TOUCHDOWN!!!

No, not that kind of touchdown. I should say we "touched-down" in St. Petersburg about 5pm local time tonight (9am back home). It was a realtivley uneventful flight. Just a little bit of food poisoning on the way here, but it left just as quickly as if came. Shelly was grateful enough to share her dinner with me on the long flight from Detroit to Amsterdam. Little did she know that I was saving her from about 30 minuets of sheer hell. She owes me...(ha).

We had a short layover in Amsterdam, then it was off to St. Petersburg. When we landed, we were greeted with a much different looking Russian landscape than on our last visit. The first thing we noticed was that the sun actually shines in Russia, which seemed to allow grass to grow and leaves to come out on the trees. What a concept!! It is in the mid seventies today and I believe the weather forcast is similar for the duration of our stay. That should provide us with some nice sightseeing weather in between visits with Max.

Our plan tomorrow is to head to the orphanage in the morning for a couple of hours of visitation, and back in the afternoon for a couple more. We will not be able to see him over the weekend as the director prefers weekday visits only. One of the two days this weekend, we will meet with the translator that will be with us during our court appearance on Monday. She will help us to prepare and let us know what to expect. Outside of that, we plan on visiting the Hermitage Museum on Saturday, and taking a hydrofoil (boat) to Peterof (Peter I's summer palace). It is about a 4o minute boat ride outside of the city. They say it is the Versailles of the North. Not sure we could call their bluff, as we have never been to Versailles, other than Versailles, Ohio. It's GOT to be better than that!

Sunday night, Madonna is performing in concert on the palace square outside of the Hermitage Museum. We will be sure to steer clear of the mayhem down there that night!

Monday we are scheduled to appear in court at 2pm. We are going to attempt a visit with Max in the morning and perhaps after court as well. We will have to play that by ear.

Tuesday, we leave around 6pm, so we will plan on one last visit with Max prior to our departure. The best news of all, is that it looks like we will be back to pick him up sooner than we thought! As a matter of fact, we may be able to bring him home almost a week sooner than planned. We need to get some clarification from the director in the next few days on our next trip's timeline.

Once we settled into our hotel room (same hotel as last trip), it was off to our favorite resturant, Stolle (pronounced "Sh-toll-e"). They are known for their "pies." Meat pies, vegetable pies and of course, dessert pies. I branched out this time and ordered a "meat pie," as opposed to my standard Chicken Kiev. I wasn't sure what kind of meat was in it, so I asked. The woman behind the counter said, "Meat. Meat. You know, 'Mooooooo'." Shelly and I could only surmise that she meant beef, so I just went with it. It wasn't half bad. Shelly went with her usual standby, mushroom soup and a greek salad. We both had cheesecake. There was no way we were skipping the cheesecake.

After dinner, we did a little grocery shopping, then back to the hotel to hang it up for the night. The clock in the room says 10:17pm, but our bodies think that it is the middle of the afternoon. It doesn't help that it is still light outside. Looks like it's going to be a restless night.

Until tomorrow...

We finally got the call...

After what seemed like an eternity, we got the call we have been waiting for since last February 2008. That call was a specific timeline that included the date we would bring our son home for good.

Prior to that, we have a few last hurdles to face. The first of which is a court date with a Russian judge. Once we make it through the Russian court system, we will return home to wait out a 10-day recision period. I can only imagine that this will seem more like 10 months, than just shy of two weeks.

Once the 10 day period is up, we hop a flight back to St. Petersburg (yeah, it sounds easy, but it's not) to pick him up.

One would think that you would, at this point, be able to return home and start our new lives together, but you would be wrong! Instead, we spend almost a week in St. Petersburg getting his paperwork finished, then it's off to Moscow via an overnight train trip.

Once in Moscow, we visit the US Embassy for, guess what, more paperwork. This should only take a couple of days, but with the weekend, maybe a total of 4 or 5 days.

Then comes what we have been dreading the most from the start of this process, the plane ride home. Neither of us are really sure what to expect, but we are prepared for a VERY LONG trip home! The combination of us not knowing him well, him not knowing us well, all three of us tired of traveling should make for an intersting flight home. I guess we just need to put it all in perspective that, a) it's only 24 hours, b) it's all worth it in the end!

Next post will be from warm and sunny St. Petersburg! Until then, Пока Пока!