Little Women

Well, we've been here for a couple of years now, and last week we finally got our first visitors! B's sisters Andrea and Kellie flew in for a visit, and they've been with us for the past week. Since we have so many pictures from their time here (including a fun tourist-type trek downtown), I thought I'd make this a photo-blog and not talk so much.

Here the sisters head towards Marx' statue near the Bolshoi Theater, no doubt discussing his economic theories. Well, actually, they were probably just talking about how cold it was, but anyway ...

If you look closely, you can read the inscription "Proletarians of every country - unite!" which didn't quite go down as he had planned.

The public bathrooms in Moscow are all pay-per-use, as Andrea and Kellie found out.

Near the entrance to Red Square, where all the touristy-type kiosks are, are a few opportunistic folks looking to profit on their resemblance to famous Russians of history. The ladies took their picture with the rather odd pairing of Nicholas II and Lenin. The price went up after the picture was taken, much to our surprise. (I know - who would have thought that these guys would turn out to be untrustworthy managers of finance!?)

Then, we entered Red Square and tried to get into Lenin's mausoleum to look at the real guy (well, his waxy corpse, anyway). No dice - it's closed until April, perhaps for a fresh coat of paraffin.


Of course, no trip to Red Square would be complete without a picture in front of St. Basil's. Here B does the honors.

Despite the cold, we walked on a little further and got a picture of the ladies overlooking the river, with Christ the Savior Cathedral in the background (just above Kellie's head) and the Kremlin wall on the right.

Of course, we've also been at home a lot during their stay. They brought lots of goodies from the US for the boys (thanks to the Dials and others who gave the girls stuff to bring for us), so here's a shot of Steven enjoying a gifted lollipop while wearing his new cowboy hat.

As I finished this up, the girls just got back from their latest outing to the souvenir market, so more pictures to come from that next time we post. Also, we can't complete the blog without welcoming our new coworker Elisabeth! She just flew in today, and will be living here in Moscow for the next year or two learning Russian, just as we did. If you'd like to check out her blog (and add her to your "thought-list"), the link to her blog is here.

While I'm linking blogs, you may as well check out B's twin sister's blog here; she's visiting us on her way to Australia to do some training for overseas work herself.

And that's about it. Thanks again for checking in, and for thinking of us. See you again next week!