Gifts for the caretakers.

We were ask to provide a small gift to each of the women that took care of Polina.  What do you get the people that have cared for your child for 2 years?  We had to buy 10 gifts which can add up fast.  Here is what we decided on.  I bought pashminas, lip gloss, and instant Starbucks lattes.  I was told that they love all of those items.  For the head caretaker I bought special soap from Philosophy.  I also printed a card for each one of them using Google Translate.  And I made a Christmas ornament using one of our photos and gave it addressed to "Baby Home #4".

the good and the bad

What I loved about St Petersburg:
Meeting Polina and carrying her out of the orphanage knowing that she is ours.
The beautiful churches
the water
walking around
the weather
breakfast at the Renaissance.
Galina
matryoshka dolls
amber jewelry
the amber room
spending time with Romney
the food
Thanksgiving Dinner
having coffe and carrot cake for lunch while overlooking an awesome church (the Singer building).
people watching
the architecture of the city
taking Brett to the Hermitage
the beautiful painting I bought of the Church of the Spilled Blood
seeing the Christmas decorations
reading the Russian Fairy Tales
meeting the other adoptive families
seeing what products the US exports
sharing this experience with my boys
skype/internet access
being able to have a drink almost anywhere
learning the history of the country


What I didn't like about St Petersburg:
the traffic
the cost of things
shopping at the grocery store
the tap water
having to pay for water at a restaurant
the maid at the courtyard
dressing my children in snow suits
not being able to read the menu or anything else for that matter
not having a free breakfast at the courtyard or a coffee pot
not being able to wash my clothes
the smoke

Our last day in St Petersburg

So today was our last day in St Petersburg. I am feeling sentimental about leaving here. This is such an amazing city that I never dreamt in a million years that I would ever have a chance to see. It's the birth place of our daughter, it's where we met her for the first time and shared our first Thanksgiving as a family. This city is rich with history and culture. I have truely loved my time here.

I refused to eat another breakfast in our room so we ate together at the hotel. Polina is getting harder to eat with as she wants to test boundaries more and more everyday and a public place is not where I want to challenge her. So I feed her on my lap and then joe takes her back to the room while I eat. I took the boys for a walk today while Polina napped. We went to an awesome baby store/toy store. I swear if it was colder in Kansas all my kids would have new snow suits and boots. The selection was amazing!!! I let the boys pick out a couple of toys and we bought a DVD for Polina in Russian.
Tonight we went out for dinner to Stolle, it was wonderful. They serve something resembling a bierocks. Polina ate an entire one by herself! Then we walked down by the Metro station for coffe and dessert. Polina was not interested in this event and felt free to express her displeasure. So we took turns walking her around outside until we could get the bill paid and get out of there. We felt it was important to get her out a bit here and there since we will be leaving tomorrow and taking the train to Moscow. I have to say that I have been thankful for having this time in St Petersburg with her while we waited for her passport. I feel a lot more comfortable traveling with her now. We spent the rest of the night packing and playing in the hall with Chuck, Allison and little Sarah. Polina has learned so much in just the one week she has been with us. She knows that she can't get off the couch head first. She is mastering going up and down the stairs. And she can say "bye bye", "hi" and "Brett".

After the kids went to bed Joe and I called his parents to wish them Happy Thanksgiving. We ask how the dog was doing and Marge said she misses us terribly. So Joe ask his mom if she would put the dog on the phone which of course she did. Brandy got all excited when she heard our voices, so excited that Marge ask if she could put her back on the phone because she wanted to talk more! LOL. I told Joe, I can't believe I'm skypeing with the dog!

Well off to bed, tomorrow is a big day. We are taking the high speed train to Moscow.

See you all soon!

Happy Thanksgiving!

So I believe that right about the time I hit "publish Post" on my last post Princess P decided that was a good time to start stirring. I tried rocking her which is not easy when you don't have a rocking chair. She seemed like she was in some sort of hyper vigalent sleep. Like she was asleep but yet conscious of what was going on. After about an hour of wrestling with her I finally got her up and fed her. I changed her and held her. After about 4 hours of this I had had enough and threw in the towel and handed her over to the boys. Joe tried to rock her but she would have none of it. Finally "Super Brett" shows up, he showed her baby Einstein videos and patted her until she finally fell asleep at 6am. We were up again at 10am and got ready for our day. When Joe got back from the passport office (which he said was really smokey...shocking I know!), Brett and I left to go to the Hermitage. We had a great time looking at the art and discussing history. Meanwhile back at the ranch Polina was left in the sole care of her father...she was terrified! :) luckily the savior of Thanksgiving was there to save the day...you guessed it, the ever charming Jaxon. Jaxon played with Polina for an hour and got her calmed down and having fun. Joe was able to put her down for a nap and then get her dressed in her super cute Turkey Day dress.

We met everyone for dinner at the Reniassance and had a fabulous dinner. Eight adults and 8 kids (5 adopted from St Petersburg). Three of the families were AAC families and one was from IAG. The hotel had prepared a special turkey dinner just for us and it was amazing. We all had a great time! On the way home our driver stopped at a local baby store and found me the next best thng to Pediasure!

Well everyone is asleep and I should be too, so I will not be proof reading this post either...enjoy.

Wednesday

So with a little help from my best friend Google, joe and I are improving our parenting skills! We have had good moments and rough ones over the past few days. But over all things are going well.

Yesterday we got up and got around and took the kids to the playground, yes all bundled in their snow suits. After that we went out for some coffee at Illy. Spent the rest of the day doing homework and playing in the hall. At dinner I decided I had had enough of the snowsuit so I put Polinas cute little coat on her and strapped her into the baby bijourn zipped her inside my coat and walked to dinner. The Russians didn't know what to think! No snowsuit but yet could they argue that she was cold?? No! Lol. I was sweating though...like I said, it's only like 32 and no wind. We went out looking for Stolle which we had heard so much about. We did not find it initially so we ate at a Lithuanian restaurant. I think Brett's head was about to pop off that we weren't going to eat at the "pie place". So I made a deal that if him and Jaxon each colored a great picture I would take them to Stolle for dessert...I hardly heard another word from either one...so we ordered some interesting food including potatoe pancakes (which Brett did try and officially decided that he does not like) and a beer. We all enjoyed ourselves and liked the food. Afterwards we stopped at Stolle and got dessert. All and all a good day.

Today we had a slow start. We ate breakfast in the room and irritated the maid again by not having our room available when she came by...plus its always a disaster...what does she expect though when you have 5 people living in about 400 square ft w/o a kitchen or laundry facility. Around noon Joe took the boys to the Military museum and Polina and I hung out in the hall and then I laid her down for a nap. When the boys got home, we went out in the hall and visited with another adoptive family. This couple adopted a 2 1/2 year old little girl. Then we had dinner at the hotel. Joe is working hard to win Polina's love, she is warming up to him slowly. That's where our friend google is coming in handy....she likes that she can understand him. Then of course joe and technology, he had to take this app down to dinner and use it to talk to the waitress. Brett said he was embarrassed by Joe trying to speak Russian when the ladies knew he couldn't. I was cracking up! Our sweet baby girl is sleeping now. :)

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving and we will be meeting 2 other adoptive families at the Renaissance for a good ol American Thanksgiving. The hotel has even agreed to make turkey for all of us. Have a great holiday! I can't believe Im going to miss black Friday! That sucks! :(

Sunday

It is now 10pm and oh what a day! Polina took her first bath today and it went great. We put just a bit of water and her stacking cups in there. She had a great time. We didnt try to wash her hair yet. I thought that could wait. We still have yet to buy any milk so we had breakfast at the hotel again. Polina finally lost it after breakfast today. She keeps trying every door on our floor hoping that one of the is the way home. I finally made her go back in our room and she just lost it. She tantrumed for about 25 minutes and finally passed out. It was so hard to not be able to help her but I've read enough to know that this is normal and I just sat next to her and patted her when I could. After nap we went to the play ground where we were promptly repermanded for not having the proper footwear on her. We did have our snowsuit and hat but no snow boots. It wasn't even cold! After that we ended up in an Irish pub that was super smokey and we didn't recognize much on the menu. We let Jaxon order for and he did a great job. We had to pay Brett 100 rubles to taste it but that was only because he was crabby (he was tired, but claims he wasn't). Tonight sleeping arrangements have been problematic. Polina insist on sleeping on the rollaway. Jax insist on sleeping with Polina. Brett doesnt want to sleep with Joe because he snores (again Brett is crabby) and I'm just laughing at this comedy act that is my life. Lol. As I write everyone is sleeping and I'm thinking back over the day. Polina still screams if I leave her alone with joe, she tantrumed and rocked really hard to get to sleep to night but all in all I think we made a lot of progress today.

So I have to mention that joe and Brett left to get groceries and came back with no food but they did have a huge pink bicycle with a canopy, streamers, backpack and basket. When Polina woke up she saw it and had to ride it. I think she thought it was her ticket out of here. So lucky me spent about 45 mins pushing her around the hall. :)

Time for bed..good night.

Day after Gotcha Day

So today well.....hmmm...Joe left at 9am to go back to the passport office which left me with three kids in a hotel room. Needless to say it was rough. Polina did great but the boys were a little stir crazy and found enjoyment in irritating each other. We knew from the night before that Polina was not ready to leave the hotel so we just stayed in the room or played in the hall (we've had a lot of fun in the hall). After about 2 hours I was texting Joe, "where are you? HELP!!!". So he came back and got the boys and took them out and about. In their snow suits of course! I took Polina down to the resteraunt in the hotel where I ordered exactly what the baby home director said she ate and she wouldnt even entertain me with a bite of it. I ended up with green vegetable soup on my shirt..which btw I'm still wearing. We moved to the courtyard because it said they had washer and dryers but they dont. Oh,I can have a shirt washed for about $12. Yeah...No. all in all the day was long but we made it through and everyone is sleeping but me. Polina is timid of Joe again but I think that will pass soon. Joe said tonight "she's such a sweetheart I wish we could just fast forward a month" he is in love and so am I. I will say that I have feelings of sadness for my relationship with jaxon but I think that is normal when you add another child to the family. I'm so blessed to have a large family (by today's standards) it just feels good.

I thought it would be interesting to mention that Joe said him and the other adoptive dad had a beer while they were waiting at the passport office. I had to post this because how much nicer would the DMV be if you could have a drink while you are waiting!