Christmas Greetings…

My Christmas Wish…

is for you to stop by my video entry in the Soar!  photography contest.  The photography contest is allowing people to rank my video “thumbs up” as well as make comments on it.  (I am #120 of the videos submitted.  That number should help you to locate my video on the website. ) Go to

http://www.soarwithmera.com/Galleries/Submission/10499462_eeZj4#746537998_2F6cY
and move your curser over my video (photo). (You don’t have to watch my video to rank my video). Click one time on it and a “photo rank” should come up which allows you to vote “thumbs up” for my video. (This comes up before you watch it) Please vote “thumbs up” and share with others. …Hopefully, this will help me in the contest 🙂  Now they are letting folks add comments to the video so I’d appreciate any comments you can make on my video.

Thanks for stopping by & I hope you will take a moment to comment on my video in the photography contest 🙂

Heather, Alan, and Colin

Christmas Gifts for Orphans…

Read this blog post (link below) to learn about a Campus Crusade for Christ team that works in the region where Colin lived.  They have a project where they and their home church are attempting to give Christmas gifts to as many orphans as they can (they are only able to visit at some of the many orphanages in Krasnoyarsk…there are many in the region).

http://ogorodnikov.wordpress.com/2009/12/14/christmas-gifts-for-orphans-project/

Thanks for stopping by,

Heather, Alan and Colin

Our First Day as a Family…

Flashback to our blog posting from December 14, 2008 (which describes our experience when we picked up Colin on December 13th from the baby home):

“Saturday came and we ended up finished with paperwork by 10ish in the morning.  We were told that when his birth certificate registration was complete in about 1 hour we would be going to the baby home to pick up Colin.  Our facilitator told us not to leave the hotel but to be expecting to leave in about 1 hour.  She would call us to let us know when it was time.  We sat and we sat and we sat some more.  Time seemed to stretch on and on.  Finally at about noon we were able to head back to the baby home to pick up Colin–right at his nap time.  Alan and I both were so hungry and unsure about how it was going to be when we picked up Colin right when he was used to napping. 

My backpack was full of clothes for Colin to change into and a diaper.  We also had about 6 caregiver gifts, a cake for the caregivers to share and some outfits to leave at the baby home.  When we arrived at the baby home, we headed in, expecting that we would be given Colin to dress.  Instead, the caregivers asked for Colin’s clothes and diaper so that they could get him ready.  Alan and I just stood there in the foyer while the caregivers for his groupa dressed him (they’d been postponing his nap so he’d be ready for us).  We heard him cry a little and then he was quiet.  The caregivers brought him out all dressed up in the blue snowsuit and hat which it seems like forever since I bought for him.  He immediately started crying when he saw us.   I took him but he still was upset so one of his caregivers held him and comforted him a little bit longer while we got ready to go.  It made us happy and sad at the same time to see how much his caregivers cared about Colin and how he cared for them.  The reality is that little Colin has had so many different caregivers in his short time at the baby home–different ones when he was at different ages, different ones on weekdays, different ones on weeknights, and different ones on weekends.  I’m sure there were caregivers he was more attached to than others.  But this is not an ideal way for a little boy to grow up.  He needs some stability in his life and as his mama and papa we will give him stability, constant love, grace, guidance, and support that unfortunately an orphanage is not able to totally give.

Once Colin was in the car with us, he was fine and he quickly fell asleep.  He woke up once we got out of the car and entered the hotel.  When we got up to the room, he did not want to nap any more so he stayed up with us and explored the room and played with his toys.  We fed him his afternoon snack at about 4 p.m. and tried our first bottle with him.  Even though he has successfully mastered a straw sippy cup with us, he had to use the beginner type of nipple for his bottle.  We gave him formula in his bottle instead of milk and he seemed fine with it.  Did I tell you that Colin had a sippy cup of water earlier?  For dinner, he had some baby food and rice cereal and a slice of bread (as close as we could get to the usual foods he had at the baby home).  Guess what else he had?  Yes, he had more water….Can you guess where this is heading?  He had a leaky diaper later on because all the liquids had to come out…Oopsie! 

Colin has not mastered toilet training and he will not do anything so far with the little toilet we bought him at the children’s store.  Not sure how some folks have been able to continue toileting with their children from orphanages who were comparable to Colin in age.  He just does not seem willing to try it.  He doesn’t like it that much when we change his diapers.  He especially did not like it when we had to clean him up from a really awful diaper he filled this morning (Sunday morning).  What a way to initiate Papa into changing poopy diapers! 

He seems to be teething and maybe even has a cold on top of it…not sure.  He definitely is snotty and we have had to aspirate his nose some to help unclog it.  We have tried to get him interested in pacifiers instead of his poor calloused thumb.  He is using them some but still prefers his thumb when going to sleep.

Speaking of sleep, we did successfully get him to sleep last night and carefully transitioned him into Papa’s arms, who placed him in his crib while Mama got ready for bed.  We could hear him stirring some in the night–touching the rails, moving around, and sucking his thumb some.  Colin has his bear that we left on the first trip and he seems to like it.  Right at this moment (1:30 p.m. on Sunday) Colin is asleep on our bed with his Mishka.  He usually goes to sleep at 12:30 p.m. until 3:30 p.m.  Papa and Mama are just hoping for him to sleep at least 1-2 hours.  He has been asleep about 45 minutes so far.

He has enjoyed playing with Papa but still favors Mama holding him.  Papa is feeding him to help with attachment.  Mama is hoping to practice using one of our baby carriers with him today or tomorrow since she is still the primary carrier!  He will walk some and today he has enjoyed hearing the squeaking sound  his new shoes make when he walks.  One of his favorite new games is flicking water from his   sippy cup straw, especially at Papa.”

Flashback to 12/10/08

“Today(12/10/08), we didn’t leave for the baby home until 3.  It took longer than our usual 30 minutes to get there due to slow traffic.  The snow has made the roads worse and there are so many people on the roads.   Once we got to the baby home, a caregiver and Colin got ready to ride in the mini-van with us to get Colin’s passport photo made.  Colin was all warm in his snow suit, snow boots and hat.  He sat in my lap and the caregiver sat behind us so it was just us comforting him during the car ride.  I had a disposable bib and a gallon-size ziploc bag ready just in case he was one of the children who gets carsick.  We were able to pull down the shades on the side windows and direct him to keep looking forward at all the cars.  He held on to Alan’s hand on one side and my hand on the other.  We know he must have been scared but he didn’t cry.  He kept looking out the front window and sat so quietly.  He even yawned a couple of times.  Once we got to the photography studio, we  expected a similar set-up to how we get passport photos.  The caregiver took off his snow garb and then our facilitator helped to set him up in front of the camera.  They placed him in a little highchair.  This is where the photography session got kind of weird for Alan and me.  The photographer starts working on his camera, which was very simple and -for want of a more polite term- primitive. It was very old, and was a simple wooden box with accordion adjustable lens. The photographer flipped up the backside of the camera to slide the film in. After he closed the camera lid, an assistant caught Colin’s attention with a small Disney squeak toy (Pluto) and the photographer clicked the shutter. Colin was a bit disconcerted by the flashes, but like the whole trip, he soldiered on with quiet reserve.

After we returned to the baby home, Colin went back in to get out of his outerwear.  Then, our facilitator brought him upstairs to the playroom where Alan and I were told to wait.  A caregiver also brought in his roll and warm milk (which he’d missed earlier due to our trip to the photography studio).  He sat on Alan’ lap and ate his bun.  Alan helped him with his milk.  Colin had us move him to my lap for the last bit of his snack.  With a full tummy, he was ready to play.  He wanted to play with a pull toy which had stacking blocks that fit onto it.  Alan and he played with this toy for quite a while.  Then, Alan helped Colin to play with a toy airplane.  Alan would make a “swoosh” sound as he moved the airplane through the air.  Colin started to try to make the same sound while playing with the airplane.  He also played with his barn toy again and looked at his book about meeting us.  When it was time to go, he walked down the stairs with our facilitator.  Today was our best visit so far this week which helps to make up for the fact that our car ride back to the hotel took almost 2 hours instead the usual 30 minutes.”

Flashback to 12/9/08

Here is an excerpt from our blog posting last year for our visits with Colin 12/9/08:

“Tuesday morning(12/9/08), we visited Colin and his doctor did a wonderful job of settling him in with us and some crayons.  He didn’t really want to color with the crayons.  He   focused on looking at them and putting them in and out of the box…Overall, it was a better visit than on Monday and we are glad to see him growing more comfortable with us.

 

A Year Ago in Snowy Russia…

Today, there’s a cold drizzle outside my window and there is a forecast for wintry weather this week.  The grocery store was full of people stocking up in case of bad weather.  This time last year in Russia, we had snow every day and the city had begun working on its ice sculpture display.  Folks didn’t rush to the store to stock up on food because snow and ice were part of their everyday world.  People often walked arm and arm because they helped to support each other as they walked down slippery sidewalks.

Over the weekend, we attended the Louisville Ballet’s performance of The Nutcracker.  It was the anniversary of us attending a ballet in Krasnoyarsk, Russia (Swan Lake) but this time we had Colin with us for the performance.  He was most attentive during the first half of the two-hour production.  I have to agree with him that the first half was the best.  How many people have gotten to hear their 31-month-old child exclaim with glee “Nutcracker!” or even manage to get out the name, “Drosselmeyer.”  We were pretty impressed at his enjoyment of the ballet which he’d been reading about for the past month.  We wanted to take a photo of all of us at the theatre but Colin was back to more typical two-year-old behavior after the end of the ballet.  He was way too wiggly and interested in the display of an art piece that looked like a house made of candy.  I ask you, why would anyone torture kids (and adults) with a big candy house you couldn’t go inside or touch?

He was cranky all the way home and crashed hard when he got home.  He was very disoriented when he woke up but we think we figured out that he was afraid he’d missed supper (he’d had a late afternoon nap after the matinee).

Back on December 8 of last year, we visited our sweet Colin after a weekend apart.  Here’s an excerpt from our blog posting from that day:

“Today’s visit with Colin did not start out easy.  He hadn’t seen us since Friday and one of the little boys in his group (the Apple Group) left on Saturday so we wonder if that change has also concerned him a little.  We visited Colin around 9:45 or so.  He cried a lot at the beginning of the visit.  He wasn’t thrilled about the different room we were put in for our visit.  Bubble time seemed to interest him as did a snack.  He also was curious about Alan’s ukulele when Alan tried playing it for him for the first time.  Alan let Colin try the strings and look it over.  Towards the middle of our visit, Colin started settling in for a nap in my arms while Alan played quiet music.  He just didn’t want to play with the toys or even sit in my lap at that point so I just held him and rocked with him (boy! could I have used a rocker).  He went to sleep without his thumb but mid-nap started sucking his thumb.  At one point, his thumb fell out of his mouth but he continued to make sucking noises like it was still in his mouth!  He slept a long time.  His head slipped down into the crook of my arm during his nap and he snuggled in.  When he woke up, we had to take him back to the caregivers for potty time/diaper change which he was in need of though he was pouty about not being able to go back to sleep.”

Cure for Christmas Blahs…(Book Review)

I was excited to read this book because it promised to explore whether Christmas can still change the world. For me, Christmases have begun to blur together year as I’ve grown older, and I’ve felt like I must be missing something. Advent Conspiracy is a short but thought provoking read which inspired me with stories of people who have found ways to make Christmas about meaningful giving. Instead of spending time with wish lists, we can make a tangible difference in the quality of life of people around the world. I hope to share this book’s principles with my family members this Christmas so we can celebrate with more joy and more compassion for others. The book has also challenged me to think carefully about how we teach Colin about Christmas so that he will grow up with a heart for others and not a desire for accumulating more things.

Heather

Birthday in Russia…

Flashback to my birthday a year ago:

“Our visit was at 3 p.m. again on Thursday.  Colin is getting used to us little by little.  He does seem to sometimes feign crying when a caregiver comes in to get supplies.  It seems like he sees crying as a way to get their attention, which is interesting since some children in orphanages learn to stay quiet because crying will not get their caregivers’ attention.  I guess it depends on the orphanage, caregivers and child; every situation is different.  Colin does not like for us to put him down during our visits.  This has not changed from our first trip.  He wants to be held as much as possible, probably because it is not something he gets enough of in his everyday life.  We are happy to accommodate him because we have missed him so much for the past 5 months.”   

The picture below is of me with my free candy bar and birthday card from the staff at the ultra-70s-style hotel where we stayed in our region.  They were in the process of renovating while we were there but it still seemed to be stuck in the 1970s (according to American standards/style).  Alan and I celebrated my birthday at a coffee shop last year and a frosty walk through downtown Krasnoyarsk.

Flashback to Dec. 3, 2008

More excerpts from this time last year…Colin again has a snotty nose but this time I get to love on him all day long and not just for an afternoon visit.  Now he is no longer leery of his Papa; he loves receiving and giving affection from both of us.  He enjoys kicking and throwing balls and is very active just as we suspected he might be once given the freedom to play and the security of our love.

“Once at the baby home, we were put in a little room by ourselves with a still-sleepy Colin who’d just woken from his nap.  He acted like he didn’t feel good again.  We fed him some cheerios and tried to interest him in bubbles.  He was all snuggly and snotty nosed so we  think he has a cold.  At 4:00 a caregiver brought in his snack, a big yummy looking roll with a little bit of sugar sprinkled on top, and a warm glass of milk.  We sat him in his little chair and let him start to work on his roll.  We had to tell him to “stoy” or “stop” a few times to make sure he wasn’t eating too quickly.  We caught glimpses of his teeth.  He now has 8 and most of them seem to be on the bottom.  After he finished his roll, Alan helped him a little with his mug of milk but Colin did pretty well by himself.  Once he is with us full-time, we will be feeding him and giving him his drinks but this is all comforting for him right now so we don’t want to change anything from his routine in the baby home.

He rested some in my arms and we thought he might even have a little fever.  It was very noisy next door where all the other children in his groupa were playing.  He’d sometimes raise his head from resting to listen to them.  When they’d brought him in, they’d acted like they wanted to give us his blankie but the caregiver didn’t seem to know which one was his (which makes us think he doesn’t get to keep his blankie with him in his crib/bed).  Colin seemed to like holding his little blankie when he was with us today.  He sucked his thumb so much.  It is sad for us to see how calloused his left thumb is but it is his way of self-soothing and we can’t do anything about it right now.  We hope to ease him off it with a pacifier and help him to learn that we are going to be available to comfort him when he is uncomfortable or afraid…

Colin really liked sitting in my lap and watching Alan play with the stacking cups.  Alan got him very interested in the cups and Colin played with them from the safety of my lap.  Colin also enjoyed watching Alan play with the toy ball.  He would throw it back and forth with Alan.  His little feet looked ready to kick so we helped him as best we could to try to kick the ball (he refused to stand up).  He was able to kick it from his safe seat and he really seemed to enjoy this.  Maybe we have a little soccer player in the making.”

 

Heather