Our Last Day Without Anthony!

Riding the little "baja mobile"
Daddy showing his how to honk the horn!
Anthony trying it!
Look at those cheeks... and those eyes!!!
Checking out the chairs... This my favorite photo of the day!
Look how little he is... see jerry's hand on his little tiny booty!
Alex in one of the chairs... He is soooo big!!!
Check out Anthony's pants... they are so big that when he comando crawls across the floor, they slide off... I will have to get him some smaller pants when we get home! :)
Big Brother showing how...

Anthony discovers the BALL!!!Where's Momma?
Family Photo on Adoption Day!
Signing Power of Attorney.
Olga-Translater, Olga-Coordinator... Aren't they so cute!?

Olga, Our fabulous Coordinator. Happy New Parents!
The Emblem and Flag on the courthouse.
Alex watched Cars while we were in court.
Just before our Celebratory Dinner!

:)

Pre-Court & Seeds! (day10)

Last night we called Aliya, one of our interpreters from last time… we talked with her for at least and hour… catching up and laughing about old times… It was such a good chat! We miss her… we were hoping to see her this time, but it just so happens that she works in Aksai which is another city… where the big oil company is. She works for one month and then is off one month… well this is her month to work! She comes back to Uralsk on August 8! Go figure!!!! But we are going to try to see her sister Assiya, and we can leave her a picture of us and stuff. We were pretty bummed that we won’t be able to see her!

This morning, we got up early and had pre-court at 10… more like 10:45… we waited in the lobby at the courthouse for 45 minutes! Typical, I hear. But it took only about 45 minutes in with the Judge. He is Kazakh looking, middle age, serious, but friendly enough. His desk was at one end of the table that we sat at… Jerry sat next to his on one side and the Baby House Director on the other side… then Olga and me next to Jerry and August, the Department of Education Inspector next to the BH director. Olga, our coordinator took Alex and they went to her house and played while we were in out meeting… Poor Misha was called by the police station to come there… so we had a different driver today! I hope they get Misha’s license to him! What a pain in the bahoney!!!!
Anyways…we sat there and he asked Jerry what city he was born in and if this was his first marriage, he asked if Gobles was the town we live in, what is the name of our company, and he looked over our passports and then our photo album. He asked about our shop… what is it? We brought him the photos we printed yesterday as well as a picture of our house and the baby’s room… but he asked if he could take other pictures from the book! Of course… he took the family picture we had done from Christmas, the living room, kitchen, dining room and then the picture of Jerry and Alex on the carousel at Disney in February . He also took the picture of Jerry’s parents as they are the current designated guardians for Anthony should something happen to us. Everyone was surprised he wanted so many pictures for the file! Usually they want maybe 6… he now has about 14! He asked how many rooms are in our house… 14… they are surprised by the number of rooms most adopting parents have. Our number includes 3 bathrooms and the furnace room… I don’t know if that is what they wanted, but that is what they got! :) Then he asked Jerry “why do you want to adopt?” Jerry was surprised he asked that today… jerry started listing reasons…We have been here before and we want to have a large family, Jerry was adopted so… blah blah blah… but forgot the main reason the judge wanted to hear. So the Judge asked for the main reason… then jerry remembered what he was supposed to say… “that for medical reasons, we have been able to have biological children…” Whether it is the truth or not, that is the main reason they want to hear… we don’t care… they can not believe that someone would want to adopt if they could have “their own children” here… so we comply… no problem. It is definitely believable… since we have been married 10+ years already! Then he went over the proceedings for court… Jerry will need to be able to tell the reasons for adoption, especially the main reason… :) and what we are asking for… to adopt Nurbek, change his name to Anthony Graham, keep his place of birth and birth date the same, but list us as his parents. And that we ask the court if they approve the adoption they also grant immediate execution… He basically told us everything we need to do in order to please the court tomorrow… that basically it was all a formality, and the prosecutor would be there. It sounded very much like he is on our side and that he is just there to make sure there is not reason why we should NOT adopt our baby… that was very reassuring. Maybe that will help us not be nervous… Then they discussed when we could have court and decided TOMORROW at 3pm!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Whoa!!! My heart started pounding!!!! That was about it and we left for home… we missed our morning visit with Anthony, I bet he was crying… poor caregivers!

My experience… I bought a new top to go with my skirt… well, I never sat down in it at the store… well when I sit… it gapes open at my chest… not that anyone else cares, because almost every other woman has the same thing, but it made me feel more nervous… maybe I will use a little safety pin tomorrow… just so I feel better! So for those coming after us… make sure nothing is gaping that you don’t want gaping… *sigh* I wish I could just wear my favorite turquoise shirt with my skirt! I feel so much better in that color!!

We came home and Alex was crying and crying, because he wanted to go back to Olga’s house and play with the kids there! We decided that he was tired and needed to go to bed. Poor kid. So he is sleeping as I type this!

So this means we will have court tomorrow afternoon… from 3-5 and then we will have to wait until Wednesday morning to go to the records office and get his birth certificate before we can go pick him up!!!! Woohoo!!!!!! That is going to be an awesome day!!! Hopefully he doesn’t decide to scream too much! Our poor neighbors!

Well if he does scream tomorrow night, it serves the neighbors right! It is 8:30 and some neighbors are pounding like mad with hammers near us… well right above Alex’s room… I hope they quit soon so he can go to sleep! Somebody was putting new bars on their windows today… maybe that is what they are working on.

When we got in the car, Olga our translator had brought us a bunch of vegetables from her garden. They looked really good.

So we went to visit Anthony this afternoon… while I was waiting for Olga to bring him to me… I stand outside his door so that as soon as she opens it and she turns… he can see me! As I was standing there, I could hear some baby in there screaming and screaming, I thought… could that be Anthony? No… I am sure not… well as Olga and I were walking down stairs.. I said that wasn’t Anthony in there screaming that whole time?” she shook her head and just said, “uh-huh.” Oh dear! I wonder what the problem was… he either had to leave his play and was mad, because there were no tears and his eyes weren’t even red when he came out, or he does not like changing his clothes… I am thinking the first! He was almost a different baby today… He was happy to see me and much less tense! He smiled so much easier today… he was content to just play nicely and he was talking a lot… flinging his arms around excitedly! It was funny… The judge’s son was supposed to come by, but he did not… so we just played. I read the God Loves You book many times… and he chewed like crazy on the crinkly stuff in the cloth book thing… he chewed on the vibrating teether. It was just a relaxing visit… we played a bunch with the cloth book… Then Jerry helped him stand up to the little bench that was sitting there… He seemed to really like that… I think he will like the JitterBuggy when we get home… It bounces and vibrates when you turn the key or put it “into gear”. Plus he will be able to stand up in it… I can hardly wait to get him home and show him all the fun things, and that he doesn’t need to throw a fit about a stupid toy again!! Although I know he will.

After our visit we headed to pick up a package at the post office that was sent to us from home. That was quite the process! It took like 20 minutes to get it! Then we stopped at the baby food store and picked up a couple things in preparation of Anthony coming home. Next we went to the seed store! That was funny! We couldn’t read anything in there so we needed to get ones with pictures so we would know what they are! Jerry picked them out and I took care of Alex, who was getting into trouble constantly! Before long it took him out to the car. He was grabbing at everything… Jerry picked up a ton of seed packets and only spent about $16!!! Each packet was only about 25 cents! It will be fun trying them over the next few years!

Then we came home and made dinner from the veggies that Olga brought us from her summer house. Oh my were they good… we had carrots, eggplant, cucumbers, peppers, and parsley, dill and garlic. We sautéed them with some butter… It was unbelievably good!!!! Even the eggplant and we have not always been huge fans of eggplant, only usually at Asian restaurants. Then we had some ramen noodle stuff. The carrots are the best carrots we have ever had and even taste good cooked… we only like out carrots raw around here too! :) We will ask Olga what kind of carrots they are tomorrow! The peppers she brought are a chartreuse green! They are very pretty and tasted like a regular green pepper… we think… we haven’t had one in a while now… I saved some seeds… :)
This evening we spent practicing our court stuff… we have to have a lot of stuff memorized this time… Jerry can’t even have notes for his speech. I think we are doing pretty good. We will practice some more tomorrow… it helps to stand up in front of each other and say our stuff. Ok we are going to bed so we are rested enough!

Our last night as a legal family of 3!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Happy Baby!

The boys before court!We are ready!!!!
Ahhhh... mamma!!!
chew chew chew! slobber slobber slobber!
I am so cute...
New toy today... we forgot we had it! It was a hit!
The post office!

Eek!!! Screaming!!! (day11)

Oh My!!! Remember the fit Anthony threw yesterday with the stacking cup issue… Well today was so much worse!!!! Oh my word!!! We had to go inside today, because it was raining out… so go figure… Anthony was in a mood! He wanted to crawl where he wasn’t supposed to… on the rug… he doesn’t need rug burns… since he drags his back end… and then he had 2 of those stupid cups in his hands and I don’t know why but he just dropped them and they banged together just right and one rolled away from him…. Oh my word, he started instantly screaming!!! And screaming and screaming and screaming and screaming! We gave the cups back and he just kept screaming and wouldn’t hold on to them… of course this made me mad, and at home I would have taken the cups away and stuck him on the pink rug, but here you have to keep them happy all the time… oh my goodness… We picked him and and he screamed, we laid him down and he screamed… he was a mess, and he was that way the rest of the visit! Just throwing fits left and right!!! We did get rid of the stacking cups and only let him have his teether and the musical toy… well then he would crawl to the edge of the sheet… touch the rug and turn and look at us… and when we grabbed him he would start to fuss… oh brother! We were actually glad for this morning’s visit to be over! That kid is going to be in for a big surprise when he gets home with us… :) Hello pink rug! His caregiver met us at the door to take him away… Most of the caregivers never smile at us for some reason, or at the babies! Maybe it is so they don’t attach to them… who knows!

In case someone doesn’t know about the pink rug… It was in the babies’ room in front of Kimi’s bed, when we were going to get the 2 babies from Kaz that first time… so our nursery was done for a boy and girl… well, we decided to leave it in there because just a few month after Alex came home we would be getting Kimi… well… obviously that has changed now… but we decided that when Alex was screaming for no reason or he was disobedient and such that he had to sit on the rug… when he was really little we would sit in front of him and if he tried to get off we would tell him no and plop him back on it… It worked so well, that now I can tell him to go sit on it and he will run to it, sit down for a minute or so and when he has calmed down he will come out and apologize… Its wonderful really… well a few months ago I said to Alex that we needed to look for a new rug to put there… something orange for Anthony… and Alex got All upset and said, “No!!! It’s my favorite!!!” So the pink rug is still in the boys’ room! Anthony will be using it too when we get home… although I may have to get earplugs until I can leave the room, because he screams, not cries! His screams are so much louder than Alex’s ever were! It’s crazy!

So I was thinking about Anthony and his fits… When he came to us today he had been crying as well… I think I have figured it out… he was taken from playing in there with toys and his roommates… I bet you anything he was mad and throwing a fit, because they had to get him dressed for us!! I am sure that he is the baby in the room with the loudest scream so when he cries, he gets what he wants just so he doesn’t disturb the other babies! I am sure he knows it, and uses it whenever he can! I am sure a couple of you reading our blog can relate… at least I can think of a couple… Hahaha!

Olga our coordinator came with us this morning… it was nice to see her… we haven’t seen her very much this trip… not that we need to but we love her! She is so sweet and smart! She knows a lot more English than she lets on… she is always saying, “sorry, for my English!” but we think she understands and says it pretty good! On the way to the babyhouse this morning , I mentioned how quiet it was outside… not so many cars and people going around… she said that since it was the weekend, that maybe a lot of people were having a rest at their country homes. She told me it is a tradition for families to have little homes in the country and that Misha doesn’t agree that people should rest there… they should take trips to rest other places… as in vacations… like we do! :) I thought that was funny! I asked about how many people have the summer houses… they think probably 50%!!!! That is a lot! I asked if they have to pay taxes and if it is very expensive she said a few hundred… I was thinking Tenge… but maybe she meant dollars! I don’t know… Hopefully tenge! :)

They took us home, where Alex went to bed and I answered some emails and Jerry worked on our next Money School class. We have a class that we are teaching at church about a week or so after we return. We have been doing some preparation for that so we will be ready! It’s going to be really good! I can hardly wait to teach this next class… Our first class was about what the Bible has to say about money and what our attitude toward money should be! It was really good and I hope that we can make a difference!

So Misha picked us up… no Olga… no problem. We went back to the babyhouse and we brought Anthony outside to play… He was still in a naughty mood, because he kept trying to crawl over to the dirty floor, than he would turn and look at us, as he scratched on the board! We brought bubbles today! That was actually really fun! Anthony really like them… he would watch them and if the were close enough he would try to grab them. It was very cute! It was much cooler today since it rained… it is only supposed to be in the 80s this week so far… I hope it stays cool! I am sure the court room is not Air Conditioned… so we will be needing several layers of deodorant!! Haha! Oh dear… Pre-court is tomorrow! So Anthony was just a mess this afternoon too… we don’t really know what he wanted other than to scratch on the dirty boards, but he threw several fits! We didn’t even know what to do with him… if we held him, he screamed, if we did anything else with him he screamed… he seemed to want to lay on his back on the floor… I don’t know, but we were trying to be very serious and straight faced and say “No! that is naughty!” and he would look at us and smile! What a squirt!!! Again we were happy to take him back to his room… I hope he gets some sleep of whatever he needs to be happier tomorrow.

You see, it is not that we don’t want him when he is fussy and screaming, we do very much so, but we do not want him screaming so much that the staff of the babyhouse comes out and gets after us, for whatever reason… we don’t want them thinking he doesn’t like us… he does… and we love him with all of our hearts already! So he is our kid and we are going to take him home! Soon!!!

We had Misha drop us at the Atrium to have dinner at MacJohns. We had the usual… a Frise sandwich for Jerry and a small pizza and coleslaw for Alex and I… we all shared a fries as well… and we tried some cherry juice tonight too… it was really good actually! At most of the restaurants they have Kaz’s version of MTV playing all the time… So Alex of course can hardly keep his eyes off of it… it’s frightening the dancing and partially naked women he has seen on there… But the dancing is what he really likes! He should have some new moves to teach Aunt Bonnie when we get home! I am hoping he forgets all the partially naked people… It is absolutely impossible to keep his eyes off of it… (the Kamelot is the only place without TV on all the time). Then we headed home and walked down the brick walkway from the Atrium toward the main street. Alex likes to chase the pigeons that hang out there…

We had the pictures for the judge printed tonight across the street at Ex-Photo. It only took a few minutes! We printed one each of our house and the baby’s room, then a profile of Anthony, a couple of his whole body and a couple of his face, as well as a family shot. All of those the Judge can put in the file for Anthony!

Tonight we will go over all the stuff they are going to review in pre-court tomorrow so we won’t feel so nervous! Then go to bed early!

Bubbles and NO More Stacking Cups!

The boys having a short ride! This is the last picture that you will see of those stupid stacking cups until we get home...
Walking around the room trying to stay out of trouble!
Whoa!!!!! Bubbles!!!
Those things are cool!
I like these things!
I can never catch one though!
Mommy's pinching my ticklish legs!
Trying to start a fit because mommy won't let me go on the dirty boards!!
I am not really sure what was going on here, but it looks like trouble!

Checking out the feet again!

A very pretty intense rose blooming outside the babyhouse! These people have roses everywhere! I need to get seeds for these roses... Mine almost always die over winter! Uralsk is colder than Michigan I am pretty sure!

Passport Photo and Fits! (day12)

This morning we got to the babyhouse and there was one open spot out front under the awnings… so we grabbed it… Olga reminded us that the photographer was coming today to take Anthony’s passport picture. She must have told us yesterday during our meeting about court… but I didn’t hear her and Jerry forgot to tell me… I think I was doing something with Alex and missed that part of the conversation! So we were there only a few minutes and the guys came… same guy as last time with the same ancient camera… poor guy! We went inside, Alex stayed out with Misha, and we had to hold Anthony up in front of the wall… oh my was that difficult… since he can not sit up on his own I had to support him and hold him up high enough to be in front of the plain white wall… Jerry and Olga tried to get him to look at the camera… but that was impossible!!! He was trying to look around the photographer to see Olga and then the other side to see daddy… the photographer was waiting take the picture when Anthony was looking directly at the camera! He had to take 5 pictures!!! It doesn’t sound bad, but it took so long for him to take one picture that this was a good ten minute process… seemed longer! He had to load him film in the camera and he had to manual advance the film! He had a little reflector and a flash that he stuck on top of the camera! I was so surprised to see such old stuff… but it was the same stuff as he had last time… Although Alex was much easier to take a picture of (almost 2 years ago) he could sit up on his own! By the time we walked out of the room we were all sweating like crazy! It was that blasted hot Music room!!! :) we went out and played for a while,
Finally Anthony got tired though and fell asleep… he fell harder asleep than the last couple times, though, because he let his thumb fall out of his mouth and both hands went down to his sides! He sleeps with his little mouth hanging wide open! It was so cute!! We took some pictures and jerry practiced all the stuff he has to memorize for court! Yikes! Then it was time to go in… Olga said I could take him in and lay him in his bed. Woohooo!!!!

We thought that we wouldn’t get to go into his room. But Olga got the Doctor and she came in a gave us a “tour” They have a play room and a bedroom. We could take pictures of the play room but not the bedroom, because all the babies were sleeping… but they let us take a picture of his crib and him in it… ok… so I laid him down and he woke up and looked scared and started SCREAMING!!!! Oh my! I felt horrible… he was waking all the other babies up! There was a pacifier in his crib so the caregiver tried to give it to him and he just kept screaming… so she ran out and got a bottle… looked like apple juice, but could have been tea… that quieted him down… I can hardly believe how loud he screams! Little squirt… There are 11 babies in his group right now. So the room is full of babies! So cute! They had all been passed out in their cribs! Until loud screamer boy came in! Good grief! So anyways… back to the rooms. Their rooms are very nice and perfectly clean and organized! There were a couple play pens in the play room and a rug and a cushioned mat. Very very nice… not a home, but very nice anyways! The caregivers all seem very sweet in there too. Then the doctor offered to show us the cribs that we bought last time as our donation. Six of them were in the infant room, the youngest babies, and four of them in Alex’s old group. They also had enough money left over from the cribs that they purchased a couple smaller playpens and 2 stoves for the kitchen! Goodness! We only gave them about $1400 last time! This time we are not going to be able to give even close to that much, but we are waiting to see what they need. Hopefully the doctor has a list of medicines that she could use. We were not able to take any pictures of the cribs that we had bought but we did see them and just maybe Anthony slept in one, as well as some of our friends’ children! That was very rewarding to see babies sleeping in them!

So we headed off to the indoor playground again… Erik and Birgit (the Belgian friends) had invited us to meet them there today, so yesterday the other couples called and wanted to meet us there after our afternoon meeting, so we had told them that we were actually already going there at lunch time… they wanted to come too! So everybody was there! I guess 3 other families from Canada were coming in today or tomorrow… and I think some families from Germany were coming in this weekend too, so there will be a lot of families her pretty quick! We leave here next Sunday, and Erik and Birgit are supposed to leave Monday right after us… the other couples… I am not so sure about… I think one is supposed to leave this week and the other is still in the bonding period so it will be a little while for them still, at least they will have some company after we all leave. Birgit said little Askhat is doing better now… she said the first few days were hard… he didn’t want to sleep and he was just kind of out of sorts, but now he is doing pretty good and sleeping all night and eating well, and happy… today I saw him grinning like a crazy baby and looked across and his daddy was smiling at him and saying things to him from across the table! That was so sweet. He seems to be very happy and he smiles pretty easily now… they said he hardly smiled for them at the babyhouse.

We had lunch… pizza today… we ordered a Marguerita pizza which should be tomatoes and cheese you know… well… it had tomatoes and cheese alright… along with Blue Cheese! It was so strong… I don’t really care for blue cheese anyways… so I will not be getting that again! :) After eating one piece Alex was off to the play room! and he played in there almost until time to go.
When Misha and Olga picked us up, she had the pictures for Anthony’s passport… oh my does he look crazy!!! It is hilarious! He looks mad and scared and curious all at the same time… he is going to hate it one day! We all were laughing! If I remember… when we get it, I will take a picture of it and post it… your going love it!

Back to the babyhouse… we sat under one awning that had a rug left on it… it is so much better when you can sit on a rug and then put your blanket or sheet over that. So we played… Alex had to have his usual potty break… he seems to have to go in there every time we are there! Jerry practiced his court stuff again… The main thing that happened this afternoon is that jerry was Laying on the floor… he had some of the stacking cups… that he had stacked on the side of his face… I know he is goofy… but he was trying to get Anthony to see them… but Anthony already had a blue on in his hand was trying to chew on it and stuff… he just was not seeing the cups on jerry’s face… I took the cup out of his hand and stuck it on Jerry’s’ head too… figuring he would follow his cup and then see the others and go knock them down… Oh NO! he let out a piercing scream instantly, and didn’t even see where his cup went he was so mad… then he went into full crying! Oh brother! I picked him up, made him look at me an told him “No!” and just told him that was naughty to scream like that and just kept looking at him… Jerry sat up and told him no as well. And we were both very serious faced and pretty soon he was just looking at us… I could tell that he knew he was “in trouble.” That was interesting… so I took the stacking cups and put them away… and I just held him for the rest of the time… Soon Olga came and took him away… We packed up our stuff and just then who came walking in? the Judge’s son, Damir! It was funny! He wanted to chat more with us, and apparently Olga had brought him some English books to help him study. So we talked for about 15 minutes about stuff… he is going to Almaty in one week to try to get his Visa to go to England and then he will go to England in September. We chatted about the economy in Kazakhstan and the opportunities that they have here to make money, by way of business and “new ideas.” So then we decided that he will come again on Monday afternoon… He thought that our meeting was at 4-5 so he was coming at 4 but our visit is 3-4, so Monday he will come at 3 instead, so we have an hour to chat. Jerry is going to give him a crash course in personal finance! This should be fun!

We then came straight home because Luba and Helen were coming for a photo-shoot around 4:30-ish… but they never showed up… slackers… we were going to do the photo-shoot and then take them to dinner at Kamelot… finally at 7:45 we went to Kamelot without them. Oh well…. It’s 10:30 and we still haven’t heard from them.

Olga called and she had something come up and won’t be able to come with us tomorrow to the babyhouse and stuff, so on Monday afternoon we will go to the seed store. Just think… Monday afternoon, pre-court will be over!!!! Yay!!!!

Anthony's Room.

Notice Alex's hair?... he needs to come home so I can buzz it again...
This is priceless! You see Alex holding down Anthony's hand? He was keeping him from grabbing daddy's notes. I am ready for my horrible passport photo!
You can see my little pipsqueak legs!

Sleeping... and still sucking... Out cold!
Really out cold!
Still sleeping, all the way in, upstairs and through several doors...
The playroom for his group which have typically been babies from 5-10 months.... so he should have been in here for 2 months already.
Large playpen and little playpen. As well as the door into the bedroom!

Putting our sleeping angel down into HIS bed...
The scared wake-up!
The mad screaming fit!
Caregiver to the rescue with a bottle of something!
His bed is along the interior wall... next to the playroom. We were thinking the empty bed in the front might have been Askhat's!

Playing with stacking cups... before the screaming fit!

what a mess!

The Judge's Son (day13)

Today was fun… we found out when we have pre-court! Olga told us we have pre-court on Monday at 10am! Woohoo! Maybe that means we will have court on Tuesday, but maybe Wednesday… we’ll see. The judge had a favor to ask of us… his son is leaving for London this fall to study English and he wanted him to come by the babyhouse today and chat with us and practice his English! We thought it was so funny… we were given a special chance to “brown nose!” It should be interesting…

Olga had Anthony’s book of questions, so I read that on the way to the babyhouse… there was some interesting stuff in there as well as his birth mother’s name! His schedule and what he eats and just some stuff about his baby life.

When we got to the babyhouse, Anthony was not in his room so we found him outside with his caregivers… covered from head to toe all in white! No wonder he is so pale, he doesn’t get any sunshine!! All the covered floors were in use, so we went inside… oh my, was it hot in there! Anthony could “crawl” around a bunch in there and check out all kinds of stuff! I check with Olga on the pictures we should bring to court… we need the ones that make Anthony look the worst… basically it pleads the case that he is unhealthy and unhappy and needs to leave the babyhouse as soon as possible… It was hard to pick out unhealthy looking ones, but I found a couple and there are several where he is grumpy looking… then a family picture, where Anthony is definitely looking grumpy… The judge will attach these to Anthony’s file as well as a photo of our house and the baby’s room. Then I showed her the excel program that Jerry made for our garden plan… I showed her the different type of tomatoes and other plants we are growing… She told us that they have a small seed store here in town and she will take us there on Sunday after our afternoon visit. She also asked if we could send her some seeds from our collection. I promised that I would send some over… maybe with a near future family. She was telling me about a tomato that they have that has a really long shelf life! Until January!!! I can hardly believe that! That would be cool! She is going see if her mom has any seeds right now… :) I am pretty excited about the seed store!

On to Anthony… he explored quite a bit, and he can move pretty fast, dragging his little behind around on the floor! It’s hilarious! We were just so hot in there! If we held Anthony it was too hot… he was even sweating! We just played… pretty soon Alex pulls over the chair and says he wanted to “talk” to us! It was so cute!!! Then he and Jerry went on to have a little conversation that started like this… “Hi! I’m Alexander.” Jerry: “ so tell me about when you were a baby…” Alex: “I was in my room in the babyhouse” and it just continued!!! It was the cutest thing ever… Actually last night, late… while Luba was still here, I could tell Alex was still awake listening to us… so I went in to remind him to go to sleep… he was wide awake! He whispered, “mommy, I need to talk to you.” I could not resist… so I got him out of his crib and we laid down on the twin bed in there and we chatted for a few minutes… about home… he is missing home, too. We talked about the gardens and Tiger and Romeo and if the blueberries were ripe yet ad how tall his pole beans might be on his teepee in the back yard. He wants to get some shoes for Anthony so Anthony can go in his teepee with him. We talked about swimming in the pool when we get home and sleeping in his bed with Anthony in his bed across the room! I don’t remember what else we talked about… It was priceless!

There was NO falling asleep for Anthony today… he could hardly stand to have his eyes off of us for a moment! He was fussy when he wasn’t getting exactly what he wanted. Such a mess… so we just kept him moving!

After our visit we went to the grocery store. We needed toilet paper, diapers, bread, pierogis, eggs, garlic, water… stuff… this grocery is so nice… it is in a very large, new mall. There is even a parking garage, when you walk in you ride the flat escalator up a couple levels… you can take a grocery cart up these flat escalators! It’s very cool. The eggs I bought were in a plastic bag… I thought that was funny!!! We came home and Alex napped.

We went to the babyhouse and were determined that we were playing outside this afternoon. Alex watched vegietale and Anthony played with us… he was very vocal today!!! He said “dadadada” a little but mostly it was this funny whiny sounding “aaaaahhhhhhhh!” so we chatted with him! He had a lot to say today! He did NOT want to relax and lay back on us! No way!!! He was tired however! He seemed to be especially interested in his toes today… I don’t think he can normal reach his toes very easily… I can not bend his toes up and touch his nose for example… he just isn’t very flexible… but think it is the miotonic syndrome thing… he is so stiff… he seems to be getting more flexible though! So that was neat to see! I took a few more pictures of his and Alex’s feet together! My my my… I forgot how while he really is!!!! He has some new bug bites on his left little arm! Poor kid… I wonder what kind of bug is nibbling on him while we are not there! The bites stay around quite a while… that’s all I know! I photographed his rash on his head too… poor kid!

The son of our judge showed up. His name is Damir, and he is cute… probably around 19 or twenty. I forgot to take a picture of him… Maybe we will see him again… who knows! He asked about Anthony a bunch and about Alex… and then I think he said he has been in Astana for 2 years studying medicine. He is going to England to study English and take some more medical courses. He is hoping that he really learns English better there! I am sure he will… he said he was concerned about getting there and then finding a bunch of people who speak Russian! He said he didn’t want to go all the way there just to speak Russian all the time! He wants to hear English! He was very friendly and outgoing! We really enjoyed talk with him. Jerry asked him what sports he likes… he looked like he was into sports… we found out that he isn’t so much into sports like most boys… his dad is disappointed that he doesn’t like soccer like all the other boys… he likes them ok, but he prefers to play computer games and video games… then Jerry told him that he (Jerry) was into off-road racing and riding quads… His eyes lit up and he got so excited… go figure… our judge that we are going to sit in front of in a few days scared out of our minds… has a son that is really into riding “quadrocycles” So they talked excitedly about Baja 100 last year and we told him about getting Dust To Glory to watch sometime. He said he was definitely going to look for it… probably have to find it in England though in English… he told us that he did not take English in school but he learned it from watching English movies and playing his games that he does… he said when he was a kid… 12… the first quads came to Kazakhstan and he of course couldn’t afford one, because they were soooo expensive, but he worked and saved him money to buy a small one ad he rode that on a small track over and over and over! He just loves it!!! It was so cute to see him get so excited! Then Olga reminded us that we needed to go to meet the other Olga… Damir said he hoped to see us again someday… so I gave him my card and he could email us and maybe we will see him in England someday. Then he was quite interested in our Weed Free garden Bed business… so Jerry told him about that real quick and he thought that was pretty neat that we had a website and all. Just when we were getting into our cars, I realized we didn’t take a picture of us! Oh well… :)

We came home and Olga was waiting for us to go over Pre-court and court… It was long… we have a lot of stuff to memorize… we cannot take any notes in with us this time… Poor Jerry has to do most of the talking… we are scared!!! :) it will be fine I know, but we are still scared! Pre-court will be an hour. Court will last about 2 hours! *sigh* Pray for us!!! :)

Feet!

Our shoes while we visit. Just cute!!!
Just talking...
Brown and white!
Big and little!
Long little toes!
Heat rash!
TOES!!!!!
Bug bites!
Happy baby!