Day 12 – AUTOMAS!!!!

We started our day off at the orphanage only to turn around when we got there to go sign some papers at a nearby office building. And when I say nearby, I mean nearby an office building not IN an office building. This is the kind of stuff I like about Ukraine…back alley meetings mean “get it done”! Unsure of what we signed but we don’t care…if we are signing papers, things are moving.

We headed over to the orphanage for our 2 ½ hours a day visit with the boys. It is all we get but we will take it. It is so hard being away from the girls and only able to spend a few hours with the boys. Weird place to be…we have five kids but so much of the time here we feel so alone. We are ready to be exhausted with parenthood in Utah. We know it will happen and that we will be begging for mercy but some days it is really hard to imagine our time apart as being a memory.

We have been playing a lot of football (soccer)! Sergei is great and Max loves it. It is a great place for us to work on trust and bonding. We get to hold (illegal but there are no refs) chase and rough house with each other. If I have the ball and Max wants it he has to run up, make eye-contact, say “1,2,3” and give me a kiss on the cheek before I will hand it over. Ok, ok the kiss is forced but it is always super sloppy and I will take them anyway I can! I LOVE THESE BOYS!

We met Joe Crispin and some of his teammates at dinner the other night. Joe is a point guard from New Jersey who plays on the local basketball team here in Ukraine called Automas. Joe really is the nicest guy ever. Not only is he the teams star player he bent over backwards to make sure we got tickets to the game for tonight….front row to boot. The orphanage does not like allowing the kids out before the adoption is final but we asked anyways to bring Sergei but were told no. Booooo! Sergei kept calling himself “Crispin” when we played basketball today.

We got to the game and there was Alice, team coordinator, who led us right to our seats. The game was a blast and we hooted and hollered and the only thing missing was our boys. We actually saw kids from the orphanage there!!! I looked everywhere for Sergei but the other kids said he wasn’t there…double Booooo. It was tough being there without him…especially seeing all the other kiddos around. We won the game and split a pizza (they are littler than they sound) before headed back to the apartment. We actually had internet for a minute and Skyped with Pearl and Charlotte for a few minutes! It was great! We finally saw them and they could see us (our connection has been so crummy it hasn’t worked that well since we arrived)! Pearl showed us how high she could jump and Charlotte copied her and tried to jump twice as high! It was just what we needed, a little dose of home.  I LOVE THESE GIRLS!

I finally broke down and spent the $28 USD for a hairdryer and curling iron with euro-plugs. I thought I was so smart saving money by not buying one yet but after 2 straight weeks of buns, braids and ponytails, my head needed a break! I will leave them here for the next family!

 Our papers are in and we are just waiting for our court date…….waiting….waiting….