WE ARE HOME!!!

Hi everyone, Just as it says, we are finally home and boy does it feel good! From the time we left our apartment in Kyiv Wed. morning to arrival in Mpls. it was right at 24 hrs of travelling. Briley did very well on the first three hours from Kyiv to Munich, but got a little rambunctious on the long flight to Chicago. From Chicago to Mpls. she stayed in our laps and was fine the whole way. We have a whole lot that we want to fill everyone in on, from all that happened in Kyiv that we weren`t able to expound on before, to how everything is going now. I think we`ll do the "hows everything going now" post this time and do a "Journey recap" next time.
After saying our goodbyes in Kyiv to our Kentucky friends and our translators on Tues., we were ready to leave Ukraine. As miserable as we had been over there, there was still a touch of remorse when we were driving down the freeway at 4 in the morning to get to the airport. We had met some very nice Ukrainian people that we now consider our friends and we will more than likely never see them again. We will however keep in touch with them through e-mails. Our U.S. friends that we met over there will have to put up with us as we will definitely stay in touch with them.

The arrival in Mpls. was great!! Tory and Collin met us at the terminal with the "Welcome home Briley, mom, and dad" signs and with Kenny and Judy there as well. Briley was wide-eyed and pretty quiet but didn`t make a fuss. The trip home took a little longer than it should`ve because we had to stop and get a gallon of American milk. That too was great!! Had three glasses when we got to our house and I wasn`t even thirsty. After a late night of "welcoming back" with the kids we finally got to lay down on an American air bed. ahhhhhh. Every bone in our body thanked us for coming home to a decent bed. We let Briley sleep with us so as to not rile her much on the first night. Well, about 30 minutes later I hear little footsteps coming up from the basement and then we had 4 in bed! A little while later there were some more little footsteps making their way up the steps and before long there was 5 in the bed. Not totally unexpected but it made for a crowd!! Thank goodness it is a king size bed because with anything smaller we might have had issues with someone falling out. Mom and Dad didn`t argue a bit!! It was just nice to be home with the boys. Thursday was uneventful as all we did was stay home and restock our cupboards with a trip to HyVee. That was in itself very nice, being able to see a well stocked supermarket with everything that you may want and more!! The prices were a little higher than what we have been used to but we`ll take it!! On Friday I went back to work while Gail took Briley over to Kenny and Judy`s to meet her new babushka and her new dedushka(grandma and grandpa). That went well as Briley took to them right away. On Saturday we took the whole crew to Collin`s basketball tourney in Austin and things went really well there for Briley too. Today we took her to Church and she did very well. She even "boogied" a little bit on a couple of the hymns.
On Thursday we will be taking her to an eye doctor to see what steps need to be taken to correct her lazy/crossed eye. We have been assured that this is not going to be a problem but still look forward to having this fixed. As far as her thin hair goes, it has been getting thicker and a little darker since the day that we started smuggling in meat and food to the orphanage. Her scabs are clearing up very nicely and we hope that a little outside type playing will help her color a bit.
The only issue that has come up with her is her extreme reluctance to lie down and go to sleep. She slept 15 hrs a day at the orphanage and here we have a hard time getting her to sleep 8 hrs at night and to get an hour or 2 nap in the afternoon. We think it might be all the stimulation that she has been getting by being out of the orphanage and once everything calms down a bit it should go better. The boys have taken her under their wing and will be wonderful brothers. If they can keep the other boys away from her until she reaches the age of 24 I`ll be satisfied!!
We will be continuing with updates and as I said earlier, we will be giving a recap of our entire trip. Until then , we have two months of mail to go through and hope that there isn`t too many bills in the pile, we have to bring Briley to the daycare with Gail with her a couple hours at a time to acclimate her to that environment and try to show her more things that she has never experienced at a comfortable pace. There is one quote by Collin that you might appreciate. One morning when we were skyping the kids, Judy asked us how Briley looked with all the chicken pox blisters. Gail told her that between the blisters, shabby clothes, thin hair, pale skin and the lazy eye, Briley truly looked like a little orphan. After we had hung up Collin turned to Judy and asked " Just what do they expect Briley to look like? She IS an orphan!!!" We are still chuckling over that one.
Take care,
Gail and Craig

The final countdown has begun-FINALLY

Well, as the title indicates we`re on the downhill part of our voyage. We can fill you in on some stuff that we couldn`t before. The last time that we were ready to start thinking about coming home, Briley`s groupa caught of all things the chicken pox!! We had to wait the 10 days for the scabs to go away or she would never pass the physical back in Kyiv. We couldn`t mention the chicken pox on our blog because if the officials caught wind of it they would quarantine the orphanage for 30 days. Just what we would have needed! We went to her birth town on Tuesday and got her birth certificate changed over, then went to Donetsk to get her passport. We even got to have a little "nectar of the gods" McDonalds!!!! Didn`t ever think that we would look forward to McD`s but it tasted awful good. We had Luba with us as well as the driver so I bought lunch for everyone. The bill came to over $20.00, which over here is quite expensive, so I wondered why that was. When we got our food we saw why. Luba, Gail and myself all had the usual sandwich, fries and pop, but our driver had 2 fish sandwiches, a big tasty, a fish wrap, super sized fries and a jumbo pop. He said that McD`s was his favorite restaurant, YAH, I can see that!!! Yes I said fish wrap, the McD`s over here have fish wraps, fish strips, sundaes with cone cups, potato wedges and a few other differences as well. Tomorrow (Sunday) morning we go to the orphanage to have a little party with her groupa, with bananas, juice, and candy to finish up the meal!! THEN- we bring her out of the orphanage for the last time!! She is ours and she ain`t going back to that place. We will board a train in Stravansk at 7:00 tomorrow night and go back to Kyiv. We are doing the train ride solo as Luba is already back in Kyiv. We are boarding in Stravansk as there is a 10 minute boarding there as opposed to 5 minutes here in Kramatorsk and with our luggage and a little girl we thought that it might be wise to drive the 10 miles to let us have more time. Not only will we have Briley, we will have a few souvenirs that Gail picked up today. I don`t know where we will fit the extra pallet but we will have to make it work. Last Sunday we went to the market, as we had said we were going to do, but we got there a little late, so things were all getting locked up. Not today!! Everything was in full swing and the weather was very nice for a change, so I`m sure all 250,000 people or so it seemed in Kramatorsk were at the market. BAZAA is what you tell the cabbie when he picks you up- English would be bazaar I`m assuming. We got there OK so he must have figured out what we said. Speaking of which- we were out of bottled water the other night so Gail had me go to the tiny market behind our apartment to get a couple little bottles to get us by. I had been in there numerous times and always had the same two gals wait on me and they obviously knew I was an American and we had some good laughs, but I always found what I was looking for. Well, Gail has been reading her Russian made easy book so she says " just say dva voda, it means two waters". So I go in there all cocky and say " dva voda" they looked at me like what book did you read that out of!! They had no idea what that meant! I went back to the tried and true way of pointing at the water and holding up 2 fingers. That works a lot better. Monday is a holiday over here so we will be able to go get my fur hats in Kyiv then. On Tuesday we will be at the embassy bright and early to do the paperwork for Briley`s visa and then take her to get her physical. From there we go back to the embassy to get the finished visa and then we are meeting our friends from Kentucky to celebrate a little as they are finishing up also. They were able to get Maxim (7 year old little boy)out of the orphanage a couple days ago and have had him with them. They have been delayed a little bit more than us with their paperwork but everything is hopefully coming together for them as well. They are more than ready to go home as well as us! On Wednesday morning WE FLY OUT!! That was sorta fun to write. I think I`ll do it again- WE FLY OUT!! ahhhhh. We will stop in Munich for I believe 2 hours then off to Chicago and then on to Minneapolis, hopefully arriving at 7:30 that night. Keep in mind we are travelling west, so we gain 8 time zones and will have 20 hrs. travel time. The outdoor market was everything we expected it to be. You can find anything and everything there. All we needed was a roll of duct tape to wrap our luggage and after looking in about 932 shops we found it! We got a "few" more souvenirs so we had to get a duffle bag also. Pretty cool looking big bag and it was only $20.00. Finished up the day by going to see Briley one last time at the orphanage and getting an " astronaut chicken" at the supermarket. You know the ones- whole rotisserie chicken with the plastic dome on it! Pretty tasty and they run about $2.50. We will try to post one more time maybe Tuesday night when we are still in Ukraine. Forgot to add that on our walk to the orphange this moring we saw another casket on the sidewalk by the apartments we walk by. This time it was open and empty and there was a guy crying on the sidewalk. Our guess is that maybe they don`t embalm here and when someone dies they come with the casket and put them in it right on the spot. Vladimir says that when a casket is by an apartment like we saw before, it is there for a short time for the people that lived in the same building to say their goodbyes. Sorta different.

Here are some pictures of what we have seen the last few days and the captions to explain them a bit..







Found this fish head on the sidewalk this morning. Have no idea how it got here, just struck us as rather odd. It rained last night. Instead of cats and dogs, it must rain cat and fish over here?


Three babuschkas that sell seeds and beans by the market down the street. They are there whether it rains , snows or whatever. The lady on the end likes to throw seeds for the pigeons. Yesterday she finally had one tame enough so she could pet it.

Had to check out the Ukrainian over the shoulder boulder holder stand!! Notice the lady in the red coat in the background laughing? Didn`t notice her until we posted the picture.Sidewalk in front of the market with all the misc. stuff.Fruits and veggies, the fruits are amazing here. Oranges and such are very good. Haven`t a clue where they get them though, surely not in this region.Typical alley at market.Lots of these babushkas selling seeds and beans here too. Once in a while you see them selling pickles on a plate. We watched one today restock the plate by reaching in barehanded in a large tub and grabbing a few more. We passed on the pickles.Lots of indoor alleys where the clothing is. Lots and lots of black clothes, boots and jackets.The fish aisle! Gail refused to walk down this one as it stunk so bad. :-)Lots of vendors with eggs. Funny to watch people pick a few and put them in a bag.Lots of cole slaw and salad tables. Yes- people are buying this stuff along with home canned thingys. I say thingys because we couldn`t tell what was in the jars.Strips of backfat for sale. Remember the previous post about using lard as a bread spread? Lots of lard tables here today also.Some cute little strollers that we haven`t seen at home.These aren`t for decoration- the babushkas use them to clean the sidewalks over her.Winner, winner, chicken dinner.I FOUND THEM!!! Boxes of chicken feet. You would think the claws would catch in your throat as they go down. Update!! Just talked to our landlord about the chicken feet. They don`t actually eat them- they boil them in a soup for flavor and take them out before the soup is served. I don`t know if that`s any better though.Bugs Bunny on the right and guess what on the left??? NUTRIA!- in other words over grown muskrat!! The ladies got a chuckle out of us checking out the feet. I had a hunch what it was but didn`t think there was any way that people would eat such a creature. Guess I was wrong!!Here we are at the local mouse store. Ironically, they were selling cats at the same stand.Care for a few chicken heads to go with your chicken feet?? MMM Finger-lickin` good. Update- they do eat the heads though!!!Fully armed guards keeping an eye on things. They didn`t look real friendly or we would have gotten closer for the picture. We didn`t want to push our luck on our last days here.This is the public sidewalks in most cases. Makes for wet, cold feet. And pants.Baby buggies over here have pneumatic tires and 4 wheel independent suspension to navigate the rough terrain, no I`m not kidding.The "WC" is what you look for over here when you need a biffy. Stands for water closet. Usually costs 1-2 gryivna to use, but they will hand you a roll of cardboard toilet paper if you need it for that price.This is the best picture of all. No, not only because it`s Gail, this is the start of our last walk to the orphanage. We figure that with all the trips we have made to the orphanage, we have travelled roughly 80 miles by walking. This doesn`t include the walking uptown trips or anything, just the orphanage miles. Our 3 pairs of socks that we both brought are looking might shabby right now.