Monday Morning Music Exercises

1. Mama Lyuda and Ana's group.

2. Musical Exercises.

3. The vodka aisle at the supermarket. Seriously. That's all just vodka.

4. Dasha's last evening at the orphanage.

5. Ana changing into her Outside Clothes.

[Robin]

It was really cold out this morning (41 degrees) and so it was hard to get out of bed, but we eventually bundled up and hurried down to the orphanage. When we got there they were not outside so we went up to their playroom. When we got into their room, Ana saw us and started crying. Not exactly the warm welcome we had hoped for... but not completely surprising based on her past morning moods. It turned out that the kids were dressing to go down to do "musical exercises." Phil asked if we could join them and watch, and the caregiver said she would ask. We trudged downstairs following the row of little kids holding hands. When we got to the room, a music teacher was seated at a piano. The caregiver spread some colored paper leaves on the floor and then, upon a musical signal, the kids all raced to pick up one leaf from the floor. They then proceeded to do what looked like a set of games/song sets that they all seemed to recognize. Phil was able to film part of it on our camera. The cutest part was when the caregiver held up a paper sun and held a folded umbrella in the other hand. She gave one of the kids a paper thunder cloud. The other kids would prance around to the music until the "thunder cloud" ran toward them and scared them under her umbrella. It was so cute it almost hurt to watch.

[Phil]

Yes, it was very cute and very old-fashioned. I could see the same scene happening in a Soviet kindergarten 40 years ago. We felt very privileged to be allowed to watch it, and we thanked the music teacher profusely.

After that, we decided to go home and have some spaghetti (!) for lunch. We're loving apartment living. We had our home-made spaghetti and watched "Hot Fuzz" (very funny British movie) on DVD as people walked past our window bundled up in their winter clothes. It was bliss.

Later, we headed back to the orphanage to see Ana again and Dasha for the last time. She's being adopted tomorrow, so I wanted to get some video of her last night there. When we got to the playroom, Dasha was all dressed up in a red velvet dress with knee-high white vinyl platform boots. I put the camera on her and asked her what she had to say to all her friends in America. She said, "What friends?" I told her that she had a lot of friends in America, including Seryozha's parents. She seemed caught off-guard by this and just laughed. Meanwhile, the caregiver told Ana to get dressed because Mama and Papa were here.

[Robin]

Ana was in a very good mood this time and promptly got dressed to go out. We got some really cute pictures of her going into her locker and getting her clothes out and dressing herself. She only had to be helped with the shirt snaps at her neck. When we went outside we played on the usual assortment--carousel, slide, rocket. Then we worked on the puzzle we had given her the day before. The hour went by quickly and when it was time to go there weren't any tears just blown kisses and "poka" (see you later).

We went to dinner at Da Vinci since it is fairly close to the orphanage. We watched other people drinking wine and started daydreaming about having a good bottle of wine with a steak when we get back. Oh, my stomach is rumbling just thinking about it!

When we got back, we finally took advantage of the whirlpool bathtub in the apartment. The hot. soapy water was soaking heaven! We really felt like this was one of our best days here.

Oh, before I forget, we also talked to the people at the US embassy today and got the information to help us plan for our trip back to Kiev. We feel confident (dare I say this) that we can get all of our paperwork done within three days, so we are planning to pick our tickets up tomorrow. OMG! we think we will be home on the evening of the 28th.

[Phil]

Yes, that's the date to pencil in, but many things can still go haywire in the next 2 weeks.

There's not much else to tell. Now that we have a 24-hour internet connection, I'm actually taking on some work for the next couple of days, but I still hope to have time to do some shopping with Robin at the Big Market. We basically have to buy Ana an entire new wardrobe. Speaking of that, people have been emailing us and asking if there's anything they can do to help us with Ana. There is, actually, but I'll let Robin explain since she's the expert on this.

[Robin]

Expert--ha! Not hardly. However, after watching the kids at the orphange I have realized that everything in our house is too large for a little girl. For those of you who have asked what we need, I think I can safely say that the following are needed: step-stool/stairs to reach the bathroom sink (and toilet?); playtable and chair set; set of full-size sheets in kid-friendly fabric; toy chest; booster seat to reach the dining room table; kid-sized silverware, plates and cups; kid-sized clothes hamper; rod and hooks for her closet; and a hand-held shower device that we can put into the bathtub. That's probably not all we need, but it's really all I have the sense to think of now. Thanks in advance for any help on these items, we really appreciate the offers!

[Phil]

I guess that's all the news for today. We had better get to sleep soon, as Colleen will be ringing the doorbell early in the AM.