1 Nov - 2 Nov Update

1 Nov 2008

We picked up the girls at 9am to have breakfast with us before we headed for Yalta. Another beautiful day on the Black Sea, sunny and warm. We had to make the girls take a sweater because they thought it was too warm to wear them, and it was; they were carried most of the day. Virginia and Irina took the girls to get jackets and some more socks and I went to the Internet cafй to post yesterday’s blog.

It’s too expensive to take a cab to and from Yalta all the time so we took the bus today. It cost us 18 rph ($2.50) for four of us to go to Yalta and it’s about a 40 minute ride; not too bad for the price. The girls were busy identifying places they’ve been along the way. I guess they weren’t restricted to home their entire lives. They travel well and behave themselves.

Actually, I think we are definitely in a honeymoon period as they are still watching their own behavior. We’ve had them many days for all day and they still haven’t had a fight. For sisters living together I find this either incredibly amazing or more likely on their best behavior. We’ve seen them when they are tired and they still haven’t been at each other. Oh, sure they pick on each other a little, but nothing dramatic. Not sure how long this will last, but we’ll take as much of it as we can. They’re pretty comfortable with us now so I would assume we should start seeing some behaviors from them. The younger one will keep us busy trying to keep up with her, but nothing out of the ordinary for girls their age. The older one has her “stuff” together and helps keep her younger sister in line. It appears it’s been this way for quite some time.
One of the older ones friends met us when we picked them up this morning. She brought a few candies with her and gave them to the older one to give to us. (Note: I hope we get fast court date because I’m tired of having to write older or younger one all the time.) We bought some candy for the girls to give to their friends. Each day we take them back or pick them up, it’s hard to not take some of the others with us. It breaks our hearts seeing these kids there and their prospects are rather slim. We’re only the second family this school year to adopt so it’s not a regular one. The last family was Italian so a lot of the kids like to say Ciao. We also gave some beanie babies to the girls for their special friends. They’ll have several opportunities to give these to their special friends.

We did get a good laugh in today. Earlier, they asked Irina if all the games and such in our flat are going to stay with the school when we all leave. Irina said yes and then they asked if there were any more games where they were going. It seems that they thought all the games we have were there and there wasn’t any back home. Irina told them that there were plenty of games at home that they will be able to play with and they gave a sigh of relief. It’s sad to think that they would think this, their world is definitely smaller than those reading this.

It still amazes me how much these kids share with so little to call their own. They like to share with each other as well as with us. The older one has some insight into bonding and is always sharing her food with us. She’ll offer up her last bite, sweets, meat, it doesn’t matter. We’ve gotten to the point where we are sharing all our foods and drinks. Neither of them tries to hog the food. It’s getting to the point where we feel like we’ve been a family for quite awhile. It all seems too good to be true but God put these girls in our hands and us in theirs so we feel it’s meant to be. Virginia and I waited 10 years for the “other shoe to fall” because things were just too good between us for it to be real and after 18 years it’s still all good. We’re not going to count on the “shoe to fall” since we both feel this is right.

The girls keep asking when they are leaving and coming home with us. Unfortunately, we can’t say for sure and the last post has the projected time.

Tonight, we got invited to go to a wedding tomorrow. All of us are invited and quite excited to see this first hand. The girls don’t know about it yet but they’ll find our first thing in the morning. I hope I can get some nice pictures of the wedding and the girls all decked out for this.
This was supposed to be a short post since today was a rather uneventful day (compared with the others). Until tomorrow.

2 Nov 2008

Today is the last day of the girls fall break. We’ve fallen into a pattern of picking up the girls in the morning, having something to eat and then doing something for the day. Today, we went to a wedding and then to a local land mark (Palace).

The wedding was of close friends of our landlady and was held in a Russian Orthodox church. The ceremony had many elements of familiar symbolism that I’ve seen before, though not sure where. It was a small ceremony, quite solemn for a wedding and very interesting to see. We feel privileged and thankful to have been a part of the ceremony. At the end, the priest blessed our adoption.

Since Papi wasn’t feeling good, I stayed in our flat while all the girls went to a palace and park for the day. I guess the girls have finally felt comfortable around Virginia and Irina that they finally started acting like I would have expected. They’ve spent so much time together that I could see it building for several days, but I wasn’t there when it finally came forth. The girls got into a fight with each other and were cranky most of the afternoon. I didn’t see any of this and they watched their P’s and Q’s when they finally got home to where Papi is. I don’t know if they’re still on their guard with me or whether it’s a cultural thing. Virginia had to tell me all about it and I could see their tiredness and restlessness.

They are now at the point of testing the boundaries which is what I’ve been waiting for. I wasn’t sure when it was going to happen but now is as good as any. I feel this is the beginning of us fitting in together as a whole family and they will learn the roles each of us plays. They are already trying to go around one of us to the other when we say no but we are united and stand together. They grumble a bit then move on. This is progress and they’ll learn that what one says, the other will back up. Today was the roughest so far and I expect there to be many more when all they have is us and themselves without all these other distractions.

Tomorrow we’ll be heading into Yalta while the girls are in school. We have a few things we want to shop for and Irina is going to try and speak with our Judge and get a court date. It’s hard to believe that tomorrow (Nov 3) we’ll been in this process for 2 weeks and we still don’t have a court date. Irina keeps us posted whenever she knows something and I can tell you that it’s not the fault of our team. This region is hard and probably a bit harder right now with world affairs being what they are. Crimea is Russian by their standards, need I say more.