SOS clinic

On Monday we bundled up Max in a blue snow suit, courtesy of another couple, parents of Berik. (thanks Jamie & Gena!) The weather is a big difference from Astana. Instead of ice everywhere, its about 50 degrees, very nice indeed but we still are using the snow suit for our little one, who is getting over a cold. There is a little park near our apartment so we can take Max for a walk each day or walk inside the Mall with the Ram store. So, with Max all covered up we head to the SOS clinic where he gets a poke in his finger so they can take blood. Max didn't cry once, our little brave boy. (it also helped the Tim was making more funny faces at Max to distract him)
After that, Max went upstairs to meet with a really nice Russian doctor. She would sing little Russian songs to him and he would just smile and smile. Everything went OK so it was back to the apartment. Tim searched some stores and found a walker to put Max in. A nice orange and green interesting looking walker that Max loves! We found this at the 'Green Market' for only $20.00. This is also a great place for families to buy souvenirs, as we wasted a lot of time in Astana trying to find the best deals. Max raced around the apartment in his new walker. We didn't bring any shoes for him and his socks would be black by the end of the day!

The next couple of days we waited for our Embassy appointment that took place on Wednesday. We walked across the street and went through all kinds of security and inspections. Once upstairs we waited for our name to be called and really it was one or two quick questions and we were on our way. We decided to treat ourselves to a scoop of Baskin-robbins at the mall and then off for a nice walk. On Thursday we woke up to rain, it was such a nice surprise as we hardly get any rain in Colorado. The only thing is the power went out about 7:30am until 4:00pm which meant cold food for Max. He didn't seem to mind and play time went without a hitch, despite the rain. We could have left on Thursday instead of Friday, but for some reason that day was sold out for flights and just about impossible to switch. We spent the day packing up everything as it takes longer now that our family is bigger with the 3 of us! Then it was bed time and up at 1:00am for our ride to the airport. All in all, the week flew by really quickly as we were busy getting schedules down for Max and learning about each other and being new parents.
Our take on Almaty is that the buildings are not as nice as Astana, but it is much warmer weather and the people seem to be more friendly. It is more Americanized and the stores have more of a selection of items. (well, maybe not the baby food!) I did ask our translator how long the process is to adopt once you are in Almaty, versus Astana and she said it takes a month just to get a court date so your looking at about 12 weeks versus 8 weeks! Whew, so glad we are almost home.

Almaty

The next few days were quite a blur. Our translator found us an apartment the very next day one block up the street across from the US Embassy and a Ram store! In a whirlwind we packed up and moved to our new home away from home. This apartment, although smaller and not as fancy, was much better then the one in Astana. We had a real shower, 4 English channels, a soft bed, kitchen, big living room for Max to play in and we are close to a major grocery store. We were set! Saturday and Sunday we spent in the apartment with lot's of play time with Max. He is clapping now and standing for brief moments by himself. He is just so adorable, growing each day. The doors have glass windows and Max would love to stand up to the door and Tim would hide around the corner, doing funny faces making Max laugh! He is very active and pulls himself up on anything, cruising around the room. He is a very good eater and eats everything we put in front of him. Some of the baby foods have such strange concoctions, like veal and pumpkin or cauliflower and rice. Yumm.....! Bath time still isn't happening, Max just cries each time his feet hit the water so we wash him really quickly and then it's bottle time and bed. He sleeps through the night really well. He doesn't have a crib so Tim barricaded some furniture in a corner and we put blankets and pillows for a makeshift bed. Nap times are usually tough and doesn't last long as he is used to a crib. It is such a joy to be able to take care of him full time. When it's bedtime for Max, it's bed time for his parents as we are new at this and also are facing jet lag still!

"Gotcha Day"

We arrived at about 11:30pm in Astana and our translator and coordinator took us to a hotel. The first thing they said was that we looked so confident this time! They picked us up around 9:00am to go to the baby house to pick up Max. At this point we were very excited and were dying to see him but first we handed out all the gifts to the caretakers and also Dr. Alma, the baby house director. We finally get to Max's room and he was eating but he looked over at us with a huge smile! We said our goodbyes and got some photos with his caretakers, the doctors and Dr. Alma. His main caretaker had tears in her eyes when we left, this only confirms how much they love Max and also how great they have taken care of our son up until this point.
Next stop was to the Ram store for baby food and formula for Max. After that we went to eat at a Russian restaurant and Max got some mash potatoes. He was doing so good! Then we went to the airport and flew to Almaty to finish out our last week. Max handled the plane ride like a pro! He fell asleep in my arms and also on the car ride to the hotel. That is the first time he has done that and it is such a nice feeling.
Our new translator took us to a hotel with a crib and Max went to bed shortly after. We tried a bath but he screamed and screamed. Seems they are not used to tub baths. We told our translator we wanted an apartment with a microwave and more space. (the cost of hotels went up on Feb. 1st and it is quite pricey, and the rooms are very small for a child) After a long day, we turned in. Max woke up once at 4:00am but quickly went back to sleep. Our first day as a family!

Return to Kaz

We are finally heading back to Astana on Wednesday at 2pm!! It has been so hard being away from our little lovebug. Most of you know by now, but Tim and I moved to Florida this weekend. We are now living near Tim's family. Max will get to grow up with his Grandpa and Grandma and Aunt's and Uncles and cousins. It was a good decision all around. Maybe even Max will one day like to scuba dive like Tim and his Dad and brothers. We are so excited to go back. We arrive on Thursday around midnight and pick up Max at the baby home on Friday morning. There will be a big 'goodbye' party for Max so his caretakers and doctors can see him one last time. Then we fly to Almaty where we wait for our US Embassy appointment on Monday morning. We have to hang around a couple more days waiting for a SOS clinic and then we head home. We hope to update the blog while we are there, but we know this might not be possible. The great thing is we have Max full time forever on Friday! We can't wait to do simple things like feeding him, bath time, play time even watching him sleep.
I wanted to mention that we had two nice baby showers in the past couple of months. (one in California and one in Colorado) If you got us some pink clothes, don't worry. If you gave us receipts, we exchanged them for cute boy outfits, if you didn't we are taking them back with us as part of our donation to the baby home along with some bottles and other items. They will go to good use! Please continue to pray for a safe journey for us. We are so thankful for everything that God has done for us!

Apartment life

Well, I figured we needed an entire entry to talk about our home away from home, after all we spent about 20 hours a day there. Our apartment had two bedrooms and two bathrooms. It was always warm (we have heard some horror stories from other families about cold apartments) but in our case, it was very toasty. Sometimes we even had to crack a window. I should mention that our digital camera konked out on us in week 3 so most of our other photos are on the video camera, so I will have to go back later and add the photos of the bathroom, kitchen and bedroom.

Our apartment was located on the 7th floor and we needed a code to get through the door. The security was very good in this place and that is the main reason we picked it. The elevator was pretty sketchy. It shook really bad going up and down and every once in awhile I made the mistake of looking down the big gap between the floor and elevator. You could see way down to the bottom and see little bits of paper. My stomach did a flip-flop when this happened. It also wouldn't always be level to the floor when it stopped. A few times it was broken, and we took the stairs, which wasn't so bad, but it was very dusty and lights were always burnt out, so it was dark a little creepy! Our apartment was more modern with hardwood floors and a stainless steel fridge. Now for the quirks:

1) Our shower or lackoff. We had this huge jacuzzi tub (jets didn't work) The shower didn't have a shower head, just a nozel with a retractable snake like piece. Your options were to take a bath, or sort of squat low. There was no shower curtian so water tended to spray everywhere!

2) Washer machine. This machine was pretty tiny and the directions were in Russian. We took a chance and pushed some buttons and it ran all night! The next day our translator asked our landlady for directions and then it only ran 2 hours. Next you hang them up to dry on a rack, and since it's so warm in our apartment, they would dry in a few hours but they were so stiff, that our pants could walk on their own! I still don't have a straight answer to why they don't have dryers over here.

3) Beds. The beds were rickety, wood frames. The sheets were small and didn't fit the thin mattress. The sheets also were differnet colors, all mismatched and very itchy.

4) Internet. Never happened. I think the landlady just didn't want to have the wires installed. (note to future adoptive families, if you have a choice on your apartment, make sure that they have had interent in the past at your apt. We basicaly dragged our laptop over there for nothing. This will also cut down on the boredom and isolation factor we faced)

Other then that, we had a nice, big warm beautiful apartment. We had about 15 channels on our TV in Russian. Except music videos were in English, and yes, they love Britney Spears over here! We watched bobsledding, ice skating, the Halmark channel and Animal Planet. A lot of those programs were in English but the translator talked over them. You could hear about every 4th or 5th word and follow along the plot. Tim watched this one funny Russian movie about some monkey who was on a hockey team, was kicked off and learned how to skateboard. Let's see, what else. I was reading a book a day and going through my stash of books too quickly so I had to break up my time between reading, working on my jigsaw puzzles and watching TV. Tim really got into crossword puzzles that Aaron and Steph left behind. (they also left us some food, and a couple of toys for Max that they just had no room for on their flight back) Thanks you guys! We also took turns writing in a journal for Max each day.

I just remembered one more quirk, no matter what time of night or day, you could always hear honking outside. It reminded me of New York. The driving is very crazy and all over the place. When the police pull you over, they get on their bullhorn and announce to the world your infraction. Our driver got pulled over once when he made an illegal turn.

For those of you who don't now, Tim and I had to return back to Colorado on Sunday. We had a number of unfortunate 'surprises' that forced us to return. We will head back on Feb. 27th. We already miss our little guy so much, but he loves his caretakers and we know he will be ok. Check back in a couple weeks to continue our journey with us.

Max has already picked a team. Go FSU! (Florida State)

Photos cont....