More than ready to get out of here!

We are here!  Now, instead of two questions every day.."papa--Kiev?, and papa--mama America?"  We are down to one!                          The train ride was interesting--I couldn't get Dema to go to sleep until nearly midnight, then at 3:00am, I woke to him sitting up in his bed weeping uncontrollably!  I thought, oh no, the reality of this has hit him and he is scared...but when I went over, he said papa Kiev and pointed to where the train came from.  He thought we had slept through our stop!  Well, it goes without saying that we were up for the rest of the day!

When we got here we headed off for the medical facility where Dema's immunization record was translated into English, and he had a cursory medical exam.  Today we will try to complete two days worth of work at the embassy so we can get on our flight tomorrow morning!

Remember the ticket problems we had?  We wanted and planned for his given name to be Dema, but that didn't happen.  And we had purchased our tickets very early so that we could get the bast airline rates--but since his name is officially Dmytro, the ticket didn't match the passport.  The folks at Aeroflot said that due to international regulations we could not change the ticket, and because Dema is a minor, they wouldn't cut a ticket for him only.  I needed to book 2 new tickets for us to get home--to fly into State College, that would have cost over $3000!  So, I came back to the apartment and booked us a flight into JFK.  Not only did that cost us nearly $1400, but Cindy will lose a valuable day of kitchen production and babushka and dadushka will be driving to New York to pick us up at the airport...   

 

Last night we had a good night sleep--lights out at 9:00 and he didn't stir until 5:00!  That was the first 8 hours I have had since we got here!  (pretty good considering we are sleeping on what feels like a sheet of plywood!)

This morning, we cooked eggs and Ukrainian bacon--I couldn't leave here without trying it!  Now, Dema is watching Dora and Diego cartoons--it so great--he is sitting here yelling at Dora and singing along with the songs.  It seems like he thinks she can actually hear him!  Today we will complete our work at the embassy and hopefully we will be allowed to hook up with Russie and Cheri for an evening out.

 It has been a long and difficult journey, but in less than 24 hours we will be able to put this all behind us and we will all start the newest phase of life!  

If you've really got a hankering for the adoption journey, please check out the blogs written by the families who are coming behind us--they are all listed on the right side of the page.  The McCracken's are in the middle of their process, the Walk's have just begun their in country work, and there are several families yet to come!