The last one from Russia!

Well the time has come to head home!  We couldn't be more excited.  I have the utmost respect for Chris and Liz who live here all the time.   It's fun for awhile, but then you start to miss stuff.  It makes you really thankful for everything we have at home.   We took Lexi to the Moscow Zoo today.  It was pretty cool.  She barks at any animal she sees so that was pretty funny.  She has been great the last 24 hours, so, of course, we going to change it all on her again.  We leave tomorrow around noon which is 2am on the east coast and get home around 8pm.  Long day, but we'll survive.  We've got the benadryl all ready for the airplane :)  Thanks to everyone for their continued support and prayers over the last month.  I loved getting all the comments and emails.  They were like a little piece of home.  The whole thing is still a little like the twilight zone.  I think when we're home in our house it will seem more real.  I keep saying, I can't believe I have 3 kids.  Everyone's reaction when I tell them the ages of the boys just looks at me like I'm crazy!  I say it will be great, maybe not initial but in the near future, we will have the most fun with them all so close in age.  Dasvadanya! (that's goodbye in Russian)

Things I miss

So I'm a little bored here in the apartment and was thinking of all the things I miss, but will get back to in a few days.  I thought I'd clue everyone in.  First and most important is the boys! Here's the rest in no particular order... church, MOPS, friends, my bed, my kitchen, going outside without 3 layers on and then having to take them all off when entering a store or restaurant b/c it 100 degrees inside, flipflops, shorts, light switches inside the room, the sun, my car, going to the grocery store and buying more than 3 things at a time, real milk, strawberries, lettuce, my couch, tv, making a simple phone call, people that smile and have manners, my personal space, hot chocolate, clean drinking water, chips and salsa, recognizable meat, not fearing my life every time I get in a car or cross the street, the sun (yes, I said that twice), washer and dryer (mostly dryer), clothes that aren't dirty or clean-but crunchy, being able to control the temperature of the room (here its centralized heat by city sections so when they decide to turn it on, its on for everyone),  Fox News, water pressure, seatbelts, wash clothes and/or loofas, toys to entertain a 2 year old, being able to order at a restaurant without using makeshift sign language, large trash cans, ice, my closet, high chairs, Charmin, wheelchair ramps- that's all I can think of for now.

Seriously though, I have really enjoyed a lot of our time here.  I like living close to stuff and being able to walk around to stores and restaurants.  Both cities are beautiful to look at.  It's kind of fun having a husband who doesn't have a job.  Mostly I've had my fill of adventure and am ready for my mundane life back.

On a total side note, I saw this t-shirt that I want.  It said "Hyperbole is the best thing ever!"  I think I may be getting a little slap happy :)

A day on the town

We went down to Red Square today and met up with Chris and Liz.  We wandered around for awhile and took in the sites.  The buildings around here are just so amazing.  We just don't have that kind of history in our architecture in the States.  We headed back to Arbat for some dinner at Hard Rock Cafe.  Clay and I (with Lexi) braved the subway by ourselves for the first time and I have to say we did pretty good.  The signs are all in Russian, so we had a map that had Russian and English on it to compare.  The weird thing here is that a station can have 3 or 4 lines running through it and so the station has a different name for each of the lines. That gets a little confusing, but we did well.  The subway here looks nothing like NYC.  It's actually very ornate.  The halls are lined with tile and fancy chandeliers.  Looks sort of like a hotel lobby not a subway tunnel.  Lexi is doing well.  She didn't sleep great last night, but she did nap well today.  The boys head back to SC tomorrow and we can't wait to follow on Wednesday!

I have

nothing new to say :)  We wandered around a little today, but mostly hung out in the apartment.  I actually cooked dinner tonight which is the 1st time in a month!  We're planning on doing some sightseeing with Chris and Liz tomorrow.  Clay did post a bunch of pics on his website, so go check them out.  Thanks to everyone who's been praying... Lexi slept much better last night which means mommy slept better too!

It's Friday Night!

There's not much to report from Moscow.  Yesterday we went to Arbat St. which is a pedestrian only street.  It has all the shopping and restaurants you need on it including a Hard Rock Cafe, which is where we ate dinner. Lexi actually took a decent nap and went to bed pretty well.  She is still waking up in the night crying and squirming around.  We can't quite figure out what that's about.  It's hard when you don't know what's normal for her or if its something new that we need to worry about.  She is also waking up about 4:30am.  She hasn't quite adjusted to the time change.  Today we wandered around some more before heading to the US Embassy.  It was nice to be on American soil for a little while plus everyone there spoke English!!  We had to do a short interview and then they gave us her visa for her Russian passport.  Now we're back at the apartment just hanging out.  It's raining so Clay will be getting take out from somewhere :)  It's supposed to rain all weekend, so that could make for a long couple of days.  Lexi really prefers to be outside.  She gets so excited at the pigeons and has this new little bark sound when she sees a dog.

Alive in Moscow!

This has been a most crazy day.  I'm not sure I can even explain it.  To make it simple, I'm going to use Moscow time though we started out in Kras.   We got up at midnight, got ready, woke up Lexi and drove 40 minutes to the airport.  In the usual Russian fashion, we stood in several lines to check in, go through security and get on the plane by 3am.   The 5 hour plane ride was mostly uneventful.  Lexi slept some, but struggled to get comfortable so mostly squirmed.  It was by far the worst airplane food I've ever had, oh, and it was dinner... figure that one out???  So we arrive in Moscow at 8am and proceed to get our luggage and get in another van to drive into the city.  There was a huge wreck somewhere so it took us nearly 2 hours to get there.  We thought that we were going straight to the apartment here, but again, since no one tells us anything we end up somewhere else.  The driver pulls in a parking lot and says this is where you get the pictures for the medical exam.  Our coordinator shows up and takes us in to get the pics then to a bank to exchange more money, then says we're going straight to the medicals (Lexi has to get an exam for the embassy).  Keep in mind none of us have had anything to eat or drink since getting off the plane and well, even that was not much.  Our travel mates (Pam, Heidi, and Hilary) are with us too, so we are all starving and very tired.  The medicals took about an hour so by this time is 1pm.  THEN, we had to drive to a different building to pay for the medicals, so that took another 1/2 hour.  Finally we're headed to the apartments.  They decided to drop off Pam and Heidi first, and managed to miss the turn and going around the block took about half an hour b/c of traffic.  Finally they are set, and we go on to our apartment.  We arrived here about 3:30pm.  Miraculously the girls did pretty well.  Lexi slept on and off in the van and only flipped out a few times.  She was so excited when we got to the apartment.  She just kept running around like she'd never seen so much space.  Clay immediately went to the grocery store and apparently its a nice one.   2-story with an escalator for your shopping cart.  He's going to head back out to McD's for dinner for us.  I would say its definitely an early to bed night.  You can pray we all adjust to the time change and Lexi to a new bed.  We've also had several frustrating things with the communication about different aspects of the adoption including some financial things, so pray that we can, in a Christ-like manner, help Bethany understand some changes that need to be made. I won't go into detail at the moment.  Only 6 more days here!!!

Last Day

We survived our last day in Kras.  It's definitely getting cold here so I'm glad we're headed home, well a little closer to home.  Lexi did much better last night and seems to close to sleep tonight, so that's an answer to pray!  We went out with all the other couples tonight for one last dinner which this time included Lexi and Hilary (the other family traveling with us, little 14 month old).  It was quite an adventure, but we got through it with only 4 tantrums from Lexi :)  At least they're short lived.   We've come to find out that Russians don't believe in letting their babies cry at all, and apparently this runs true even at the orphanage.   We also got warned by our coordinator not to let her cry in the room or someone might turn us in and they would come take Lexi away.  Seriously, thanks for scaring the living daylights out of me.  So now we've been all paranoid about her crying.  But we also don't want to start bad habits.  So hard to parent in another country especially when we know she doesn't understand most of what we're saying.  She has figured out the sign for "more" already.  Like I've said before, she likes to eat and if signing gets her more food, she's all for it.  It took her about 30 minutes to figure out how to sign and get more of whatever.  

We head to Moscow in the morning.  We don't really know the exact agenda there, I guess we'll find out when we get there.  Our whole trip is like that, we have very little control and they only tell us on a need to know basis.  Half the time we get in the car, we don't even know where we're going.  If we ask questions about something more than one day in advance, they just tell us that they'll let us know later.  My inner control freak is about to go insane!!! :) LOL...

Crazy Night!

So I never got around to posting last night, but let me just tell you about it.   We had a great day.  Lexi ate lots of food, pretty much anything we put in front of her.  We found a cool park and she took a great nap.  She loves the bath so we did that again.  THEN, bedtime came.  I don't know if she just wasn't tired or she was pushing her limits, but... she was fine at first, just playing in her bed with some toys.  I have to sit in the room with her or she screams.  So I look over and she has taken her shirt off, so we put it back on.  Then a few minutes later, I'm standing in the doorway between her room and ours with my back towards her and I hear what sounds like little footsteps.  I turn around and there she is standing behind me.  Seriously... some how she climbed quietly out of the crib. So back she goes.  We decided to sit on the couch in her room and watch a movie (with headphones) since she apparently isn't going to sleep any time soon.  I look over and she's playing with something, so Clay gets up to check it out.  She has now removed her pants and diaper!!  Somewhere in there she had taken her shirt off again, but we had decided to leave it alone, but now again we get her dressed. Finally she settled down and went to sleep.  The whole process was about an hour and a half!  Stay tuned for tonight's bedtime report...

Alexis Kay Cartwright

Well, its official!  She's finally ours.  We signed adoption papers and a birth certificate today then went to pick her up.  We've had fun today. However, we did find out that we do not have enough toys to entertain a 2 year old in a hotel room :)  Luckily it's warm today, so we took a couple of walks around the courtyard in front of the hotel.  They turned off all the fountains 2 days ago, so she couldn't see those but the horses and ponies were out in full force.  She also loved the pigeons everywhere.  Coming home from the orphanage she fell asleep in my lap which, of course, in Cartwright tradition meant she didn't want her afternoon nap!  Also in the typical Cartwright fashion, she loves to eat so that's great.  We just finished giving her a nice warm, long bath and greased her up with good ol' Johnson and Johnson.  We're going to try to call the boys a little later and then its off to bed.  You can pray she sleeps well in the hotel.  It's pretty noisy, but we have a real crib so hopefully she'll settle right in.  They don't give us a whole lot of info on her habits or likes so its hard to know what she's used to as far as routine.  I still can't believe its finally for real!!!!

The time has come

It's late Friday night and tomorrow is the day!  We ran around today getting last minute stuff for Lexi like toys and food.  Then stayed up late playing cards with Heidi and Pam since it was our last free night :) We go tomorrow at "9 and 10 minutes" as our coordinator says. It's supposed to be warm tomorrow so hopefully they won't fuss about the clothes I want to put on her.  The orphanage workers are really into layers.  We will be inside in a hot room and Lexi will have on a onsies, then sweater, then jumper dress with thick tights.  If we go outside its even worse.  I can't imagine what they do when it actually gets cold here.   We've seen some of the other kids outside in full blown snowsuits with hat and hood on.  It's like 45 degrees out.  Crazy.  Anyway, they frown at us about a lot of things so I'm sure they will not like what I've picked out for her to wear. But she's mine now, so what can they say!  ha, ha!

Thursday night

We visited Lexi for the last time at the orphanage today.  We actually got to take her (with supervision) to get her passport photo taken and then back to the playground at the orphanage.  She did great in the car and was very intrigued by everything around us.  Our coordinator and driver are busy with another family tomorrow and we're going to do some preparing for Lexi so we won't go to the orphanage, but they said be ready by 9am on Saturday with clothes!  I can't believe its almost here.  

The 10 days has gone much faster than I thought.  It's helped having so many Americans here.  10 of us went to dinner together tonight at Mama Roma's, the local Italian joint.  It's always an experience eating out b/c you never know if the server is going to understand you.  Luckily Mama Roma's menu has pictures for us, so we can point.  It also has everything listed with its Italian name, then Russian name, and then English name. You get really excited if a restaurant has an English menu!  What I wouldn't give for some chips and salsa though.  There's lots of Italian here and obviously Russian.  There's also a German restaurant that we tried and there seems to be lots of sushi bars which we did not try :) But apparently Mexican food has not made it here yet. The coordinator in Moscow said "Taco Bell" when we mentioned Mexican food so its really not here yet.  And now that I've rambled on, I'm going to quit and go to bed!

Back home

So I had been thinking all day that I should post a little bit about what the boys have been doing in KC while we're away.  They have been having so much fun and I think they've eaten McDonald's about 7 times already.  They've gone to the pumpkin patch, the petting zoo, and Worlds of Fun as well as old friends' houses to play.  My parents said they've been great other than some potty issues, but what's new with that.  They may just be being nice to me anyway.  So... today we call them AND my mom got appendicitis and had to have her appendix out yesterday (Monday). Seriously.  My poor dad now has a sick wife, 2 toddlers, and a job to juggle (a job based on the stock market-so not a great week anyway).  Needless to say, they definitely could use your prayers.  They've had such a great 2 weeks and I had this happy little blog planned and now this.

5 days and counting!

It's Monday evening so only 5 days until Lexi is with us.  Not much happened yesterday so I didn't post.  There are 4 new couples here, all with different agencies plus another Bethany couple.  Most of us hooked up last night and went to the Kras cultural museum.  It was all in Russian, but you got the idea.  Then we all ate at Mama Roma's, the local Italian joint.  Nothing like a bunch of loud Americans in the middle of a Russian restaurant.  It was quite a scene.  Today we went to brunch with our new friends from Alabama.  They head back to Moscow tomorrow with their little girl, Rosie.  She is also 2, so we're getting a glimpse of what's to come :)  We got to visit Lexi this afternoon and she was as playful as ever.  At the end she started repeating "Hi" in her little voice and then cracking up laughing like it was the funniest thing she had ever heard.  Clay is out taking pictures right now.  He wanted to get some good shots of the crazy traffic.  When we get to Moscow, we will be able to post lots more pictures.

Russian culture

So a few things I've noticed while being here.  First, pretty much all the women wear either stiletto shoes or boots... like knee high ones.  I can't really explain it, so I've given Clay permission to take pictures of Russian women :)  They consistently dress up way more than us and the shoes complete the outfit.  It's amazing to me b/c they walk every where in those heels.

Secondly, is the driving.  I know we've said it before, but the traffic here is crazy.  Our host told us yesterday not to worry about our driver b/c they're are no rules!  Seriously, they just create lanes when they need them and make u-turns when its convenient.  Yesterday we saw cars driving down the trolley tracks!  Oh, and the horn.  Instead of a polite "beep" to get someone going at a green light.  Here the horn means I'm coming, so you better get out of my way! and its loud, long, and repeated.  There is one traffic circle we have to go through, and I've nicknamed it "The Circle of Death".  Sea Pines looks like a piece of cake now!

Lexi was great today.  We got to play outside with her and her class.  I was barely holding back the tears as I pushed them all on one of those little merry-go-round things that are outlawed in the states now.  They were all so cute and this one little boy was eating up the attention.  I want to bring them all home.  Everyone needs to adopt!!!  

I'm going to watch the fireworks out our hotel window now as well as the party in the square!

Here's a picture from today!  I haven't loaded any other pics b/c internet is such a commodity over here.  You can look at Clay's site for a few more. www.claycartwright.com.

The big thing today was that Lexi said "Papa" and pointed at Clay.  We thought it was a fluke the first time, but she did it several more times :)  Made his day!  She gets more animated and more verbal everyday.

We visited Lexi again today.  She is definitely warming up to us especially to Clay now.  We had a room to ourselves, so we just had fun with her today.  She was acting much more like a crazy 2 year old :)  After our visit to her, we hooked up with another couple that is also adopting a 2 year old girl and they have a 6 year old son with them that they adopted from Russia.  We ate California Pizza Kitchen and then braved the Kras flea market.  It was great.  We also went in the toy store and bought a little stroller.  And then there was the food market... like a city market that you can buy fresh food.  There were piles of fruits and veggies so we got some apples and bananas.  But there were also piles of raw fish and caviar!  Literally bowls of caviar just sitting there.  Then there was the pet store in the next room, at least we think they were for pets :)  All in all, a fun day.