Yana ... Anna

At my persistance we finally received late last week a digital copy of Anna's referral photo. We first saw this photo of Anna (who was then and is now still legally named Yana) that crazy last full day we were in Russia on our first trip. You may recall us writing about how we were visiting with Alexander (Ruslan) when our adoption agency facilitator rushed in to say she had a referral of a little girl we could visit. We had to hurry and say our good-byes to Alexander and speed over to the Department of Education's office to formally review and sign paperwork that would enable us to visit Anna. This was all in the afternoon. Anna lived two hours away and we were to leave the country the next morning. I'm not sure why Anna's referral photo is in black and white. It looks like a photocopy, which I remember is also what we saw in the Department of Education's files (whereas Alexander's official referral photo was a color hardcopy, of which we only received in digital format). Anyway, because we immediately went to visit her, we never did get a copy of her referral photo. Once we got home though, I kept asking for it because I wanted it for her scrapbook. And because I thought she'd want to see it someday, too.

She's progressed so much I've stopped counting how many words she says. She's even now putting words together. For example: Daddy car; Elmo night-night; Almost eat. She can count to four without a problem; to six but she might skip over five; and I can hear her saying some of the other numbers so I suspect it won't be long before she's counting to 10. She knows A, B, C in order, and I can hear her working on other letters.

As much fun as it is to see the children thriving and progressing, it sure hasn't been easy. I usually talk about the good things here. I'm not an argumentative person and Mikel and I have rarely squabbled. In other words, I've pretty much tried to create as much of a stress-free life as possible (yeah, I know we all need some stress or there'd be no reason to get out of bed in the mornings). So, correcting the children's wrongs (or disciplining) is really tough for me. I mean, it has to be done so they'll learn and be kind and polite and not so terribly spoiled and so they'll have all the good attributes that everyone wants their children to have. But it's extremely stressful at times. Especially when they look at you and do something they know is wrong, which they just found trouble for doing. Sometimes you just have to take a deep breath and not take it personally, which is what Mikel tells me all the time but which is hard to do! Don't get me wrong. Overall everything is pretty darn wonderful. But some days (yesterday) are bad enough for me to say "Thank the good Lord Papa's on his way home."

At this very moment, though, the children have been kind enough to nap for an hour and a half already (and I'll let them keep going as long as they want), so I'm feeling some serenity.

P.S. Not sure I've ever written this before but despite the fact that her name is spelled Anna (as opposed to Ana) we're pronouncing it like Ah-na. That's how it is spelled and pronounced in Russia, and mainly on paper I prefer the look of Anna over Ana. As for when their first names will be legally changed, it will be done so after we "readopt" them here in the states, which can be done here in SD at the six-month-home mark (two months from now). Readopting through the US legal system isn't something we have to do, as they are legally our children. But it is something we will do in order to get them a U.S. birth certificate which I'm sure will make their lives a lot easier down the road. At that time we'll legally change their first names. They already legally have our last name. This means we'll have to reapply for new Social Security cards and whatever else in their official new first names. (By the way, their Social Security cards did arrive a couple weeks ago, sooner that we'd anticipated.)