Oo-ohh Say Can You See, aa-aa Wand'ring Family?

Yep - we're back in the US, having returned to have the baby. It's funny how many people have asked us how it feels to be "home" without realizing that this isn't really our home any more. I suppose you could say we're not really at home anywhere on earth :) but, insomuch as we have a home on earth, it's back in Moscow now.

That said, it is good to be here! We've had a week now to de-jet lag ourselves, and now all of us, inlcuding Steven, are back on our regular schedules. For Bobbie and I, that means doing our Russian lessons via Skype (an internet videoconferencing program). Every morning, both of us have a separate two-hour class with our teacher just as if we were there, and so far it's working well. Hopefully we'll be able to find some language helpers here soon and continue to make progress in the language. Just because we're a long ways away doesn't mean we have to give up studying!

Anyway, I thought you might enjoy a few pictures and videos of our time here so far, so here goes. First up, we have a shot of the beginning of our journey, when both B and Steven were in good spirits. Then we started going through security checkpoints - a lot of them!

To fly out of Moscow, you first get scanned (all baggage, plus you get patted down) as you walk through the airport door. Then, you go through outgoing customs and your bags are checked again. Then, another X-ray scan of your baggage, then a guard opens your carry-on luggage for a hand inspection. At this point, you finally go get your boarding passes and check your big bags, and here we had some complications with Steven's ticket. After some confusion and an additional $360, we were through, and only had one more scan of our baggage, another patdown for weapons and we were through!

Then, a mere 14 hours later, and much struggling with a baby boy not accustomed to sitting in one place for that long, we were here! Here Steven has finally fallen asleep, and I'm enjoying a rare moment of peace on the plane.

Since we've gotten back, we've been enjoying the wonderful spring weather. When we left it was in the single digits and there was still snow on the ground, and here it's warm and everything's green! It's really wonderful.

Of course, Grandpa and Grandma Williams have also been enjoying their grandson, and here Steven's going for a ride with Grandpa in the wheelbarrow:

I'm trying to include more videos, since everyone tells us they love them, so here's a clip of Grandpa tickling Steven, always one of his favorite activities.

Steven likes this kind of flight a lot better than the kind in actual airplanes!

Of course, he's had a chance to make some new friends as well in the last week. Our friends Mike and Martha have a baby boy named Noah who's almost exactly the same age as Steven. We took him over there one night and they "enjoyed" a bath together. Frankly, I think this was more a stunt for the moms to laugh at them, not to mention take some pictures that might come back to haunt them in high school. :)

Anyway, Steven hasn't had a lot of time in his life to hang out with animals, since neither us nor any of our friends have any back in Moscow. Here he explores the world of cats at Noah's house. This cat's name is Arnie, and Steven seems to like him:

Anyway, that should do it for this installment. Sorry we've been late getting it up, but we've been spending all our time getting our language classes back up and running, not the mention hanging out with family and friends.

Oh, and I should pass along one piece of news, which some of you might find humorous. If you're recall, in our last post we mentioned that some of our friends had bought us a lovely snowsuit for our expected new delivery. Since I was so confident in our doctor's diagnosis on an early ultrasound that we were expecting "Nicole," I foolishly joked that the pink snowsuit might be "gay-looking" if it turned out to be a boy.

In a strange twist of fate, in our doctor's visit on Tuesday to make sure everything was OK with B and the baby, we found out that we are indeed expecting a boy! We've been calling him "Nicole" for so long, it's going to be tricky to think of a boy's name now. Anyway, thanks to all of you who have laughed at me for that remark! :)

With regards to the What Is It?™, KarenG gets the point. The blue plastic thing is indeed a shoe cover, something you are required to put on when you go to the doctor's office in Russia. It makes sense, since in a home you always take your shoes off at the door, and you can't really do that in an office. However, you need something to keep everyone from tracking snow everywhere, so they solve the problem with the shoe covers.