Link to new family blog and book...

We are starting a new blog for our family, and to update you on when baby sister is going to arrive. Here's the link: http://www.familyofallstars.blogspot.com/

Also, we have turned this blog into a book! This is for Gavin to have for the rest of his life! We gave copies of the books to the granparents for Christmas. The book is 62 pages long full of all the pictures and text from the beginning of the blog to the end. If you happen to want one, use you may use the link below (we are 'not' making any money on it!). There is a free 15 page preview you can view beforehand as well. On to the family blog!

Bringing Home ...

An Adoption Story:...

By Aaron & Shannon All

Book Preview

Back home safely in the US!

It's a sinking feeling to have your name called over speakers in an airport, let alone in a foreign country. We had just finished eating lunch and were on our way to the gate when Shannon heard our flight had finished boarding, and they were calling our names. Turns out our flight was 20 minutes earlier than we had thought and they seemed to board very early. We were the last people on board, and they closed the doors before we even reached our seats. How embarrassing, but as long as we were on the plane we didn't care. The flight was 11 hours and was as bad as we had heard, and expected. There were tears from both mother and child. Gavin had at least 3 meltdowns, all for different reasons (no nap yet, hungry, bored). It was nice to have the extra seat for him as we had all three in the middle section. We resisted getting up and walking him around on board for our own sanity, since we heard that once they realize they can get up, they never want to sit back down. The other passengers may have paid a price for that though. When we arrived in Atlanta, it took awhile to go through customs/passport control, agriculture control (we had a Russian banana in our bag). The adoption paperwork only took a few minutes. We had to get our luggage and recheck it again. We had a giant sigh of relief as we exited the final security check and we were "free at last" inside the Atlanta airport. We ate at Houlihans to eat & kill some time and then rested at our gate (yes, we were early to the gate this time!). We all three slept on the 1 & 1/2 hour flight to KC, and landed around 9:30pm. We got chills when we landed and were giddy to get off the plane. When we exited the plane we were welcomed with a warm reception from our family & friends. There were welcome home signs, cheers, and tears. My brother had flown in to surprise us too. Gavin was warm, smiling, and playful with everyone who met and held him. We stayed at the airport and talked for over an hour before going home. Both our families came back to the house to see Gavin go into his new home. When we pulled in the drive we saw the outside of the house was decorated with "it's a boy" signs, balloons and a stork in the front yard. The inside of the house was decorated as well, and there were gifts for Gavin. We stayed up talking and laughing until 1:30am. Shane flew in Saturday, and family and friends spent the weekend at our house, eating, and letting Gavin run amuck. It's such a relief to be home. I am on parental leave for this week, and Shannon will be home with Gavin for 10 weeks before going back to work part time. Gary & Shane flew back this morning and Ellen is staying with us until Thursday. She will be a big help allowing us to get settled in and focus on Gavin. Again, thank you all for your thoughts and prayers for our safe return and the start of our family.
Note: We plan on updating providing updates Gavin's progress and will eventually have more updates on his little sister that is on the way (although posts will be a lot less frequent, so get some work done in the meantime!). We may/may not start a new site since this one is for Gavin, but haven't figured all that out yet.

A few videos from the airport:

More pictures from this weekend:

Back in Moscow - End of Day 6 (Headed home)

After breakfast this morning we walked to the Red Square area one last time to get some final pictures and souvenirs. There was a
funny moment where Shannon and I were talking to each other while shopping at a street vendor. A small girl (11 or
so) next to us said "hello!". We said 'hello' back, and her and about 10 of her friends all giggled. We weren't sure what was going on at first, but soon realized they were wanting to practice their English. I asked them where they were from and one of them
said "We are from Russia!". I told them they spoke very good English and they giggled again. We asked them some other simple questions so they could answer, and each time they answered back with excitement...laughing after each answer. They asked about the baby, we snapped a picture (attached) with them and said goodbye. It was colder and cloudy here today, so we didn't get the best picture in front of St Basil's Cathedral because Gavin was cold & restless, but it'll have to do. We warmed up inside of the GUM shopping mall and ate lunch. After Gavin's nap, a driver picked us up at 2:30pm to go to the Russian Consulate. We basically sat in a waiting room for an hour, I went into an office and signed my name once ... and it was over. So, we're finished with paperwork in Russia. Gavin has a Russian passport with an immigration visa to the US. Once we land on US soil in Atlanta he will become a US citizen. We will need to get him a social security # and us passport (optional, but recommended) when we get back in the states. We were starving when we got back to the hotel so we had Pizza Hut delivered. We will be picked up at 10:00am tomorrow morning to leave for the Moscow airport. Our flight leaves at 1:30pm, we land in Atlanta at 5pm, and KC by 9:10pm.
This will be our final post from Russia.

We have had a wonderful time in both Abakan and Moscow and will never forget this experience and have had fun sharing it with all of you. We are so excited to get back home and start our new family in the states and for all of you to meet Gavin. We are 'not' looking forward to the 10 1/2 hour flight, but know it's an necessary obstacle to get back to where we want to be. Shannon has read online that this flight is a "rite of passage" for adoptive parents and has been likened to both to childbirth and wrestling with an alligator for 10 hours. We will have plenty of snacks, toys, walks down the aisles, and if we're lucky...a little sleep. Thanks again for following along with us on our journey to bring home Gavin. Dosvedanya for now!

One last video from today - Gavin gettin his groove on:

Back in Moscow - End of Day 5

Gavin cried in his sleep off/on around 1:30am, and eventually woke up crying at 3:30am. We put him in our bed where he fell asleep and woke again at 5:00am. At that point we just stayed up. After breakfast and the playroom time he took a 2 & 1/2 hour nap until 11:00am. Luda came by the hotel to drop off some papers we need for the Russian Consulate visit tomorrow. It will be our last hurdle. We fed him lunch in the room, and then Shannon and I ate at the hotel restaurant. It was another sunny, beautiful day here. We decided to walk down to Arbat street. Arbat street is a several block area with restaurants, gift shops and where street vendors are selling their tourist stuff. We had eaten at the Hard Rock Cafe here on the first trip to Russia with Mom. We bartered and bought several more souvenirs, probably too many. Gavin could go all day in a stroller. He loves it. He smiles and waves to people, holds his hands out trying to touch street poles as we walk by. People usually look at him and smile back at him. We headed back and stopped by the grocery store and the pharmacy to pick up milk and diapers in order to make it through the rest of the trip (a 34-pack of diapers will last 3 days right?). We headed back to the hotel and have been hanging out in the room letting Gavin play in his drawer of toys. Shannon just got back from a walk in the hall with him and is getting ready to feed him. By the way, I changed my first dirty diaper today...I almost hurled. My job is normally to do the setup (lay down the towel, get the diaper out, hold his hands and feet back) but today Shannon decided I needed to start...and I think it was his messiest one yet. Tomorrow morning we will go back down to the Red Square area to get the obligatory picture with Gavin in front of St Basil's Cathedral (pictured at the top of the blog site) and any other pics we may have missed with him from his first visit. All for now. Tomorrow evening (morning for KC) will likely be our last post because we will be traveling all day Friday.

Back in Moscow - End of Day 4

Gavin slept for almost 10 straight hours last night...going to bed at 8pm, waking up at 6am. We did our normal breakfast routine around 7, then went straight to the playroom for an hour. Today was a beautiful day in Moscow. The sun was shining for the first time this week, it felt like it was in the upper 60's or so. Gavin was in a great mood all day. After the playroom we gave him a bath, and he splashed and played this time. After that, we decided we were going to get outside. We were going to just go to the bookstore and back, but when we realized how nice it was we thought we better take advantage. So, we walked down to where the Red Square, The Kremlin & St Basil's cathedral is. We took some pictures with Gavin in front of various tourist things then decided to go shopping at GUM. GUM is a huge indoor mall near the Red Square that has high-end European stores. Mid way through Gavin had fallen asleep in the stroller for about an hour. Most of the stores were way out of our price range, but we window shopped and found a gift shop to get some souvenir's and we bought a little pink dress for Gavin's sister...and out of desperation for quick food we ate at Sbarro's pizza. We went back to the hotel to meet the driver to go to the US Embassy. We got picked up and hit some heavy traffic, and then we realized we had forgotten the money in the safe in the room. The driver doesn't speak English but we were able to communicate using 'no' and rubbing our fingers together for $$$. He was NOT happy...and we were upset with ourselves. We had plenty of Rubles to cover the cost, but the Embassy needed dollars. Because of the one way streets and heavy traffic it took us 20 minutes to get back to the hotel, even though we had been gone for less than 5 minutes. We ended up only being 10 minutes late and it didn't matter anyway because the Embassy is not busy with adoptions theses days because of the Russian requirement of all the adoption agencies to become re-accredited. The Embassy was uneventful. Basically we went through some security checks, had a 5 minute interview, gave Gavin a US Visa stamped on his Russian passport. They also gave us packet of immigration papers that is to remain sealed until we land in Atlanta. In Atlanta we will have to go through a secondary immigration line to have those papers processed for his citizenship. But, he explained that when the plane lands in Atlanta, Gavin will become a US citizen at that point. We came back and walked immediately to the bookstore to shop. Shannon had been craving a Mcflurry so we walked to dinner at McDonald's. It was very large, had a big screen tv, a McCafe (like a Starbucks) and was packed with people. They didn't speak English but we managed to fumble through the order. We got Gavin a Maloko (Milk). Shannon had him drinking through a straw in seconds. I'm told by Shannon this is no small feat for children his age. We're pretty sure now that he is the smartest boy in Russia, if not the world. He is also imitating the sign for milk. We just got done feeding and playing with him, and just put him down at 7pm. We had a blast playing, cause he is imitating a lot of things and to quote my mom, he is at such a cute stage right now. Awesome, Shannon just walked back in the room and handed me a glass of champagne from the lobby...this place is great. A good way to end the night.


Debbie-my diaper bag is from http://www.zagbag.com/ -my friends Heather and Brooke sell them for a local company in Missouri. Each back is custom made from fabrics you pick out. Get Aunt Janet in the business and she'll make a fortune!

A video for the day, shortly after feeding him dinner:

Back in Moscow - End of Day 3

After our nap, we went walked to get our lunch. Gavin was a little whiny, but not terrible. He just really loves food and cannot wait to eat when he decides he's ready. We walked around outside again for an hour and eventually found a pharmacy to pick up some Baby Panadol (Russian tylenol) for the teething. The main pharmacy chain here is called "36.6", which is body temp in Celsius. At this point we were on the main drag that leads down to the Red Square, the Kremlin, etc. We snapped a photo from a distance, but plan on going all the way there with him on Wednesday. We also got a photo in front of a McDonald's, which Mom requested. Shannon also picked up some banana's from a street vendor. The best part of the day was when we got back to the hotel lobby. We were walking in and a nice lady stopped us and asked if we would like something to drink or eat, they had champagne, juice and hourderves. It looked like some kind of banquet for a local business and we assumed it was for them, but she insisted it was ok. So, we both had a glass of champagne (kidding, Shannon had juice) and then the best part...the lady asked us if we knew there was a children's room in the hotel. We had no idea...she stopped what she was doing and walked us through several turns down the hallways to a small room. Inside was a room dedicated for playing with all kinds of toys, chalkboard, stuffed animals. She said in her Russian accent, "this is good because when you're in the room too long it can become annoying"...we said "YES, it is annoying!". We watched Gavin play for an hour as we (I) sipped champagne. We said to each other that it felt like the room was heaven, and that the lady who brought us there was an Angel. We will use that room many times the rest of the week. Gavin just went down at 8pm, so we may be back on track. We'll see how long he sleeps. All for now, but got a voicemail from Luda that we are getting picked up at 1:15pm tomorrow to go to the US Embassy. Also, we may just start posting once a day in the evenings from here on out.

Back in Moscow - Beginning of Day 3

So far we have had a much better day. Gavin slept from 4 to 10pm last night and then midnight to 5:45am. He had fallen asleep in between us in the bed, and we didn't dare move him. When he woke, he immediately was smiling and was lovey dovey and babbling. So we were off to a good start. We went down to eat breakfast at 6:30am and he did great, but that's not surprising. He is always so good in public and around other people, so that part we haven't had to worry about yet. We're feeling better about it being more of a scheduling thing, although we know he is a toddler and is bound to be whiney at times. To try and answer the question about Russians being protective in cold weather...even before we left for the trip Shannon had read how Russian's how they are very particular about keeping their children dressed very warmly. When at the orphanage in June (temp was in the 80's) Gavin had on tights, with pants and socks, two layers of shirts on...that was for when he was indoors. When he was outside he was in the same clothes, but inside a full blown snow suit w/hood and all...again this was June and in the 80's. They also never go outside without some kind of hat on, no matter what the weather is like. That is why you may have noticed that Gavin had on a funny ball cap (I hope it's a coincidence that it had a bunny on it) in the videos at the orphanage. Anyways, after breakfast we ventured out on an hour walk in the surrounding blocks of the hotel. Gavin fell asleep towards the end. After Gavin's nap (right now) we plan on walking to Coffee Mania for lunch, and then will go for a walk (By the way, this place has a cool interactive website where you start outside the restaurant, and click to enter, etc...all the pictures are of the one we go to - http://coffeemania.ru/eng). We'll, we better go down for our nap too, if we can sleep a little now, we won't feel like crashing later on for the 3rd night in a row. We will post again tonight.

Back in Moscow - End of Day 2 (& Videos)

Luda came to the hotel lobby today to complete the paperwork required for the US Embassy visit, she will drop off the papers tomorrow and get our interview scheduled for Tuesday. Apparently she will not be going with us (maybe b/c it's considered American soil and she would need a visa?), but her driver will pick us up and take us. I guess we will take the papers with us and just do what they tell us. We will take Roman's advice and will definitely take advantage of any food & shopping while we're there. We go to the Russian Consulate on Wednesday, but don't have any details yet on that. There isn't anything scheduled for us on Monday or Thursday-Luda drops off or picks up the papers we need and we don't have to go. We didn't have the greatest of days today. During the Dr's visit, he mentioned Gavin may be teething and that his gums were swollen (not sure how he knew that). We had noticed that Gavin has gradually become fussier and is starting to wake up from naps crying. It is also getting harder to keep him happy & content while awake. We're not sure if it's just teething, the schedule changes, or a combination of both. We're also starting to get cabin fever already. We spent most of the day in the room trying to keep him happy. We would like to take more adventures outside, but the problem is that everyone (from Abakan to Moscow) keeps warning us to keep him inside, keep the air off in the room, keep him bundled when outside, etc. It's in the low 50's and usually drizzling/raining outside so we feel guilty taking him out for too long. And after he woke from his 1 hour nap (shortly after the grocery store trip) he cried for an hour straight. We tried everything we could think of, passing him back and forth to hold him, feeding him, changing diapers, playing, etc. I'm thinking that Ria is right and that it's all about the schedule. Anyway, we will try to better on his schedule tomorrow and hopefully the weather gives us a break to get out for awhile.



Below are some videos we promised!:

The first visit at the orphanage...this is where we learned they had been showing Gavin Victor our picture while we were gone.


On the playground at the orphanage


Shortly after court, in the Abakan hotel room...saying "papa"!


A cute moment imitating Shannon...

Every time he hears something outside, especially a dog, he says Woof, Woof ! (or "ov, ov" - in Russian).

Back in Moscow - Beginning of Day 2

Gavin went back down to bed at midnight, and Shannon and I around 2am this morning. We slept until 5am. We feel pretty good considering though...probably due to 4 hour nap late last evening plus the 3 hours of sleep. It's probably the most sleep (in a short timeframe) that we've had in 9 days. Shannon's Dad donated nearly all of his Marriott points to pay for the hotel stay while in Moscow...we are so thankful(this probably cost them a trip or 2 to Hawaii). One of benefits of the hotel package is the breakfast that is included with the stay...this isn't an ordinary continental breakfast though. It includes tons of pastries, made to order omelette's, pancakes, fresh fruit, yogurt, meats, cheeses, pickled herring, salmon, sausage, bacon, hashbrowns...on and on and on. It's better than any American breakfast we've had and it's called the "American Buffet". The buffet is normally 840 rubles ($33) per person, we will look forward to this every day this week. By the way, we haven't mentioned Gavin's appetite...the boy can eat! The few times when he's not in a good mood is when he is waiting on food. We spent the morning playing in the hotel room, running around the hallways, etc. The Dr came at 9am for the US Embassy examination. He said the purpose of the visit was for immigration purposes...to ensure he doesn't bring any disease into the country. The Dr did his post graduate work in the states at Harvard, USC, & UAB. He is a professor for his full time job here. He said Gavin appears generally healthy, he told us a few things to have our American Dr to look at, but no major concerns. He's just undersized but we think he will catch up. The Dr, like others, commented how calm and happy he seems. We took a walk to the grocery store and bought the foods Oleg recommended to buy. Speaking of...since Abakan we've been feeding Gavin some canned meat that Oleg recommended. Gavin seems to like it ok. It had a picture of animal on the can and we didn't think anything of it, but when Shannon bought some more today she saw differnt animals on the can (same brand). Now look at the picture of the cans starting from the top...Turkey, Cow, Chicken...we have been feeding him the one on the bottom! A quick related story...when Alya was translating what foods the orphanage had been feeding him, she mentioned heart of Goat,and heart of Cow! Good protein I guess. An un-related story...we only packed for one week's worth of clothes...so now Shannon is doing laundry the old fashioned way...in the tub and using the clothesline in the shower (I used to think, "who would use a clothesline in a hotel"? Us I guess.). Gavin is napping now and we are going to also. Luda comes at 2pm to prepare paperwork for the US Embassy tomorrow. We have picked out 7 videos to post, but will have to wait to work on them this evening ( I promise!).

Back in Moscow - End of day 1

[I've obviously lost track of the days...it was Friday yesterday, now it's Saturday evening in Moscow...we are now just 9 hours ahead of KC time.]

We woke up at 5, Gavin was up by 6, and we were picked up by Alya and Oleg by 7:15 to go to the Abakan airport. Our flight was delayed by an hour, so we didn't leave until 10:00 or so. Alya and Oleg helped us get checked in, pay our overweight luggage fee, and hung out with us until it was time to go through security, then we had our goodbyes...we have grown to like Oleg, Alya and Abakan very much. Oleg had tears in his eyes as we started through security. We can only imagine all the time and effort he has put into this entire process behind the scenes. Gavin did great on the plane. He started out whimpering, restless, and even crying a little for the first hour of the flight. But then lunch was served, he had some rice, bread and a banana. After that, he fell asleep for 2 & 1/2 hours across our laps. The only problem was we couldn't move during that time for fear of waking him. Shannon gave him a sucker on takeoff and landing so he had no problem with the ears popping. When we landed, he looked out the window at all the other planes on the jetway, pointing and babbling. Luda was there to greet us and had a huge smile on her face when she saw Gavin, she immediately asked to hold him. She talked to him in Russian and he was definitely paying attention. We got checked in and have a crib in our room. Even though the Abakan hotel was fine, it is so nice to be back in our luxury American hotel...the beds are great too. We made some porridge (Kasha in Russian) and took it down to the hotel restaurant to eat. We had chicken fingers and chili nachos and a beer (for me) as we were craving American food. While Shannon was feeding him porridge, she was able to teach him "more" in sign language, he started using it immediately...we were amazed how quickly he learned it. We came back upstairs and played in the room for an hour or so. But, because we were up at 5am, and today is 4 hours longer because of the timezone change, we were barley able to keep our eyes open. We knew that we should force ourselves to stay up, but it was over and we all 3 slept for 4 hours...waking up at 9pm. Not good, we had to wake Gavin up in order to try and get back on some sort of schedule. So, for the last few hours we have been trying to feed, bathe, play, and put Gavin back to bed. Gavin did not like the bath, he may not have had one in a tub before. Shannon also took him for a stroller ride down the hotel hallways and is trying to put Gavin down again now (almost midnight). Tomorrow, a Dr will come to our hotel room in the morning to look at Gavin. Luda says he speaks English very well and he has studied in the US. I don't think it's a full checkup, but just to fulfill some requirement for the US Embassy stuff. He will only be here 15-20 minutes, but we will ask him as many questions as we can. Then, Luda will come over at 2pm to help us prepare more papers for the US Embassy visit on Mon & Tues. Not sure what else we will do tomorrow, maybe walk to the local grocery store to get some food for the room, milk & water. He has been such a trooper through most everything...from traffic on the streets, to new people, to plane rides. On the hour drive from the airport today he sat quietly, smiling when spoken to, looking out the window...the driver that Luda uses commented to her in Russian that he was surprised he didn't hear the baby. He is just so good natured (even though he is crying right now before going to bed!). We have so many good pictures that we will wait to post videos tomorrow. Just as you are reading and re-reading the posts, we read and re-read all your comments! As soon as we connect to the internet, your comments are the first thing we check...and we laugh and talk about them. Thanks again for everyone's support.

Here are some more pics from today: