Finding Joshua at the End of Reece's Rainbow: Court date!

Our court date has been set for Tuesday, the 29th. It's later than we were hoping for, but the end is in sight! After court, we will take the overnight train to Kyiv and fly out that afternoon! Then I will return on April 9th to finish up the process and bring Charlie home!

Now I know why all the other adoptive parents compare this to groundhog day! We do the same thing everyday. We get up late, usually go somewhere in the AM (walking, shopping, etc), visit Charlie in the afternoon, and watch a movie at night. In between all that, we read, use the computer, and do word puzzles. Real exciting, eh? It is getting a little redundant, but the excitement of being in a different country is still good enough to keep us going! Well, for me anyway - Ken is QUITE happy to lay around reading all day! :)

Charlie recognizes us now, and often he seems happy to see us. We only visit him for about an hour and a half per day. During the morning visiting hours, he's sleeping. In the afternoon, our visit is wedged between nap and snack times. The last few days, we've taken Charlie outside and we slowly walk around the baby house a few times before playing with him inside. It's really nice when we get a room to ourselves to visit with him, because we can lay him down on the couch, and we can take off some of his clothes when he gets too hot. Other times we play with him in a long hallway. There's benches and toys for this purpose, but he can't play with any of the toys, and he can't sit up properly on the little benches. So, he just sits on our laps and plays with whatever little toy we brought for the day! There's a sort of faux-jungle gym set up at the end of the hallway, and he likes banging the swinging rings around. They make a great noise! But this really wears him out! He doesn't last very long doing any sort of physical activity. Plus, he's always sweating through his clothes, and I think being that hot makes him sleepy on top of everything else! He's usually wearing three shirts, overalls, tights, and socks. Often the nannies insist on a sweater too. Ok, enough of my babbling, I know you are here for the pictures!