Back to normal plus 1

It has been great catching up with family and friends. It’s hard to believe that we have already been home for a little more than a week. Time has flown by so fast.

It was so great to see so many people at the airport as we groggily made our way down the escalators upon our arrival. It was even nice to be able to spend time with family right after at our place even as we were so physically and emotionally exhausted from the agonizing 24 hour day of flying over 11 time zones 🙂 .

Last week was a huge adjustment for all of us starting with me going back to work and Tanya staying home with Cooper and trying to get everything in order and back to some normalcy.

It’s been fun to watch Curious Cooper as he takes in all the new people and things around him. He has already met many of our nice neighbors and he has already had many new firsts. Here are just some of them.

His first meal at home

And very first Thanksgiving at Great Grandma & Grandpas with yummy pumpkin pie

And we can’t forget joining the bigger boys to watch a little football

He’s already had many fun times with cousins

And even a chilly trip to the local playground

This week/month/year has given us a lot to be thankful for. This past week has reminded me of that often. We can’t wait to see what’s next as we experience many more firsts with Cooper. Stay tuned 🙂

Home Sweet Home

Hello everyone. Sorry it’s taken us a while to post. Yes, we made it home (just barely, but we did it! 🙂 ) Let’s just say the flights were stressful at the best of times. LOL I think Jila is exactly right when she says 18 months is probably one of the toughest ages to fly at. Cooper had the hardest time getting comfortable and every time he drifted off to sleep he squirmed and writhed around and didn’t sleep very long at all. It made it hard too because he was too big for the baby beds and too small to have his own seat. So after about 30 minutes on the plane we were all tired, uncomfortable and irritable. And we tried not to think that we had 23 more hours of that feeling. Ha ha.

But eventually we made it home and we all felt so good to be home at last! We had a great welcome at the airport – thanks to everyone that came down to see us. I know we were probably quite smelly and our brains were quite fried so I don’t think we were making much sense, but it was nice to see you all nonetheless. Then Cooper got to go for a car ride with his new cousins Bentley, Ethan & Tate (& his Auntie Marla) and soon we were home at Cooper’s new digs.

We got in the house and everyone said that I should take a look around. Part of me barely remembered the house since we moved in December and then we were off in July – but once I took a look around I was so overwhelmed by what everyone had done (& I know I speak for Ken here too).

Before we left I didn’t have much time to do up the baby room. I had some ideas that I wanted to do a Dr. Seuss theme because I love reading, I love Dr. Seuss and it seemed like a good theme for either a boy or a girl. But when it comes to home decor, I have ideas but I have no idea how to execute them. When we were in Kaz, I once thought to myself “Wouldn’t that be nice if someone came and did up the baby room as a surprise” but I really didn’t expect it and the outcome was beyond my wildest dreams. Well, I’m not doing a very good job of explaining this, am I? I’ll try to show you some pictures just to give you a little idea of what my family did for us. If I understand correctly, the main leads on this project were my two sisters Marla & Trisha and my cousin Jocelyne. Also my mom Nana took care of a lot of the details (& cleaned the whole place for us, bought us lots of groceries and fed us when we got home). And the supporting cast were my nephews (Bentley, Ethan & Tate) who gave Cooper a TON of their toys (& a whole play structure) and I’m sure my dad and my two bro-in-laws. And if there is anyone else I’m missing, we are very, very grateful for all your work too!

This really did play out like an episode of ‘While You Were Out’. Now I understand why everyone cries (with happiness of course, except for some really silly people) when they see the final reveal. I know walking into Cooper’s room and seeing how much he liked it and how cozy it felt, made my eyes get really misty. 🙂

This is what Cooper’s room looked like before we left. (Actually it looked worse than that but I think my family made it look a little better when they staged it to take a picture. 😉 )

And this is what it looks like now:

(Just the wall decals aren’t up in this photo yet.)

And Nana also made sure all Cooper’s clothes were ready in his closet and dresser:

I keep going around the house and finding little things everywhere – like shoes in the closet, new winter hats for Cooper, new socks, etc. etc. It’s so awesome and we are so fortunate that everyone has looked out for every little detail for us. When we got home on Thursday we were standing in Cooper’s room, I was so tired and I realized we had used the last diaper. So I said to my sisters that I had to go out and get more diapers and they said “Maybe you should look under the change table” and there were tons of diapers there. That made me feel SO grateful!

To top it all off, they went even further and did up some other rooms in our house for us. I still hadn’t had time to put any artwork on our walls in our living room:

So they blew up pictures of Cooper and us and put them on the wall:

And then they even transformed the area downstairs (that I had always envisioned as a play area) into a safari theme play area. Here’s what it looked like before (lots of random furniture and mainly unused, dead space):

And here’s what it looks like now:

It seems so appropriate that this is Thanksgiving weekend, because we have SO much to be thankful for!

Well, I could go on and tell more stories, but I’d better sign off for now and I’ll continue on Monday. I’ve hidden in the computer room to get this written, but I can tell Daddy is getting a little antsy to be relieved as the play partner. Who knew getting up at 6AM on a Saturday morning and having to play, play, play could be so exhausting?!

Hello Everyone – It’s Scully Here!

Well, since I finally made it home, I thought I’d rush around and get a few things ready. It seems that there were so many preparations for the overseas trip, that very little in the way of preparing for life at home was accomplished. So, with only a few hours until the big arrival…

 

I started with my favorite place…..

 (keep scrolling down)

 

 

 

 

 The backyard of course!  

 

Then I put some necessities out…   I personally think that these two go together….

 

 

 

 

 

         

 

 

 

There were a few things I’m not sure where they came from….. Africa???

 

 

 

 

 

 

 So hey, Cooper!  I think I’m ready for you!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Just remember one thing…   

Even though you got your own room…

 

 

 

 

 

 

I’m the princess around here!

 

 

 

 

 

Just joking…  

I had you a little scared, didn’t I?

Really…..

 

 

 

 

 

WELCOME HOME COOPER!

I love you so much already

 and I don’t even know you yet! 🙂

(See yesterday’s blog for arrival info.)

Homeward Bound

Thanks for all your prayers, positive thoughts and well wishes.
Yesterday we were down to 3 options: a kindhearted stranger to bring our paperwork along on the plane with them, our Moscow contact buying a very expensive plane ticket at our expense to fly the docs to us, or having the docs sent by train and rescheduling our flights to Monday.
Obviously the first option was the most preferable albeit the least likely to happen. Well, I’m happy to say that miracles really do happen! We got the call at midnight last night that some kindhearted soul was bringing our paperwork and at 6:30AM our coordinator in Astana phoned to say she had the docs in her hands. So now we are madly packing and we should be in the air by 5:50PM Winnipeg time today (Wednesday). And after a 24 hour journey we should be arriving in Winnipeg at 5:30PM on Thursday. You are more than welcome to come to the airport if you would like to. We will be arriving from Toronto on Air Canada flight #267 at 5:33PM on Thursday, October 8th.

What a year it’s been for us. We went into 2009 thinking that we would get a call to go to Kaz most likely in the winter of 2010. So while we were waiting we decided to go along with our church on a life-changing trip to Africa in February. Then in May we got the call that our letter of invitation had arrived. Surprise! A few other families from our agency got their invites around the same time, although they were invited into Kaz within a couple weeks. I began to worry a little bit when it turned out we were only invited to arrive in August. I’ve heard of other families whose departure day was close and then their agency phoned to tell them their invitation had been postponed. But we decided to just trust the process and have some faith so when July 21st rolled around we got on the plane to Germany and prayed that there wouldn’t be any last minute changes. We had an awesome time in Salzburg, Munich, Heidelberg, the Rhine Valley & Frankfurt and before we knew it we were on a plane to Astana. I kept telling Ken “I hope they know we’re coming.” I was totally envisioning being stranded in Astana but within about 10 seconds of clearing customs I heard someone call my name and there was our coordinator Bayan. At this point it was midnight so we had a short sleep at an airport hotel and in the morning we were whisked off to Borovoe and then finally to the baby house in the afternoon. And then we finally met our Cooper – once he finally awoke from his nap. To think that he was very quiet, shy and unsure of us that day. Sometimes when it’s a little wild around here I wonder where that calm, quiet boy is. 😉

I won’t bore you with all the details right now but after some waiting, some hurdles, some more waiting, completion of some major steps, some more waiting, a few more hurdles…here we are 2 months &
3 days later getting ready to come home.

There are so, so, so many people to thank I’m sure that we’ll forget someone so please know that we appreciate the support of each and every one of you.

Mom & Dad Neumann – Thank you for your support in every way imaginable. Without you this whole process never would have happened – literally. Cooper is very excited to come home and meet his Nana & Papa.

Jeff & Trisha – Thank you for taking care of (& loving) our dear Scully. We loved hearing all her updates and it makes us happy to know she has a second home where she is so comfortable.

Greg & Marcie – Thanks for taking care of our house for over two months. That is a huge job and we so appreciate all the time and energy you’ve taken to do that.

Marla, Trac & the boys – Thank you for calling so regularly, for giving good advice and even for posting our blog and forwarding the comments to us. Thanks also for all the hand-me-downs. Cooper is already putting them to good use. We are looking forward to him having some new cousin playmates.

Chris – Thanks for always, always being such a reliable (& willing) on- call dog sitter.

All the Kaz adoptive parents (particularly Jila and Julian & Sara) – Thanks for all the support and advice. When you’re halfway around the world and you’re confused or bewildered about what’s going on it’s very reassuring to hear from people who’ve been there & done that.

Our adoption agency in Canada, our social worker and all the people who worked for us here in Kaz – without you there is NO way we would have been able to navigate this complex process on our own. A big HUGE thanks!

To anyone who gave us a phone call – Thanks for lifting our spirits and letting us hear a familiar voice from home.

To all our regular faithful blog commenters – Thanks for being so loyal. We looked forward to your comments to brighten every one of our days.

To anyone who left a comment – Thanks for giving us a pick-me-up on days that at times were monotonous or stressful.

To our anonymous readers – Thanks for taking the time to read about our journey. We hope you enjoyed it even a small fraction as much as we did.

To all our family & friends who kept us in your prayers – Thank you, it made a HUGE difference.

To all the strangers who kept phoning us and keeping us on the line babbling something in Russian even when we told you we couldn’t speak Russian – Thanks for keeping us such good company 😉

To Cooper – Thanks for letting us be your Mom & Dad. We’ll try very, very hard to do a good job.

As for the future of this blog, we are probably going to keep blogging at least a few times a week. Hopefully we’ll have some interesting stories to tell you. Well we hope to see most of you in person very, very soon. Paka for the final time from Kazakhstan!

More bus adventures In Kazakhstan

Yesterday afternoon with Cooper in the Ergo and city map in hand, we decided to test our luck with the transit system in Astana.

We had planned on doing a little souvenier shopping in the old part of Astana since we hadn’t had much luck finding keepsakes in the new part of the city.

In Astana the buses all seem to be numbered so after asking around in our limited Russian, we were able to decipher that #10 would get us to where we wanted to go. We boarded the bus to find out that we should have instead taken the #10 bus in the opposite direction.

After some time we were able to finally make it to this cute little souvenier shop called Talisman. For the most part we have found it very hard to find any stores that sell a lot of traditional Kazak items. We’ve asked many locals and the best that we got from them was that the Talisman store was our best bet, and it didn’t dissapoint. We saw many of the traditional clothing and items that we had seen in Kaz pictures as well as worn by some people in public.

We decided to fill our stomachs before we purchased the whole store and were very happy to discover that just across the street was TGI Fridays.

How many people back home can say they ate at a TGI Fridays in Kazakhstan. Well we can now 🙂 The food was pricey but good. We did have one funny moment though. I asked if refils on coke were free and they said no, so I went back to our table. They must have understood it as I wanted one anyways because they delivered one to me some time later even though I was just asking. It reminded me of the time a similar thing like that happened back at Cafe Alina while in Lake Burabay.

Anyways, a little later the manager dropped by and in her very limited English asked, “Who gives free refils” to which we replied, “In America”. She then mentioned that today they would give a free refil for us. When the bill arrived we discovered that we had been charged for the refil. No big deal, but after paying for the bill the manager approached us with two free Cokes in cups to go. Of course at this point we didn’t really want them but graciously took them anyways. We later laughed it off as another moment of misscommunication as what had happened with the bus earlier.

We did manage to get some shopping done (mostly Tanya) because it was starting to get a little late and Cooper seemed a little tired of waiting around on dad’s back (translation: he was getting a little wrangy).

It was time to go so we managed to ask around and this time pick the
#117 bus. This turned out to be a big mistake but only because we were packed like sardines in it and I just happened to have a less then happy kid on my back.

After what seemed like an eternity we were able to get off at our stop and then calm was finally restored after arriving to our flat, having a quick snack and then bedtime for liitle exhausted Cooper.

We both then had a moment to ponder that today’s bus rides had most likely been another first for Cooper 🙂

Today’s post is hopefully our second last before our trip home. We should know within the next 24 hours whether or not our final paperwork will be able to be in our hands in time to make Thursday’s flight so we can be home in time for Thanksgiving.

We will be praying very hard for that to happen.

Patience & Preserverence

First of all my apologies that there will be no more blog photos until we return home. Alas we don’t have the proper resources to upload photos to our ipod.
I think yesterday was intended to be a lesson in patience & preserverence. Let’s hope the next few days are more along the lines of yesterday’s message topic in Morris: peace. 🙂 Now those of you that have had one year olds around the house are probably wondering ‘what was she thinking having coffee AND a laptop so close within kiddo’s reach?’ Yes I realize now that in my groggy early morning state I probably wasn’t thinking too much at all. I was trying to do some quick research on ways to get our docs back from Moscow and Cooper was happily feasting on some Cheerios watching cartoons so I figured I had a window of opportunity. But as I looked up and saw Cooper dashing towards me I realized the error of my ways.
I had about 3 seconds to try to move my coffee to higher ground, shield the computer, and reason with a 1 year old why pushing, pulling or touching the computer was a VERY bad idea. Well you all know how it turned out!
I didn’t think that much coffee had sloshed on it but apparently it doesn’t take very much. Once I cleaned the coffee off the couch I went to restart the computer and that’s when I realized we had a problem and I ran to wake up Ken. “Ken wake up, I think the computer is wrecked.” “Did you turn the computer over as soon as it happened?”
“Ummmm, ooops no.” I think Ken may have been more upset if he really liked the laptop but he’s never been a fan of it and it was something we had to buy out from a previous job (long story). Anyways Ken has it all in pieces and he’s trying to dry it out but he’s pretty much written it off. The good news is that he thinks we’ll likely be able to get all our pics off the hard drive – plus good thing we have about 70% of our pics & video backed up to an external harddrive. So that leaves us with our trusty iPod and now here I sit using a teeny tiny keyboard typing with one finger. It’s amazing what you can get done when you’re determined. LOL Yesterday we headed to the Mega Center mall to try out their Internet cafe there. That’s the mall with the best indoor play structure and yesterday Cooper and I were pleased to discover there were 3 more play areas we had not yet discovered. Sidenote: why don’t the malls in Winnipeg (besides the small one in St. Vital) have play structures?
Cooper spent over an hour playing near the Internet cafe. The area was packed with kids – most who were a lot bigger and older than him – and even though some of them were being bullies he held his own and had a great time. We had to drag him away from the play structure and on the way home he fell asleep in the Ergo riding on Daddy’s back.
We’ve had a few awkward moments at the play areas. Sometimes Moms will try to talk to me and I just smile and say that I’m sorry I don’t understand. It also feels strange because I have no idea what the kids or moms are saying to Cooper although he seems to understand them.
Also there’s been a few times where he’s run up to people because I think they remind him of people from the baby house. I totally understand but I’m looking forward to being home so that I can understand what’s going on and so things will hopefully not be so confusing for Cooper.
Like we’ve mentioned before they are constantly working on all sorts of construction in this part of Astana. Outside there are cranes all over and in our building we can often hear drilling and hammering. At times it can be quite loud like as if you are sitting in your living room and someone is working away in the kitchen. Cooper doesn’t seem to mind the drilling but he seems to be a little uncertain of the hammering. I’m ashamed to admit that I sometimes use this fact to my advantage and if Cooper is a little squirmy getting into his PJ’s or in the bathroom, I get Daddy to make a little hammering noise and suddenly the squirming stops. 🙂 And finally the latest news on our paperwork…after weighing our options we’ve basically whittled it down to two. Thanks for all the advice you gave – especially Julian & Sara – to help us figure out which options were viable and which were not. Basically it boils down to hoping and praying that our contact in Moscow can convince some kindhearted passenger to take the docs on the plane on Tuesday night.
If not then the docs will have to come by train and we will scramble to try to rebook our tickets for Monday and hope that Ken makes it back in time to get to work on Tuesday. So that’s the latest. We REALLY appreciate all your thoughts and prayers. We’ll keep you posted on any developments. Paka for now!

Editor’s Note:  Because of the issues above and the necessity of updating through their IPOD, Ken and Tanya are having difficulty accessing WordPress to update their blog.  Each day they have been emailing their blog post to me and I have been posting for them.  On days (such as today) when I don’t receive their blog entry before I leave for work, I may have to post later in the day.  Sorry!   – Tanya’s sister Marla

It’s time for a coffee break :(

Today we learned that a morning’s first cup of coffee, a laptop, and a very active one and a half year old can sometimes be a bad combination.

We are now sad to say that the laptop that we were using every day to post our blogs is now out of commission :(. We hope to now try to get to an internet café to post our blog as often as we can.

Posting in Astana each day for the most part has turned out to be quite a challenge. For reasons unknown to us, we have been having issues accessing our blog using multiple sources of internet that we have been able to find. We can’t even access the blog via Wifi on the IPod.

Speaking of coffee, One thing I’ve missed a lot while in Kazakhstan is my Costco no-drip coffee thermos. I would often carry it around with me most places that I went. Even to church :). It had become a regular part of my toolkit for work. As you can tell I’m a big coffee drinker.

While in Kazakhstan my coffee intake has been drastically reduced because of not having the thermos as well as not being able to find a coffee shop that offers coffee to go. Even in the food courts at the malls they don’t offer coffee in a paper cup to go. This all seems weird to me.

The past couple of months Tanya and I have lived off instant coffee. I had never really been a fan of instant coffee before. I can remember spending time at my Grandparents house as kid and instant coffee was all that my grandpa would ever drink.

We also had a chance to get used to instant coffee each morning when we were in Swaziland Africa this past February on a mission trip with our church. I know we’ve been quite spoiled this year with first Africa, then Germany and now Kazakhstan.

The current instant coffee of choice for us lately is the Tchibo brand. Even Cooper demanded a taste the other day when mom was sipping some.

We won’t however be giving our Cuisinart Grind and Brew coffee maker away just yet as we are both itching for a cup of freshly ground coffee when we get back :).

It’s the Final Countdown

Wow, I am suddenly shocked that we have made it to the last step of our in-country process. All along the way I’ve just kept focused on getting one step done so we can move on to the next one. An end point to the whole process isn’t even something I’ve really allowed my mind to dwell on because otherwise I figured I’d get too antsy and drive myself (& Ken) crazy. And really, we have been enjoying our time in Kaz, but now that the end is near, I am ready to pack up and come home.

I’m really eager to get settled back in at our house; to get on a regular routine; to see our family, friends and our precious Scully again; and well, some of us just need to get back to work since those bills still seem to arrive even if you are halfway around the world. 🙂

This is where our current situation is at: we have Cooper’s passport and his visa to leave Kazakhstan. Now we just need his citizenship and his visa to enter Canada. We get those documents from Moscow. A lot of families fly to Moscow to get those docs and then head home from there. We decided a while ago to just stay in Kaz since it’s not much longer to wait and we didn’t want to have to uproot Cooper again, fly to Moscow for a couple days and then try to attempt a 24 hour long travel back home. Now, we made that decision when I was thinking that we could just FedEx things to Moscow in a day, get it processed and have it FedEx’ed back in a day. Easy Peasy. Yeah right. The glitch is that any courier from Astana will only guarantee 4 business days to get documents one-way. We have exactly three business days to get the docs to Moscow, get them processed and get them sent back to us. We’re hoping the processing time in Moscow really only takes one day as we’ve been told. So therefore the glitch is to somehow get the docs there and back at warp speed. We considered just packing up and all heading to Moscow last minute, but we need a visa to do that and now we don’t have enough time to apply for one.

Our coordinator tried to get our documents on the passenger plane last night, but she wasn’t able to get the pilots to take them. So that meant they got sent on the train this morning at 7AM and they should be arriving in Moscow about 50 hours later around noon on Monday. So if we can get the documents processed super-fast there is still a glimmer of hope that we can leave here at 4AM on Thursday morning. We’re hoping our Moscow contact can somehow send them with someone on the passenger plane on Monday night. If that doesn’t work, we need someone to fly the documents to us if we want to leave here on Thursday. Apparently there are a couple people we can hire to do that for us. We’ve also been researching our options and another possibility might be for Ken to fly to Moscow on Tuesday morning, wait in the airport terminal for someone to bring him the docs, and then fly back on Tuesday night (apparently you don’t need a visa if you are there less than 24 hours and you are not switching plane terminals but we need to verify this for sure). It would be a grueling flight because it takes 13 hours to get back to Astana since he has to fly way past Astana to Almaty, wait there and then fly back to Astana. And then turn around less than 12 hours later for our flight back home with an 18 month old!

Are you confused yet by all those details? Don’t worry, sometimes I’m not sure if I really understand it all either! What it boils down to is with lots of prayer – and a few miracles – we are hoping to be home in time for Thanksgiving.

Today was our first rainy, cloudy day in Astana. We have been so fortunate to have had so many days to go out and explore. But today it was definitely a dreary, inside day. So we had to come up with ways to entertain ourselves.

We practiced making silly faces,

we made our own bowling lane with empty bottles,

and then we tried to see how high we could stack the bottles.

Today while Mommy was making her breakfast, Cooper decided to be proactive and get dressed himself. Apparently he is into the latest teenager styles (as in low-riding pants):

I guess I’ll have to always check that he’s appropriately dressed before leaving the house. 😉

Our flat has been taken over by our little one

This morning was another sunny day in Astana. Here are some highlights of our walk to the Presidential Palace this morning. On the second pic you can see a pyramid on the left side. That is the 61m glass-and-steel Palace of Peace & Harmony, home for the triennial Congress of World and Traditional Religions, hosted by Kazakhstan.

It was also fairly breezy so the flags looked very cool blowing in the wind. I hope to be able to purchase a Kaz flag before we head home.

Ever since we arrived in Astana we have started to find out that some things are very hard to do with a very active, energetic one-and-a-half year old around such as:

Keeping your shoes in the closet

Posing for pics

Keeping your flat clean

And even working out

Fun times like these have been keeping mom & dad very busy and entertained as we anxiously await word on the final bit of paperwork to be done in order for us to return home.

Some of our loyal readers had requested a before and after pic so I won’t disappoint ;).

Before

After

As you can see we are still trying to learn the whole sippy cup thing 🙂

Sleeping Beauty

I’m sad to say that wasn’t the case last night. Despite the fact Cooper had his shortest nap yesterday afternoon and we went on three separate excursions yesterday and he was constantly rubbing his eyes, he just could not fall asleep. He was up and out of bed probably about a dozen times. We sat on the potty three separate times and had success each time, but still that did not help. He would play and sing in his bed and he would rub his eyes, but still he could not fall asleep. We were waiting for him to fall asleep so we could go to bed but well past midnight we were very tired so we gave in and went to bed. After Ken used his patented cocooning method (where he wraps kiddo up in all his blankets), eventually Cooper fell asleep. And then this morning he was up like a bolt and ready to run around and play.

Because of this, we decided to have some indoor playtime and laundry time this morning, lest we go out and have a breakdown somewhere due to lack of sleep. That seemed to suit Cooper just fine and he found lots of things to keep him entertained. And I’m happy to report that as I write this it’s shortly after lunch and this is Cooper’s current status:

Mommy & Daddy are crossing our fingers that tonight will look much the same! 🙂

Astana has three newer style malls similar to the malls back home. All three are in our area and we’ve been frequent visitors of two of them, so yesterday afternoon we set out to check out the third one. It was such a nice afternoon that Ken was able to go in shorts and Cooper seemed content to ride on Daddy’s back.

Along the way we passed by what’s being called the most daring of all Astana’s architectural fantasies, the Khan Shatyr.

It’s taking quite a while to build it. According to my trusty Lonely Planet guidebook, the nearest thing to a real Xanadu-style ‘pleasure dome’ that humanity has ever created, the Khan Shatyr will be an enormous, transparent, leaning, tentlike structure, 150m high, made of a special heat-absorbing material that will produce summer temperatures inside even when it’s minus 30° outside.

After walking a few more minutes we made it to the mall.

 

It’s interesting that it’s only two blocks away from the Mega Centre mall. In Astana everything that is new construction is being built in very close proximity to each other. If you asked me to rate the three malls, I would give this mall the lowest rating because it had no children’s play area. Now if you asked me two months ago, I probably would have rated this one the highest because I thought it had the best selection of stores. My, how the factors that are important to you suddenly change. LOL

Cooper can be very mischievous – as I’m sure most of you can guess. When he’s getting into things he shouldn’t, we will look at him, shake our finger and say a stern ‘no’. At first it was hard to keep a stern look because as soon as we did this, he would come running up to us with a big cheesey grin and give us a big hug. Now he seems to have stopped the hugging thing, and instead he will imitate us – which makes me want to laugh, but I try very hard to keep a stern look on my face.

Like Ken said, Cooper doesn’t seem very interested in the TV which is okay with me because I really don’t want him watching too much TV. There is one channel here which is similar to Treehouse back home. All the shows are in Russian of course, except there is one show called ‘Funny English’ and as the name implies it’s a show about teaching kids English. So if that show is on I try to get him engaged with it because they say words in Russian and then in English.

Today we tried to show him a Veggie Tales Silly Songs DVD. At first he didn’t seem interested, but once I sat down with him and tried to get him into the singing, he seemed to enjoy it. In fact, when we had to leave to go to the potty, he could still hear the music and he was sitting there and humming along.

I do love that he has really taken and interest in music. When we first met him he didn’t seem to like music all that much. But now, he really seems to enjoy it. We have three musical toys here and first thing in the morning he’ll always turn them on and then as soon as their familiar music starts he does his favorite little dance to them. And whenever he feels like it is too quiet in here, he’ll run around to each toy and turn them on so they are all playing their music at the same time. He’s also really good at imitating the music to his one toy and he’ll often walk around humming it.

Well, I’d better go before our little munchkin is awake and rarin’ to go. I’m pretty sure he’s expecting some outside time this afternoon as before his nap he was waiting by the door with his shoes in his hand. Paka!