Tickle Tickle Tickle

Another great day of visiting with Cici. She was very excited to see us and greeted us with big hugs and kisses. Her foster parents once again hosted us for both sessions today, and their hospitality has been wonderful. We started out the visit this morning by pulling out crayons and construction paper and doing a little bit of drawing. Carolyn cut out a few snowflakes, and her foster mom, Yordanka, cut out some doll chains. Cici was appropriately amazed with them, but it proved to be a connection point between the two adults as much as it did with Cici. I spent a lot of the morning playing tickle games with her. We have made up several different ones, and they have rapidly progresses in intensity and in the trust she has to have in me. By the time we left for lunch, the game had progressed to where she was standing on my lap, holding my thumbs (while I gripped her wrists) and falling straight back, counting on me to stop her before she hit the ground. When we had to leave for lunch, I had to just hold her and stand up to get the game started. Everybody was in the process of saying goodbye, and since she was in my arms, she started waving to her foster parents and saying ciao. She was ready to go! I finally got her handed off to her foster father, Daren, but I think she'd have gone with me at that point if I'd tried.

Partly because of where I end up sitting during the visits, and partly because I apparently make a good play toy, it seems like I end up entertaining Cici while the adults talk about her. Yordanka had expressed a wish as we were leaving last night to have us show her today where we lived and to learn something about our home environment. We decided that taking the photo album we had prepared and going through it with them would be a good way to facilitate that conversation. So, while Cici and I played, Carolyn and Maggie explained to the rest of the group what Cici's life will be like when she comes to live with us. They explained the concept of home schooling and the wonderful opportunity it provides for a first class education. They talked about living arrangements, interaction with immediate and extended family, and a host of other things I missed out on because I was busy playing. But, Cici and I both preferred it that way. Our goal was to demonstrate to both the foster parents and the social worker, without appearing in any way boastful, that Cici will enjoy all of the opportunities and advantages we can possibly provide in raising her. The goal of the foster care system here is to nurture the children in an environment that helps make them more adoptable and thus opens up doors of opportunity these children might not otherwise have access to. They have poured their hearts into this child for the past year, and we wanted them to understand how their efforts will pay off in Cici's life. They were very excited, and they kept returning to the book over and over again. Cici was very interested in it as well, and would sit and look through it for as long as a 3-year-old's attention span would allow before starting up a new game.

In return, Daren and Yordanka provided a wealth of detail on Cici's background, her life both in the orphanage and in their home, her daily routines and sleep patterns, and a whole host of other information. She pulled out her computer and showed us pictures of Cici over the past year. It was wonderful to see the transformation story told in those pictures. You could read the story in Cici's eyes as you moved chronologically through the pictures. They have done a wonderful work in that child's life, and we will be forever grateful.

During our lunch break, we worked on filling in the few holes still left that we would need to tell Cici her life story some day. Yordanka has an excellent collection of photos and documents of the last year and has offered to share them with us, but we needed something to cover the first two years. So, we hopped in the car and drove first across town to the orphanage where Cici spent her first two years and then drove about 25 minutes out of town to Novi Pazar, the town where Cici was born, to take some pictures. We were even able to find the hospital on Novi Pazar, so we can someday show Cici where she was born. Emily was actually born between here and Sofia, rather than in Lom, in an area that is famous for its vineyards. We plan to stop by there on our next trip when we pick the girls up, since the mountain roads will be easy to navigate and the grapes will be approaching harvest when we are here in the summer.

Our afternoon visit with Cici was very much like the morning one. Carolyn brought along some of the beads we had and made a pair of bracelets for Cici. She loved them and wore them the rest of the day. Yordanka started up some of Cici's favorite songs on her computer, and she danced for quite a while. At one point she organized a group dance with Carolyn, Yordanka, and me, and then she and Carolyn danced a bit later on. She closed out the evening with more tickling and tumbling with me. She got started bouncing up and down on my knees and outlasted my stamina by a long way. She is very energetic and delightfully playful. She is going to absolutely love having big brothers to play with!

Tea Party with Cici

Another wonderful Monday. We got to meet Severina for the first time this morning. We walked from the hotel to the local center for child welfare and foster care supervision. Once we found the right office, the social workers called Severina's foster parents to let them know we were there. They live almost right around the corner from the center and so, because of the cold, were waiting at home until we got there to bring her over. While we waited, we spent the time talking to the social workers about her case history, medical condition, and other background information they could give us.

After about 15 minutes or so, Severina showed up with her foster parents. She is an adorable little doll! She came in all bundled up in a heavy brown fur coat with fur fringed hood, a pink Minnie Mouse stocking cap underneath, pink gloves, and a big pink scarf wrapped across her face (It was about 10 degrees outside). The only thing you could see were her eyes. She was being ushered into a small office with 6 adults already there and two more that came with her, so she was understandably a little shy to start off. She quickly warmed up to the situation, however, and proceeded to entertain all of us for the next 90 minutes. She is very imaginative and readily makes up her own games and songs. She entertained herself for a very long time with just a small plastic dog and tiger. At one point, she decided to put on some earrings. She pantomimed the entire process, picking up an imaginary earring from the palm of her hand and pinning it to her ear, then picking up another one and putting it on her other ear. The social worker held up her hands like a mirror, and Severina (they call her Cici) inspected her earrings in the mirror. At another point she picked up a cap from a magic marker, walked to the door of the room, and using it as a mirror applied lipstick, even going so far as to rub her lips together to smooth the lipstick.

She is cheerful and happy, and spent a good deal of time singing, both common children's songs and her own made-up songs. She is artistic and loves to draw, which makes Carolyn's heart sing. She is also very warm and affectionate. I took a few pictures of her with my iPhone then called her over to look at them. She was perfectly content to allow me to pick her up and put her on my lap. We looked at her pictures, then watched a couple videos of Emily from last week, and finally looked at some pictures of Caroline and Elizabeth from Elizabeth's birthday. She recognized the birthday cake and said something about it, so everybody started singing Happy Birthday. The second time through I filmed her and she enjoyed watching herself sing. A little later on, she was playing with a big plastic teddy bear that looks like it was probably once a package for candy or gummi bears or something. She brought it to me and I made the bear give her a kiss on the cheek. She took it back and gave it a big hug, then moved a little closer to me, so I hugged her the same way she hugged the bear. When I turned her loose, she moved even closer, wanting another hug. I gave her a big one and kissed her cheek. She returned the kiss very willingly. She then moved over and got a hug and kiss from Carolyn.

She really enjoyed putting on Carolyn's earmuffs and scarf. The earmuffs are soft black fur, and the scarf has fur pom pom tassels on it, and she loved the feel of them. Once she got Carolyn's scarf on, she took her own scarf and put it on Carolyn. She is very polite, has been taught please and thank you, and loves to help her foster mother and keep things neat and tidy. She has been very well raised and cared for since she was moved to the foster home last year.

Cici's foster parents are absolutely wonderful. They are an older couple who have a 30-something daughter of their own. They felt called late in life to get involved in the foster care system to make a difference in the lives of needy children. They love her dearly, and there is a very special bond between her and her foster father. Today was very emotional for him, and I really felt for him. I know how difficult I would find it being in his situation. On the one hand, Cici is being given a great opportunity through this adoption, one they have worked hard over the last year preparing her for, and he is not really in a position to raise her to adulthood himself, but on the other hand this is the first step in a process that leads to him losing his little girl. He was very proud of her, and talked a lot about her progress. They have done a great work with her over the last year providing her with love and affection, proper nutrition, and focused education and training. They turned a small and undernourished two year old out of an institution and turned her into a bright eyed, healthy bundle of energy in a year. The foster mom speaks pretty good English and has been teaching her some words in English since they found out she had been referred to an American family. They have taught her manners and graces as well. She is thriving under their care. I am so grateful to God that He provided such wonderful environments for both of these precious girls.

Wanting to ease the strain on Cici of getting out in the bitter cold weather, her foster parents have opened their home up to us as a place to meet all week. It has the added benefit of keeping Cici in a comfortable environment with access to all of her own toys and dolls. It will make our time with her much more enjoyable. They hosted the meeting this afternoon, and it was a great time. It is going to be nice to get to know them over the course of the week, and hopefully getting to know us will make the transition for them next summer much less painful. They are already planning to request another child when Cici leaves, and will be able to continue to make a difference in the lives of some very special children in this community.

She is a bundle of energy from the word go. She started off the afternoon by setting and serving at a tea party using her toy tea set. She did lots of singing and dancing, played with her dolls, and pulled out her toy doctors kit and examined and medicated all of us. I eventually got her into a game of tickle, and we had a great time with that. Meanwhile, Carolyn had a great conversation with her foster mom about daily routine, likes and dislikes, and other pertinent mommy info. To settle her down a little, I pulled out an app we found yesterday for toddler flash cards. It has, among other things pictures of various animals, and each time you change the picture or touch the screen, it says the animal name and then plays the sound the animal makes. It entertained her for quite a while as the other adults talked about her. Afterwards, Carolyn read one of her books to her and played dolls with her. Her foster mom then got out her computer to show us some of the videos she likes to watch. Cici spent the last 15 minutes or so of the evening dancing and singing along with some of her favorite songs that were playing on the computer.

In all, it was a wonderful meeting with some very warm-hearted people. Cici is an absolute delight. I think we both had a great time and are looking forward to a great time this week.

Safe in Shumen - Barely

Despite all my efforts to the contrary, we made it to Shumen. The trip was roughly the equivalent of driving from Knoxville to Memphis without using interstates and with varying amounts of snow and ice on the roads. For the first half of the trip, we never saw the asphalt, only sanded ice and snow. It was like driving 150 miles on dirt roads. Carolyn was hating life; her back took a pretty good beating. The second half of the trip was on something akin to our numbered 2-lane US highway system, with speed zones through every town and every cautionary hazard speed an enforced speed limit rather than just a suggested safe speed.

Given my southern boy heritage and vast lack of experience with ice and snow driving, we did pretty well. At one point, a very large truck coming the other way leveraged his size advantage and claimed more than his share of the road, forcing us onto the shoulder and thus into the pile of snow created by the plows. Fortunately I was able to get back on the road before losing momentum and getting stuck. A while later, we were approaching a merge with another road and the lady in front of me decided to stop completely for some reason. It happened to be on a sheet of slick ice, so despite everything I and the antilock brakes could do, we bumped her. She had a steel trailer hitch that took the impact and left her car completely unscathed, and she waved it off and went on her way. However, her hitch made a mess of our front license plate holder. As the front plate is absolutely required for driving here, we MacGyvered a solution to hold it on using a twist tie from an appliance and a couple lengths of plastic cord from the bead-stringing kit Emily used to make bracelets for herself and her friends.

The trip took a total of 8 hours with 30 minutes for lunch our only stop. Fortunately, we arrived at the Choice Hotel in Shumen to find a very lovely and luxurious little (6 rooms) hotel and excellent attached restaurant. We had a nice dinner and are now just trying to fight off sleep long enough to make it to a reasonable bed time. Tomorrow is a day of rest and recovery, and I don't anticipate posting an update. We meet Severina at 10:00 on Monday.

Ciao Yani!

Yanka did everything she could today to make saying goodbye really hard for me. She certainly succeeded admirably!

First thing this morning, we wanted to get some pictures to have for her "life book." Experts recommend that for international adoptions especially, and probably for domestic ones as well, that you put together a book of pictures and mementos to help them remember and connect with their time before they were adopted. It helps in building their sense of identity and connecting with their roots, especially since, in most cases, they are not likely to ever see these places again.

Yanka showed us her room and her bed in the orphanage, and we made a few pictures of her in her room and with various members of the staff. The conditions were really very nice. There were three beds in a nice size room with a single wardrobe that the girls shared. The room was painted pink, just like her new room will be, and it was very clean and fresh. There were two additional bedrooms as well, a blue one for the boys and a yellow one for the younger girls. There is a very nice size living room area with a large "pit group" type set of sofa components, an entertainment center with tv and a collection of toys, and a table for meals and for doing school work. There is a kitchen for preparing meals and a large bathroom as well.

Next we went to see her kindergarten. We were able to take a few pictures there as well but only of the outside and the entryway. We could not take any pictures that included other children without their parents' consent, so we were not able to get pictures of the classroom since school was in session. We did get to see the whole facility and meet the director and teachers. The school consisted of a single very large and very well furnished classroom. It is actually in the same building as the orphanage, but has its entrance on the opposite side of the building. There were probably 12-15 students in the class and there were three teachers there at the time. I recognized a couple of the children as being from the orphanage, but most were just local children who came there for school. The teachers and the director were all very nice and were very excited that Yanka now has a mommy and daddy. Maggie explained to them that we would be coming back for Yanka in the summer, so they will be able to confirm in her mind that we are indeed coming back.

Our next stop was the town center to find a photo studio to take some passport photos of Yanka that will be used for her US visa. On the way, we stopped off and bought a special gift for the director of the orphanage. I will say more about her later, but she has been wonderful and we wanted to do something very nice for her in return.

After we got the photos taken, we retreated to the same cafe we had visited on Monday while they processed and printed the photos. We ended up staying there through lunch, and Yanka proceeded to really start twisting the knife in my heart. She has been a daddy's girl since Tuesday anyway, and had held my hand rather firmly all morning long. As we sat in the cafe, she was next to me in the booth as we drank juice, played with the iPhone, and eventually ate pizza for lunch. We started playfully teasing a little bit, something that has taken a few days to develop, and then she decided it was time to start cuddling and snuggling. Up until this morning, she would sit in my lap and at best let me put my arms around her loosely or pick her up only for the purpose of seeing out the window. This morning she wanted to cuddle and hug, and would pull my arms tightly around her so I would hug her. She even leaned back in my arms a couple of times and let me hold her like a baby for a few seconds while flashing a big smile. I melted. It was a wonderful time.

After lunch we rushed back to the orphanage so we could say goodbye to the director before she left at 1:00. Yanka handed out the gifts she and Carolyn had assembled yesterday to all of the staff, and we had a nice visit for a few minutes. I cannot think of enough good things to say about this orphanage and this director. The directors of the orphanages set the tone for the family visits, and according to Maggie they can sometimes be difficult and uncooperative. We were blessed with unprecedented freedom and support from this director and her staff. They wanted to do anything and everything they could to make this visit the best experience possible. The director was totally open handed about the visit and placed basically no restrictions on us at all. She and her staff were readily available to answer questions and provide as much information as possible. They work very hard to bring the few children they have along very quickly and make them adoptable. They took great delight in talking about which of their children were in an active adoption process and which countries they were going to. The children in their care were all very healthy and happy, and they became very affectionate toward us as they got used to seeing us through the week. Unfortunately, this particular orphanage is the rare exception rather than the rule and conditions most places are just not that good. For anyone reading this blog in preparation for a visit to Bulgaria, please don't set your expectations for your visit based on this particular example. Unless you are visiting this specific orphanage, you are very unlikely to experience a visit with this much freedom and opportunity for interaction. We feel so blessed that Yanka has had the opportunity to be in this orphanage and for the care, love, and nurturing she has received there. I am very sad to have to leave her for a while, but I am very happy to know how well she will be cared for and that she will be actively prepared for the experience of leaving with us when we return. I suspect it will be difficult for her to leave; she seems to like it there very much.

We brought Yanka back to the hotel this afternoon for our last visit. She and I took out the trash, then she spotted the play-doh and wanted to make things. She sat in my lap and thought up things for me to make. She tasked my very limited skills as a sculptor to the utmost, but her last request was for a ball. I handled that one pretty well. After we made it, we spent some time making up games to play with the ball on the coffee table. As we wrapped that up, I took a piece of paper and traced her feet and measured her arms to get an idea of clothing and shoe sizes. She then decided it was time for one of her favorite activities of the past few days, brushing Carolyn's hair. She has said several times that she wants hair like Carolyn's, and seems a little embarrassed that hers has to be kept so short.

After the salon treatment, we got to the critical element of the visit, explaining that after tonight we would not see her again for a long time, but that when we came back, we would be taking her home with us for good. Carolyn started out by giving her a very soft pink plush bunny rabbit, and she was very excited. She said in the car later that she was going to sleep with it. We then pulled out the photo album we made for her, and I explained, with Maggie translating, where we were going, when we were coming back, and how she would come to live with us after we came back. I walked her through the book and introduced her brothers and sisters, grandparents, cousins, cars, toys, and lots of other things. She loved it, and went through it herself several times, naming everyone and everything in it. She even showed it to the bunny rabbit. She has a very tender heart. When she saw the picture of Elizabeth she said, "Oh, she's so sweet!" She had said the same thing about a picture of Caroline a few days before. When we told her that she would be able to grow her hair out after she came to us, she pointed to her back just above her waist and said she wanted it that long. Her hair is thick and wavy, so it ought to be stunning grown out long. Finally, we introduced her to her new name. Actually, we let Maggie handle it and she did wonderfully. She told Yanka that where we live, people have names that sound more like ... and then she listed off the names of her brothers and sisters. She told her that she would have a name like that as well - Emily Catherine. When Maggie asked her if she liked it, she enthusiastically shook her head and said yes. The staff at the orphanage was told about the new name as well, and they will start using it to help her get used to it. So, from this point forward, she is now Emily Catherine Osborne. We're not absolutely sure at this point whether she will be Emily Cate or just Emily, but Emily is easier for a one-finger typist. On the way back to the orphanage, Emily and Maggie had a long conversation as she tried to work all of this new information out in her mind and understand what it all meant. She still doesn't fully grasp it yet, and may not until several days go by and we do not come, but the orphanage staff and her teachers will continue to reinforce that mommy and daddy will be back in the summer, and once the official court decree is issued, the staff at the orphanage will start priming her for the transition. I am confident they will do an excellent job.

Saying goodbye to Emily for the last time was tough, but she is in excellent hands and we will be working hard to get ready for her. God is working everything out perfectly.

Tomorrow we are off for a six hour drive to Shumen (possibly longer if the road are in bad shape) where we will enjoy a day off on Sunday and get ready to meet Severina on Monday.

A Day in the Life...

There was a heavy snowstorm across the whole country of Bulgaria yesterday and today. The heaviest snowfall hit here in Lom overnight, and during my jet lag induced sleepless vigil from 1 to 5 AM, I was concerned that we would get snowed in today and wouldn't get to see Yanka at all. I don't know what the official numbers were, but I scraped at least 4 inches of snow off the car this morning. I noticed a pretty good flow of traffic on the main road up the hill from the hotel, but the road out from the hotel, and especially the parking area looked questionable. When I went out to check on the conditions and to clean off the car, I decided to try driving up the hill just to see how it went. Turned out that there was no problem getting out at all, and the town of Lom had done an excellent job of clearing and sanding the surface streets. I drove back to the parking area, picked up Carolyn and Maggie, and off we went.

We had decided after the success of yesterday to try to simulate as best we could a "normal" day (as if such a thing really existed) such as Yanka will experience when she comes home. Carolyn mapped out a morning of work and school activities, and we worked through the schedule. It worked great, and it solved the problem of the tedium involved in trying to entertain an active 7 year-old for hours on end.

We started the day with a trip to the grocery store to shop with mommy for breakfast and for something to make for lunch. We ended up with a loaf of bread, some jam, and a plastic spoon to make jam sandwiches for lunch (peanut butter is a rare foreign delicacy available only in the finest stores in the big cities :-) ), and some croissants for breakfast. Yanka loved shopping; it was probably her first time ever. We got to the hotel, and after a minute or two to play in the snow, the ladies headed upstairs to start breakfast while I moved the car to a better spot and walked around taking pictures of the snow. When I got to the hotel room, breakfast had been set out, so we prayed and got ready to eat. Yanka came over and opened my croissant for me, then shook my orange juice and opened it for me as well. Someone has trained this child well :-). After breakfast, she helped Carolyn clean up and then helped her assemble little gift bags for us to give as hostess-type gifts to the caregivers in the orphanage. Once that task was done, Carolyn read Go Dog Go to her off my iPhone. It proved a little long, but she stuck with most of it. Next, Yanka and I took out the trash. She then had "school" time with Carolyn. We had brought a little activity book where you use a set of plastic stencils to trace various clothing components onto a doll picture - paper doll style - and a set of markers and accessory stickers to color with. Carolyn used it as an opportunity to start teaching the English names of the colors.

After school, it was lunch time. Yanka and Carolyn set out the bread, and Yanka spread the jam and assembled the sandwiches, which she proudly delivered to each of us. Add a bottle of water and we had a very lovingly prepared and excellent lunch. Yanka helped clean up the table and put away the food, and it was off to the orphanage for nap time.

After her nap and the drive back to the hotel, I read Go Dog Go to her again. About three quarters of the way through, she lost interest and started flipping the pages faster than I could read them. She then helped Carolyn assemble a few more gift bags. Finally we broke out the play-doh and all had a good time making stuff. A little time was spent looking out at the river, then back to the orphanage for the night. In all, it was an excellent day; probably the best we've had.

Tomorrow is our last day with her. It is going to be tough to say goodbye.

Girly Girls and Silly Putty

Today started out with Yanka very much where yesterday left off. She was very definitely Daddy's girl right off the bat. I was the one she hugged when we arrived to get her. She wanted me to help her with her boots, and was petting me a bit as I zipped them up. She grabbed my hand and led me to the car, and as we started the morning activities, she was perched on my lap. It was really nice, but we really needed today to be a day for her to connect with Carolyn.

There were some big breakthroughs on that score today thanks to the intelligence and insight of our wonderful interpreter, Maggie. We have been very much in the mode of trying to make things fun and interesting for Yanka, and I think she has seen us more as playmates than authorities and caregivers. She has been interested in me as a novelty since she has had limited exposure to men. Maggie picked up on this and suggested that Carolyn pull back a little and assert more authority. It worked beautifully. Carolyn went into "mommy mode" and started directing Yanka to do things and correcting her if she didn't respond. It was amazing to see Yanka fall right in line. She had her moments, but for the most part was extremely obedient. In the few cases where she needed correcting, she responded to it immediately and positively, no stubbornness, crying, or tantrums at all. She also began paying most of her attention to Carolyn, and it was interesting to watch them carry on a two-way conversation in two different languages with essentially no interpretation help from Maggie, and yet Yanka was following instructions, responding to both praise and correction, and showing genuine interest in Carolyn and what she was doing. Maggie did a great job of knowing when to step in with a quick interpretation and when to stay back and let them work through something on their own. We are going to try, weather permitting, to take it a step further tomorrow and do more "real life" activities rather than just babysitting games. We are both looking forward to the change.

The morning activity was supposed to be cutting and pasting with construction paper. The scissors broke a few minutes into the activity, so Carolyn resorted to tearing out shapes like hearts and butterflies and snowflakes, while I had the daddy duty of making several paper airplanes. At some point, Yanka started playing with Carolyn's hair, then asked for a comb. I dug out a brush, and she had the best time brushing Carolyn's hair. She even worked on my hair a bit. Then she wanted Carolyn's blush. She had seen Carolyn put some on the night before, and had even gotten a little put on her own face just for fun. We gave her the blush, and she proceeded to apply some to her own cheeks and then to Carolyn. By the time she was through, she had completely covered Carolyn's face in blush. Then, a few minutes later as we were standing by the window watching a boat on the river, she remarked on how red Carolyn's face and asked "very innocently" who had made her face so red. Before lunch, Carolyn took Yanka into the bathroom to wash their faces, clean up the glue after the cut and paste activity, and put on some lotion. Yanka ate it up. She had lunch with us today and was very well behaved and showed excellent table manners.

After Yanka's nap, we brought her back for our afternoon visit. All we really had ready to do was play with silly putty, and we figured it wouldn't go very far. We got some old newspaper from the front desk and started by playing with picture copying and stretching. She lost interest pretty quickly and didn't really find the distorted pictures particularly amusing. I showed her how to make a ball with it, and the first time she saw it bounce, we had our afternoon activity. She and I played ball, bouncing and rolling it across the coffee table in the hotel room and chasing it all over the place. She showed some potential athletic aptitude, which was a bit of a surprise. She could catch a small ball pretty well off the first bounce. Meanwhile, Carolyn cut out a few construction paper snowflakes using scissors the desk clerk had loaned us, and Yanka helped glue them to a piece of background paper. Then Carolyn showed her how to clean the glue off the table and then rinse the cloth out and hang it up to dry. We then made a couple more videos of her singing some songs. When she returned to the orphanage, she was armed with two boxes of sweet tarts for the rest of the kids. It has been snowing all day and the forecast is for snow tonight and tomorrow as well. I'm just hoping the roads will be passable enough to got up the hill to the orphanage in the morning.

Thanks so much to all who have responded on the blog or by email to these posts. We can't reply to each one individually because of limited data on the international roaming plan, but please know that we do see all of the comments and we very sincerely appreciate your words of support and encouragement.

Beads, Beads, and More Beads

Day two with Yanka was much more calm and relaxed. The temperature is dropping and it started raining, so we had to stay inside. We brought her back to the hotel and spent the morning coloring princess pictures and playing with a new slinky. The coloring didn't work so well because the coloring kit was designed not to make a mess with the markers. The marker writes essentially clear and reacts with a chemical in the paper to make the color, but it takes a few seconds after the mark is made to be visible. It proved somewhat frustrating and she lost interest quickly. The slinky was a bigger hit. After her lunch and nap time, we brought her back to the hotel again and spent the time stringing bead bracelets for her to give to her friends at the orphanage. She and Carolyn made 10 or 11 bracelets, and she was very excited to have something to take back to her friends.

I think the bad weather will actually prove to be a blessing. The time is much more productive in making a connection with her when we can focus on quiet activities. The time spent exploring the town and playing on the playground was fun, but at least for a child Yanka's age, it's building a relationship that is most important, and the quiet, intimate interactions serve the purpose better. Carolyn particularly enjoyed the beads because she was finally able to establish direct communications.

Today was something of a Tati (daddy) day. She warmed up to me much more than yesterday. We spent some time this morning talking to the orphanage director about her life at the orphanage, her interactions with the workers and kids, her schooling, her background, etc. She spent a good deal of that time in my lap. She would hop down to go somewhere, but climbed right back up when she returned. It was a huge step. She also wanted to sit in my lap while they were making bracelets, and she was very eager for me to participate in the coloring activity. She even let me pick her up repeatedly when she wanted to look out the window at the river but couldn't see over the concrete balcony wall. That was huge!

Yanka continues to be very enthusiastic and talkative. She makes sure everyone is included in the activities, and if one of us disappears for a few minutes, she is eager to know where we went. She is extremely bright and very curious about the world. Caroline will be especially interested to know that her favorite color is pink (rosovo), and that she loves babies and princesses.

One very tough thing about the trip so far has been the jet lag. I think we are both feeling very sleep deprived. Yanka's nap time allows us to rest as well, but we both keep waking up in the middle of the night and not getting back to sleep until nearly time to get up. As I write this it is nearly 4:00 AM, and we have been up talking since about 1:30. We are leaving a little later this morning because we are planning to keep Yanka with us through lunch later today, so hopefully we will be able to get a little more sleep!

Bead Necklaces and Beautiful Smiles

What a wonderful day! I could not have imagined it being any better, or any more different than what we expected. We thought we were going to the orphanage for a meeting with the director to ask any questions we might have, after which we would be taken to something like a cross between an interrogation room and the waiting room at the doctor's office where we would meet Yanka for the first time and spend the morning with her. That couldn't be different from what happened.

We arrived at the center and were immediately shown into the main activity room where we were met by three or four adults and about ten kids. It was immediately obvious from the smile on her face and the excitement bubbling inside her like a pressure cooker which one was Yanka, even if we hadn't already seen the pictures and videos. She was beautiful! I found myself experiencing emotions not much different from the first time I saw each of our other children. She was introduced to us as her visitors, shook our hands, and then immediately went back and gave Carolyn a huge hug. She was a little more reserved with me because she has very little interaction with men, but it was not nearly as bad as I was afraid it might be. We went into the director's office and Maggie had a quick conversation with her. Meanwhile, one of the other ladies was helping Yanka put on a coat and Yanka was already telling her we were her mommy and daddy. It turned out that they were letting us take her out by ourselves to spend time with her. We had to bring her back for lunch and a nap in the afternoon, but we picked her back up after 4 and spent a few more hours with her.

She was a little shy at first, but is very sociable, talkative, and friendly. She is very inquisitive about everything around her, and Maggie spent a good deal of the day answering questions. The weather was beautiful, so we took her to the central part of the town, a traffic-free shopping and restaurant area to walk around. She stopped at several shop windows and wanted to know what everything was, and for everyone she saw she asked about what they were doing.

I started taking pictures with my iPhone, and she immediately wanted to see them. I zoomed in on one and she loved being able to slide it around and zoom in and out. Then she started taking pictures of everyone and everything. Carolyn pulled out her phone and showed her a couple of videos of herself. She also found a couple of Severina, and Maggie asked if she might like to meet her one day. She said she would, but noted that she was very young. Like most kids, she picked up the whole iPhone thing quickly, could find her videos from the home screen, and explored the apps on both phones. From that point on, she didn't go very long without asking for one or the other of the phones.

After walking around a while, we found a cafe to get some juice and coffee. She wanted her juice in a bottle, and showed how she could pour it into a glass. She kept stirring Maggie's tea and my coffee for us and kept wanting to add sugar to my coffee for me. While we were there, Carolyn pulled out a bead kit she brought, and Yanka very diligently strung enough beads for a bracelet and necklace, easily 100 or more in all. She was so pleased with them and showed them off when she went back for lunch.

She really wanted to swing, so for our afternoon time, we brought her back to a wonderful riverfront park on the Danube right behind our hotel. It had probably ten or more small playground sets scattered along the riverfront. She went from one playground to the next, trying every slide and occasionally swinging as well. She would approach each new slide a little fearfully and wanted help both climbing and sliding. She would show more confidence on the second try, and by the third or fourth, she was on her own. She even met a friend on the playground, an older girl she apparently knew from a previous orphanage. She was very excited to tell her friend she had a mommy and daddy and her news elicited a big hug from her friend. She then introduced mommy and daddy and Maggie.

We were very impressed with the orphanage situation. It looked a little rough on the outside, but most of the buildings in town are that way. Inside was bright and cheerful and very clean. More importantly, all of the workers were very friendly and the kids all seemed truly happy. They are going out of their way to ensure we have a good opportunity to visit and they are genuinely excited for these adoption opportunities. Yanka was apparently well coached on the importance of behaving properly while out with us, and she asked is several times how she was doing. They are doing a fantastic job with the kids. Both times Yanka came back, all of the rest of the kids met her at the door to find out what she did while with us. When we dropped her off for dinner, we sent her in with a bag of tootsie pops to share with her friends. She was very popular then and ate up the attention.

The forecast for the rest of the week involves rain and snow, so we are planning some calmer indoor activities. We are looking forward to being able to slow down and start connecting with her. Today was such a whirlwind of activity that we didn't have much focused talk time. However, it was a lot of fun and I wouldn't trade it for anything.

Alive and Well and Living in Lom

We made it to Lom. As is usual most of the time, all of the things I was worried about for the trip melted away. There was one unexpected hitch, but more on that in a minute.

The flight to Sofia was very bumpy, but winter in Europe, especially over the Alps, usually is. The Sofia airport wasn't bad, maybe just a little spartan. When you get off the plane, you go downstairs and clear passport control. From there you go straight to baggage claim and then exit through customs, which was really non-existent. It consisted of walking out one of two doors. The one on the right was for no declaration. The one on the left was for if you needed to declare something. Neither appeared to be attended, and everyone just walked out the no declaration door into the outer terminal. Our Family National attendant, Miglena (Maggie), was right there waiting for us as we came out, and we went straight to the rental car desk.

Driving in Bulgaria so far has not lived up to its reputation. The roads were in reasonably good shape, very much like rural highways in the states. They seem to be somewhat less well maintained in some of the towns, but the cross-country run was no problem. Navigation was also no problem the iPhone maps app was dead-on the entire time. There was a good bit of snow in Sofia and through the mountains, but the roads were well tended and clear. Once we got north of the mountains, the snow was gone and the land flattened out into beautiful rolling farm lands. From what we've seen so far, it is a beautiful country with an interesting mix of quaint little villages with tiled roof houses and soviet era apartment complexes. The one common denominator was that, at least in my eyes, everything was in need of repair and renovation. The approach into Lom was neat. The town sits in a valley running up away from the Danube with higher ground on both sides. The road from Sofia curves across the eastern ridge, and the first view of the town is of the whole valley laid out at your feet.

After a completely in eventful trip and even an easy time finding the hotel, we hit our one hitch. We parked the car and walked up to the hotel only to find it completely deserted, the doors locked, and the lights off. Maggie tried calling all of their contact numbers, but got no answer. Our original list of hotel options was limited to two, so there wasn't much for a backup option. There was another, albeit much smaller, older, and cheaper hotel right next to our intended choice, and we went there to inquire about our original hotel. It was apparently shut down for some reason. Maggie called the other hotel on our list, but they didn't have availability for the whole week, so we just moved into the hotel where we had gone to inquire originally. It isn't the high rent district, but the beds are tolerable, the rooms are heated, and there is hot and cold running water with a private bathroom in each room. It'll do.

Maggie has been great. She has given us a lot of insight on the adoption process in general, the plan for the next two weeks, and a lot of the history and culture of this land. She took great care of us in getting the hotel mess sorted out, and she has a good sense of humor and plenty of flexibility. The next two weeks with her are going to be fun!

Tomorrow morning we have an appointment with the orphanage director, then we get to meet Yanka for the first time. She has been told that she has visitors coming and is very excited. We can't wait! Off to bed now. It's been been a 30 hour day, and I'm tired.

Breakfast in Paris

After a most enjoyable drive though torrential rain and tornado warnings to get to the Atlanta airport, the flight to Paris was almost nice. We had no problems getting off on time, and with some of the weather delays for incoming flights to Atlanta, quite a few people apparently missed connections and the flight was not crowded. A helpful jet stream even blew us into Paris an hour early.

We have most of our clothes in a single carry-on, and we packed a large suitcase with additional clothes and gifts for the workers, attendants, and children in the orphanage. I guess the overweight baggage charge means we packed a lot.

Charles de Gaulle airport is interesting. It is all glass and very modern, and it looks kind of neat. The airport is divided into several terminals. Transport between the terminals is by shuttle bus, and they provide a very scenic tour of the bowels of the airport. When you go from terminal to terminal, you have to clear security again, so be ready for it. We had some food saved from the flight over that ended up in the trash. Their security was the slowest I have seen so far. Efficiency was not a consideration in their planning. In all, given the slow shuttle system, the distances you have to cover, and the really slow security even at off-peak times, I would not want anything less than a 3 hour layover here. Otherwise, you could easily miss a connection if something goes awry.

The flight to Sofia looks to be on time, so we should be there by early afternoon. I'm SO looking forward to the drive to Lom when we get there.

Getting Ready To Go

After a more than two years of planning, paperwork, home study, background investigations, and dreaming, we are getting ready to make our first trip to Bulgaria to meet our new daughters. We identified Yanka as a potential good fit for our family shortly after we settled on Bulgaria about a year ago. We requested a match with her and set out to find a second little girl to bring into our family at the same time. The Bulgarian Ministry of Justice found Severina for us in early November, and we got the official referral for both of them a few weeks later. Now we have the chance to meet them and spend a little time getting to know each of them.

A two-week international trip is a pretty big deal to pull off, and doing it on about two weeks notice has been somewhat frantic. There are so many things to pack, so many loose ends to tie up, and so many things to remember, there is no way we'll get everything done in time. We are just trying to manage the crisis so that whatever we end up forgetting doesn't become a major problem -- just get all the big rocks into the jar first.

We fly out of Atlanta tomorrow, layover for about 4 hours in Paris Sunday morning, and get to Sofia around 2:00 Sunday afternoon. From there, we rent a car and drive about 200km north to the town of Lom on the Danube River. Driving in Bulgaria is rumored to be a challenge anyway, and driving through the mountains in the middle of January ought to make it even more interesting. The plan is to spend a week with Yanka in Lom, then head 350km east to Shumen to spend a week with Severina. Then we will have to say goodbye to them for several months while the adoption is finalized. Hopefully, we will be able to go back and get them in late Spring or early Summer.

While we are away, Carolyn's parents, primarily her mother, will be minding the fort, getting the kids to various appointments and activities, and hosting two mock trial practices. I hope she knows what she signed up for. We are eternally grateful. We could never make something like this happen without this level of support from all of our family.

Time to get packing! Next stop, Paris.