Our first full day together

A few pictures from today. . . I really didn't take many, didn't have time. ;)


















They use these super small trash bags here so if you don't take it out often it really piles up. Doesn't Eric really look like a true trash man. ha ha The walk to the dumpster is over five minutes in one direction.






A little play time just before bed.

We have had a great day together. Lincoln is doing remarkable well. He is very happy and we have pretty much been keeping him on his schedule.

He slept right through the night and woke bright and early at 6am just like his Nannies said he would. We were hoping for later but no. Eric slept on the sofa pull out and I slept in the bed with Lincoln. Lincoln is not fun to sleep with; he was rolling all over the place and talking in his sleep. Needless to say I did not get very much sleep. Eric said he didn’t sleep much either because he could hear him. For tonight, Eric got creative and has moved our bed in such a way that we have created a small space on the floor that he has a little room to roll around but he can’t get out of the spot without our help. We are really hoping he will sleep well in there.

This morning we called home so his grandparents on both sides could hear his cute voice for the first time. It was so wonderful to finally feel like we were sharing him with our family. He was cute we put his grandparents on speaker phone and Lincoln was looking around the room trying to figure out where the new voices were coming from.

He did take his first nap after his cereal at 8:30 and slept for an hour and half. Then this afternoon he slept again for three hours. Mommy even took a nap during two of these. In between sleeping he did great at eating and playing around the apartment. He learned a new word/sound today “uh oh” and he even knows to say it when he drops something. We have a gate up closing off the kitchen from the living room and he even figure out that when he drops his toys into the kitchen that is when you say “uh oh”. Could be coincidence but we think he is just super smart. ;) Another cute thing he is trying to do, he actually started this yesterday, we always snap our fingers to him to get his attention and he is trying to figure out how we do that. He gets his fingers in the right position but of course he can’t figure it out. I have no idea but I would think a kid would be several years old before you could teach him how to snap. I will keep you posted if our genius child figures it out.

It is 7:30 now, Eric is working on getting him to sleep, and hopefully he goes down soon. I can hear him still talking and making noise so I don’t think we are close yet.

We did get confirmation today that our passport application was received in Almaty today. Due to the holiday it will not be processed till Tuesday. It takes 2 or 3 days to be processed then it gets mailed back to Aktobe for one more signature then it gets mailed to Astana (the capital) for more processing then it will finally get forwarded to Almaty where we will pick it up. It seems like a crazy process to us but unfortunately we have no control over it so we are trying not to let it bother us. We can not of course apply for Lincolns’ visa till we have the passport and we are not sure yet for certain but we don’t believe he can get his medical exam either till we have the passport so we are just waiting now. It is not looking good that we will make it home on the 31^st like we have schedule. This holiday is really screwing up our travel home plans. Another potential problem for us is our visas expire on April 3^rd so we are hoping we are ready to come home by then. I guess we need to find out what we need to do potentially to extend our visas. (If anyone reading this knows we would appreciate hearing from you. I imagine this has happened to other families in the past.) Now we need to decide if we want to stay put here in Aktobe longer or take our flight to Almaty on Monday like we have scheduled. It is much cheaper to stay here in Aktobe and living in the apartment is nicer than staying in a hotel with Lincoln. Not sure yet what we will do we will do.