Food, Fun and a Road Trip....

Andrew loves food and was happy to get to eat at the Ukrainian Piccadily Puzatta-Hatta ("Fat Hut"). I followed him through the line and copied his order, except I got a little less. It was fun hearing him order in his new half Ukrainian/half English mix. He usually gets the first few word out in Ukrainian and then unconsciously switches to English because he is more comfortable speaking English now.






After dinner, we went back outside and saw a big Carousel. Andrew said he'd never gotten to ride one before. It was fun seeing his delighted face as he rode on the pony. I'm so glad he's still enough of a little boy to get such pleasure out of something so simple.






We were with new friends we met on the airplane. They are adopting through Reece's Rainbow. Reece's Rainbow helps people find and adopt special needs children mostly children with Down's syndrome but also children with physical disabilities such as hearing impairment and illnesses including cancer.

We were all staying near the Irish pub so we stopped by there on the way home. Andrew got a big piece of cheesecake, but I got something better. Mark took a photo of me with my happy White Russian:





The next day, we had a quiet morning before need to change apartments. The landlady and her son helped us carry our suitcases to the new tiny apartment few blocks away. We asked for cheaper places so we are getting smaller apartments than last time. We settled into our new place. Mark was able to work, Andrew enjoyed watching Ukrainian tv and I read on my kindle. Soon it was time to walk back to the SDA to sign for the referral. That was an easy process. It was getting dark when we came out and snowing. We wanted to get coffee, but decided to stop by St. Michael's first. As we walked there, Mark and Andrew threw snowballs at each other and I pretended I didn't know them. Suddenly, we heard the church bells ringing in an especially festive way and remembered it was the Vespers of Theophany (Epiphany).I loved hearing the bells calling us to church and walking throughout the snowy street lit with beautiful Christmas lights made it even better.



After church, we had dinner and then did a little shopping on the way home. I was wearing white gloves from Target that left glittery white lint on my coat. I tried to pretend It was happy pixie dust from Mary Evelyn in heaven but it bothered me. Thankfully, I've spent enough time in Kiev that I had a good guess of where to go to get new gloves and a lint roller. It was very satisfying to walk into the department store and make my purchases. I felt almost native.






That night, Andrew and I couldn't sleep. Andrew's bed was a hard little couch and he tossed and turned. Mark wisely took a sleeping pill at midnight. I thought I'd be able to sleep, but I couldn't. We were planning to get up at 4:15 and the hours dragged by. At 12:52 I was startled when the Skype phone rang. I was worried that something was wrong, but it was just Mike and Angela calling to let me know my puppy wanted to say hi! They had forgotten about the time change. It was so good to see their familiar, happy faces. It made me feel a lot better.

I laid back down and tried to sleep, but I couldn't. I was too burdened with my thoughts and emotions. At 3:00, the phone rang again. It was Thomas. I was glad to hear his voice. When I teased him about calling me in the middle of the night, he explained that my Skype was saying I was online and he also forgot about the time change. He thought it was the opposite and that it was morning for us. I had taken the iPad into the bathroom to talk to Thomas without bothering Mark and it was cute when Andrew crowded in with me so he could say hello too. Andrew was wide awake and had been tossing and turning just like me.

After saying goodbye to Thomas, I gave Andrew a snack. I quizzed him on multiplication which immediately made him tired and then told him we would race to see who first got to sleep. That worked for him and he slept, but I was still awake when the alarm went off.

Leo and Luda arrived at 5:45 and we climbed into the van for the 5 hour drive to Kovel. Andrew made a bed in the backseat and I snuggled with Mark. Soon we both got some good sleep.

When I woke up, we were driving on icy, snowy but smooth roads through the beautiful Ukrainian countryside. It was snowing outside and just getting light.
We arrived in Kovel by midmorning and went to the familiar regional office to get the paperwork. It was nice go see the kind, friendly people who helped us last time and they enjoyed seeing our Andrew and how happy and healthy he is.

We soon drove to the orphanage to meet with the Director. He was very warm and friendly. It was sweet to see how happy he was to see Andrew. Andrew showed him the photo book we made as a gift for him. It has photos of Andrew's life from June to the present showing family, church, school, friends and baseball! Andrew could hardly speak enough Ukrainian to explain anything to him, so Luda needed to help. I think it gave him some good reassurance about Andrew's new life and we gave him the book to keep as a gift.

The Director was happy for us to adopt Nadia and Ruslan so all is well from that side. He said he will help us with the process. It was nice to see him and the other people at the orphanage again and especially to see how they love Andrew.

At last we were shown to that same room where we played with Andrew the morning we met him, and there we waited for Nadia and Ruslan.


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