Winding down our 10 day wait...

Yuliya on the monkey bars at the park.

We took Yuliya and her friend Sasha to a fun park here in Sumy. She is here cooling off in the mist of a fountain. Notice the words on her shirt: 'American Cutie!'

At the 2-lane bownling alley in Sumy. About 6 frames in, they shut the entire game down, shut off the electricity, and left us in the dark for about 15 minutes. They came back and restarted everything again, and we still have no clue why that happened. A proud Carrie wanted to me make sure to post that she came in second place.

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We still have no internet at our apt. The (so-called) technician came to fix it and after messing around with a few things on my computer, exclaimed that I have American viruses on my computer and that I need to reinstall Windows. I argued with him, telling him that if there was one computer in Ukraine that did NOT have viruses (I work for Symantec), it was mine. He started messing around, until I realized that he would do more damage than good. So I gave up, and now enjoy the brisk walk to the internet cafe.

Lack of blogging has not been easy. It like taking the pacifier from the child! Blogging is a great outlet for me (as if you did not know that) :)

We are going to try to wind down everything this week. Our 10-day wait is over on Tuesday, and we hope to head to Kiev Wednesday morning. Not sure what time, but we're pretty sure Vladimir will call us at 6:00 AM and tell us to be ready in 20 minutes. :) I will post flight information later this week. We've throughly enjoyed our time here in Ukraine, but when I walk in to find Carrie clicking her heels together 3 times, I think that means it's time to bring Yuliya home to America. The 10-day wait with Yuliya has been invaluable, but by now, after 1,987 games of Uno, Skip-Bo, Yahtzee, and other games that we've all but worn out, we just want to bring our daughter home. We have been to New York Pizza so many times, they don't even greet us with a Russian expression anymore. They just order our usual 2 bowls of borsch, 6 rolls, a mixed veggie salad, a bacon and corn pizza (for Yuliya), a blino (pancake), drinks and a Kinder Egg. Carrie and I have survived on borsh and blinos (flat pancakes filled with various fillings). We did find a place that sold the surprise-filled pastries that were popular in Dnipro for the other families, but so many people were walking by, picking up the 2 that we saw and smelling them, that we opted not to try it. Hygiene is a little loose over here. We did get homemade borsh from Natasha's mom the other day after we went to the outdoor market to get all of the ingredients. It was interesting to see hundreds of people in little booths at the outdoor market, selling everything and anything you could thinks of! Food, dry goods, clothes, etc -- it was all there. It like a flea market on steroids. It went well until someone pushed Carrie to the ground as they walked by. Good thing the perpetrator did not understand Carrie's english. Or was it french?

Each day, we grow a little closer to our sweet Yuliya. I compare her to an M&M -- she is such a sweet girl on the inside, and loves to give love and receive it. On the outside, she sometimes puts up a cool, 12-year old front. The orphanges tend to force kids to grow up a little faster than they should. Kids really can't be kids like they should there, so we've got a lot of hugging, loving, reassuring, complimenting, and everything else that will build our daughter's self esteem up. I had our translator tell her that she is a beautiful girl. Yuliya replied to the translator that nobody had ever told her that. There are so many little things like this that we are learning about her. It has really hit home that we've undertaken a major responsibility, and this 10-days has allowed us to realize that we have made the right decision and there is no question in our mind that we're supposed to be doing this. As much as I adore Yuliya, the impressive part of this all is to see the relationship growing between Carrie and Yuliya. Kids tend to trust Carrie, and this is no exception. This morning, Yuliya brought Carrie some boiled noodles with butter, and a cup of tea she made from a tea bag she found in the bottom of a drawer. She then cleaned up the entire kitchen. Yuliya, at this point anyways, is showing her acceptance by little things she does like this.

I'll post more when we get to Kiev. Thanks for your kind emails and comments. If anyone would like to call us, our number is 380668359256.