Paul & Jessica's Adoption - Journey to Ukraine and Back

Seaworld and Melbourne in April

2008-05-09T15:35:00.005-04:00

We visted Jessica's sister to meet her new baby, Violet! Congratulations April and Julio! We went to Seaworld one day since it was so close by and the boys just loved it. The dolphin show and the little Shamu roller coaster were the big hits. There is a big climbing area (with lots of small holes) that we all went in that ended up being a little challenging for Mama and Papa. We did not cover 1/2 of the park as it is so huge with so much to do and see, so we'll need to go back.

Lowry Park Zoo in April

2008-05-09T15:31:00.010-04:00

We visited the Lowry Park Zoo in Tampa after hearing so many rave reviews from our friends. It really is a great zoo/kids park with all sorts of rides and things to do. The first picture was at the skunk exhibit (P-U). The boys enjoyed riding a camel and horse as well as the kids' rides. We finished the day with some water fountain fun.

Easter in Melbourne

2008-05-09T15:08:00.020-04:00

Easter was very special with Jessica's family. The boys highly anticipated gettting their Easter basket from the Easter bunny. They were very curious about how big he was and why he brought and hid eggs. On Saturday we went to the beach (which had a great playgound too) with Jessica's sister and the boys' cousins. Afterward we got James and Vitali a haircut
in Melbourne Beach at a chic salon, they did a super job!

Easter morning was really fun. Within 5 minutes they ate the treats in their baskets, much like Christmas. The boys really enjoyed hunting for Easter Eggs with their cousins despite the rainy weather. After the hunt we all went to the zoo which had a special dinosaur exhibit. The spitting dinosaur was their favorite along with feeding the parakeets. This zoo also has the cutest pretend animal hospital which the boys really had fun with. Afterward we all enjoyed a great Easter dinner mde by Grandpa and Grandma.

Mini Cruise in February

2008-05-09T14:42:00.011-04:00

We have been very slack bloggers, haven't we? In February we went on a short cruise to the Bahamas. The boys were so excited, they asked about it for weeks beforehand. When we were finally on board, they were so tickled they couldn't stop smiling. The picture of Mama and Papa was taken by James - we were impressed. The first stop was at a private island where we explored, looked at fish, and relaxed. The boys found a little hill of sand to roll down - see video on bottom of the post. The next day the ship docked at Nassau and we went to Atlantis to see the aquarium. The hammerhead sharks and sawfish were definately the highlight of the aquarium. We then walked to the beach which was the first time the boys saw real waves crashing on a beach. They played at the shore for at least an hour before digging in the loose sand. They both are adventerous eaters and liked to try all of the different foods. It's funny, but they seem to like the food we like (but less spicy of course). James said he wanted to stay on the ship when it was time to leave.

Fun in Seattle and Canada

2008-02-12T20:28:00.018-05:00

We went to visit Paul's family in Seattle and it was great to finally introduce the boys to everyone. We had 2 days in the Seattle area and while there visited Pike Market of course and even got a few inches of snow at Uncle Dale and Aunt Katherine's house which was unusual for that area. We then made the drive (about 5.5 hours) to Whistler in British Columbia, Canada, which was a great scenic drive. Too bad Vitali got car sick both ways - it may have been a bit too hilly for his tummy. The boys loved playing in the snow and even went to ski school one day. Mama and Papa got to ski for a few hours which was very exciting and a bit scary as it has been a couple of years since we've hit the slopes. No injuries to report, thank goodness. At the end of that day all of us took the lifts up to near the top of Blackcomb Mountain and back down (the boys are not quite ready for skiing down yet although James thinks he is). We all had a fabulous time and it was great to be able to take James and Vitali on their first skiing adventure. How cool!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

2008-01-06T18:49:00.000-05:00

December was a wonderful month for us...we went to Disney World again and all had the best Christmas of our lives at Grandma's house! We are looking forward to all of the growth, love, excitment, fun, happiness and new experiences that will come our way in 2008.

Thanksgiving and Two B-Day Parties

2007-11-28T15:47:00.000-05:00

Wow, we have been busy!

Last week we went to a friend's daughter's birthday party. The boys had a great time in the bounce house! James likes more of a "mosh pit" style bounce house experience which the other boys also apparently enjoy. There was also a clown that the boys had some reservations about until she painted spiders and webs on their faces, then they decided they liked her OK.

The long holiday weekend was very eventful, starting with Vitali's school Thanksgiving luncheon. Vitali was dressed as an Indian and participated in his school wide presentation - very cute. The masses of people and crowded line for food was too much for both boys to endure, so we all had Wendy's for lunch.

Then off to Melbourne where we stayed at Grandma's house and visited with Jessica's sister's family. The boys had a lot of fun playing with their cousins, Sydney and Owen. The boys were fascinated with the big Thanksgiving turkey and James wanted to carve it like Grandpa. Thanksgiving dinner was wonderfully delicious as usual. We are so thankful for Grandpa and Grandma who slaved for hours in the kitchen for us. We have a lot to be Thankful for this year. Our beautiful boys are number one on the list and have added so much joy to our lives. We are also Thankful for all of our family, friends and the boys' teachers who have helped our family through this transition time.

On Friday we visited the local zoo where they have Giraffes you can feed from an elevated boardwalk. James was into it but Vitali was happy just to watch. The zoo also had parakeets that you can give a fruit treat to which was lots of fun.

Sydney's 6th Birthday Party was on Saturday at a park on the water. What a nice day it was! The children had lots of fun playing at the park for hours and our boys made some new friends.

Now we are getting ready for Christmas. The boys love the Christmas tree and James has expressed an interest in flying with Santa in his sleigh. He has decided that the whole family should go on a ride with Santa - he said he will sit on Mama's lap and Vitali will sit on Papa's lap. He is still practicing saying the word "reindeer". The holidays certainly have become much more exciting for Mama and Papa!

Halloween and Disney World!

2007-11-07T16:08:00.000-05:00

Wow, what fun we have been having! Halloween was a big hit with the boys. They got into the spirit by playing at home in their Superman and Alligator costumes in the week before Halloween and then suited up in Buzz Light Year and Woody for the real event. Below is a video of 2 supermen. We did not show them their Buzz and Woody costumes (which Jessica could not resist when she saw them at the Disney store since the boys are big into "Toy Story") until Halloween and they were soooo excited to wear them. They quickly got the hang of Trick-or-Treating and James was asking to go home after about an hour. His reason for wanting to go home was so he could "eat all candy". Well, his dream of eating all of his candy did not come true but he did enjoy several pieces.

Last weekend we took the boys to Disney World - Magic Kingdom and EPCOT. They had been asking to "go to Mickey Mouse's House" so we went ahead and took the plunge. James was THRILLED to meet Mickey and gave all of the characters big hugs when he met them. Vitali followed James' lead as usual. It was very cute to watch them. It was not as cute reminding them not to touch other people or to not shake the chains so much that they hit other people while we waited in lines all day - but overall we had a great time. They also really enjoyed the pool and hot tub at the hotel. Their favorite ride was as you could have guessed - Buzz Light Year! Lucky for us the weather was great and Magic Kingdom was not crowded on Friday.

Now we are talking about Thanksgiving with the boys. They were sad to see the Halloween decorations go and we haven't gotten around to any Thanksgiving decor (other than left over pumpkins) so they are failing to see the thrill in Thankgiving. I told them that we will have a big dinner and James said that he wants a "little dinner". They will be excited to go to Grandma and Grandpa's house though!

Jessica's Birthday

2007-10-08T22:15:00.001-04:00

We all had a wonderful time on Friday picking a couple of pumpkins up at a nearby pumpkin market. The boys crawled and ran around while giggling for at least 1/2 hour. The boys are into fall/Halloween. They really enjoy going to Target's Halloween section where they like to be scared by the crazy animated decorations.

On Sunday Paul and the boys selected Jessica's birthday balloons with a Halloween theme in mind -James picked the black kitty. They(with Jessica's help of course) also baked cup cakes for Jessica's birthday cake. We had dinner at a Japanese Steak House which was very entertaining. The boys enjoyed eating with chopsticks and ate everything from the salad with ginger dressing to the soup to the rice and chicken. We never know what they will like. They especially liked the fire the chef made on the grill. After dinner Vitali could not get enough cup cakes but James was not so much into them - he is not a big cake eater. The boys had fun watching Jessica open her presents.

We are all really looking forward to Halloween in the neighborhood as Jessica has been coaching them on the Trick or Treat protocol. As of today both boys will be Superman. It's going to be a long wait for them to get to Halloween night.

Vitali's First Day of Pre-School

2007-10-02T12:20:00.000-04:00

Vitali started a morning program on Monday at a pre-school where he will attend a few mornings a week. He was very excited to take his lunch box to school. James did not have school that day (teacher in-service day at his school) so Mama and James both escorted Vitali to his classroom. He happily marched into his classroom and had a great day. Mama is happy about this as pre-school has really helped James.

James' 5th Birthday

2007-09-25T20:03:00.000-04:00

What an exciting day we had today (Sept. 25th). James started his day with his favorite breakfast of eggs and sausage and then took the birthday cupcakes that Vitali and Jessica made yesterday (see photos) to school. He had a great day at school and was thrilled to see his Mickey Mouse balloon when he got home. After dinner he enjoyed opening his gifts and his favorite part of his special day was blowing out his candles on his birthday cake. He was very happy with his leapster game, train set and books and even shared his new guitar with Vitali (though not very willingly). Vitali and Jessica went to the park this morning after dropping James off at school and Vitali had fun getting the birthday balloons with Mama. The boys are now busy playing with new Toy Story figures and watching "Little Einsteins" after having their bath. What a great day for all of us.

Preschool has been going very well for James and he is chattering in English more and more. Vitali will start a preschool program a few mornings a week starting in October which he is really excited about. The boys speak a mixture of English and Russian to each other these days and are most certainly adjusted to their American lives. They enjoy going the the library to check out books and continue to love swimming in the pool. They also still spend a lot of time jumping on a mattress we put down on the garage floor.

Our next big event will be Mama's birthday in October and then Halloween. We have been reading books about Halloween and will pull out the decorations next week. The boys are looking forward to wearing Superman costumes and saying "trick or treat". We can't explain how much joy these boys have brought to our lives and how lucky we feel to be a family!

First Day of Pre-School

2007-09-08T21:47:00.000-04:00

James had his first day of pre-school on Thursday (see first photo below - he has his bag of school supplies). We found what seems to be the perfect school for him. It is a small private school that teaches pre-K through grade 8. The teachers are very nice and everyone there has gone out of their way to make us feel welcome. James has enjoyed his first two days there, and his teachers say he is "florishing" in this environment. He had a smile on his face when Jessica and Vitali dropped him off, and a smile on his face when they picked him up. We are thrilled that he is enjoying his pre-school experience so far. Vitali has suggested that we find a "little" school for him since James' school doesn't have a class for children his age.

James is still working on swimming unassisted, however, has very quickly mastered mask and snorkel. Vitali finally decided that he was ready to swim (with his life jacket on) around the pool by himself. We want to get them both in swimming lessons when we have the opportunity. They both love the water and we look forward to when we can take James snorkeling where he can actually see some fish.

James lost his two lower front teeth last week which were getting loose when we left Ukraine. That makes three teeth total so he only has his upper front tooth left - this tends to make biting off chunks of food difficult. He did not know what to make of the tooth fairy after the first tooth, but caught on after the second. Papa explained how the tooth fairy flys in through the window at night while he is sleeping to take his tooth and leave him some money. The funny thing is that Papa used a chicken dance flapping motion instead of the standard fairy wing motion in his explanation. So now when James talks about the tooth fairy he does the chicken dance flap. We think he swallowed the second tooth while eating an apple since it was no where to be found. So he drew a tooth and put the paper in a cloth bag for the tooth fairy that time. In the morning he found a $1 coin and within 5 minutes was asking about where the third coin was for his tooth that was already gone when we met him. He is a bit of a negotiator.

James and Vitali are both chattering more and more in English and some of what they say is just priceless. They certainly keep us entertained and give us many reasons to smile each day. They like to watch "Little Einsteins" on TV and want Papa to make the car "blast off". James is now on a soccer team but refused to participate beyond the warm up excercise at the first practice. Paul has offered to help coach in hopes of encouraging James to play. We'll see how it goes this week. Jessica has started working with James on the computer which he loves - Vitali is starting out on a calculator which he is not happy about. It's amazing how much progress these boys have made in just 2 months!

Great Time at Grandma and Grandpa's

2007-08-21T20:29:00.000-04:00

Our trip to Grandma and Grandpa's house went great. We had a wonderful "Welcome Home" party with a big bounce house water slide and a fabulous cake. The boys loved playing on the water slide and everyone who came had a great time. We enjoyed seeing everyone and were especially glad that the 4 Ukrainian sisters from Gainesville were able to make the trip down to meet James and Vitali. James and Vitali had a great time meeting their cousins Sydney and Owen and they found out that Grandma and Grandpa's house is lots of fun. They both liked borrowing Owen's 4-wheeler.

Our lives have settled into a comfortable routine for all and we are so proud of the boys' progress. We have been out to dinner a few more times and are so glad that the boys can manage to sit nicely in their chairs and eat their meals. We have visited a few parks, a few friends' pools (they like the pool variety although they still enjoy their own pool at home) and an indoor bounce house park. They both have new big wheels that they enjoy riding "fast". They went to the dentist today and the dentist was very impressed with their behavior.

The most used English phrases by the boys are: "where is it?", "I found it", "I got it", and "Come here." They know a lot of animal names and food words and are always talking about what is "big" vs. "little" (especially in regards to each other). They seem to understand much of what we say and we think they will be saying much more in English soon. On the 3 occassions that we encounted a Russian speaker James was not so excited to hear his language - he acted as if the language had a negative association for him whereas Vitali doesn't seem to care either way although he intenty listed to the 4 sisters' Ukrainian nanny, just soaking it in. They are interested in learning and we are thinking that we may look at a very part time pre-school program for them soon.

Both boys are hooked on wearing their sunglasses and know all about sunscreen. A few weeks ago Vitali finally decided that he likes the dogs and they have fun taking the dogs for walks. James has started noticing letters and can count to 10 in English. He really likes reading books with Mama and Papa before he goes to bed at night. The queen mattress that came out of their bedroom was in the garage waiting for a new home and we decided to put it down on the garage floor for them to jump on. That was a great decision since it gives them a place to legitimately jump since they are constantly tempted by the furniture. We don't have any big plans on the agenda coming up...just James' birthday in Sept.

Making Major Progress

2007-08-06T21:41:00.000-04:00

(Paul writes as Jessica sleeps after another busy day)
After weeks of lots of love and working with the boys it seems as we have turned the corner and things are getting easier by the day. Both boys are fairly compliant now and are getting with the program. Even the food issues have gotten progressively better as they are more willing to give new and previously rejected foods a chance. Both boys now enjoy playing with Papa (without Mama), especially football tackling/WWF style wrestling on the front lawn. These little guys like to play rough.

After weeks of waiting our boys finally visited our pediatrician. We were reassured that both boys looked good and that a full battery of blood tests were necessary to check immunizations and to be on the safe side for other typical ailments often seen in children adopted internationally. The trip to LabCorp was not fun, especially for Papa who restrained both boys. The technicians who drew their blood were even better at their job than we could have imagined, but Papa was still rattled by the time it was all over. Of course neither boy showed any signs of being upset after only five minutes of playing with their new cars in the lobby (Mama's idea). Maybe Mama should have brought a new car for Papa too.

We were feeling adventurous so we took the boys to Macaroni Grill last week around 5pm to avoid the crowd. We were impressed that their excellent behavior that we had observed in Ukraine restaurants had not changed. We took them to Sanibel Island by boat this weekend and played in the sand and tide pools, they loved it even though it was hot. Afterward we went to our favorite casual resturant, The Lazy Flamingo, and then Dairy Queen for some plain vanilla softserve ice cream cones. That went so well, we can see that we will be going again soon.

This last picture we had to post as this really cracked us up. James wanted to ride his bike outside but wanted to keep wearing his Superman (he calls it Kusitman)pajamas on - cape and all. We thought "why not?" So he happily rode around the driveway in his PJs.

Their English is really coming along and we think they understand a lot of what we say to them. Some of the English words they are using are so heavily accented or are new sounds they are developing that it is hard not to smile when they use them as it is sooooo cute.

We had a really great and fun weekend with the boys and are looking forward to the experience we will have with them next weekend when we take them to Jessica's parent's house in Melbourne. We have been home for one month now and are hopeful that the boys are ready for the excitement of this out of town trip. We have eased them into activities outside of the home and think they are ready...we'll see.

Another Busy Week

2007-07-25T21:57:00.000-04:00

(Paul writes as Jessica pays bills)
Last week we bought a double jogging stroller which Jessica has been very happy with. Both boys hurry to strap themselves in which cracks us up as they are then immobilized. We have taken the boys to a small nearby park which seems so kid friendly and glamorous compared to the playgrounds of the orphanages and parks in Ukraine - there's no broken equipment or sharp edges at our playgrounds. From our trips to the park we have learned that neither boy has ever been on a swing long enough to know how to swing as neither kick their feet and lean back - so we are teaching them how.

Something that we really enjoy is watching the joy on the boys' faces everytime they put on their clothes or shoes and try new activities, especially if it is the first time. Papa bought the boys their own pair of polarized sunglasses, a must for the young fishermen. We all went on the boat for a short ride down the Caloosahatchee River last weekend and had a great time. James has been practicing diligently with his fishing pole (Thank You Brian and Sunni). Maybe this weekend we will try a little spotted seatrout and mangrove snapper fishing to get them started. We have all been having a great time together!

A Busy Week With the Boys

2007-07-16T21:36:00.000-04:00

(Paul writes as Jessica turns in early after a full day with the boys and a sore throat & cold)

No, we have not forgotten our blog readers, we have just been a little busy starting the acclimation process with the boys. Our first day back seems like it was a dream as we were so sleep deprived. The next few of days our internal clocks adjusted from all of us getting up at 4pm to just yesterday where everyone slept until 7am. The boys are also adjusting to life at home in our family and a new schedule. They are making great strides and they continue to amaze us. They are both picking up English words quickly - Jessica has been working with them with mostly flashcards and books and occasionally Baby Einstein videos during the day. They are turning out to be somewhat picky eaters, more so Vitali. Sometimes they like to tell each other how they do not like the food and what they think it tastes like (use your imagination) at the table. We try to ignore it. They do try just about everything we put in front of them, which we are happy to see. We are often surprised about what they like and don't like. For example, they do not like Cream of Wheat (sweetened of course), but do like baked ziti with spagetti sause - go figure.

Both boys really like the pool, Paul predicts that James V will be swimming unassisted within a month, with his brother close behind. The boys also love to ride their tricycles which were handed down to us by a good samaritan neighbor. We also have bikes w/training wheels on loan from a good friend, but the trikes seem to be a good place to start.

James V has been doing very well with Max (our 5lb Yorkie), he likes to play fetch with him and is very gentle. Unfortunately Vitali was terrified of the dogs at first, but he is starting to want to get closer and retreats when he reaches his comfort level. So we have been carefully limiting contact between Vitali and the dogs by shuffling the dogs between the patio/fenced back yard and the dog's room. Everyone seems happy with this arrangement as we let Vitali decide when he is ready for full time dogs.

WE MADE IT HOME!!!

2007-07-08T21:27:00.001-04:00

(Paul writes while Jessica opens mail)
After enduring some very long last fews days in Ukraine which included planes, a train, and various automobiles we are finally home with our boys. We had passport problems due to a change in a Ukrainian law and just bad timing. Fortunately for us, in addition to having Natalia and Roman working diligently for us we had the American Embassy in our corner and they went way beyond the call of duty to help us get the boys' visas to get home on our scheduled flight. Additionally, we had Aerosvit Airline ticket issues that we had to deal with at the Kyiv Airport that would have caused us to miss our flight if not for bad weather causing our flight departure to be delayed. When the plane took off we were in disbelief that we had all made it on board. At around 6pm on Saturday night we got to New York City JFK Airport and slept on a very comfortable bed on US soil. We arrived in the Fort Myers Airport at 10am this morning (on the 8th, see photo). We are sooooo happy to be home! The boys had fun meeting the dogs (James V. had more fun with that than Vitali) and all enjoyed some time in the pool. Overall they were thrilled to be at their new home. We are exhausted and and a bit overwhelmed. We are so thankful for the help we have had from our friends in preparing the house for our return. We will have to show you a picture of the boys' new room. We hope to catch you up on the last fews days in more detail once we catch our breath.

Only One More Day in Berdyansk

2007-07-01T05:24:00.000-04:00

The paperwork process will start up again on Monday afternoon and our lives will get hectic. Roman will arrive here on Monday afternoon and on Tuesday morning will travel to Zap. with our court decree. Monday afternoon we need to go to a notary with passport applications and take things to James's orphanage for his farewell party. Monday evening we will do the paperwork at the orphanage to sign James out and Monday night will be his last night he will spend in the orphanage.

We will pick James V. up on Tues. morning and travel 1.5 hours to meet Roman and do the boys' birth certificates in Guliaypole which will take about 2 hours. Then we will drive 1.5 hours to Zap. to do paperwork at Vitali's orphanage and then do passport stuff. Vitali will spend his last night in the orphanage and we will pick him up Wed. morning and all travel to Kiev. We hope to travel by plane which is 2 hours vs. the overnight train. It depends on the timing of things and availability of plane tickets, etc. Then Thurs. in Kiev we plan to take the boys for mandatory medical exams and then to a visa appointment. So, if all goes well and according to schedule, we will have Fri. free with the boys in Kiev. That's the plan. We may need longer in Zap. and may not be able to leave there until Thurs. We'll see how it all goes. We are really looking forward to arriving at home on Sunday - ONE WEEK FROM TODAY!

So, as you can see, our next week will be very busy. We are not sure if we will have a chance to do a lot of posting on the blog in the next week but will do our best to update you on our progress.

Here are a couple of photos of James's play area at the orphanage. The other day we found some adorable kittens and James enjoyed petting kitties for the first time. He was very hesitant at first to get too close to them. See also the photo of James enjoying a peach and a bottle of water. Yes, he was wearing a yellow headband that day. We noticed a few of his buddies had them on too. He was looking pretty cute. We are not sure if he understands that we are leaving soon with him because we have not had a translator here for 2 weeks. He and Vitali are in for their first big adventure very soon!

Visit with Vitali

2007-06-29T05:42:00.000-04:00

We had a great time visiting with Vitali. His new favorite thing to do is pull his truck around with a string. We made several laps around the building looking at the dog behind the fence (there is a HUGE black and white dog that lives at the orphanage in a fenced area that all the kids seem to be scared of), smelling the flowers, looking for the kitties and cars (he seems to have an obsession with "machinas" which is Russian for cars) and making sure his cargo/doll stayed in the bed of his truck. It was fun. His friend Anastasia who is in his group and is being adopted by a family from Atlanta, has a truck that she pulls around too and sometimes they like to trade for a while. It's very cute. He's had a cold (and so have Mama, Papa and James V.) but wasn't letting that slow him down. He was not happy about going back to his group, he really wanted to stay outside and play with us. We think he was enjoying his freedom. He repeats phrases and words after we say them so we think he will be learning English fairly quickly.

Between visits we stopped at the open market near the orphanage and a pig head caught Paul's eye. We couldn't think of a good use for it so we decided not to buy it.

Paul Gets a Haircut

2007-06-26T10:39:00.000-04:00

Paul feels like a new man after getting his first Ukrainian haircut. He found it a pleasant surprise that it is not necessary to speak Russian to get a hair stylist to do just what you ask for with your hair. Here are his before and after photos. Afterward he decided he needed some dried salted shrimp - just kidding, but they are available from street vendors (see photo). Although we are very adventurous with the food here, we have not worked up the nerve to try these.

James is still having a great time riding on Papa’s shoulders. He belts out children’s songs in Russian or just makes up his own “La, La, La” song while picking cherries from the cherry trees. He even picks cherries for Mama and Papa to eat. See the picture below, his face and fingers are stained with cherry juice. He is such a delightful child. He really likes fruit and has learned to say “banana” perfectly. When we arrived yesterday to visit with him he was just getting up from his nap. All of his buddies scurried around to help him get dressed and to collect his toys to send him off to play with us. It was such a precious thing to watch.

We had dinner at the Potato House again (we can’t seem to stay away) last night. We took a photo so you can get a feel for the place. We have been to the Pizza Place next door so many times that they offered us a discount card that works at the Potato House too. They even issued one to us without us having an address. They are really nice.

Tomorrow we are off to Zap. to visit with Vitali. We can’t wait to see him. We will spend the night there on Wed. so that we can get in 4 visits with him (2 each day). The sun is shining here and the weather is just perfect. We’ll all be home in 12 days. Thanks to everyone for continuing to think of us!

Recent Highlights

2007-06-24T04:45:00.000-04:00

Above are a couple photos of our last visit with Vitali. We hated to leave him there and wished he could come with us back to Berdyansk. While we were in Zap. our driver took us to see a Kossak village/outdoor museum type deal and we have included a picture of that above.

James's new favorite game is to ride on Papa's shoulders while he happily sings a song and directs Paul which way to walk (see photo above). We covered the whole orphanage grounds this way and found some cherry and blackberry trees. James had a great time picking and eating them while conveniently up so high.

Our other recent events/comments include:
-We had a lady do our laundry which is actually thrilling - we had nothing clean left to wear since we don't have a washing machine or drying rack thus making washing clothes in the bathtub not such an appealing task.
-We got fresh towels finally at the hotel which believe it or not is also notable.
-We had dinner with Joy and her daughter (American family here adopting 4) and enjoyed their company. Only other Americans can understand the types of things from home that we miss.
-It has been windy and sunny outside and there are people on the streets selling fresh fruit (cherries, apricots, berries, etc.)
-There are 2 adorable little girls at James's orphanage that we would love to bring home with us too, but we suppose we should just come back with 2 this time.
-We will sign out James from the orphanage and leave Berdyansk with him around July 3rd and he will reunite with Vitali on July 4th and we will then sign Vitali out too. So, we will have both boys as of July 4th and will then all return to Kyiv.
-We'll be home in 14 days with our boys!!!

Court Date 6/19/2007

2007-06-21T05:04:00.000-04:00

It’s official, the boys will be ours after the 10 day wait period! The hearing lasted about 45 minutes with Roman (Natalia’s co-worker) there to interpret for us. The judge asked Paul several questions all of which covered the information in our home study, probably so that it would all go into the record. There were 2 jurors present along with the adoption inspector, the attorney for the orphanage, a few other city officials, and the orphanage care taker and James. Apparently there is a new rule in this region that requires adoptive children that are old enough to know what is going on to be at the hearing. James sat on Jessica’s lap outside of the judge's office/courtroom while waiting for the hearing to begin but then refused to enter the courtroom. The hearing was held with him out in the hallway with his care giver and then toward the end of the hearing the judge wanted him to come in the room but he just plain refused. Several people tried to coax him to go in (they even gave him candy) buy he wasn’t going for it.

So, the hearing went on and afterwards we found out that the care taker had taken him back to the orphanage. The poor little guy was just terrified of the whole thing. Requiring a young child to attend a court hearing is not such a great rule in our humble opinion. Anyway, after waiting 10 minutes in the hallway we were called back in to hear the favorable decision that we were hoping for. The judge told us that we had enough money to take good care of the boys and that she hoped that we had enough energy too.

The 10 day appeal period began the day after and since it ends on a Ukrainian holiday, our official 10 day wait period will end on July 2nd. On July 3rd the court judgment will take effect and then we can proceed with the final details (getting new birth certificates, passports, a medical exam and a visa appointment) that need to be accomplished to bring the boys home. Based on the estimation of time it will take to complete these tasks in all of the different cities we have to travel to, we scheduled our flight from Kiev to JFK on July 7th. Unfortunately because of our late afternoon arrival time in JFK we can not get a flight home to Fort Myers until the next morning on July 8th. It looks like we’ll be spending the night at the JFK hotel.

Here’s a photo of us in front of the courthouse in Berdyansk after our court hearing and also one of us at “the beach”. We were so happy to have the court hearing behind us.

After the hearing we went to visit James V. who acted a little sheepish when he saw us but after a hug from “Mama” and “Papa” (the titles that new parents automatically receive at the orphanage – additionally all of the kids call us that when we show up there) he was back to normal. We gave him some water “with gas” (that’s what they call the carbonated water that is very popular here) which he was delighted with and he called it “pivo” (beer). When another care taker asked him how court went upon his return he told her “I didn’t know what those people were talking about there and I did not want to go in there”. So after the court experience we now know for sure that James is a strong-willed child. We hope that he will be more excited about getting on an airplane than he was to enter the court room.

We are now in Zaporizhia where we visited Vitali yesterday twice yesterday and will visit with him twice again today before returning to Berdyansk. Vitali was happy to see us and enjoyed feeding his cookie to his new alligator (see photo below). He also has a fondness for baby dolls and likes to feed them as well. There is a little girl in his group who is being adopted by an American family from Atlanta who shared her new baby doll with him. The children are used to having only one toy (if that) to play with at a time so he gladly traded his alligator with her for a few moments with the doll. It was so cute. Vitali has a huge appetite and will happily eat any food that is offered to him.

We stayed in our favorite green hotel (we don’t know the name of it) in Zap. last night where we get VIP treatment. Natalia did some of the owner’s English homework the last time we were here (we think this has something to do with our VIP treatment). We always get the same room and last night were asked what we wanted to eat and what time we wanted our dinner and at 7PM at the requested time it was delivered to our table. They asked last night after dinner what we wanted to eat for breakfast and what time we wanted it served and this morning we got a knock on our door to let us know our breakfast was ready. We had ham and eggs, bread with cheese, OJ and coffee. Now if only the bed felt like it was made for VIPs. Here is a photo in front of the hotel - the man is our driver (Viktor) in Zap. who has asked if we can adopt him too.

The countdown begins - we will be home with our boys in 17 days!!!

Update & Some Pictures

2007-06-18T10:51:00.000-04:00

So, here's the update: We had dinner with an American family on Sat. night at "The Potato House" (a SW American themed potato restaurant - interesting concept)who is here to adopt 4 kids, ages 10, 12, 14 & 16. Wow. They were really nice and it was great to have an English conversation. We have tried to shop here in town for something for the boys to wear out of the orphanage. It has been a bit of a challenge. Where is Old Navy or Gap when you need it?! Other than visiting James V. twice a day and cruising "the boardwalk" at night, that's about it for the latest activities.

The last time we visited Vitali we met a few other American families who were visiting their children at the Sonechko (Sunshine) orphanage. One of them managed to get a good picture of all 3 of us, Wow! Paul and Vitali had fun that day playing in the playground in the bus - see the photo below. We visited James V. the past 3 days and have included a photo of him and Jess playing with his newest toy. We showed James V. a video of the dogs playing with a ball and he laughed and really liked it. I'm sure Max and Milo are very excited to meet the boys.

Here's a few photos of our latest "home". I believe we mentioned our hotel was very near the "beach", well here it is... Paul standing by the beach, Paul in front of our corner convenience store (they sell mostly beer), a picture of our hotel, and Jessica on the cell phone at the beach. All is a stone's throw from our hotel.

Tomorrow is our big court date. We believe everything is in place for the hearing. We think they will be taking James V. to the hearing which is a bit surprising to us. We hope it is a pleasant experience for him - and us. We will go to Zap. for Wed. and Thurs. to visit with Vitali. Thanks for continuing to comment and support us! The adventure continues...

Thursday and Friday...we think.

2007-06-15T06:45:00.000-04:00

It is hard to keep track of what day it is. The only days we know for sure are Sat. and Sun. because we can’t do paperwork. Thursday we visited James V. in the morning. We played with his Shrek puzzle and of course played ball outside with bubbles and the ball. I brought some stickers for the other kids in his group. They were all grouped around me with their little hands held up waiting to get their sticker on their hands. It was really cute. Occasionally if another child tries to get too much attention from us when we arrive James will remind them that we are HIS PARENTS. One little boy asked Natalia if we could take him with us too. When she told him “no” he asked her “well then will you bring me some parents too?” The children know we don’t understand a word we are saying but they still talk to us.

Natalia needed to return to Guliaypole for some papers that weren’t ready on Wednesday when she went there. Guliaypole is a very small town/village where the vital statistics are registered for the surrounding villages. The boys were born in a 2 different villages nearby. This is the village/town (see photo of vital statistics office) where the boys’ birth certificates are registered. Those papers needed to go to the administration office at the orphanage in Zaporizhia but by the time she would get there on Thurs. afternoon the office would be closed. So, we went with her so that we could take care of the papers on Friday when we visit Vitali and she went on home to Kiev.

We got to see Vitali on Thurs. afternoon. His group plays outside in the morning and afternoon since it is summer time and they can enjoy the good weather. We play in a separate area of the playground and he really enjoys the bubbles – he likes to blow the bubbles himself. He loves bananas – I have never seen a child eat a banana so quickly! We will visit him in the morning and afternoon on Friday. We will go to lunch and to the internet café in between visits and then will leave town around 5:30 PM.

We ended up renting 2 hotel rooms in different cities on Thursday night. We had settled in to the room in Berdyansk and did not have time or energy to pack everything and haul it to Zaporizhia for one night. We stayed at the same hotel in Zaporizhia that we had stayed in before – a small family-owned place where they are really nice and will cook for us. When we go back and forth from Ber. to Zap. we use the same driver, Victor, who lives in Zap. and drives to Ber. to get us. That is a lot of extra road time for him but he wants to drive us.

We will spend the weekend in Berdyansk and visit James in the mornings and afternoons. We hope to get together with an American family sometime this weekend who is in Berdyansk adopting 3 children. Our COURT DATE should be on TUES JUNE 19th if all goes well with the necessary paperwork. If things go as planned we should be able to return home around July 7th. So, keep your fingers crossed that all the papers and signatures and seals and approvals etc. fall into place for our court hearing. After our court date we will enter the 10 day wait period and then need to go to Guliaypole for new birth certificates, then to Zap.for passports (we think, we'll let you know), then to Kyiv for medical exams and visa appt. The boys will probably meet around July 2nd or 3rd...again, we'll let you know! What a process.

Berdyansk and the Boys

2007-06-13T10:54:00.000-04:00

Berdyansk is a beach town where many Ukrainians and Russians vacation. It is very small and casual with a large port. The smell of and the site of the water makes it feel like home for us so we are happy to stay here rather than in Zaporizhia which is much larger and a bit industrial looking. There are dried/salted fish stands along the roadside (see photo) and there is a summer carnival set up along the beachside. They nibble on the dried fish while sipping a beer and yes, we tried it -it tasted like salty fish jerky, not too bad. The summer carnival is very busy in the night time with adults and children enjoying the crazy rides and food/drinks. They even have break-dancers in the main square at night (see photo) and these guys are better than the guys in Kyiv, having more actual gymnastic talents.

Our hotel is about 100 yards from the “beach” which is water with a very narrow flat rock shore with some short stretches of sand. Many people swim in the water which is pretty calm, sometimes flat as a lake. We went in the water once so far and it was pretty nice. There are several open air flea markets here where people do a lot of their shopping for anything from fruit to flip-flops.

We have a standard hotel room that also has a small living room. We can not do any cooking but they do serve food out on the patio so we usually get some coffee and eggs at the hotel in the morning. Our hotel is about a 10 minute drive to the orphanage so we get a taxi 2 times per day. We are able to visit James V.’s orphanage in the morning and afternoon for about 2 hours. So, our routine when we are in town here will be to have breakfast, visit James from 9:30-11:30, have lunch, buy snacks for James’s group (it’s customary that adoptive parents bring snacks every day for all of the children in the child’s group – about 15 kids total), get whatever else we need to do done, visit James from 3:30-5:30, have dinner and walk around, get organized for the next day and then go to bed. We will visit Vitali in Zap. which takes from 7:30 AM to 8:30 PM probably every 3rd day.

Natalia is still chasing paperwork around. The paperwork is additionally complicated by the fact that both boys were born in a 3rd city that is 2 hours away. She went there today. Collecting, signing, sealing, turning in and shuttling all the different paperwork between 3 cities all 2.5 hours apart has kept her and us very busy. We hope to have things in order to get a court date by mid-week next week. She will be going back to Kyiv on Friday and then we will see her back here when we have our court date. She will then return here after we complete our 10 day wait which starts the day after our court hearing.

We were in Zap. Yesterday to visit Vitali who is really cute. He makes lots of very expressive faces and continues to talk about cars. When the child actually gets to ride in a car it will probably be his biggest thrill in life so far. We played with some bubbles and Vitali just loved it! He wanted to blow the bubbles himself and had a great time chasing them around. He also enjoys coloring (James is not so into the coloring). We brought a camo outfit for him which he found in my bag and promptly dressed himself in. When it was time for us to go he just changed right back into his orphanage garb.

We visited James V. twice today (June 13th) and he was thrilled to see us. Paul mentioned on our last blog how Vitali’s care-takers had described him and guess what, James’s care-takers described him the same way! We took him some new shoes today and he was so excited and marched around to show us how well they worked on his feet He is used to wearing sandals and we thought some lace-up shoes would be nice for playing ball outside with Papa. There is a little gym in the inside play room that he played on a bit today (see photo) and we also worked on a Shrek puzzle which he enjoyed. He would however way rather go outside to play. So, this afternoon we playe lots of ball outside and on the playground equipment. Like most boys he is full of life. He is also quite a climber. We have shown him video of Vitali and he points at the screen and says with a smile “Vitalic blah blah blah” (we don’t know what he’s saying) which is just precious. Today he was talking constantly and we finally told him in Russian (both boys speak Russian) “I don’t understand”. He kind of cracked up, smiled and then kept on talking. Hilarious.

We will be in here in Ber. again tomorrow then plan to go to Zap. on Friday. We are really enjoying getting to know the boys. We think that Vitali is left handed and James is right handed. They are both just really sweet and happy energetic people. James wants to “go home now” meaning that he wants to go back to Florida with us now and for us to stop leaving him at the orphanage. We are such proud parents.

Busy, Busy

2007-06-11T04:42:00.000-04:00

(Paul writes while Jessica tries to answer email on another computer)
Hi everyone! Things have been a bit crazy and we do not have good access to internet at all - dial up speed at the Post Office. The first thing we need to tell you is that our oldest son will go by the name James so we have switched the order of his name (that we originally reported on the blog) that will show on his birth certificate to: James Vladimir Owen. He is called "Vovka" (o pronounced as in vote) - which is short for Vladimir - at the orphanage, so right now we call him James Vovka when we talk to him. Natalia asked him about this and he said that this name sounds good. Right now we are staying in Berdyansk (B) which is a small "beach" town on a man-made body of water.

To catch you up on what has been going on since our last blog -starting with the morning of June 8 - we drove around with Natalia in Zaporizia (Z) while she worked with and submitted paperwork. We then visited Vitali in the afternoon. His caretaker told us that he is very active, is the first in his group to try new things, and is well liked by the other children. He seemed to recognize us and was happy to see us. We stayed in Z that night and visited him again in the morning (6/9). We gave him a small baby doll which he kissed and gave some of his juice. He really likes cars - if hears or sees one drive by he immediately points it out. After our visit we were driven to B to see James Vovka. He was very shy at first but agreed to play ball outside. After having alot of fun kicking the ball around for a while he really warmed up to us. We are convinced that he will be a soccer star as he displayed excellent agility. We stayed in B and visited him in the morning and afternoon of 6/10. We played more soccer and some basketball. Paul is very glad that he played a few years of soccer in his youth so that he can keep up with James Vovka.

Today (6/11) we will do paperwork for James Vovka and visit him. Tomorrow (6/12) we will go to Z to do more paperwork and hopefully get to visit Vitali in the morning and afternoon. We will then go back to B which will make for a long day and will include 5 hours on the road and a couple more hours of waiting in the car while Natalia works with the paperwork in various locations around town. On Wednesday (6/13) we will be in B again visiting James Vovka in the morning and afternoon.

Adopting two children at the same time in 2 separate cities is not typical here and the fact that the cities are 2.5 hours apart makes the process more difficult (not to mention hard for us to visit the boys as often as we would like). Our court hearing will be in B which is why we are staying in a hotel here. After that there is the 10 day waiting period where we will stay in B and make visits every few days or so to Z to see Vitali. We are sooooooo happy right now and all of the paperwork and waiting is without question well worth the wait for our 2 beautiful boys!

GREAT NEWS!!!

2007-06-08T11:46:00.000-04:00

We have GREAT NEWS to report!!! At this moment we could not be happier and can say that June 7th was one of the best days of our lives.

Around 10:00 AM on June 6th we got a call from Natalia telling us that we would have our 2nd appointment at the SDA at 12:15 PM that day. We met a Canadian family at McDonald’s on the way to our appointment who were in Kiev waiting for their second appointment. It was great to visit with these nice people who were in our same situation.

At our appointment we were presented with only one option but when we saw the files we knew that we had found our children! We had heard that many people know their children when they see their files in this situation and this was certainly true for us. We were so excited! Vitali just turned 3 years old and his brother, Vladimir will turn 5 in September. Both boys are in good health and were adorable in their photos.

We quickly purchased plane tickets to Zaporizhia, packed our things and returned to the SDA to receive our referral letter at 5:00 PM. Then straight to the airport for our 7:00 PM, one hour flight. Upon arrival we had dinner at our hotel and turned in for a sleepless night.

So, on our big day - June 7th - after obtaining the permission papers from the Executive Committee at the City Administration building to visit the Sonechko Orphanage we were on our way to meet Vitali around 10:00 AM. At the orphanage we first met with his doctor who went over his medical history with us and we were pleased that his good health was confirmed.

Then they brought in our little boy (too bad Jessica had decided to visit the bathroom not knowing that he was on his way). When she returned he was sitting in a chair across from Paul looking as cute as could be. When they brought Vitali in Paul thought, “Oh no, she’s missing the big moment!” Vitali acted very shy (as expected) but did warm up a bit when we presented him with some juice, a piece of candy and a stuffed giraffe.

We chatted for a bit with the care-takers and then Vitali showed us his room and bed. We were really impressed with his stair-climbing skills. We played outside for a short time and then had to say good-bye to leave for the 2 HOUR DRIVE to meet his brother Vladimir in Berdiansk where he lives in the Boarding School of Berdiansk City. These boys have not seen each other for 2 years!

Upon arrival in Berdiansk we again needed to get permission (more paperwork) from the city to visit the orphanage and went on to the boarding school around 5:00 PM. This was a much more formal meeting where the director of the boarding school held Vladimir on her lap and we talked at a table with Natalia and 2 city administrators along with the director and his doctor. His good health was also confirmed and we eventually got to play a little bit of ball with Vladimir in the office while the other women continued to conference. We could tell he felt a bit apprehensive (as expected) but seemed to enjoy playing. He has a really nice smile and looks just like his brother.

We are so pleased to introduce you to our sons:

Vitali Palmer Owen

James Vladimir Owen

Happy Birthday to Paul! He met our 2 sons who live 2 hours apart and have not seen each other for 2 years on his special day. Like Mom said in her comment a few days ago, we know this is a birthday he will always remember. There is no better birthday gift he will ever receive. Thank you to all of you for your thoughts and prayers.

June 5th, Tuesday in Kiev

2007-06-06T09:06:00.000-04:00

Paul writing:
Yesterday we went for a walk to an island that is also a public park via a “pedestrian” bridge. Notice the car crossing the “pedestrian” bridge in the picture of Jessica. This brings up some observations that we have made about the cars in Kiev. Basically the rule of thumb is – if the car can physically make it to any location by means of jumping curbs, going through grass, or in between barriers obviously meant to block vehicles it is OK to drive and/or park there. We’re talking parks, church grounds, and especially sidewalks. So we have learned that just because you are on the sidewalk or in a peaceful park does not mean that you are safe from traffic. Also it seems that cars always have the right of way - especially on the sidewalks. Honking is more of a non-verbal conversation with other drivers and pedestrians than out of necessity. We digress…

The park was virtually deserted and we walked until we noticed how much it looked like those abandoned amusement parks you see in horror films and, then turned around and walked to nearby Podil. We walked by a cute little church and took a picture. We noticed a neat sign for a dentist (see photo) but decided to pass on a walk-in appointment. From there we visited the National Historical Museum of Ukraine which was very interesting. We saw many archeological artifacts, coins, weapons, clothing etc. This picture is of a carriage from the 18th Century which we thought was pretty cool.

We think we will have our 2nd appointment Wednesday or Thursday. If we do, you may not hear from us for a couple of days if we have to travel far. Thanks for all of your positive feedback and comments!

Wardrobe Change

2007-06-04T07:46:00.000-04:00

Well, the weather has cooled down quite a bit and it has been drizzling outside. This is the weather we expected to encounter and it is actually a nice change for us. Most exciting is that we can branch out into wearing a few items of clothing that we haven't already worn 5 times. Sometimes it's the little things that get you excited.

We checked out the "Monument of Friendship of Nations" this morning which was pretty neat looking (see photos). We have also included a photo of a small statue of Lenin from the previous day. Then we ate lunch at the grocery store. They have a few little restaurants inside the grocery store and you figure the foods gotta be fresh. We bought stuff to make pasta with - sauce and sausage for dinner tonight at home. This will be the first real meal (involving the stove that is) that we have made.

On Sunday we met up with the family from VT that we had met at the airport and visited with them. We ate lunch at McDonalds which we all agreed had never tasted so good! Paul and I had walked to a "botanical garden" but it was closed when we arrived at 4:00. This was fine since our goal was really to go for a walk and we had randomly chosen this destination. We went to the same pizza place we had told you about for dinner and there is nothing more to report on Sunday. We contacted some American folks who are in town waiting for their second appointment and hope to see them while in Kiev. So, that's the update.

OK blog-readers, we need more blog comments...we know you are probably waiting until the excitement of us actually meeting our child but we would love to hear from you. The waiting part is not so fun.

Here's a photo of the Ukrainian flag that we got for Rob and Melissa's four Ukrainian sisters.

Market and Museum of Ukrainian Life

2007-06-02T11:20:00.000-04:00

We started out the day by getting Paul some new shoes in the underground mall nearby. He needed a shoe that could give his blisters a break (he brought only one pair because his size 12 shoes would take up so much room in the suitcase) and now he is soooo happy. He was tempted to get Timberlands (for $150) but ended up getting Ecco brand shoes since they are not an American brand and we paid about the same price for them that we would have at home. This is such a big city that you really can find whatever you want.

We waited in front of “Mr. Snack” by our apartment for an hour for a driver that we had hired who did not show up and then we moved on to strolling along the street fair that has been set up on the main street of Kiev for the weekend. It looks like some sort of international fair where each country in the European Union has a booth handing out information and of course there are several beer tents interspersed along the way. What does the information say that they are handing out? We don’t know. They did give out cute little country flags, we understood that much. There were also a few stages set up with some singing and dancing going on.

We walked on to the big market to take some photos for you of what all goes on in there. Different vendors sell quite a variety of fresh products including meat, flowers, produce, caviar and cheese. We took pictures of the meat products, produce and cheese/cheesecake lady. From what we saw, if you have a need for any tongues, hearts or any other hard to find animal parts, this is the place to go. The cheese lady was really nice and gave me a bite of her cheesy cake thingie. It was pretty tasty. All of the vendors were anxious to get out attention and wanted us to buy their goods but alas, we walked out empty-handed.

After those diversions we returned to our original agenda and got a taxi to take us to the outdoor “Museum of National Architecture and Life of Ukraine.” This attraction takes up 150 acres and displays the landscape and architectural styles of the traditional wooden buildings and shows what village life was like in old style Ukrainian life. It was quite interesting and beautiful. It was about a 30 minute drive from the downtown area. There were folks there selling their traditional style wares and we took a horse and buggy tour. We also ate a home-made pickle and Paul got a sausage and potato lunch cooked on an outdoor skillet which he shared. This was a nice peaceful break from the hustle and bustle of our every day city life. There were many people there strolling around enjoying the outdoors. The admission price was $2 each. We just can’t get over these cheap admission prices!

Overall it was a very pleasant day and we hope you all had a nice Saturday too!

Day Off

2007-06-02T02:53:00.000-04:00

Hi blog-readers, today's post is not that exciting since we took the day off from our vigorous sightseeing. We had to get a new internet card, went to the grocery store again and found that after that excursion we had just enough energy left to lay around the apartment and read. Not impressive or adventurous, I know. We did manage to leave the apartment to go to a very chic mall restaurant and order some chicken wings for dinner. The menu said they were "buffalo style" so we just had to know what that really meant. They were basically fried wings with no sauce but that's OK. All 6 of them were really tasty. Then we stopped on the way home to take a few pictures of the breakdancers who were out doing their nightly routine. In response to Brian's comment, he knows that Paul's best dancing is done as he is falling off the side of the boat. We wrapped up the evening by watching a precious episode of 24:Season 1 on DVD on the laptop. Paul begged to watch another episode but I kindly reminded him that we need to ration our DVD watching. We'll do our best to do something exciting on Saturday to tell you about.

We should get our appointment at the SDA this next week. Thank goodness we have a cell phone so that we don't have to sit home by the phone!

Thursday, Last Day of May

2007-05-31T13:46:00.000-04:00

We headed out to find an elusive botanical garden that we could not find the day we went to the WWII Memorial Park and we ended up doing some more exploring on the monastery grounds which was on the way. We’ve included a picture on the grounds which are quite lovely.

Next we ended up at a restaurant that we believe is a popular tourist destination since the restaurant is built in the traditional Ukrainian village style (see photo). We both got something other than what we thought we were ordering (not a huge surprise). They did have a translated menu but somehow some details got lost in the translation. I got a soup that was a cold soup containing chopped boiled egg, potato, cucumber, scallions and dill and Paul’s soup was a basically hot water soup with poached fish and some dill. I don’t believe either of us would choose to order these soups again. Then Paul got a kind of flattened fried meat pie and I had what was like gyro meat rolled into a log and wrapped in lavish bread. The presentation was quite attractive (see photo). Eating out is always an adventure. We have found we should not approach eating out here with the need to satisfy a food craving, but more a desire for a new culinary experience. The restaurant was really cool inside.

We did end up finding the botanical garden which we found to be somewhat deserted and unkept looking. It could be that this is the beginning of the gardening season and they did not get to this one yet. We have determined that the term “botanical garden” can be used rather loosely. But who needs another perfectly manicured botanical garden anyway when there are many other impressive sites to see.

We thought you may enjoy a photo of all the people happily frolicking in the fountain on the square below our apartment. It was especially busy as there were many teenagers out who appeared to be celebrating the start of summer vacation. Keep in mind this is what we think since we don’t actually really know what the heck is going on around us. We wrapped up the day with Paul’s favorite – what we fondly refer to as “street pizza” which is a piece of bread with some pizza type toppings that you can buy from a cart on the sidewalk. It is best when you are lucky enough to get it straight out of the oven which has only happened to us once. It costs a dollar. The food from street carts is very inexpensive however nice restaurants are pricier.

Metro to the Zoo

2007-05-30T10:36:00.000-04:00

OK, OK we will continue to tell you about the minutia of our days…Today we are very proud to report that we rode the metro and actually resurfaced in the right place, twice! We decided to go to the zoo which from the map appeared to be a bit too far to walk so Paul studied up and we went for it. It only cost $3 each for entry to the zoo and quite frankly we think they should up their fee and do some improvements to the place but there is something to be said for making the zoo affordable for all I guess. The metro by the way costs just 10 cents each person per ride. At that price we figured we could afford to get lost a few times.

We saw bison, camels, bears, an elephant, a rhino, a hippo, giraffes, zebras and a bunch of monkeys. The rhino was really close to the short fence and so was the hippo which you will see in the photo submerged in the pool with the elephant in the background. I guess these guys haven’t tried to break out. The monkeys were under a bit more of a lock-down, maybe they’ve had troubles with them trying to escape. The zoo had a bit of a wild look about it and was extremely interesting – it appeared that they were working on converting some of the animal housing to the more modern habitat looking displays that we are used to seeing in America. My favorite part was the petting zoo which I normally do not get into but we had some time to kill. I just loved feeding the little goats. I must really miss my puppies and am starved for animal interaction or something since I now like holding monkies and hand feeding goats.

We tried some Ukrainian wine last night which was pretty good (we bought it at our favorite grocery store) and then had some snacks (a pressed chicken deluxe sandwich, and a bowl of soup we had not tried before that was very good) at “Mr. Snack”. What a day.

Stay tuned for our next chapter, perhaps the “hydro-park” or another botanical garden. We are telling ourselves that it will be so nice to be able to share our experiences in Kiev with our child some day, right?

Tuesday in Kiev

2007-05-30T03:34:00.000-04:00

We are thinking about weaning you off the daily postings, we don’t want to use up all of our material! Yesterday we walked to a park and then ate some stuffed crepes. We passed on the one with the hotdog looking product inside and went for the apple filling which was very tasty. We attempted to go to another botanical garden but ended up at the exit instead of the entrance apparently and did not want to see it badly enough to retrace our steps and try to find the entrance. The map we have doesn’t always turn out to be 100% accurate and then there is also user error I suppose along with our inability to interpret signage. We stumbled upon another church, there are many in Kiev

We went to the grocery store and got some more of the basics, too bad I bought paper towels instead of toilet paper (this can’t possibly be interesting to you yet I am compelled to report an accurate account of the day). I guess we will be going back to the store soon. I have discovered the snack products including some delicious cookies and am quite pleased with my discoveries.

Last night we went to a pizza place (a sit-down restaurant) we found in the huge building on Independence Square and it was GREAT! We each had a small pizza (Paul had pepperoni product and pepperoccinis on his and I had feta cheese and garlic sauce – “yummo!”) and a glass of wine for $12. What a deal, huh? We have been eating pretty much anything and everything. I have to admit that I have eaten mystery meat (it’s only a mystery to us, not to everyone else) and all kinds of food from street carts. The chicken gyro type thing with the funky sauce (all at room temperature) we ate the other day from a food court turned out to be a mistake if you know what I mean, but overall we have been happy with our digestive systems’ performance.

We watched some street performers last night – they were break dancing/popping on linoleum that they had put down on the sidewalk. There were about 6 guys who took turns doing their thing and then walked around with a collection hat. It was actually highly entertaining. Sorry, we have no pictures – we were traveling light last night.

We are still waiting for some news. Of course you’ll be the first to know when we hear something. Thanks for continuing to comment on our posts, it is so nice to hear from everyone!

Holiday Weekend

2007-05-28T13:11:00.000-04:00

This blog entry is being written by Paul who gave Jessica the day off, it being a holiday and all.

On Sunday we watched the beginning of what appeared to be a 5k race in the morning. There were lots of people out in the streets enjoying the holiday. Many vendors had set up snack and beer (pivo in Russian) stands with special shade tents to sit down in. Paul noticed a line of people waiting for some unknown drink in a tank on a trailer, so of course he had to try it. It turned out to be apple cider (he thinks) that had a flavor that can best be described as “approaching fermented”. Paul could not drink more than a ¼ glass, but the whole cross section of the locals – young and old love the stuff. We’ll chalk it up to American taste buds - I guess.

We then went to the underground mall (there are many in Kiev ranging in size and style) and had brunch at the food court. We had a couple of nice crepes with loose pork sausage in one and a sort of cream cheese in the other. Paul tried an interesting looking sausage (Jessica refused on looks alone) which did not turn out to taste better than it looked. We shopped for staples at our favorite underground grocery store after that. We have a new appreciation for our setup at home where one drives their vehicle to the store and hauls a ton of groceries home. Here we (and most of the locals in Kiev) walk to and from the store and end up a making more frequent trips where the amount of groceries is limited to how much you can carry - about a mile for us.

We walked around the Podil area again to see if there were any more festivities – not much that day, only great shopping along St. Andrews Decent. That afternoon Kiev experienced a downpour similar to the ones we get in SW Florida, close-call lightning and all. We retreated into our neighborhood Mr. Snack and had a bowl of Borsch, which was delicious!

Today (Monday) we took our longest city hike yet. We started by passing through Independence Square where a street entrepreneur launched his young baboon onto Jessica’s arm. For some reason, this did not phase her and I then negotiated (badly) for the cost of him taking a picture of us on our camera with this and another monkey that someone else placed on Jessica. We paid 10 Gryvna ($2) for three pictures. We walked to the Mariyins’ka Park and Palace and then to the WWII Memorial Complex – about 3 miles. This memorial was quite impressive. The statues are amazing and the scale of everything is immense. We were surprised that they allowed people to climb at will all over many of the statues and retired war vehicles, tanks, large guns, etc.

Keep your fingers crossed that we will hear from the SDA tomorrow regarding when our 2nd appt. will be!

Botanical Gardens and Shopping

2007-05-26T10:58:00.000-04:00

Hi everyone, we couldn’t seem to find the motivation to post yesterday but we are back today with lots of pictures. Yesterday we were feeling adventurous and thought we’d take the subway to the Gryshko Botanical Gardens. Well, we got all the way down into the subway, and we mean way down under the city (about 200 feet underground) and then we couldn’t figure out how to get on the right color line and which way to go. We figured if we couldn’t do that then how in the world would we know when to get off or how to get back. So, we lost our nerve and took a taxi instead. That in itself is actually adventure enough. Here’s a few photos of the Botanical Garden which was on a huge piece of land.

We had dinner at a food court we found in a nearby underground mall which is actually not really even worth mentioning. You may find it more interesting that you can buy and drink beer all over the place (meaning wherever out on the sidewalk) AND it is cheaper than the bottled water. Don’t get the wrong idea, that’s not what we’re doing, but if we wanted to, we could.

This morning we saw a cycling race on the main street outside our apartment. We think it is part of the holiday weekend festivities – Sunday is Kyiv Day. We went shopping at the St. Andrew’s Descent again and it was WAY busier than the last time we went on a weekday. There were 5 times the vendors with lots of people all over the place. There were lots of great examples of terrific craftsmanship and tons of interesting things to look at. So, the following pictures are: the bike race, classic Lada car w/antique goods on the hood, shopping area, St. Nicholas Church, another church, homemade Barbie outfits, and some mini medieval fair type action.

We hope to hear from the SDA on Tuesday (wishful thinking) regarding our appointment since Monday is a holiday. We know our child is there waiting for us, we just have to be patient. It is a great thing to be able to get to know our future child’s country and its people. It really is a lovely country with kind and beautiful people.

Waiting

2007-05-23T14:10:00.000-04:00

So, first of all we would like you to wonder what it would be like to operate a computer when all of the commands are in a foreign language that uses a different alphabet (that's what happens at our internet cafe). It's pretty fun, kind of like a new sort of game. Another fun game is to try to find your way around a city when there are few street signs and when you do see them you need to figure out what the English spelling of the pronunciation would be so that you can find it on your English map. We met the Americans from VT for dinner last night and it took us a while to find the restaurant. We had a nice time with them.

We had a pretty relaxed day today visiting a few churches. We are still waiting to hear from the SDA in regards to when our next appointment will be. Our big accomplishment today was that Paul got us online at the apt. (it is very slow but nice to have). We are pretty sure it would have been much easier if we could read and understand the Russian instructions on the back of the internet minutes card.

Anyway, here are a few photos to keep you interested…they are of the shopping on St. Andrew’s descent, the SDA close-up (the gate to the right of the turquoise colored church- St. Andrew’s), an impressive govt. building, an interesting decoration in our apartment’s kitchen, Jessica in the St. Sophia Bell Tower with St. Michael’s in the distance, Paul in the St. Sophia Bell Tower with the church/museum behind him and finally St. Michael’s Church.

Life in Kiev

2007-05-23T09:25:00.000-04:00

So, to catch you up on the basic "life in Kiev" for us lately...On May 21st we had dinner at a nice Ukrainian Restaurant. I had borscht (sp?) and Paul had a good version of split pea soup. Then we moved on to some Chicken Kiev (I just had to do it) and Paul had some mutton which looked like a mutton meat burger. Here are the photos to prove it. It was all very tasty. Also here's a picture of me at the internet cafe and in Independence Square area at night.

First of all, thanks to everyone for your comments and support, it is nice for us to read your posts on our blog.

On May 22nd after our heartbreaking appointment at the SDA we had dinner with Natalia and then turned in quite early. We were still trying to catch up on our sleep and it was a rough day...sorry you had to go without an update.

Today we are refreshed in the sleep department and we went to the grocery store for some more salami, cheese and bread (good to eat at all times of the day) and more bottled water. We then did some shopping on a famous street near St. Andrew's Church which had lots of local crafts for sale. We will post some pictures of this excursion later. It's great fun to try to read a map in another language.

We still have internet problems so are still doing the internet cafe thing. Many things just don't work the same as they do at home and the language barrier makes it tough to resolve these issues. We had to laugh last night when we returned to our apartment - the stairwell was PITCH black and we had to go up like 8 flights of stairs. I had read in some experienced person's blog to bring a flashlight...and now I know why!

We have some time on our hands to explore Kiev tomorrow, so we'll let you know what we find. Thanks for thinking of us at home. All will turn out the way it's meant to be.

If at First You Don't Succeed...

2007-05-23T03:09:00.000-04:00

We had a very disappointing day yesterday. We met with Natalia at 9:00 who told us what to expect at our appointment at noon. We were shown a few files and unfortunately had to make a request for a second appointment. We remain hopeful to receive another appointment sometime in the next week that will result in the visitation of a child. Natalia is doing a great job for us but it was not in the cards for us yesterday.

Our Tour of Historic Kiev

2007-05-21T11:48:00.000-04:00

We had a great tour today. Our guide spoke English very well and we saw a lot of the city. Here are some pictures from our day. I had to buy that red scarf when we were on the monastery property to cover my shoulders and I needed to cover my head while touring the underground caves in the monastery - that is customary. The other woman in the photo was our tour guide.

I will share a few more observations with you:
Across the street from our apartment is a music conservatory and they are constantly practicing on all skill levels on different instruments - mostly horns. Apparently they do a bit of opera singing practice in the area...additionally the demonstrators were on loudspeakers giving speeches and at times playing music. So, this morning there was I guess what you would call a cacophony of sounds in our apartment.

The beds in our apartment are kind of short for some reason.

The people that we come in contact with in the public always talk to us in Ukrainian or Russian (we can't really tell the difference). There is not much English spoken here. The people have been very helpful and understanding of our lack of language skills.

There are underground tunnels/crosswalks/shopping areas under the main streets all over the place. You don't cross a busy street, you look for the underground entrance which looks kind of like a subway station entrance.

That's it for now. We will meet with Natalia tomorrow morning and we will have our BIG appointment at the SDA.

Pictures from 5-20 and 5-21am

2007-05-21T04:52:00.000-04:00

-The pictures below are:
-The balcony view from the apt.
-Apt. living room
-Apt. bedroom
-Apt. kitchen
-4 photos on Independence Square
-Picture down the street (arch)
-Paul's truck
-Apt. front door
-Demonstrations on the square (off apt. balcony)
-"Mr. Snack"

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We're Here!

2007-05-21T02:39:00.000-04:00

We are in Kiev! Julie picked us up at the house this morning and delivered us promptly to the airport where we caught our Jet Blue flight to JFK. This was our first Jet Blue flight and we really liked the TVs in the seat backs. We had plenty of time to burn at the JFK airport after we figured out the transportation system that got us to the international terminal. The flight left one hour late but arrived in Kiev only 15 minutes late. It wasn't too bad really although we won't say time "flew by". We were really lucky to get exit row seats but not so lucky that those seats didn't recline.

At the JFK airport we met a nice family from VT that was on our same flight to Kiev that had contacted us on our blog - they have their appt. the day after ours. It was nice to chat with other people that are adopting at the same time. They started their process way before we did and had been delayed by the shut-down of the old NAC (before it reopened as the SDA - State Dept. of Adoptions) They are so happy that they are finally traveling and we feel so fortunate that things went so quickly and smoothly for us.

Upon arrival it seemed like our bags were the last ones to hit the belt and we had some confusion at customs - we did not fill out a declaration form when we initially went through the red line (we just didn't know or see it) and then we had to physically show our cash at customs (not such a comfortable feeling). Then we were met by Natalia's friendly face which was a huge relief. She was there with a taxi and took us to the apartment she got for us right on Independence Square. The apt. is a fantastic location where we can walk to lots of restaurants, shopping and historical sites. It has a restarant below it called "Mr. Snack". The SDA office where we have our appointment on Tues. is practically accross the street. It has 2 bedrooms, a living room, bathroom and kitchen. It is fun to look out the balcony at all of the activity below.

Natalia took us to the grocery store (we had to buy bottled water and also got some rolls, cheese, lunchmeat, and bacon flavored Lays chips - we just had to try them) and then to several cell phone places on a wild goose chase. We are not having great luck with the phone service yet and the computer/internet has been rough going so far as well. We spent some time walking around downtown and did some major people watching. We saw lots of beautiful women walking around in crazy high heeled shoes that I couldn't walk across the street in let alone all around town on brick sidewalks. It is a very cosmopolitan and hip city with lots of activity and lots to see.

It is so warm here we can't believe it. It practically feels like the heat at home. I told Paul that I wish we could go back home and repack. Thank goodness I threw a pair of sandals and capri pants along with a few tank tops into the suitcase at the last minute! Who knows, maybe it will cool down or maybe we will end up in a cooler area of the country. We are prepared for either. It is very green and beautiful outside and the architecture is amazing.

Today we will be going on a site-seeing tour that Natalia has set up for us which should be great fun! We'll let you know how it goes, so far so good. We were up for 30 straight hours yesterday and Paul slept well last night but I still had trouble sleeping. I imagine I will sleep tonight. We found a public internet access station at the post office which we are using right now, but we are still getting our act together so we will try to post some pictures next time. Things work a bit differently here and there is definitely a huge language barrier that makes things a bit difficult in the technology dept.

Traveling Soon!

2007-05-09T19:09:00.002-04:00

We are leaving in just 10 days....WOW! We leave on May 19th on a Jet Blue flight to JFK and then will make the 10 hour flight on Aerosvit direct to Kiev. We arrive on the 20th at 11:00 AM and Natalia will be meeting us at the airport. It will be nice to have the 21st free to get adjusted before our appointment on the 22nd. We are packing very light since there may be various planes, trains and automobiles involved on our journey to the orphanage and we don't want to be hauling around a bunch of stuff. Uncle David will be taking care of Max and Milo (the dogs) in May and then Lotte, our trusted dog sitter, will take over in the month of June. If David or Lotte should need help with the dogs, lucky for us Tara is ready to save the day. We feel so lucky to have them to take care of our precious, spoiled puppies. We are getting more excited at this point and are trying not to get nervous. Paul is busy at work delegating duties for his projects and letting his clients know he will be away. He is glad he has such reliable support at his office. Jessica is busy pondering which items will make the final cut in the packing process. We are thankful for the support of our friends and family and look forward to sharing the details of our adventure.

We Have Our Appointment!

2007-03-19T12:43:00.000-04:00

We have been notified by Natalia that our dossier was in fact officially accepted by the SDA in Ukraine and we have been issued our appointment in Kiev for May 22nd! So, we will be looking into making travel arrangements, probably leaving here around May 20th. We are relieved that we have our appointment and know when we will go on our trip - we were unsure about when we would recieve our travel date are are thankful to have so much advance notice. When we arrive in Ukraine we will be met by Natalia who will have made transportation and lodging arrangements for us. We are looking forward to meeting Natalia who is the same facilitator that our friends Rob and Melissa used for their adoption of 4 Ukrainian sisters two years ago. Rob and Melissa had a great experience working with Natalia and it is great to know that we will be in good hands while we are there.

While We Wait...

2007-02-27T15:09:00.000-05:00

The waiting and preparing for our adoption is an interesting experience since the age and sex of our future child is unknown. Our understanding is that the children are kept in an orphanage for about 14 months before they are eligible for international adoption - so the youngest children eligible for adoption in Ukraine are about 1.5 years old. We have been told that there are not many very young children available for adoption and we hope to adopt a boy or girl between the ages of 2 and 5. We will not know who the child is that is waiting there for us until we review a few childrens' files at our appointment in Kiev. After selecting a child to meet we will travel to whatever orphanage in the country they live...wherever that may be.

So, we are busy at home organizing the house and garage to make room for whatever stuff our child is going to need to incorporate into the household. We have gotten the bedroom closet redone to maximize space utilization and we have even chosen a pediatrician. We are reading some books on international adoption issues and day dream about what it will be like to add a child to our family that currently includes 2 adults, 2 dogs and 2 old cats. Next on the list is to familiarize ourselves with some Ukrainian and Russian phrases. Sound like fun?

Dossier Submitted!

2007-02-18T17:00:00.000-05:00

Our completed dossier has finally been submitted to the Adoption Center in Kiev....now the real waiting begins. Our facilitator (Natalia) said that we will receive our registration number within 20 days then within 2 months after that should receive our invitation to travel. We expect to be traveling to Ukraine in May. We will receive 2 weeks notice of our travel date and then will be in Ukraine for about 4 weeks to complete the adoption. Let the nesting stage begin.

"You Are Going Where???"

2007-01-15T19:58:00.000-05:00

Ukraine gained its independence in 1991, with the breakup of the former Soviet Union. All of Russia's former republics then formed the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), with headquarters in Minsk, Belarus. Rich in natural resources, Ukraine was once called the "Breadbasket of Europe," because of its fertile soil and beneficial climate conditions.

Quick Facts and Figures

Official Name: Ukraine
Capital City: Kiev
Flag: here
Latitude/Longitude: 49° 00'N, 32° 00'E
Languages: Ukrainian, Russian, others
Official Currency: Hryvna
Religions: Ukrainian Orthodox, others
Population: 49,506,000 Land Area 603,700 sq km (223,090 sq miles)
Landforms: Mountainous areas southwest (the Carpathians), and south (the Crimean chain). Most of the land consists of fertile plains (steppes) and plateaus. Dnipro River and its many tributaries disect the country.
Land Divisions: 24 oblasti, 2 municipalities and 1 autonomous republic

First Post

2007-01-15T19:44:00.000-05:00

We are looking forward to sharing our adoption journey with you. Our completed dossier (application) should be in the hands of our Ukrainian attorney, Natalia, by the end of January for translation and notarization. Natalia thinks that we could be traveling as early as April. This whole process is moving a long a bit quicker than we had anticipated and we are excited to go.