Chef Igor

Aunt Shawn arrived yesterday. She brought holidays treats, yummy pecan sandies. Shawn is planning to make ginger snaps while she is here (my favorite). Last night she helped supervise as Igor decorated Christmas cookies. These are the same cookies that Shawn & I use to decorate when we were Igor's age!

We made home made pizza last night. Igor helped toss the pizza dough. Maybe he'll be a chef when he grows up. Or he might be in charge of wardrobe for a movie studio... notice the change of shirt...

Merry Christmas everyone!

Adoption Update

Igor and I made gingerbread cookies. We decided we would make a cookie family- Daddy, Mommy, Igor and brother (AKA BOC). Igor moved the feet on several cookies prior to baking so it look would look like we were exercising! I attached our "standing" cookie family for your viewing pleasure.

We have an adoption update!
In October there were many AWAA families who received referrals. We thought we might hear something at the end of the year or the beginning of 2008. A recent update from our family coordinator has confirmed, we will not be a family of four (except in cookies) for several more months.

Several people have asked about the adoption process compared to Russia. The process is very different. For those of you who walked with us through Igor's adoption you'll recall we received pictures of Igor, accepted the referral, we went to Russia to meet Igor and then confirmed we would go forward with the adoption. We returned home and waited for our court date. Six months later, we returned to Russia to face a Russian court in order to adopt Igor. Once the judge ruled in our favor, we picked up Igor. Then it was a matter of getting his Russian passport, US VISA, US embassy visit and then home!


The Ethiopian process is different. Once we receive and accept our referral, our child will be removed from the orphanage and placed in a transitional home run by our agency. The transitional home can serve between 10-20 children dependent upon the ages and needs at any one time. Next, we will be assigned a court date. We will not go to Ethiopia for the court hearing, our in country representative will be there on our behalf. After a successful court ruling we will be giving travel dates to pick our son. AWAA estimates this process will take 2-3 months.

Currently, 15 children occupy the transitional home. Rob and I do not expect more referrals until the new director is onsite full time and some of the children are picked up by their adoptive parents. We anticipate this to happen sometime in January or February 2008. As we learn more, we will share the news with you.


Families with October 3 referrals hope to have their cases heard on Dec 13. Please pray the court hears the adoption cases on the 13th and they would travel quickly to pick up their little ones.


We will update you on the status of referrals as soon as we hear something.

Santa Claus came to town

Today, we saw Santa! He came to our neighborhood to ask children what they would like for Christmas. Last year Igor was very afraid of Santa but he did sit on Santa's lap right before it was time to go home. This year it took Igor about 30 minutes to gather his courage to sit on Santa's lap. When Igor walked up to Santa it was such a sweet moment. Igor smiled and looked right into Santa's eyes.
Igor has gained so much confidence in the last year!

The Tree is up!

For some time, Igor has been eagerly anticipating the Christmas tree going up!

This week we put up the tree and decorated it. This is the first year that Igor "gets" Christmas. He was so excited to decorate the tree we asked him to choose which lights would go on the tree- multi-colored or white lights. Igor decided both..... Multi colored lights combined with white lights seemed a little odd to me so I asked which lights he liked best. Igor picked the multi-colored lights. Rob and Igor headed upstairs to collect the Christmas decorations and lights. Can you guess who found the neatly wrapped lights and brought them downstairs?

Clearly a rookie mistake by mom and dad.

Next year, we'll carry the lights, not the kid(s). It took Rob a LONG time to untangle the lights. Finally we were able to decorate the tree! Igor requested the ladder so he could help with every aspect of decorating. Igor wanted to put up the star but he's not tall enough, even with the ladder, so Rob placed the star on top of the tree. It's beginning to feel a lot like Christmas.

Like last year, as soon as Igor comes downstairs for breakfast the lights on the tree must be turned on. Igor LOVES the Christmas tree.

Preparing for another child and Igor continues to grow up

Igor continues to grow like a weed. He has grown 3/4 of an inch in 5 months! He is getting too big for his little car bed.

At the family reunion we learned that Rob's uncle and aunt wanted to give away their son's bunk bed. Did someone say they were giving away a bunk bed??? We would love to have a bunk bed for our growing family!

On Friday, we drove 4 hours to Rob's Uncle & Aunt's house. It was great to spend time with Dave, Jeannie and their kids. It's cool that the beds can remain in the family. We were also able to have lunch with Aunt Shawn who lives in the next town!

Igor was so excited he wanted to set the bed up as soon as we arrived home! Rob and I were exhausted so we set them up the next afternoon.

When we put the top bunk up we realized that the ceiling fan will have to come down. It's so close to the top bunk. Igor can touch it. YIKES. Igor LOVES his new bunk bed! He likes to play on the top bunk but currently sleeps on the bottom.

A house of cards... I mean gingerbread

Igor saw a gingerbread house in a catalog the other day. His eyes grew wide with amazement and delight, then he asked if we could make a gingerbread house. I thought it looked like fun so I said YES! Little did I know what I was getting myself into.

I purchased a pre-baked house so we could get a feel for the size of the house and the amount of candy. I thought we could bake a second house closer to Christmas.
Before building the house Igor and Rob had decided that once it was decorated they would eat it. hmmmm..... I thought we could keep the house out as a Christmas decoration. In hindsight, this discussion was not necessary.

Igor mixed up the frosting to the consistency of toothpaste. Then we propped up the house with cans and started cementing the house together as described in the directions. It was much harder than I had anticipated. The frosting was more like fondant and it was very difficult to line up the house's edges just so. Finally we were able to get the foundation of the house up. We left the house to dry. A few minutes later we heard a crash. The gingerbread had fallen like a house of cards. The side of the house had cracked.


Igor said, let's not do this anymore mom. I suggested we decorate the house even though it was broken. Igor agreed. He loved putting on the candy.

No news.....

We don't have an update on our adoption... so we continue to wait.

Yesterday, we took Igor to his first college football game. We weren't sure if Igor would like the game or how long we'd stay. Igor really liked drinking hot chocolate while watching the marching band perform. Things took a turn on the first possession of the game when the home team scored. That's when Igor heard/saw the cannons and fireworks. Igor is terrified of fireworks so he demanded to go home. We were able to see the opposing team score before we had to leave (in the first quarter). Igor has proclaimed that he will never, never, never ever go to another football game again...

When we arrived home, Igor headed for his CD collection. He played his "new favorite" CD. He danced for about 30 minutes. I think he has pretty good moves for a 5 year old who has never seen a music video.