Day 42

Another Friday here in beautiful Kharkov...!

Actually, the weather here is gorgeous right now, and we are so thankful that we are here now, able to play outside with our little dude and not in the visiting room.  We're also happy that we can walk all over the city without trudging through slush and snow.

Danila was happy to see us again today- and is again showing his impish side.  He thrives on  negative attention- probably an orphanage behavior.  Today there was a pile of leaves that was burning around the corner from where we were playing.  He wanted so badly to go closer to it and do heaven knows what.  We, of course, wouldn't let him play in the fire...so he repeatedly tried to sneak over there.  It turns into a game- he runs that way, or tries to climb over the bench, and Bryan catches him and sits him down and tells him nyet.  He smiles and laughs and thinks that it  is funny.  Gah! The only thing that we've found to work is to completely remove him from the situation and distract him with a positive activity- which works fine.  We just have to remember how to curb that behavior, and also make sure that his teachers understand that as well when we get home.

Another instance is when we were playing Memory again, and he'd continually take the tiles and bend them.  He knew it was naughty, he knew we didn't want him to do that...but he'd get a big old smile on his face every time he did it!  When we took the game away after he had 3 chances to play with them correctly, it was like we were the meanest.parents.ever.  I think he may have a future in acting.  He forgave us as soon as we redirected him to another activity, though, so we all still have our friendship bracelets.

I'm totally not trying to write only about the negatives today, but just to give you a full picture of our little guy.  We'll definitely have some adjustment issues when we get home and throw 3 brothers into the mix, but it's nothing that love, consistency, patience and understanding can't overcome.  Honestly, since our children tend more toward the "spitfire" personality than toward the "complacent" personality, we feel pretty at home with this side of Danya's nature.  Bring it on, baby!

The rest of the visit was good- lots of swinging and singing, coloring and snacking, hugs and kisses, high fives and giggles.  It's all good.





And now, for the moment you've been waiting for:  Yes, we DO have a court date for our appeal- kinda.  This evening, Bryan talked with Tatyana, who had talked to the judges (or something) and she told us that we would have court sometime next week.  However, they are squeezing us into their schedule, so we won't know when our actual date will be until the day before.  Of course, we are hoping that it will be Monday, so we can get started with going home ASAP, but you all know how that works!

We spent the evening with Cara, Doug, and Anya (their resident Ukrainian-American for now).  We had semi-homemade pasta, garlic toast, veggies, and ice cream topped with strawberries.  It was comfort all-around...good conversation, laughs, and adoption-talk.  We're so thankful to have them here- have I mentioned that before??