A busy day

Steve again. There is a warming trend here in Ust. Now we see the unattractive side of snow as the roads are a mess of oily slush and walking becomes more precarious. You can tell the weather is tough on the roads here. I have seen some potholes that could eat a Lada (Russian brand of car).

Our morning trip started with a quick cry session from Aidan followed by our usual playing and—surprise— he fell asleep on us again. While he was conscious, Terri engaged him and tried to teach him how to take toys out of the bag without flinging them across the room. Liam arrived, happy and in a good mood, this despite the fact he was wearing hideous bright lime green pants that would put anyone in a foul mood. He enjoyed his playtime with us but you could tell he was ready for lunch by the end of our visit.

After our visit, we went to the director’s office to be briefed on what the court experience will be like. The other American couple, the Woods, were there as well so we were briefed together. The lady from the Ministry of Education basically walked us through all the types of questions we will be asked and how we should prepare for them. It sounds pretty intimidating but the translator will be with us the entire time.

Afterwards, we had lunch with the Woods. We went to a place called Pizza Blues. I use the term pizza loosely since they use mayonnaise instead of tomato sauce—‘nuff said. Fortunately we were warned in advance so we could order non-pizza foods. Once we went through the minefield of ordering food, we got to know a little bit about each other and traded notes on our experiences so far. We also talked about the kids, go figure. It was nice to just hang out with some Americans for a little while. Terri also tried something new at lunch, too. It was like a fried ravioli is with a dipping sauce. I tried a couple and they were good. Unfortunately, we had to cut it a little short as our driver and translator had to leave to go deliver some of our papers to the coordinator.

The afternoon visit started about the same as the morning, a quick little cry from Aidan followed by some playtime. The director came in to see us and gave him a hug… which started the crying all over again. But soon he was playing again, that is, until he fell down and bounced the toy train off of his forehead. We were able to quickly distract him and he soon realized that his little bump was not life threatening. He has also learned the bear hug from me, which is a lot of fun. I squeeze him and make a growl noise and in turn he tries to imitate. It is funny, he grabs my shoulders and squeezes with all his might and gives a pretty impressive growl. Our translator said that Aidan’s caregiver wanted to know why he came back from his morning visit so sweaty. The little guy is like a nuclear reactor when he sleeps—talk about generating heat. So they asked if we could make him not sweat so much. I found this to be quite amusing.

Liam got to go mobile again. The excersaucer was in the room today and the boy was moving. This put him in a very happy mood—along with the fact he no longer had the lime green pants on. It was hard getting pictures of him as he would zoom across the frame. He was also having fun playing with a noise making remote control—a very happy baby, indeed. He really gets into the remote control toy—watching the little lights intently. We held him for a while a he made some pleasant mumbling noises. He is so different from the baby we first met.

We finished our day at the coffee house and spent the evening polishing off season two of 24. We also found out that the Spurs beat the Mavericks. A good day all around.