Update from the hotel.....

We are still in country waiting on Anna's passport.  Tomorrow will be  a week since we have applied and we are praying that it comes ASAP! Can you believe the people at this hotel let us sit here for 4 days sweating like pigs and dripping wet before they decided to tell us that we have air conditioning in the room? I don't know how we would have made it this long without a/c.  But thank our good Lord above it is nowhere near as hot here as it is back home.  In fact we have had some cloudy, breezy and cool days here that I am so thankful for!  Below are some photo's and things about Miss Anna!

Anna likes to watch Signing Time!

Sweet girl sings in her sleep, for a long time during the night :)

She is also a thumb sucker...I've never had one of those :)

Believe it or not, at 6 years old she is pretty much potty trained.  My bio daughter with

DS was nowhere near being potty trained at 6 years old!  Anna is afraid

of the big toilet so I had to go and buy her a "pot"

When we first got her she stuffed all of the bread she could in her mouth.

I am thinking she was afraid someone was going to steal her bread.  She is a riot...she will take her

thumb and pack the bread on the side of her jaw like a hamster packs food :)

She LOVES to take a bath and I think she would take 20 a day if we let her.

Just being her cute and lovey little self :)

Packing her jaws with goldfish

 .

This is what she does when she gets sleepy or aggravated.

She will suck her thumb and cover her eye with the other hand and

she rocks back and forth, back and forth.  Sometimes it makes me sad :(

If she wakes up in the middle of the night she will sit up in bed and rock herself back to sleep.

She loves to eat!!!!!!!!!  She will lower her head and put her mouth

down to the plate and start shoveling in it.  She is a VERY independent little girl!

I think I will have my morning bread in bed please :)

She is not too crazy about cold stuff.   She hated ice cream at first and

she will tolerate small bites of it now.  It was so funny when she took

her first bite if icecream....she made a face like it was sour and made a gagging action.

  She LOVED this popsicle until she got a big ol' bite

and I think maybe it gave her a brain freeze because she spit it out and wouldn't eat anymore.

She loves to go on rides in the stroller, BUT when the stroller stops she gets angry

and tries her best to climb out!

On our ride leaving the mental institution for the last time ever!!!!

Are you my mama?

I will ask her where's mama and she will pat her sweet little hand on my chest.

She gives the best hugs and kisses.... don't expect less than 40 a day!!!



Anna is doing really great considering we just swooped her away from all she has ever known.  I was a bit worried what would happen that first night we had her and would put her to bed. Would she be sad, scared or confused? No, she didn't appear to be at all.  She acts like she has known us all of her life and she was just waiting on us to come and pick her up and take her home :)  What a love bug she is.  She wants to hug and kiss all the time and I am so happy that she is attaching very nicely to me....she KNOWS I am her mama!!!!  She loves to sit around and be held and loved on, like she just eats it up!

Of course she has some issues that will need to be addressed when we get her home.  She will most likely need glasses, per the orphanage director, so we will get her eyes checked out.  Anna walks with a limp and I am not sure if it is because she had an ankle or foot injury or if it is because her foots turns inward some.  Her poor little skin is in such bad shape and she just claws at it.  My mom and I found our way to a pharmacy to get some cream for it with the help of google translator, LOL.  Oh what an encounter we had on this day with a drunk and crazy Ru**ian lady.  It was a horrible nightmare and I will blog more about that day when we are safely out of this country and back home.  But back to Anna....when she is tired or upset she will start rocking herself back and forth and makes a grunting sound.  This is very typical for orphans because they need some sort of stimulation even as babies and they quickly learn that rocking themselves helps ease some of their frustration and need for stimulation.  Despite her limp, she is a very strong and sturdy little girl who loves to jump.  Our daughter Ashlyn is 11 and so uncoordinated and floppy that she CANNOT jump yet!  Anna has at least 2 cavities and WIGGED out on me the first day I tried to brush her teeth!  She was scared to death, so I am wondering jsut how true the caregivers were about her being able to brush her own teeth. I thought she was going to lay an egg on me when I went to brush them!!!  We have to chase her away from bathroom day and night because she wants to be in the bathtub 24/7.  The child has not had a bath in 6 years, so I guess it does feel pretty good to soak in some good, warm and sudsy water!  She is also an escape artist and we have to build a fort to keep her in the room at night and out of the bathroom just so we can at least sleep with a little peace.  First we block the entry way to the room with a heavy leather chair and then put a big suitcase on top of the chair and a wood chair on top of the suitcase.  We shut the bathroom door at night and put  a heavy table in front of the door and a heavy suitcase on top of that. We had such a scary incident with her waking up and going in to the bathroom while we slept.....I will save that story for later too :(  What a nightmare it was!!!!!  So needless to say we are praying every day that our passport comes back ASAP so that we can get this little girl at home where she will be safe and loved.  We get the most awful stares and glares in the community here when we walk around with her.  The people act like they have NEVER seen a child or person with a disability in their life...and you know what? They probably haven't because they are all packed away in orphanages and mental institutions.  I just look at them and smile :)  I want to make a sign in Ru**ian that says "yes I am beautiful" and tape it to her shirt, ha ha haha!!!!  That would give them something to stare at for sure :)  So if you are reading this and you pray, please pray that God has favor with us and gets her passport to us ASAP and heads us home safely to join the rest of our family back in the good ol' USA who are so excited for our return!!!!