Morning weather report: 44, feels like 39. Projected high: 44 and rainy (we’re at the high temp today!) Temperature will drop toward 30 throughout the day, with gusty winds as a cold front passes through.
Meanwhile back in Memphis: Overnight low of 44, but heading back to a high of 77 (break out the swimsuits!)
This morning stated out very dreary with rain. Fortunately, it’s warmer than originally predicted so at least we didn’t have the sleet that had been forecast (it’s still in tomorrow’s prediction though). Cold, rain/sleet then snow is forecast for next two days, with temperatures predicted to dip into the teens by Wednesday and not break the freezing mark the rest of the week. Brrrrr! None of the trees have any leaves left.We had a fun discussion on the way back to the RBS yesterday, discussing nicknames. Specifically, some of the ones in their Family Group. For example, one boy is called “Fish,” because he’s always making a “fish lips” face when any of the girls walk by. Then David was asked whether he had a nickname. A little squirming, but no response. Kate was quiet on that one too, so I suggested “Poochy-mu” (Почему is Russian for “Why?”) in honor of all the questions the judge asked him. We nearly ran off the road since we were all laughing so hard (even Sasha)! It’s nice to know that we all have a good sense of humor.
Today we broke routine with a morning visit, so Sasha and Masha picked me up at 10 am, shortly after the rain stopped. Since the kids are now on school break (Nov 4th – 12th), coupled with a brief water outage this morning, breakfast was served a bit later than usual so I got to venture down “The Forbidden Hallway” as Cathe calls it, to see them at breakfast. It’s the hallway with the cafeteria, where David and Kate would quickly disappear at the conclusion of our late afternoon visits earlier on in our adoption process, never to be seen again, or at least until our next daily visit, since 5 pm is snack time (dinner isn’t until 8 pm). I was able to catch a couple quick photos before retreating to let them finish.
While waiting for the kids to finish breakfast, I met up with the Director. Last time I had seen him was a brief moment the day the TV crew was at the RBS filming a Republic Day celebration. Anyway, I kept missing him this past week and I wanted to drop off a small gift Cathe and I brought for him. Good thing I saw him today since he also wanted to invite me to tea on Thursday. My presently not-so-full calendar social calendar will be completely full after that!
Since the weather was blustery, we headed back to our favorite spot during the Bonding Period, Ludmilla’s classroom. Kate wanted to show off her “Best Student” award. (I’ll have to ask which subject it is for) and David could hardly wait to dig out the computer. Not so fast! It was time to play a few flashcard games and a few other kids joined in. (There were a couple grumbles to the effect of, “Papa, we’re on school break! Why do we have to study more?” but they didn’t last long once we started having fun)We have mastered the alphabet with the exception of the occasional slips with letters which have identical counterparts in Cyrillic (but are pronounced differently), so today’s drill was a little different. First we went through the cards and named the picture that was on each to represent the letter. Then we played a game of High-Low in which I held up two cards and the kids had to indicate which comes first. I did my best Regis Philbin imitation with a, “Is that your final answer?” approach before marking the score. David started out strong, but the girls caught up after a couple trick questions. Over eagerness was David’s demise as the girls took a moment longer to think before responding. Up to now, we had focused on teaching Kate the ABC song since David knew the letters. We’ll have to work a bit more on alphabetical order to help with dictionary drills.
After a few more pleas to dig out the computer were met with “Позже” (later), Kate happily got work in her coloring book while David and I did some more work in the picture dictionary. He’s really good at matching the English word to the right object or action, so I covered up the text and started pointing to objects. Not a happy camper! After 15 minutes, he begged for a break and took a quick picture of me in a stern, School Master pose. With that, our lessons were over for the day.FINALLY the computer came out of the bag so I could show Kate and David some new pictures Cathe sent from home (thankfully compressed so I could download them over dial-up!). Yesterday some very good friends from church came over and helped rearrange some furniture to complete preparations for the children’s arrival. In short order they converted our guest room into a suitable little girl’s room for Kate (we had already painted and decorated, but left adult-sized furniture in place for Scott, our house sitter). Then David’s new Captain’s Bunk was set up and the transformation was complete. Both kids were VERY happy with the results. (Thanks guys for all the help!)
Two hours had flown by, and it was time to go. It was an interesting change visiting in the morning instead of the late afternoon. You have a completely different perspective on the day’s schedule. “Getting the daily visit out of the way” isn’t exactly the right term, but it’s close. Once you wrap up a morning visit, there is still a lot of day left to do something. Too bad it had to be on a day with crummy weather!
In just two hours, the temperature had dropped, the wind had picked up, and there were snow flurries in the air. Masha and Sasha took me over to the Big Flea Market so I could get one more unique Kazakhstan souvenir: KZ stickers. While there, I also picked up a “Caution: Woman Driver” sticker which has “Respect Me” written at the bottom (my dictionary also offers and alternative term: “Admire Me”). The rest of today will be spent reading more of the book on Kazakhstan. Tune in tomorrow for a fresh update!
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