Family

Throughout this entire journey we haven't had wifi which meant NO communication! Now looking back I feel it was a time God wanted us to reflect and grow together in our marriage as we quickly changed from husband and wife to "mommy & daddy". I can assure you we grew together.. Even when we were laying on the floor singing church songs for about 3 hours! I think this happened several times!

I think God knew we weren't going to make it with Reed if we couldn't share him with his family back home! Needless to say Skype is our best friend now! We get to talk with everybody each day. Each day at the orphanage we would show him the family book and he would say names of people and animals... It was so cool to see him meet them for the first time online because he knew exactly who they were. He would jump up and down yelling something in Russian and go get the family book to show them a picture of themselves! He knew exactly who they were. He loves to dance, sing, talk, or whatever else Tyler has taught him to do every day for every person! He is so smart he figured out that CeCe (Aunt Cassie) says "dah" (which means yes) to everything so he always asks her for cookies & juice and when she says "dah" he runs to the refrigerator and points... He has it all figured out! Today he even called her all on his own! He must have wanted a cookie!

Yesterday he got to meet his dogs for the first time.. He was so excited! If only we could understand Russian! We did manage to understand he likes the little dogs better than the big one!

Gigi showed him his room and he was so excited... He started cheering "bravo" when she showed him a toy!

Today when I bought him an outfit I learned just how much this sweet boy has missed out on... I tore the tags off and went to throw them away and he about started crying. He kept saying no and I had no idea why. Come to find out he wanted the tags as toys. He has kept them all day. He won't let them out of his sight. To think there are so many sweet babies just like him who have had nothing just breaks my heart. Why? Each day at the orphanage humbled me. To see these children who want nothing but a smile and hug hurts. I wanted to load them up and bring them all home! Thank goodness for logical Tyler! This precious boy has already taught me so much. He has changed my life in so many ways. I hope and pray I do the same for him.

Tonight we got to spend time with another American family who are adopting two precious girls. They were actually in the same region as us. It was so awesome to be able to eat and talk with other people! What's so cool is their youngest and Reed already knew each other from a summer camp! They talked the entire time. How cool will it be to let them continue this friendship!?! We had a translator explain some of the things they were talking about... They were telling each other how cool Kiev is.. They were explaining to each other they were moving to the US but they wouldn't be in the same city.. They were also saying they had different mamas and papas because remember they have always called everybody mama and papa. It's so neat to see how much they understand.

Only a Visa to go... We booked our flight for Thursday so let's pray we get it within 2 days or we are in big trouble! We should arrive around 6:08 Thursday night!