday morning. He woke up early (5:30 am!) since our tent is white and it gets bright as soon as the sun rises. I ignored him as best I could until he stood up, looked down at us sleeping on the ground, and started saying Dada!? Dada!? He giggled and pointed at the tent all around us – full-arm open-hand pointing as if to say: do you see this?

We spent the morning at the camp site and went to the beach after lunch. Nikolai loved playing in the sand and water. The sand was trouble though; Nik would get a little in his mouth and then use his totally sand-coated hands to try to get the sand out. He also had a few face plants in the sand as he had difficulty walking on it at first. I have no idea how much sand he ate. Eric and Chris fished some, but only caught a small rockfish and a skate. A guy nearby caught a small fish (like 4”) in a net and let the kids see it. Nik grabbed it right away.

Sunday our friends planned a full day including going to the beach, eating lunch, breaking down the camp site, playing at the playground, looking at the fish in the tanks, and hiking in the cypress swamp – not to mention driving home. I was a little worried that nap time was notably missing from the schedule. We went down to the beach in the morning. As soon as we got close Nikolai started saying “ish” (fish) and doing the sign for fish. Is it really possible that he remembered the fish that were caught on Saturday?? I doubt that he automatically associates water with fish. We got back to the camp site a little before noon. Nikolai actually fell asleep during lunch in the cool chair we brought that attaches to the picnic table. We pulled the pack-n-play out of the tent and laid Nik in it to take a nap while we packed everything up.

The mini-hike through the swamps was fun. We did not bring anything to carry Nikolai in, so he walked some, we carried him the rest of the time. He was really loud in the woods, which were otherwise quiet and tranquil with occasional frog croaks. He just sounded so amazed by everything. During the hike (and really all weekend) Nikolai tried to imitate Tyler and wanted to do everything he did. But a 5-year old can do things like walk on the wooden retaining wall that is difficult for a 1-year old, even with two spotters.

Nikolai really honed his dog-spotting skills on this trip. A few times on the hike he would stop or try to go backwards saying “ooh ooh”. Sure enough a moment later a dog would come around the corner. I do not know how he knew they were coming – perhaps he heard a leash rattling? He got to visit with three dogs this trip, accompanied by ecstatic giggles.

We were definitely going through baby withdrawal at work Monday, and I think the baby missed us too. He just wanted to be held rather than being laid in his crib to sleep. Usually he wants to lay down right away and fall asleep on his own. Unfortunately he is a little miserable too since it looks like he may have caught poison ivy as well as sustained several bug bites.

Memorial Day Weekend

2009-05-26T22:14:00.001-04:00

Bubbles!

Nature Masks

We had a lot of fun this weekend since our friends from Salisbury (soon to be from Colorado :-() and my sister and her family came into town. We spent a lot of time at my parent’s house letting the kids play and swim. We also went to a wedding on Sunday. Nikolai had fun at the wedding watching the band and running around in the pavilion thinking he was playing with the big kids (who were playing tag and hide and seek). The wedding started at 2 and we left the reception at about 7:30; amazingly Nikolai was only fussy towards the end of the hour-long ceremony and fine the rest of the night! The wedding was fun since it was two of my archaeology friends getting married and a lot of the guests were also archaeologists. The tables were named after projectile point styles.

China Update

2009-05-22T09:29:00.001-04:00

Since swine flu hit the news there have been rumors floating around that China was going to hold referrals, TAs, etc. until as late as September, and that even if you had TA you would be unable to make appointments in certain regions. TAs, however, kept coming to most agencies, and some people were able to make appointments and even travel. Our agency has taken China’s request that parents delay travel to heart and is not letting anyone travel right now (this only affects SN adoptions as they have not had NSN referrals in a while).

Then, with virtually no advance warning, referrals arrived on Wednesday! They are nearly 3 weeks late, but China claims they were not held for any reason. This batch is about the same size as last batch (yay!!) which is encouraging. However, the fact that they arrived so late means they practically skipped a month. If referrals were held just because of swine flu, then there is a chance that they kept working business as usual, but just did not mail anything out until later. If that is the case, then we could see another batch of referrals in about two weeks, which would get everything back on schedule. If the next batch does not arrive for 4 or more weeks, then the benefit of this being a good sized batch is basically negated. So much speculation...

I think we are still looking at the end of next year as the most likely time for referral, with travel in early 2011. I have not given up hope for travel in 2010, though. Of course, it could be much later, but we will deal with that too.

First Rock Concert

2009-05-15T09:27:00.001-04:00

We took Nikolai to his first rock concert on Tuesday. The music director at church is from Liverpool and he and three other guys performed songs from the Beatles. Nikolai was SO funny. At first he was content to stand on my lap (not sit, though) and sway back and forth with the slow songs or shake wildly and move his feet during the fast songs. At one point he grabbed Chris and my Mom’s hands, who were sitting on either side of me, to make swaying way to one side and the other easier. When a song would end he would clap along with everyone and yell “yay”. Eventually he had enough of sitting with his apparently too reserved parents and started making his way to the dance floor. He paused for a while to bang on an empty chair next to the senior pastor and right in front of us, so that was fine. Then he moved up another row and we thought he was just socializing. Finally, he made a break for it and crawled full speed onto the busy dance floor! Luckily the pastor’s wife grabbed him and picked him up to dance for the rest of the song. I went up to take him from her at the end of the song, but he refused to come! He wanted to dance more.

He Can Walk!

2009-05-08T22:04:00.002-04:00

Nikolai took 10 steps independently today! He really has been able to walk for several weeks now, but would not let go and insisted on holding at least one finger. When we would let go, he would crumple to the floor instantly. Tonight he was leaning with his back against the coffee table focusing on the TV remote so I thought he might walk to me without thinking as much as normal. I called to him and he took three steps to me! He would not go back towards the table, so I propped him up against it again and moved further away. He took 10 steps to reach me! The next time, he got a little carried away and put a basket of toy beads over his shoulder and tried to walk. He fell over after a few steps, spilling the basket of beads, and resulting in an “uh oh”. He never dropped the remote, though. It took me nearly a half hour to get the TV back to normal, but that is another story.

Random Thoughts

2009-05-07T13:49:00.004-04:00

Happy Birthday Alex!
Ryan helping

Party!

So Cool

Fun at the Park

At the Park in her New Polka Dot Dress

We went to MI this weekend for my niece’s third birthday. 3-year old girls are great for teaching language. Nikolai tried to imitate her a lot – including her screech, which sounds really funny in Nikolai’s low voice

As noted above, Nikolai has a low voice for a baby – I think he will be a bass. That should compliment his tenor father well for duets

Nikolai has learned to flush the toilet (over and over). Surely this means he is partly potty trained, right? Probably it means we need to be better about keeping the bathroom doors closed

My niece and nephew are SO cute

Alex is such a girly girl – through no real direction of her parents (e.g., my BIL insisted on dying the newborn onesies black). Alex got some pink doll house furniture for her birthday. After it had been put in her room, she asked “where is my pretty pretty bed?”. When she got up Sunday after her party, she was wearing her new butterfly necklace, which had been in a box on top of her (tall) dresser. We were drawing on her new easel and I drew a fairy and told Alex it was her (she had just drawn a picture of me). She said “that is me? As a butterfly? I want to be a purple butterfly with a purple face” Of course I complied and drew an all-purple fairy (face included).

Ryan is probably the sweetest 4-year old boy I know. He is so sensitive. At one point my sister made a comment that all of her portion of some food (I cannot even remember what) was gone, and Ryan said “you can have some of mine, I don’t need it all”. When Alex got in trouble for climbing on her dresser in the middle of the night to retrieve her necklace – and wearing a necklace while sleeping, Ryan was worried because Alex’s feelings got hurt.

Nikolai is obsessed with music. I know all babies love music, but I think his interest goes beyond normal. He sat through a 1-hour musical without taking his eyes off the stage. He signs “more” in the car when the classical piece ends. He will be entertained for hours in the basement alternating between playing the piano and guitar, and generally Mama gets bored first, causing a little tantrum when I bring him back upstairs. After watching the minister at church energetically play the djembe, Nik plays his toy drum the same way – shaking his head like a rock star.

I wonder if there is anyone in the area that teaches dombra lessons?

Nikolai has started hitting in the face when he is frustrated and/or over tired. What to do?

While he knows what the word no means, Nik does not seem to care. We learned in adoption parenting classes to visibly change your stance and say “no” forcefully to get their attention if they are doing something like biting or hitting. The problem is that Nik LOVES to be startled, so this just makes him laugh and try to get us to do it again.

It is funny to watch Nikolai try to categorize the world. We have an overhead light in the kitchen that is round. Nik calls it a balloon; and now he calls all lamps above his head “balloons” regardless of their shape. Animals are either “ooh ooh” (dogs), “baa” (sheep), “diiirdie” (birds), or fish – for which he does the sign. My sister’s Scottish fold cat was determined to be a “baa”.

I am sick of doing paperwork and social worker visits. We are definitely dragging our feet in renewing our home study this time. How do people manage to adopt 4+ children? They must just do paperwork in their sleep.

The positive vibe in the Rumor Queen June room is starting to make me nervous about getting our home study updated and submitting the I-800A. June 6 is the biggest LID in June, so that big group is really getting excited because they are maybe only a year or less away from referral. While we are June 23, for the first time we are actually getting CLOSER to referral, rather than further away each month.

Why is it that USCIS’s mistake is costing us $420.00? Everyone acknowledges that they made a mistake, but apparently there is no protocol for correcting mistakes without filling out more forms – with the mandatory fees of course.

Nikolai’s tantrums are so funny. He carefully lies down on the floor, and then begins to fake cry and kick his feet. Tantrums generally last less than a minute. Unfortunately he will probably perfect his tantrum technique as he gets older.

Someone took my lunch from the refrigerator at work yesterday. How can this happen? Do they not know what they brought? I was so looking forward to the leftover dahl and the tangelo.

Tangelos are my new favorite fruit – I cannot get enough of them. I became addicted on my last trip to the Gulf Coast. I am supposed to go back in the next few weeks (even though I see no point to the trip – the temp field director has things well in hand and he would have to get me up to speed if I went). Perhaps I will go just to buy fruit.

Nikolai does all the hand motions to Twinkle Twinkle – including making a perfect diamond with his fingers for that part of the song. He has started doing another set of motions, one of which is moving his arm back and forth in front of him. I have not yet figured out what song it is; my guess was wheels on the bus (with the swishing of the wipers) but I did not get much reaction when I sang that song. I will have to ask day care.

I hope Nikolai is always as good an eater as he is now. He really loves food. I am always surprised to find a food he does not like. The most recent rejected food was hummus – doesn’t hummus seem like a perfect food for a 1-year old? His current favorites are mac-n-cheese, refried beans, and spiced pumpkin from the Afghan restaurant – oh, and sugar in any form.

Happy Easter

2009-04-12T22:22:00.003-04:00

How many peeps is it safe to feed a 1-year old? I made the mistake of working on my peep diorama for work and of eating a peep in Nikolai’s presence. Suddenly the colorful toys he was not allowed to have became a colorful food he was not allowed to have. He just sat there and cried pointing at the pile of peeps, so of course I gave in and gave him a taste. Sugar coated sugar is apparently now a new favorite food.

I took Nikolai to the grocery store Friday to pick out things for his Easter basket. Since he is young, I did not think it would matter if he saw everything in advance. When we got to the stuffed animals, I pulled out a cute, soft bunny and showed it to him. He glanced at it and then grabbed a bright pink care bear and held it to his cheek. We compromised with a yellow care bear. I would never have chosen a care bear myself, but I can see why he would – the bear is shaped like a person, it has big eyes, and a tuft of fur on top, which he kept playing with at the store. Nik then saw the rack of balls and kept saying “ball” so he got a batman ball for his basket. We finished it off with some Gerber puffs, pear baby food, bubbles, and a whole peep. When he opened the basket on Easter he pulled everything out, ate the peep, threw the bear aside and put the basket on shoulder like a hand bag. He really enjoyed the bubbles at bath time, though.

We spent Easter day in Pennsylvania, which was fun. Nikolai got to spend time with his Grammy, and Abby, the big black lab.

Yummm...A whole peep!

Cut Off March 8, 2006 - 2 Days Matched!

2009-04-03T22:24:00.001-04:00

I never thought I would be happy for CCAA to only match two days of LIDs. But it is a good thing this month. With the exception of January (which was better), in the past six months CCAA has matched between 22 and 63 people who responded to the Rumor Queen polls. If they continue at that rate we expect to receive referral around February of 2011. March 2006 is the largest month to date based on the polls – and March 7th is the largest day in March, with approximately 63 people on the RQ polls. So we were sort of worried that they would have difficulty matching even one day (although they have never done a partial day). But they matched two days! That includes 83 people based on the polls.

If CCAA can continue to match as many as they matched this month, we could see a referral as early as July of 2010 – seven months earlier than we are currently estimating! Of course that assumes this is not a fluke and they can match as many next month. January’s referrals included 85 people, and they followed that with a devastating month of 22 referrals. Today I choose to ignore the past and have hope!

Happy Nauryz

2009-03-23T15:48:00.004-04:00

Ready for the party

Playing with his dombra that Saule, Zhana, and Murat gave him when we left Astana

March 21 is Nauryz in Kazakhstan, although celebrations generally last one month. This spring festival is celebrated in many Muslim countries and the word comes from the Persian holiday. In Kazakhstan, however, Nauryz is really a secular celebration. It was reinstated when Kazakhstan gained independence in 1991 after being banned during the Soviet period. The day marks the beginning of the new year and renewal of nature. It makes so much sense to me to start a new year in spring and end the year at the end of winter. I do not like celebrating new years in the middle of winter - maybe I will start a movement to change the date. Actually I do not like to do anything in winter.

We attended a party for kids adopted from Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan on Saturday. It was fun to meet other people who have adopted and see their beautiful children. I got to meet Eileen and Audrey, whose blog I follow - so that was especially neat. Nikolai had fun, although he had a runny nose and was not his normal outgoing self. I just brought him to the doctor and found out he has a double ear infection - poor baby. Luckily I do not think he really interacted with the kids at the party, so hopefully he did not pass it on to anyone.

There were a few Kazakh students from GWU who came as well. GWU has a Kazakhstani student association, who plan various events. The students were taking email addresses so they can let us know if there are any events suitable for children. They also told me about a new Kazakh restaurant that opened in the Arlington area, which we will have to try.

6 Months

2009-03-13T22:43:00.005-04:00

This week marks the 6 month anniversary of meeting our son. I cannot believe it has been so long! Looking back at the pictures is fun. He was so little! He still makes many of the same expressions. It is strange to realize how little we knew of his personality back then, even though he was already expressing it.

Week of September 9-12, 2008

Today

Snow

2009-03-02T19:52:00.003-05:00

What happened to the outside??

Hmm... Something I have never seen before - better taste it!

It's good! Snow is fun!

Just one more bite

Check out my snow mustache

So Cute

2009-02-16T10:05:00.003-05:00

I decided to share a list of cute things Nikolai does, mostly so I can remember them in the future.

He reads books to us – he turns to a page, says something in baby talk, and then turns to the next page (not necessarily front to back, but he gets the idea).
He imitates the way we read books. For example, in the Baby Faces book we shake the book during the “ding-a-ling” part of the “I like making noises” page. Nik shakes the book for every page with that particular baby on it.
He pulls at his clothes when he turns to the “I like putting on my clothes” page of the Baby Faces book.
He loves the hokey pokey, and for the “do the hokey pokey” part of the song we point our fingers up and dance around. At church he does the hokey pokey dance, pointing his fingers up, during the hymns.
He growls like a lion, baas like a sheep, and says ee ee ee like a monkey. And he just started saying ruff ruff ruff like a dog.
He crawls down slopes as if he is going down stairs – backwards. As soon as his head gets a certain level below the rest of him he whips around and continues backwards (full speed!).
When I walk in the room, he gets a big smile and excitedly proclaims “Dada!” (while not correct, still really cute).
Most animals get growled at. At first we thought he thought all animals sounded like lions, but now we are wondering if instead he thinks he is a lion and is growling at all the other animals.
He loves to brush his hair when Mama is brushing her hair. After bath, getting pajamas on (always traumatic), and a couple of books he will crawl into our bedroom where his brush and toothbrush are kept. He immediately pulls the pacifier out of his mouth when he sees his toothbrush.
He likes to sit in his new chair and play his steel drum while Mama and Dada dance.
He claps along to music.
When he wants to get out of the bath, he points to his towel and/or growls (the towel is a lion).
He has conversations with the animals on his favorite blanket and his bunny when he is supposed to be sleeping.
He greets people he knows with a huge smile.
If he wants us to know he is happy or really likes something, he will smile starting with his eyes and then his mouth. It is difficult to do – try it!
He will bat our hand away when we try to stabilize his walker – even if he is careening out of control down hill.
He will not let go of things in order to walk, but has no qualms about standing precariously on a toy in order to climb onto a chair or reach something on the table.
He blows kisses.
He will tap you gently on the back to get you to turn around and say “boo”.
He gets excited when he accomplishes something he has been working at, such as putting the stacking cups inside each other, feeding himself with a spoon and actually getting the food inside his mouth, and getting the little blocks into the correct space to hear the letter (it’s difficult – he only gets it every once in a while).
He sucks the last drop of coffee out of our cups when we are done (he is destined to be a coffee drinker).
He will point to his mouth and pull on his hair when asked where they are (getting close with nose and eyes, but not quite there).
He says several words: boo (book), ba (bath), ba ba (bottle), more, Mama, Dada, p (up), Nana, Pop (his grandfather), banana, no no, and apple (although we have not heard this one in a while).
He says thank you when handed something – well not exactly “thank you”, it is more of a sneeze sound with a nod, but the intention is clear.
He will shake back and forth and say “no no” for things he is not supposed to do (but does them anyways – usually after making sure we are looking).
If we forget to give him a pacifier when we put him in his car seat, if he is calm he will put his hand to his mouth and then hold it out (a car ride without a pacifier means crying the whole way). If he is not calm, then he just screams, which is generally equally effective for getting us to give him the pacifier.
The way he says "hop hop hop" is so cute - like "bwap bwap bwap"

Happy 1st Birthday Nikolai!!

2009-02-04T21:25:00.002-05:00

Nikolai is 1 year old today! We had a little party with my parents. Nik got to eat pea soup with ham, one of his favorite foods, and two mini cupcakes! I almost did not get pictures he ate the little cakes so fast. He grabbed a third and said “more, more” but we thought that was a little much. Today was his second day of full-time daycare so he was tired since he only gets one nap a day now. We basically had to keep him awake to open his gifts. His new chair and drum re-energized him though!

I can kind of see why some adopted kids do not like their birthdays. Nik’s birthmom and dad were definitely in my thoughts today. I hope God brings them peace.

January Update

2009-01-27T21:28:00.002-05:00

Chris's Quartet in Concert

Tyler Entertaining Nikolai

Baptism

January has been a good month. We had an appointment with the local craniofacial team on January 8. The appointment was kind of neat – they brought in about 12 kids and they all got their own room and then the 10 or so specialists (speech, dentist, plastic surgeon, cranio surgeon, and others) rotated around the rooms to look at all of the children. There were two other adopted kids (both from China). We were in a room across from a little boy a couple weeks older than Nik and the two boys played together. The boy’s parents were really friendly and interesting, so it was nice to have someone to talk to. Based on the appointment it looks like Nik is in good shape. His hearing is good, his speech is normal for his age, his palate is fine (despite what the pediatrician had suspected), and the cleft in his alveolus may fill in as his baby teeth come in bringing bone with them. It is possible that he will need a bone graft when he is 7, or just orthodontics, but the cranio team thought there was a chance everything would be fine too. This was all good news.

I went back to work on January 5, although with all the various appointments I have not worked a full week yet. I was really nervous going back at first, but work is really fun and I am able to leave at a reasonable time to avoid some of the traffic and get home to play with and feed Nikolai. My parents watched Nikolai this month, although he starts daycare the first week of February.

We had our first post placement visit. We were worried that the social worker would nit-pick all of our attempts at baby proofing, but she did not even take a tour of the house. She is easy to talk to and talkative (unlike us) so the meeting went well. Nik of course was charming as he is a flirt and really wanted her pen. She, like the IA pediatrician, recommends avoiding daycare. We would not choose daycare if we had a choice, but finding good in-home care is difficult and I have no idea how to start. I think Nik will be ok at daycare as he is the type to demand attention. He also likes playing with other kids. If he is not – then we will find other options.

Nikolai got his first tooth on Sunday, and another one on Monday!! He got the upper right and lower left front teeth. There will be no stopping his eating once he has teeth to bite with. Nik has started eating a variety of table foods while we continue to clear out the freezer of baby food. He has a new favorite – refried beans! Pears are still up there, though, especially the wonderful Royal Riviera pears from Harry and David that we have now.

Nikolai was baptized on Sunday. Our friends from Salisbury, MD, Chris’s mom, and Chris’s aunt came into town. They had all been planning to come to see a concert Chris’s quartet gave, so we asked the church if Nik could be baptized then as well since everyone would be in town. We had tried to get Nikolai used to the minister before hand, but he had always cried as soon as Jason picked him up. But during the service Nik did great! He was amused by the video of a waterfall on the screen above him, and really liked everyone looking at him. I on the other hand hated being in the front with everyone looking – it is strange raise such an extrovert :-). When the minister put the water on Nik’s head, he whipped around to look at the bowl of water and tried to climb down to get to it. It was great having so many people here to entertain Nik, especially our friends’ 5-year old, who was willing to push Nik around on his fire truck and generally entertain him.

Merry Christmas

2008-12-28T22:42:00.005-05:00

Cousins in their matching pajamas (note Nik's focus on the dog)

"I want a puppy for Christmas"

Presents!

Alexis in her "butterfly dress"

Cousins - Ryan, Nik, and Alex

The boys (and Jen) playing with Alex's doll house

Playing with his new water table

Hanging with Grammy

We had a fun and crazy Christmas with my family. My sister and her family came into town and met Nikolai for the first time. My mother-in-law came into town too, so in total we had 10 people! My niece and nephew were of course full of energy and for the most part Nik kept up with them. They were really sweet and good about letting him play with them. Alexis kind of treated Nik like a doll and kept squeezing his cheeks and giving him kisses.

Nikolai has figured out that “more” means more of anything. He even says “more ba” for more bottle. When I ask him if he wants to eat or if he is hungry he will pretend to chew, opening and closing his mouth. He will even do this for his medicine, which is lucky since he will be taking it for the next 9 monhts. But now he has started doing this for anything he wants – which mostly this holiday has been my sister’s Boston terrier. Nik crawled all over the house following Cocoa. At first Cocoa liked it and gave Nik lots of kisses (tongue to tongue – ah!). Eventually Cocoa started running when Nikolai came close. Nik had a particular yell he reserved for the dog, although he has now started making the sound for our guinea pig too.

Nik is not walking, but can stand a little on his own. He balances for a few seconds and then gets overly excited by the event, laughs, and falls down. He will also walk holding on to our fingers, leading with his belly. He just learned to put things “in” and let go – so maybe soon he can help put things away rather than just pulling them out? His Grammy got him a neat train with alphabet blocks that shoot out the back of the train into the next car if you put them in the top of the engine, and Nik likes to put the little blocks in the slot. Nik has really gotten into reading books. He pulls his books off the shelf one at a time, looks at the cover, and either drops them or sits down and indicates he wants them read. I have memorized some of his favorites – and I think he has too. At one point I started reciting one of the books because it was in my head and driving me crazy, and Nik crawled right over to his book case wanting to read the book. It is amazing how much he seems to understand even though he cannot express it yet.

The youth at church say Nikolai is the baby from Ice Age. We watched Ice Age to see what they meant, and they are totally right! He makes the same looks and is always clapping and happy like the Ice Age baby.

This is my last week off from work and I am definitely not looking forward to going back. My parents are going to watch Nik for most of January, and then he starts at daycare. This week we plan to try to get some of the post-adoption things done. First we need to apply for a social security number. Unfortunately we were mistakenly sent a Permanent Resident Card for Nik rather than a Certificate of Citizenship so we do not know if we will have to update his SS# info once we have proof of citizenship. USCIS told us the "system" shows him as a citizen, not a permanent resident. We need to get new passport photos taken for all of us, and apply for passports. I also need to take Nik to the lab to try once again to get blood drawn to finish the range of tests recommended for adopted children, and required by our pediatrician before he will sign off on the daycare application. We have our first post-placement visit in January. We are trying to correlate the visits required for VA and Kaz to save on costs. At some point we need to take the required online courses for Hague compliance, update our home study, and submit an I-800a for China.

Update 1

2008-12-09T23:55:00.002-05:00

We had a fun Thanksgiving in Pennsylvania at Chris’s mom’s house. My parents and our friends from Salisbury, MD joined us as well. Nik did well with meeting a lot of new people as relatives stopped by to visit. He had fun playing with our friend’s 5-year old. By the second day he was very attached to his Grammy and crawled over to her to be picked up. He also seemed to really like her big black lab, Abby. Nik gets a little overwhelmed by the full-face licking, but so do I. At one point, Nik was playing on the floor in the kitchen and someone let the dog in, who went right over to Nik. We put Abby back outside really quickly, and Nik crawled over to the door crying until we opened the door to let him see the dog again.

Nikolai is so funny. He is starting to imitate us a lot, including fake coughing when we cough and pretending to chew when we are chewing a crunchy snack like nuts. He says several words, but I do not think he knows what they all mean. I always thought he would start saying a few simple words for things he likes the best, like bottle and bath. Instead he seams to repeat words he has heard, often out of context. We let him gnaw on an apple after I ate the skin (and after he threw a fit because I was not sharing) and since then he has been randomly saying “apple, apple.” Many people use signs with babies, so we tried to teach him the “more” sign. Now he will say “more” over and over and if he gets desperate he will add the sign. Unfortunately he appears to think that “more” means Gerber puffs. He will have a tray full of cheerios and baby food waiting, but will keep saying more until the puffs appear. I want to reward him for communicating and making it clear what he wants, but I really do not want to reinforce his belief that “more” means puffs. Plus, a baby really cannot live on puffs alone. He says “uh oh” every time the pacifier comes out of his mouth, and whenever something falls – even if it is a ball he drops intentionally. He seams to have decided that Chris is “dada” even though we have always called him “papa”. Apparently someone (possibly a grandparent) taught him dada and it has stuck.

We bought a Christmas tree last night. We put it up after Nik went to bed, and I was anxious to see his reaction in the morning. This morning he was a little sleepy and playing with his toys and finally noticed the tree. He stopped playing and very seriously said “oh”. He crawled over to it and I picked him up to get a closer look. He cautiously touched a branch and pulled his hand back. This evening he still seemed wary of the tree, which hopefully lasts for the next 3 weeks!

I started looking at daycare facilities since I have to go back to work in January. The first Kindercare place nearly made me cry. The room for the babies and toddlers was about a quarter of the size and with much fewer toys than Nik’s room at the baby house. Plus at the baby house there is usually a 1 to 3 ratio, while daycare facilities only have to have one adult to four babies. I could not picture my active boy being confined to such a small space all day. Many places I called have a waiting list until July or August, so I did not bother visiting them. Today I visited a different Kindercare that I liked a lot. There are a lot more babies in the room, but the rooms for the babies, wobblers, and toddlers were big and clean with lots of toys and room to play. To enter the baby room, we had to take off our shoes, which seemed very Kazakh. The staff seemed good and calm. The wobblers (a transition stage between baby and toddler at this facility) were actually in a quiet environment for a nap, which would clearly never happen at the first Kindercare. I decided to reserve Nikolai a spot at the center and while I was writing the check, they let Nik play in the baby room. When I went in to get him, he had already accumulated two toys and was trying to get another toy out of a little girl’s hand. He may be trouble at daycare. He was a little upset that I cut his play so short when we left.

Random Musings

2008-11-22T22:40:00.002-05:00

Nikolai seems to get cuter everyday. He is so funny. He has started playing peek-a-boo himself, pulling the blanket over his face (or at least close to his face). His grandfather also taught him to “high five” and Nik will stop in the middle of eating or playing and raise his hand until someone responds. Some meals are hard to get through with all of the high fiving. He LOVES music. We went to lunch with my parents at one of my favorite restaurants in Old Town Alexandria on Friday. Soon after we sat down he started rocking side to side and it was only then that I noticed the quiet music in the background. He seemed to like the classical guitar pieces the best. After lunch I took him into the bathroom to change him. Luckily there was no one else there as it had a great echo and Nik enjoyed shouting out some of his favorite sounds. I joke that he is slowly composing a baby opera as he has a few favorite series of sounds that he repeats for a few days and then chooses new series. He is getting really good at pulling up to a stand and has started cruising on furniture, crossing one foot over the other. He is still working on getting down from a stand without assistance.

I cannot believe how people’s opinions about what a 9-month old should eat vary. The international doctor feels all foods should be pureed smooth. The pediatrician said he can eat anything as long as it is cut into square or triangular pieces. We are sort of splitting the difference. He eats pureed or mashed oatmeal, rice cereal, snow peas, green beans, carrots, white potatoes, sweet potatoes, avocado, banana, apple, pear, and papaya. He also eats pieces of avocado, ripe pear, soft tofu, egg yolks, baby puffs, and cheerios. He has a funny habit when eating puffs or cheerios of holding one in his right hand the whole time. He eats this one last. I think this makes him feel more in control of the end of food and the end does not catch him off-guard. For some reason he does not like carrots, but will eat about half of a ice cube’s worth before refusing to open his mouth.

It is much easier to take care of a baby everyday now that I am rested and no longer sick. Still I sometimes have trouble getting lunch for myself. My neighbor Marina, who is from Kazakhstan, has been really sweet and has cooked me lunch twice. The first meal was beef stew with a lot of dill. The aroma reminded me so much of Kazakhstan it made me miss our time in Astana. I bundled Nik up to walk over to Marina’s house and return her pots. In Kazakhstan children must be completely covered and kept very warm or else you are likely to be scolded by perfect strangers. It is not unheard of for young kids to be dressed in snow suits when it is 70 degrees out, so I was very conscious to dress Nik warmly to go to my neighbor’s house. She said she liked his hat, but didn’t his grandmother knit him any booties for his feet? (which were already covered with tights and socks!). So funny. It will be such a gift if her family remains in the townhouse complex until Nik is older so she can tell him about Kazakhstan. Her kids speak Russian and English and were excited to meet Nikolai too. When Marina speaks Russian to Nik now, he gets upset. I do not know if it really is the fact that she is speaking Russian or if it is just that she gets close to him and she is still a stranger. Marina showed me the correct way to open a pomegranate – it’s amazing and I intend to share with my family and friends.

Nikolai was evaluated by the international adoption doctor on Tuesday. His language and puzzle solving are slightly delayed, but he is actually advanced in gross and fine motor skills. This was great news. He also has gained 1.6 pounds since he came home. Unfortunately the doctor thinks he probably has a submucous cleft palate as well as the cleft in his jaw. This may mean surgery soon as well as in six years. With all of the screening tests required and the need for a craniofacial evaluation, he is going to be at the doctors a lot. The doctor also recommended vision and hearing screening with two separate specialists who evaluate babies. It is not likely that this would be covered by our insurance, although possibly the hearing evaluation since he has cleft issues. I really do not think he needs it, though, as he seems to hear subtle sounds and imitates us fairly accurately (when he chooses to imitate). We just said uh oh! and he repeated it back exactly! These are two sounds different from his normal ba, ma, la, da, etc.

Nikolai is missing some vaccines, so he had three shots – including a flu shot – on Wednesday. He has had hives all over his legs since then, poor baby. We gave him some Benadryl yesterday and more today, which seemed to help a little. It made him crazy though. It sort of reminded me of the Simpson’s episode where Maggie gets into the coffee. He crawled and cruised around babbling constantly and giggling. He also seemed to get hyper focused and would repeat whatever we said including a few new sounds. I am glad that we did not give him Benadryl for the flight home like some people recommend – not that we really considered it anyway since we do not think medication should be given with no reason.

First Week Home

2008-11-10T23:02:00.000-05:00

The past week went pretty well. Nikolai is so cute, sweet, and happy. I realize we are spoiled and I cannot imagine how hard it would be if he was a difficult baby. As it is we are exhausted and get frustrated with his moments of screaming (like when we try to put a new diaper or clothes on him). Nikolai slowly has adjusted to the time zone and has gotten close to sleeping through the night. However, he still wakes up between 4 and 5 am wide awake and wanting to play. It is better than 1 am like the first few nights, though. Unfortunately he and I have caught bad colds. His breathing was so labored on Friday that we took him to the doctor, who prescribed asthma medication to open up his lungs. The combination of a bad cough waking him up and the medication has messed with his (and our) sleeping pattern. He does better during the day and likes to eat and play.

Nikolai has experienced many firsts this week – first ride in a car seat, first trip in a stroller, first football game with dad, etc. He is pulling himself up on everything and seems to prefer to stand – even if it is on the tops of his toes (ouch). We brought Nik to church with us on Sunday since it was youth Sunday and the youth had been very anxious to meet him. Chris went early before the 8:15 service to help out with the three services. I brought Nik to the 11 am service. We were greeted at the door by a mass of excited junior high and high school students. I often say that Nikolai is a flirt – he likes attention and will generally smile at new people. We realize that this can be a sign of attachment problems, but have not worried yet since he has only been with us for two weeks. We were pleasantly surprised that at church Nik kept laying his head on my chest and averting his eyes from all of the new people. Maybe he is attaching to us! He loved the music at church and shook his shoulders back and forth during the hymns.

We have not really established a consistent schedule yet, especially for lunch time and the afternoon. We learned tonight that what little routine we have begun is VERY important. Nik was winding down a little late tonight – around 8:15 when in the past we had had a hard time keeping him awake past 7:30 pm. We decided to skip the bath since he was not too dirty and I am out of energy with being sick. After trying to get him to sleep for nearly 45 minutes, we put him down on the floor to crawl around thinking he wanted to play a bit more. He made a beeline for the bathroom and tried to climb in the tub, crying the whole time. So we gave him a bath and he went right to sleep afterward. Note to parents – DO NOT try to skip bath time again.

Our Week in Almaty

2008-11-08T21:59:00.011-05:00

I apologize for the long post…

Traveling - Saturday and Sunday 10/25 and 10/26

Our first big adventure happened before we even left the house. Our flight was at 9:54 pm on Saturday, so we waited to pack until Saturday morning. No problem – we were ready to go by about 2 pm. At that time we decided to check the tickets one more time and make sure we had the time correct. We did have the time correct, but not the day! The tickets were for Friday the 24th and then Saturday the 25th from Frankfurt. This despite our having been provided an itinerary by the travel agent for the dates we requested – leaving on the 25th. So we panicked a little, bought a new ticket from Frankfurt to Astana since it was not too expensive and we figured it would be easier to find an alternate flight to Frankfurt than to Astana. We then left for the airport immediately. The person who arranged for our tickets got in touch with the travel agent and she got us seats held on the Saturday 9:54 flight out of Dulles. She also got us seats on the flight to Astana on the 26th (yes – the flight we had already repurchased on our own).

When we got to the airport, we were told that the seats that had been held for us on the 9:54 flight were in business class rather than economy like our original tickets, and the new fare would require an additional $16,000! The flight was apparently oversold by about 20 people in economy, so there was not much they could do. The gentleman helping us looked at the earlier flights, and found that there was one economy seat on a flight leaving at 7 pm, so we decided to fly separately in order to save $8,000. As he was booking the seat for Chris on the 7 pm flight, apparently he had kept hitting refresh just in case and a second seat opened up. We could tell he was happy about something, but he did not tell us until he had gotten the second seat booked. Miraculously he also managed to get us seats together on the 7 pm flight to Frankfurt, and then cancelled the double-booked flight to Astana. The new tickets did not cost us anything, despite it being our mistake for showing up a day late. Franz Jean-Jacque helped us for literally a half hour trying to ensure we had an affordable option to get to Astana on time and he will forever be part of our family history. The customers in line behind us were not nearly so appreciative of his efforts, but you cannot please everyone J. The rest of our travel was largely uneventful. We had an 11 hour layover in Frankfurt, but were able to get some sleep in the lounge chairs that line the halls of Terminal 2. If anyone ever is in Frankfurt for an extended period and wants to relax – go to Terminal 2. It had lots of chairs, good restaurants, and was largely deserted (unlike the B portion of Terminal 1, which we had found to be miserable during our first trip to Kazakhstan).

Forever Family Day – Monday 10/27

We arrived in Astana at about 6 am on Monday. Our plane got in right after a large flight from Moscow, so getting through passport control took forever. When we finally got through, Zhana (our interpreter) and Murat (our driver) were waiting. They took us to a hotel so we could rest a bit and shower. We had been told that no apartments would be available and that we would have to book our own hotel for the few hours in the morning. This is usually something that is done for parents if apartments are not available, but we figure they were annoyed since we had originally planned to got through Almaty and then changed to Astana to avoid one flight (I hate flying). Most hotels that offer ½ day rates would not answer the phone or were booked, so we ended up at a hotel with reasonable but not cheep rooms. Their website advertised that they had ½ day rates, but no one on the phone would confirm that. When we arrived at the hotel we found that they would not offer a ½ day rate and we paid for a full night’s stay. Murat was outraged at the hotel clerk; we felt it was unfortunate because it seemed like a waste to spend so much money just for a shower, but it was still cheaper than a flight for two from Almaty to Astana, so it was ok. The hotel room was fine, but really made us appreciate the apartments we had stayed in – even the old (and rather dirty) apartment in Almaty.

We showered and then organized all of the gift bags for the baby house (8 caregivers, head caregiver, baby house main doctor/director, doctor, and secretary) as well as for Zhana, Saule, and Murat. We were then picked up around 11 am and taken to the baby house. Since Monday was a holiday, few of the normal employees were there and the baby house director had made special arrangements to be there. Incidentally - Republic Day (which is really on October 25, but celebrated on the Friday before and Monday after as well) is a day when Kazakh people celebrate new beginnings; it was the day that the Kazakh SSR signed their declaration of independence from the Soviet Union. This sentiment is quite fitting for the first new day of our family.

We went first to speak with the baby house director to express our gratitude and answer any questions she had. We gave her her gifts, which she looked at right then (we had been told no one would open gifts in front of us). She said she liked the scarf and pendant, and that the stationary was a very unusual gift (good unusual). We left gifts for the caregivers and secretary who were not there today. We also gave her our cash donation for the baby house and the items that our friends and family had given us for donation (toys, diaper cream, diapers, crayons and coloring books). The director was appreciative of the toys and said they were very good and would ensure the children had good development.

Nikolai with his favorite caregiver

We then went upstairs to get Nikolai! His (and our) two favorite caregivers were the only ones working in the room (Aitugan and Zhan). Zhan picked up Nikolai and changed his diaper and dressed him in the clothes we brought. They then handed him to us. He did not smile or anything, but was not worried either. The caregivers looked more upset. We had stored the gifts we had brought in the playroom, so when we went in there to get the two caregivers’ gifts, Nikolai got really excited (poor baby). We then brought in the gift bags for the two caregivers. Aitugan called Adilet’s name and tried to get him to go to her; he halfheartedly held out one hand. She said that was a very good sign and that Adilet had been looking for his mama and papa since we left. She is really sweet. We then went back downstairs to say goodbye to the doctor and baby house director. The director picked up Nikolai and showered him with kisses. I think she kind of scared him and he reached out for Chris. Then we bundled him up and we were off! I had meant to try to get more pictures of the baby house, but everything happened so fast I only got one picture.

Playing at the hotel

We were thankful that we still had the room at the hotel as we had almost two hours until our flight to Almaty. We were dropped off at the hotel, and they said we could get some lunch and feed Nikolai. This seems like a simple statement, but since we had just arrived that morning, had a limited amount of tenge, did not know the restaurants in the area, and have never had a 9 month old baby before, it was fairly daunting to us. Luckily we had brought some formula and baby cereal with us from home, so that is what we fed him. He seemed to like it. The whole process was quite messy, though, and when we went to rinse out the bib and cloth napkin, we found that the room no longer had water. So we packed everything up in a blue diaper bag to deal with in Almaty.

To Almaty - Monday 10/27

When Zhana, Saule, and Murat brought us to the airport, they gave Nikolai a gift – a small dombra. It is wonderful and was thoughtful of them. Getting checked in for our flight, bags checked, and through security was a blur as I was carrying a baby and operating on about 2 hours sleep. We were grateful that Saule and Zhana came with us and spoke to the people at the counter and directed us where to go. We had to show Nikolai’s new birth certificate to take him on the plane; it shows us as his parents!

The plane ride was fine. We had made some Hipp tea in a bottle just in case take off and landing hurt Nikolai’s ears, but he was content sucking on a pacifier and did not seem bothered. After an hour on the plane, though, Nikolai no longer wanted to sit still and play with toys, but wanted to move around. He crawled and stood on our laps but that was the extent of his ability to move. Luckily (and I will never say that again in reference to a flight) we hit pretty bad turbulence on our descent to Almaty. The planed was blown side to side as well as up and down. Nikolai loved it! After a bought of being blown around he would giggle and move his shoulders side to side as if trying to make it happen again.

We landed safely and were met by Dima, who had driven us to the apartment our very first night in Kazakhstan back in September. He took us to the Partners’ office to fill out some paperwork. We then went to the Ramstore to get some food for the night. Finally we arrived at the apartment, which is the same one we stayed in when we were in Almaty last.

Nikolai was happy and wanted to play with everything on the rug. We laid down a sheet to keep him off the dirty floor. He is crawling really well now, and can pull himself up to a stand on anything. He has also learned to clap, but otherwise seems the same as when we left. He was excited to see some of the toys he had played with before, like the singing caterpillar and stacking cups.

First night with a baby

The first night, as expected, was pretty bad. Nikolai slept well from about 9 pm to 1 am. At that time he woke up and we assumed he was hungry since he is used to being fed a lot of cereal at midnight. So we gave him some cereal and tried to get him back to sleep. I think the stress of the day before plus the sugar rush from the cereal made him wide awake. He finally fell back asleep around 3 am, but awoke every hour after that. Finally at about 6:30 am Chris was in the shower and I could hear Nikolai moving around. Suddenly I heard a thud and got up to find he had fallen down between the mattress and the crib side. I knew the crib in the apartment was fairly flimsy, but I had not noticed this flaw. He was shocked by the event, but did not get hurt and did not even cry. Although it is horrible to say, he looked pretty funny with his arms and head sticking out from the side of the crib, especially with his wide eyes looking up at me. I brought him into the bed to try to rest a little longer. He laid there for a little while, but then discovered he liked the game of crawling over my legs (and towards the edge of the bed) so I reluctantly got up. We reworked the crib, adding lots of rolled up towels and blankets to cover over the spaces where he could get caught or fall.

Doctor’s Visit – Tuesday 10/28/08

We did well sticking to his normal schedule in the morning. Nikolai even went down easily for a nap at 8. He was still asleep at 10:30 when we had to wake him up to get ready for the doctor visit. The visit was easy – they just weighed and measured him, listened to his heart and lungs, and checked his ears, nose, and throat. We had been wondering about his measurements – 70 cm long and 8.06 kg (17.6 pounds). Other than wanting to grab the stethoscope and thing to look in his ears, Nikolai did well – he likes attention.

Church in Central Park

After the appointment, we decided we wanted to take a walk somewhere, so Dima told us how to get to Central Park from our apartment. The park is only about a block away. It is wonderful! We have not been very ambitious about sight-seeing in Almaty since we are so tired, but I really wanted to see one building that I had seen in models (while in Astana) but I did not remember what it was called. It turns out that this building is the Orthodox Church in Central Park! It is beautiful - like a cross between a fairytale castle and a Russian church. The park also had an interesting memorial to people who had died in wars and a monument remembering the defense of Moscow during World War II. The trees in Almaty have just turned so the park was all decorated for fall. Teenagers and families with little children were all over the park. Nikolai loves to watch kids, and birds – and kids feeding large groups of pigeons was particularly interesting.

Embassy Visit - Wednesday 10/29/08

We were picked up in the early afternoon to go to the embassy to file the I-600 paperwork in order to get a US visa in Nikolai’s Kazakh passport. The embassy is across the street from the Partners’ office, so Dima parked at their office and then told us to just wait outside. We saw a another family go into the office and I recognized them from following their blog since we started the Kazakh process. Then one of the younger people from the office (Asel I think?) came out leading two other families and their new babies. She led our funny parade across the street to the embassy. We went inside and joined a few other families with little babies from other agencies. When they called our name, we went up to the window, told them when we were leaving and they handed us Nikolai’s passport with the US IR3 Visa along with a folder with all of the original or official copies of the important paperwork that had been submitted in support of the adoption. This included Nikolai’s original birth certificate, the adoption decree, and various other items. Considering how difficult it is to deal with USCIS and file the I-600A in the US, filing the I-600 was surprisingly fast and simple.

We then went back to the office and paid for the rest of the stay (apartment, registration fee, etc.) The staff were sweet and really seem to care about all of the children. They addressed each of the babies individually and commented on them. One of the staff picked up Nikolai, who was a little unhappy having missed his morning nap and wearing the overly warm snow-suit. He would not smile for any of them – so unlike our flirty boy. Then we were done and they said “your adoptions are complete” and we could leave.

Thursday 10/30/2008

We asked Dima what he thought we should see in Almaty and he suggested the Tzum store, Central Park, art museum, mountains, and history museum. We had no interest in shopping and were not prepared for the mountain trip with a baby, so we decided to go to the history museum. We were not overly excited about it having been to two museums in Astana, but felt we should see part of Almaty and if nothing else would enjoy being driven through the city. It turns out that the museum is amazing and very different from the one in Astana. The first floor included paleontology and archaeology exhibits with lots of fossils and artifacts. The second floor had an exhibit similar to that in Astana with a yurt and examples of traditional clothes, tools, decorative arts, and household items. The third floor was really neat and had little exhibits representing the cultures of the groups of people who live in Kazakhstan (Korean, Tatar, etc. ). Nik did well through the trip and only got a little fussy a couple of times. The biggest problem is that he loves to hear his voice and there were many places with good echoes in the museum so he would yell Ah! to hear the effect. People kept looking at us, so I eventually gave him his pacifier (sorry baby – I promise we will encourage your talking once we get home). The top floor was an exhibit celebrating independent Kazakhstan, which we went through quickly.

Happy Halloween - Friday 10/31/08

We decided to lay low on Friday since we were going to be picked up at 1 am to leave for home. We packed and took another walk to Central Park. We also got some giant Kit-Kat bars (one of our favorite things in Kazakhstan) to celebrate Halloween.

The Trip Home – Saturday 11/1/08

Friday night was the first night that Nikolai did not wake up at 11:30, so we had to wake him up at 12:30 to get changed and fed. We were running a little late and had not left the apartment at 1 am when we were supposed to be at the end of the drive with our suitcases. Now I understand why it looks like the people in the apartment before just left without even throwing out perishable food – we apologize to the family who came after us. Dima came upstairs at 1 and carried one suitcase out to his car, and we were downstairs about 8 minutes later.

The flight from Almaty to Frankfurt was pleasant. We had business class tickets (courtesy of Chris’s company – thank you TDI!). Plus we had a bulkhead seat with a bassinet. It was dark and quiet and Nik slept more than half the flight. Otherwise he had a meal and played quietly. He had done so well with takeoff and landing on the flight from Astana to Almaty with just a pacifier that we did not prepare a bottle. But I think he was too tired during the landing in Frankfurt to actively suck on the pacifier – he chose to scream in stead, poor baby. The flight from Frankfurt to Dulles was much harder. Nikolai cried for the first few hours, and then was unhappy the rest of the time. A nice lady sitting next to us gave him a few crackers, which kept him happy for a bit. He slept the last three hours of the flight, but that was it.

He's a US Citizen!

Nikolai became a US citizen as soon as we landed. We therefore were able to go through passport control in the line for US citizens. The officer opened the sealed “brown envelope” and stamped our customs form with something to let the customs officer know where to direct us. Incedently, the brown envelope is just a normal brown mailer – we expected something much more formal and impenetrable. We had heard that getting through immigration could take a long time, so we had told our parents we would call them when we were getting close. But it took no more than 10 minutes to fill out a form and get the required stamps that will result in Nikolai’s Green Card automatically to be sent to us. Then three of us were off! We stopped by my parents’ house on the way home. Chris’s mom had come down from Pennsylvania and was staying with them. Nikolai charmed them all and then we went home!

Nikolai

2008-11-04T16:41:00.004-05:00

"I can hold the spoon myself!"

"Papa is so funny"

Our little German Shepherd - trying to herd both parents back into the same room

“How nice of mama and papa to put this toy here for me!”

(Seriously – this is the only cabinet he has shown any interest in)

We're ALL Home!

2008-11-03T15:46:00.008-05:00

We all made it home safely on Saturday afternoon. Chris and I adjusted to the time difference pretty easily, but apparently Nikolai is still on Kazakh time. He wants to sleep all day and play all night (we are very tired). Today is our second day home and it has been a little better, so I do not think it will take too much longer to get him on a more normal schedule. He has a bad cough, but otherwise is a very happy easy-going baby. We are so in love.

Chris’s mom came into town to meet Nikolai and stayed with my parents. They spent the morning on Saturday making baby food! We are so lucky to have such supportive families. So far Nikolai pretty much likes everything. His favorites are snow peas and pears, and of course formula and rice cereal. He was a little perplexed by the sweet potatoes and could not yet handle the skins in the blueberries.

As someone who has gotten stuck in the China slowdown, I always get annoyed with people who respond to the despair of waiting China adoptive parents with statements like “it is all part of God’s plan” or “it will all be forgotten when you meet your daughter.” These statements dismiss the feelings of people who are facing not only an unexpected 4+ YEAR wait but also much uncertainty about whether or not the adoption will ever really happen. However, since the cutest, most wonderful little boy ever has come into our lives, I cannot help but think that God did have a different plan for us than we originally thought. If it were not for the China slowdown, we would not have pursued a Kazakhstan adoption and we would not have our son – a frightening thought indeed. I will never say it in reference to anyone else’s situation, but for us, it was all part of God’s plan.

We did not have internet access while in Almaty, but I did continue to write posts, so I am going to post them all at once soon.

Getting Ready – Or Not!

2008-10-24T11:01:00.001-04:00

We are getting really excited (and a bit nervous!) Before our first trip we ended up packing the day we left. That was stressful and we promised ourselves we would plan ahead for the second trip. So here we are the day before we are to leave and we are both at work and have not packed!! We also have not yet figured out how to install a gate across the top of the stairs since our banister is metal. I think if necessary we could do that when we get home? The most important thing outstanding is the car seat. We MUST at least get that task done in order to get home from the airport.

I think if we can survive the first day in Kazakhstan we will be ok. We land at 6 am, go to the baby house some time in the morning, and then fly to Almaty. I really wish we had one day to reintroduce ourselves to Nikolai before we take him on a plane, but it is not to be. I hope we will at least have time to make a bottle for the flight. Do domestic flights in Kaz have the same liquid restrictions?

Waiting Period is Over

2008-10-16T22:03:00.003-04:00

So it has officially been 15 days since the judge named us Nikolai’s parents. As far as we know we are now legally his parents! It seems a bit anticlimactic since he is so far away right now. Every step counts, though.

As an update to China adoptions - the petition worked! More than 17,000 people signed the petition, and with congressional support USCIS has agreed to allow families to continue to file the I600A for up to 6 years as long as parents do not let their 171H/797 expire and the original was filed before Hague went into effect in April of 2008. This allows for the original filing and three renewals, with every other renewal being free. This is great news for those concerned about meeting China’s new guidelines and especially for people whose agencies are not Hague accredited.

Business as Usual

2008-10-12T18:28:00.004-04:00

We are home for about three weeks before we get to go back and get our son. After that I plan to take some time off. So I have three weeks to try to wrap up all of my outstanding projects. I found out Friday I need to go back down to Mississippi tomorrow! It seems so funny to take a business trip during this brief period home, but it works I guess. But I hate flying and I seem to be on airplanes a lot lately. Oh well - maybe work will give me a little leeway on the deadlines for the other projects. I wonder if I will be able to do a little work during the two months I am home with our son - maybe while he sleeps? At least to my knowledge no hurricanes are headed to MS right now.

China Adoptions

2008-10-08T21:10:00.002-04:00

In general we feel sort of removed from the China wait since we are so close to getting our little boy. But a recent post on Rumor Queen is so disturbing, I keep thinking about it. Based on information she has gathered from the thousands of members, it appears that nearly 40 to 50 percent of the people who originally submitted dossiers in 2006 have or plan to withdraw. That means as many as 10,000 or more people who wanted to adopt NSN from China have been unable to complete their adoptions. Luckily that number includes many people who switched to special needs adoption from China – great for China’s SN orphans and for the people who have been able to build their families. Other people have switched countries or given birth, but still many others have had to withdraw without a child.

It is heartbreaking reading about people who are forced to withdraw because after waiting several years with years to go in the wait they will be too old to legally add a child to their family. I cannot imagine living somewhere that could dictate the maximum age to be a parent or the maximum number of years between your and your child’s age. The economy is forcing some people to make difficult choices as they face another home study update. And USCIS may end up forcing some people to withdraw by only renewing their 171H if their applications are Hague compliant, their agencies are Hague accredited, and they meet China’s new guidelines. None of these requirements are applied by China to families who submitted their dossiers before the new rules, but USCIS thinks it is too hard to keep track of the date the dossier was submitted and they are trying to hold everyone to the same standards. In theory people could receive a referral from China without any problems, but be unable to complete the adoptions because the US is too lazy to distinguish between pre- and post- Hague China adoptions.

We definitely have to submit the I-800A since we let our I-600A expire, so we will have to ensure that our application is Hague-compliant. Our agency is accredited, we have not lived in too many states (for getting clearances), and we are willing to take the required classes. It is unclear if USCIS will try to hold us to China’s new rules or not, but I think we do meet them. You can help many people whose agencies are not Hague accredited, who do not meet the new rules, or for whom making their applications Hague compliant is too much of a burden by signing this petition, or following the other suggestions of the JCICS.

The most disturbing part of all of this is that despite only half the number of dossiers still remaining in line, China continues to reduce the number of LIDs they cover every month. What does this mean? It almost seems like China is reducing referrals to nothing – but then why are they still accepting dossiers?

One good and virtually unheard of bit of info – apparently a second “add-on” batch of referrals has been sent out for some (if not all) people with 2/16/06 LIDs, despite the official cut-off being 2/15/06!

Happy Birthday Chris

2008-10-06T20:16:00.002-04:00

Please join me in wishing Chris a very Happy Birthday!!

It looks like we will not be going back to Kazakhstan until October 25. I do not know why we have to wait so long, but I guess we can survive. We come home for good on Halloween!

We're Home

2008-10-05T16:52:00.002-04:00

We definitely miss our little guy, but there are some nice things about being home:
Being able to watch the Redskins game (especially a division game that they won!!)
Warm, humid weather
Trees and singing insects
A dishwasher
Brushing our teeth with tap water
Chinese and Indian food
Comfy bed
People to talk to in English

Both of our flights home were sold out. I cannot imagine surviving the flights with a very active baby on our laps. We hope we will be able to afford a seat for him – not that he will sit there, but the extra space would be nice and perhaps we could lay him on the seat to sleep. We were dreading all the work we would have to do when we got home, but came home to find that my parents had kept up the yard, mowed the grass, and even removed the stump of a dead holly I had been unable physically to dig out. They also left us a freezer full of food and fruit and milk in the fridge. Best of all they humored us with looking at all of our pictures and video the day they picked us up from the airport. My parents are awesome.

We do not know yet when we can go back, but we hope it is soon.

But I Don't Want to Leave!

2008-10-03T08:13:00.002-04:00

Today was our last visit with Nikolai. I am going to miss him SO much. I have no idea why our agency says it is easier to make two trips and encourages people to do so. Leaving is hard! Living in Astana is easy.

Nik played for a long time on the swing again today. He was playing games with us – saying ah! and we would repeat it and he would laugh and say it again. He also was playing with me in the mirror; as soon as I would make eye contact in the mirror, he would look right at me, so I would look at him and then he would go back to the mirror. This went on for a while, accompanied by many giggles. The toys he liked weeks ago are now boring. He tried to use us as jungle gyms, but does not quite have the coordination to do so yet. He also tried to climb into the swing by himself. I think he gets frustrated that we try to help, but otherwise he would have fallen and the swing would have hit him in the head. At one point today he was heading for the pile of things he is not allowed to play with (my purse, plastic bag, camera) and we picked him up and turned a different direction. He basically spun on his belly all the way around and then started crying as he quickly pushed himself up into a crawl position! How can that not make him happy? He seems so unimpressed with his accomplishments.

When we left, they gave us the bottle we have been using during our visits. It is the one we bought and it has his name written in Kazakh on it. We left a blanket in his crib, so that when we come back to get him we can take something to remind him of the baby house. We left the crinkly book – which is one of his favorite toys, especially because it has a mirror in it. We also left the picture album my sister made for him – can you tell he likes it in the photo?

Court Day

2008-10-02T12:59:00.003-04:00

Saule, doctor, judge, us, secretary
Saule, us, Zhana, Irina, Murat

We’re parents! Or at least will be after the 15 day waiting period. Since we are so close to officially being approved and this is a private blog, we have decided to share a picture!

I am going to include a lot of detail, because I know it helped us prepare to read the process others went through – so if you are not interested in the details the important part is above. Court was not fun, but it was not that bad either. The day leading up to it was not fun, as we prepared our speeches and rehearsed our answers to questions that may be asked. We were the first family with our agency to go through the new court system (juvenile court) with the new judge in Astana. It is possible that we were only the third international family in general to go through court. The last woman (from Spain) was initially denied and her court date postponed for three weeks, and then at the last minute, postponed another couple days. So our facilitator was very stressed.

The day of court we were picked up at 11:10 and taken to a generic building with a lot of people standing around. We went upstairs to a dark hallway lined with chairs. We stood there for a while, and then had to present our passports. Since Chris had to say the first paragraph of his speech in Russian he wanted Irina (our translator for court) to review the Russian. She told him to practice it out loud, and then continue with the English. This was great as it made us more relaxed and gave her a chance to practice translating. Eventually we went into the court room. We sat in the front row of several chairs, with Irina between us. The baby house doctor and social worker sat at a desk to the left of the room. It was nice to see people we recognized, and I think they are generally there to bolster the case of the adoptive parents. The secretary sat at the far end next to the judge’s desk, and the prosecutor (who we think represents the state) sat on the right side of the room. I was surprised that after we sat, Irina told me to practice my speech and she practiced translating. When we heard someone coming down the hall, everyone got quiet, we stood and the judge walked in.

Court Process

The judge began by listing everyone present, explaining our rights, and asking if we trusted everyone and understood our rights. We said yes. She then asked whoever was going first to begin. Chris stepped up to the podium with Irina beside him and gave his speech. Afterward the prosecutor and judge asked him many questions (details below). Eventually the judge told him to sit down, and then it was my turn. I gave my speech and was asked questions by the prosecutor and judge. The judge then asked Chris to stand up again and answer more questions. Finally when we were done with our part, we sat down. Next Saule was asked to stand and explain her role in our adoption. Then the baby house doctor gave a speech about Nikolai’s health and past diagnoses. The social worker went next, and basically outlined the process that was followed – that we had a dossier that presented us as good people with good references and family, that we had visited the baby every day for 14 days, etc. She read her speech and read it very quickly, so Irina had a hard time keeping up. She was funny – at one point as she was whispering the translation, without a break, she says “she is saying other things; she is talking too fast; my feet are cold.” It was very nice to break the tension for us.

Eventually after everyone was done with their speeches and being questioned, the doctor, social worker, and prosecutor all went around and gave their recommendation. All recommended in our favor! The judge announced that she would come back with her decision at 1 pm. At the time it was 12:50 so that seemed like really good news. The prosecutor rushed out the door so that we did not have time to give her her gift. She eventually walked back by once – so we were able to give her a gift. We started to walk up to the social worker and doctor to give them their gifts, but then an unknown woman came in and started talking to them, so Saule told us to wait. When the woman left, we started for the table again and then the woman came back in, so we stopped again. I am sure that the doctor and social worker were both amused at watching this as they are used to the giving of gifts after court. The social worker then left. Saule told us that she assumes the decision will be good, since everyone has already left.

The judge came back in at about 1:20 and read a very long decision very very quickly – too quick for it all to be translated. The gist was that she approved the adoption and after 15 days it would become final. She then outlined her reasons for granting the adoption.

Speeches

In Chris’s speech, he thanked the court for hearing our petition, introduced us – including our names, where we are from, where we work and what we do, and how long we have been with our companies. He then explained why we chose to adopt, and why we chose Kazakhstan. He talked about when we arrived in Astana, how we chose Adilet (Nikolai), and how we have watched him develop since we have visiting him. Chris discussed how much we have enjoyed Astana and how we plan to ensure that Adilet will have knowledge of the country and be proud of his country of birth, and that we plan to bring Adilet back to visit at some point. Next he stated that we understood the medical history and diagnoses of Adilet, and that we had good medical insurance and would immediately bring him to a doctor and undertake any treatment recommended. Chris discussed our ability to financially support a child. He described our neighborhood and the fact that we have Kazakh neighbors, really good local schools, and that we would ensure Adilet had a good education and was allowed to make his own choices in life. Chris explained that he hoped to share his interests in music, theater, and travel with Adilet. Finally, Chris asked in Russian for the court to decide in favor of the adoption, and that we love him very much and want him to be our son.

My speech was much shorter. I described the moment we first met Adilet, and that we have bonded with him and love him very much. I described the room we had prepared for him at home, and my interests I want to share with Adilet. I then promised we would send post-placement reports until Adilet is 18 so that they can see how he is developing and what he is learning. I then stated that we knew that bringing a baby into our lives would be a big adjustment, but that we wanted that more than anything and that we have a great support network of family and friends. I then explained our plan for taking time off when we get home and then our plan once I return to work. Finally I asked the court to grant the adoption.

Questions

Most of the hard questions came from the prosecutor; she would ask a question and then use our answer to trap us in the follow-on question (e.g., asking if we could afford to travel every year with the implication that it would be good for Adilet’s education and when we said yes, she followed up with Do you realize you will not be able to have a care-free life travelling whenever you want once you have a child). The judge asked questions, but was actually personable. At one point she asked Chris if I knew how to make beshbarmak, and then told us to be sure we learned how before we left Kazakhstan because Kazakh children like dough with meat. They all laughed when Chris explained that he is the one who cooks food from this region.

The first question that Chris got asked was actually the hardest. The question itself was not hard, but our facilitator had told us not to mention any interest in adopting from other countries, and to focus on how excited we are to adopt from Kazakhstan. So of course the prosecutor’s first line of questions was about China. We have one line in our home study explaining that we started with the intention of adopting from China and then switched to Kazakhstan (it was required to get through USCIS in VA). Luckily we did not have to get into a discussion of the ongoing China adoption. Even Irina and Saule did not believe us when we told them it takes 4 to 5 years to adopt from China and we did not want to get into that in court.
Other questions:
Why not adopt from the US
How did the process of choosing a child at the baby house work
Why did we choose Adilet
What medical treatment do we plan to undertake – will we have Adilet get surgery
How much money do we make
What assets do we own/ what is our value
How long did the process to adopt from Kazakhstan take
What was the process in the US to adopt form Kaz
Do we have enough money to take a yearly trip
Do we realize that once we have a baby we will not be able to live like before and travel
Are we worried about unknown medical conditions with Adilet
Have we had any problems communicating with Adilet (we assume they meant bonding)
Are we planning to have more children; when we answered that we wanted to adopt this child and then would decide later, the judge said we could come back to Kazakhstan to adopt again (always a good sign)

I was asked the following questions:
When I take time off, will I get paid. When I said no, they followed up asking whether or not I got maternity leave and when I said no again, they explained that their country was much more supportive of mothers. I agreed – really all other countries are more supportive of mothers.
What did the social worker in the US do
Is the social worker licensed
Is there a financial or tax benefit to adopting internationally
Who will watch the child after I go back to work and if that would be true until Adilet was school aged
Will we enroll him in preschool
There may have been other questions.

After court we went home for lunch. We were picked up at 3 to go to a notary to take care of a bunch of the paperwork. We then went out to dinner to Samibar to celebrate. Zhana, our normal translator, met us there. Chris and I walked home since the weather is beautiful right now. This allowed the translators to get a ride, which is good because otherwise they often have to ride a bus home.

Last Official Visit

2008-09-30T06:42:00.001-04:00

We finished our mandatory 14-day visitation a while ago, which allowed us to apply for a court date. Today we signed in the last space in the baby house log-in book assigned to us. We are going to court tomorrow. Assuming the outcome is positive then we can come back to the baby house until our flights home, but apparently we will not have to sign in any more.

It will be so hard to leave him. I feel like he has really opened up to us in the past couple of days. Today he repeated sounds we made for the first time. He also reached back to us when we returned him to his room for the first time. He moved all over the room today. He still much prefers to crawl on his belly and elbows than crawl for real. I think once he is able to balance better and realizes he can reach for toys while in the crawl position he will be more open to it. At the end of the visit he did not want to get down, or be held, or be given his bottle – I think he was tired but too hyped up to calm down. He did finally calm down as we read him a book, bounced him, and gave him a bottle at the same time. He kept babbling with the bottle in his mouth – not the most efficient way to drink.

Baby Bits

2008-09-29T06:52:00.005-04:00

Can you tell he likes toys?

Nikolai was so cute today. On Saturday when we left, he was holding one of the bigger playroom balls that is blue with white dots. It is somewhat deflated and he can hold it with one hand. When we took it away in order to bring him back to his room, we told him he could play with it again on Monday. And today as soon as we walked in before we even laid out the blanket, he reached toward the blue ball sitting on the shelf. He is so smart. He is going to be a lot like his cousin Alexis in that he loves roller coaster-like movements. He laughed out loud at being dipped upside down and being held on his back and swooped around.

Recently Nik has been in an exploratory mood. I think he just realized that he can get where he wants to go and has decided to check everything out. He went over to the swing, so we let him sit in it for a while. Nik also crawled for real today! He complained the whole time, but did it. I guess he was complaining because I had taken the ball out of his hand in order to get him to use both hands rather than elbows and had rolled it out in front of him. He crawled to go get it, but was not happy about it. He giggled at being bounced in time to music on the little singing caterpillar – much of which was quite fast energetic music. Eventually, he nearly fell asleep doing this, though.

Zhana’s mother cooked us a whole batch of blinchiki since she heard we had been buying them from the store! These are big pancakes, like Swedish pancakes (or Russian I guess), filled with things – usually slightly sweet cheese like a blintz. We were surprised by a caramel-filled one we came across during dinner last night.

Clingy Baby and Sightseeing

2008-09-28T11:20:00.003-04:00

At the good restaurant
Kazakh and Astana Flags in the wind
Chris and Zhana in the Model near a Southern Region
Model of Almaty (note - the four buildings in the back are real)
View of the Old City from the Monument to Victims of Opression

During our visit on Saturday there was another couple (from Spain) who was visiting their daughter for the first time. Nikolai was so funny and reacted in an unexpected way (at least we did not expect it). When we first went into the play room he gripped my arm and did not want to get down and play. When he did play, he kept gathering his toys - sort of in bulldozer fashion crawling on his elbows and scooping the toys in front of him. The little girl was playing with the stacking rings and the blow-up tube that jingles, which are communal toys. He kept trying to go over and take her toys – even the stacking rings, which he has had no interest in playing with ever; he would complain cry when we would redirect him. I guess since other than the second day of our visits there has been no one else in the play room, Nikolai had decided everything in sight was his. He only really relaxed when the couple left early and we had the room to ourselves again. Hopefully he will be secure enough to share by the time we go to get his little sister!

The weather on Saturday was beautiful – warmer and sunny. We went for a walk to a park we had seen driving home from the baby house. It has a great sculpture at the entrance that would be perfect for a zoo. There is also an empty building with the outlines of trees around it. The center of the park is paved with flower gardens. The surrounding area has natural winding paths through birch and other trees. We then walked back down to Kshlak for dinner – which is definitely my favorite restaurant here.

Sunday we went to a place with models of the major cities and landscapes of Kazakhstan. It was neat, and would be a lot of fun for kids because several of the models can be climbed or walked through. It was sunny, but there was a constant 30-mile an hour (or so) cold wind that made the trip a little difficult. I felt bad for our interpreter in her nice skirt and fancy boots. I wore wool socks, hiking boots, and kept the hood of my coat up the whole time. She did not try to rush us at all – if I were in her shoes I would have been tempted to ensure we kept moving to get out of the wind sooner. There was no guide available because of the cold, but Zhana did tell us a lot about the buildings in Taraz, where she is from. This was useful because based on the models it appears that Taraz really has the most interesting features as it is one of the oldest cities, having been situated on the Silk Road. It is also at the base of a mountain range. I really want to go to Taraz.

We then walked to the aquarium and paid the fee to get in to the first section (no fish). The aquarium itself was more expensive and I had heard not that interesting so we skipped it. The first section was kind of like a kid’s Vegas, with one-story models of various places including the Statue of Liberty, a tee-pee, the Great Wall, Greco-Roman statues, etc. We had a cup of tea and then went across the street to the Mega Center, which is basically a mall like you would find in the US, except with more hands-on activities for kids.

Murat was not able to pick us up afterward because of family obligations. So we took the bus with Zhana. It was really easy – and just 60 tenge. It would be easy for us to get home on a bus by ourselves as getting us anywhere close to Bayterek will do. I imagine it would be harder to try to take the bus to some other specific place without knowing the routes.

Two more days till court – Ack!

Travel Tips

2008-09-28T08:50:00.002-04:00

I decided to post some packing tips for anyone who may be travelling soon who has not been here before. The most important thing in travelling is (to quote our agency) go with the flow. Things change constantly and we were often unsure how or when things were going to happen, but it all works out. Even the procedure to follow at the baby house changes daily, perhaps based on who is working, so now I do not feel so bad that we did not know what to do at first.

I think everyone feels self-consious in unfamiliar surroundings. Now that we have been here a while, I am more at ease and have found everyone to be friendly and helpful - even when trying to order food in a restaurant where no English is spoken or on the menu. I have read some blogs where people felt they were stared at a lot and they did not like it - do not let it bother you, just have fun. We mostly have only been stared at by children - after they heard us speak. I have to admit I have done my share of watching people as well. If you are worried about standing out, plan to primarily wear dark colors, such as a nice black coat, and you will blend in more.

Things we are very glad we brought:
A universal power strip (there are few plugs and it is nice to be able to plug the TV, cable box, DSL box, laptops, cell phone charger, etc. into the same power strip despite the various plug types);
A small photo printer to print our date-stamped digital photos for court;
A few zip-lock bags of various sizes;
Blue diaper disposal bags (both for use at the baby house and as liners to the trash cans in our bathrooms);
Travel coffee presses and ground coffee (we have been able to buy ground coffee since we ran out, but it was very expensive);
Sugar, salt, and pepper packs looted from fast-food restaurants (not that I am encouraging looting :);
A long phone cord (would have liked to have had a long computer cable too – but were fine without it);
Granola bars – for quick snacks, especially when we first arrived;
Couple water bottles for our first night in Almaty (bought during layover in Frankfort);
DVDs of our favorite TV show, and a variety of music (on one of our laptops);
Clothes for any weather (it has been between 30 and 88 degrees here in the past couple weeks);
Stacking cups;
Water-proof bibs;
Shoes easy to slip on and off for the baby house visit;
Non-toxic all-purpose wipes (for quick cleanup of the table/ kitchen and for wiping down drooled-on toys)

Things we wish we did not bring:
Diapers (maybe bring 4 or so just so you feel you have some, but mostly I wish we had just bought them here - especially not knowing the size ahead of time);
Power converter (have found no use for it as all of our electronics have their own converters);
Some of the baby clothes (we did not need anything short-sleeved other than under-shirts, and did not need warm sweaters since we will not have custody on this trip – one winter coat for baby was useful, however)

Things we wish we had brought but did not:
At least one bottle (obviously more is needed if you are only making one trip);
A really warm sweater that would fit over a long-sleeved shirt (even if just worn in apartment; the heat still has not been turned on even though it is below freezing every night);
Warmer socks;
A bigger blanket to use in the baby house (I did not expect him to move off of our little blanket so quickly);
A few thin undershirts/ onesies to put on as a bottom layer rather than having to add a sweater to increase layers;
Something spicy, whether it be chili powder, tobasco sauce, taco seasoning or whatever. Food here is never hot spicy (spiced and flavorful yes, but not hot spicy);

Larger/ longer baby socks or tights to ensure no skin gets exposed.

Other random observations:
I like to watch TV (more than I should) and the only English language show we have is Fox news, which I can only tolerate for so long. I have become addicted to Lazy Town and other kids shows where you do not have to understand what is spoken. We have also caught welcomed episodes of Power Puff Girls and Foster’s Home for Imaginary Friends. Sponge Bob is somewhat disturbing in Russian (or maybe always).

Watching TV in Russian does not lead to being able to understand or speak Russian (I keep thinking I must be absorbing something – but no)

Dora the Explorer here speaks Russian and the Spanish phrases she normally says are in English.

Most entertainment places here seems focused on kids – which is neat. It would be a great place to be if we had a 5-10 year old.

We feel old in Astana. I do not know if it is where we have gone and driven or what, but almost everyone looks like they are under 30 years old.

Everyone only wears black, and stylish black high-healed boots are standard now that it has gotten cool. We feel like we stand out a lot when we wear bright colors, and we are definitely not as well dressed as most. I never have mastered wearing heals; I prefer my hiking boots.

I will miss good juice when we leave. All of the juice here tastes just like the fruit. Cherry is the best. While I dislike most cherry-flavored things in the US (artificial, sweet), in Kazakhstan I love anything cherry – juice, yogurt, etc. (tastes like fresh sour cherries).

2008-09-25T07:49:00.000-04:00

Nikolai apparently slept better the past couple nights and he was in a good mood for our visits today and yesterday. Yesterday when I first picked him up he giggled, buried his head in my chest, and kicked both legs with excitement. He is definitely getting more snugly, although he still has to face outward if we are moving. I think he likes to see where he is going. He has been saying a variety of different sounds – ba ba, ma ma, bla bla, da da, ah, and of course the excitement screech. Today he crawled using both legs for the first time, rather than just the right leg and left toes. He was carrying two toys at the time, though, so he was down on his elbows.

We were told yesterday that he had been taken to the dentist, and the dentist thinks he will have to have surgery on his upper jaw at some point. Today they said the opposite – that the dentist saw a tiny cleft in his jaw that is not likely to need surgery. I think the difference is in the translation provided to us, not the actual decision. We just need to get him home and see what our American doctors think (and hear the explanation in English!). In looking in his mouth, we cannot see any problem. It is convenient that he opens his mouth so wide when excited – makes it easier to look.

We had lunch at the coffee house across the street today. The coffee was really good and strong. We each had a slice of pizza, which was served cold with soft cheese and pepperoni, tomatoes, and parsley. It was good, but not really very pizza-like. Chris was still hungry and ordered a second piece. This one came out hot! Very funny. The coffee place is also a bar. It has a nice atmosphere and I would like to get a drink there some night - as soon as I get over this cold. I know I probably should not be visiting the baby with a cold, but I am fairly certain I caught it from him and I am careful to clean my hands beforehand.

Court Preparation

2008-09-23T11:08:00.004-04:00

When we received our LOI, our agency thought we would not be able to get a court date on our first trip. So we planned to have the pre-court interview and then come home for an undetermined amount of time before returning for court, the 15 day waiting period, and all of the other paperwork to bring our son home. Since we have arrived, our adoption facilitator, who is also a lawyer, (Saule) has been working to try to get us a court date on this trip. We will be the first family with our agency to go through the new juvenile court system in Astana rather than the general court system. Therefore everyone is a little on edge because they do not know what to expect.

This morning Saule came over to our apartment with an interpreter (not our normal interpreter) to prep us for the pre-court interview and court. We discussed all of our answers to the questions we can expect and what to include in our speech. Apparently we BOTH have to give a speech. I hate speaking in public even when I can read what I am going to say. How am I going to present a memorized speech in court that will determine the fate of our family forever? Saule said “it only has to be about 5 minutes”…5 minutes! That is a long time! They also reviewed our gifts again and determined exactly who will receive which gifts. We were told to dress professionally for pre-court and court. I only brought one nice outfit, so I was thinking I would have to wear it for both events.

After they left, we had pizza for lunch and got ready for the baby visit. At first we were told that the visit would have to be cut short in order for Saule to submit our paperwork to the judge to request the pre-court interview. But half-way through our visit, Saule called and said that instead we would be picked up a half hour late because she had gotten an appointment with the judge. When she picked us up, she said that there would be no separate pre-court and that our final court date may be as much as a week-and-a-half earlier than expected! We will know for sure later. We suddenly feel like our time here is limited and we need to do everything quickly. We will still have to change our original tickets to come home later, but by much less than we expected.

When we arrived at the baby house today, there was a news crew there. We were quickly ushered upstairs to wait for Nikolai to be brought to us. We watched the news interview from the window, but I do not know what it was about. All I saw was a very well-dressed woman holding a baby girl all in pink getting interviewed. She then drove away in a fancy Mercedes with black windows.

Nik was very unhappy today and the aunties said he had not slept. He actually cried just out of tiredness for the first time that we have seen. Plus they gave us a bottle that just poured out liquid, which made him cry because he could not just chew or suck on it without it spilling all over (and me taking it away to make sure he did not drown). He fell asleep about 20 minutes before the end of the visit. There were some brief moments of crazy laughter today as well – especially while we swung him in front of the mirror. He loves looking at himself in the mirror and it usually makes him giggle just to catch sight of himself.

The weather is slightly warmer today, so we decided to walk down to the fountain where we had found the good restaurant before (Kyshlak). There are four or five restaurants at this location (which is called “round square”). We decided to try one that looked Japanese. Despite specifically saying we would not have Sushi in a land-locked country like Kazakhstan, we had sushi! We also had the best miso soup, vegetable tempura, and sake. It was strange to order Japanese food in Russian from a menu written in Kazakh and English. The restaurant was expensive, but it was a really nice change from the food we have been making in the apartment.

Day 12 to 14

2008-09-22T12:47:00.004-04:00

I got distracted by a deadline for work and have not written recently. Our visit Saturday was a lot of fun. Nikolai was in a great mood and wanted to play. He can screech really loud when he gets excited, which should be interesting as he gets more comfortable with us. After the visit on Saturday we went to the Eurasia Market to get a few souvenirs, including a “national outfit” for Nikolai and some classic Russian fairytales. The only outfit they had is for an older boy, but he will grow into it. We would love to just take our time walking around the market, but we do not know how we can get there without our driver and do not want to be rude and tell our translator we do not want her to come. I tried to keep track of how we drove home thinking we could try to walk back there some time, but after the fourth turn and many miles I gave up.

Saturday was “subbotnik” which literally means a Saturday when everyone works. It is a day when everyone goes out into the streets to clean and do maintenance projects. We passed a group of teenagers who were obviously supposed to be cleaning their section of the road side. As Chris said, they could have been the church youth or any other group of American teenagers. Most were standing around in big groups, with one person sort of sweeping the same spot over and over. One was climbing a concrete road barrier. And a few were working hard picking up trash and sweeping the sidewalk. Our driver told us that all of the schools and colleges take part in subbotnik. Our translator asked us what they call it in America when everyone cleans the streets on a Saturday :-).

Sunday we went to the Pyramid of Peace, which is basically President Nazarbayev’s vision of a utopian society where all people and all religions live in peace. If the people in Astana did not take the idea and the building so seriously it would be quite silly. The bottom section is all in dark tones, representing the past. The middle levels are white, representing the present, and the top is blue representing the future. The stained glass at the top includes doves, each representing one of the nationalities that live peacefully within Kazakhstan. From the air, the stained glass appears as the sun on the Kazakh flag. To reach the top you walk up suspended staircases through a hanging garden. At the top is a circular table with a circular halo above it where President Nazarbayev envisions the world’s religious leaders meeting regularly in a peaceful conference. The first conference, unfortunately, was attended largely by political leaders. There is a beautiful opera house in the very bottom of the pyramid; if possible, we hope to see a concert there while we are here; it would be walkable from our apartment, although they constantly tell us not to go outside at night. We will have to see how much tickets cost. The elevators in the pyramid move diagonally up the side so as to leave the interior space unbroken.

Within the lower levels of the pyramid there are models of Astana as well as planned buildings including a huge entertainment center that will open next year and become the tallest structure in the city. The center will house a theater, golf course, sand beach and wave pool, gardens, restaurants, etc. A development is also planned with 12 apartment buildings, two office buildings, and a central building whose purpose I cannot remember. Within this development, there will be no cars, but everyone will get around in gondolas. A huge resort area is planned on a lake. It was sad, the tour guide kept saying that the lake is currently the “pearl of Kazakhstan” but soon it will have a big development.

We had a morning visit with Nikolai today so that Saule could submit all of our documents to court this afternoon. He was really excited for the first 30 minutes and then got tired and grumpy. While we were first dressing him, one of the doctors came by as asked to listen to his chest. I guess she was listening to his heart, because I am sure that his breathing did not sound too good with his bronchitis, but she listened and then let us take him to go play. Everyone in the baby house (including Saule) seemed really stressed today. When we had first arrived in Almaty the partners had said that it would be difficult to get an appointment with the Ministry of Education since we would be arriving on a Monday, which are always more busy. I guess they were right – everyone seems to move at double-time on Mondays.

Day 11

2008-09-19T07:47:00.005-04:00

Our Apartment from Bayterek (closest building) and our grocery store (round building)

Curved wall between living room and kitchen.

Shower

I cannot believe we only have three more days of official bonding. The time goes so fast! Nikolai was very cute again today. We sort of have a routine going now where we play on the blanket for about 20 minutes and he practices crawling and sitting. At some point he gets fussy and from then on all playing, etc. must be done while being held. A new game we played today was “pass the baby” where we pass him back and forth between us. Each time he greets the new person with a big smile. It has been too cold to go outside for walks, but near the end of the visit he only wants to be carried around with occasional trips in the ball pit.

I have become fairly adjusted to life here, although I do not do any of the paying or talking. I think I would be more brave if I had to, but why use gestures when you are with someone who can actually speak Russian? I have learned to pick my feet up when I go between rooms and no longer stub my toes on the raised ledge between each room. I also generally remember that all light switches are on the outside of the rooms. Neither of us has tripped over the curved wall between the living room and kitchen and I now step over it without thinking. I am very amused at the dichotomy of having the most high-tech shower I have ever seen where water can come from the normal shower head, the ceiling, or the sides and yet living in a location where people regularly lose hot water or water completely. We have not had hot water for three days now. I could not face another cold shower today and heated some water on the stove and took a camping-style shower. We learned today that one of our neighbors has a key to the stairs, so if the power goes out we are to contact them. I think our landlady may also be trying to get a copy made. It was sunny today!

Day 10

2008-09-17T09:36:00.005-04:00

It has stopped raining here, although I wore a sweater and my winter coat today. It is hard to believe that I was hot in short sleeves just a few days ago. I think it is supposed to get up to the 60s again next week, but we have some cold 40-degree weather ahead of us for a while. The drastic changes in the weather fascinate me. Every day the wind and clouds move in from a different direction.

We had another good visit with Nikolai. He sat by himself today! He can move from sitting to “crawling” too, although he sometimes gets frustrated when his foot gets caught. It is funny, when he first leans forward from sitting he ends up in a perfect crawl position, and then he straightens his left leg, plops his belly down, and gets down on his elbows before he starts moving – whatever works I guess. He also pulled himself up to a stand using my knees today. We tried to get him to do it again, but his hand slipped and he got frustrated.

It is getting hard to take pictures now because he really wants the camera and every time he sees it and we don’t give it to him he starts to cry – not the full out cry, more of a complaining cry but still, we like to keep him happy. Peek-a-boo makes him giggle out loud every time! About 15 minutes before the end of the visit he fell sound asleep. We have been told not to let him sleep. They try to keep all of the babies on the same schedule, which makes sense when you have so many to take care of. So we were a little worried about bringing him back to his room asleep and tried to wake him up, but that did not work at all. So we brought him back asleep prepared to be scolded – but instead they were very sweet and said he had not slept well for two days and that he just needed his parents in order to fall asleep.

Day 8 and 9, I Think

2008-09-17T09:36:00.003-04:00

It has poured for the past two days here. It was in the 80s last week and now it is in the 40s and they are talking snow!

When we got to Nikolai’s room yesterday the nannies were saying he had been calling for his papa for the past half hour (saying bababa). Since he has said that since the second day we met him, we do not think he is saying papa but it was sweet of the nannies to say so. They also told us he knows when it is getting close to the time for the visit and starts getting excited. He is definitely the most excited when we first get there and wants to jump around, and unfortunately the first thing we do every day is change his diaper and clothes. This task is now complicated by the fact that we do so in his normal changing room, which has a high changing table with a slippery cover. It is all we can do to have one person try to at least keep him on the changing table if not still and the other try to quickly remove clothes, change the diaper (which luckily so far has only been wet), and add new clothes. We do not attempt socks in that room but wait until he is more distracted in the play room and his feet are a little more still. Saule asked us today if we both plan on returning for the second trip or only one of us, which made me laugh as we can barely change his clothes with two of us I cannot imagine trying to do it alone.

One of the head nurses was in the room today visiting all of the babies. She told us that Nikolai has made a lot of advances since we started visiting, which was nice to hear. Since Nik was so active and vocal from the day we met him, it is harder for us to notice a big change. The one area we definitely see improvement physically is in his attempts at sitting. When we first met him he would be doubled over forward whenever we tried to get him to sit. Now he sits up straight, unless reaching for a toy. He still cannot balance, but is getting better. His version of crawling has gotten pretty good too and he can move quickly, albeit in a fairly unconventional way that generally results in his pants falling down.

We saw Nikolai really cry for the first time yesterday; other times he has just protested or sort of cried without much resignation. He was sitting on my lap and suddenly lunged forward, presumably to get a stacking cup and I did not quite catch him in time. I do not know if he hit his nose on the cups or just got scared but he started crying. I stood up with him and walked around a bit and he quickly calmed down, which was nice to see. He suddenly lunged two more times (once forward and once backward) so I guess he must not have been too scared by the event. We successfully caught him the other two times :-).

At the end of the visit he fell asleep as I was giving him a bottle - so cute.

Other Musings:

We had an elevator adventure yesterday. When we got back from our visit, we got in the elevator and it started to move up then suddenly lurched, dropped a little, and the lights went out. I thought it was going to drop all the way to the ground. Luckily it instead gently went back down to the first floor and the doors opened. I have a bit of a fear of elevators as it is, so I was not about to get back into it after that. We walked up the seven flights of stairs, only to find the doors to the seventh floor locked again! So we went to the sixth floor and had to ride the elevator, which had started working again although the lights were still out, up one floor to get home. I am not worried about getting out in an emergency as the locked door is pretty flimsy and would be easy to break through, but I still want the option to take the stairs on any day that the elevator is too scary (like when the lights are out).

Today the guy came to install the internet, but we were missing a disk so he had to come back in the evening. Despite being halfway across the world, he so reminded me of our IT guys at work. I now have high-speed internet rather than the hourly dial-up (which incidentally ran out the day before yesterday). Because the internet guy was coming, the landlady called us to check if he had come so we were able to ask her if she had a key to the stairwell on our floor. She came over to try the key she had, but it also did not work. She said she is going to get the correct key – so now someone else is working on that. Since the weather is changing, the heat in the city is starting to be turned on, and today was our first day without hot water.

We have been washing our fruits and vegetables in cheap vodka, which is significantly cheaper than drinking water and likely more effective at killing bacteria. We had read that suggestion on someone’s blog and highly recommend it!

Day 6 or 7

2008-09-15T11:21:00.001-04:00

We are still unsure exactly which day we started the official bonding. Today the caregivers let us actually go into his room to pick him up, and we could change him in their changing room. They gave us the bottle that we had bought, which although it is high flow it does not just pour out the liquid. As soon as Nikolai saw it he wanted to drink. Since he had to actually suck it took him a little longer to get through the bottle and there was no mess! He almost fell asleep at one point, but woke up quick when we took the bottle away.

Nik has decided he wants the camera; apparently it is the last interesting toy that we have not yet let him play with. He will “crawl” over to whoever is taking a picture and try to grab the camera. We will have to bring a new toy again tomorrow – although I already feel silly with all of the toys we bring. He went over to Zhana today as she was sitting on the floor nearby and patted her hands as if to see why she was not also paying full attention to him – so cute.

Our coordinator reviewed our gifts, photo album, and photos we have been taking at the baby house. We need to buy one more high-end gift but otherwise are ok. We will also buy some chocolates to add to all of the bags. I know that our coordinator does know yet if all of the paperwork from the maternity hospital will be in order for us to go to court on this trip, but it is encouraging that she appears to be planning for the possibility!

No Baby Visit :-(

2008-09-14T13:36:00.002-04:00

There are no baby visits on Sundays, so this morning we went to the culture museum, where we met Zhana. There were no English-speaking guides available, so we had a guide give us a tour in Russian and Zhana translated. She did a really good job, and the guide was patient, waiting for each statement to be translated. The museum was free as was the guide – or at least we did not pay anyone. It added so much to get information in English since we could not read the exhibit signs. I loved the museum – it is well laid out and the exhibits are visually appealing. (I am sure the fact that I am an archaeologist had nothing to do with it :). There is an ethnographic display on the first floor that includes examples of how the nomadic people lived in the 19th and 20th centuries (and possibly presently). There is a yurt that looks just like the piñata Jen made for the party. The examples of clothing, tools, rugs, and adornments were amazing. Zhana said when she visited her grandmother that she lived in a yurt. She said it was very comfortable – warm in the winter and cool in the summer. The rest of the exhibits summarized the history of Kazakhstan, including the Stone Age, Bronze Age, Iron Age, Sachs (sp?) era, Turks era, Hun period, Russian, Soviet, and post independence periods. We need to find a book that summarizes the history as it was a lot to try to memorize and there was no bookstore or gift store at the museum.

After getting back from the museum, we decided to walk down the gardens to the west of Bayterek to see if we could find what Zhana had called an entertainment center (did not find it). There are bronze-like statues all over this side of the gardens. The architecture is so interesting, so I have included some pictures of the city. There were not many people out and it kind of felt like walking around a closed amusement park.

At the western end we found a great restaurant with beautiful décor and good food. I had chicken cooked in paprika, garlic, and scallions and Chris had lamb shashlik. We were exhausted by the time we got back and just relaxed. For dinner we watched a couple episodes of Arrested Development and ate fruit, bread, and cheese with Georgian wine. We have become spoiled here, not having to be anywhere before 10 am and having someone drive us where we need to go. Today is our last day of relaxation, however, as I have to start actually doing some work. I do not want to use all of my vacation on this trip so I can save some for when we get home. I can’t wait to see Nikolai tomorrow!

Saturday Visit

2008-09-13T13:29:00.006-04:00

Today was Saturday, so our visit was in the morning. It was relatively cold and windy this morning, so we decided to not take Nik outside. Plus the coordinator does not join us on Saturdays and Zhana could care less what we do, so we were a little more at ease. We met a family from Boston visiting their daughter this morning. Since our visits are normally in the afternoons, we have not had the opportunity to talk to them before. They have finished their bonding and are to take custody of their little girl on Tuesday! So they filled us in on some of the process that has confused us – like how to get a bottle, what to do with dirty diapers, and how many clothes to bring each day. Their daughter is also in Nikolai’s room.

We played for a while on the blanket and then Chris went back to Nik’s room to get a bottle. We had left the bottle we bought yesterday, but the one they gave us was a different one. It does not matter, but we were so proud to have found the bottle, which required us recognizing the word for pharmacy and going to three different locations before we found one. The bottle the caregivers gave us does not require sucking, but instead the tea comes out if the bottle is just turned upside down. Nikolai was very excited and wanted it immediately. He, however, is not very good at drinking from the bottle and tea was spilled all over his front. We kept taking the bottle out of his mouth to ensure he was not drowning, but eventually he apparently got annoyed at this and held on to the nipple with one hand and the hand and nipple went into his mouth together. I do not know if all bottles in Kaz are this way – just pouring out the liquid – or if his is left over from before his surgery and therefore before he could suck. Despite the mess, Nik managed to drink most of the bottle and seemed much happier for it. We did change his clothes afterward and will bring a water-proof bib on Monday rather than the now-saturated cloth bib we had today.

Nikolai was nearly crawling today. He moves quickly, but only his right leg is bent to the point of using his knee, while he still uses his toes on his left leg. If he were ever to drop the stacking cups from his hands, it would simplify the process since both hands always have a stacking cup he supports himself on his elbows. His feet are so cute, always in motion, and seem big! While the onesies all seem a little big on him, none of the socks seem quite big enough.

After the visit, Zhana took us to the Bayterek. Although it is next to where we are staying, we were more comfortable going inside with our translator. I really like Zhana. I do not think she is a very good translator as she often neglects to translate anything and often gets words wrong, causing confusion. But she is really sweet and I think our personalities are really similar. We had fun taking silly pictures in the gardens outside of Bayterek, which include animal, human, and yurt topiaries as well as giant Kazakh rings. While we certainly could have figured out how to go up to the top of Bayterek ourselves, it was nice to have someone tell us about the various buildings.

Picture Day

2008-09-12T12:11:00.000-04:00

When we arrived at the baby house this morning we were told to go get Nikolai and that we were leaving immediately to get his passport picture taken. The class was running a little late on its normal schedule and none of the babies had eaten yet. So one of Nik's favorite caregiver fed him really quick while everyone else quickly dished out food for the rest of the babies – most of whom were crying by this point. I cannot believe how hard the caregivers work and how calm they stay despite the insistent little ones all around.

The car ride to the photo place was an adventure. I am not sure if he has been in a car that he can remember. He was not really worried but watched everything, turning his head quickly as if trying to follow the things as they went by; I am surprised he did not get car sick. In the passport photo, the baby is supposed to have their mouth closed – which took several tries to get, once we got him to stop staring at the mirrored ceiling.

Back at the baby house we went for a walk since he was already dressed for outside. By the time we got inside to play, Nikolai was exhausted. He just wanted to be carried around, with occasional banging of the cups together and watching the singing caterpillar. His cold/ bronchitis is so bad that it seemed he could barely breathe. I really hope he is ok. He does not feel warm or seem to have a fever, so that is good at least.

Life in Astana
The landlady called yesterday morning to tell us the cable installer would be here either before or after 12 – we did not quite catch which. I cannot imagine not speaking any Russian here and trying to do things like this. When I picked up the phone the landlady spoke Russian and I quickly handed the phone to Chris, who could at least determine the reason for the call and the person calling.

We have gone for lots of walks, shopped at the grocery store, and bought pizza at the place down the street (very good pizza!) but otherwise we have not really ventured out much. We have only seen one small café nearby and are mostly cooking at home, which is fine. Since the grocery store does not have much produce we had asked earlier in the week to go somewhere to buy vegetables. They said this kind of trip had to be planned, and they would take us to the bazaar on Friday. So today we went to buy fruits and vegetables in a big building that has lots of little stands inside, each one of which is like a farmer’s produce stand. We got some great tomatoes, cucumbers, cauliflower, scallions, garlic, grapes, and apples. We definitely will have to go back to this market in the coming weeks.

Last night one of our neighbors stopped us in the hall to ask if we had a key to the stairs. Apparently we were not the only ones worried about the stairwell being locked. If we ever lost power we would not be able to go visit our baby as we would be stuck on the 7th floor! I was hoping one of the neighbors would contact someone to unlock the door since it seemed to be a task best handled by someone who can actually speak Russian. And this morning the doors were unlocked! There are actually three doors with key locks between us and the stairwell. Currently the doors are open and the keys are there – I hope it stays that way.

Day 2 or 3?

2008-09-11T12:44:00.001-04:00

Nikolai was in a very happy mood when we first brought him into the play room. He tried to grasp our faces – including my eyes, which was a little unfortunate, but still cute. He then played on his belly for a while. At one point I read him a book – the one with all of the baby faces, which he seemed to really like. He had to hit his hand in the middle of each baby’s face (watch out baby Snow). We also showed him the photo album my sister made for him and introduced him to his family and cousins. After the initial playtime on the mat, he would not let us lay him down and would cry instantly if we tried. We are still not adept add adding or taking off clothes, especially since he cannot sit so we laid him down to put his coat on and then to take it off again after a walk outside. Both times there was much protest. Even after two days we are starting to see more of his personality and to see him exerting his will.

He discovered that he could go from sitting on my lap to standing just by holding on to my fingers – this elicited much excitement. He does not really giggle, but more yells and opens his whole mouth when excited. His legs are so strong and always kicking or pushing against something. His middle is less strong, preventing him from sitting up as yet. When he started to fuss a little we sat down in front of the mirror, which was good until he realized how close we were to the ball pit and he had to get in it. He loved kicking the balls and reaching for them but would become a little overwhelmed once he managed to get all the way in.

We went for a walk outside again. It is much cooler and less windy today – absolutely a beautiful autumn day. He still looked a little worried and was really quiet outside, but actually looked around a little more. He carried the little red stacking cup around the whole time we were outside. I think he may be the type of baby to get attached to security items, which at the moment are stacking cups. At the end of the visit he got really tired. His face is so expressive and looks SO sad when he is unhappy. His whole forehead wrinkles up. To calm himself down he blows raspberries and says bababa (well the Kazakh version – it is more like bwa bwa bwa). We are supposed to bring a bottle tomorrow, which seems like a good idea since we are so thirsty by the end of the visit I am sure he is too.

We're Here!

2008-09-10T13:47:00.005-04:00

Our “packing” six hours before we were to leave for the airport

(note that clothes had not yet entered the mix).

Packed – with 10 minutes to spare.

It took us a while to figure out how to get on the internet. Apparently at some point we will get DSL in the apartment, but for now we are relying on I cards. So this post is long, to catch up to today.

We Arrived!

We left DC during torrential rains from the remnants of Hannah. Since our packing was so last minute, we likely packed too much and ended up checking two 46 lb bags (under 50!) and one smaller bag and carrying on a roller suitcase and two backpacks. We arrived in Almaty the next day (or was it two days later?) and were greeted by our driver, Dima, who took us to the apartment for the night. We tried to get all of our bags into the apartment without waking the whole neighborhood – a difficult feat when you have heavy suitcases, are wearing hiking boots, and the apartment is five flights up narrow concrete and tile stairs. The apartment was nice, and it was fun to see evidence of its use by other families in the recent past. Thank you to whoever left the Garnier shampoo in the bathroom; since we arrived so late and were only staying one night we did not want to try to unpack or locate anything like shampoo. We did unpack our travel French presses and coffee, however – we do have priorities. We were picked up outside the apartment at 8 am the next day and taken to the partners’ law office to go over details of the trip and our paperwork. Everyone was very friendly and helpful and seemed to have everything under control. We then went to the Ramstore to change money, have a cup of instant coffee (apparently this is a requirement of the process – the sisters and the driver insisted we have a cup of coffee despite our being a little late leaving the office for the airport), and headed back to the airport for our flight to Astana.

In Astana, we were greeted by Zhana (our interpreter), Saule (our facilitator), and Murat (our driver). We arrived too late to go to the Ministry of Education for an interview, so they took us to our apartment. This apartment is really nice; everything is brand new, which is why internet and cable are not yet hooked up. We can see the Bayterek tower from our back window. There is a grocery store across the street (and next door to the MFA!). The store, though, is more like the Trader Joes of Kazakhstan. It has a lot of prepared foods and not as much in the way of food to cook; it is especially lacking in produce.

Baby!

We have started visiting a little baby boy we plan to call Nikolai, but we are unsure if the official bonding period has begun or not. We were told that we are very lucky as there are no other baby boys available. I am not sure if we got the wrong translation or what the purpose of this statement was, as after waiting for two hours before our meeting with the baby house director, we had already seen a lot of baby boys pass by in the hall. At one point a group of young toddlers came in from outside. After pausing chaotically to take off their shoes, they filed past us. Several of the kids made faces and tried to get our attention. One was crying. They are all so cute – I cannot imagine why they are not yet adopted; I guess there is a lot of process involved in making babies eligible for adoption, especially international adoption.

When they brought Nikolai in to us for the first time, I walked up to him and he smiled. I took him from the caregiver, and he instantly turned and wanted to go back, which was cute and reassuring that he had bonded with her. He then looked around at the other people. He was really alert and definitely interested in seeing everything, although he looked a little anxious. The director then asked if we liked him, and we said YES. So we made an appointment to come back after the babies’ naps to play.

Day 1

This bonding session was all about the toys. Nikolai did not want to be held – only to play. When we put the toys at one end of the blanket, he pushed with his toes and pulled on the blanket with his arms to efficiently scoot himself towards the toys! He kicks his legs with excitement. He will be crawling in no time, although he is not yet able to sit up. Nikolai is a very active little guy. He rolls and wants to crawl. He loves banging things together and was amused by the different sounds, trying out banging a stacking cup on lots of different things – the crinkly book was the best. He is funny when he loses track of one of us, he violently twists his whole body around to the point that he nearly rolls over.

They told us we could put our own diaper and clothes on him if we wanted. We changed his clothes – with much drama as we are not good at it. We did not change his diaper, because his was not wet, but I think we were probably supposed to change him anyway. We did not hand over the diapers either – this part of the process still eludes us. Hopefully tomorrow we can figure out exactly what to do. He made a variety of funny sounds, which was a good sign. He growls, says Aaah, mmm, la, and once said ma. He also makes raspberry sounds, which neither Chris nor I can imitate unfortunately. He responds to his name, which has made us hesitant to start using the name we have chosen for him. We will have to see how that goes. The time went fast, and the caregiver came to get him. He had a hold of the big purple stacking cup and phone rattle, and took them back with him.

We were able to ask the doctor a couple questions after we played. Our main question was whether or not he has a cleft palate, as he has a repaired cleft lip. After a bit of misinterpretations/ translations we were finally able to understand that he does not have a cleft palate! This is a relief – while we are fully committed to this little boy, we were not looking forward to several surgeries. We also are only approved for non-special needs according to our US paperwork, so it would have been complicated getting the needed additional paperwork.

In the evening we went for a walk around where we are living. We walked to the Bayterek and then down the street to the Presidential Palace, which we could see from a wonderful fountain that included an arch to walk under. The architecture in the area is amazing. I have never seen anything like it. It is sort of like the set of a sci-fi movie.

Day 2

Today when we got in the elevator to go downstairs, the lights were out. Our trip down seven floors was in pitch darkness, but luckily the elevator stopped at the bottom floor as we had hoped. We were not able to take the stairs as the door to the stairs on the seventh floor was locked. God forbid there is ever a fire, between having to use a key to unlock two doors to exit the apartment and then the locked staircase. The apartment is funny in that all doors have locks – from the outside. So you can lock someone in the bedroom or bathroom, but not keep someone out. Some of the doors even have keys. There is an enclosed balcony-like area that I think is common in most apartments in this region. The balcony is lined with windows, but the landlord told us we could only open one window at a time. We are not sure what the reason is, but I am envisioning the building falling over like a file cabinet when more than one drawer is opened.

When I went in to get Nikolai, he greeted me with a big smile! We changed his diaper and clothes. We put a size 4 diaper on him, although we really think he should be wearing 3s, but they told us to use 4s. Changing went better since we brought easier clothes to put on him. We got yesterday’s clothes back, except the onesie and socks. We definitely need more short-sleeved undershirts/ onesies.

It was really warm out today so we asked if we could take him for a walk. They said they had to ask the doctor. The doctor approved it, but only if we had warm clothes for him. We had brought a short-sleeved onesie, a warm, long-sleeved one-piece outfit, a hat, and his winter coat. They had us so paranoid that we put all of the clothes on him since it was very windy (I think it is always windy in Astana since it is surrounded by miles of steppe). I was hot in my long sleeves but did not want to get in trouble for not putting enough clothes on him. Of course they came out and said he was too hot and to take off the coat. He looked a little worried since I am not sure he had been outside before. He liked looking up at the trees, but when a group of pigeons took off, I think that was too much for him. We went back inside to play after a fairly short trip outside.

Nikolai seemed like he was not feeling well today. He has a chest cold and is teething really bad. He chews on everything. While he did play a little, mostly he cried if we tried to put him down on his belly or back. He wanted to be held and jump or bounce (always while chewing on something). We would love to use a little oragel on those painful gums, but do not think it would be allowed. Another woman was visiting her little girl today, who is a bit older than Nikolai and was crawling all over. At one point she crawled over and tried to take the stacking cup out of Nikolai’s hand and the resulting struggle caused both babies to cry. It was very cute to see him so possessive since he does not seem to care if we take the toys from him. The little girl is in his class, so perhaps she is always stealing his toys.

The woman was supposed to go to court today, but there is a new system in place and the new judge requested additional documentation. Our coordinator explained to us that they do not know what will be required for our court process and that she will do what she can. That worried us a bit, although hopefully it means just an extended process rather than denial of the adoption. The additional documents are required of the maternity hospital.

At the end of the visit, Nikolai started rubbing his eyes and just wanted to sit. He did smile at the caregiver when we brought him back, but I do not think this was his favorite care giver since the reaction he had yesterday was much more animated. They told us to bring a whole stack of diapers tomorrow. I think they also want us to leave several changes of clothes there and they will dress him. I am not certain of this, though – it is all a bit confusing. As we were leaving they asked if we wanted to sign today and we said yes. All we had to sign, though, was a log book documenting the fact that we had visited today. While we were in the doctor’s office signing the log book, they showed us two pictures of Nikolai – one from before his surgery to repair his lip and one after. They asked if we wanted them so we could show our doctor. Of course we do – we now have a picture of him from when he was a newborn!! It is interesting that it seems they have so much information that never gets passed on to the adoptive parents (unless maybe at a later date they give you a copy of the file?). Every detail is so important though.

Celebration

2008-09-05T17:26:00.005-04:00

Kids' "Yurt"
Our Niece Trying to Hit the Yurt-Shaped Pinata

With all of the chaos, we never got a chance to post about the baby shower my sister and parents threw for us. It was so much fun. I have read other posts of people whose families did not fully support inter-country adoption and had trouble embracing another culture. I guess my family is the opposite, as they threw a Kazakh-themed party with an imitation of a yurt for a shelter, maps of Kazakhstan for place mats, Kazakh flags for decoration, and various Kazakh foods. My sister even found a cookie cutter in the shape of Kazakhstan and made cookies with a sprinkle marking Astana. We are grateful for all of the support of our families and friends. Many people have contacted us asking if they can do anything - we REALLY appreciate it; knowing we could call on you if we got overwhelmed has helped keep us calm. Unfortunately, we have been too disorganized to really ask for help!

Tempting Fate

2008-08-29T00:32:00.000-04:00

We have been working under the assumption that we had at least until the end of September before we would travel. We have been very busy at work and have not begun to prepare – we have not wrapped up projects at work, packed, bought what we need for the trip, bought gifts, or ordered money. We took it too far, though, and both of us had business trips planned this and next week. I am in Mississippi now and trying to figure out how to efficiently evacuate 30 archaeologists before Gustav hits when it took us months to get them all down here. Chris is supposed to go to Germany next week. Well, as I said, we took it too far in tempting fate and just got a call that our LOI arrived and we have to be in Kazakhstan in about 1 WEEK!! After waiting nearly 3 years (since we started the China adoption) you would think we would be more prepared!

Surprise!

2008-08-13T12:53:00.004-04:00

On Sunday our friends John and Heather, who are church youth counselors with Chris, held a party for the youth who are going away to college for the first time – as well as those returning to college. After the evening church service we headed over to the party, and were amazed to find that the youth and counselors had instead planned a surprise baby shower for us!

I cannot believe how generous and supportive everyone is. We got a lot of cute clothes and books and other useful things. More than anything we were reminded again that we have a wonderful community who will be there for us whenever we need it. Plus the youth are willing to babysit!

Where are We Going?

2008-08-09T10:15:00.006-04:00

Astana!

Astana is the new capitol of Kazakhstan although a lot of official business still takes place in Almaty. The city was called Akmola before becoming the capitol in 1997. Akmola grew up in the 1820s around a Cossack fortification on the banks of the Ishim River. This city was chosen for the new capitol in part because of its location near the center of the Eurasian Continent. Astana is located in the Kazakh Steppe, a flat, semi-arid steppe that covers most of the interior of the country. Astana is the second coldest capitol in the world, after the capitol of Mongolia. I am really hoping we will be home before November (but still have no idea since we do not yet have a Letter of Invitation) because in November the average high temperature is 28 degrees! It keeps getting colder after that. Astana used to be a place a lot of people went for adoptions, but due to the increase in economic development and domestic adoption in the region, it seems that recently fewer people have been going to Astana. We are so excited!

Another State Department Rant - Hague

2008-07-31T09:15:00.002-04:00

This rant is on behalf of others, as hopefully it will be resolved by the time we need to deal with it – in early 2010.

As most know the US ratified the Hague treaty on inter-country adoption in April. This has little effect on our Kazakhstan adoption as Kazakhstan is not party to the Hague, but China is. Our China agency received Hague accreditation, so we assumed there would be no problem. We are willing to take the additional required courses and we have not lived that many places (the new Hague form requires a background check from every state and country we have lived in since the age of 18).

But now the first few people who have been approved for immigration through the I800a rather than the I600a (pre-Hague) are starting to receive TA (travel approval) for China. Presumably they let their 171H expire at some point and therefore when they needed to renew approval, they had to fill out the I800a. (We also have technically let our 171H expire, by virtue of switching it to Kazakhstan to expedite that adoption). Despite having received a new valid 171H, these people are being denied US Consulate appointments and are therefore not able to travel. The US considers their adoptions to be Hague cases simply due to use of the I800a form, but China considers them pre-Hague based on the text of the Hague regarding transition cases (more correct interpretation). Apparently the only problem is one piece of paper that the US is requesting from China that states that the referral process was done according to Hague standards. While it seems that this should be something simple for China to provide, they are currently not willing. As annoying as this is, China really is in the right here based on the text of Hague that states that all adoptions begun before ratification of the Hague will continue to be processed as non-Hague adoptions. China does not care that the US has started requiring the new immigration form regardless of when the adoption actually began.

I am glad we are still far away from having to deal with this as it is bound to be resolved in the next year, right? At some point nearly all families will be traveling on an I800a despite their adoptions being started before Hague. For NSN adoptions with LID before about mid March, if people have consistently kept their 171H valid, they may still be fine. These families would have missed the opportunity for the free renewal the first time and therefore are able to use it now - for their third renewal of the I600a and are therefore able to proceed under the old rules. For later LIDs, most of us used the free renewal for our first renewal and are being told that we cannot then pay for another renewal of the I600a, but must now submit the I800a. I know the Hague is really a good thing as it helps to ensure that all adoptions are done in an ethical manner, helping to limit the chance for baby trafficking. I just wish people involved would also use common sense and realize that unreasonable hoops are preventing children from getting families, even when everyone already agrees that there are no ethical issues or questions.

I know we said we were going to make the blog private, and still will. We just have been swamped at work and not had the time to figure out how to do it yet.

A Rant - with a Happy Ending

2008-07-24T02:00:00.003-04:00

“Please be advised that we have received your approval Cable…We are ready to process the case.”

After six months of emails and phone calls we finally received confirmation that the National Visa Center has sent our cable to the US embassy in Almaty. This very important step will allow us to get a visa stamp on our child’s Kazakh passport that will automatically make our child a US citizen when they touch down on US soil. We can finalize the adoption in country without this approval, but we cannot leave Kazakhstan.

While navigating the ever changing requirements of a foreign government has at times been difficult, the real difficulty for us has come from our own government. Due to security concerns (from babies??) all adoption visas began to be routed through the National Visa Center late last summer. This had not been true when we applied for our first I7IH for China; at that time the local USCIS office was able to send the approval cable directly to the country. While many people complain about their local USCIS office (primarily due to processing times) I do not recall anyone ever complaining that they did not do their job. Since the switch to routing through the National Visa Center, I have heard of MANY people who have had difficulty with approval cables not being sent. I even read that one family’s approval was sent to Thailand, but they are adopting from Ethiopia!

We received our 171H for Kazakhstan in December of 2007. About six weeks later we emailed the embassy in Almaty to make sure they had received everything and they notified us that they had not. So we emailed the NVC to see when the cable would be sent, but got no response. The first time we called the NVC they stated that they had no record of us adopting. So we went back to our USCIS office and asked them to resend our approval information to the NVC. Several weeks later we called the NVC again and this time they actually found our name, but only had record of our approval for China from early 2006 (why didn’t they find that information the first time we called?!) As a side note, when you call the NVC they request a case number. Adoptions do not get case numbers – only every other kind of immigration does. So once you explain that, they state that they have to pull up a different spreadsheet. So adoptions are not even in the same system as the rest of immigration, so how does it help to be routed through the NVC? Often their excuse to inquiring adoptive parents when they have no record of anything being received from the local USCIS office is that they have thousands of pieces of mail to go through. Isn’t that their job?

Luckily our local USCIS office has been very helpful and they are as frustrated as we are with these problems. So they started sending everything FedEx with tracking numbers. We got the tracking number from our USCIS office and called the NVC again. This time they again said they had no record of us, but after my wonderful husband insisted on speaking to the supervisor and stated that we had the name of the person who signed for the package, they suddenly found our information and said that the cable had been sent on June 30. So we emailed Almaty again – and today got confirmation that they had received the cable! No matter where you are adopting from, always check with embassy to ensure that they have what they need. I cannot imagine having to try to resolve this from Kazakhstan.

Again, we will be making our blog private in the near future, so if you would like an invite, please leave a comment on this or the previous post. Thanks!

Big News! - and going private

2008-07-15T22:10:00.003-04:00

First, the big news - we received our region assignment! Just when I was starting to get discouraged we got the call.

I have found that I go through the same pattern for every step of the Kazakhstan process. When we first begin a step, I am really happy for a few days at the prospect of progress, and then I settle in and just start marking off the days. But when it gets within a week or two (or beyond) our estimated time to complete a step, I start to worry that something is wrong or that we have been forgotten. When I finally am convinced we may never hear anything I am caught off-guard by good news. Unfortunately, recognizing this pattern has done little to help me deal with all the waiting.

As an aside note - I love where we live. We went to the bank to get a cashier’s check for the next installment of the adoption fees and the cashier who helped us had been born in Almaty! He had moved here about six years ago. It is fun to live in such a diverse place that you can just run into someone from Kazakhstan. We also have neighbors from Kazakhstan (and Korea, Vietnam, Central America – you get the picture).

Well we have reached a point in the adoption where we feel we need to limit what we put on the internet. So we will be making our blog private. Please leave a comment or send us an email to tehop1 at gmail dot com if you would like an invitation. We will automatically be sending an invite to our friends on the “gang” list as well as relatives.

Happy 4th of July!

2008-07-08T13:38:00.010-04:00

Our nephew, Ryan, at the parade.

Our niece, Alexis, at the parade.

Our friend, Tyler, at the parade.

In the big pool.

It's never too early to learn to build a fire!

Splash!

New Friends

Mmm, Frosting

Ok, so I am a few days late. We had a wonderful weekend since my sister and her family and our friends from Salisbury came to visit. We all hung out at my parents’ house, which is only about 20 minutes from us.

No update on the adoptions. Our dossier has been in Kazakhstan for about 9 weeks.

Happy "LID"iversary to US!

2008-06-23T08:42:00.001-04:00

Today we celebrate our 2-year LIDiversary for China. There is some debate as to whether reaching the two year mark in waiting is actually a day to celebrate. After some consideration, I think it is definitely a day to celebrate! It brings to mind the emotions and excitement we felt when we began the process. Two years and 1 week ago today our dossier was sent to China (DTC). We had received our 171H only two days earlier and with the help of our agency’s courier managed to get it authenticated and submitted so that we did not miss the June 16 dossier submission date. I do not know if they still do things this way, but our agency used to only send dossiers every other week and since we were coming up on July 4, the next submittal date would have been in mid July. At the rate things are going in China, that would have added about 4 months to our wait! Plus, we would have missed being a part of the great June group on Rumor Queen. So we were DTC on June 16 and were then ecstatic to find out we were logged in 1 WEEK later. We had been told to expect our LID 30 to 60 days after DTC.

The best thing about this LIDiversary is that it is just a day to sit back and celebrate. We do not have to update anything this time since we had renewed our home study and background check in November when we began the Kazakhstan adoption.

Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA)

2008-06-08T20:47:00.006-04:00

We do not have an update on the adoptions, but did find this picture of the MFA in Astana. Our dossier has been there for about five weeks. At some point the dossier will move to the Ministry of Education (MOE). Our coordinator has indicated, however, that we may not hear when this happens. So our next update will likely be notifying us of our region assignment! We then have to wait for an invitation to travel. We have A LOT to do before we would be ready to travel and definitely before we are ready to have a mobile baby in the house. It is hard to focus on the “to do” list, though, without any real idea of when we will travel. This is especially true having already had so much disappointment with the timing of our China adoption. Will three months turn into three years again? I don't think so, but it is still hard to assume that this adoption will really happen. (Or maybe we are just procrastinators who work better under pressure :-)

Update on China Earthquake

2008-05-27T20:32:00.002-04:00

As most people have likely heard, as of today the death toll in China has passed 65,000. Those kinds of numbers are inconceivable to me, and the photographs are devastating.

The Chinese government is working hard to reunite families, and is working to expedite local adoption of children orphaned by the earthquake. I am impressed that the government is trying to provide not only food and shelter but also counseling to the people affected.

According to updates on Half the Sky, it appears that the children in the majority of the orphanages in the region are safe with many now living in tents. I wish the children in the schools had been so lucky.

Tragedy in China

2008-05-12T11:56:00.002-04:00

Wenchuan County in Sichuan Province experienced a massive 7.8 – 8.0 earthquake last night. The initial reports suggest more than 7,000 people have lost their lives. This is also one of the main research and breeding centers for endangered giant pandas. Significant damage is reported in several counties in Sichuan Province, some of which report collapse of as much as 80 percent of the buildings. More minor damage is reported in the large cities of Chengdu and Chongqing, as well as the Gansu and Yunnan Provinces. Please pray for the families who have lost loved ones, those who cannot get in contact with loved ones due to loss of communications, families currently in Sichuan Province to adopt their babies, as well as those who have recently been matched with children in orphanages in the vicinity of the epicenter. I am sure we will hear more as the day progresses.

Half the Sky and Love without Boundaries have set up funds to help children affected by the earthquake, including providing care and housing for orphaned children and for children temporarily separated from their families http://www.halfthesky.org/ and http://www.lovewithoutboundaries.com/

Preparations

2008-05-08T20:04:00.003-04:00

We purchased these suitcases for our trips to Kazakhstan (and future travel if they hold up ok). Aren’t they cute! I hope the dots are not too much for traveling to Kazakhstan, but we do not really intend to walk around much with them while we are in country. The suitcases are hard sided, supposedly tough, and really light. The large suitcase only weighs 10 pounds, so that will help with weight restrictions. Our current plan is to check the middle and large ones and then take large backpacks as our carry-ons/computer bags. We may decide to get another medium sized one rather than taking the large. I know we should try to pack light, but we’ll see how we do. Having a bad allergy to laundry detergents makes me wary of assuming I will just wash everything there. I have heard people recommend Charlie’s soap, which dissolves even in cold water, so maybe I will try it. I hate trying new laundry detergents, though, since bad hives make me miserable.

Progress!

2008-05-05T11:35:00.003-04:00

We heard from our adoption coordinator today that our dossier has left the Consulate! This is all she wrote:

“Jim just e-mailed me. Your dossier is back in Kazakhstan.”

This is great news, but I want more details! Is it logged in at the MFA? Why didn’t she use the words “Ministry of Foreign Affairs” but instead just said “in Kazakhstan”? When did it arrive at the MFA? What timeline are we looking at now? I wish she had not said “back” in Kazakhstan because the word implies backwards progress. I know that our dossier was there during translation, so I assume that is what she means. I am trying to read a lot into a one-line email.

Update
We got a little more information. Our dossier should be registered at the MFA some time this week. Our coordinator thinks that we still have about a 3 month wait until region assignment. I had hoped it would be quicker since we are open to either gender, but 3 months is not too bad. It does potentially mean travel in winter, though, which I had hoped to avoid. We will see what happens, there are still too many variables to make accurate predictions.

China - May Referrals

2008-05-02T21:38:00.004-04:00

Wow, I can't believe it has been another month already. China referrals came out today. The official cut-off has not yet been announced, but it is looking like the cut-off is 1/12/2006. This is a fairly big batch based on the Rumor Queen polls, but it is hard to get too excited about a 3-day batch. I cannot believe China may only cover one month of 2006 LIDs before the Olympics.

I admit I did not read the reactions this month, in part because it is hard to hear the stories of so many upset people. Also, I am absolutely swamped at work. If anyone knows an archaeologist with a Master's degree who wants a job, let me know!

Kaz Update - or lack therof

2008-04-22T11:23:00.002-04:00

Our dossier will have been at the NY Consulate for 60 days on Thursday. I am a little worried after reading comments from people with other agencies whose dossiers were rejected for having the request for a healthy child in their home study. I cannot remember what the exact language is in our home study, but I think it requests a child "with potential for overall good health" (i.e., it is ok if they are sick now as long as we can get them better through treatment).

Our agency guidelines state that it takes an average of 60 days to get through the Consulate review, so we are still within this time frame. Earlier in the year, however, it was taking closer to 20 days to get through, so we are a bit discouraged. I heard from our coordinator today that she expects it to take at least another couple of weeks and she will provide us a new update then. She said "the Consulate is trying to get caught up" presumably following the holidays in March. Which hopefully can be read as our coordinator not being worried about the wording in our home study, right?.

Bus 758 to Scranton

2008-04-19T22:31:00.003-04:00

We often joke that we are more ready to parent teenagers than a little baby. Well, at least the awesome teenagers at church. The youth involved in the drama program just performed “Bus 758 to Scranton,” a play Chris wrote. It was a retelling of the parable of the sower and the seed set in a bus stop. It was really good. I loved how expressive all of the cast were. They worked really hard and I had to share some pictures!

China Update

2008-04-07T08:29:00.002-04:00

The early rumors this month suggested a decent sized batch of referrals – possibly reaching 1/13/06. My own prediction was through 1/10/06 this month and 1/13/06 next month, so getting to the 13th in one month was a pretty positive prediction.

Referrals came out Friday – the cut-off is 1/9/06. This makes this one of the smallest batches in a while, which is saying something. It is not totally unexpected as April referrals have been very small batches for the past several years. The theory is that orphanage workers who prepare babies’ dossiers were on vacation for the New Year celebration. This in one of the few holidays during which many people are able to travel home, especially people who work in the city but have families in the country. So two months later when CCAA goes to assign babies whose dossiers were received the month before, there are fewer baby dossiers available. I am sure the huge snow storm, which left several orphanages without power for weeks, may have affected things as well.

It brings tears to my eyes reading the reactions of everyone who missed the cut-off by one day, especially after thinking most of the month that they were definitely “in”. Don’t give up! You will see your babies faces next month! I am also saddened to read that so many people with 06 and 07 LIDs have decided this month to drop out. I hope those people will find other options for expanding their families.

For us, I think we are now definitely looking at 2010 for China referral. At least we can breathe a little easier about ensuring a year between our adoptions. Really, this may help us ensure at least a year in age between the kids as well.

We have no update on the Kazakh adoption and are still waiting to get through the first round of reviews, which is at the Consulate in NY. Apparently the Consul should be back from vacation this week and hopefully we will hear something in the next couple weeks.