Cutest Mouse EVER!

Hi Everyone- I always tell myself that I will not let so much time pass without posting. So much happens that I want to document but I just don’t get to it somehow. So, again, this will be a long one. Forgive me and enjoy my random thoughts and declarations of adoration for our little one. So, right now, I am watching the Amazing Race on TV who is traveling to Almaty, Kazakhstan on this episode. It is so weird to see the babushkas, clothes and faces that remind me of the place that our boy comes from. I know it’s strange, but it makes me feel kind of homesick somehow. I also find myself looking around us wherever we are in DC for the same. Today at the zoo, I heard a man speaking Russian and immediately spun around so I could see if it was someone who looked like Rin or like any of the other people in KStan. And I looked at the faces of the people visiting the Kazakhstan horses there and wonder if they, too have a connection to that part of the world. That’s just another reason that I love DC- all of the different people with a connection to places all over the world. And it makes me even more anxious to get to Kaz again before to long. But more about what is going on with that at the end of this post. Let me start with our little mouse. He had an absolute blast on Halloween. The day before HDay, we had baked cupcakes to take to the park for a Halloween party there and so he was just about bouncing off the walls with excitement the next morning- he knew it was a special day and he was eager to get it started. He was absolutely terrible all morning but I can’t really blame him. It’s hard to wait when you are not quite 2 years old! And when he woke up from nap, he raced over to his little costume and started trying to put it on himself. He was totally into the whole idea of dressing up. He thought that the whiskers were absolutely the best part and keeps trying to get my to paint them on him again just for fun. He basically ran all of the way to the park saying “SQUEEK! SQUEEK!” while Peter and I ran behind him with the cupcakes trying to keep up with our little scampering mouse. We ended up trick-or-treating at a few of the houses on our block after the park and it was more than enough for a little tyke who didn’t really get it yet. Just wait until next year though- he’ll be unstoppable in his quest for candy. Although, I think our guy is a pretty good eater. I think it stems from the fact that I have him hooked on cooking. He carries around one of my pots with some dry pasta in it and ‘cooks’. He asks for specific things like the potato masher or the cupcake tin to make it a little more authentic. And he really does help me cook sometimes. When we made the Halloween cupcakes he counted out 2 eggs, helped stir the batter, put the papers in the cups, told me which ones needed more batter, told me when the timer went off, and helped put decorations on top. He gets so excited about it that he jumps up and down yelling “Cooking, Mama! Cooking!” I don’t think Peter likes the idea, but I really want to get him a kitchen for him to play in. But I am really enjoying not cooking on our ‘Take-out and a Movie” Friday nights. So far, we have watched the Wawa movie (Ice Age: The Meltdown), Gasgar (Madagasgar), Pumpkin movie (Pooh’s Heffalump Halloween Movie), Cars, and Elmo Saves Christmas, and we have gotten takeout from Italian, Indian, Thai, Pizza, and Chinese. It’s my new favorite night of the week. Sweet Rinat is doing a ton of talking these days. I actually have people ask how old his is pretty often and comment that he’s a good talker. It definitely makes my life easier when he can tell me what he wants. Some of his new words are crocodile, shovel, wallet, hummus, heavy; and even better, he’s speaking in semi-sentences like “Bubby tayoh why” (Bunny’s tail is white), “Sitting NatNat” (Rin wants to sit here), “Dada soo bown” (Dada’s shoes are brown), and my fave “Dah duh Dada Mama” (can you guess what that one is:-)? Yes, he is really into naming the colors of everything these days too. I think he knows all of the main colors and I don’t know what he’s going to learn next. Peter and I have started applying to preschools for him next year and it is kind of sad and exciting at the same time. I can’t believe that it is already time for me to let him start leading his own life. Here in DC the process is insane. I think we are going to try and find 6 schools to apply to after going to open houses and we are hoping to get into one 2 days a week starting next September. I know I am going to bawl my head off when I drop him off for the first time. But that’s next year… And who knows what we’ll be doing by then. And this post really long already so I will give you a (relatively) quick sister update and then sign off. We started down the road in Feb and it has been crazy ever since- closings, slowdowns, policy changes, new agencies, and generally not knowing what was going to happen. I’m glad I was so naive the first time around or else I would have gone crazy- I just assumed that everything would work out (and it thankfully did). It was so easy last time and this adoption is so full of ups and downs. We don’t really have any idea how things will go but we are being told that it will be at least two years and we cannot be guaranteed a girl or a child under 1 year. It will get to a point that our papers will have been sitting over in Kaz long enough and they will tell them to send us to Kaz and get us a child or they will send it back. But we are almost done with the temporary dossier that our agency is requesting and then it is just a waiting game. We have to wait for the OK to get the real deal dossier done (apostiled & updated), and then we turn it into the consul and wait yet again for them to send it to Kaz, then wait again for them to assign us a region, and then again for a specific city and a date to travel. We will most definitely let you all know when we have any news. And, in the meantime, we will be enjoying the gorgeous cool weather that we have been having. Happy Fall! -m