Hello, Moscow!

Hello, blog readers! We're in Moscow, safe and sound, with a napping girl and Wifi that is working once again. Life is very good :-)

So, yesterday was pretty wild, as Mommy got to experience the joy of packing with Suzannah. There's a reason it took me almost the entire day to pack 3 bags :-) But by 4:00 everything was set, all the bags were packed and zipped and sorted into piles, and we were ready for the the call that is was time to go get her passport. So we waited.

And waited.

And then waited some more.

By 5:00 I was getting frantic. I knew we couldn't leave without that passport, but time was ticking past. All kinds of awful possibilities flooded my brain. (I can be SO creative when it's time to worry!)By 5:15 - after I'd tried to call Vala 4 times and failed to connect with her at any point - I was convinced that something had happened, there was a problem with the passport, we couldn't get it and we would have to miss our flight and all the flights for the next 5 days were booked solid and we would have to unpack everything and stay in Astrakhan forever ....

Then at 5:45, Vala appeared at the door, apologizing profusely. It was a last-minute rush for the passport, so she had brought it with her. All was well. Everything was okay.

WHEW!!!!

We loaded everything into the car for the last time and went to the airport. Suzannah loved watching the bags go through the x-ray machine. She would have stood there for hours if she could. We were early, so there was plenty of time to eat our sandwiches and run around the waiting area 4,297 times. Oh, and flirt with the poor man trying to read his newspaper in peace. All I can say is, he was incredibly patient, and Suzannah has excellent taste :-)

The plane ride ... everything was great until it was time to buckle her in. Then came the tears. And the wails. And the howling. And the squirming, blubbering, overheating, pounding, kicking, and utter heartbreak that only a 3 year old can pull off. I was terrified that she would be like this throughout the flight, but then the flight attendant came aorund with pre-takeoff candy (works for me) and Suzannah was calmed by a cheap fake strawberry . Thank you, God. After that, she did a totally fabulous job. She almost fell asleep a couple of times, though never really gave in. There was too much to see! She had to play peek-a-boo with the man in the seat behind us, and hold hands with the lady across the aisle from us, and raise & lower her tray table about 53 times, and throw goldfish into the air (oops) and simply soak in every little thing she saw and heard.

Then we had to buckle up for landing, and it was heartbreak city all over again.

All of our bags made it with us. Olga met us at the airport and brought us into the city. The drive took about an hour, and guess who stayed awake the whole time? (Hint: it wasn't Mommy.)

We arrived and found the apartment folks waiting as promised. The place is quite nice. It feels like I'm in an old building in Manhattan. We're on the 19th floor, and our windows overlook Arbat street. We have a little entryway that leads to the bathroom, a big main room with my bed, her crib, the TV, and all of the open suitcases, and the kitchen. (Excuse me for a moment while I exult in the joy of having a kitchen once again.) It's probably not much bigger than the hotel room, but it has a lot more character and privacy and location. And it has the most awesome door! I'll try to get pics later, when Suzannah is awake.

Olga and I had to go over some paperwork before she left. This didn't go over well with Little Miss, who was very uncertain about this whole New Place thing (and also tired, hungry, wet, and beyond overwhelmed.) When Olga finally finished & left, Suzannah fell apart. Can't say that I blame her. By this point it was 12:30! I put her into her crib, she rocked herself for about, oh, 45 seconds, and then she was out.

We had to be up fairly early this morning as Olga was picking us up at 8:45 for Suzannah's doctor appointment. I woke up before my alarm went off (dammit!), but it did give me time to have a shower & finish up the paperwork in peace. The Tsarina slept until 8, and probably would have slept longer if I hadn't opened the curtains to wake her. She was in much better spirits than last night. In fact, she was so busy prancing around the apartment that I had a hard time convincing her to sit down and eat breakfast! But she finally did, which was great, because (a) she didn't eat much the night before, (b) I wasn't sure how long our morning errands would last, and (c) I didn't have anything else to give her if she decided to be a diva. We made it downstairs just about 2 minutes before Olga arrived. Perfect.

Our first stop was the medical exam. Our doc was a briskly friendly guy who spoke flawless English. Even though he was obviously very busy he took the time to introduce himself, explain things thoroughly, and play with Suzannah as he examined her. He also said we were going to have a hard time keeping the boys away from her,
and that she had fabulous shoes :-)

She needed a chest x-ray (thanks to a very common false positive reaction to a previous TB test), and she did a GREAT job. She stood up there on the little platfor with not a fear in the world. She did turn away at the crucial moment the first two times, but other than that, it was smooth and easy. (I kept remembering when Josh was 2 and had to have a chest x-ray, and they strapped into this HORRID contraption that kept him blinded and immobile .... thank heaven this was so much more humane.)

The x-ray showed that her lungs were fine, except it seemed she'd had bronchitis in the past few weeks. Good to know! So with medical clearance in hand, we headed off to the consulate to drop off our paperwork.

This wasn't Suzannah's favorite part of the day. There was WAAAAAAAY too much waiting for a tired little girl who wanted to explore all the cool new things. it didn't help that we had to go through the entry procedure twice because Mommy the doofus forgot she had cameras in her bag, and they showed up on the x-ray ....

We paid for the visa and handed in all our paperwork to a lovely clerk who said we had a very wonderful girl. I was amazed that the poor woman had to go through our entire file right then, checking every single sheet of paper. And folks, this was close to a novella-sized manuscript. But she finally came back and said that everything looked fine. HOORAY! Now all that remains is to get through our appointment tomorrow afternoon!

With all our chores out of the way, Olga took us to a grocery store. Oh glory! I never thought I would be so happy to buy chicken and pasta and vegetables. We came home and I cooked my first meal in almost 2 weeks. It was nothing fancy - chicken & onions sauteed in butter, and little pockets that I thought were pierogies but actually tasted like cheese blintzes - but oh, it was so so SOOOOO good. Tonight, I'm going to make chicken noodle soup. What bliss.

Experiment 626 is unfamiliar with kitchens, so we had some challenges keeping her safe while Mommy cooked, In fact, she already managed to reach up and touch a hot pot while I was cooking. But thankfully, it wasn't hot enough to burn, and it did seem to get the message across, as she stayed a healthy distance from the stove for the rest of the time.

By the time we cleaned up from lunch it was seriously nap time. She went down with no problems. I hope she sleeps well today, because tomorrow's appt. is at 2:00 (who thought up THAT timing for little kids???), so we will be nap challenged tomorrow. And on Saturday, of course, we'll be on a plane at that time, wooohooo!

I'll try to get pictures after nap and post them tonight. We will probably go out and explore a bit, too - this looks like a very busy and interesting area.

Later!