successful day-4 to go

Good day in Moscow.  We spent a good bit of the morning walking on arbat street. Vasa didn't quite have an appreciation for the artists and musicians, but he loved the crane that was making repairs below the road.  We spent a good bit of the time watching that.

We ate lunch at the hard rock.  They had a blow up jumper inside--how cool is that-so Vasa played in that a while.  Then, when he saw the milk come, no more jumper.  Josh worked very hard trying to teach Vasa to only put one piece of food in his mouth at a time and to chew.  His meals for him still consist of him trying to shove as much food as possible as quickly as possible in his mouth.  We were prepared for this, b/c so many of the books that we read explained how common this is in institutionalized children whose food is limited every day.  He liked his mac n cheese and the bread and our hamburger meat, but wanted nothing to do with the brocolli or carrots. We bought the girls and my nephews a t-shirt and grandpa.  I continue to be impressed with how well our waiters speak english--wish my russian compared.

We headed back to the room for a much needed nap for all of us.  Vasa willingly went down for a nap.  After a few hours, we were all up playing in the room.  We were a bit frustrated b/c we tried to skype with Buddy and had a lot of trouble getting it to work.  We also tried with Mimi later and had trouble with hers, too.  We just downloaded the skype last week, and it kept saying that mimi's was outdated.

Vasa loves the toys--his favorite is probably the $7 big lot car that goes forward and back and makes lots of sounds.  We've enjoyed seeing him dance to his elmo cd player.  Turning on and off the lights is still also loads of fun.

We went out tonight to Chilis.  It was very yummy.  Josh and I split a piece of salmon, rice, and steamed veggies and vasa had a chicken sandwich and mashed potatoes.  He loved the potatoes and would eat some of the vegetables if I hid them in the potatoes.  He has left every meal with a very full tummy.  Speaking of full tummys-when you have lots of full tummies there is lots of kaka.  It has been a while since I had a child that couldn't ask to go to the bathroom, so josh and I forgot to take him to the potty when we got home--we were skyping with mimi when Josh said, oh no!!  Kaka!  He has actually done really well--only 1-2 accidents.

At chilis, they gave Vasa a balloon.  He has played with that balloon like I think no other child has played with a balloon.  He was very entertained with it and insisted that we take it back to the room.  He didn't want to put his jacket on until he saw me taking it off of his high chair.

Now, after some crying, he is in the bed but not sleeping yet.  Quiet, but not sleeping.  He seems to soothe himself by rubbing his head, eyelid, and pulling at his hair a little. Now he is rubbing the bear on his head.

 Josh and I have noticed, though, while we are rocking him at bedtime and when he got hurt (pulled the door on his toe), that there are no tears.  We think he must have blocked tear ducts or no tear ducts at all--may be a reason he's had some eye problems.  We also noticed that he looks flat footed-special shoes for that?  We thought maybe it is because of shoes that he has worn on  his feet thus far weren't the best quality or maybe the wrong size.  Josh said he couldn't be in the military for flat feet--maybe that will keep him out of the russian military, too :).  We heard that if he enters the country between the ages of 19-32, he may have to serve in the military.  He will keep dual citizenship, and I think most of their men must serve at least a short time.  He may just have to stay far away from Russia during that time-no gog/magog war for my child.

Love my girls and miss them.  I'm still hiding behind the drying rack (have a washer but no dryer) while josh is trying to get Vasa to sleep.