This is the post some of you have been waiting for!

Today I saw Liuba, Lena, Julia & Katya! I wanted to present each girl their gifts separately and of course without other children around but all four girls came in at the same time and I didn’t know how to get out of the situation. It really is frustrating to not convey exactly what your plans and ideas are.
First, I gave each girl a big hug and said that was from their Mama & Papa. (See video #1) Then I gave them each their gifts and James took their pictures.

I then got this wonderful idea to video each girl and let them send a message home. (See video #2, #3 & #4) I apologize that the sound is so bad and that you can hardly hear the girls let alone hear Hanna translate what they’re saying but at least you can see their cute faces in action!?
Liuba does not have a video. She was just too shy and after the other three went, I turned to her and tears were leaking out of her eyes and down her checks. I quickly went to her and wrapped my arms around her and told Hanna to tell her it’s okay, it’s no big deal she doesn’t have to make a video. Then Alex saved the day by wanting to make a video himself. (See video #5) By the time I had filmed Lex, Liuba had stopped crying and was smiling again.
Svetta had been lurking outside the door. I invited her in but she wouldn’t come. I asked Alex if Svetta was sad and he said no but he went out to check on her. He came back in asking me for gum for Svetta I had him give her a whole pack. My heart just hurt for this little girl. Here all her friends had gifts and American families coming for them and she did not. She has a little sore or something on her face and they’ve spread some red medicine on it making it look even worse. Someone thinking of adopting more needs to think about this Svetta. (UPDATE: THE RAST'S ARE COMING FOR SVETTA WITH LENA! HURRAY!!)

We then went to tour the grounds and buildings. Julia wanted James to play football and like the Pied Piper that he is, he soon had a flock of children around him I witnessed the glass game-see James post below-and then Alex not liking to compete for James attention, offered to take me on a tour of the children's living quarters.

(Playing the "Glass" Game)

The building, although old and in need of updating, was clean and compared to the Inspectors building it was in much better condition. The first room was the TV room where the children were watching Desperate House Wife’s only it was dubbed in Russian-that was weird to see Carlos & Gabby speaking Russian.
Then we went upstairs where the door to the sleeping area was locked but there is a window in the door looking in and I was able to get video of wear Alex sleeps. Then we went downstairs to the cafeteria.
I took some video of the grounds and all the while Hanna-who you might hear on one of the videos-wanted to go back to the main house. She did not like this. I asked if she had ever been to an orphanage before. No, and it was breaking her heart. “Look at all these children. They all want homes and families and Alex is the only one getting one.” It really bothered her. She has a very tender heart. I told her the orphanage was better than I had imagined and better than many I had heard of and researched. She was appalled.

Don't get me wrong. It's not wonderful by any means-but given what resources are available it's clean, it's warm and the children are cared for. I was questioning Oxana about how can children who have never been through a hosting program just say yes to adoption to parents they have never met? Even our inspector/question session seemed stressful for Alex-she said that perhaps because anything is better than what they currently have? I can see that now. This in no way meant negative about the staff or teachers of our orphanage. I think they do the best that they can. It's the idea that these children eat, sleep, study and play as a herd or group, how can a few teachers and staff nurture and love 500+ children? It's no way to spend a childhood. No way to learn values, and life lessons. Anyway, I digress...

I kept checking on James but he appeared to be having a wonderful time outside with the kids-and he so needed to burn off some pent up energy-so I went back with Hanna to see what the plans were for Alex this weekend. He mentioned that Ivan was picking him up on Friday. Naydia clarified that only James and I can take Alex out of the orphanage now as we have permission to adopt and so we're hoping to check him out on Sunday and go to church in Dnipropetrosvk (if we can figure out where it is-anyone have an idea about this?) and then to see Ivan and Snezhana. (If the weather is good and they actually want us to come. I need to talk with Snezhana but I don't have access to my ICQ account on this computer.) We will not have a translator so it will be an adventure, I'm sure.

I asked Alex (again) for the English books I sent-mostly so I could have the dictionary to help us communicate better-so we went back to the building where he eats and sleeps and his teacher gave him the key to the class room where the books were. I was able to talk with his teacher briefly. She said she had helped Alex with his letters to me and that he had waited so long for us to come and was so excited. The morning after I had called from Kiev he announced to her excitedly, "My parents are in Kiev!" She said she would meet with us later this week and give us his school papers and awards.
We were sitting at the back of the TV room and upon Alex returning with two of the three books I sent-the dictionary and the child dictionary-she moves people over so he and I could have the table. I guess she thought I wanted to work on his English right now! I got the book out and soon had Lena, Katya, a couple other girls and of course Alex working on English. I would read the name of an item with a picture down the side of the page and they would repeat it and find it in main picture. Then all of a sudden Alex and I are whisked away to a private class room by the teacher. I guess the teacher thought it was too noisy for us? It was more fun with a group but at this point, Hanna has left to return to Kiev and there's no way I'm going to be able to tell her I would rather study as a group.

We study for about 20 minutes and then I think, "Wow-how boring am I? Here James is out playing and I'm in here making Alex study!" I asked if he'd like to go out with Papa? No, he wants to stay with me-he really does well one on one with Papa but I think he thinks he needs to be the best and brightest to get Papa's attention-which isn't true-and just like when he was with us in October he sort of shuns being with the other children. In my heart I think he's just a little possessive and worries we'll fall in love with someone else but we won't. Well, we might-who knows- but that doesn't change how we feel about him or that he's the one we came fore. He's ours and we're not changing our minds but how do you tell a child this? Especially when you don't speak the same language?

He asks to play games on my Ukraine phone and tries to show me how to lock it but then can't unlock it! He fixes it by taking the back off and battery out and then it works again.Whew!

He has his own phone and has downloaded many pictures mostly of cars-lots of cars! But a few of not so nice pictures of girls-uh-women actually-which concerns me.

We go out and all the boys playing with James run to Alex and tell him "Papa" and give him a thumbs up and shout out other things. James has obviously been a hit and everyone is telling Alex how cool and fun his new Papa is. Alex grins.

We head back to the main red building-James sweating from playing so hard-and then were invited for dinner-again! I said yes, but insisted on paying today!

We had a nice meal with George, (Naydia's husband) Oxana, (she's back from Dnipropetrosvsk where she met with Ivan and got his statement about being supportive of the adoption as well as got the wheels in motion to correct the middle name of Alex's birth mother) James, Alex and I. Potatoes w/meat and carrots, some brown bread with liver spread (yuck), cucumbers, olives and juice. Then Naydia brought a chocolate bar! Yum.

Constantine was there but didn't eat. He never eats with us, just drinks tea and talks and talks.

Afterwards Constantine asked James many questions-through Oxana about his job.
Alex climbed on my lap and we go through his photo's on his phone and I "da" the cars & silly cartoons and "nett" the half naked women and marijuana plant and he deletes them for my benefit. (Later, I have Oxana tell him how much I appreciate him deleting those photo's. Who knew I'd be mothering him before it was official?)

Alex and I played a few hands of the Russian card game, me actually winning a hand and he ate a banana we brought then he pulled out my crochet and wanted to learn. He did pretty good! And he showed it to Oxana boasting that his Mama taught him!

Someone was sent for Alex around 7:30 and we got great departing hugs and told him we'd be back tomorrow. I actually got lots of hugs today and about a 1 one minute hand hold but then when he saw other children he dropped my hand. No worries, my Austin would do the same thing!
That was our day at the "boarding" school. It didn't start until late (3:30?) as our driver was with Oxana so we slept late, read and watched movies and walked to the little market before leaving. (I finally got some video of the exterior of this place!)

Later Oxana went over Alex's medical report and it all came back healthy except for his delayed speech. He can't say his S sound correctly. That's okay, we can work on that.

It looks like blogger will not allow me to post all these video's on one post so I'll add them to the next one and post if after this one-with any luck they'll be in the correct order!

Note later: I am really having a hard time uploading all these videos. I will for sure get every one's girls on but I don't know if I can get the rest on. I had four uploaded, tried to publish and they disappeared. Sorry!

Video #1

Video #2

Video #3