Day 2 at the Orphanage.

This morning was a bit rough as I waited patiently for a phone call from Syvette to let me know if everything went well with getting Dima's birth certificate and possibly his passport.  Not sure because Syvette has been so busy with all the families here, that I just do as I am told.  I trust things will get done and don't ask questions.  What ever it takes to get Dima home! Syvette worked her magic this morning with a little paperwork issue, but it sounds like we are back on track. 

This afternoon the Noel's, McKracken's and I went to the orphanage as Lori and Russ had to travel to Lena and Eric's region where they were born to do paperwork.  They were hoping to get back to meet Lena and Eric's older sister whom came from another town to see them and meet Lori and Russ before they leave for America.  I don't know if they made it back in time unfortunately.  I know they all will be dissapointed.

Dima was boxing again when I arrived again.  This time the boxing coach made it known to me that they need 10 new boxing gloves.  I asked how much and he said about $3,000 grivnas! People here are known to ask things for the orphanage and when they see that we are Americans, they think we all have a lot of money to spend.  He then proceeded to tell Dima to ask me.  I will have to pull out my Russian dictionary tomorrow to explain "We can not afford to get that many gloves!!".  The tricky thing here is if we would have bought gloves before Dima's court date, it could have been viewed as a bribe.  Now it would be safe to purchase some. I would like to support the boxing here, but it's hard to when there are other needed items. There are kids who have shoes with holes in them and clothes that are so old they are falling apart.

We all hung out in the usual room and enjoyed the company.  Part of me would like to be alone with Dima and get to know him better, but I think I am learning more about him when we are in a big group.  I didn't think he liked to sit down and do book work, but he enjoyed Mick and Janel's word find book that they brought.  It was in English and had pictures to help show what the words were.  I wish I would have brought something like that for our trip home to pass the time.  I enjoy finding out something new everyday about Dima!

 Here are a few pictures from today.

Artyr and Dima trying to pull each other back in their chairs....(notice that Dima loves to wear this shirt a lot so I thought I'd ask him if he'd like to take it back to America with him and he actually said no! I think he wants a fresh new start.)

Eric and Artyr arm wresting...I didn't put the next few pictures in as I didn't want Eric's ego to be hurt:)