Tom playing with Kara, she loved to go to him for playing, especially if he tossed her in the air, she liked to play rough.
I t was heartwarming for me to see that he too was bonding with Kara, you never know if you can bond with a child not born to you until you are with them and learning about who they are. At that point she was a complete unknown to us, and we were being watched very carefully by staff, so it made us nervous initially. We both decided to pretend they were not there and just play with and hold Kara.
Meghan's behavior was beginning to get , well, BAD. She was dropping to the floor much more, or out in the snow, and she was not happy about us holding someone else, she was always there if one of us held Kara. It was an adjustment for everyone, but I was glad she came with us, I can't imagine bringing Kara home out of the blue, and Meghan wondering who in the world she was.We were both pretty defensive about Meghan's presence in Ukraine, just let anyone say anything negative about her, I was ready and willing to fight like a tiger to protect my daughter if need be
We had tremendous pressure not to bring her with us, it ended with bad feelings between us and those who opposed our plans. Was it easy to have a daughter who had special needs in a country that did not accept said children? Yes and no, no one was outwardly hostile, rude, mean, etc. The ladies at the dining hall treated her like any other child. The orphanage staff was very sweet to Meghan and often gave her apples and cookies, but then they worked with special children daily. We knew that she made Yelena uncomfortable. We rather expected it knowing the culture frowned on our daughter walking about normal folks, so it was not a shock to us.
Kara was clapping, and it came out as a blur, if we click through all 5 pictures quickly, we can see the clap!
The amazing thing about our morning with Kara was the fact that she stayed in Tom's lap, she usually crawled down in a few minutes, but she stayed a while that day.
A proud daddy!
Mom WAS here, you will not see many pictures of me, pretty typical, I take most of them. Kara liked to walk with me.
Kara grabbing my nose again, see her smile? It took weeks to stop her from doing that, and with her grip, it really hurt! Meghan was trying to stop her...She reaches out to me to be hugged but has some issues with people coming too close to her face.
She smiles when you tickle her or play rough with bouncing. She does not smile at us just because. Again, she seems to be confused. She is funny though.
The snow was the deepest it would be that week, and it was deep! We loved it, but not the slipping on ice all the time.
We are not from a snowy world, so all of it fascinated us. We took a lot of pictures of the Ukraine snow!
Meghan getting some snow for a snowball. I was throwing them at Tom to get him to lighten his mood! Not sure it worked for him, but Meghan and I had fun.
You can see how much snow had fallen from the bench behind Tom. Yes, we were all plenty warm, when we took off Meghan's coat and hat, her hair was wet from perspiration, even though there was snow everywhere, it was not that cold during the day. This would be the end of the deep snow and the beginning of a melt.
The orphanage from the road, the toys looked like a lot of fun, I loved how colorful they all were, especially in contrast to the snow and ice.
Walking back to our room, it was almost time for lunch, we all liked lunch in the dining hall, we always had our own pot of soup and of tea. Tom and I drank a lot of tea, I think for me, it was the best tea I ever had. I tried to drink tea once I got home, but it never tasted like the tea in Ukraine.
Aren't the trees beautiful? They were so tall, I could not get a picture of the entire tree. 
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