moscow - trip 1 - day 4

Much better day today. We drove across Moscow to the notary office, and we only had to wait 30 minutes before we signed our documents for court. R paid 1400 rubles, and then we were on our way to the orphanage. I was happy that we were getting to go out to Kolumna earlier in the day.

The traffic was not heavy today, so we made it to Kolumna in 1 1/2 hours. As soon as we arrived, we went into the music room again, and his caregiver brought him in. She said she could tell that he had been waiting for us. As always, he was in a happy mood. We got down on the floor, and he actually played with the stacking rings for a few minutes. We read the “Touch and Feel Farm” book again, and that was still his favorite. At one point, I left him with Russ, and went across the room. I sat back down on the floor, and then called him. He crawled all the way across the room to me! So once he’s wearing fewer layers of clothing, he’ll really be moving around. When he got to me, I gave him lots of hugs and kisses, and I could tell he was very pleased with himself. The rest of the visit, he just wanted to be held, so we did. Lots of hugs, kisses, and snuggles. I told him he is my Snuggle Bunny! I got some great pictures of R holding him. At the time, we didn’t know if we’ll see him tomorrow, or if today was our last visit, so we told him how much we loved him, that we would be coming back to take him home as soon as we could, and that God would be with him and take care of him until we returned. About 2:30, his caregiver came in. She watched us with him for a few minutes, then she played with him along with us. She seems to like Eli, and is good with him, and I am very thankful for that. At 2:45pm, we kissed him one more time, and then she took him upstairs for yogurt then a nap. She took the keys on a ring and the photo album for his crib, and the stacking rings for his room.

Then we went to the office to give I. the notarized documents for court, and then I. gave us our folder that we’ll turn in at the courthouse tomorrow. While we were at the office, we found out that we won’t be seeing Eli again on this trip. We have to go to the courthouse tomorrow, and the drive to Kolumna in the heavy traffic is just too long. We have our 8 doctor medical on Friday.

Please pray that we get a court date as soon as possible, so we can bring our Snuggle Bunny home very soon! We miss him already!