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Tuesday, March 27, 2007

Well, we have been here 10 days so far. We are really looking forward to getting home and getting back to a routine at home. I didn't sleep that well last night. I was letting this embassy thing weigh on me. It's just one more step toward home and I really don't want anything to go wrong now. We are so close but yet I feel like we are so far. Julia is coming for us around 1pm so we can stop by to get our letter and then we have our appt at 2pm. We start our day like many of the other ones. Feedings, diaper changes and our breakfast rotation. The breakfast thing is nice. It gives the other parent a 30 minute down time to relax and eat in peace. The kids are doing great so far and Brooke is just really coming along. Every day she smiles and giggles a lot more and this makes me so happy. She is making great strides in getting rid of the Orenburg scowl. Everyone still tells us that she is such a serious child. Well, you spend the first 6 months in a baby hospital with no love and then get moved to an orphanage for the next 2 and see how happy you are. She'll get there. One day, we won't even remember that scowl.

The morning passes by pretty quickly. We get the kids dressed and we're down in the lobby and ready to go. We have had the same driver the entire time. The van is nice since it has more room and he seems to be driving not so stop and slam on the breaks. Perhaps it was because I was a crab to him on our first day riding back from the airport. We make it to the medical center and Julia is nice enough to jump out and go and get our letter. She comes back and tells us that the doctor hand wrote it and it's in Russian and English. perfect. Let's hope Delta will take it and not charge us the $400 for having to change our flight. We now move on to the embassy. When we arrive, there are a lot of people standing out front. Julia tells us that they are Russians and looking to get travel visas. Good. We don't have to stand in that line. We go over to the side and they look at our passports and need our appointment sheet. We get in and thanks to Ann and Dave, we left all cellphones, cameras and electronic devices at the hotel. We go through security and they want me to leave my thermos. I explain that it's hot water for the formula and the kids. They seem to be alright with that and let us go. We grab our ticket from this automated machine which gives us a number. Steve gets out "the package" which we have been calling it. This is our money he has been carrying. Just in case you all wanted to know, we had, key word there was HAD, 25K with us in CASH. Do you know what that's like to carry? Geez, it you lose that...I don't even want to go there. I constantly asked Steve, do you have the package? Anyhow, he gets out the cash that we are going to need here and we go to the second floor. There are more adoptive parents there ane luckily, we are 2nd in line. We pay our money at the cashier (we have to pay for the kids' travel visas and they also charge us because the kids aren't related....don't ask. It's only money!) We then wait for our number to be called. The waiting room is now really filling up with parents and kids and we are talking with others. I actually get Brooke to fall asleep since she's tired and is missing her afternoon nap at the baby suite. They open up the windows at 2pm and they call us up pretty quickly. I figured we were going to be called into a separate office and interviewed. Nope. You stand at the window you are called to and they talk to you right there. This woman had us hold up our right hands and swear to blah blah blah. i have no idea but it was something about being the kids' parents. hello. What have I been doing for the past 7 days. I tell her that we do and she actually lets me go sit back down since she sees that Brooke is sleeping in my arms. Steve comes back a few minutes later and tells me that now we will have to wait for about 30 minutes until the visas are ready. No biggie. I am talking with some people who have adopted a 6 and a 10 yr old. Bless their hearts. We are one of the only ones in this waiting area that have small children. The rest are like 3 and older. These kids will now have a real good chance at life. I am especially happy for the older ones. The guy and his wife who have the 6 & 10 yr old, those kids were taken from their family and placed in the orphanage. Yikes. I hope they make it and enjoy their new life in America. In a way, I'm glad our kids are younger so they dont' remember how life started out for them. It's not long and they are calling numbers 1-6 to come and pick up the passports with the Visas in them. Yeah. We are done. This means we can REALLY go home. Steve grabs them and we head out the door. We say goodbye and good luck to the rest and walk back out to the van. It's a short trip back to the hotel. The embassy wasn't far. I have to admitt, I thought the embassy would be a bit more of a grand looking place. Just looked like a building. We hang out at the hotel for the rest of the night and get our things together and pack. I can't believe we are actually going home tomorrow. I am really excited to be home but I am really not looking forward to that flight with 2 kids. Steve goes out and gets us more KFC and brings it home. We just wanted something easy so we can go to bed early. I have the alarm going off at 5:30am. We get the kids down to bed....finally....as Kyle is still being a pill at going to sleep. He just really fights it. We have a hard time just letting him sit in the crib and cry since we are in a hotel and that part of the baby suite sort of echoes. The poor people next to us. Hopefully there isn't anyone on either side although I believe there is. He finally goes down but not before waking Brooke back up. This solidifies the fact that we are NOT going to have them in the same room when we get home. 2 rooms, 2 separate beds. Once they are down, we finish up with our packing and get to bed. My stomach is in knots again just thinking about this flight. We are going to have to have our A game on tomorrow for a very long time. It should take us well over 24 hours to get home. I am thinking that the non stop Aeroflot flight that would have us home in 13 hours is sounding pretty good right now. Oh well, Delta here we come!

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