Friday with my Parents

We had 2 great visits today. The girls are doing so well and expanding and developing more and more every day. It is amazing to see them changing right before our eyes. We have been spending so much time with them and giving them so much love and attention and I can tell it is really helping. I am so happy to have the opportunity to wait out most of the 10 days here with them. Masha is coming out of her shell. She is smiling, babbling, and so much more interactive. She is crawling so much more and reaching for different toys. It is great to see. D also has been enjoying the added attention. She is walking so well and has done it herself on a number of occasions for a handful of steps. Such fun. My dad takes tons of photos and has taken over 1 hour of video already. We finished off the cheerios today too. We'll have to buy more for tomorrow.

I had wanted to take my parents to Fortuna for lunch this afternoon but they seem to have had a blackout. Instead we bought lunch at the supermarket- good cold cuts, bread and chips and ate in room. We also found a children's toy store in mall.We purchased a Russian music toy because we only have one good music toy right now and there is a daily fight over it. Masha loves it but if she has it in her hands and Dasha sees it she grabs it right away.

When we arrived for our Afternoon visit they had put Masha in a silly white bonnet. I guess they washed her hair and it was still wet when they brought her to us. She also had some red type medicine on under her nose since she had a cold. It looked silly. And so all the photos from today she has this stuff on her.

We got back to the hotel after our afternoon visit with the girls and arrived to find a blackout in our hotel. No one knew when the electricity would come back. So we trekked up the 4 flights of stairs to our dark room to put our stuff down. My parent’s wiped out their personal sized flashlights (who new they had a survival kit with them) and we lit our way back down the stairs to figure out what we were going to do. W certainly can’t eat at the hotel dining room in a black out. So, we ventured out to the center of town and decided that none of us were especially hungry. So what do you do in a blackout in a frozen snowy place-We decided to have dinner at Baskin Robbins. Two scoops for each of us and a relaxing visit at the Russian Ice cream store. Not sure you can read the sign or the cups but they say Baskin Robbins in Russian.

It was nice to walk around in evening. Lots of people walking around in pedestrian area. I have to say that I always heard that Tver was a very poor town. Looking around tonight we saw so many good looking well dressed people, in beautiful fur jackets and coats, holding designer bags. All the young girls in high black stiletto heels. I do not know how they do not break their necks walking on the ice. Also, no one shovels or clears the snow and ice from the sidewalks. It just freezes, melts, refereezes etc all winter long. In some spots in must but 12 inches higher than the actual sidewalk with all of the ice built up. I have seen some trucks with men shoveling out dirt onto the sidewalks. Not that it helps.

My mom decided that all this walking and braving the cold, ice, steps, language barrier, and craziness of Russia and the orphanage is the “Babushka and Deyadushka test”. If you pass the test and make it through your time in Russia you are ready to be grandparents. Also, it is so funny watching my dad buy all of these souveniers. He bought tons of nesting dolls, and Russian themed things. My mom says it is like the proud dad and granddad giving out cigars after the birth of a grandchild. He is going to go home and say “yay- its twins, have a nesting doll.”