Flight to America day! Otherwise known as the day that wouldn't end. Since a normal day last 24 hours, and we spent about 32 hours in Thursday's date, it felt long. Visa in hand (hooray!) we went to the airport. We think our driver was glad to get rid of us and our abundance of luggage, but he got us to the airport in plenty of time to make our first line of the day. We had to go through (a) passport check/security, (b) ticket agent for boarding pass, (c) immigration/passport control and (d) passport check with boarding passes to board. That was just to get out of Kiev! And it took us nigh on two hours, but we made the flight.
This was, again, a day of firsts for Galyna. She enjoyed the first airline trip, laughing and cheering when we took off. She also liked the headphones and iPods, spending most of the flight listening to music, coloring and playing with the Russian-speaking boy in the seat behind us. We think at one point she wanted to join his family as we caught her hugging the boy's mom quite a bit. Not sure if it was attachment disorder, the fact that the family spoke her language, or the fact that we were telling her no desert until she ate more of her meals. That last one may have been a bit unfair considering the quality of the airline's food offerings. Which, while tolerable for the most part, did cause problems for Amissa when the only only dinner option was pizza and cake, neither of which she can eat with her wheat/yeast intolerances. (Nothing against Delta's service; for the most part it was very good. The food and a lack of communication about the delay at JFK being the two exceptions.) Fortunately, well-stocked with granola bars and "relatively" healthy snacks we made it to JFK in New York with few incidents.
(Except for the immigration officer having us step aside for a bit while he consulted someone on Galyna's passport in Kiev, but he allowed us through after a short delay, no further questions asked.)
JFK was an interesting experience. We had a small dinner at the airport at a restaurant I won't name for their too-high cost for what you got. Then we waited. And waited. Our plane didn't arrive at the gate until well after it was supposed to have lifted off for Minneapolis. Amissa ended up falling asleep, and Galya played with the little boy from the first flight and his family (who were sharing our gate area for their flight.) We finally got on the plane, and made it to Minnesota around 1:00 Friday morning. There was one short time where Galya was crying in her sleep on the plane, but I put the iPod on "children's music" and put that in her ears, and she was fine the rest of the flight. The other two girls slept, as did Shannon and I for a very short time. All in all we landed after 24-26 hours of nothing more than a couple of cat naps. But we were home! The Coleman and Glirbas families met us at the airport with signs and balloons, then helped us home with the luggage. Our cars and expanded family mean we'll be packing much more lightly for trips. This isn't a bad thing, and considering Shan's aversion to minivans, we'll likely be in these cars for a while.
Off to sleep, and then...
Friday
We awoke, pretty much later than usual but earlier than we needed to. Galyna spent the day exploring the house and running back to us for hugs every little while. It was a good day. The girls went to school in the afternoon to see their classmates before Christmas break. Amissa's class screamed in joy when she showed up. Tierney's class was in art, so she wasn't able to introduce Galyna, but it was good to see her friends. Galyna was apprehensive when her sisters were dropped off, but overall in good spirits. Nice to see her loving her sisters. When Shannon started getting ready to go to the school to get the girls, Galya saw her and started asking what was up. As soon as Shannon said the names Tierney and Amissa, Galyna jumped up to get her jacket and boots to get her sisters too! The rest of the evening was dinner and cuddles on the couch as nobody had much energy for anything else.
The Weekend
Saturday was errands and playing. Shannon and I did some unpacking and cleaning (full disclosure: Shan did more than I did). It snowed, which the girls liked. For the ... well for every meal to date, Galya indicated she wasn't going to eat everything on her plate, not liking vegetables. She's finding out she doesn't get to negotiate her dinner choices, or how many bites she has to eat to get a snack later. If anyone has tips on getting a youngster to eat vegetables, let us know. Since Tierney and Amissa love veggies, this is new territory for us. On the other hand, Galya at least doesn't argue. She just doesn't eat it knowing there's no candy later. She does like meat, cereal, potatos, bread/butter and bananas though. That much we do know!
Sunday we went to church, and she was again introduced by her proud sisters. Galyna made it through two hours of Sunday School without us there, so it seems that she's able to hang with her sisters for some amount of time without us. This is VERY good, although it doesn't yet get us to the point of her lasting a full school day yet. It was also good to see so many of YOU who read this blog and let you meet Galya in person. Not to mention the joy of hearing a service in English.
We're going to be working with the daycare provider tomorrow as her son (a 4th-year Russian student at the U of Chicago) will be there to help. We want to see if he can help explain the concept of school, and that just because we won't be there doesn't mean we won't be picking her up. It's got to be so very hard on Galyna not understanding everything yet; we can sympathize as we don't either. But she, like her sisters, has proven to be a trooper. We also picked up a Christmas tree, to her delight, which will be decorated today.
There have been a few mishaps, as we've had to work through the idea that makeup isn't for chewing on or dumping on the floor, and ownership of some toys is yet unclear. But overall her adapting to the family, and vice versa, is as good as we could have expeted in the first few days. Our prayer is it goes as well in the coming months.
As a heads-up, this will be the last of the "daily recap" types of posts. From here on out I'll be blogging here more about milestones. If you're on Facebook, or subscribe to updates from this blog (via RSS or something similar) you'll get notices. Otherwise, check back from time to time. I'll also update my other blog when I update things here. Posts will probably still be frequent through the holidays, but start to taper off as we get into more of a routine.
If you have any questions about how things are going, or what we're up to though, feel free to drop us a line. Or better yet, subscribe to one of the blogs or become my Facebook friend!
God bless,
Ron
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