Vlad Day 6 – Visit number 4

Yesterday was another great visit. I think we are all getting tired of the visiting room though. It is causing us to get very creative in coming up with new games to play. One of the caregivers walked through just after the lil guy had done something really neat and Justin and I were saying high piat (piat is 5 in Russian). He loves to give us high piats and low piats. The caregiver must have thought this was cute or we were completely nuts because she got a huge smile as she left the room. So today was his day for manipulating me a bit :o) He loves to drink water from a water bottle we have kept in our bag. From what we gather from other families, the children in the baby homes and orphanages do not get a lot to drink. They pretty much drink with their meals and that is it. This of course is to keep bathroom trips and wetting to a minimum. So we try not to let him have very much of the water. Well he picks up the bottle and looks at me for more. I say Nyet (no) and shake my head. He says Spaseeba MaMa (thank you MaMa) and tilts his head and gives me a grin with a twinkle in his eye. How can I resist that!?! He knows how to play us.

After leaving, Lana asked us if we had made our final decision to adopt him. We of course said absolutely and that we would just go ahead and bring him home now. She giggled and said that that is what everyone says. I have no doubt! We then had to go back downtown to the city of Vlad to go to the notary. This was to make it official that we will adopt him and to sign a very important paper that will take him off the registry so that he will not be adopted by another family. Lana took us to a few shopping places downtown and then we treated her and the driver to Baskin Robbins. She said, “The we-there not so good for ice cream.” Justin explained that the weather is ALWAYS good for ice cream. She couldn’t argue with that.

I guess we will not be able to share his Russian or English names on the blog until everything is final in court after trip two. Sorry about that!

Today is our last day here. We will leave in a bit to visit the little guy. We will work with Lana to try to explain what is happening the best we can to a three year old. I am praying to God this morning that he give me the strength to keep my emotions in tack until after we leave the baby home, and also that he gives the lil guy peace in knowing that we will return soon. He knows no life other than the baby home. He has never spent one minute outside of institutional living. For the next couple/few months, we pray that he falls back into his routine and he is content. Of course selfishly we would like to think that he will miss us, but for his sake we hope that he does not.

We leave Vlad today to fly to Seoul then to LA then to Chicago. We will get on the morning train in Chicago and arrive home in Macomb at 10:30ish a.m. on Saturday – assuming we have no traveling drama. It will be a hard day for us, but we know that we are coming back to two amazing children, tremendous family and friends and that helps a great deal.