Day 2 of our Adventure

On Wednesday morning we woke up at 3:30 a.m. We just couldn't sleep. We stayed in bed until about 5:30 a.m. and then decided to get up and get ready for the day. We needed to be ready by 8:15 a.m. to be picked up for our MOE appointment at 9:45 a.m. We went downstairs and had breakfast. It was included with the cost of our hotel. They had a pretty good selection but I was really hoping for some bacon or maybe a boiled egg. I had some sort of hashbrowns, kiwi, cold cut turkey, cucumbers, tomatoes and orange juice. The orange juice was like drinking an orange. After we ate breakfast we went back up to the room and called the kids. We were grateful to hear that everyone was doing well.

At 8:15 we went downstairs to meet our facilitator. We arrived at the MOE at 8:45 a.m. and our facilitator told us that we could go walk around for about 30 minutes. So we took some site seeing pictures of the main square.

This is a cathedral that we would be going on a tour of on Saturday.

 This is a river that runs all the way through the city. Peter the Great had originally wanted his city to be set up like Venice Italy with river ways instead of streets.

 My sweetheart in front of the river. You will notice that he is wearing his heavy jacket. Well, heavy for California. When we left the house on Monday morning I could not find the sweater I wanted to take so I grabbed my winter jacket instead. I was thinking that the weather would be in the low 80's and so I was upset that I was going to look silly wearing my big jacket. Once we got there and it was raining when our plane landed, I was go grateful to have a big jacket. It was just too bad that the only shoes I brought were sandals.

We were going to cross the street here to get a better picture but I was afraid of getting hit by a car. I don't think pedestrians have any rights in Russia so it's a cross at your own risk type of deal.

We probably only walked around for 20 minutes because we were cold and not crossing the street limited our abilities to see much. (We did cross one small street and I was not willing to do more in my stupid sandals).

Once we got back to the MOE we sat down and just waited. But as we were waiting someone came out and started to talk to us in Russian. We obviously looked confused and our facilitator and the other facilitator sitting next to her started to laugh. Apparently, I look Russian and the MOE worker thought we were a Russian family looking to adopt. Guess I didn't stick out as much as I thought I did.

We found out there was another family here from California who had their MOE appointment that day too. One thing I have to say about our facilitator is that she is very good at her job. She did not want us to have to wait so that is why we got there early to be the first in line. We were asked to please leave our jackets out front when it came time for our appointment. That seemed to be a continuing theme in our visit. We were freezing because we did not bring long sleeve shirts. So we really wanted to keep our jackets on. But I guess we appeared rude if we did so because our facilitator was adamant that we take them off and leave them out front.

We were called back and had to show our passports to the MOE worker. Then she showed us a picture of a little girl with Down syndrome and read the information she had on her. We were told at that time that the child had a minor heart defect but they weren't sure what it was and that we would need to ask the institution that she lived in about it. We were then asked if we wanted to meet the child and had to sign a paper stating we wanted to do so. And that was it. Next stop was to pick up the social worker to take with us to the institution.

The institution we were going to was about an hour away. It was a very beautiful drive out there. I couldn't believe all the trees we saw. I was starting to get really tired at this point and a little hungry too. I had brought protein bars and trial mix with me so I started nibbling on that to make my tummy happy.

We picked up the social worker and then were on our way to the institution. The social worker only needed to come with us on one of the visits but she is the one who has to decide if she thinks we were going to be a good fit with this child.

Once at the institution we meet the assistant director and another lady who I don't remember what her job title was. Again, we were asked to hang up our jackets and leave them. I was still a little cold but not freezing. The workers were so hospitable and they had us sit at a very tiny table pushed back into a corner. They then offered us some really yummy bread, cheese and salami to eat along with candy. They also offered hot tea and coffee. I had no idea they were going to feed us and had just eaten my protein bar but felt I needed to eat something as they had prepared so much.

While we were eating they asked us questions about our family life and why we wanted to adopt a child with Downy syndrome. We showed them pictures of our house and our children that we had brought to show Natasha. Then they took us up to ask questions of the doctor and another woman that worked with Natasha. They were all very nice. We asked the questions we had on our list and found out that Natasha had an oval window (hole in her heart) when she was born but that it had closed itself up. So no heart problems right now. We learned what her schedule was and saw some really cute pictures of her playing doctor with another child. Plus we saw artwork she had done in her classes.

Then it was finally time to met Natasha. I will not be posting about that visit here as I had already blogged about that visit.  We were probably only with her for 30 minutes. We had ran outside after her without our jackets so again I was freezing. I know I should not have been that cold when it was about 60 degrees outside but you have to remember that I came from 100+ summer weather.

After our visit we were exhausted but we knew this would be our only change to visit the gardens so we decided to make the most of it and tough it out. We had been told by another mom who had adopted from the same area that we really wanted to see the gardens since we were going to be there in such beautiful weather. We were so thankful that it didn't rain on us while we were doing our tour.

Here are some pictures of the garden just to help you get a feel for how beautiful it really is there.

Backside of the Cathedral that overlooks the gardens and all the fountains.

One of the main fountains in the garden.

Beautiful Avery located in the gardens.

 This picture is looking down at a section of the gardens.

And this picture helps to show just how big the gardens were. We took one hour to explore one side of the gardens. Then we decided we were just too tired to look anymore and after a while all the fountains and trees started to look the same. Plus did I mention I was freezing in my sandals and my feet hurt.

It was an hour drive back to our hotel and I think Steve may have fallen asleep on the ride back. We decided to just eat at our hotel. By this time we were pretty hungry and wanted food that sounded like something we could understand. Our hotel had English speaking staff and menus. We shared beef tips and a bake potato and I ordered some borscht just to try and experience something of the culture. It was pretty good but I think I was just too tired to eat.

We went back up to our hotel room to try and relax and call our children. We were 11 hours ahead so we had to stay up later than we wanted to be able to talk to them and not wake them up too early.

 Here is a picture of our hotel room. The bed is 2 twins pushed together and Steve complained that he could feel the mattress springs on his side. In my next post I will tell a funny story about that.

This was the view from our hotel room.

It was still very light out when we tried to go to sleep but we were both so tired I don't think we really cared. Next post will be our 2nd visit and our physical experience.

It really has been an incredible adventure.