The Last Few Days

Sorry that I have suddenly gone missing from my blog. Having two children is hard work. I have had to choose between sleep or blog posts and unfortunately sleep usually wins.

The girls are amazing, wonderful, and it is still hard for me to believe they are mine. Of course, it hasn't been all easy. The girls are mostly well behaved but have had a huge traumatic life change to deal with and their two years old. So as expected, they have their moments. All in all we have had 5 wonderful days, though.

I won't have time to explain everything we have done but will try for a general overview. Monday was pretty much a free day except for picking up the girl's Russian passports. Their pictures on them are so adorable. We mostly played at the hotel but did walk down to the park for a bit.


Tuesday was a travel day as we had to move to Moscow. This was a difficult day. We left the hotel at 5am (two hours before girls usually wake up). There were some plane delays and we ended up stuck at the gate for over two hours with sleep deprived toddlers. This airport funnels everyone from the flight into one small room which was very crowded and not a great place for kids. Addie had a major temper tantrum since Mommy refused to let her go onto the tarmac or roll around on the dirty airport floor. I ended up in the bathroom with her and came out to find a whole room of russians glaring at me. It was probably the most embarrassed I have ever been in my life (although my sister tells me not to worry - they will embarrass me many more times before they are grown). Thankfully, they both fell asleep in my lap before we even took off and didn't wake until nearly the end of the flight. My prayers were definitely answered.




Mariya got car sick again on the way to the apartment. Poor baby! Once at the apartment, I filled out American embassy paperwork, the girls played, Mom went grocery shopping and we were all thrilled to see Dad that afternoon. The twins LOVE him. He is clearly the star as they constantly talk about him, show him things, and bring him literally all their toys. I guess men are a novelty for children from orphanages as they hardly ever see any. We were all tired and headed to bed reasonably early.

Wednesday was pretty much a free day. The kids are still adjusting from the time change and it was very, very windy out so we didn't do too much. The American Embassy physician appointment was at 6:30 that morning as well. I was pretty unhappy when they said 6:30am since that would mean another early morning. However, kids are still on Kemerovo time zone so they were up at 5:00am anyways. Ughhh! They were both given a clean bill of health and their paperwork is ready to go. We had lunch at Sbarro (see clown photos below) and dinner with Kathy & Tessa at TGIF.





Mom and Dad went on a tour of Moscow all afternoon. They had a good time, but Dad had a hard time staying awake. The time change from home to here is 12 hours so it takes some adjusting to get used to. Hopefully he will feel better in the next day or two.






I still can't make my comments work so I will do my best to reply to everyone here. Thank you all for the comments and congratulations. In the picture of mom and I with the girls on pick up day - Addie is in Mom's lap and Mariya is in mine. Hopefully that will make it easier to identify them. Beryl, you are certainly welcome to bring a picture of them to bible study. Amber, would love to skype anytime. We are nine hours ahead of you guys. Try not to call around 9pm my time. I use the computer for the girls bedtime lullabies and someone always calls right when they are almost asleep. Not a huge deal if you do, but I won't be able to talk anyways. Trish, hopefully you are right about the bossy thing. Actually, one of the twins seems to be at least a little less bossy than the other. We will see how they are in a couple months.

Well, we fly home on Tuesday. I will do my best to write before then. It is almost impossible to write while they are awake. Can't wait to see everyone soon.

Lindsey

Location:ул. Нов. Арбат,Moscow,Russia