A few laughs

Being silly!

Tickle, tickle.

Happy.

Learning about his sister's.

Chowing down after the puppet show.

First family photo!

It has been so amazing having Sarah and Shawn with us on this journey, we keep commenting on how fast this week has gone by that we have been here already!  I know much of it is because we have been able to share this experience with them and laugh and talk.  I just wanted to share a few of those moments with you.

1) Sewing Mix-Up
     Our first experience was when we arrived in Blake and Mila's region off the train, we went straight to the Security Administration office to be asked some more questions about why we wanted to adopt a child with special needs, etc.  While Jerad and I were in the office being questioned, Shawn discovered that half of our dossier (our coveted pile of paperwork that we have been putting together for months) was sewn into their dossier.  Evidently, this hasn't happened before, so our facilitation team had to wrap it back up in a birthday sack with duct tape and put it back on the train for the 15-hour ride back to the capital city to be fixed.  We found out this morning that it has been fixed and has arrived back in this region where we are at.  Praise God!! The seriousness of how it could have effected our court date and time in country wasn't funny, but the thought that they wrapped our paperwork that we were told to take such good care of in an old birthday sack and sent it off on a train made us all giggle.

2. Shared Apartment
  We didn't realize the humor in this situation until a while after...but during the train ride Basile's and us had discussed finding a larger apartment, and staying together to save on our costs.  So when our facilitation team brought us to our apartments, one of the women, Violetta, on the team mentioned one of the apartments was 2 bedroom, so we asked if there was any way we could share it.  After a long silence, we tried to explain our idea of sharing the apartment again, thinking she didn't understand.  She looked at the other man, Sasha, on our facilitation team and he nodded no.  She said "well, we don't allow that in this country."  We kind of all looked confused and went on our way.  Only after seeing the apartment did we realize what she was saying.  The one apartment we had to stay in was only 1-bedroom...as in everything is all in 1 room with 1 bed....the 2-bedroom apartment meant there was a kitchen which was 1 room and a bedroom/laundry/bathroom combined for the other room...but only 1 bed!  2 bedrooms, only meant 2 rooms total.  Hahahah, we realize now the confusion of our facilitation team...they said their country wouldn't allow us all to stay in the same bed!!  Still laughing about that one...I can only imagine what they are thinking about us now :)

3.  Big American Eaters
     We have eaten at 2 pizza places in this country now since we have arrived.  We have usually ordered 2 large pizzas and drinks to all share.  We have quickly realized that the tables at these restaurants are not NEAR big enough to accommodate our feasts.  I didn't think much of it the first time we at pizza, we just pulled another table up to sit it on so we could eat off of our plates.  Today, we ate lunch at another place and again, the table was tiny.  We sat our plates on our laps, put the pizza, drinks, and french fry plate on the table and ate like that.  I dropped my fork on the floor and almost spilled my drink, but we managed.  After sitting there awhile, I realized everyone was staring at us....haha, everyone else was eating 1 slice of pizza with tiny little bowls of what looked like salad (not sure)...while we chowed down 2 large pizzas and a plate of french fries.  What's even funnier, is that on the English menu, there weren't even single serving pizza slice options or salad options available...they must know we like to eat!

4.  House Hunter's International
    We decided to be adventurous today and walk back from the orphanage, it was a nice day, still no sun here, and we were in no rush to get anywhere.  (still haven't gotten used to that)  We followed Jerad and Shawn's lead, as former Eagle Scout's, we trusted their intuition with directions...after walking through lots of mud, in some closed off neighborhood, near the train tracks, back through the mud, back through the alley of a neighborhood, over the tracks, and around again, we FINALLY found our way back to our apartments.  I think what would/should have taken 1 hour to walk turned into nearly 2 hours.  We felt quite adventurous at the time, but I'll admit it was a little spooky at times.  I am terrible with directions so I would have been no help at all, but just did what I was told. :)  We kept looking for a bright blue building, which we finally found, thank you Lord!  Along the way we kept passing the same people over and over again, so Shawn was pretending like we were shooting an episode of House Hunter's International and were checking out local real estate...thank goodness we are all really tired and loopy or else had a good sense of humor because we did laugh most of the way home...until Sarah got a blister...ouch!

**Notes from today's visit, Blake loves cookies!  We were taken into a playroom where the staff was doing a puppet show for all the groupa's, all I could make out if it was it was about a cat and it would meow and the kids would all laugh, then all the kids got up and danced around the cat and continued to laugh and dance.  It was so fun to interact and be a part of Blake's daily activities.  He was locked in on the show.  Sarah has a picture of us all watching, I'll post it later.  But at the end everyone was given a cookie, boy did our little man's eyes light up when he saw that coming.  He reached with his hands up high and smiled so big.  Then he took his sweet little time enjoying every bite.  He'd lay it down on his lap, and push on it, then rock back and forth in excitement making little grunting sounds, then take another bite, and continue.  He made a big mess with the crumbs, but after finishing it he swept all the crumbs up and ate the ones he could get into his mouth.  Then we played, tickled, threw the ball, sang songs, and looked at our family pictures...today's visit was 180 degree difference from the past few.  I've always heard 3 days was the magic number before the child opened up and was active.  We got to see the active little boy everyone kept telling us about.  It was a great visit, I hope this afternoon's is just as eventful...even if we don't have a cookie to take him.  (we haven't asked if we can bring in food from the outside yet).

Watching the puppet show.