All posts by Molly

Day 3

November 26, 2010 Molly 14 Comments

Today’s visit was very good and also a bit heartbreaking. We played with the same toys as yesterday. I also brought our ipod today so that Lena could look at pictures while I took a video. She likes to name all of the people in the photo, “Ilya, Mama, Papa, Lena”. It’s also fun if I point to them in the photo and she names them while she points to the real person.

They both love to it when they build a tower and Aaron picks them up to put the top blocks on… I should mention that these are very soft foam blocks, so it didn’t hurt if they hit anyone when they fall over!

We brought snacks today and wow, they devoured them. Ilya drank two juices boxes… and they shared two small packs of crackers. They ate them eagerly and licked up very last crumb (including the ones on the floor, before we could stop them!) They let us cuddle with them while they ate. We were trying to teach them “please” but I know they have no idea what we’re saying and we are trying to get them both to trust us, so I did not push it too much. I don’t want them to be the person waving a cracker in their face, but not letting them have it.

Ilya absolutely warmed up to us today. He took our camera and was going through all the photos. He found a picture of the castle of foam blocks that he and Aaron made and he ran over to Aaron saying “Papa! Papa! Papa!” That maybe the first time he has called for his “papa”. A nanny came in at one point and I think she asked who we were. Well, both of them said almost at the same time “Mama i Papa”. They both seemed very proud to have their own mama and papa. And, in the middle of our visit, Ilya had to go to the bathroom (so we think he is fully potty trained, as he actually asked both of us and looked at us like we were crazy since we had no idea what he was saying). Well, a nurse took him to the bathroom and we knew he was back when we heard his little feet running as fast as he could down the hall! He is letting both of us pick him up and hug him. We played the running away from mama game, where they act like they don’t want me to get them, but then they laugh when I pick them up and hug them, kiss them and tickle them. Aaron tried to play that with Lena, and she laughed, but she ran right over to me to be picked up!

Aaron played “airplane” with both of them today too. He’d set Lena down and she pull on his legs to be picked right back up again. She really is something. She smiles constantly. I mean, constantly. She smiles when we play with her, she smiles when we feed her, she smiles if we’re just sitting there next to her. Ilya takes a toy out of her hand, and she just kind of shrugs it off and keeps smiling. I kept commenting to Aaron on the constant smile. I was actually wondering if she is this way for her nannies too; if she is just a very happy little girl. Well, they came down to get her for lunch, we did not understand what they told her, but you should have seen the pout on her face. I am not sure that I’ve ever seen a child that genuinely sad before. She didn’t cry or screamed… she just looked miserable.

Lena has a very strong desire to be held. If you hold her like a baby, she gets a huge smile on her face. This orphanage is a very good one, but I still don’t think that they get the chance to be held constantly like a baby with a mother does.

We had a bunch of RR kid sightings today. We saw David, James, Polina, Carolyn and Dana. They were all very curious, but Dana especially broke my heart. She looked at me and said “Mama?” She ran over, but before I could give her a hug the nanny pulled her away. She and Carolyn walked by again later and they both tried to run over to us. It’s hard to see all the RR photos and know that a child is waiting. But when that child comes up to you and asks you “Mama?”… that is just heart wrenching. I am very glad that Dana has a wonderful family coming for her. She is the only one of those who does. All the rest of them are 4 or 5, I think, and still waiting. These children need a mama and papa. Adoption is hard, long and expensive, but it’s beyond worth it. And special needs? Who cares. The second Lena came over to me and smiled, I realized that there was nothing wrong with her. Trust me, she’s perfect. Ilya too. This might sound really cheesy, but I am not sure that you can understand it until you’ve met these children. Until Lena smiles for the whole two hours during your visit or Ilya runs down the hall ’cause he can’t wait to play with you more.

First Adoption

Day 2…

November 25, 2010 Molly 9 Comments

I meant to post this before the last post… the last post was actually from yesterday. We had a long day of walking around Kiev on Tuesday, a train ride Tuesday night into Wednesday morning and then we arrived and met Lena and Ilya. We just got the internet set up today, but I am almost totally caught up on blog posts. I have been trying to type everything up, even silly things. I am not sure if you really want the detailed account of our flights or the train ride, but I’ll post what you demand!

Thank you all for the super nice comments, emails, facebook posts, etc. Here is my post from today… I’ll post the detailed account, then end it with some extra stuff…

Today, we got up and Sasha told us to be ready to go to the orphanage at 8:30. Ilya and Lena needed to go to the hospital to get their tests updated. While they were just done last month, it is a regional policy to have them done whenever a family wants to adopt the children. Sasha said that we could wait at the orphanage while they went to the hospital and then play with the kids for a bit when they got back.

Well, we got to the orphanage, and Sasha said that we could go to the hospital. She would stay back and we could accompany them. We walked down the stairs and there was Lena. Sasha asked her if I could hold her and she let me. She let me carry her outside. I put her down for a few minutes and she was pulling me all around. I think they told her that she was going to go in the car and she wanted to go back inside. This was both Ilya and Lena’s first trip in a car.

They brought Ilya out and he let Aaron pick him up. He was still being very shy, but he has no problems with us holding him. We went to get in the car and Lena started crying and screaming. One of the nurses came over and picked her up and got her in the car. I hopped in and Aaron handed me Ilya. He sat right down on my lap. Lena stopped crying not too far away from the orphanage. The nurse was talking to her a lot in Russian. I think she was telling her how Ilya liked the car and how it wasn’t scary.

After driving and a few random stops, we got to the hospital. The nurse pretty much bossed us around the hospital, showing us where to go. She hand me carrying both of their coats and holding Lena’s hand or carrying her. Not so easy. I am not sure that Lena had ever been up that many steps before and she still walks very slowly, so at one point, to keep up with the nurse I just wrapped my arm around her and pulled her up. I should add that they don’t seem to carry their children like we do at home. The kids don’t seem to know to wrap their legs around you. Most people seem to just put their arm around the kid and lift, unlike the hip carry we typically do in the US. We will have to teach them that, because it makes the child much harder to carry without balancing them on your hip.

The hospital was uneventful. Aaron got to hold Lena for the first time. We also dug out this little train we brought, which lights up and makes noises. Wow, Ilya loved it. He had a big smile on his face.

After the hospital, we walked up and down the block, waiting for the driver. Ilya enjoying seeing all of the trucks and cranes and cars. He was scared of the pigeons we saw… he hid behind Aaron. Hilarious.

We drove back to the orphanage and got to play with them for twenty minutes. Out came the little train and the camera. Lena loved them both. Ilya wanted to play with the gigantic foam blocks. He was stacking them and then knocking them over. We started playing with him too, stacking and knocking them over. Lena joined in too. Wow, Ilya forgot that he was shy. He was running around laughing. He let us help him stack them. Aaron would pick him up to put the very top ones on. Lena seemed to enjoy the whole thing too. I think that she will be a tomboy and join Ilya in playing with trains and building and destroying.

When Lena wasn’t playing with the blocks, she was trying to grab the camera from me. She literally grabs it everytime I try to take a picture. The second it is out of my pocket, it is in her hand. Proof…

When the nanny came to get them, Ilya remembered that he was supposed to be shy and ducked his head down and ran over to her. Lena gave me a big hug. I am ready to take them both home!

Here is something for a laugh today, we went to the store to get stuff to make something like Thanksgiving. I grabbed a bottle next to the olive oils. It was a bit cheaper than the olive oils, but I thought it was some kind of vegetable oil. Well, I went to make chicken and I poured the “oil” into the skillet and the second it hit the pan… vinegar. How do you make chicken with no oil, no butter, no salt or pepper? You poach it in milk with some garlic and hope it tastes okay…

This was my best attempt at Thanksgiving, chicken and mashed potatoes…

First Adoption

The Post You’ve All Been Waiting for…

November 25, 2010 Molly 10 Comments

So, since I haven’t been able to get internet access for awhile, I could tell you about our adventures wandering around Kiev, or our 15 hour train ride or our lovely new facilitator and all of our running around in Donetsk. OR, I could tell you about how we meet Ilya and Lena… those are Reed and Scarlett’s real, Ukrainian names, which I feel comfortable sharing, now that we just wait on some paperwork and a court date. I think I know which one of those options you all will pick.

When we first got to the orphanage, we sat down with the deputy director of the orphanage, introduced ourselves and told her why we want to adopt (which I should mentioned is the edited for Ukrainians version). Then, she read through their entire file. The surprise was… that thing I was worried about in Lena’s file from our SDA appointment… not in this file. There was something new in her file which I will have to research, as I have never heard of. According to their files, both of them are very healthy. We got more of Ilya’s history… we just got a bit of Lena’s and hope to see if they can tell us anymore.

One of the most interesting parts of Ilya’s history was that he has a great-grandmother who visits him and has been desperately praying for a family for him. She is very old and has no means to take care of him, but she loves him. To quote the deputy director, God answered her prayers. I really hope that we have a chance to meet her.

After they finished all of the histories, the deputy director went out and asked someone to bring them in. A few minutes later, the door opens and in comes Lena. She was obviously startled by all of these people (us, the deputy director, our facilitator, and a local social worker), sitting around, watching her. When I said her name, she walked right over to me and stood at my legs, waiting for me to pick her up.

Then, Ilya came in. He was so scared. His head was tucked down, he ran over to the social worker for a minute and then he came to Aaron when Aaron went over to him. He let Aaron hold him, but he was obviously terrified of these two people here to see him. He also seemed tired (it was their naptime).

We brought out the camera to ask Sasha, our facilitator to take a photo of all of us. She took a couple and told me to look at them. Well, apparently, Miss Lena is a little ham. She got so excited to see her photo on the little screen. She would point to her photo, point to her self, point to Ilya’s photo, point to Ilya, point to one of us in the photo, point to one of us. By the end of our short visit, we had her calling herself and Ilya by name. I didn’t feel comfortable asking her to call us anything in front of the deputy director and social worker. Ilya smiled when he saw himself on camera and when Lena pointed at him and said “Ilya”. But that was the most we got out of him.

At the end of our short visit, the deputy director asked Ilya if he liked his “mama” and “papa” and he said yes! He was obviously very scared and tired, but I am glad he said that he liked us.

It is a good thing that Ilya is a bit scared. He obviously likes the deputy director a lot and it is good to see that kind of attachment. Personality wise, I totally expected the opposite, even our facilitator who has met them both was expecting the opposite responses from them. She said before we went, “Ilya is very friendly. He will come up to you and say “Where have you been the last three years? Mama and papa, I have been waiting for you.”

I will also tell you, Ilya seems gigantic to me. Lena is small, but she is around what I was expecting. I am not sure that the 3T clothes I brought for Ilya will fit him!

I am excited to spend time with them tomorrow, without all of the other people around. Sasha told us to bring toys, but especially bring snacks. That is the way to win their hearts.

First Adoption

Some Photos of Kiev

November 23, 2010 Molly 4 Comments

I thought you all might like to see some photos. They’re just over our apartment and the State Department of Adoption building where we got our referral.

Our apartment in Kiev is tiny for an apartment, but it is reasonably sized for $60/day.

This is the bedroom.

Here is the living room. Please ignore the stuff everywhere. This was just after we arrived.

The kitchen. Tiny sink. Tiny stove. Normal size microwave.

This is the State Department of Adoption building. This is not the door we went in. No, we walked through the construction zone and went in some little tiny side door.

This is the church just next door to the SDA building. It is under construction. That area of Kiev has lots of these beautiful orthodox churches. I have not seen any closer to where our apartment is.

Here you can see a photo of us with the Lococo and Cornish families who we had dinner with last night. That was fun… both families are nice and this is the Cornish family’s second adoption from Ukraine, and they have also spent a lot of time here advocating for children with Down Syndrome and other special needs.

First Adoption

Scarlett and the Immigration Cards

November 22, 2010 Molly 7 Comments

It sounds like they have different medical terminology than we do in the US and even if the diagnosis which they told me for Scarlett this morning is accurate, it is not as bad as we first thought. We’ll also have a better idea when we see her and consult with her doctor. As well as possibly getting an appointment with a private doctor here in Ukraine if we feel it would be best.

Just an update for those of you a few steps behind us, it sounds like you do not need to worry about the immigration cards. I’ve heard from a few other families, including those who have completed their adoption and they do not have the cards. I asked our facilitator today and she said she thinks that they’ve done away with them, as families have not needed them for awhile.