The Big Move!

Wow! It sure has been a long time since I've posted, sorry! We packed, moved and unpacked in the last 3 weeks so things have been busy. We moved into our new home just before Thanksgiving so we were able to host for our friends.




Our new home has 4 bedrooms with a huge backyard. Sasha calls it a park. He also tends to get lost in the house and needs help finding his way back to his train set. The boys were in the same room, but Sasha was being so silly and keeping Stasi up, that we seperated them and they both sleep much better. There is an office in the garage so Andy has claimed both spaces and I have the spare bedroom as my art/scrapbooking room and it will be the guest room. We had so many friends help us paint, move and unpack and we are so grateful! Stasi was a big help, as usual and Sasha was working hard taking apart his toy chest. We love our new house!!




Now we are on a countdown to Christmas. For the boys, they just know that it is when we go to Babushka and Dedushka's house and are mostly excited about that, but we are looking forward to our first Christmas with our boys.

Halloween!

Sorry, sorry, sorry that I haven't posted but I woke up Halloween morning Sick, Sick, Sick. I finally went to the Dr. who said I had a virus and just needed rest. HA! With 2 toddlers that is a laugh! Andy had to stay home 2 days this week to hold down the fort and friends pitched in to help out...Thank you! This was my first experience being sick and having to be a mom at the same time...not easy and not fun! In the midst of it all, Andy's Dad came from North Carolina to meet the boys for the first time. They all had a lot of fun together.

He was also here for the boys' first Halloween. Our little bottomless pit, Sasha, was quick to figure it out. "I say trick or treat, they give me candy, I say thank you, and I run as fast as I can to the next place...AWESOME!" Sasha was a Doggie and Stasi picked Gorilla. My girlfriend Beth has a great collection of masks so I picked 2 for Andy and I and we were quite the family of animals. We were joined by our good friends Christian and Jillian and there son Caleb. We had quite the zoo tramping down the street. It was a fun night!

Boys' Dedication

Saturday we had a wonderful party for the boys. It was both very fun and very meaningful. We celebrated their arrival to their forever family, their 2008 birthdays and we dedicated them to the Lord. Our dear friend and pastor Christian, gave a wonderful dedication, commiting the boys to the Lord. He anointed the boys with oil and Andy and I shared a verse that we picked for each boy. I had made a cake for each of them and we sang Happy Birthday. This was their first time ever celebrating a birthday. It was such a fabulous day. Here are some pics. of the party.
Sasha discovered the chip bowl and quickly planted himself there. MMMMMMMM!


Our friend Charis did face painting for the kiddos,and Stasi and Sasha helped out as well.




Andy charmed everyone with his talent of creating balloon animals and flowers.


The Dedication. The boys love Christian sooooooooo much they just had to climb into his arms in the middle of the dedication. It was quite cute and loving!



The Birthday Celebration!!





Thanks to all who attended, either in person or in thought and prayer!

Apple-Picking Time!

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Today the boys and I went apple-picking with our MOPS (Mothers of Pre-Schoolers) Group and had a great time. The boys loved picking, and eating, apples. They each ate 3 apples while we were picking and the orchard didn't charge me for the apples the boys ate. So Nice! I only let the boys pick the Granny Smith apples as I like those best for baking pies, but they didn't know I was directing them to certain trees!



Tomorrow we are taking the boys to a Classic Cars and Motorcycle Show. Can you tell we have boys?! We think (hope) they will love it; we'll let you know.

Pumpkin Patch and a Boo-Hoo to the House

Well, for various reasons too boring to post on a blog, we lost the house! Boo-hoo! We loved it and I am still having a hard time letting go of the fact we won't be moving into it, but this just means there is something better out there for us. We will still be closing escrow on our place since we have great buyers who have offered a fantastic price for our place. We will rent back our condo from them until we find our next home. Please PRAY we find one soon, we have to be out of the condo by Dec. 31st and I'd really love to be settled before the holidays!

On a happier note, we took the boys to the pumpkin patch on Sunday and they had the time of their lives! Hayrides, corn mazes and PUMPKINS! I think Stasi's head was about to explode as he just couldn't decide which one to take home. Decisions, decisions!



After naps I went out for coffee with a girlfriend while Andy bravely had the boys clean out their pumpkins and prep the seeds for roasting. This was a huge project for Andy to undertake as he hates messes. But other than Sasha dumping his bowl of seeds all over the table and floor, the boys did a pretty good job. Monday after naps I had the boys help me sprinkle the seeds with salt then we baked them. The seeds were devoured in 2 days.


We decorated the house for Halloween tonight and the boys went nuts with all the fun stuff! Pumpkin lights and silly scarecrows, bats and ghosts. They had to call bebushka and tell her all about it. So cute!

Visit from Boo-Boo

Sasha calls his beloved Grandma's "Boo-Boo" which is short for Babushka. We had a very fun 3 day visit from my parents, Aunt, Uncle and grandma. Sasha learned that he had 2 "Boo-Boo's" and was quite thrilled about this fact.

The family got to see the boys swim, play and EAT! Everyone was impressed by Sasha's eating ability, and Stasi's desire to always help. Help cleaning, organizing, carrying this to and from a car. If he can help, he wants to participate. We love and encourage this in him as best we can.

In this picture, Aunt Deb and Stasi are washing the breakfast dishes, and Uncle Bruce and Sasha are drying. The four were efficient and I was very thankful.


Each night the 2 "boo-boo's" or grandmas, or babushka's, whichever, bathed and read to the boys. The blanket Stasi and my grandma (his great-grandma)are sitting on is a homemade blanket from her. Sasha has one too, his is green. Stasi has slept with it each night. Sasha knows which one is his, but still resists being covered at night. He does like to play "sleep" during the day, at which time he uses his blanket from "boo-boo".



We are busy packing up the condo, ready to move in about 15 days. We keep telling the boys that we live in a "milinky dom" little house, and that we are moving to a "novi bolshoy dom" a new big house. They are both excited about this and love to help pack. We'll see how long this lasts, but so far so good.

Sold and Bought!

The condo has been sold, well, in escrow, pending on us finding a place, and we did! We signed papers last Thursday evening. (Which interrupted the premeire of Grey's Anatomy!) We are moving in about 3 weeks, YIKES! Escrow closes Oct. 21st. We bought a 3 bedroom house with LOTS of space inside and out. We were hoping for a 4 bedroom but all that we looked at were teeny. Even two 5 bedroom homes we looked at were teeny and trashed! So we went for a house where we could add on and enjoy the space around us. It is a great entertaining house and many of you know how much we like to entertain so we'll have to have another wine tasting party to celebrate when we are all moved in!

We will certainly miss being able to walk to Trader Joe's, Cold Stone and Coffee Bean, all the important stores. As well as walking to see our friends; Eaton's and van der Heide's. But a whole new world awaits us on the other side of the freeway...Woody's BBQ, Ralph's, Goleta Coffe Company, and Bennett's the teaching store, my favorite! What we won't miss are the skunks, opposums and racoons. We had 5 racoons in our yard two nights ago, and the boys got to see the action. The "o-coons" are all they could talk about the next day. So exciting!

Today we visited the Slavic Church in town with the woman we met at radiology. It was a 2 1/2 hour service, which we were not prepared for, but it was an excellent service and a wonderful experience. The service is in Russian but there is a translator in the back and we had headsets. The songs were written in Russian and English on the screen, so we just sang in English. We have never been so welcomed at a church before, and we've been to quite a few. I bravely took the microphone and introduced ourselves to the congretation, stating that we had just adopted the boys from Krasnoyarsk, Russia and were here hoping to meet families to help the boys keep their Russian language. We were flooded by families after the service waiting to introduce themselves to us. A wonderful older lady, definately a "babushka" offered to help out with the boys anytime I wanted. YES! YES! YES! The pastor told us they will be starting Russian school in December where the boys would eventually learn to read and write in Russian. Our minds flipped back to the movie, My Big Fat Greek Wedding, when the main character had to attend Greek School growing up. Looks like that will be the fate for our boys; they start Russian School in December! So excited about this! We will definately be going back to the Slavic Church this coming Sunday.

Here are some of the latest and greatest pics!
Sasha Wrestling a Tiger. It's a toss up who wins!


Stasi talking to Uncle Chris (my brother)



And the daily activity of water play!







Anyone wanting to help us move, be here on Oct. 21st!