Day 12, October 16, 2009

Today our normal driver and interpreter had the day off. With several WACAP families in Vladivostok recently, the WACAP staff has really been spread thin and all of them are working very hard. So, one of the heads of the WACAP office in Vladivostok took us to the baby home so Vlad (our driver) and Anya (our usual interpreter) could have a three day weekend to recharge their batteries.

When we arrived at the baby home, the first order of business was to talk to the head doctor to thank her for taking such good care of our little guy. We are truly appreciative of the way all of the baby home staff has taken care of him. When we were on our way out of the doctors’ office Michelle asked if we could see our little guys’ actual room so we could see where he has spent most of his life up until now. Thankfully she said “yes” so we headed up to his room. When we got to his room, there were about 8 or 10 kids all in a large playpen. They had just woken up and were getting ready for snack. All of them were wearing the same blue and pink outfit and were standing there anxiously anticipating the snack of the day. Our little guy was in the center of the playpen, but when he saw us enter the room he walked right up to us and grinned. We were happy to see that even in an environment where he had never seen us; the little man recognized us and was seemingly happy to see us. The baby room itself was clean and seemed like a little bit of a controlled chaos as the caretakers transitioned everyone from nap time to changing diapers to feeding them. We were only in the room for a minute or so, but we were happy to get a chance to see where our son has spent so much of his life.

After our little guy had eaten and was brought out to us, we took him out to the playground as it was a nice warm, sunny day here in Vladivostok. We spent about a half hour out there playing on slides and swings and just hanging out. Once we went inside, we headed to the gym where our little guy smacked the gator around a little more (go Vols!). There is a little riding car in the gym and our guy likes to push it around or ride in it. We also played catch with the bouncy balls he loves so much. Michelle says he is a typical little boy as he likes cars and footballs and bouncy balls and stuff. His favorite game today was to drop the ball and then look at me pathetically until I went and picked it up. When I would bring it back to him he would have this little devilish smile on his face, and I think he knows he already has me wrapped around his tiny fingers. Like yesterday, he tired out before our time was up so we decided to wrap things up a little early today as he has had a pretty exhausting couple of weeks getting used to us. We told him that we only have one more normal visit with him on Monday before we bring him back with us on Tuesday!

Tonight is Michelle and my last Friday night without a little one, so we are going to party it up tonight. If you know either of us, you may have gotten a laugh out of that line as neither she nor I have “partied up” a Friday night in several years. Actually we are spending our night making spaghetti and doing laundry then will probably go to bed early. We moved to a suite with a kitchen last night and we are taking advantage of some leftover spaghetti and sauce the Scrudato’s gave us before they headed back to Jersey a couple of days ago.

That’s all from Vlad tonight. We aren’t sure what we are going to do this weekend, but I think we’ll both be resting and preparing for the little guys’ arrival early next week!

Day 11, October 15, 2009

Another day, another couple of “firsts”. Our little guy is making big strides in getting to know us. Today when the caretaker brought him out of his room and set him down, he walked straight to Michelle marking the first time anything like this happened. On previous visits we would either take him directly from the caretaker’s arms (we get a little excited so we get grabby sometimes) or the caretaker would set him down and he would stare at us like we each had two heads. Today the caretaker set him down and he immediately walked over to Michelle who scooped him up and kissed him which made him smile.

After the initial greeting, we went straight to the gym to play. His favorite item to play with today was the picture album we brought him on Trip 1 and left with him so he could look at pictures of his Forever Family. He is teething so he likes to gnaw on the plastic edges of the photo albums, but we think he also likes the pictures. He touched and pointed at the pictures a bunch, and this is when he gave us our second “first” of the day; his first laugh out loud (or LOL if you are reading the blog via text message)! He was looking at a picture of Michelle and I when he laughed, so there are two possible explanations for the laugh, either he thinks we are funny looking or he remembered that he bit Michelle yesterday and that gave him a chuckle. Whatever the reason, we were really happy to experience this “first” together. In addition to the photo album, he still liked his gator toy (being Tennessee Volunteer fans, it brings us great joy when he pushes the gator around), his Redskins football and a few items that we bring him each day. Michelle also taught him how to kick a ball, so he walked around playing soccer for awhile. He was soccer natural, so maybe we have young David Beckham on our hands. He was up walking around a lot today which tired him out pretty quickly. He was asleep in Michelle’s arms about 30 minutes before it was time for us to take him back to the caregivers, so we took turns holding him while he slept, then returned him to his room a little early so he could have snack and go down for his real nap. He was adorable sleeping in his Mommy’s arms. We can’t wait to see him tomorrow.

On the way home we stopped at a grocery store for some food for us and the little guy. We also stopped at a pharmacy where Michelle picked up some cough syrup and cough drops. She is feeling better than earlier in the week, but she still has some lingering effects of a pretty nasty ear infection. She’s a trooper though, and we are using a lot of hand sanitizers and cleaning wipes when we are with the little man.

Tomorrow we have our last visit of the week. We only have tomorrow and Monday’s visits left before we go back on Tuesday for Gotcha Day.

Day 10, October 14, 2009

Today we had another great visit with our son. We are getting in about 2 ½ hrs every day with him, and enjoying every second of it. Today was the first day that he didn’t cry at all when he was brought out to us, not one tear today! WooHoo!

He loves to drink out of his sippy cup, and has officially tried Gerber yogurt puffs. I procrastinated today when giving him a puff and he almost took off my finger. I had little teeth indentions for about an hour. Although Bill did think it was funny when I screamed (he has sharp teeth!).

Here is a picture of the adoptive parents we had dinner with last night. Lots of support and kids here at the VMI right now. It’s nice to be around others that have had the same experiences.

Day 9, October 13, 2009

Today we headed to the baby home as per the usual just after 11am. They were late feeding him so they didn’t bring him to us until almost 15 till 1. First we took him outside to explore the playground for about 30 minutes. It was chilly so we decided to take him into the gym for the rest of the visit. One of the caregivers brought up a couple children in to play with him. This was one of the first times we were allowed to interact with a child other than our own. They seemed to play well with each other overall. At one point, Bill encouraged our son to go play with the Caregiver and a young boy that was in his groupa. Our son immediately turned around and wanted Bill to pick him up. Rather this is the start of bonding, or a coincidence, we will take it!

Tonight we met several families in the White Rabbit for dinner and a play date with the kids. We enjoyed meeting with the other families and hearing about their experiences thus far. Lisa and Glenn, whom we have become very fond of, are taking Anastasia home to New Jersey tomorrow, and we wish them safe travels. Neva, her mother, Sergei and Peter will also be flying home to Oregon tomorrow. Most of the other families are leaving within the next few days as well. We wish everyone safe travels and best wishes with their forever families!

In closing, the attached photo is a pet of Artem. Looks like he was trying to escape!

Day 8, October 12, 2009

Father-Son Day at the baby home…

Before I get into the details of today’s visit, I need to backtrack to some information we learned last night. Our friend Kenny came to our room at about 6pm last night and told us that he had found out that Russian Prime Minister (and former Russian President) Putin was going to be visiting a government complex right next to the Vlad Motor Inn today. This news directly affected everyone at the Vlad Motor Inn, as we were being told that nobody would be allowed out of the area after 7am this morning and nobody would be allowed in before 8pm tonight. Obviously this concerned us because we were supposed to leave at 11:15am to visit our little guy. We received a call from our agency shortly after Kenny let us know what he had heard, and our agency confirmed that things were going to be a little crazy around the hotel today. The agency said there were basically 3 scenarios for being picked up by our interpreter and driver. 1, the driver and interpreter would make it into the hotel area like usual. 2, the driver and interpreter would have to park a little ways away and walk in to get us. And 3, nobody would be allowed in or out. Obviously options #1 or #2 were fine with us, but #3 was not good.

This morning we woke up and before we could even deal with the Prime Minister, we had a bigger problem. Michelle was feeling awful. We think she has a bad ear infection and her throat has been giving her trouble for a week now and everything came to a head overnight. She was really caught between a rock and a hard place as she had to decide whether to go visit the little man and risk getting him sick, or staying back and missing out on a visit. Ultimately she decided not to put the little guy at risk of catching anything she has. He is coming off a tough cold of his own, so we didn’t want him to relapse and start feeling bad again. I haven’t ever seen Michelle this bad off, she is really ill, so I think she made the right decision to stay home today.

So, minus my better half I set out to fight my way through the Russian security perimeter to get to the baby home. Our interpreter Anya and our driver Sergei met me in the lobby and informed me that we were going to be fine to leave the hotel but we had to walk to get to their vehicle. They had to park about 3 blocks away, so it wasn’t bad at all. On the walk to their van, we saw several military guys in the side streets around the hotel. Most of them stared intently at me as I was carrying a backpack that was making a lot of noise. I was really hoping that none of them were trigger happy because I didn’t want to be taken out due to a children’s toy making a little noise in my backpack. Perhaps I have seen too many movies because I sort of anticipated a Red Dawn style chase scene with the Russian military in hot pursuit of Sergei’s van as we left the area, but I was pleasantly surprised as nobody even looked twice at us while was we hit the road. (I am willing to bet that was the first ever “Red Dawn” reference in adoption blog history. What a great movie!).

Now on to the best part of the day…the visit. When our little guy’s caretaker brought him out of his baby room, he looked at me and stated to cry. Hopefully he missed his Mommy, but I took him and assured him that we were going to have a great day no matter what. He only cried until we got to the gym, where he saw the slides and decided that this was going to be a fun day after all. He and I spent some time playing on the mats, and then we got up and played on the slides and walked around the room. There were two toys that were a huge hit today, his Redskins plush football and the traditional Russian weeble toy we have mentioned in the past. He carried that football with him the whole day, which made me happy! He made a lot of sounds today too which is something he had only showed brief glimpses of on prior visits. He really came out of his shell about halfway through the visit and became really active. He played with his toys more than he ever had for us, and really seemed to be enjoying himself. Of course we rode the slides and rocked on the rocking tiger again too. Father-Son day was really a lot of fun for both of us I think, but we are both looking forward to having Mommy back in the action with us tomorrow. The little guy and I took plenty of videos to show Mommy back at the hotel, and she has already been through them and said she can’t wait to get out and see him tomorrow. When we returned to the hotel we were stopped by a guard, but our driver said something to him in Russian and the guard allowed us to drive right up to the Vlad Motor Inn parking lot.

While I was gone, Michelle said that word of her sickness spread around the hotel, and several families chipped in some cold medicines and things to get her health headed on the right path. We really appreciate everyone’s concern and willingness to help! Thank You.

Tonight we will take it easy and rest up for what will hopefully be a full family visit tomorrow. As far as we know nobody famous is visiting the Vlad Motor Inn, so traveling around the hotel should be back to normal again!

Day 7, October 11, 2009

Today we went into downtown Vladivostok with the Scrudato's and Duda’s. The Duda’s asked their driver Sergei if he would take us for some sightseeing, souvenirs, and lunch today and luckily he was more than willing to take us. First he drove us to a point high on a hill above the port of Vladivostok. We took many postcard quality pictures of the city from this vantage point. The weather was perfect today, and it was really beautiful to see the mountains next to the ocean beyond the port. We took some pictures of some Russian naval ships too. It’s strange to think that just 20 years ago, a group of Americans taking pictures of Russian Navy ships in Vladivostok was called Espionage. Now it was just a nice outing among new friends. We also did some sightseeing in a town square near the water where the Scrudato's little girl Anastasia was able to take her first pony ride.

Once we finished with the sightseeing we went to a nice little souvenir shop where we did the tourist thing. After that we went and had lunch at a cafeteria style restaurant which had really good food. Michelle and I didn’t branch too far off of the beaten path though as we just had rice and chicken and vegetables which were similar to things at Oriental restaurants back home. They had plenty of traditional Russian fishes and meats at this place, but I guess we weren’t in a daring mood today. They had excellent desserts though!

On the way home we stopped at a kids clothing store where we bought a hat and some pants for our little guy (actually the Duda’s chipped in the pants as Michelle and I weren’t patient enough to find them in the store on our own). We want to make sure we have him properly dressed for when we leave the baby home next week. “Properly dressed” in Russia means “about 13 layers of clothing no matter how warm it is”, so we need to do what the Russians do (at least while they can still yell at us).

That’s about it for today. We are resting in the room tonight so we have some energy to play with the little guy all week. We know you are all looking forward to seeing some pictures, but we need to stick to the rules we agreed to and wait until Gotcha Day (Oct 20th) before we publish any pictures. Believe us, it will be worth the wait, we have some good ones of the little man!

Saturday, October 10, 2009

Hello from Vlad! Today we had a lot of down time as we were not allowed to go to the baby home to visit our son. We walked to the store and picked up a few items, and did laundry to get ready for next week.

We also went to the playground to watch Glenn and Lisa's little girl play. What a cutie! We met a family from California that adopted a little girl as well. There were several families on the playground, mostly Russian.

Tomorrow we are looking forward to going into town with the Duda family to do a little shopping and have some traditional Russian cuisine.

Paka!