Dearest Dema,
Well, G3 is officially sick! He was coughing, sneezing, and sniffling all night long. Hopefully it is just a head cold and Amanda and I will not get it. I don’t think I could face it right now. I am currently bemoaning the fact that I feel like a pretzel after sleeping on that bed for a few nights. I thought it was pretty comfortable, or maybe it is the effort of sleeping on the edge as far away from G3 as possible to escape the germs, but I woke up this morning sore and stiff with the discomfort mostly in my lower back. We are a fine looking family looking to adopt - sick and crippled!
But here is where the quiet days are very welcome. We don’t have anything to do until this afternoon when we visit you. So, we are going to spend the morning soaking G3 in the tub to drain everything out of his head, soaking me in the tub to loosen up twisted and hurting muscles, and keeping Amanda busy with school work and games. Sounds like a plan to me! Until later....
Later...... Amanda and I walked around a little in downtown Mariupol, drifitng in and out of a few stores having fun. We bought a few items (restocked our emergency Snickers bars) and then went into a learning center we saw advertised - Oxford English Center. We talked to the director there and looked at some of the workbooks they have to teach English. They were ok - but nothing great. I haven’t found the perfect piece of curriculum yet. As you will learn with me, being a homeschooling mom, I am very picky about the learning resources I choose. They have to be just right, and so far nothing has struck me as being just right yet. Never fear though, I will persevere.
Okay, back now. We went to the orphanage again today and saw you again. I am going to have to digress a moment from our story to discuss your name. When we first met you, we had no idea that Dima, your name, was a common nickname for Dymtro. We spelled it phonetically and came up with Dema. Well, when we were talking to Alex earlier this week he mentioned that we had spelled it wrong. I checked with our facilitator here and found out that indeed - the spelling is Dima. So now I have half of a blog and a blog title that is misspelled. So from now on, I will spell it correctly. I was going to back through the blog and correct every misspelling, but then I thought better of it. It will be a good story for us to tell someday. And on that note, I was glad we had a chance to discuss names today. We found out that you were okay with keeping your name and just adding Gardiner as a surname. That relieved me as I wanted you to keep your name. If you decide to change it someday, that is up to you. But for now, it is who you are.
So, when we got to the orphanage we saw another child that is slated for adoption later this year and then you came in. I had prepared a few things for you to do while we were together. I had made a small family history chart on my computer and put names and ages in it just to familiarize yourself with your new family. I worried that your family was not on it - I don’t want you to think we are replacing your family - we are merely adding to it - making it bigger and better. We practiced both the Russian and English words for family members. I am determined to learn Russian - as determined as you are to learn English. As G3 said, the race is on - I mean to learn more Russian than you learn English. (I am pretty sure that youth will triumph in this case but I also figured that it is a good motivator.)
We got to stay about 2 hours with you - that seems to be a standard visit give or take. Sasha then gave us an update on the paperwork and its progress. He said that he got all the paperwork from the orphanage this morning and then went to track down your paperwork from the district of Mariupol that you were born in. He said that it wasn’t easy, and the gentleman in the government office was a little snippy, but that he managed to get everything done. He was then able to turn everything into the local office to get the recommendation for adoption that has to be taken to Kiev next week. We are on schedule if a little ahead of schedule, so we are very happy. Once the paperwork goes to Kiev, we can start to look at court dates and make some decisions about whether we can go to Paris for a week or so.
Afterwards we went out to dinner at a local hotel across the street from our apartment building. It was an excellent meal - we are getting spoiled by the good food here - also by the great beer. We have missed Stella Artois in Utah, but it is on tap everywhere here.
Amanda and I finished up the night with a little more schoolwork and a couple of card games. G3 went to bed early to try to shake this cold that he has. Tomorrow we are privileged to be able to take you out of the orphanage for a few hours - you said you wanted pizza and a movie, so that is what we will do!
Till tomorrow,
Bethany, G3, G4, & Amanda
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